Description

A compelling biography of one of the greatest men of the modern age. Stanford is particularly brilliant on the tensions inside Luther s private and spiritual life. This is a very fine book, written with a flourish. Melvyn Bragg

The 31st of October 2017 marks the 500th anniversary of Martin Luther pinning his 95 Theses – or reform proposals – to the door of his local university church in Wittenberg. Most scholars now agree that the details of this eye-catching gesture are more legend than hammer and nails, but what is certainly true is that on this day (probably in a letter to his local Archbishop in Mainz), the Augustinian Friar and theologian issued an outspokenly blunt challenge to his own Catholic Church to reform itself from within – especially over the sale of indulgences – which ultimately precipitated a huge religious and political upheaval right across Europe and divided mainstream Christianity ever after.