Wittenberg

We begin the pictures today at the very door of the Castle Church where Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses. Unfortunately the wooden door was destroyed by fire during the Seven Years War in 1760 and was later replaced with bronze doors and the text in raised letters. At least I wasn't tempted to nail anything there. The next picture is of his grave in The Castle Church. Even though he did most of his preaching at the Town Church he was allowed to be buried in the more formal church along with Philipp Melancthon. The third picture shows a portion of the town and the twin towers of The Town Church. We climbed the tower at the Castle Church to get those pictures and it reminded us of climbing the Statue of Liberty. Our legs are sore!

Next we walked down to the Town Church and met Martin along the way and stopped to have our picture taken with him. He looks pretty good for being about 500 years old! Then you see the interior of the Town Church and then the pulpit from which he often preached. It was moving to be in such a place where such courage was taken to preach the Gospel in it's true form!

The painting shows Martin Luther on the right pointing to Christ as the Lamb of God. Luther's wife is in the group on the left as is the artist. The next picture is of the study, writing, and sleeping room of Philipp Melancthon, Luther's friend, colleague, and fellow theologian. We visited the Melancthon House today and will go back to Wittenberg on Friday to spend a significant amount of time at the Luther House.

Not every moment was spent in touring. Ingrid and her cousin Brigitte from Switzerland found time for a little window shopping. The final picture shows the tower of the Castle Church at night as we made our way back to the car and then drove an hour and a half to Halle where we will be staying for the next several nights.

Tomorrow we go to Erfurt and Eisenach. See you there!