Katharina Von Bora: Martin Luther Meets His Match

12 Min Read

Katharina von Bora was born in January 1499, and gifted to a convent at the tender age of five when her widowed father remarried. She took her vows as a nun at sixteen at the Marienthorn Convent in Nimbschen where she was content to live in the safe cocoon of cloistered life until her haven was infiltrated by the writings of Martin Luther.

In the early 1520s on a trip away from Wittenberg Martin Luther stopped at a local Priory in Grimma, to break his journey for some rest and food. While he was there, he preached, most likely on the book of Romans which was a favourite of his at the time. The Prior, Wolfgang von Zeschau eagerly took notes of Luther’s presentation, collated them and sent a copy to his two young nieces, Veronika and Margaret von Zeschau, who were nuns at the Marienthorn Convent in Nimbschen. Veronika and Margaret shared these new teachings with some of the other nuns at the convent and they began a small Bible study group. There were twelve nuns in all who participated in this time of study and Katie Von Bora was one of them. Another was Margaret von Staupitz the sister of Luther’s friend and mentor Johann von Stapuitz. After several years of Bible study the nuns were convinced that they needed to leave the convent. At the time women in Germany had little agency. They couldn't live alone or support themselves without the protection and financial sponsorship of a male relative – either a father, brother, husband or another close relation. When the nuns decided to leave the convent their first course of action was to write letters to their families requesting shelter and support. All their respective fathers and brothers denied them assistance. Convicted that God was calling them to leave but without the means to do so the women resorted to desperate measures.

St. Mary's Church, Wittenberg, Germany

Margaret Von Stauptiz wrote to Luther requesting counsel. Never one to pass up an opportunity to make a stand for truth Luther advised the nuns to escape, going so far as to offer his assistance. The nuns gladly accepted Luther’s help and he made arrangements for them to leave the convent under cover of darkness.

Breaking twelve nuns out of a convent was hardly an easy feat mostly because Nimbschen lay within Ducal Saxony which was strongly Catholic and at odds with their Protestant leaning neighbours in Electoral Saxony where Wittenberg and Luther were. Rumours swirled that the Duke of Saxony had executed a man for assisting in the escape of another group of nuns within his realm which added an extra layer of danger to the entire escapade. But Luther wasn’t one to back down from a challenge. He turned to a trusted friend, Leonard Koppe for help. Koppe, though nervous about the entire endeavour agreed.

On Easter Sunday in the dead of night Koppe took his wagon down to the convent filled with empty fish barrels. The nuns met him outside the convent gates and crammed themselves into the waiting fish barrells. Koppe then drove them over the border into Electoral Saxony. By morning the nuns were safely out of Ducal Saxony and within the realms of Prince Frederick, the Elector of Saxony and Luther’s self-appointed protector. Three of the nuns disembarked in the small town of Torgau on the way to Wittenberg while the remaining nine rattled into Wittenberg on Tuesday.

Luther, generously, assumed financial responsibility for the nuns which would have been a stretch for him on his university lecturer salary. He also wrote to their families once more soliciting help but none of them wanted to acknowledge the runaway nuns for fear of scandal or worse.

Filming On Location, St. Mary's Church, Wittenberg, Germany

Katharina managed to find a position within the household of Lucas Cranach, the official court painter to the Electors of Saxony and Luther’s official portrait painter in later years. At the Cranach home Katarina met various people from different walks of life including King Christian II of Denmark who was so impressed by her wit and intelligence that he is reported to have given her a gold ring.

Eight of the nine nuns were soon married much to Luther’s relief, but Katharina remained, working for the Cranach family and hoping to make a decent match. She caught the eye of 25-year-old Hieronymus Baumgartner, most likely a student at the university. Baumgartner was a decent young man from a wealthy family in Nuremburg and just two years older than Katarina. It seemed like the perfect match until he went home to get his parent’s permission to marry Katharina, and they vehemently objected to the match. Marrying a runaway nun was not only scandalous it was considered heretical as well and the family had no desire to create unwanted turmoil for themselves.

They had probably garnered enough attention having a son studying under Luther at Wittenberg without adding another layer of peril to the situation. At first Hieronymus did nothing. He hemmed and hawed, vacillating between submitting to his parents and simply doing what he wanted regardless. Finally Luther wrote to him, demanding that he stop procrastinating and make up his mind. The letter jolted him to action, and he threw over Katharina in favour of marrying another young woman.

By this time Katharina was becoming something of a liability. She needed to be married off and soon, so Luther suggested she marry Caspar Glatz, an elderly minister pushing 70. The proposal was the final straw for the young and spirited Katharina. She decided to take matters into her own hands and wrote to Luther’s close friend Nicholas von Amsdorf declaring that while she would not be marrying Caspar Glatz, she was happy to entertain a proposal from either Nicholas himself or Martin Luther.

The Castle Church, Wittenberg, Germany

Whenever anyone dared suggest that he marry, Luther was quick to vehemently oppose the suggestion. When his friend Argula von Grumbach wrote to him urging him to seal his Protestant views by marrying he refused saying he couldn’t possibly take a wife when he daily expected martyrdom. But Luther changed his mind in June 1525, soon after Katharina’s bold letter to Nicholas von Amsdorf. Katharina von Bora and Martin Luther were married on the 13th of June 1525 by Luther’s close friend Johannes Bugenhagen. Luther was sixteen years older than his wife, cantankerous, temperamental and plagued by depression. Their union was not a love match, but they fell in love as time passed. Soon after his wedding Luther wrote to a friend confessing “I am not madly in love, but I cherish my wife.” A few years later he wrote “I would not change Katie for France or for Venice, for God has given her to me and other women have worse faults. She has a few but her virtues outweigh them.”

Luther had several nicknames for Katharina. Often, he referred to her as “My Lord Katie” in letters he wrote to his friends. Sometimes he called her The Morning Star of Wittenberg, because she rose at 4am in the summer and 5am in winter but also referencing her gifts and the impact she had on the small university town.

From the outset the Luthers’ marriage drew a storm of malicious opposition. One printed pamphlet which was publicly circulated called Katharina a fallen woman who had left God and forsaken Christ as her bridegroom. Some opponents declared that their union would produce the anti-Christ. Luther, ever pragmatic, told her that if he was burned, she would not escape his fate. One well-meaning friend wrote to Luther years later telling him that Katharina was the partner of his calamities. Much of what is known about Katie von Bora is through Luther’s letters to her. Sadly almost none of her letters to him have been preserved which is a revealing testament to how women and their work was viewed during the 16th century.

Market Square, Lutherstadt, Wittenberg, Germany

After her marriage Katharina had a lot to contend with. Martin Luther was not a very domesticated man; one story from the early years of their marriage recounts how he hadn’t washed his sheets for an entire year before he married. He simply fell into an unmade bed every night until the straw in his mattress decomposed, and he had to throw it away. When Katarina became mistress of Luther’s home everything was upended. She took the entire household in hand, rising early to manage not only the chores inside the home but also care for the gardens, fields, livestock and other industries associated with the abandoned Augustinian monastery they called home. She also managed the family finances, making sure that they stretched Luther’s modest salary to accommodate the growing demands on their hospitality.

Katarina was also good at caring for Luther’s many diseases, the chief of which were mental and emotional. But she could manage physical maladies as well and was skilled in working with herbs, poultices and various other natural remedies. One of her sons who later became a doctor praised her for being a skilled healer.

Luther’s home was unconventional for so many reasons. It functioned as a hostel for various Protestant refugees seeking shelter, a hospital where the sick could come for healing and an open house where anyone could drop in for a meal and a conversation with Doctor Luther, especially at dinner time.

Their home, the Black Cloister, had been the Augustinian monastery Luther lived in when he first arrived in Wittenberg as a monk. The residence was eventually emptied of monks as most of them either embraced Protestantism or chose to leave. The entire monastery was then loaned to Luther and finally gifted to him and Katharina by the Elector of Saxony.

The building had forty rooms on the first flour which were frequently occupied by asylum seekers, family members, guests or visiting scholars. Katarina charged boarders a fee, but asylum seekers and family members stayed in exchange for help around the house or fields.

Katarina ran the massive, complex household like a tight ship, finding creative ways to supplement Luther’s income to make ends meet. She herded, milked and slaughtered cattle, made butter and cheese, ran a brewery, planted a garden and orchard which supplied much of the household food and managed all the servants. She also kept an assortment of livestock – chickens, pigeons, geese and pigs – which were used to feed the ever-growing population in their noisy and bustling home.

Wittenberg, Germany

Luther was generally, blissfully unaware of the intricacies of running his large household. He was always ready to offer strangers shelter, take on new boarders or throw banquets on behalf of friends who had received a promotion or gotten married. When the growing financial demands threatened to outpace their income Katharina diversified her investments and interests. She bought real estate and planted crops which she sold for a profit to generate additional income.

When their eldest son Hans was born on the 7th of June 1526, Katharina added yet another role to her growing portfolio – she was now a mother, and she took her work in this area very seriously. The Luthers had six children, two of whom died. Their second child Elizabeth died before her first birthday prompting a grieving Luther to write to a friend saying “My little daughter Elizabeth is dead. I am left as weak as a woman. I would never have believed that the hearts of parents are so moved toward their children” After Elizabeth came Magdalena, then Martin, Paul and Margareta. When Magdalena was fourteen, she died, devastating her parents with the loss of yet another child. As she was buried Luther is reported to have said “my dear Lenchen you will rise and shine as the stars and the sun.”

Wittenberg, Germany

Of all the various gatherings the Luthers hosted the most famous were the frequent table talk sessions. Every evening when Luther was in town scholars from the university, students and other visiting reformers would gather round the dinner table to participate in a lively theological discussion. Katharina would often join these sessions and proved to be lively conversationalist and contributor. Luther often said she could teach an Englishman German better than he ever could. She was opinionated and unafraid to share her thoughts with the other men at the table. Once Luther suggested that Katie curb her incessant speech by saying the Lord’s prayer before she opened her mouth. Another time Luther tried to bribe her with fifty gulden to read the Bile from cover to cover by easter. She is reported to have said “I’ve read enough. I’ve heard enough. I know enough. Would to God, I lived it.” While Luther loved a good theological debate, Katharina was focused on practical Christianity.

After Luther death in 1546, Katharina struggled to make ends meet and care for her younger children. She rented out rooms in the cloister, bought another farm where she harvested and sold wheat for a modest profit and kept her gardens, orchards and brewery going. But Luther’s death sparked turmoil across the Holy Roman Empire. The conflict broke over Wittenberg when the emperor besieged it, forcing Katharina and the children to flee to Magdeburg. When the emperor’s troops finally withdrew Katie returned to Wittenberg to find her lands ravaged, her buildings burned, her livestock consumed by the army and her livelihood gutted. Providentially the Black Cloister remained offering her the opportunity to rebuild. Y

et her dreams for restoration were thwarted when the plague swept through Wittenberg forcing her and the children to evacuate once more. Only two of her children, Paul and Margaret remained with her and Katharina set out with them to Torgau in a wagon. While she was driving, most likely surrounded by a crowd of people as set on escaping as she was, the horses bolted in fright. Katharina struggled to regain control of the wagon, but she was thrown, landing on her back on the dirt road before rolling into a ditch of cold water. She was transported to Torgau where her daughter Margaret, who was then 18 nursed her but she never fully recovered from the accident.

Three months later, on December 20th, 1550, Katharina Luther passed to her rest. Her final words were reported to have been “I will stick to Christ, as a burr to a topcoat” Katharina von Bora was a woman of both character and courage. She was sensible and pragmatic yet as tender as she was hardheaded. Her determination and hard work enabled Martin Luther to become an effective minister. She made their home a centre for discipleship and a place of refuge to all those who needed shelter. Reflecting on both his marriage and Katharina’s presence in his life Luther often said, “let the wife make her husband glad to come home and let him make her sorry to see him leave”.

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