“The Rope Breaks When it is Tightest”: Luther on the Body, Consciousness, and the Word

Abstract

Martin Luther's revolutionary insight concerning the location of the event of justification in the “bottom of the heart” contained, as is well known, some ancillary results toward the displacing of external activities—”works”—from a central position in the quest for salvation. One effect of his theology was a radical redistribution of weight in his anthropological understanding, a shifting of focus away from a person's active participation in liturgy and the sacraments, asceticism and good works, and toward the event of justification in the “consciousness,” “depths of the heart,” or “the inmost heart.” Moreover, a new understanding of the psychological situation in which the Gospel can operate involved Luther in new methods for preparing and reinforcing the justification event. This article will examine Luther's description of the psychological situation in which justification occurs; his revised anthropology, especially as it affected his view of the human body; his identification of the ear as the direct access to the “bottom of the heart”; and, finally, the consequences of Luther's anthropology for the understanding of asceticism, death, and the sacraments.