We are reposting our 2024 episode from our conversation with Volker Leppin. (The podcast will be on break through January and resuming in February with some exciting new content). Check out Volker Leppin's latest works that have come out since this episode originally aired: United with Christ: Martin Luther and Christian Mysticism and Francis of Assissi: The Life of a Restless Saint. Formally published Episode Details: Renowned Luther scholar Volker Leppin comes on the podcast to for a great discussion on his most recent book Sola: Christ, Grace, Faith, and Scripture Alone in Martin Luther's Theology from Lutheran Quarterly Books and the famous debate between Martin Luther and Johann Eck in June and July of 1519 known as the Leipzig Debate which proved to be a turning point in Luther's understanding of Scripture's authority.

Volker Leppin is the Horace Tracy Pitkin Professor of Historical Theology at Yale Divinity School. Prior to Yale, he taught church history at University of Jena and University of Tübingen. He is the author of many books, monographs, and articles in church history, especially on the Middle Ages, the Reformation, and Martin Luther. He is especially known for his biography of Luther titled Martin Luther: A Late Medieval Life.

SHOWNOTES:

The works about Luther that Dr. Leppin mentions were significant for him were:

Karl Holl's "Luther", presented as a lecture on Oct 31st 1917.

Gerhard Ebeling's book Evangelische Evangelienauslegung: Eine Untersuchung zu Luthers Hermeneutik

Heiko Oberman's book Luther: Man Between God and the Devil

(Andrew also brought up Oberman's book The Dawn of the Reformation: Essays in Late Medieval and Early Reformation Thought)

In the past few years, Roman Catholicism (and to a lesser extent Eastern Orthodoxy) has been attractive to people (including younger people) looking for tradition, beauty, and stability in a world that is often chaotic. What are the "pitfalls and possibilities" (to quote Doc Brown) of this 'Current Catholic Moment'? John Hoyum, a Lutheran pastor and academic, joins Andrew and James on the podcast today to discuss this topic and things related to it. This conversation was inspired from his recent article "Reformation Christians and the Current Catholic Moment". SHOWNOTES: In today's episode, James brings up the book Long Before Luther: Tracing the Heart of the Gospel from Christ to the Reformation

John brings up the following resources (which he also references in his article above): -video of Ryan Burge's statistical analysis of the alleged religious revival -Daphne Hampse's book Christian Contradictions: The Structures of Lutheran and Catholic Thought

-Jaroslav Pelikan's book The Riddle of Roman Catholicism

-Herman Sasse's book Here We Stand

We were delighted for Amy Mantravadi to return to the podcast to discuss her book Face to Face: A Novel of the Reformation,the second of her two-part novel series. (She joined us to discuss the first book Broken Bonds on an episode earlier this year.) Amy is a regular contributor at 1517 and writes about theological and historical topics. SHOWNOTES

The following works are brought up or referenced in this episode:

-Amy's previous work The Chronicles of Maud trilogy.

-Robert Kolb's Bound Choice, Election, and the Wittenberg Theological Method

-Rudolf & Marilynn Markwald’s book Katharina von Bora: A Reformation Life

-Martin Luther's Bondage of the Will

-Martin Luther's “Against the Robbing and Murdering Hordes of Peasants” (1525), which can be found in Luther's Works, Volume 46

-Coming Soon: Amy's talk “How the Bondage of the Will Changes My Life” will be featured in an upcoming video from the 1517 YouTube channel.