And should the peasants prevail (which God forbid!),... yet surely they who are found, sword in hand, shall perish in the wreck with clear consciences, leaving to the devil the kingdom of this world and receiving instead the eternal kingdom. For we are come upon such strange times that a prince may more easily win heaven by the shedding of blood than others by prayers.
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"I am not mad, but I am a prophet."
"Eating is a serious business. You must eat with delight and not as if you were doing penance."
"The devil is God’s devil."
"God created the world out of nothing, and so long as we are nothing, he can make something out of us."
"When I am assailed by temptation, I find it good to eat, drink, and be merry, so that I may not be alone with the devil."
German theologian whose 95 Theses (1517) launched the Protestant Reformation and broke the Catholic Church's monopoly on Western Christianity. Closely associated with Philipp Melanchthon (Lutheran systematizer) and John Calvin (later Reformer who built on Luther's break). For an intellectual contrast, see Pope Leo X, Renaissance pope (1513-1521) — Leo X's indulgence sales triggered Luther's break and Leo excommunicated him in 1521 — Luther's entire Reformation is structured as a direct answer to the indulgence-funded Vatican Leo represented.
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Luther tells rulers that if peasant rebels win, those who died fighting them die with clean consciences, trading earthly defeat for heavenly reward. He argues these times are so extreme that a prince can secure salvation faster by killing rebels than ordinary people can by praying. Violent suppression of revolt becomes, paradoxically, a shortcut to God's kingdom.
Luther wrote this in 1525's 'Against the Murderous, Thieving Hordes of Peasants,' urging German princes to crush the Peasants' War. Though he launched the Reformation by defying authority in 1517, he fiercely defended secular rulers against social revolt. He believed earthly government was divinely ordained to wield the sword, separating spiritual freedom from political order—a distinction that shaped Lutheran political theology for centuries.
The 1524-1525 German Peasants' War saw roughly 300,000 peasants revolt against feudal lords, partly inspired by Reformation rhetoric about Christian freedom. Around 100,000 were slaughtered. Luther, needing princely protection for his reform movement, sided decisively with the nobility. The early modern era blurred religious and political authority, and Luther's pamphlet helped cement the alliance between Protestantism and territorial princes that defined post-Reformation Germany.
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