No, I think not.
When the various parts of the New Testament were written there was, as yet, no Patristic Tradition.
I agree, it is a shame and he was a gifted scholar.
In fact he was undeniably more honest, more sincere about his vocation and had more experience as a priest than the Pope had. I can see why, when push came to shove, he had to make a stand.
The old
Catholic Encyclopedia itself concedes: I should refer to the existence of the
Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification (mentioned here previously by hansard). In many ways Lutheran theology is not very far removed from Latin Catholic theology. The apple didn’t fall far from the tree.
And it appears that on the major points of Luther’s original 95 thesis
for which he was silenced, the Latin Catholic church has conceded.
I am not a Lutheran but I see that far too often he gets a bum rap. He was not perfect of course, but let us see what he was up against: A very nearly ruined and corrupt church with incompetent leadership that resisted genuine reform as long as it possibly could, actually it could not be moved to act until it was in serious danger of collapsing completely.
The Council of Trent was not called together until a full twenty-five years had elapsed, and it took about eighteen years to conclude. After which the Catholic Reformation was finally underway. All that delay was unnecessary and damaging.
The Latin church did change it’s theology over time, and even now there are people advocating new dogmas.
My point here is that in his own inventiveness Father Martin was quite in keeping with his tradition, the tradition of the Latin Catholic church to reinterpret the Gospel.
