Some nations have tried to copy Finland’s success. Partly, that is possible. But they do well to take those people in account.
Martin Luther is best known for having launched the Reformation through Ninety-Five Theses at the castle church in Wittenberg, in 1517. Yet, his letter “To the Christian Nobility of the German Nation”, written three years later, was probably the second most important event of the Reformation.
Since the Bible was the ultimate authority, Luther believed that everyone ought to be able to read it. Education was key for this. Luther called the nobles of Germany to plant schools all over the land. Luther’s work paved the way for universal education.
Luther’s principles arrived in Finland through Mikael Agricola. The Finnish reformer had been a pupil of Luther and Melanchthon in Wittenberg.
After his return to Finland, Agricola knew that he needed to translate the Bible in the Finnish language. However, this task was much more arduous for him than it had been for Luther when he translated the Bible into German.
Until then, Finnish had never been written. It was Agricola who first standardised the language and wrote a book called “ABC-Kirja” (1543) to teach Finnish grammar to the children. This was the first textbook of Finnish education.
Agricola also started to translate the Bible but died before being able to finish the work.
The Reformation was impeded in the kingdom of Sweden –to which Finland belonged– in the second half of the sixteenth century. Agricola’s translation of the Bible remained unfinished for over a century, and Christian education was certainly not reaching everyone either.
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