This chapter may be kept brief; it is only intended as a general survey of Luther's economic thought. Its main aim is to correct an earlier notion that Luther was either ignorant or disinterested in economic questions or that accordingly his economics was rather primitive. Neither of these charges is accurate. The key points of Luther's economics and business ethics can be grasped from the monographs and articles by Roscher, Schmoller, Barge, Fabiunke, Strohm, Scott, Pawlas and more recently the present author; as well as the monographs focused on particular aspects of Luther's economics, such as Prien's volume on business ethics, Rieth's volume on the concept of avarice in Luther's theology or Koch's more recent dissertation on business ethics from the Middle Ages to the modern period. They all have some minor as well as (in some cases) major weaknesses, and not always have they advanced the field considerably or significantly. The interpretation to be found in the following lines will, accordingly, differ in places. By sketching out the cornerstones of Luther's economic ideas, this will provide us with the context for the analytical summary of his Von Kauffshandlung und Wucher in (chapter 5).

Myths

As suggested in the introduction (chapter 1), there are many myths – let us call them oversimplified meta-narratives – about Luther and his times. Let us here consider only those relevant for the present purpose. An older tradition, based not only on Schmoller and Roscher but also on some twentieth-century Marxist historians and their concept of an Early Bourgeois Revolution, had it that at Luther's time early modern capitalism came to the fore and that Luther's economics, as well as the early mercantilist authors, with whom he shared some convictions (see chapter 5), would classify as the ‘first economic doctrine of the Bourgeoisie’. This is, of course, wrong. Capitalist practices, such as profit-making for profit's sake, had existed for ages. The thirteenth-century Italian giant family firms and ‘medieval super-companies’ of the Medici, Bardi and Perruzzi and thirteenth-century financial institutions in Siena and Genoa had provided the blueprint and algorithms for modern banking; setting the scene for the sixteenth-century Augsburg Fugger, Welser, Höchstetter and many others of the ‘last medieval super-companies’.