- Dr. Eck: Martin Luther! Do you think you are the only one who knows the truth?
- Martin Luther: I will tell you what I think. I have the right to believe freely. To be a slave to no man's authority. To confess what appears to me to be true whether it is proved or disapproved, whether it is spoken by Catholic or by heritic.
- Dr. Eck: Then you deny the authority of the pope!
- Martin Luther: In matters of faith, I think that neither council, nor pope, nor any man has power over my conscience. And where they disagree with scripture, I deny pope and council and all. A simple layman armed with scripture is greater than the mightiest pope without it.
- Dr. Eck: Heresy, Doctor Luther! Heresy!
- Martin Luther: Heresy? So be it. It is still the truth!
- Opening narration: Fifteen-hundred years after the birth of Our Lord, the lands and people of Central Europe comprised the Holy Roman Empire. A strange and mystical commonwealth which compelled allegiance both to emperor and pope. Powerful in this political structure were the rich states and free cities of Germany, whose princes and counselors commanded armies pledged to defend both Empire and Holy Roman Church. The pious believed God himself had established dual authority over Christian man. They accepted the emperor as ruler of life on earth, and the Church as intercessor for man's destiny in the world to come. The Church had largely forgotten the mercies of God, and instead it emphasized God's implacable judgements. Even Jesus Christ was presented as a relentless avenger, and man himself so hopelessly engulfed in sin that he must live in perpetual dread of a furious God. Painted constantly and vividly before his eyes were the fires and torments of Hell. The early sixteenth century was a time of deep-rooted superstition and fear. Christianity was mixed with elements of paganism, and men believed the world was filled with demons and evil spirits. For protection and deliverence from eternal damnation, the Church demanded absolute and unquestioning obedience of the people. On a mid-summer's day in fifteen-hundred and five, about a decade after Columbus discovered the New World, a young law student made his way through the marketplace in Erfurt, Germany. His name was Martin Luther.
- Inquisitor: Doctor Luther! Yesterday you admitted these writings were yours. Will you tell us now, do you persist in what you have written here, or are you prepared to retract these writings, and the beliefs they contain.
- Martin Luther: I ask pardon if I lack the manners that befit this court. I was not brought up in king's palaces, but in the seclusion of a cloister. I am asked to retract these writings, but they are of different kinds. In some I discuss faith and good works, if I were to retract these, I should be denying accepted Christian truths. In others, I attack popery, and assail men who have afflicted the Christian world and ruined the bodies and souls of other men. If I were to retract those, I should be like a cloak that covers evil. Most serene emperor, illustrious princes, noble lords, I am only a man, and not God. But I must defend myself as did Jesus Christ, when he said as I say now, if I have spoken evil bear witness against me.
- Inquisitor: Martin Luther, you have not yet answered the question. Give us a simple answer. Will you recant, or will you not?
- Martin Luther: You ask for a simple answer. Here it is. Unless you can convince me by scripture, and not by popes or councils, who have often contradicted each other. Unless I am so convinced that I am wrong, I am bound to my beliefs by the texts of the Bible. My conscience is captive to the word of God. To go against conscience is neither right, nor save. Therefore, I cannot, and I will not recant. Here I stand, I can do no other. God help me. Amen.
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