The indulgence controversy
By the early 16th century all that was needed in Germany to bring about a radical movement of protest was an issue capable of uniting the forces of dissent. Such an issue was provided by the sale of indulgences in 1517 near the town of Wittenberg in Saxony.
In 1514 the archbishopric of Mainz had fallen vacant, and, in an attempt to increase the influence of the Hohenzollern family, the younger brother of the elector of Brandenburg, Albert, was put forward as a candidate. As he was already archbishop of Magdeburg and administrator of the diocese of Halberstadt, he could not be appointed to Mainz without buying a papal dispensation of 30 000 florins.
The Hohenzollern family borrowed this enormous sum from the Fuggers and, in order to enable Albert to repay the debt, Pope Leo X allowed him to share the profits from the preaching in Germany of an indulgence for the rebuilding of St Peter’s. This in itself was a highly corrupt form of preaching an indulgence but, in addition, Albert’s agent, a Dominican friar, John Tetzel, was particularly unscrupulous in his manner of selling his “spiritual bargains”. He laid little emphasis on the need for repentence and his attitude is well summed up in the contemporary doggerel:
Just when the coin in the coffer rings
The soul from purgatory springs.
In 1517 Tetzel was selling the indulgence near Wittenberg. Although the elector of Saxony would not allow him into his territories, many Saxons crossed the border to buy the indulgence. An Augustinian friar, Martin Luther, was deeply shocked at the immorality of the sale and in October he nailed ninety five theses to the door of the castle chapel. In these, he condemned indulgences and other corrupt practices of the church.
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