Martin Luther and the Arts: Music, Poetry, and Hymns

Author(s):  
Johannes Schilling

From the beginning of the Reformation, Martin Luther had a significant impact on church and society through his contributions to sacred music. His intention to spread the gospel among the people through song achieved its manifold purpose. This remains true not only for his own time but for the following centuries up to the present day, all over the world. Other poets, contemporaries and descendants alike, were inspired by Luther’s songs and composed their own hymns. Among these the most significant ones in German literature, poetically and theologically, are Paul Gerhardt (1607–1676) and Jochen Klepper (1903–1942). Luther’s lifelong love of music was accompanied by an in-depth musical education. He knew secular and sacred songs from an early age, played the lute well, and sang in the convent when he was a monk, as a husband and father with his family, and as a professor with his students. Music was an indispensable part of his life. He first began writing sacred songs in 1523, sometimes composing the melody as well. He also crafted a four-part motet. Luther was able to assess the composers of his time well. He considered Josquin des Prez (d. 1521) the greatest master, and among his living contemporaries he appreciated in particular Ludwig Senfl (c. 1490–1543). He was also acquainted with other composers and their works. The incorporation and promotion of music in the schoolroom resulted in a close relationship between church and school, as well as between classrooms and religious services. Pupils took part through chanting at services, and the evangelical hymns in the chantry were spread through the choir’s chanting books. Numerous musical prints originated in Georg Rhau’s printing shop in Wittenberg that carried the Protestant repertoire into the world. From central Germany, starting in Saxony and Thuringia, the Protestant musical culture covered all of evangelical Germany and later shaped Protestant musical culture. In addition to choir-related music, it cultivated the musical rendering of biblical texts. Heinrich Schütz and Johann Sebastian Bach are the finest representatives of this specific Protestant musical culture. In addition, the culture of the organ, first cultivated in northern Germany, became widespread. One of several masters of the organ was Dieterich Buxtehude (c. 1637–1707), who established evening concerts in Lübeck, which in turn served as precursors to the bourgeois musical culture. Luther’s approach to music is formed through the conviction that music is a particularly beautiful and unique offering of the divine creation. Music moves human hearts and allows them to anticipate the heavens. To bring people joy and to praise the Lord is music’s true task and, indeed, its service.

2009 ◽  
Vol 42 (01) ◽  
pp. 233
Author(s):  
Samuel Taupin

The international cooperation initiative established by the Eisenhower administration (1956–1961), the People to People program, aimed to support American community leaders from different fields—such as the arts, education, sports, religion, health, and the military—in international exchanges to enhance understanding and good will on the part of citizens around the world.


1965 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 152-162 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. E. J. Cowdrey

It is not at first sight easy to explain the ever-growing appeal which Cluny had during the tenth and eleventh centuries for clergy and still more for laymen, particularly in Burgundy, France, Christian Spain and North Italy. The basis of Cluniac life was the choir service of the monks and the silence and ordered round of the cloister. By and large the Cluniacs did not seek to work outside the cloister or to become involved in wider pastoral care. They were, indeed, concerned for the Church and for the world at large, but with a view to winning individuals to share spiritually and to support materially the other-worldly ends of the monastic order. Yet, especially under abbots Odilo and Hugh, there was a rapid rise in the number of houses subject to Cluny or otherwise influenced by it; a Cluniac house formed part of the neighbourhood of a large part of the people who lived to the south and west of Lorraine. Cluny itself was well situated to attract travellers, and its dependencies were especially important on the pilgrimage routes. Together with the increasing number of Cluniac houses the long series of charters which record its endowment with monasteries, churches, lands and other wealth testify to its impact upon Church and Society in western Europe.


1983 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 90-92
Author(s):  
Viggo Mortensen

The Reformation of GrundtvigianismBy Viggo MortensenA review of The Vartov Book 1982, published by Kirkeligt Samfunds Forlag. This yearbook is a forum for all-round discussion and open debate. It does not regard the Bible as an a-historical heaven-sent book, but contains reliably informative articles, amongst others a narrative account by Finn Jacobi of the stories concerning Mary, the mother of Jesus. Two other articles attempt to read Grundtvig in the light of K. E. Løgstrup by drawing their theoretical basis from Løgstrup in order to reform the rigidified grundtvigianism.Løgstrup’s theology, according to Ole Jensen, is a modern grundtvigian theology. The grundtvigianism that was victorious in the last century was in fact victorious unto death, insofar as it forgot the critical barb in Grundtvig’s concept of folkelighed (that which is of the people). But Ole Jensen finds this criticism revitalized in L.gstrup’s posthumous essay collection System and Symbol from 1982. Svend Andersen’s article on the world-picture and the creation idea is also indirectly a criticism of those who allow a natural scientific general view to gain a monopoly on the description and interpretation of reality. He advocates a dialogue between theology and the natural sciences.


Author(s):  
Johannes Zachhuber

The concept of modernity has emerged as a major philosophical, theological, and sociological category of interpretation in the aftermath of the French Revolution. It was meant to embrace fundamental changes to the fabric of Western culture, including the rise of capitalism, liberalism, democracy, and secularity. From its inception, references to Luther and the Reformation have been a frequent element of this kind of theory. The first major theorist of modernity in this sense was arguably Georg Friedrich Wilhelm Hegel, who set the tone of subsequent contributions by aligning modernity with subjectivity. For him, the religious dimension of this development was crucial, and he was explicit in his claim that it was the Reformation that brought the turn to subjectivity in the realm of religion. A side effect of the turn to subjectivity was the alienation of the subject from the world. Modernity is thus deeply ambivalent, and so is Protestantism. Later thinkers developed these insights further, but also criticized the identification of Luther with the origin of modernity, pointing to continuities between his theology and earlier, medieval thought.


125 scholarly articlesThe Oxford Encyclopedia of Martin Luther is a collaboration of the leading scholars in the field of Reformation research and the thought, life, and legacy of influence – for good and for ill – of Martin Luther. In 2017 the world marks 500 years since the beginning of the public work of Luther, whose protest against corrupt practices and the way theology was taught captured Europe’s attention from 1517 onward.Comprising 125 extensive articles, The Oxford Encyclopedia of Martin Luther examines:• the contexts that shaped his social and intellectual world, such as previous theological and institutional developments• the genres in which he worked, including some he essentially created• the theological and ethical writings that make up the lion’s share of his massive intellectual output• the complicated and contested history of his reception across the globe and across a span of disciplinesThis indispensable work seeks both to answer perennial questions as well as to raise new ones. Intentionally forward-looking in approach, The Oxford Encyclopedia of Martin Luther provides a reliable survey to such issues as, for instance, how did Luther understand God? What did he mean by his notion of “vocation?” How did he make use of, but also transform, medieval thought patterns and traditions? How did Luther and the Reformation re-shape Europe and launch modernity? What were his thoughts about Islam and Judaism, and how did the history of the effects of those writings unfold?Scholars from a variety of disciplines – economic history, systematic theology, gender and cultural studies, philosophy, and many more – propose an agenda for examining future research questions prompted by the harvest of decades of intense historical scrutiny and theological inquiry.


Horizons ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 44 (1) ◽  
pp. 137-147
Author(s):  
David M. Whitford

I once quipped in a class that I wondered if the Martin Luther portrayed in some books would even be able to recognize the Martin Luthers of other works. Would Erik Erikson's sexually repressed, rebellious Luther recognize the confident and assertive Luther of the recent popularly aimed biography How a Monk and a Mallet Changed the World? The five-hundredth anniversary of the Reformation seems an apt moment to reflect a bit on the place and significance of Martin Luther in the Reformation and the church. The anniversary year will see at least a half-dozen new biographies, numerous conferences, and nearly ubiquitous commemorations. As we mark this year, what portraits are now being drawn? What conclusions? Is there any hope of synthesis and common representation, or shall we each have our own Luther, few of whom recognize the other? Since the last centennial of the Reformation, scholarship on the Reformation generally and Luther specifically has emerged from the tight quarters of confessionalized history. In 1917, there were no commemorations. Luther was celebrated by Protestants and lamented by Roman Catholics. There was little in the way of neutral ground between those two poles. In 1999, the Lutheran World Federation and the Vatican issued a Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification. In 2016, Pope Francis traveled to Sweden to participate in a joint commemoration of the Reformation with a Lutheran (and female) bishop. Such would have been unthinkable in 1917, or 1817, or 1617. As Luther has been released from the confessionalized walls that held him so long, what image do we see now? In what follows, I would like to reflect on three aspects of the “new” or “newer” Luther that has emerged.


Author(s):  
Yuriy Ivonin

In the History of Germany the role of Martin Luther as the prophet of autocratic State had already been prepared to the First World War. However, it became reality in the 1930-s. The development of territorial states was the main result of the Reformation. Luther’s Institution of the secular power was a part of his theory of two Kingdoms: the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of the Earth. The discussion about the strengthening of the role of the state and its control in all spheres of the society took place in the 1720-s – 1740-s. This situation was connected with the conflict between the princes and estates or commons. Luther was afraid of civil commotions, he was deeply conservative in relation to secular powers and persistently supported the Idea that the people needed to be subordinate to the secular power. Luther’s movement was a decisive step on the way to the formation of the early Modern Times Statehood. Luther’s first activities supported the commons’ self-government or the idea of communalism, but later, especially after the Peasants’ War 1524–1526, he feared the situations when princes and magistrates could not support the Reformation and therefore, he led the concept of the territorial State of the Early Modern Times and he could not become an apologist of the autocratic state.


Author(s):  
Kenneth Austin

This chapter talks about identity as the heart of a fundamental issue associated with the Reformation. It recounts how the Protestants of Geneva and Rouen forced biblical names on children being baptized in order to make a bold and public statement of their intention to distance themselves from Catholicism. It explains how the use of names associated with the New and Old Testament not only embody the Protestants' great enthusiasm for the Bible, but how they also encouraged an identification specifically with the people of Israel. The chapter looks at John Calvin, who was a generation younger than Martin Luther and leader of the two largest movements associated with the Reformation. It compares Calvin and Luther's attitudes towards the Jews, in which Calvin has generally been considered the more sympathetic since he did not write anything that was as substantial and vicious as Luther's text.


Author(s):  
Abdul Rashid

Allah commanded the Prophet Muhammad (ﷺ) to inform the people in the following way: O' my people, do you see whether I am on the (right) reason from my Lord Who provided me with the best subsistence, and I only intend to reform as far as possible, and whatever my capacities are, they are from Allah upon whom I have trust and revert to Him (for guidance and help.) In this verse, the Qur'an has given the words that Hazrat Shoaib (A.S) used for the reformation of his nation. This also makes obvious the fact that the primary objective of the advent of Messengers has been the reformation of society. This great reformatory work was performed from Hazrat Adam (A.S.) up till Hazrat Isa according to the prevalent situation of their times. But after these holy personalities, their followers tampered with their teachings. Subsequently a personality was sent (by Allah) who in the light of the divine teachings pledged to reform not only his own people but the whole world. This holy man was Hazrat Muhammad (ﷺ) who came to this world fourteen hundred and sixty years ago as Mercy for All the Worlds By virtue of his magnanimity, he turned the darkness of the world into light. He reformed the society, uprooting all the evils of the human society, in such a manner that this society, corrupt for centuries, instantly turned into one that became exemplary for future generations. In other words, he, Muhammad (p.b.u.h) reformed the worst society of the world successfully, effectively and in a very short period of time.


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