Conclusion

In conclusion, I believe one of the main distinctions in the challenge of this book is that unlike other books that may have been challenged or endangered because it faced extinction or had to be distributed in secret, the Passional Christi und ANtichristi was distributed publicly but faced a challenge because it presented a challenge. What I mean to say is that by proclaiming a new form of thought that openly opposed the Pope and the system of the Catholic church, Martin Luther also presented a challenge to the existence of the Catholic church and how people would view it after his works had begun to circulate. 

The pamphlet is never mentioned to have been lost or eliminated however Luther himself faced excommunication by Pope Leo X in 1521 and his followers were branded as promoters of hearsay and devil-like thoughts so the threat of opposition always remained as long as Luther’s ideas were opposed by the highest power: the pope. The threat then was not just manifested in the physical copy of the pamphlet but also in the followers of Luther and in their beliefs. The threat that existed was the fear of being excommunicated and rejected by society because they held a different opinion of beliefs than the Catholic majority. Additionally, the pamphlet and Luther’s future works received much backlash from papal authorities in the forms of propaganda, broadsides and written letters that called Luther a fool and his followers deemed as prey to the devil’s trap.

In this encounter of new media, it’s unfortunate to say that while the Passional Christi und Antichristi has a presence online, there is often very little information to give light to the public and Catholic response to this specific pamphlet that named the Pope as the Antichrist. Many museums offer only a limited translation of the polemic writings in Luther’s pamphlets and are recently discovering mistakes of fact because of unsuspected piracies, reprints, and confusion on who illustrated the pamphlets. 

What is gained from the process of digitization is an experience that is similar to the illiterate German population who received the pamphlet for the first time. Most sources do not include a translation of the writings accompanied by the illustrations in Luther’s pamphlet and therefore the audience, such as myself, who are not literate in the German language, must resort to interpreting the illustrations as we see them. While this may seem like a disadvantage on one end, it also serves as a completion of the intended purpose for the pamphlet. In a way, by having to interpret the illustrations, we are fulfilling Luther’s purpose of catering towards an audience who had for so long, been neglected because of their disadvantages in their reading and comprehension skills. The experience of developing a connection with the pamphlet is mimicked, if not completely replicated in our own interpretation of the Passional Christi und Antichristi.