This presentation explores how Martin Luther’s theological teachings on both medical and miraculous healings can serve as a resource for addressing contemporary challenges in global public health. Drawing on my recent book, The Reformations of Medicine: Early Modern Beginnings and Contemporary Possibilities, it demonstrates ways in which Luther’s thought offers a framework for renewed engagement between religion and medical science.

This paper traces the cultural-historical development of Danish trust culture, focusing on the influence of Lutheran social imaginaries. Following the Reformation in 1536, Denmark-Norway became a mono-confessional Lutheran state in which national and religious identities converged. I examine how trust shaped this identity through key Lutheran ideas: Obedience to secular authority, the priesthood of all believers, and the individual’s authorisation before God. I explore how these imaginaries both supported and challenged the emergence of democratic trust culture during the 19th-century transition from absolutism to democracy, as paternalistic trust gave way to the citizen as a new locus of trustworthy authority.

Studies of early Protestant poor relief have clarified the institutional reform of charity, but less attention has been paid to how biblical texts were reread to sustain those institutions under financial pressure. This paper draws primarily on Bugenhagen's Braunschweig Church Order (1528) and Luther's Large Catechism (1529) to show how Prov. 19:17 received an evangelical interpretation. A verse long associated with self-interested, meritorious almsgiving was reread as a description of the Christian who, trusting in God's prior promissio of salvation, contributes to the common chest for the neighbor with a cheerful conscience, freely and gladly.

In the Psalms people cry out to God for help. Luther’s comments on The Seven Penitential Psalms can be helpful as a first step in reaching out to God. The second step is the encounter between the human being and the hidden God. Luther’s theologia crucis explains this meeting, where God is revealed at the Cross. The third step is to receive hope from the promise of God.

Vorgestellt wird ein Editionsprojekt der Sächsischen Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Leipzig, welches das kirchenpolitische Handeln der sächsischen Kurfürsten zwischen 1513 und 1532 dokumentiert – jener Landesherren also, unter deren Regierung die von Martin Luther und Wittenberg ausgehende Reformation begann, sich ausbreitete und schließlich obrigkeitlich durchgesetzt wurde. Die Edition ermöglicht damit eine umfassende Analyse der Kommunikations- und Entscheidungsprozesse sowie der innersächsischen, reichsweiten und europäischen Dynamiken, welche die Kirchenpolitik der ernestinischen Fürsten bestimmten. Der Beitrag gibt Einblicke in die editorischen Grundsätze und Arbeitsweisen des Projekts sowie in die in bisher drei Bänden sowie in digitaler Form publizierten Projektergebnisse.

Im DFG-Projekt 563650280 „Erschließung und Teildigitalisierung von Kirchenbibliotheken in Sachsen-Anhalt“ (Laufzeit: 1.7.2026 –30.6.2029) werden durch Archiv und Bibliothek der Evangelischen Kirche in Mitteldeutschland und die Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin gemeinsam 17 ausgewählte Kirchenbibliotheken katalogisiert und Provenienzen erforscht. Bisher nicht online verfügbare sowie reich annotierte Werke werden digitalisiert. Eine der Sammlungen ist die Kirchenbibliothek St. Andreas in Eisleben. Sie enthält Reformationsdrucke mit Provenienz- und Lesespuren ihres Gründers Caspar Güttel und anderer Reformatoren. In meinem Vortrag werde ich an ihrem Beispiel zeigen, wie die bibliothekarische Verzeichnung und elektronische Bereitstellung von Reformationsdrucken sowie die Digitalisierung handschriftlicher Provenienz- und Lesespuren die Reformationsgeschichte voranbringen kann.

Der Römerbrief – für Luther das „rechte Hauptstück des Neuen Testaments“ – ist für die reformatorische Theologie von besonderer Bedeutung. Die Breite seiner Auslegung soll mit diesem Dissertationsprojekt für die Wittenberger Reformation (bis 1580) erforscht werden. Dabei interessieren vor allem die exegetische Methodik sowie die jeweilige Perspektive auf den Römerbrief als Ganzen. Ausgangspunkt dafür sind Römerbriefkommentare, deren Aufbau und Vorgehensweise analysiert werden. Neben Luthers Römerbriefvorlesung und -vorrede kommt zunächst das monumentale exegetische Werk Melanchthons zum Römerbrief in den Blick. Aber auch weniger bekannte Arbeiten, wie Andreas Knopkens Auslegung von 1524 oder Cyriacus Spangenbergs in Predigten abgefasster Kommentar von 1566/69, finden eigenständige Beachtung.

Vorgestellt wird ein Projekt, das erstmals alle bekannten und archivalisch zerstreuten ca. 900 Briefe Karl Holls (1866–1926) chronologisch erfasst und historisch-kritisch ediert. Das hybride Editionsvorhaben soll sich mit der Einrichtung eines Holl-Portals verbinden, das lebens- und werkgeschichtliche Orientierungen ermöglicht und über den Briefwechsel hinausgehende Dokumente im Digitalisat verfügbar macht. 

Karl Holl soll mit der Edition als Pionier der Lutherrenaissance und als national wie international vernetzter Theologe des 19. und 20. Jahrhunderts weiter erforschbar werden, dessen Wirkungs- und Rezeptionsgeschichte bis heute reicht. Ansätze und Tools aus den Historischen Netzwerkstudien ermöglichen qualitative Auswertungen, die Schlüsselpersonen, Netzwerkcluster oder Leerstellen aufdecken können.

It is often considered that approaching ethics and the Christian life through the notion of virtue does not fit particularly well within the Lutheran tradition. However, Lutherans in the Reformation and post-Reformation eras produced a substantial body of ethical writings in which talk about the virtues is far from a side issue. Within this tradition, Johann Gerhard’s Schola pietatis (1622–23) presents an extended exposition of the Decalogue largely organized around the virtues. Studying this text offers interesting insights into post-Reformation Lutheran virtue thinking.

In my short presentation, I will analyze the first Lutheran Church Order, written in different steps during more than thirty years by Laurentius Petri, a student of Luther and Melancthon. This text was formally accepted 1571 and the Diet of Uppsala 1593 gave it a confessional status in East Scandinavian Lutheranism.

I will analyze the actual prayers in the Church order and focus on how some main theological topics in the Large and Small Catechism are transformed into a Nordic context by the first Lutheran Archbishop of Uppsala.

Published in 1529, Martin Luther’s catechisms support environmental stewardship today. Luther’s approach to the Ten Commandments provides a “law and gospel” lens for acknowledging ecological harm and living out faith in God through service to others, including environmental systems. His explanation to the first article of the Apostles Creed affirms the goodness of creation and the use of scientific thinking as a God-given tool. The “daily bread” petition of the Lord’s Prayer is a locus for Luther’s political theology, in which people participate in social systems that exist to provide food and safety to all in the community. Through these and other observations, this presentation shows how Luther’s catechisms are good resources for contemporary efforts to care for creation.

Luther’s Notes on Ecclesiastes (published in 1532; lectures in 1526) is a rich source for the study of the inner life of the human being. The issues that Luther addresses and the responses he gives sound strikingly familiar: human beings suffer due to their constant worry about the future and success, they feel anxious because life is full of uncertainties, and they work hard to make their lives better. All the while, they forget to live in the present, and most importantly, forget to trust their lives to the hand of God. This presentation discusses the existing scholarship on the Notes and proposes a fresh line of inquiry.

Luther research is also conducted in the Lutheran churches. Especially in Lutheran churches theology is the blood in the church body. Therefor the global communion of Lutheran Churches in The Lutheran World Federation (LWF), has since its inception in 1947 been engaged in Luther research through the Department for Theology and Studies (DTS). Between the LWF assemblies in Curitiba (1990) and Hongkong (1997) the emphasis was on the relationship between justification and justice as it plays itself out in relation to social ethical issues concerning land reform, bioethics and peace ethics. How can a specific Lutheran viewpoint be sustained in a more and more diverse ecumenical setting?

This short paper examines Martin Luther's understanding of ideal masculinity in primary sources from the 1520s. First, the paper offers a glimpse of Luther's biblical commentaries and their prefaces, which can be considered as Fürstenspiegel, and their portrayal of his teaching on ideal masculine attributes and deeds dedicated to Lutheran rulers. Second, the paper analyzes Luther’s polemical responses to the violence of the Peasants' War and his strict instructions to princes on how to extinguish the revolts. The paper argues that Luther taught a model of virtuous leadership, ideally combining both masculine and feminine attributes, with preparedness to wield hegemonic power to govern and protect.

As Lutheran denominations in the North Atlantic (Canada/US and western Europe) face decline, local and regional leaders are reflecting critically on what it means to be “church,” and adjusting institutional models to better reflect 21st-century post-Christendom realities. These practical shifts call for an ecclesiological renewal of what Lutheran ministerial leadership means: enacting the entirety of the gospel “to comfort [lat. console] and encourage our consciences as long as we live” in the community called together by the Holy Spirit through preaching, teaching, administering the sacraments, and any proper work of the Word of God (SA III, 10.2; SA III, 12.3; LC, Creed, 53-55). What might this look like today? This short paper explores Luther’s theology and practice of ministry through five praxical (integrative) Ps: praying/presiding, preaching, pastoral caregiving, pedagogical teaching, and prophetic witnessing. While acknowledging contextual differences and rejecting repristination, this paper identifies kernels in Luther’s thought that can grow into an understanding of ministry for today.

This presentation covers several different methods and epistemological approaches to Luther scholarship within the global field of Luther studies. Without claiming the authority of a single, particular approach, the presentation will encourage us to understand the various methods in the field today. It also questions which insights we miss when we seek to categorize Luther’s theology into neat categories and methods. In particular, this examines feminist and intersectional epistemologies in relation to other current methods in Luther scholarship.

In this presentation I correlate themes drawn from qualitative research done by Martin Luther University College in response to Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Calls to Action directed at theological schools (regarding the treatment of Indigenous children in church run residential schools) with the motifs from Luther’s theology, including his robust theology of creation, doctrine of vocation, understanding of the common priesthood, and sacramental theology.  I propose a doxological pedagogy marked by embodied and subject-centred learning guided by pedagogues identifying as learner-teachers.

Many LGBTQIA+ Christians struggle to integrate their embodied and relational experiences into their faith. Heteronormative theology has claimed that God is not found in embodied experiences. Martin Luther taught that God is chiefly known in God’s Word, the Sacraments, and on the cross. Currently, LGBTQIA+ Christians are queering claims regarding knowledge of God and asserting that God is encountered in embodied and relational queer experiences. There are references in Luther’s works where he also contends that God is present in embodied experiences. Finally, the resonances that exist between queer knowledge of God and Luther’s ways of knowing God are explored.

As is well known, Luther and Melanchthon took different paths in the great 16th-century debate over the (lack of) freedom of the will. Especially in his later years, Melanchthon moved closer to the position of Erasmus of Rotterdam. This article explores the question of whether this difference might (also) be rooted in a shift in pneumatology. How is the efficacy of the Spirit of God in human beings specifically defined in each case—by Luther and by Melanchthon?

Scholarly attention has long focused on theological divergence between Luther and Melanchthon, while their collaboration within the Wittenberg milieu has received less systematic analysis. This paper presents a series of case studies in which Melanchthon’s theological reflection appears to have provided conceptual or methodological stimulus for Luther’s own theological articulation during the period 1521–1546. It thus gives attention to these moments of close theological interaction and shared conceptual development, suggesting that greater attention to theological collaboration may yield a more nuanced understanding of early Wittenberg theology.

In the short presentation I will offer a contextual close reading of Philip Melanchthon's presentation of emotions in the psychological treatise Commentarius de anima (1540). A comprehensive understanding of Melanchthon's view of emotions would need a thorough examination of psychological texts prevalent during his time. Among them, I will focus on reading his text in relationship to his immediate textual and intellectual context. These include works of late medieval Aristotelian, Jodocus Trutfetter of Eisenach, and two humanists, Johannes Bernhardi and Juan Luis Vives. All three were contemporaries of Melanchthon and he was familiar with their psychological writings.

Scholars have described and analyzed the influence and contributions of Humanist scholarship in the Reformation. Yet seldom today is Martin Luther identified as a Humanist. My paper will argue 1) that Luther identified with the Humanist movement from early in his career; and 2) that Luther’s German vernacular writings were the most important vehicle for his Humanist scholarship and reform work. Luther’s Prefaces in his 1522 German New Testament are examples of a distinct form of biblical humanism, revealing how Luther put Humanist principles to work for the improvement of Christian life especially among the German people.

This short presentation considers a selection of Luther’s sermons based on the New Testament antilegomena books. The question is not historical-canonical: did Luther believe this or that book is Bible? Instead, this paper will examine how and to what extent these historically disputed books of the New Testament shaped Luther’s theology and his pastoral care from the pulpit.

As the first work Luther published, the mystical text from the late 1300s, Theologia Germanica, offers an obvious starting point for gaining a deeper understanding of Luther’s relationship to mysticism. However, the text’s focus on Jesus as the prototype of the transformation that must take place within a human being makes it difficult to understand why Luther was so fond of this work. To better understand this—and Luther’s relationship with mysticism in general—it is worth reading Luther’s writings from the period around his publications of Theologia Germanica, i.e.  1518-20, in the light of this work.

The commentary currently in progress is based on a comprehensive examination of the medieval background of Luther’s Ninety-five Theses, draws on Luther's interpretation of the Penitential Psalms, analyzes both the modifications of Luther's position as the conflict began as well as the arguments put forward by his opponents.  This allows for a tentative reconstruction of the intended disputation. The presentation at the Congress uses the Augsburg Treatises by Cardinal Cajetan as an example to identify a possible Catholic argumentative strategy. It analyzes the different theological premises in the controversy as well as the conclusions drawn from them step by step.

TBA

In 1926, Bonhoeffer submitted an assignment about Luther’s view of the Holy Spirit in his 1535-1545 disputations. Luther’s relational ontology seeks to clarify how the human being can be transformed from ‘an old sinner’ into a ‘new creation.’ Luther underlines the affective character of the movements in which we are moved beyond ourselves, calling our listening (auditus) a passion, while the late Bonhoeffer, in his resistance to Hitler, coined the phrase that we must listen with God’s ears (mit den Ohren Gottes hören). Who is the subject of agency in this process, and how does divine-human interaction work in prayer?

While Luther’s language is marked by the art of distinctions, these are not a reflection of an ontological dualism, but the addressing of the dual, traumatized situation of human existence facing two types of symbolic/informational environments –one signified by the outcome of an evolutionary process that has as its preferred perspectival view the ego(s)and its socially-regulated inscription (Law, Big Other), and another that emerges as a different ‘virtual’ perspective which is in contention with both the personal ego and the social super-ego (Christ, faith, Promise).  Post-structuralism, psychology, and the mind sciences offer critical heuristic tools to appreciate Luther’s perspectives and to understand the gap that transverses the subject and their struggle to fill the void (idols).

While the changes were gradual in most places, Protestant theological shifts influenced views of medicine. Rather than saints as supportive intercessors, the emphasis fell to the natural world and its medical remedies, so that medicine became a manifestation of God’s providence. In their rejection of superstition and saintly intercession, Protestant reformers promoted direct prayers to God and natural medicines of the divinely created world. As a vehicle for God’s healing, Martin Luther saw natural medicine as a means of divine revelation and healing power. Philip Melanchthon included medical knowledge in the university curriculum and various church ordinances gave greater recognition to the role of city physicians.

TBA

Drawing on analytical accounts of the promise, this presentation will look into Luther’s account of the gospel as promise, asking, first, what must be ontologically true of the divine Promisor for the promise to be believed, as well as how a promise believed structures the subjectivity of its recipient.  Though Luther offers no unified or analytically precise account of the promise, his perspective not only supports but also contributes to the findings of analytical philosophy. Given that the promise has ontological implications, the presentation will briefly outline the implications of this fact for Luther’s concept of righteousness.

As a result of our sinful nature, there can be no unmediated relationship between God and humanity, for God must wear a mask in all of his dealings with us.  Moreover, our human nature cannot recognize God, nor comprehend his nature, without a covering.  Therefore God, in his grace and mercy, envelops himself in his word and works and reveals himself in certain forms.

Accordingly, it is the responsibility of humanity to apprehend God where and how he has chosen to reveal himself – through the will of his good pleasure and the will of the sign – so that every person might find and worship the true God, experience salvation and receive eternal life.

TBA

TBA

Struck in the white-hot heat of the Reformation, the Augsburg Confession has sounded distinctive Lutheran notes for nearly half a millennium. For most of those five centuries, it has been interpreted by northern and western scholars. Today, Lutheran churches are growing in the global south—preaching, teaching, and confessing the faith in contexts far removed from 1530 Augsburg and the halls of first-world churches and academies. This paper will explore how we might listen to the Augsburg Confession in new ways—interpreting how it plays on an international scale and amplifying the confessional resonances of Lutheranism around the globe.

The presentation addresses the challenge of overcoming harmful dualism by advancing a holistic turn in trinitarian theology. It brings patristic insights – especially Augustine’s – into dialogue with Luther’s and Bonhoeffer’s contributions to trinitarian ontology. The central claim is that Augustine’s legacy can support an ecumenical, participatory trinitarian understanding that bridges Western relational–substantial approaches and the Eastern emphasis on the Father’s personal primacy. By engaging these traditions together, and through Luther’s and Bonhoeffer’s development of Augustine’s thought, the article argues that a trinitarian view of communion as a dialectic of person and community in love can transcend both individualism and collectivism, offering a foundation for holistic ecumenical theology today.

In some of Luther’s formulations of the happy exchange (fröhlicher Wechsel) it is clear that the justi-fying exchange between Christ and the sinner also has the character of identification. The question is: Within the framework of a contemporary reconstruction of Luther’s metaphor - what kind of identifi-cation or identity are we talking about? My tentative suggestion is that we could use literary identifica-tion as an analogy. As part of my argument, I will use ideas in K.E. Løgstrup’s philosophy of fiction.

In this talk, Dost will explore the major tenets of Renaissance humanism as expressed in the work of Paul O. Kristeller, as they relate to the changing priorities of Reformation Science. Especially prominent among these attributes will be the ad fontes approach, which in this case led back to a reexamination of the direct evidence.  Furthermore, the prioritization of Plato over Aristotle among Renaissance humanists was reflected in maintaining the dialectic of Aristotle and his priority for finding evidence by observation, combined with a general discarding of the content of Aristotelian science in favor of a more virtuous expression from a combination of geometric modeling and neoplatonic assumptions about the universe. If there is time, we will examine a concrete example or two.

The authority of Scripture is without question a hallmark of the Protestant Reformation. But a few issues confront the scholar looking to document the origin of the phrase and its use in the sixteenth century. Perhaps the most pressing fact is that the phrase itself is seldom used, though biblical authority is correctly implied. Moreover, while the authority of Scripture is paramount, the various parties understood and framed that authority in different ways. This short presentation seeks to lay out some of the challenges and articulate some common rules for a Reformation understanding of sola Scriptura.

Luther’s necessity of immutability (or events) arises from his thoughts about the immutable-mutable encounter in time and history. At its worst, this phrase suggests a coercive necessitation that threatens the independence of the human subject. Instead, this presentation suggests that the phrase does not threaten human independence from God, but maintains the differing experiences of time and history between the person (mutable and finite) and God (immutable and eternal). This presentation will analyze both Luther’s conception of temporal experience and divine interaction alongside his analysis of biblical narratives in DSA.

This presentation outlines the findings of my dissertation, a study of the reception of Aristotle’s ethics at Wittenberg, Helmstedt, and Jena from the time of the Reformation to the end of the Thirty Years’ War. Contrary to the meta-narrative associated with Alasdair MacIntyre, I argue that the Reformation did not mark a “beginning of the end” for the virtues, but instead gave rise to a robust Aristotelianism that shaped the teaching of ethics profoundly for close to two hundred years. I survey Luther’s position, Melanchthon’s reforms, and subsequent developments and controversies at the three universities mentioned.

My research makes a new and contemporary approach to Luther´s concept of Law. In this approach, Law in Luther´s theology is not only a counterpart of the Gospel but something good and life-giving. My current work focuses on Luther´s commentary on Genesis, where Luther sees that Law was already instituted in paradise. Law was originally good but because of sin, it became a source of curse. In Christ´s work, also Law is redempted to its original state. This new approach to Law gives also some new views to traditional discussions about Antinomism and Third Use of the Law.

In recent times, a number of systematic and philosophical theologians have sought to rehabilitate what is called “classical theism”. Central to classical theism is, for instance, divine impassibility, immutability, simplicity, atemporality, omnipresence, and omnipotence. This is contrasted with attempts to modify or reject all or parts of the basic claims of classical theism. Modern theologians have sometimes assumed that Martin Luther rejected or at least destabilized such a notion of God. In this paper, I will consider what it would take to determine Luther’s relation to a putatively classical notion of God.

From sin, ‘bending’ every being ‘coram Deo’ into a being ‘coram hominibus’ – just as, following Kant, alleged metaphysical knowledge turns the noumenon into my phenomenon – through the justification of man, ‘simul peccator et iustus’ – just as the moral law reveals both my guiltiness and my freedom – to righteousness, the faith that everything is God’s work ‘pro me’ – to the ‘moral faith’ in the Supreme Good, and the ‘critical’ finalism of reason and of all things towards it. Though, in Kant’s ‘Religion’, ‘reflecting faith’ reflects on radical evil and the necessity of grace according to Luther’s spirit, eventually reaching 'the limits of mere reason’.

Model theory, a branch of mathematical logic concerned with the interpretation of formal syntax, has been applied widely in mathematics and the sciences but not yet to theology. Yet theology, like physics, begins with historically conditioned language whose meaning must be discerned. Since language qua language cannot intend, Luther's texts should first be approached formally, as syntactic objects awaiting interpretation. Meaning enters only when a model is supplied: a domain, extensions for predicates, relations over individuals. Forensic, participatory, performative, and Christological readings presuppose non-isomorphic models, each "satisfying" the language differently. Model-theoretic analysis locates where these structures diverge, and why interpreters talk past one another. 

This short presentation explores Luther’s distinction between necessitas consequentiae and necessitas consequentis in rule-based AI system “Isabelle/HOL,” an automated reasoning environment for rigorous logical/mathematical reasoning. Using varying-domain semantics, the paper analyzes the de re/de dicto distinction, rigidity, and the formal status of God as a rigid designator defined through necessary essence. The study shows both the strength and the limits of Luther’s position: it isolates the precise assumptions under which Luther’s claims about divine will and necessity are valid, and it shows that stronger forms of necessity collapse do not follow without further assumptions. Formalization thus clarifies the theological meaning and coherence of Luther’s account of necessity.

Als Quelle für die Kabbala-Rezeption der Täufertheologen Augustin Bader (ca. 1495-1530) und Oswald Leber (ca. 1485–1530) stelle ich (Übersetzung aus dem Hebräischen) Auszüge aus Texten des Jerusalemer Kabbalisten Abraham ben Elieser ha-Levi (ca. 1460–1528) vor: aus seinen Briefen (dort deutet er das „Ereignis Luther“ aus jüdischer Perspektive) und aus seinem Danielkommentar (von Leber und Bader wahrscheinlich rezipiert). Hinzu kommen Texte aus Reuchlins kabbalistischer Hauptschrift „De Arte Cabalistica“ (1517), die für die kabbalistische Erkenntnistheorie, die Gotteslehre und die Lehre vom Kommen des Messias von Bedeutung sind.

Most scholars are aware of how unsystematic Luther’s theology seems to be, how most disagreements in Luther scholarship have roots in the different positions he takes. Based on Luther’s admission that different contexts mandate different theological affirmations, I will point out how the Quantum Physics concept of Complementarity might justify and even commend this rich diversity. Just as an electron is both particle and wave, depending on your research question, so appreciating the different pastoral concerns Luther addressed accounts for his distinct views on the role of the Spirit in human activity and whether to depict justification with the forensic model or as the Finnish model does.

Die biblische Botschaft von der Rechtfertigung bedarf einer begründenden Theorie, um verständlich und dann auch glaubwürdig zu sein. Der Rechtfertigungslehre der westlichen Kirche liegt eine Theorie der Gerechtigkeit zugrunde, nach der Rechtfertigung oder Versöhnung nur dadurch möglich sind, dass in irgendeiner Weise die beschädigte Gerechtigkeit wiederhergestellt wird. Luther hat sich von dieser Form der Rechtfertigungslehre abgewandt und seine „Rechtfertigungslehre“ stattdessen auf einer Theorie der Vergebung avant la lettre entworfen. Avant la lettre, weil es ausgearbeitete Theorien der Vergebung erst seit dem 19. Jahrhundert gibt. Gleichwohl hat Luther konstitutive Elemente einer Vergebungstheorie durch sein Bibelstudium entdeckt.