Katharina Von Bora (Luther)
Around the year 1523 and friend of Martin Luther’s named Leonhard Koppe came to him with a problem.
He had, years ago, committed his daughter to a Benedictine convent at
age 3. Her father missed her greatly and
had received some secret communication from her, but had no options to get her
back. Helping a nun to escape, in this
part of the world, was a capital offense.
Martin used some contacts to get his friend a job
delivering fish to the convent. There, Leonhard
was able to facilitate communication with his daughter, who mentioned there
might be some friends who would join her in her escape. One day, Leonhard drove his wagon into the convent
with twelve barrels of herring and drove out with a fugitive nun hidden inside
each empty barrel, back to Wittenberg and Martin Luther. One man in Wittenberg wrote, “A wagon load of
vestal virgins has just come to town, all more eager for marriage that for life
[itself].”
Leonhard claimed his daughter, and Martin felt a sense of
responsibility toward the young women and set about, first to find their families,
then finding them eligible husbands. He
married them all off but one, Miss Katharina Von Bora, a feisty redhead who, at
age 22, was well beyond the usual age of marriage. Martin widened and widened the net until two
years later he found an elderly widower who would be willing to marry Katharina
and give her the security she would need.
Martin took her to meet him and made the formal introduction. Katarina told Martin, “Sir,
this gentleman is not acceptable!” Still
looking at her patron, she continued, “but if YOU were to ask me, I’d say ‘Yes’!”
While Martin had encouraged marriage for ministers, he
shunned it for himself, thinking the constant threat of a heretic’s death to be
an unfair burden to any woman.
Nevertheless, in the summer of 1525, the 42-year-old former monk married
the 24-year-old former nun and the Luther household was born. Initially, it was a marriage of convenience,
Luther writing this his marriage would, “please his father, rile the Pope,
cause the angels to laugh, and the devils to weep.” Martin’s Catholic critics turned their venom
on his new bride, one pamphlet calling her a “poor, fallen woman” who had
passed “from the cloistered holy religion into a damnable, shameful life.” Katharina did not seem at all affected by the
harsh criticism, and kept her focus on the success of her husband. Over a short time, the marriage of
convenience became one of a deep love and respect for each other.
Katharina, or “my Lord Katie”, as he often called her, stormed
into his life, setting his domestic affairs in order: bring order to the
finances, seeing to his health, and making certain Martin’s habit of giving
money away thoughtlessly didn’t damage the family coffers too badly. Owing to Martin’s bouts of gout, insomnia,
constipation, stones, dizziness, and ringing of the ears, Katharina became very
proficient at herbal medicines and massage.
She also had an incredible intellect, respectfully challenging her
husband in the areas of theology he was studying. At such times, he referred to her as “Doctora
Lutherin.” She was a bundle of energy,
who harnessed that energy into being a blessing to her husband.
The Augustinian monastery where Martin once stayed was
purchased by a nobleman and gifted to the Luthers. Katharina arranged for boarding of their
frequent guests in the rooms, at times being hospitable to 30 guests at a time,
supervised planting of the fields, managed an orchard, harvested a fish pond,
directed the barnyard, and even slaughtered the livestock. Martin wrote, “In domestic affairs, I defer
to Katie. In everything else, I am led
by the Holy Spirit.”
Katharina found time in all this activity to bear six
children, three boys and three girls, born in a span of seven years. The Luthers also adopted four children. Their hearts were broken when their daughter
Elizabeth died at age 8 months, and again when another daughter, Magdalena,
died at age 13. Martin seemed to take
great joy in performing some of the ‘womanly’ tasks for his wife. He reserved for himself, as often as he was
home, the chore of washing diapers.
Katharina also made certain Martin’s personal
priorities were in order. Martin had,
while single, seen the marriage covenant as somewhat of a broken institution
and preached often on the responsibilities of husbands to take more of an
active role in their marriage and domestic life. ‘Lord Katie’ held him to this standard. One story is related about Martin locking himself
in his study, so enmeshed in his studies that he ignored his family for five
days. After five days, she removed the
hinges from the door so the children could storm in.
They were married for 21 years before Martin Luther
passed away in 1546. His wife wrote, “For
who would not be sad and afflicted at the loss of such a precious man as my
dear lord was? He did great things not
just for a city or a single land, but for the whole world. Therefore I am truly so deeply grieved that I
cannot…eat or drink, nor can I sleep.
And if I had a principality or an empire and lost it, it would not have
been as painful as it is now that the dear Lord God has taken from me this precious
and beloved man, and not from me alone, but from the whole world.”
Christian History Magazine – two editions
on the life of Martin Luther
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