This study is distinguished both by the originality of its questions and by the thorough and clear answers it provides based on the lucid interpretation of the sources. It contains a wealth of new insights regarding Luther's understanding of metaphor, his various forms of language, and above all the relationship between the universal priesthood and ordained ministry. The author succeeds in showing that both are not in competition with each other in Luther's work, but are mutually conditional. This brilliant, still highly topical standard work of Luther research had been out of print for some time. The unchanged reprint, which is supplemented by bibliographical references and a foreword by Wilfried Harle, appears on the occasion of the five hundredth anniversary of Luther's first statements on the doctrine of the universal priesthood.