Why did Luther curse those who oppose indulgences?

Question

In the 95 Theses, Luther makes a stand against corruption in the Catholic church of that day. This resulted in events leading to the separation between the Catholic and Protestant churches.

It seems the theses are always referred to, but never actually read. Their content does make me a bit uneasy, especially this part (the English translation used as source):

71: Let him who speaks against the truth concerning papal indulgences be anathema and accursed.

Or, the original for those that know Latin:

71: Contra veniarum apostolicarum veritatem qui loquitur, sit ille anathema et maladictus.

Now, I have never heard even one Protestant speak positively about indulgences. What are Luther's motives in saying this (especially in such strong words), and did he later on change his mind?

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Edit: Thanks to Caleb's suggestion, I'll add some other relevant theses to provide context.

67: The indulgences which the demagogues acclaim as the greatest graces are actually understood to be such only insofar as they promote gain.
68: They are nevertheless in truth the most insignificant graces when compared with the grace of God and the piety of the cross.

91: If, therefore, indulgences were preached according to the spirit and intention of the pope, all these doubts would be readily resolved. Indeed, they would not exist.

It seems quite clear to me that Luther didn't oppose indulgences per se, rather just the sale and abuse of them and the exaggeration of their power. If I'm wrong here, please provide some good references to show that.

Answer 1

Why did Luther curse those who oppose indulgences?

Firstly, he did not curse those who opposed indulgences. He himself was against indulgences. He wrote the 95 theses because of the sale of indulgences:

Luther, aflame with indignation, challenged the sale of indulgences and demanded that the entire matter be discussed by the scholars of the University. He invited his academic colleagues to a public disputation to consider the Ninety-five Theses, or objections, which he had raised against the sale.

What he said in his 71st thesis, was this "Let those who oppose the truth about indulgences be anathema and accursed". He didn't say "curse those who oppose indulgences," but rather "curse those who are against the truth concerning indulgences."

The "truth about indulgences" was that you cannot buy your own salvation, and Luther was trying to state that. This can be seen in Ephesians 2 : 8,9.

Now, the Catholic priests and pope were trying to oppose this, by saying that what Luther was teaching was false. Thus, Luther says, "those who oppose the truth about indulgences be...cursed". He was cursing the priests and the pope!

Why? Isn't this rather strong?

Consider this. When you get someone who deceives others concerning their salvation, telling them that by paying money, they can save themselves, this person is basically sending the poor gullible people to their damnation. They are systematically dooming people with their sell of indulgences. Isn't that what Satan is actually doing? Trying to draw more people into Hell?

Thus, Luther has good reason to curse those who try to oppose the truth of the indulgences.

Answer 2

1. You need to understand the vernacular of the day. Documentation took hard line tones that would never be acceptable in today's culture. Luther in particular used much stronger wording than even many of his contemporaries. This included every detail of his daily life, not just special documents such as his 95 Theses.

2. Luther said and believed some pretty wacky stuff that would make most Protestants uncomfortable. His ideas and actions were instrumental in setting off the Reformation but he by no means perfected it.

3. Luther did not entirely reject the idea of indulgences and was not trying to say the idea behind them was heretical, only that the church of his day had perverted them. There is quite a bit contrast laid out in his Theses between ideas that he goes out of his way not to denounce and implementations and implementors that he decries vehemently.

   Including some additional context might help here. In #67 and #68 Luther notes that indulgences promote some good, but that they are a very small grace in comparison God's grace.

   #67. The indulgences which the preachers cry as the “greatest graces” are known to be truly such, in so far as they promote gain.
   #68. Yet they are in truth the very smallest graces compared with the grace of God and the piety of the Cross.

   If you continue on through the next dozen or so points you can see that he isn't asking Rome to abolish the practice so much as to put it back in proper perspective.

   (English source text.)

Answer 3

Luther published his 95 Theses in 1517.

At that time he had not fully separated from the theology of the Roman Catholic church and the Pope.

Most of his 95 Thesis are really just asking for thoughtful consideration for reform from inside the church.

In regards to the thesis involving Indulgences, I believe Luther meant that those who speak against the truth regarding them are anathema. That is, that anyone who does not wish to seek the truth regarding them, whatever that may be, is wrong to do so. He does not make many absolute truth claims. He may also be implying that the truth about them is that indulgences were being abused.

It is very possible that I give Luther more credit than he deserves though, for it is quite true he still held to many Catholic beliefs at that time.

However, asking what Luther meant by it in 1517 is NOT the same as asking what Luther thought about Indulgences later in his life when he had solidified his theology.

The Babylonian Captivity of the Church, written in 1520 prior to the Diet of Worms, contains this in it's introduction and I am certain must be considered to be Luther's final position on Indulgences:

1.1 Like it or not, I am compelled to learn more every day, with so many and such able masters vying with one another to improve my mind. Some two years ago I wrote a little book on indulgences, which I now deeply regret having published. For at the time I still clung to the Roman tyranny with great superstition and held that indulgences should not be altogether rejected, seeing they were approved by the common consent of men. Nor was this to be wondered at, for I was then engaged single-handed in my Sisyphean task. Since then, however, through the kindness of Sylvester and the friars, who so strenuously defended indulgences, I have come to see that they are nothing but an fraud of the Roman flaterers by which they rob people of their faith and fortunes. I wish I could convince the booksellers and all my readers to burn up the whole of my writings on indulgences and to substitute for them this proposition... [emphasis added]

You can read the rest here

Answer 4

With respect, I believe you're misreading this item. Dr. Luther is sometimes hard to understand, but in my experience (having read the whole Book of Concord and a lot of his other writings) is that he's very rarely self-contradictory. He is not self-contradictory in this case.

Here's the proposition.

71: Let him who speaks against the truth concerning papal indulgences be anathema and accursed.

Let's try parsing it...

A   "the truth concerning papal indulgences"   
B   "against" A
C   "him who speaks" B
D   "Let" C "be anathema and accursed".

So, this all hinges on the meaning of A -- the truth concerning papal indulgences. The rest of this broadside makes the point, in many ways, that papal indulgences are evil.

This is a thesis: a proposition for debate. Dr. Luther is asserting that it is true, and inviting partners in discourse to support or refute it. This thesis / antithesis mode of discourse is a late medieval academic methodology.

Something also hinges on the meaning of "sit ille anathema et maladictus." This is very specific, not just a general cussing out. Anathema means "excluded." "Maladictus" means "spoken against." In this thesis, Dr. Luther asserts that the church and the academy share a duty to restrain the speech of those people who defend papal indulgences.

Again, this is late medieval discourse, not 21st-century discourse, so it sounds a little alien.

As for the claim that he wasn't speaking against papal indulgences, and only against their misuse, that's untrue. He is speaking against the indulgence preachers' claim that they have the divine authority to sell these letters of indulgence. At this point in history, he was not sure whether the indulgence preachers were acting with the knowledge of the pope, for what it's worth.

20 Therefore by "full remission of all penalties” the pope means not actually “of all," but only of those imposed by himself.

21 Therefore those preachers of indulgences are in error, who say that by the pope’s indulgences a man is freed from every penalty, and saved;

...

26 The pope does well when he grants remission to souls [in purgatory], not by the power of the keys (which he does not possess), but by way of intercession.

...

28 It is certain that when the penny jingles into the money-box, gain and avarice can be increased, but the result of the intercession of the Church is in the power of God alone.

The point Luther asserts is that the Pope may (indeed, ought to) pray for the forgiveness of people, but that the power to grant that forgiveness is God's alone.