Andy Naselli

Thoughts on Theology

Martin Luther

Katie Luther: A Biographical Sketch by Jenni Naselli

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My wife gave a delightful 27-minute biographical sketch of Martin Luther’s wife, Katie, at the Godward Life Conference a month ago:

This was part of a session titled “Womanhood: Lost and Found.”

20 Resources on the Protestant Reformation

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2017 is the 500th anniversary of an event that strangely ignited the Protestant Reformation.

If you want to learn more about the Protestant Reformation, consider these helpful resources. I combed through about 800 relevant resources in my Zotero library and selected only twenty—including some picture books and videos.

1. Bainton, Roland H. Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther.

New York: Abingdon-Cokesbury, 1950.

After hearing so many historians recommend this biography as a classic, I finally read it last year. It’s still in print for good reasons.

[Read more…] about 20 Resources on the Protestant Reformation

A New Documentary on Martin Luther

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Last night my wife and I watched a screener of the new 90-minute documentary Luther: The Life and Legacy of the German Reformer.

It’s excellent:

  • It interviews reliable guides throughout the film, especially Carl Trueman, Steve Nichols, R. C. Sproul, and Bob Kolb.
  • It’s both sympathetic and critical. It responsibly surveys the life and times of Luther. Some of Luther’s writings make us cheer. Others make us wince. The film helpfully explains why.

Here are two previews:

The Barber Who Wanted to Pray

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Our three-year-old daughter enjoyed this new book after it arrived in the mail yesterday:

R. C. Sproul. The Barber Who Wanted to Pray. Paintings by T. Lively Fluharty. Wheaton: Crossway, 2011. 33 pp.

It’s about Martin Luther teaching his barber, Master Peter, a simple way to pray.

You can read the whole book online here (“Preview the Book”).

Related: See Carl Trueman, “A Lesson from Peter the Barber,” Themelios 34 (2009): 3–5. Trueman’s article ends with this footnote (numbering added):

Martin Luther’s treatise on prayer can be found in the following works:

  1. Martin Luther, “To Peter Beskendorf,” in Luther: Letters of Spiritual Council (ed. and trans. Theodore G. Tappert; Philadelphia: Westminster, 1955), 124–30;
  2. idem, “A Simple Way to Pray,” in Luther’s Works (ed. Jaroslav Jan Pelikan, Hilton C. Oswald, and Helmut T. Lehmann; trans. Carl J. Schindler; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1968), 43:187–209;
  3. idem, “Luther the Confessional Theologian: A Practical Way to Pray (1535),” in Martin Luther’s Basic Theological Writings (ed. William R. Russell and Timothy F. Lull; 2nd ed.; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2005), 12–17.

Luther: The Graphic Novel

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I recently read all 144 pages of this graphic novel to my three-year-old daughter, and she loved it (even though some of it is over her head):

Susan K. Leigh. Luther: The Graphic Novel; Echoes of the Hammer. Illustrated by Dave Hill. St. Louis: Concordia, 2011.

This 32-page sample PDF illustrates the book’s format and style.

The story has five parts:

  1. Luther’s Early Years
  2. Luther the Heretic
  3. Luther the Outlaw
  4. Martin and Katie
  5. The Reformation Continues

It’s published by Concordia Publishing House, the publisher of The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod, so I’m guessing they know something about Luther.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5OtMaoHk-Q&feature=player_embedded

Related: My wife and I reviewed this book in 2008:

Paul L. Maier. Martin Luther: A Man Who Changed the World. Illustrated by Greg Copeland. Saint Louis: Concordia, 2004. 32 pp.

Reeves Recommends Reformation Reading

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The “Further reading” section of Michael Reeves’s The Unquenchable Flame: Introducing the Reformation (Nottingham, England: IVP, 2009) flags six resources as “must reads” (pp. 189–91, numbering added):

1. Every Christian should read Roland Bainton’s classic biography of Luther, Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther (Abingdon, 1950). A rip-roaring bedtime page-turner.

2. And why not try reading some of Luther himself? You can find his great The Freedom of a Christian online . . . .

3. Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion is a must. The title makes it sound scary; inside, it is easy to read and warm in style. If you can, get F. L. Battles’ two-volume translation of the 1559 edition (Westminster Press, 1960). [Read more…] about Reeves Recommends Reformation Reading