Talk:The Ninety-Five Theses

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the The Ninety-Five Theses article.
Article policies
Christianity
Christianity Portal
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Christianity, an attempt to build a comprehensive guide to Christianity on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, you can edit this article, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion. If you are new to editing Wikipedia visit the welcome page to become familiar with the guidelines.
Start This article has been rated as Start-class on the quality scale.
High This article has been rated as High-importance on the importance scale.
Assessment comments
WikiProject Lutheranism The Ninety-Five Theses is part of WikiProject Lutheranism, an effort to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to Lutheranism on Wikipedia. This includes but is not limited to Lutheran churches, Lutheran theology and worship, and biographies of notable Lutherans. If you would like to participate, you can edit the article attached to this page, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion.
Start This article has been rated as Start-Class on the quality scale.
Top This article has been rated as Top-importance on the importance scale.

Contents

[edit] Where are the 95 Theses?!

This article is rediculous if it doesn't actually list all 95 Theses. Copyright? What copyright? This document is legally and completely in public domain. I'm sure that someone has an English version of the Theses that was written a couple of hundred years ago that is well outside of any copyright!! --Solascriptura 11:15, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

The reason why the theses aren't here ins because it is Wikipedia policy to keep texts in Wikisource and not in the articles themselves. --CTSWyneken 14:07, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Burned at the stake?

What if Martin Luther had been burned at the stake in 1521? Would the Reformation movement have flourished as it did? Would the Catholic Church have mantained its political and social power? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 199.174.169.109 (talk) 18:33, August 27, 2003

Probably would have went the way of Jan Hus. But this isn't the place for that discussion, though it would be great, we are here to put relevent and helpful facts, this is were we discuss those facts.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.32.20.136 (talk) 12:49, January 2, 2006
Also, if it weren't for Gutenberg's printing press, would the reformation have spread as it did?—Preceding unsigned comment added by 137.220.15.14 (talk) 21:01, July 24, 2005

[edit] Kingdom Now

To whoever placed the Kingdom Now link on this page - this is not a political sounding board, and that link is being removed and completely irrelevant to the topic at hand. --L. 17:38, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Copyright of Martin Luther's Works Updated

Fellow editors:

I've put all the current information on the copyright of Martin's Luther's On the Jews and Their Lies into the copyright topic page. For future reference, I'll put anything new I discover there and will answer questions about the status of this and other works at that location. --CTSWyneken 16:06, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] What's wrong with this picture?

Luther is said to have posted the 95 Theses on the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany, on October 31, 1517. Some scholars have questioned the accuracy of this account, noting that no contemporaneous evidence exists for it.

Am I the only one who reads Wikipedia to note the extreme, extreme, extreme irony that the "scholars" referenced in the footnotes here were Jesuits? 76.16.160.102 01:27, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] 95. theses

I added all of the 95 theses. Go Me! Arctic-Editor 16:06, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Shouldn't have done that. - Wikipedia:Don't include copies of primary sources 81.79.47.179 10:32, 18 February 2006 (UTC)
  • I think the 95 Theses is a critcally important piece of religious history (and thats coming from a non-practicing person). The 95 Theses should be posted here, not simply their reactions. The 10 Commandments gets full treatment. Is this a case of discrimination simply because 95 is more then 10? I don't even know which religion these Theses go along with, but if theres going to be an article on them it should certainly contain all 95. -Ghostalker
  • In support of Ghostalker above, I re-added and crosslinked the 95 theses. They are in the public domain, and they are an important piece of church history. Similar articles 10 Commandments, John 3:16, etc. —Preceding unsigned comment added by ZuG (talk • contribs) 17:42, August 5, 2006
  • I too think the 95 Theses should be listed on the page. It is just as important to one religion as the 10 comandments are to another. I say put them back. --Midnight Rider 04:26, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
As per WP:NPS, something of this size should be placeed on Wikisource and linked from there. This page should be for a general description and citing other sources about the Theses themselves. -- Kesh 04:39, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Readers, please note: what's posted in the article is a tremendously weak paraphrase, that in many cases bears no resemblance to what Luther said. Check the Project Wittenberg link below.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 64.83.234.164 (talk • contribs) .

Agreed. This is a horrible, misleading translation. I removed it, and placed a prominent link to wikisource, in accordance with Wikipedia:Don't include copies of primary sources. Elcocinero 17:07, 18 August 2006 (UTC)
I just visited wikisource and the document is tagged for deletion over copyright issues. So I guess its days are numbered... --Monotonehell 06:19, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
I just checked our link to the Wikisource listing of the theses. The version there is from Project Wittenberg. I added the source info, but don't have the time at the moment to format it correctly. Would someone check it? --CTSWyneken(talk) 10:58, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] External Links

The current external link to the Project Wittenberg seems to have expired. The same text via wayback is: http://web.archive.org/web/20050331084919/www.iclnet.org/pub/resources/text/wittenberg/luther/web/ninetyfive.html 205.201.10.244 20:21, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

It is working now. I'm puzzled, because at least this site has always worked. 8-) --CTSWyneken 23:24, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] 19000 relics...

In the second paragraph, it says each relic provided 100 days of relief. When there were 19000 such relics, the total amount would be 1.9 million DAYS, not YEARS as indicated. On the other hand, if each relic provided 100 YEARS of relief, then the toal amount is correct. I can't tell which unit is wrong so I can't make the correction. I'll leave it to the original author to verify the values.—Preceding unsigned comment added by Pierre Rioux (talk • contribs) 12:32, October 11, 2006

I noticed that too.--Oreo Priest 20:39, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

19000 x 100 / 365 = 5205.5. Sounds right if 19000 is an approximate number to the nearest 100 relics. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.128.105.57 (talk) 12:53, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Content of 95 theses?

I was disappointed that there is very little discussion of what the 95 theses actually say. Yes, I see the Wikisource link, and I'm aware of WP:NPS, but I was hoping that there would be some summary and analysis of the theses. Something along the lines of "Theses 1 through 15 deal with ... Scholars think that ... The Lutheran church and other protestant denominations implemented them by ... Theses 16 through 25 ..." Given WP:NOR, I'm not expecting Wikipedians to do the summarizing, but I'd be absolutely stunned if such an analysis hasn't already been published.

I'm particularly disappointed that there is no mention of which theses are the 41 that Leo X wanted retracted, why, and why the other 54 were not viewed so harshly. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.104.112.125 (talk) 10:07, January 3, 2007

All excellent points, which is why you should register a username and do the fixing! Akradecki 15:55, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
Indeed. On the other hand, the contents aren't particularly important in detail -- it's nothing that others were not saying already -- it was the way Luther put it and the fact that in landed in the hands of non-academics... --CTSWyneken(talk) 17:00, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
Yes, what were the 95 theses? Wheres the link to them? The article is named 95 theses after all. And which 41 were asked to be removed? Its important to know as it shows that the Catholic Church was willing to accept the remaining 54 theses, thats more than half of the paper. Tourskin
The style guide for Wikipedia requires that documents not be put in Wikiepedia in their entirety at all. There's a link to Wikisource version of the text. By the way, this is not unusual for encyclopedias. Very few full texts are present in them at all. --CTSWyneken(talk) 17:15, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] This article isn't very good

It starts out talking about relics and doesn't explain how this had any impact on Martin Luther and caused him to write the 95 theses. The article should start out with what the 95 theses were and why Luther decided to write them. If you want to talk about how the relics affected Martin Luther that should be later in the article. Someone please rewrite this or at least reorganize it. Dr. Morbius 21:01, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Feel free to wade in and edit. This was started from the main Martin Luther article, seeding it with from there. The result is the beginnings of a more tightly written main article. It does, however, not make for sparkling prose. --CTSWyneken(talk) 21:24, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Purpose of the Theses

How exactly does this explain what the purpose of the theses was? It talks about relics and selling indulgences, and only links these to the theses at one seeminly minor point at the start of the second paragraph. Having read the whole article I still have very little knowledge of Martin Luther or the 95 theses. I don't know anything about 'Luther's actions', and I don't see what makes the relics so important to selling indulgences in general. Is viewing the relics the only way to get indulgences? What is an indulgence anyway? Is it just a reduction of time in purgatory or can they be used for other things as well? None of this is made clear. I really can't see what the 'Purpose of the Theses' part is trying to say. This article is generally in dire need of some care and expert input, and someone who actually knows about the theses should at least do a rewrite of the purpose part. -- Haridan 23:25, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. The article needs some serious help. I don't have the time to properly research it right now, but it's getting added to my list of articles to clean up. -- Kesh 00:10, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] The 95 Theses in Turkish

Per discussion (and silence) at Talk:Martin Luther, I am moving an external link in the Martin Luther article containing the 95 Theses in Turkish to this page for safe keeping. Since there is a Turkish language Wikipedia, I am not certain we need the external link to the Turkish translation of the Theses at all. Here is the link:

Keesiewonder 20:21, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Tetzel's reaction

What about Tetzel's reaction? He wrote "95 Anti-Theses" or something like that. Brutannica 23:55, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

I'd never actually heard of this guy until now. Very interesting stuff, and absolutely relevant to the article. Time to gather references! -- Kesh 00:12, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I believe the specific title for Tetzel's anti-theses is One Hundred and Six Anti-Theses. 65.31.128.168 17:18, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Move page to 95 Theses

Per WP:NCD. Thoughts?--Flamgirlant 22:54, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

No, that doesn't work. The is a part of the title of the work. 95 Theses could be any such thing (several folk have mimicked Luther) The 95 Theses, however, is the match that lit the medieval powder keg. --CTSWyneken 13:43, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

If there is a possible confusion, then why does 95 Theses redirect here?--Flamgirlant 16:35, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Because we moved it from that title to the current one, for the reasons above. --CTSWyneken 15:13, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] 95 [sic] luftballoons

did i say "luftballoons?" .. i meant "Theses." Perhaps we should avoid the rather unscholarly-lookin' reliance on numerals to name numbers in the text. if i am not mistaken, the title of this page should be "The Ninety-Five Theses," not "95 Theses," and the redirect should go the other way about. (if you look up "95 theses," you should land at "The Ninety-Five Theses," right?)

thoughts? _-- Johndoh75 (talk) 18:55, 16 November 2007 (UTC)


RE: I think that the title should be The 95 Theses, because I think that's what they were actually called, so I agree with you.

[edit] When you Google it...

When you Google the 95 Theses and look for the Wikipedia article, it only says "95 Theses," with no tag afterwards. If I'm not mistaken, normally it should say "95 Theses-Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia." Can someone change that or look into it? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.181.168.148 (talk) 02:02, 22 January 2008 (UTC)