From indulgence preaching to a disputation
On 31 October 1517 Luther wrote to Archbishop Albrecht of Mainz, protesting that indulgence preaching encouraged people to mistake payment for assurance of salvation. He asked the archbishop to correct the preaching and enclosed propositions for discussion. Their preamble invites an academic disputation and written responses from those unable to attend.
The argument concerns the relationship between repentance, forgiveness and penalties imposed by the church. Luther initially framed his intervention as correction within the church. Wider circulation helped turn it into a dispute about the limits and foundations of ecclesiastical authority.
Repentance, charity and the church's treasure
The opening thesis treats the whole Christian life as repentance. Other propositions reject reliance on indulgences as a guarantee of salvation and criticize promises that payment immediately releases a soul from purgatory. Thesis 36 says that a truly repentant Christian has remission without purchasing an indulgence.
Luther also directs attention to ordinary obligations: giving to the poor and lending to those in need are better than buying indulgences, and necessities for one's household should be preserved. Thesis 62 identifies the gospel of God's grace as the church's true treasure. The text nevertheless retains approval of properly understood papal remissions; it does not contain every position Luther would later adopt.
References: [1]
Print circulation and the posting story
Humanist correspondence and print carried the Latin propositions beyond the intended academic audience. The resulting controversy connected indulgence preaching and church finances with popular anxieties about salvation. Luther's positions developed further during the disputes that followed.
The familiar image of Luther nailing the theses to a Wittenberg church door rests on contested evidence. Historian Axel Gotthard notes that the accounts associated with Melanchthon and Georg Rörer are not eyewitness testimony. The letter to the archbishop dated 31 October is documented; the circumstances of a public posting remain a separate historical question.