Martin Luther
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Controversies after the Diet of Worms<br />
MARTIN LUTHER: THE RELUCTANT REVOLUTIONARY<br />
PROF. M. M. NINAN<br />
Attempts to carry out the Edict of Worms were unsuccesful.For one, <strong>Martin</strong> <strong>Luther</strong> disappeared<br />
from the public and went into hiding. Although Roman Catholic rulers sought determinedly to<br />
suppress <strong>Luther</strong> and his followers, within two years it had become obvious that the movement for<br />
reform was too strong. By March 1522, when <strong>Luther</strong> returned to Wittenberg, the effort to put reform<br />
into practice had generated riots and popular protests that threatened to undermine law and order.<br />
<strong>Luther</strong> himself was very conservative in his outlook. After all he had no intension of splitting and<br />
forming a Christian sect. As for him, he never intended it. It was all force on him. God took<br />
control of everything. With the political, social and economic situation of Europe the change took<br />
place. The ice was broken. After the Edict of Worms, however, the cause of reform, Papal control<br />
was lost and the struggles within the theological realm at least remained a possibility with the legal<br />
and political level. Church lost its absolute control and the crucial decisions were now made in the<br />
halls of government and not in the studies of the theologians. By 1523 side by side with <strong>Luther</strong>,<br />
other charismatic leaders came in front, including Thomas Müntzer, Huldrych Zwingli, and <strong>Martin</strong><br />
Bucer, with more radical changes in mind<br />
Thomas Muntzer : Huldrych Zwingli : <strong>Martin</strong> Bucer<br />
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