Erasmus and Luther

Hackett’s paired edition of the 1524-26 exchange over whether the will is free: Erasmus’s De libero arbitrio and Luther’s much longer and angrier reply, De servo arbitrio. Printing both sides together is the point — the disagreement is what separates the humanist project of reforming the church from the Reformation that broke it.

Why it’s on the list: It is assigned in Renaissance and Reformation between The Praise of Folly and Pico’s On the Dignity of Man, so students read Erasmus twice: once as the satirist of the old church, then as the man who would not follow Luther out of it.

Where I saw it: Assigned in Renaissance and Reformation on the University of Austin’s Fall 2025 reading list — “65 Texts Our Students Are Reading”, 65 assigned texts across 12 courses, shared by @uaustinorg on November 13 2025 and saved to Kyle’s Apple Note “Books To Read”. The full curriculum is transcribed on UATX Fall Reading List.

Connections

• UATX Fall Reading List — the curriculum this was assigned in.
• The University of Austin — the institution whose course list this is.
• Erasmus — one of the two authors.
• Martin Luther — the other.
• free will — the question at issue.
• Renaissance
• Christianity