Preferred Citation: Edwards, Mark U., Jr. Printing, Propaganda, and Martin Luther. Berkeley:  University of California Press,  c1994 1994. http://ark.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/ft3q2nb278/

 
Chapter Seven— Catholics on Luther's Responsibility for the German Peasants' War

Conclusion

It is a fascinating characteristic of a significant number of the Catholic pamphlets against Luther that in proving a point they often contented themselves with listing excerpts from Luther's works. We looked at this in some detail with Emser's Answer to Luther's "Abomination ," but Cochlaeus, for example, also commonly proceeded in the same fashion.[53] Sometimes commentary or exposition followed the list of excerpts, but often not. It is difficult to think of a clearer demonstration that they were reading Luther differently than, say, Evangelically

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minded readers. The conclusion seems inescapable. If the same text proved one thing to a Catholic and another to an Evangelical, the historic meaning of a text cannot be determined independent of its reader.

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Chapter Seven— Catholics on Luther's Responsibility for the German Peasants' War
 

Preferred Citation: Edwards, Mark U., Jr. Printing, Propaganda, and Martin Luther. Berkeley:  University of California Press,  c1994 1994. http://ark.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/ft3q2nb278/