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Philip
Melancthon was Luther's close friend. In 1530 Melancthon composed the
Augsburg Confession, a statement of the Lutheran theological
position, and a defense of it as orthodox.
Melancthon by Dürer, 1526
Melancthon's home in Wittenberg
In 1530,
Charles V called the princes and cities of his german territories to a
Diet at Augsburg. He needed unity within the Empire to face the
attacks of the Turnks. He called upon the Lutherans to explain their
religious convictions so the controversy of the Reformation could be
resolved. Philip Melanchthon, a close friend of Martin Luther and a
Professor of New Testament at Wittenberg University, drafted a common
confession for the Lutheran Lords and Free Territories. The resulting
document, the Augsburg Confession was presented to the emperor on June
25, 1530.
Luther
was a well educated man. He had studied logic, psychology, astronomy,
metaphysics, and mathematics as well as politics and economics in
addition to his biblical studies. However, he was a man of his age,
and he held a geo-centric view of the solar system. Luther believed
that a view of the universe that put the sun at the center of the
solar system was not compatible with his religious beliefs and he
dismissed Copernicus in 1539 with harsh words, "This fool wants to
turn the entire science of astronomy upside down! But as the Bible
tells us, Joshua told the Sun, not the Earth, to stop in its path."
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