Posting a notice for such an event on the doors of the church, which was affiliated with the university, was a common practice at the time. Luther composed his theses in Latin and intended them as the basis of a disputation, or scholarly debate, on papal indulgences. Most depictions of Luther posting his theses show a defiant monk swinging his hammer against the church door, but the scene depicted here is probably more accurate: an assistant posts the theses while Luther discusses them with a colleague. When he posted his theses, Luther was a thirty-four-year-old priest and professor of theology at Wittenberg University, a provincial institution that had been founded only fifteen years earlier. Caption titles are linked to catalog record). The following selections of Luther's and other Reformation-era works at the Library of Congress document not only the progress of Luther's thought as the conflict with Rome took shape, but also how printing in Germany blossomed into a mass medium as public interest in the controversy continued to grow. Luther's supporters in Germany's vibrant print industry made many of his works the first "bestsellers" in history and Luther himself among the most famous men in Europe.
As he expanded his critique into other areas of church policy and the conflict with Rome intensified. Thanks to the new technology, his theses soon reached a broad circulation that surprised even Luther. The clash between Luther and the Catholic Church in Rome was also history's first "media event." Johannes Gutenberg's development of the moveable-type printing press about seventy-five years earlier had a profound impact on the spread of Luther's thought. These were the early years of the Protestant Reformation, a turning point in history that would transform not only the Christian faith, but also the politics and society of all of Europe. Within less than four years, the Catholic Church would brand Luther a heretic, and the Holy Roman Empire would condemn him as an outlaw.
On October 31, 1517, Martin Luther posted his Ninety-five Theses against papal indulgences, or the atonement of sins through monetary payment, on the door of the church at Wittenberg, Germany. Note: The items described in this post were displayed in an exhibit of the same title in the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Building of the Library of Congress, October 3, 2017–January 1, 2018. Martin Luther as Priest, Heretic, and Outlaw:
Martin Luther as Priest, Heretic, and Outlaw: The Reformation at 500 (European Reading Room, Library of Congress) The
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