Martin Luther

Perhaps the greatest religious leader the world has ever seen, Martin Luther is seen as the spark to the Protestant Reformation. Some viewed him as a heretic while others saw him as an advocate for religious freedom and truth. Martin Luther (November 10, 1483 - February 18, 1546) was a Christian theologian and Augustinian monk whose teachings inspired the Protestant Reformation and deeply influenced the doctrines of Protestant and other Christian traditions. Luther, a teacher, preacher, priest and theologian, was, one of the most outstanding people in European history. Martin Luther's belief's led to his search for God, which would eventually change the course of history and the current society by changing people's views of the church and attempting to reconstruct the church's values and morals. He produced a great impact on the further development of Christian religion and European philosophy as well. He disagreed with some of the practices and beliefs of the Roman Catholic Church and that changed it very much. The fundamental problem that Martin Luther argued was the salvation of humans. Luther felt that Christian belief must be based on the word of God, tradition, and faith. He also contributed to the critical regard at a traditional holy Catholic Church, which was considered to be an infallible representative of the almighty God. He was shocked by the corruption within the Catholic Church and widely criticized the efficacy of indulgences particularly in his "95 Theses". As a result he was condemned and excommunicated, but still he continued to develop his theological ideas. He denounced the authority of the Catholic Church and estimated that the only religious authority was the Bible and individual reason. His view on theology, bible and Christian religion in general was quite different from that of the Catholic Church. He found a new sense of the righteousness of God, which he understood not as active righteousness, which is adjudged by God on the basis of human's works, but as passive righteousness that is received from God who makes sinners just. In short, he believed that salvation is a gift of God's grace, received by faith in God's promise to forgive sins for the sake of Christ's death. His translation of the Bible also helped to develop a standard version of the German language and added several principles to the art of translation.

The efforts of the reformers, who objected to the doctrines, rituals and structure of the Roman Catholic Church, led to the creation of new national Protestant churches. The most famous and well-known emigration to America was the migration of the Puritan separatists from the Anglican Church of England, who fled first to Holland, and then later to America, to establish a new government and English colonies of New England with their own religious freedoms. The Puritan movement who were often referred to as dissenters and nonconformists, eventually