MacCulloch, Reformation, 106-37

This is a very important section because it tells us about the crucial ideas with which Protestantism originated.

Define: soteriology, primate
Identify: Augustine, Pelagianism, nominalist theology, predestination, Friedrich (=Fredrick) the Wise, Wittenberg, indulgences, Albrecht of Brandenburg, 95 Theses, Diet of Worms, Edict of Worms (1521)

Note that p. 110 bristles with interpretive assertions:
(1) "The medieval western Chruch...was not in terminal decay."
(2) "The old Church was immensely strong, and that strengh could only have been overcome by the explosive power or an idea."
(3) "Social or political history cannot do without theology in understanding the sixteenth century."

1. What does Augustine have to do with the Reformation?

2. Who was Luther?

3. How and why did he develop or discover the concept of justification by faith alone?

4. Why was his new theology controversial? What strategy did Luther's opponents pursue when they attacked his theology?

5. What were his three great Reformation treatises of 1520? Why were they important?

6. Where / from whom did Luther's message find its earliest support?