1520

Luther's three reformation treatises and the bull "Exsurge Domine"

In 1520 Luther issued three programmatic works: "To the Christian Nobility of the German Nation", "On the Babylonian Captivity of the Church", and "On the Freedom of a Christian". In the first he called on secular rulers to convene a reforming church council and rejected the papalists' "three walls". In the second, drawing on humanist philology, he reduced the sacraments to two – baptism and the Eucharist. The third set out his doctrine of justification by faith alone.

That same year Pope Leo X's bull "Exsurge Domine" condemned Luther as a heretic. Luther publicly burned the bull together with books of canon law. This marked the final break with Rome.