Background
Nicolaus was born on December 3, 1483 in Torgau, on the Elbe.
Nicolaus was born on December 3, 1483 in Torgau, on the Elbe.
Nicolaus was educated at Leipzig, and then at Wittenberg, where he was one of the first who matriculated (1502) in the recently founded university.
Nikolaus became a theology professor in 1511, Amsdorf attended the Leipzig debate with Luther in 1519 and the Diet of Worms two years later, where he participated in the plan to protect Luther from his detractors by pretending to kidnap him while actually lodging him secretly in Wartburg, a castle near Eisenach. Amsdorf subsequently aided the Reformation at Magdeburg (1524), Goslar (1531), Einbeck (1534), and Schmalkalden (1537). When Luther in 1539 supported the intended bigamous marriage of Philip, landgrave of Hesse, Amsdorf opposed him. He was made bishop of Naumburg in 1541.
As a Reformer holding a bishopric, Amsdorf found his position difficult but remained under Luther’s persuasion until it was necessary to yield to the Roman Catholic bishop Julius von Pflug in 1547. Exiled to Magdeburg, Amsdorf superintended the Jena edition of Luther’s works. Continuing to fight for the purity of Luther’s doctrine, he opposed the views of Philipp Melanchthon and other Reformers. In particular he emphasized that salvation could come only to persons of faith and that their efforts to perform good works might even be self-defeating. Among Amsdorf’s extant writings are numerous letters and varied short works.
He died at Eisenach in 1565, and was buried in the church of St. Georg there, where his effigy shows a well-knit frame and sharp-cut features.
He was at first a leading exponent of the older type of scholastic theology, but under the influence of Luther abandoned his Aristotelian positions for a theology based on the Augustinian doctrine of grace.
According to his convictions, he was a supporter of the Lutheran Nation-Lutheran Party as opposed to the Filipists. He believed that good deeds can even harm salvation, because because of them a person begins to be proud. This point was the antithesis of the assertion of his opponent, Georg Major, that we are being saved by good deeds (synergy). Subsequently, the extremes of both opponents were smoothed and in the Formula of Concord (1577)
He was a man of strong will, of great aptitude for controversy, and considerable learning, and thus exercised a decided influence on the Reformation.