Johannes Agricola (April 20, 1494 – September 22, 1566) was a German

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 Protestant

Protestantism

Protestantism is one of the three major groupings within Christianity. It is a movement that began in Germany in the early 16th century as a reaction against medieval Roman Catholic doctrines and practices, especially in regards to salvation, justification, and ecclesiology.The doctrines of the...

 reformer and humanist

Humanism

Humanism is an approach in study, philosophy, world view or practice that focuses on human values and concerns. In philosophy and social science, humanism is a perspective which affirms some notion of human nature, and is contrasted with anti-humanism....

. He was a follower and friend of Martin Luther

Martin Luther

Martin Luther was a German priest, professor of theology and iconic figure of the Protestant Reformation. He strongly disputed the claim that freedom from God's punishment for sin could be purchased with money. He confronted indulgence salesman Johann Tetzel with his Ninety-Five Theses in 1517...

, who became his antagonist in the matter of the binding obligation of the law on Christians

Abrogation of Old Covenant laws

While many Christian theology systems reflect the view that at least some Mosaic laws have been set aside under the New Covenant, there are some theology systems that view the entire Mosaic or Old Covenant as abrogated in that all of the Mosaic laws are set aside for the Law of Christ...

.

Early life

Agricola was born at Eisleben

Eisleben

Eisleben is a town in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. It is famous as the hometown of Martin Luther, hence its official name is Lutherstadt Eisleben. As of 2005, Eisleben had a population of 24,552...

, whence he is sometimes called Magister Islebius. He studied at Wittenberg

Wittenberg

Wittenberg, officially Lutherstadt Wittenberg, is a city in Germany in the Bundesland Saxony-Anhalt, on the river Elbe. It has a population of about 50,000....

, where he soon gained the friendship of Martin Luther

Martin Luther

Martin Luther was a German priest, professor of theology and iconic figure of the Protestant Reformation. He strongly disputed the claim that freedom from God's punishment for sin could be purchased with money. He confronted indulgence salesman Johann Tetzel with his Ninety-Five Theses in 1517...

. In 1519 he accompanied Luther to the great assembly of German divines at Leipzig

Leipzig

Leipzig Leipzig has always been a trade city, situated during the time of the Holy Roman Empire at the intersection of the Via Regia and Via Imperii, two important trade routes. At one time, Leipzig was one of the major European centres of learning and culture in fields such as music and publishing...

, and acted as recording secretary. After teaching for some time in Wittenberg, he went to Frankfurt

Frankfurt

Frankfurt am Main , commonly known simply as Frankfurt, is the largest city in the German state of Hesse and the fifth-largest city in Germany, with a 2010 population of 688,249. The urban area had an estimated population of 2,300,000 in 2010...

 in 1525 to establish the Protestant mode of worship. He had resided there only a month when he was called to Eisleben, where he remained till 1526 as teacher in the school of St Andrew, and preacher in the Nicolai church.

Controversy

In 1536 he was recalled to teach in Wittenberg, and was welcomed by Luther. Almost immediately, however, a controversy, which had been begun ten years before and been temporarily silenced, broke out more violently than ever. Agricola was the first to teach the views which Luther was the first to stigmatize by the name Antinomian

Antinomianism

Antinomianism is defined as holding that, under the gospel dispensation of grace, moral law is of no use or obligation because faith alone is necessary to salvation....

, maintaining that while non-Christians were still held to the Mosaic law, Christians were entirely free from it, being under the gospel alone, see also Law and Gospel

Law and Gospel

In Christianity the relationship between God's Law and the Gospel is a major topic in Lutheran and Reformed theology. In these traditions, the distinction between the doctrines of Law, which demands obedience to God's ethical will, and Gospel, which promises the forgiveness of sins in light of the...

. After he wrote an attack on Luther shortly after Luther had given him shelter when he was fleeing persecution, Luther had nothing further to do with him.

Restoration and later life

In consequence of the bitter controversy with Luther that resulted, Agricola in 1540 left Wittenberg secretly for Berlin

Berlin

Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

, where he published a letter addressed to Frederick III, Elector of Saxony

Frederick III, Elector of Saxony

Frederick III of Saxony , also known as Frederick the Wise , was Elector of Saxony from 1486 to his death. Frederick was the son of Ernest, Elector of Saxony and his wife Elisabeth, daughter of Albert III, Duke of Bavaria...

, which was generally interpreted as a recantation of his obnoxious views. Luther, however, seems not to have so accepted it, and Agricola remained at Berlin.

Joachim II Hector, Elector of Brandenburg

Joachim II Hector, Elector of Brandenburg

Joachim II Hector was a Prince-elector of the Margraviate of Brandenburg . A member of the House of Hohenzollern, Joachim II was the son of Joachim I Nestor, Elector of Brandenburg, and his wife Elizabeth of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden...

, having taken Agricola into his favour, appointed him court preacher and general superintendent. He held both offices until his death in 1566, and his career in Brandenburg was one of great activity and influence.

Along with Julius von Pflug

Julius von Pflug

Julius von Pflug was the last Catholic bishop of the Diocese of Naumburg from 1542 until his death. He was one of the most significant reformers involved with the Protestant Reformation....

, bishop of Naumburg-Zeitz, and Michael Helding, titular bishop of Sidon, he prepared the Augsburg Interim

Augsburg Interim

The Augsburg Interim is the general term given to an imperial decree ordered on May 15, 1548, at the 1548 Diet of Augsburg, after Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, had defeated the forces of the Schmalkaldic League in the Schmalkaldic War of 1546/47...

 of 1548, a proposed settlement under which Protestants would accept all Catholic authority, being permitted to retain the Protestant teaching on justification

Justification (theology)

Rising out of the Protestant Reformation, Justification is the chief article of faith describing God's act of declaring or making a sinner righteous through Christ's atoning sacrifice....

 but otherwise compelled to accept Catholic doctrine and practice. From that time, he was an outcast among Protestant theologians. It was an irony that one of the most radical Reformers ended his life viewed as having capitulated to Catholics.

He endeavoured in vain to appease the Adiaphoristic

Adiaphora

Adiaphoron is a concept of Stoic philosophy that indicates things outside of moral law—that is, actions that morality neither mandates nor forbids....

 controversy.

He died during an epidemic of plague

Black Death

The Black Death was one of the most devastating pandemics in human history, peaking in Europe between 1348 and 1350. Of several competing theories, the dominant explanation for the Black Death is the plague theory, which attributes the outbreak to the bacterium Yersinia pestis. Thought to have...

 on September 22, 1566 in Berlin.

Writings

Agricola wrote a number of theological works. He was the first to make a collection of German proverbs which he illustrated with a commentary. The most complete edition, which contains seven hundred and fifty proverbs, is that published at Wittenberg in 1592.

In literature

In 1836, Robert Browning

Robert Browning

Robert Browning was an English poet and playwright whose mastery of dramatic verse, especially dramatic monologues, made him one of the foremost Victorian poets.-Early years:...

 used him as the subject of an early poetic solioquy, "Johannes Agricola in Meditation

Johannes Agricola in Meditation

"Johannes Agricola in Meditation" is an early dramatic monologue by Robert Browning. The poem was first published in the Monthly Repository; later, it appeared in Dramatic Lyrics paired with Porphyria's Lover under the title "Madhouse Cells."Agricola's "meditations" serve primarily as a critique...

".