One of the textual bases of the New Testament translation was the Latin and Greek versions, and its philological annotations, recently published by the Dutch Catholic humanist Erasmus of Rotterdam and called the Novum Testamentum omne (1519).

[7] Thanks to the then recently invented printing press,[8] the result was widely disseminated and contributed significantly to the development of today's modern High German language.

[9] Luther adopted more of a free phrase-by-phrase or dynamic equivalence translation approach and made use of some of Erasmus' Greek and annotations in his Novum Testamentum omne.

While he was sequestered in the Wartburg Castle for ten months (May 4, 1521–March 3, 1522),[15][16] Luther began to translate the New Testament from Latin and Greek[17][13] into Saxon German.

In the opinion of the 19th-century Protestant theologian and church historian Philip Schaff: The richest fruit of Luther's leisure in the Wartburg, and the most important and useful work of his whole life, is the translation of the New Testament, by which he brought the teaching and example of Christ and the Apostles to the mind and heart of the Germans in life-like reproduction.

[23] The translation of the entire Bible into German was published in a six-part edition in 1534, a collaborative effort of Luther and many others such as Johannes Bugenhagen, Justus Jonas, Caspar Creuziger, Philip Melanchthon, Matthäus Aurogallus, and Georg Rörer.

The Old Testament was translated using a Jewish Masoretic Text of Soncino, the Vulgate of Jerome, the Septuagint, and, later, Latin versions by Santes Pagnino and by Sebastian Münster.

[26] According to Biblical historian W. Gordon Campbell, Lufft's printing of the Bible was introduced for sale at the Michaelmas fair in Wittenberg.

However, the book remained too expensive for most people; an unbound copy of the complete 1534 Bible cost the equivalent of a month's wages for the average laborer.

Due to its fundamental importance for Protestantism, voices were soon raised that wanted to regulate the content of the Luther Bible, but such initiatives were regionally limited.

[31] In 1863, the Deutsche Evangelische Kirchenkonferenz (EKD, German Protestant Church Conference) decided to prepare a revision of the Luther Bible.

[32] Shortly after the first revision, the EKD realised that the Luther Bible contained too many archaisms and that the spelling did not conform to the current rules.

In 2017, on the 500th anniversary of Reformation Day and the posting of the Ninety-five Theses, the fourth official revision of the Luther Bible was published.

[40] The word "alone" does not appear in the Greek texts,[41] but Luther defended his translation by maintaining that the adverb "alone" was required both by idiomatic German and the apostle Paul's intended meaning according to his interpretation,[42] and that sola had been used in Western theological tradition before him.

Luther responded by making the point that his slogan encapsulated neatly the substance of the NT even if it did not use precisely its original words.

While the text of the 2017 version retains the disputed word "alone" (So halten wir nun dafür, dass der Mensch gerecht wird ohne des Gesetzes Werke, allein durch den Glauben), the footnote gives a "literal" translation (Wörtlich: »dass der Mensch aus Glauben gerechtfertigt wird, ohne Werke des Gesetzes«) for the second half of the verse.

In any case, it does not offer a philologically clean translation of the Bible.An example of this is Gal 5:6, where the usual translation "For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth any thing nor uncircumcision: but faith that worketh by love" is inverted to "love that works by faith": German: "Denn ynn Christo Jhesu gilt widder beschneydung noch vorhaut etwas, ßondern die liebe, die durch den glawben thettig (tätig) ist.

[citation needed] Luther also added German legal terminology which is not found in the original text, for example Denkzettel in Matthew 23:5.

These books and addenda to Biblical canon of the Old Testament are found in the ancient Greek Septuagint but not in the Hebrew Masoretic text.

[55] Though included, they were not numbered in the table of contents of his 1532 Old Testament, and in the 1534 Bible they were given the well-known title: "Apocrypha: These Books Are Not Held Equal to the Scriptures, but Are Useful and Good to Read".

This stemmed predominantly from his translation of the Bible into the vernacular, which was potentially as revolutionary as canon law and the burning of the papal bull.

[59] Luther's vernacular Bible came to be present in virtually every German-speaking Protestant's home, and increased the Biblical knowledge of the German common masses.

[58] Luther's goal was to equip every German-speaking Christian with the ability to hear the Word of God,[citation needed] and his completing his translation of the Old and New Testaments from Hebrew and Greek into the vernacular by 1534 was one of the most significant acts of the Reformation.

In a few months such people deemed themselves so learned that they were not ashamed to dispute about faith and the gospel not only with Catholic laymen, but even with priests and monks and doctors of divinity.

German-speaking Protestant writers and poets such as Klopstock, Herder, and Lessing owe stylistic qualities to Luther's vernacular Bible.

[75] Luther's program of exposure to the words of the Bible was extended into every sphere of daily life and work, illuminating moral considerations for Germans.

[75] According to some hagiographers, the popularity and influence of his translation gave Luther confidence to act as a spokesperson of a nation and as the leader of an anti-Roman movement throughout Germany.

[dubious – discuss] Luther's vernacular Bible broke the domination and unity of the Roman Catholic Church in Western Europe.

[84] Luther believed that mankind had fallen from grace and was ruled by selfishness, but had not lost moral consciousness: all were sinners and needed to be educated.

The possibility of understanding the vernacular Bible allowed Luther to found a State Church and educate his followers into a law-abiding community.