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Theme Articles: A Man Caught Between Bad Anthropology and Good Theology? Martin Luther's View of Women Generally and of Mary Specifically
Author(s) -
Pedersen Else Marie Wiberg
Publication year - 2010
Publication title -
dialog
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.114
H-Index - 5
eISSN - 1540-6385
pISSN - 0012-2033
DOI - 10.1111/j.1540-6385.2010.00531.x
Subject(s) - martin luther , excellence , feminist theology , ambivalence , sociology , relation (database) , theme (computing) , theology , moral theology , philosophy , diversity (politics) , epistemology , anthropology , psychoanalysis , psychology , database , computer science , operating system
: Martin Luther's view of women is as complex as his authorship is vast, encompassing a diversity of genres and purposes. Luther seems ambivalent toward women like the tradition before and after him. In his reformation enterprise he appears torn between his good theology and the bad anthropology that obscures his purportedly universal principles. This article uncovers some of the ambiguities in Luther's approaches to women, theoretically teaching men's authority over women yet simultaneously teaching the mutuality and equality of women and men; and practicing such mutuality and equality in his everyday life, not least in his marriage to Katharina von Bora. His good theology also comes to the fore in his Mariology, especially in his commentary to the Magnificat, in which Mary is not just a ‘woman’ but the human being par excellence in her truly faithful relation to God.