Luther's Passional

Especially at a time when literacy rates were low, the Passional was a popular form of instruction and devotion. It was Luther’s belief that children and the uneducated were “more apt to retain the divine stories when taught by picture and parable than merely by words or instruction.” In his 1522 Personal Prayer Book, reformer Dr. Martin Luther included 50 pages of woodcuts, together with the brief scriptural passage describing the scene. In the 1522 edition, the woodcuts were commissioned from printer Hans Lufft. They were replaced in the 1529 edition with woodcuts from Albrecht Dürer. Unable to locate either of those sets of woodcuts, this re-creation used the woodcuts of Gustave Doré, the 18th century French artist.