Have you heard people say, “Knowledge is power”? We think it’s no big deal that we can read books in our native language. During the Reformation, however, a single printing of the Bible written in German caused big changes.
Before the Reformation, most Bibles were written in Latin. To understand Christianity, people usually relied on what the Catholic Church taught. The pope could decide what was considered true and false within the Christian religion.
When Luther printed the Bible in vernacular, or everyday German, common people gained new power. Priests no longer stood between them and their understanding of Christianity. Was the pope following the Bible’s teachings incorrectly? For the first time, common people had the knowledge to think about such things for themselves.
