Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 29, 2025
And in this frame of mind he took just now a step, calculated to sharpen all the tongues of slander, but one in which he saw the fulfilment of his calling. Freed from unchristian monastic vows, he entered into the holy state of matrimony ordained by God. We first hear him speaking decidedly on this subject in a letter to Ruhel of May 4.
Luther, on the contrary, was not afraid at this moment to exhort the Archbishop, Cardinal Albert, of whose friendly disposition to himself, his friend Ruhel had recently informed him, to follow the example of his cousin, the Grand Master in Prussia, by converting his bishopric into a temporal princedom, and entering the state of matrimony, and to name, as the chief motive for so doing, the 'hateful and horrible rebellion, wherewith God's wrath had visited the sins of the priesthood.
Amidst all the terrors of the Peasants' War, which had now broken out in all its violence, and in earnest contemplation of a near end possibly threatening himself, he had formed the fixed resolve, as his letter of May 4 to Ruhel shows, to 'take his Kate to wife, in spite of the devil. This is the first letter in which he mentions her name to a friend.
Besides writing to the Cardinal Albert himself, recommending him to marry, he sent a letter also on June 3 to his friend Ruhel, who held office as one of his advisers, saying, 'If my marrying might serve in any way to strengthen his Grace to do the same, I should be very willing to set his Grace the example; for I have a mind, before leaving this world, to enter the married state, to which I believe God has called me. He had thoughts of this kind, he added, even if it should end only in a betrothal, and not an actual marriage.
Quite in the same spirit that dictated his letter sent to Ruhel only a few days before at Mansfeld, Luther now sent forth a public summons 'Against the murderous and plundering bands of peasants. He began it with the words already quoted, 'Before I could look about me, forth they rush ... and rage like mad dogs. Thus he wrote when he saw the danger was at its highest.
Here he wrote to his friend, the councillor Ruhel of Mansfeld, advising him not to persuade Count Albert to be 'lenient in this affair' that is, against the insurgents; for the civil power must assert its rights and duties, however God might rule the issue. 'Be firm, he entreats Ruhel, 'that his Grace may go boldly on his way.
Symptoms of a physical disorder, the stone, had appeared, however, even then, and in after years became extremely painful and dangerous. On June 7, 1526, as he announced to his friend Ruhel, his 'dear Kate brought him, by the great mercy of God, a little Hans Luther, her firstborn.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking