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() is a papal bull promulgated on 15 June 1520 by
Pope Leo X Pope Leo X ( it, Leone X; born Giovanni di Lorenzo de' Medici, 11 December 14751 December 1521) was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 9 March 1513 to his death in December 1521. Born into the prominent political an ...
. It was written in response to the teachings of
Martin Luther Martin Luther (; ; 10 November 1483 – 18 February 1546) was a German priest, theologian, author, hymnwriter, and professor, and Augustinian friar. He is the seminal figure of the Protestant Reformation and the namesake of Lutherani ...
which opposed the views of the
Church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a building for Christian religious activities * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian communal worship * Chri ...
. It censured forty-one propositions extracted from Luther's ''
Ninety-five Theses The ''Ninety-five Theses'' or ''Disputation on the Power and Efficacy of Indulgences''-The title comes from the 1517 Basel pamphlet printing. The first printings of the ''Theses'' use an incipit rather than a title which summarizes the content ...
'' and subsequent writings, and threatened him with
excommunication Excommunication is an institutional act of religious censure used to end or at least regulate the communion of a member of a congregation with other members of the religious institution who are in normal communion with each other. The purpose ...
unless he recanted within a sixty-day period commencing upon the publication of the bull in
Saxony Saxony (german: Sachsen ; Upper Saxon German, Upper Saxon: ''Saggsn''; hsb, Sakska), officially the Free State of Saxony (german: Freistaat Sachsen, links=no ; Upper Saxon: ''Freischdaad Saggsn''; hsb, Swobodny stat Sakska, links=no), is a ...
and its neighboring regions. Luther refused to recant and responded instead by composing
polemical Polemic () is contentious rhetoric intended to support a specific position by forthright claims and to undermine the opposing position. The practice of such argumentation is called ''polemics'', which are seen in arguments on controversial topics ...
tracts lashing out at the papacy and by publicly burning a copy of the bull on 10 December 1520. As a result, Luther was excommunicated in 1521.


History

The historical impetus for this bull arose from an effort to provide a decisive papal response to the growing popularity of Luther's teachings. Beginning in January 1520, a
papal consistory In the Roman Catholic Church a consistory is a formal meeting of the College of Cardinals called by the pope. There are two kinds of consistories, extraordinary and ordinary. An "extraordinary" consistory is held to allow the pope to consult wit ...
was summoned to examine Luther's fidelity to
Catholic The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
teachings. After a short time, it produced a hasty list of several perceived errors found in his writings, but
Curia Curia (Latin plural curiae) in ancient Rome referred to one of the original groupings of the citizenry, eventually numbering 30, and later every Roman citizen was presumed to belong to one. While they originally likely had wider powers, they came ...
l officials believed that a more thorough consideration was warranted. The committee was reorganized and subsequently produced a report determining that only a few of Luther's teachings could potentially be deemed heretical or erroneous from the standpoint of Catholic theology. His other teachings perceived as problematic were deemed to warrant lesser degrees of theological censure, including the designations "scandalous" or "offensive to pious ears".
Johann Eck Johann Maier von Eck (13 November 1486 – 13 February 1543), often anglicized as John Eck, was a German Catholic theologian, scholastic, prelate, and a pioneer of the counter-reformation who was among Martin Luther's most important int ...
subsequently became involved in these proceedings. He had personally confronted Luther a year earlier in the
Leipzig disputation The Leipzig Debate (german: Leipziger Disputation) was a theological disputation originally between Andreas Karlstadt, Martin Luther and Johann Eck. Karlstadt, the dean of the Wittenberg theological faculty, felt that he had to defend Luther ...
and had obtained copies of condemnations issued against Luther by the universities of
Cologne Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 million inhabitants in the city proper and 3.6 millio ...
and
Leuven Leuven (, ) or Louvain (, , ; german: link=no, Löwen ) is the capital and largest city of the province of Flemish Brabant in the Flemish Region of Belgium. It is located about east of Brussels. The municipality itself comprises the historic c ...
. In a letter to a friend, Eck said he became involved because "no one else was sufficiently familiar with Luther's errors." Soon after having joined the committee when it was already halfway through its deliberations, he began to exert his considerable influence on the direction it subsequently took. The committee on which Eck sat consisted of some forty members, including cardinals (among whom was Cardinal Cajetan), theologians and canon lawyers. The heads of the three major mendicant orders, the Dominicans,
Franciscans , image = FrancescoCoA PioM.svg , image_size = 200px , caption = A cross, Christ's arm and Saint Francis's arm, a universal symbol of the Franciscans , abbreviation = OFM , predecessor = , ...
and
Augustinians Augustinians are members of Christian religious orders that follow the Rule of Saint Augustine, written in about 400 AD by Augustine of Hippo. There are two distinct types of Augustinians in Catholic religious orders dating back to the 12th–1 ...
, were represented. Central to the committee's proceedings was the matter of whether (and in what manner) Luther and his teachings should be formally condemned. Some members argued that Luther's popular support in Germany made it too politically risky to issue a bull at that time. The theologians supported an immediate condemnation of Luther. But the canon lawyers advocated a mediating position: Luther should be given a hearing and a chance to defend himself before being excommunicated as a heretic. Ultimately the committee negotiated a compromise. Luther would be given no hearing, but he would be offered a sixty-day window in which to repent before further action would be taken. Prior to Eck's involvement, Cajetan had expressed his desire that the committee members examine the whole context of Luther's writings and specify careful distinctions among the various degrees of censure to be applied to Luther's teachings. Eck's approach was markedly different. He bulldozed a final decision through the committee to ensure a speedy publication. As a result, the text it ultimately drafted simply contained a list of various statements by Luther perceived as problematic. No attempt was made to provide specific responses to Luther's propositions based upon Scripture or Catholic tradition or any clarification of what degree of theological censure should be associated with each proposition listed. All quoted statements were to be condemned as a whole (') as either heretical, scandalous, false, offensive to pious ears, or seductive of simple minds. Eck may have employed this tactic in order to associate more strongly the taint of error with all of Luther's censured teachings. However, this ' formula for censure had already been employed by the earlier
Council of Constance The Council of Constance was a 15th-century ecumenical council recognized by the Catholic Church, held from 1414 to 1418 in the Bishopric of Constance in present-day Germany. The council ended the Western Schism by deposing or accepting the r ...
to condemn various propositions extracted from the writings of
Jan Hus Jan Hus (; ; 1370 – 6 July 1415), sometimes anglicized as John Hus or John Huss, and referred to in historical texts as ''Iohannes Hus'' or ''Johannes Huss'', was a Czech theologian and philosopher who became a Church reformer and the insp ...
. When the committee members had obtained agreement among themselves regarding the selection of forty-one propositions which they deemed to be problematic, they subsequently submitted their draft text to Leo X. He appended a preface and conclusion and issued the document as an official papal bull on 15 June 1520. Copies were printed, notarized, sealed and distributed to specially appointed papal nuncios who were tasked with disseminating the bull, especially in those regions where Luther's followers were most active, and ensuring that its instructions were carried out.


Text

Printed copies of this bull bore the Latin title (Bull against the errors of Martin Luther and his followers), but it is more commonly known by its Latin
incipit The incipit () of a text is the first few words of the text, employed as an identifying label. In a musical composition, an incipit is an initial sequence of notes, having the same purpose. The word ''incipit'' comes from Latin and means "it b ...
, (''Arise O Lord''). These words also serve to open a prefatory prayer within the text of the bull calling on the Lord to arise against the "foxes hathave arisen seeking to destroy the vineyard" and the destructive "wild boar from the forest". Both refer to passages of Scripture: "Catch the foxes for us, The little foxes that are ruining the vineyards, While our vineyards are in blossom" (Song 2:15 NASB) and "A boar from the forest eats it away And whatever moves in the field feeds on it. O God of hosts, turn again now, we beseech You; Look down from heaven and see, and take care of this vine" (Ps 80:13–14 NASB). In these poetic metaphors may also be found an echo of Leo X's engagement in the hunting of wild boars while residing at a hunting lodge in the Italian hills during the spring of 1520. Following additional prayers of intercession directed towards the Apostles Peter and Paul and the "whole church of the saints" to defend Catholicism against Luther, the bull proceeds to list the forty-one propositions previously selected by the committee. The condemned propositions do not cover all disputed points of doctrine advocated by Luther. Many of Luther's important works setting forth his disagreements with Catholic theology, including '' On the Babylonian Captivity of the Church'', had not yet been published when this bull was issued. Moreover, on account of Eck's efforts to speed the committee along, it did not have sufficient opportunity to thoroughly examine the material Luther had already published. Therefore, the list of condemned propositions draws in large part upon the material with which Eck was personally familiar, including the 95 Theses, the lists of censures against Luther issued by the universities at Cologne and Leuven which Eck had brought with him to Rome, and Luther's (a detailed exposition of the 95 Theses). More than half of the forty-one censured propositions come from the 95 Theses or the ; the larger part of the remainder are derived from the Leipzig debate. The selection of censures themselves in large part combines and amplifies those statements already selected as problematic by the universities of Cologne and Leuven. Some of the condemnations confirmed prior judgments by the papacy. Luther's support for conciliarism is explicitly censured (proposition #28) and is singled out for further condemnation in the bull's conclusion: "
uther Uther Pendragon ( Brittonic) (; cy, Ythyr Ben Dragwn, Uthyr Pendragon, Uthyr Bendragon), also known as King Uther, was a legendary King of the Britons in sub-Roman Britain (c. 6th century). Uther was also the father of King Arthur. A few m ...
broke forth in a rash appeal to a future council. This to be sure was contrary to the constitution of Pius II and
Pope Julius II Pope Julius II ( la, Iulius II; it, Giulio II; born Giuliano della Rovere; 5 December 144321 February 1513) was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 1503 to his death in February 1513. Nicknamed the Warrior Pope or t ...
our predecessors that all appealing in this way are to be punished with the penalties of heretics. In vain does he implore the help of a council, since he openly admits that he does not believe in a council." Other condemnations represent new papal interventions on matters that had been freely disputed among Catholic scholars and theologians before that time. For example, Luther's opposition to the burning of heretics (proposition #33) and his anti-war stance with respect to the
Ottoman Turks The Ottoman Turks ( tr, Osmanlı Türkleri), were the Turkic founding and sociopolitically the most dominant ethnic group of the Ottoman Empire ( 1299/1302–1922). Reliable information about the early history of Ottoman Turks remains scarce, ...
(proposition #34) reflect opinions also shared by
Desiderius Erasmus Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus (; ; English: Erasmus of Rotterdam or Erasmus;''Erasmus'' was his baptismal name, given after St. Erasmus of Formiae. ''Desiderius'' was an adopted additional name, which he used from 1496. The ''Roterodamus'' wa ...
. Moreover, Luther explicitly referred to the church father
Jerome Jerome (; la, Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus; grc-gre, Εὐσέβιος Σωφρόνιος Ἱερώνυμος; – 30 September 420), also known as Jerome of Stridon, was a Christian priest, confessor, theologian, and historian; he is co ...
for support when he opposed the practice of burning heretics. Leo X then proceeded to issue an authoritative condemnation of these forty-one propositions in the following words: Additionally, the bull contains a directive forbidding any use of Luther's works and decreeing that they should be burned: Luther, along with his "supporters, adherents and accomplices", were given sixty days from the publication of this bull in which to desist "from preaching, both expounding their views and denouncing others, from publishing books and pamphlets concerning some or all of their errors". Luther himself was instructed to "inform us of such recantation through an open document, sealed by two prelates, which we should receive within another sixty days. Or he should personally, with safe conduct, inform us of his recantation by coming to Rome."


Reaction


Reactions by Luther and his sympathizers

The Pope assigned to Eck and Cardinal Girolamo Aleandro the task of publishing this bull in Saxony, its neighboring regions, and the
Low Countries The term Low Countries, also known as the Low Lands ( nl, de Lage Landen, french: les Pays-Bas, lb, déi Niddereg Lännereien) and historically called the Netherlands ( nl, de Nederlanden), Flanders, or Belgica, is a coastal lowland region in N ...
. They found this task more difficult than had initially been anticipated on account of the widespread public support for Luther, particularly in Germany. At
Erfurt Erfurt () is the capital and largest city in the Central German state of Thuringia. It is located in the wide valley of the Gera river (progression: ), in the southern part of the Thuringian Basin, north of the Thuringian Forest. It sits in ...
, students who sympathized with Luther tossed copies of the bull into the local river and at
Torgau Torgau () is a town on the banks of the Elbe in northwestern Saxony, Germany. It is the capital of the district Nordsachsen. Outside Germany, the town is best known as where on 25 April 1945, the United States and Soviet Armies forces fi ...
, a posted copy was torn down and defaced. Even some Catholic
bishops A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is ca ...
hesitated as much as six months before publishing the bull's contents. At times, the opposition faced by Eck and Aleandro was so fierce that their very lives were endangered. At
Leipzig Leipzig ( , ; Upper Saxon: ) is the most populous city in the German state of Saxony. Leipzig's population of 605,407 inhabitants (1.1 million in the larger urban zone) as of 2021 places the city as Germany's eighth most populous, as ...
, Eck had to retreat for an hour to a
cloister A cloister (from Latin ''claustrum'', "enclosure") is a covered walk, open gallery, or open arcade running along the walls of buildings and forming a quadrangle or garth. The attachment of a cloister to a cathedral or church, commonly against ...
in fear for his life. Eck found his task to be particularly onerous. He had received secret instructions permitting him to include more names under the bull's threat of excommunication at his discretion. This power he chose to exercise by supplementing the bull with the names of several prominent German
Humanists Humanism is a philosophical stance that emphasizes the individual and social potential and agency of human beings. It considers human beings the starting point for serious moral and philosophical inquiry. The meaning of the term "human ...
and thereby aroused their opposition besides that of Luther's supporters. In the Netherlands, Aleandro also experienced his share of confrontations with Luther's sympathizers. Among those he encountered was Desiderus Erasmus, who declared that "The inclemency of the bull ill comports with the moderation of Leo" and also that "Papal bulls are weighty, but scholars attach much more weight to books with good arguments drawn from the testimony of divine Scripture, which does not coerce but instructs." For these reasons, its dissemination took several months to complete. Luther himself received an official copy bearing the papal seal in early October of that year. However, rumors of its existence reached Luther well in advance of the official copy. At first he doubted their veracity and thought that the document to which they referred may be a forgery, possibly by Eck himself. Nonetheless he commented that it was the work of the
Antichrist In Christian eschatology, the Antichrist refers to people prophesied by the Bible to oppose Jesus Christ and substitute themselves in Christ's place before the Second Coming. The term Antichrist (including one plural form)1 John ; . 2 John . ...
, whatever its true origin may be, and started to compose a response even before he had received an official copy. His response was entitled ''Adversus Execrabile Antichristi Bullam'' (''Against the Execrable Bull of the Antichrist''). Luther defiantly proclaimed in his response that "whoever wrote this bull, he is Antichrist. I protest before God, our Lord Jesus, his sacred angels and the whole world that with my whole heart I dissent from the damnation of this bull, that I curse and execrate it as sacrilege and blasphemy of Christ, God's Son and our Lord. This be my recantation, O bull, thou daughter of bulls." He subsequently took issue with the censure of his statements: "My articles are called 'respectively some heretical, some erroneous, some scandalous', which is as much to say, 'We don't know which are which.' O meticulous ignorance! I want to be instructed, not respectively, but absolutely and certainly. ... Let them show where I am a heretic, or dry up their spittle." Much of the remainder of the tract is devoted to a discussion of the censured propositions. With the publication of the bull, sporadic public burnings of Luther's works began to take place in Germany in accordance with Leo X's instructions. However, in some places this directive proved impossible or difficult to carry out because of Luther's popular support. On certain occasions, his followers managed to substitute his condemned books with wastepaper or anti-Luther tracts, or rescue some of his works from the flames before they were consumed. On 29 November 1520, Luther published a second response to the bull entitled ''Assertion of All the Articles Wrongly Condemned in the Roman Bull''. Luther's commentary on proposition number 18 provides a representative example of its general tone: "I was wrong, I admit it, when I said that
indulgences In the teaching of the Catholic Church, an indulgence (, from , 'permit') is "a way to reduce the amount of punishment one has to undergo for sins". The ''Catechism of the Catholic Church'' describes an indulgence as "a remission before God o ...
were 'the pious defrauding of the faithful'. I recant and say, 'Indulgences are the most pious frauds and imposters of the most rascally pontiffs, by which they deceive the souls and destroy the goods of the faithful. Luther also published his ''
On the Freedom of a Christian ''On the Freedom of a Christian'' (Latin: ''"De Libertate Christiana"''; German: ''"Von der Freiheit eines Christenmenschen"''), sometimes also called ''"A Treatise on Christian Liberty"'' (November 1520), was the third of Martin Luther’s major ...
'' that same month. Although this work was not penned as a direct response to the bull, it nevertheless reaffirmed Luther's commitment to certain themes censured therein, including the primacy of
ecumenical councils An ecumenical council, also called general council, is a meeting of bishops and other church authorities to consider and rule on questions of Christian doctrine, administration, discipline, and other matters in which those entitled to vote are ...
over papal decrees. On 10 December 1520, sixty days after Luther had received a copy of this bull, he and
Melanchthon Philip Melanchthon. (born Philipp Schwartzerdt; 16 February 1497 – 19 April 1560) was a German Lutheran reformer, collaborator with Martin Luther, the first systematic theologian of the Protestant Reformation, intellectual leader of the Lu ...
invited the local university faculty and students to assemble that morning at the Elster Gate in
Wittenberg Wittenberg ( , ; Low Saxon: ''Wittenbarg''; meaning ''White Mountain''; officially Lutherstadt Wittenberg (''Luther City Wittenberg'')), is the fourth largest town in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. Wittenberg is situated on the River Elbe, north of ...
. A bonfire was lit and volumes of
canon law Canon law (from grc, κανών, , a 'straight measuring rod, ruler') is a set of ordinances and regulations made by ecclesiastical authority (church leadership) for the government of a Christian organization or church and its members. It is t ...
, papal constitutions, and works of
scholastic theology Scholasticism was a medieval school of philosophy that employed a critical organic method of philosophical analysis predicated upon the Aristotelian 10 Categories. Christian scholasticism emerged within the monastic schools that translate ...
were burned. Luther himself tossed a copy of the bull into the flames. Having done so, Luther is reported to have said, "Because you have confounded the truth r, the saintsof God, today the Lord confounds you. Into the fire with you!", a declaration which alludes to
Psalm The Book of Psalms ( or ; he, תְּהִלִּים, , lit. "praises"), also known as the Psalms, or the Psalter, is the first book of the ("Writings"), the third section of the Tanakh, and a book of the Old Testament. The title is derived f ...
21:9. Luther himself later explained his actions that day: The breach between Luther and the papacy was finalized on 3 January 1521, when on account of Luther's failure to comply, the Pope issued the bull to declare that he had been formally excommunicated.


Modern reactions

marks a watershed event in Christian history.
Protestant Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...
author
Philip Schaff Philip Schaff (January 1, 1819 – October 20, 1893) was a Swiss-born, German-educated Protestant theologian and ecclesiastical historian, who spent most of his adult life living and teaching in the United States. Biography Schaff was born ...
notes that "The bull of excommunication is the papal counter-manifesto to Luther's Theses, and condemns in him the whole cause of the Protestant Reformation. Therein lies its historical significance. It was the last bull addressed to Latin
Christendom Christendom historically refers to the Christian states, Christian-majority countries and the countries in which Christianity dominates, prevails,SeMerriam-Webster.com : dictionary, "Christendom"/ref> or is culturally or historically intertwin ...
as an undivided whole, and the first which was disobeyed by a large part of it." However, contemporary scholars of the
Reformation The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...
widely agree that this bull itself is a "strange document and an evasive assessment of Luther's theological concerns". Schaff notes that the condemned propositions are "torn from the connection ontext and presented in the most objectionable form as mere negations of Catholic doctrines. The positive views of the Reformer are not stated, or distorted." Catholic author John M. Todd calls the bull "contradictory, lacking in charity, and incidentally far less effective than it might have been". Not only does the text fail to identify precisely how each proposition is censured, but also it avoids direct engagement with numerous issues that are central to Luther's theology including and . In part, this evasion was simply an unavoidable consequence of the fact that Luther did not fully articulate his mature theological position until some time after this bull had been issued. Even so, Eck did not afford the committee sufficient time to better grasp the core issues at stake in Luther's teachings. As a result, some of the censured propositions are ambiguous, peripheral to Luther's main concerns, or were misunderstood or misrepresented by the committee. At least twelve of the forty-one propositions fail to accurately quote Luther or misrepresent his beliefs. The bull itself contains an internal contradiction: at one point it orders all of Luther's works to be burned, but elsewhere restricts this censorship only to those works which contain one of the forty-one censored propositions.


Proposition 33

The censure of certain theological propositions in this bull continues to be a source of controversy. For example, proposition number 33 censured by this bull states, "It is contrary to the will of the Spirit that heretics be burned.". That is something that more recent Catholic discipline, particularly in regards to the declaration of
Vatican II The Second Ecumenical Council of the Vatican, commonly known as the , or , was the 21st ecumenical council of the Roman Catholic Church. The council met in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome for four periods (or sessions), each lasting between 8 and ...
that "the human person has a right to religious freedom" and "This freedom means that all men are to be immune from coercion on the part of individuals or of social groups and of any human power, in such wise that no one is to be forced to act in a manner contrary to his own beliefs, whether privately or publicly, whether alone or in association with others, within due limits", seem to have softened. The tension between these two authoritative sources of Catholic teaching has sparked a contemporary debate on
papal infallibility Papal infallibility is a dogma of the Catholic Church which states that, in virtue of the promise of Jesus to Peter, the Pope when he speaks '' ex cathedra'' is preserved from the possibility of error on doctrine "initially given to the apos ...
, but Vatican II's declaration on religious freedom is not absolute but only "within due limits", subject to a "just public order".
Eastern Orthodox Eastern Orthodoxy, also known as Eastern Orthodox Christianity, is one of the three main branches of Chalcedonian Christianity, alongside Catholicism and Protestantism. Like the Pentarchy of the first millennium, the mainstream (or " canonical ...
author Laurent Cleenewerck asserts that Leo X's condemnations technically satisfy the requirements of an infallible () definition, in accordance with the criteria laid down by
Vatican I Vatican may refer to: Vatican City, the city-state ruled by the pope in Rome, including St. Peter's Basilica, Sistine Chapel, Vatican Museum The Holy See * The Holy See, the governing body of the Catholic Church and sovereign entity recognized ...
. The declaration of Leo X that members of the Catholic faithful must "condemn, reprobate, and reject completely each of these theses or errors" on pain of an automatic () excommunication is said to constitute an authoritative papal definition on doctrinal matters concerning faith and morals which must be held by the whole Catholic Church. He then notes that the practice of burning heretics poses a "serious ethical problem" and thus Cleenewerck finds in support for his conclusion that "the idea that Papal Infallibility can be presented as independent of any conciliar consent and as 'the constant belief of the universal Church' is rejected." Others disagree with those assessments and advance the alternative view that a censure that may be heretical but may also be merely "scandalous", "offensive to pious ears" or "seductive of simple minds" cannot be accepted as an infallible utterance of the
Magisterium The magisterium of the Roman Catholic Church is the church's authority or office to give authentic interpretation of the Word of God, "whether in its written form or in the form of Tradition." According to the 1992 Catechism of the Catholic Chu ...
. Brian Harrison argues that a censure of an unspecified nature is potentially subject to future clarification or reform, unlike an ex cathedra definition, which is, by nature, irreformable. A second argument advanced here asserts that censures that are merely "scandalous", "offensive to pious ears" or "seductive of simple minds" strongly depend upon a particular context of certain historical or cultural circumstances. A proposition that causes scandal or offense when it is advanced within a particular context "may not necessarily be so noxious under different circumstances". Even if a proposition is essentially true but poorly worded or advanced in a particular context with the intent of provoking scandal or offense, it may be censured as "scandalous" or "offensive to pious ears".


Manuscript copies

A copy of ' is extant in the
Vatican Library The Vatican Apostolic Library ( la, Bibliotheca Apostolica Vaticana, it, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana), more commonly known as the Vatican Library or informally as the Vat, is the library of the Holy See, located in Vatican City. Formally es ...
.


Notes


References


Sources

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External links


Latin Text of ''Exsurge Domine''
{{Authority control 16th-century anti-Protestantism Martin Luther 1520 documents 16th-century papal bulls Documents of Pope Leo X 1520 in Christianity