Diet of Worms

The event

Following Luther's excommunication by Pope Leo X in the bull Decet Romanum Pontificem (issued January 1521, after Luther had publicly burned an earlier papal bull threatening excommunication), the newly elected Holy Roman Emperor Charles V summoned Luther to appear before the imperial diet, or assembly, at the city of Worms to answer for his writings.

Granted safe conduct for the journey, Luther appeared before the assembled emperor, princes, and church officials in April 1521, where he was presented with a stack of his own published writings and asked whether he would recant their contents. After requesting and receiving a day to consider his response, Luther famously refused to disavow his writings unless convinced by scripture or clear reason that he was in error, reportedly concluding with words traditionally rendered as "Here I stand, I can do no other, God help me. Amen" (though the precise wording, and whether this exact phrase was spoken, is debated by historians).

The emperor subsequently issued the Edict of Worms, formally declaring Luther an outlaw of the empire, banning his writings, and authorizing anyone to kill him without legal consequence — a sentence that in practice was never carried out, in significant part because Luther's own territorial ruler, Elector Frederick the Wise of Saxony, arranged for Luther to be secretly intercepted on his return journey and hidden at Wartburg Castle for his protection.

During his roughly year-long stay at Wartburg, disguised under the alias "Junker Jörg," Luther translated the New Testament into German from the original Greek, producing a work of remarkable literary and linguistic influence that helped standardize the modern German language and gave German-speaking Christians direct access to scripture in their own tongue, a landmark achievement of the broader Reformation project of returning authority to scripture over ecclesiastical tradition.

Other witnesses

• Edict of Worms, 1521 (full text)
• contemporary accounts of the Diet of Worms proceedings

Further reading

• Christian History Magazine 39: Martin Luther, the Later Years — free full issue
• Christian History Magazine 115: Luther Leads the Way — free full issue