Luther’s Lectures on Genesis and the Formation of Evangelical Identity 9780271091020

Citation preview

Luther's Genesis.book Page i Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:24 AM

Luther’s Lectures on Genesis and the Formation of Evangelical Identity

Luther's Genesis.book Page ii Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:24 AM

Habent sua fata libelli

SIXTEENTH CENTURY ESSAYS & STUDIES SERIES GENERAL EDITOR Michael Wolfe St. John’s University EDITORIAL BOARD OF SIXTEENTH CENTURY ESSAYS & STUDIES ELAINE BEILIN Framingham State College

RAYMOND A. MENTZER University of Iowa

CHRISTOPHER CELENZA Johns Hopkins University

HELEN NADER University of Arizona

MIRIAM U. CHRISMAN University of Massachusetts, Emerita BARBARA B. DIEFENDORF Boston University PAULA FINDLEN Stanford University SCOTT H. HENDRIX Princeton Theological Seminary

CHARLES G. NAUERT University of Missouri, Emeritus MAX REINHART University of Georgia SHERYL E. REISS Cornell University ROBERT V. SCHNUCKER Truman State University, Emeritus

JANE CAMPBELL HUTCHISON University of Wisconsin–Madison

NICHOLAS TERPSTRA University of Toronto

ROBERT M. KINGDON University of Wisconsin, Emeritus

MARGO TODD University of Pennsylvania

RONALD LOVE University of West Georgia MARY B. MCKINLEY University of Virginia

JAMES TRACY University of Minnesota MERRY WIESNER–HANKS University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee

Luther's Genesis.book Page iii Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:24 AM

/XWKHU·V/HFWXUHV WV *HQHVLV IVL\PM )RUPDWLRQ WN (YDQJHOLFDO

,GHQWLW\

-RKQ$0D[ILHOG

3IXTEENTH#ENTURY%SSAYS3TUDIES 4RUMAN3TATE5NIVERSITY0RESS

front matter_Luther Page iv Friday, December 28, 2007 8:41 AM

Copyright © 2008 Truman State University Press, Kirksville, Missouri USA All rights reserved tsup.truman.edu Cover art: Detail, epitaph for Pastor Johannes Weidner (d. 1606) and his family, St. Michael’s Church, Schwäbisch Hall. Photograph by the author. Cover design: Teresa Wheeler Type: Minion Pro © Adobe Systems Inc. Printed by: Thomson-Shore, Dexter, Michigan USA

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Maxfield, John A., 1963– Luther’s lectures on Genesis and the formation of evangelical identity / John A. Maxfield. p. cm. — (Sixteenth century essays and studies ; v. 80) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-931112-75-8 (hardback : alk. paper) ISBN 978-1-935503-51-4 (e-book) 1. Luther, Martin, 1483–1546. 2. Bible. O.T. Genesis—Criticism, interpretation, etc.—History—16th century. I. Title. BR333.5.B5M39 2008 222'.1106092—dc22 2007051722

No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any format by any means without written permission from the publisher. The paper in this publication meets or exceeds the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48–1992.

front matter_Luther Page v Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:14 PM

In memory of my grandfather George Oliver Lillegard missionary, pastor, professor of exegesis and Greek, and preacher on the book of Genesis

Luther's Genesis.book Page vi Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:24 AM

Johann Reifenstein. Luther Lecturing in 1545. Pen and ink drawing. Photograph courtesy of Stiftung Luthergedenkstätten in Sachsen-Anhalt.

Luther's Genesis.book Page vii Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:24 AM

Spoken words possess an indefinable hidden power, and teaching that passed directly from the mouth of the speaker into the ears of the disciples is more impressive than any other —Jerome to Paulinus, Ep. 53 (AD 394)

After speaking these prayers several times, he was called by God into the everlasting School and into everlasting joys, in which he enjoyed the company of the Father, Son, Holy Spirit, and of all the Prophets and Apostles —Philip Melanchthon, History of the Life and Acts of the Most Reverend Dr. Martin Luther

Luther's Genesis.book Page viii Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:24 AM

BLANK

Luther's Genesis.book Page ix Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:24 AM

Contents Figures

x

Acknowledgments

xi

A Note on Translations

xiii

Abbreviations

xiv

Introduction WHY THE GENESIS LECTURES?

1

The Genesis Lectures and Luther’s World of Faith

One PROPHETS AND APOSTLES AT THE PROFESSOR’S LECTERN

10

A Deluge of Books — A Book to Be Heard — Engaging His Students — A Window into the Lecture Hall

Two THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

32

Genesis—The First Book of Moses and the Holy Spirit — Divine Scripture and Human Authorities — The Limits of Philology — Genesis as Christian Revelation — The Exercise of the Word

Three THE ARENA OF GOD’S PLAY—CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

73

Holy Place, Holy Work, and Holy Order — Civil Government as Holy Order — The Household as Holy Order — The Distinctive Holiness of Christian Life in the World — The True Contemplative Life

Four THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

141

Humanism and History — Genesis as the History of the Church between God and the Devil — Luther as Humanist and Historian

Five THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD IN THE LAST DAYS

180

The Ministry of Angels — A Golden Age and the Dregs of Time — Interpreting the Times

Epilogue

215

Bibliography

223

Index

237

Luther's Genesis.book Page x Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:24 AM

Figures All figures (except the frontispiece) are referenced in the text. Frontis

Johann Reifenstein. Luther Lecturing in 1545

vi

Lucas Cranach the Younger. Prince John Frederick and Martin Luther Witnessing the Baptism of Christ

85

Fig 2

Lucas Cranach the Younger. Four Executed Criminals

90

Fig 3

Lucas Cranach the Younger. Evangelical Service and the Damnation of Papal Clergy

Fig 4

Lucas Cranach the Younger. Evangelical and Catholic Services

Fig 5

Epitaph for Margarete Brenz (1500–48), St. Michael’s Church, Schwäbisch Hall

136

Epitaph for Pastor Johannes Weidner (d. 1606) and his family, St. Michael’s Church, Schwäbisch Hall

137

Detail, epitaph for Pastor Johannes Weidner (d. 1606) and his family, St. Michael’s Church, Schwäbisch Hall

138

Fig. 1

Fig 6 Fig 7

x

103 104–5

Luther's Genesis.book Page xi Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:24 AM

Acknowledgments This book grew out of my doctoral dissertation, which was accepted by the faculty of Princeton Theological Seminary in May 2004. Like the dissertation that preceded it, the book arrives with many debts. Prior to doctoral studies at Princeton, my study of history and theology was shaped by professors at Gettysburg College, Concordia Theological Seminary, Indiana University, and the Pennsylvania State University. My first introduction to Luther’s Genesis lectures was provided by a course of lectures and readings given by Dr. Ulrich Asendorf as a visiting scholar at Concordia Theological Seminary in 1993. During doctoral studies, my research in the lectures was facilitated by two seminars in Luther interpretation by Dr. Scott Hendrix and one on Renaissance historiography and constructions of the past by Dr. Anthony Grafton of Princeton University. The members of my dissertation committee—Dr. Scott Hendrix, Dr. Paul Rorem, Dr. Anthony Grafton, and, prior to her sabbatical leave, Dr. Elsie McKee—provided careful guidance for my project from the initial proposal through review of the dissertation draft and its revision. I am particularly indebted to the steady stream of constructive criticism and meticulous editorial advice of Dr. Scott Hendrix. I am also grateful to Professor Emeritus Gottfried Seebaß of the University of Heidelberg for providing office space and assistance during the final six months of my dissertation research and writing. Further research for revision of the book was facilitated by the collections at Luther Seminary Library in St. Paul, Minnesota. After submission to the general editor of the Sixteenth Century Essays and Studies series, Dr. Raymond Mentzer, two anonymous readers offered reports that contained helpful suggestions for further developing the book and pointed out xi

Luther's Genesis.book Page xii Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:24 AM

xii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

various matters of detail that needed additional attention. Prior to submission of the revised draft to Truman State University Press, my wife, Jennifer, carefully read through the entire manuscript and offered invaluable assistance in making the prose more concise and clear. Truman State University Press project editor Barbara Smith-Mandell offered detailed criticism of the manuscript and concrete suggestions that further improved the work as it moved through another revision prior to final copyediting. This book is dedicated to the memory of my maternal grandfather, the Rev. George Oliver Lillegard, who devoted his life to the preaching of the gospel and who shaped in his family and parishioners a deeply Lutheran identity, an identity formed in part through his own reading of Luther’s Genesis lectures and by preaching on the Genesis narrative at Harvard Street Lutheran Church in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Luther's Genesis.book Page xiii Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:24 AM

A Note on Translations My study of the Genesis lectures was of course greatly facilitated by the English translation in volumes 1 through 8 of the American edition of Luther’s Works. I also utilized this edition in quotations, but have revised the translation wherever it seemed appropriate to use a more literal rendering of the syntax and vocabulary of Luther’s Latin as given in the critical edition (Weimarer Ausgabe). The frequent use of German phrases in this Latin text, which is lost in the American edition but which appears conspicuously as a bolder type in the original sixteenth-century imprints, is made evident through the use of italics in the quotations, and this is noted in the footnotes. The biblical references that were generously added to the text in the American edition are omitted, except where these are given in the text (and not just the margin) of the Weimar edition, as these reflect the references in the original imprints. To convey in part the way the printed edition of the lectures originally appeared, I have also generally reproduced use of capital letters according to the orthography of the sixteenth-century editions. My translation of the biblical text of Genesis from the Latin of the Weimar edition is also revised where necessary from the translation given in the American edition. Unless otherwise noted, translations from other modern works or editions in foreign languages are my own.

xiii

Luther's Genesis.book Page xiv Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:24 AM

Abbreviations MODERN EDITIONS OF LUTHER’S WORKS LW

Luther, Martin. Luther’s Works. American Edition. Edited by Jaroslav Pelikan, Hilton C. Oswald, and Helmut T. Lehmann. 55 vols. Saint Louis and Philadelphia: Concordia Publishing House and Fortress Press, 1955–86. St.A Luther, Martin. Studienausgabe. 6 vols. Edited by Hans-Ulrich Delius. Berlin, later Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 1987–99. WA D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe. Edited by J. F. K. Knaake et al. 65 vols. Weimar: Böhlau, 1883–. WA Tr D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe, Tischreden. 6 vols. Weimar: Böhlau, 1912–21.

TRANSLATIONS OF THE BIBLE NKJV New King James Version. Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1984.

OTHER WORKS CCSL Corpus Christianorum. Series Latina. 176 vols. Turnhout: Brepols, 1953–. CR Corpus Reformatorum. Philip Melanthonis opera quae supersunt omnia. Edited by Karl Gottlief Bretschneider and Heinrich Ernst Bindseil. 28 vols. Halle, later Braunschweig: Schwetschke, 1834–60.

xiv

Luther's Genesis.book Page 1 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

Introduction

Why the Genesis Lectures? THE GENESIS LECTURES AND LUTHER’S WORLD OF FAITH During the last decade of his life, from 1535 to 1545, the German Reformer and University of Wittenberg professor Dr. Martin Luther lectured twice a week, though with some extended interruptions, on the book of Genesis. These lectures were taken down as stenographic notes by several of his students and later edited and published in four volumes beginning in 1544. In his biography of Luther, Heiko A. Oberman wrote that these lectures on Genesis, long ignored by modern researchers because the text was produced from the students’ notebooks rather than by the Reformer himself, are worthy of serving “as an introduction to Luther’s world of faith.”1 Wrestling with this fascinating and expansive text confirms Oberman’s view; this study provides just such an introduction. The object of this study is not to examine the relationship of Luther’s interpretation of scripture to his theological discoveries and intellectual development. Nor is it to study the Reformer’s hermeneutic principles, his exegesis as it relates to the history of biblical interpretation, or even the theological treasures he mines from the text of the first book of the Bible. Rather, this study is an investigation into Luther’s practice of lecturing on the biblical text in the oral and aural environment of his university classroom. The lectures on Genesis open a window into Luther’s lecture hall during the last decade of his life, allowing modern readers to view a sixteenth-century professor engaging his students with the text of scripture 1Oberman,

Luther, 166–67.

1

Luther's Genesis.book Page 2 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

2

INTRODUCTION

and using that text to form them spiritually.2 In the process, Luther attempted to form in his students a new identity—an Evangelical identity—enabling them to make sense of the rapidly changing society and church in which they were being prepared to serve, primarily as pastors in the developing territorial churches of the Reformation.3 In the later 1520s through the 1540s, the break that had occurred between the papal church and the Reformer (and excommunicated heretic) Martin Luther expanded and solidified to become the major schism within the western Catholic Church that has endured for nearly five hundred years. During the last two decades of his life, Luther was not only ecclesiastically and politically active in leading the Evangelical reform movement centered at Wittenberg; he was also active in shaping the Reformation through his position as professor at the university. Even before Lutheran confessionalization became a political and institutional process, Luther was engaging his students in a theological and intellectual process throughout his career as a professor of Bible that was foundational for the later process of confessionalization.4 Luther’s Genesis lectures shed light on how he used scripture to instill in his students a worldview that reflected the ideals of the Lutheran Reformation and that, therefore, contributed to the break between Evangelicals and those who remained within the papal church. Although the layers between what Luther actually said in the classroom and what his students wrote down and later edited and published cannot be clearly distinguished, the text of the lectures nevertheless reveals an important connection between the Reformer’s mature thought and the emerging identity of confessional Lutheranism.

2Mickey Mattox likewise notes in his study of the Genesis lectures that the published text of the lectures “take[s] us into Luther’s classroom, showing both how he tried to shape the faith of the coming generation, and the continuity he saw between his interpretation of the Bible and the premodern traditions of Christian exegesis.” Mattox, Defender of the Most Holy Matriarchs, 10. 3Thus, this study is in the genre of the “history of thought,” which Heiko A. Oberman distinguished from intellectual history and defended from its social historian critics by describing it as “the story of how people come to grips, both intellectually and emotionally, with the circumstances and conditions of their life.” Oberman, Reformation: Roots and Ramifications, 1. Since this book focuses on Luther’s thought and activity in the classroom and not on how his students may have appropriated his teaching, identity formation is defined in terms of what Luther was attempting to accomplish in shaping that identity, and shows how Luther’s activity as a teacher and aspects of his thought formed an important layer of the background to that process. 4For confessionalization as an institutional and political process, see Schilling, “Confessional Europe,” and the bibliography given there; see also Hendrix, Recultivating the Vineyard, 148–60.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 3 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

WHY THE GENESIS LECTURES?

3

This study uses the term Evangelical for the new identity Luther was seeking to form in his students because this was the term most commonly used in sixteenth-century Germany for Luther and his followers. The term is capitalized because in the course of the Reformation, specifically in the 1520s to 1540s, the adjective evangelical began to be used as a noun to define a movement and then a group of urban and territorial churches. This evolution of usage is reminiscent of the way the adjective catholic (meaning “universal”) changed into a proper noun during the Arian and the Donatist controversies of the fourth century. After those controversies, the term catholic no longer meant simply the universal church but came to denote the Catholic Church in its creedal orthodoxy in contrast to the Arian heretics and later its Catholic unity as opposed to the schismatic churches championed by the Donatist party. In the West during the Middle Ages, Catholic orthodoxy and unity were inseparable from the papacy at Rome and the cultural identity of western Christendom as one of the heirs of Romanitas, that is, the Roman Empire and its culture.5 With the Reformation, this view of Christendom was challenged and the structural unity of the Roman Catholic Church was broken. The term Evangelical in the sixteenth century first of all denoted the German Evangelical movement led by Luther and his followers but was broadened to include other reformers who sometimes established different, even competing agendas for the reformation of Christendom.6 The term distinguished those who adopted the Reformation from adherents of the papal church, the Roman Catholic Church. It also distinguished the churches of the magisterial Reformation—that is, the Reformation as accepted and put into lawful practice by various German states and cities—from the Anabaptists and other radical movements. When the confessional separation of Lutherans from other Evangelicals became an established fact in the course of the German Reformation, the Evangelical church splintered into Evangelical-Lutheran and Evangelical-Reformed communions, but these terms reflect usage after Luther’s lifetime. For Luther, reformers and their followers who defined themselves in ways other than according to his own understanding of the gospel (including the sacraments) were in no way Evangelicals but were Schwärmer or “Sacramentarians,” terms Luther 5On the development and cultural identity of western Christendom, see especially Brown, Rise of Western Christendom; and Herrin, Formation of Christendom. 6On the agendas for the reformation of Christendom in the sixteenth century, diverse in belief and practice but sharing the common goal of a reinvigorated Christian faith and life, see Hendrix, Recultivating the Vineyard.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 4 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

4

INTRODUCTION

often used for Anabaptist “fanatics” and those who rejected his traditional belief in the sacrament of the altar as the gift of Christ’s true body and blood for Christians to eat and to drink. The use here of the term Evangelical, therefore, focuses on the context of the 1530s and 1540s and on the Evangelical movement led by Luther, with Wittenberg as its center. This use of Evangelical should not be confused with later attempts to unite Lutherans with various Reformed churches—either in a union church as in nineteenth- and twentieth-century Germany or in a generic evangelical Protestantism as in the United States. Nor should use of the term in its sixteenth-century context be confused with its predominant usage in much of Anglo-Christianity today, where evangelical usually denotes a conservative Protestantism that has emerged from the revivalism of eighteenthand nineteenth-century Britain and America. This use of terms is also quite different from that of Mickey Mattox in his study of Luther’s interpretation of women in the Genesis narrative. His use of the words catholic and evangelical strictly as adjectives explains a critical difference in interpretation. Mattox provides a detailed study of passages of the Genesis lectures in the context of the history of biblical interpretation, while the present study unveils how the Genesis lectures as a whole reveal the broader contours of Luther’s worldview in the last decade of his life. Mattox concludes that Luther’s interpretation of the women of Genesis was catholic and evangelical. By this, he means first of all that Luther’s interpretations were often traditional, revealing engagement with and often acceptance of patristic and medieval interpretations. At the same time, Luther’s interpretations of these narratives clearly bear the marks of his distinctly evangelical theology, which Mattox succinctly terms a “theology of word and faith.”7 Without disagreeing with Mattox’s conclusions, this study presents a different perception of what Luther was doing (or attempting to do) in the lecture hall. Luther’s “world of faith”—as revealed in the Genesis lectures—was marked by elements that were radically untraditional. Indeed, Luther’s teachings in his university classroom were hostile to many medieval Catholic traditions of Christian faith and life and to the ecclesiastical structures of the papal church, from which, by the 1530s, he had made a decisive break. This is true, first of all, of the task of biblical exposition, despite the continuities that remain. But more importantly, Luther’s break 7Mattox, Defender of the Most Holy Matriarchs, esp. 14–28, 109–10, 126–27, 135–37, 197–98, 225, 250–52.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 5 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

WHY THE GENESIS LECTURES?

5

with Catholic tradition concerned the very nature of Christian faith— therefore the very nature of Christian life in the present as well as in the past and the future. As he viewed through the mirror of the Genesis narrative his own experience as a Christian whose understanding of the gospel had been rejected and condemned by the papal magisterium, Luther attempted to fashion in his students a new identity, shaped by the interpretive mirror of God’s word. An essential aspect of that identity in the 1530s and 1540s (and later) was that Catholic and Evangelical were no longer compatible adjectives but incompatible nouns identifying conflicting understandings of Christian faith and life. The terms represented identities in conflict and beliefs worth dying for.8 This study uses the text of the lectures to outline the contours of the new identity that Luther laid out through his exposition of Genesis. Those contours structure the chapters of the book: how Luther approached and taught his students to perceive the text of holy scripture; how that text unveiled for Luther the nature of Christian life in the world; and how Luther viewed and taught his students to view the past, the present, and the future of the church and the world through the book of Genesis. Joseph Lortz once wrote that Luther’s use of language is so powerful that “one is tempted simply to quote him.”9 Indeed, Luther’s language is the key that opens the window into his lecture hall. Extensively summarizing details of the lectures and including long quotations provides the reader with an accessible introduction to the older Luther’s world of thought and an understanding of the way Luther used scripture in the exercise of spiritual formation. As Luther himself noted, the text of the Genesis lectures is often rambling and repetitive; it is an oral exercise in the word of God rather than a polished commentary developed for publication. Still, over the course of ten years, hundreds of students, whether they heard only portions of the lectures or the whole, were exposed to central themes that their professor worked and reworked over time. The most important of these themes are brought to the fore in this study in a way that introduces the whole, preserving as much as possible the way Luther developed these themes from the Genesis story.10 8On the willingness of sixteenth-century Christians of various confessions to die for their beliefs at the hands of other Christians, and sometimes to kill in order to protect the civil and ecclesiastical community from the attacks or conscientious objections of dissenters, see Gregory, Salvation at Stake. 9See also the context of this remark in Lortz, “Basic Elements of Luther’s Intellectual Style,“ 5–6. 10The lectures are a massive work of four folio volumes of Latin text in the original published form (the volumes appearing between 1544 and 1554), three large volumes in the critical edition XXXXXXXXX

Luther's Genesis.book Page 6 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

INTRODUCTION

6

FROM LECTURE TO TEXT Characterizing the published text of the Genesis lectures as a window into Luther’s expository practice in his university classroom raises the thorny issue of the relationship between that environment and the printed redaction of the lectures. This is especially important in view of the claims made by Peter Meinhold in 1936 that the Genesis lectures, as published initially under the leadership of Luther’s former student Veit Dietrich, are not an accurate record of what Luther actually said. Rather, Meinhold argued, they are thoroughly reworked commentaries that contain traces of a theology alien to Luther and were shaped significantly by editors who had been deeply influenced by the maturing (and different) theology of Luther’s colleague Philip Melanchthon.11 Meinhold’s conclusions have been criticized as a heavy-handed and flawed analysis that judges the reliability of the published Genesis lectures according to an abstract construct of what he believed distinguished Luther’s theology from that of the students who prepared the lectures for publication. Scholars today either qualify or abandon Meinhold’s skepticism and view the published Genesis lectures, in the words of one scholar, as “an indispensable source for our knowledge of Luther’s thought.” 12 Three arguments suffice to show why investigation of these lectures, despite the provenance of their publication, will bear considerable fruit for the understanding of Luther’s activity as a lecturer on the Bible. First, Luther himself was quite aware that others reworked his oral lectures into published commentaries, a practice begun by Melanchthon in 1519 with his publication of Luther’s In epistolam Pauli ad Galatas, F. Martini Lutheri Augustiniani, commentarius. While Luther occasionally complained about a specific edition or passage and even the whole idea of preserving his works for posterity, he never prevented the publication of

11

(WA), and eight volumes in English translation (LW). 11Meinhold, Genesisvorlesung Luthers, 5, 370–428. 12Jaroslav Pelikan drew this conclusion despite some skepticism induced by Meinhold’s arguments; see Pelikan’s introduction to the lectures, LW 1:xii. Similar judgments are made by Martin Brecht (Martin Luther: The Preservation of the Church, 136) and Heiko A. Oberman (Luther, 166–67). Ulrich Asendorf (Lectura in Biblia, 33–39) gives an even more positive assessment of the lectures’ reliability in his extended discussion of Meinhold. Hans-Ulrich Delius (Quellen, 12) also declines to accept Meinhold’s judgment, in particular regarding the citations in the text from Nicholas of Lyra. Mattox (Defender of the Most Holy Matriarchs, 264–73) has convincingly refuted several of Meinhold’s specific arguments regarding anachronisms and other marks of editorial redaction, and has collected the arguments of several scholars against Meinhold’s conclusions.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 7 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

WHY THE GENESIS LECTURES?

7

his works as edited by others.13 Quite often, he supplied a preface of his own to the edited work. The first volume of his Genesis lectures, entitled In primum librum Mose enarrationes, appeared in 1544 and contained Luther’s own preface and postscript; thus his acceptance of the volume was not tacit but clearly articulated. In the preface, Luther wrote: These lectures fell into the hands of two collectors, good and pious men.… To be sure, all faithful and zealous ministers of the word of God judged that [the lectures] ought to be published. For my part, I leave them to their own judgment, so that I employ the word of Paul and I see that they are moved by pious zeal to help the churches of God, and certainly I approve their desire and pray for the abundant blessing of God.

In the postscript, the Reformer likewise noted his approval of the publication and conveyed his hope “that this work of mine will be of some benefit to the godly, and that it will please them.”14 Bernhard Klaus argues persuasively that the sixteenth-century editions of Luther’s sermons and lectures must be evaluated on principles based on a different canon than those commonly used by modern Luther researchers as they attempt to reconstruct Luther’s theology. Rather, the editions should be evaluated according to the editors’ aim (and the readers’ demand) to make the “pure teaching, true theology, and true and proper exposition of scripture” of the Wittenberg Reformation available for use in the church.15 What was important to sixteenth-century editors and readers was the content of the published lectures as the preserved legacy of Luther’s teaching and their utility for the church’s proclamation of the purified gospel. This content—including the ways Luther used language and what this reveals about the mature Luther, about his conduct in the lecture hall, and about the Wittenberg Reformation in the last decade of the Reformer’s life—is the focus of this study.

13See Klaus, “Lutherüberlieferung,” 37–42, 44; and the introduction to Luther's lectures on Galatians in WA 57 (Galaterbrief ): xv–xx. Luther was not the only professor whose lectures were published from students’ notebooks. On the practice among Italian humanists, see Grafton and Jardine, From Humanism to the Humanities, esp. 64–65. 14WA 42:1.14–22; and WA 42:428.19–20 (LW 2:235). 15See Klaus, “Lutherüberlieferung,” 43, 47. See also the detailed treatment given to Dietrich’s editing of Luther’s exegetical works in Klaus, Veit Dietrich, 337–50; and the older essay of Albert Freitag, “Veit Dietrichs Anteil an der Lutherüberlieferung.” Following Klaus, Mattox concludes, “Such works as the Enarrationes [the published Genesis lectures] therefore mediate Luther very much as he wished to be known.” Mattox, Defender of the Most Holy Matriarchs, 272.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 8 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

8

INTRODUCTION

Second, evaluation of that content—and the fair question of whether the printed text accurately reflects Luther’s words in the classroom—must proceed not on the basis of comparison with his early thought or with modern scholars’ constructs of what distinguished Luther’s theology from that of his students, but on the basis of comparison with other clearly reliable texts of Luther’s from this late period. Examination of parallel texts and historical contexts supports the conclusion that the Genesis lectures reveal Luther engaging the scripture in such a way that the word of God provides a commentary on the many concerns and crises that Luther and his university faced in the 1530s and 1540s. The text of the Genesis lectures itself indicates where Luther’s voice is indeed being heard, where an editor on occasion adapts his words for a published medium, and perhaps even where the editors inadvertently or purposefully interpolated passages with ideas that are not easily reconciled with what is known about Luther as an older man.16 But the burden of proof in such questions is on those who assert that a specific passage is not true to what is known from other sources about Luther in the last decade of his life. Finally, the question of whether the text of the Genesis lectures conveys Luther’s actual words becomes largely irrelevant in view of how subsequent generations of Lutherans received this text. Erich Seeberg noted in 1932 that “the foundation [Urgestein] of Lutheran theology is again and again established in the edition of the Genesis lectures.”17 This modern judgment reflects the enthusiasm with which the publication of the lectures was pursued and the final product was received, a topic that goes beyond the present study. Indeed, the first charge that the published In primum librum Mose enarrationes was a compromised text appeared among those seeking to discredit Melanchthon’s leadership of the Wittenberg Reformation already during the crisis over the Augsburg Interim imposed by Charles V after his military victory over the Evangelical princes of the Schmalkaldic League in 1547 and, in their view, Melanchthon’s failure of leadership after Luther’s death.18 But the charge did not stick in the sixteenth century. Rather, the text itself had considerable influence upon subsequent generations of Lutherans in Wittenberg and 16See Forsberg, Das Abrahambild in der Theologie Luthers, 6, where he argues that the editors’ occasional insertions can be distinguished from the genuine material. Forsberg uses both Meinhold’s criteria and writings of the older Luther to make his judgments. 17Seeberg, Studien zu Luthers Genesisvorlesung, 9. 18Meinhold, Genesisvorlesung Luthers, 30. See also Olson, Matthias Flacius and the Survival of Luther’s Reform.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 9 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

WHY THE GENESIS LECTURES?

9

beyond. The fact that Luther’s students recorded his words and prepared them for publication is an asset for this investigation insofar as the text records what the students wrote down, that is, what they heard Luther saying in the lecture hall. Whether the historic Luther was misunderstood or was transformed in some way into the prophetic Luther of later memory, the text reveals the Luther that his students heard and subsequent generations read.19 In this oral environment largely preserved in the written text, one first finds Luther working with the scripture to form his students spiritually as he teaches them how to perceive and hear the Bible as the word of God. Second, Luther addresses the present with a new Evangelical understanding of Christian holiness and life, defined by the activity of God in justifying sinners and making them holy, as that divine activity is unveiled in the narrative of the patriarchs. Third, Luther conveys a new Evangelical understanding of the church, shaped by a reconstruction of the church’s past as it has existed since Adam. Finally, Luther prepares his students for an embattled present and an uncertain future as the attacks of the devil and his minions against the rediscovered gospel were increasing in intensity in the last days. Through these themes, a clear picture emerges of the new identity Luther had developed in his own mind as an Evangelical Christian no longer bound to the papacy at Rome, an identity that he attempted to instill in his students through his lectures on the book of Genesis. Some of these students viewed that oral engagement as significant enough to pass down in printed form to later generations. They entitled these lectures “Enarrationes on the First Book of Moses of the Reverend Father Herr Doctor Martin Luther, full of wholesome and of Christian erudition, faithfully and diligently collected.”20

19On the central role Veit Dietrich played in this transmission of Luther’s theology, see Klaus, “Lutherüberlieferung,” 45. On the image of Luther among his followers and the effort to preserve his writings, see also Kolb, Martin Luther as Prophet, Teacher, and Hero, esp. 137–54. On the use of Luther’s Genesis lectures by subsequent interpreters of Genesis in their own exegetical works, see Mattox, Defender of the Most Holy Matriarchs, esp. 211–23, 243–47. 20From the title page of the 1544 Wittenberg edition of the first volume of the Genesis lectures: “In primum librum Mose enarrationes, Reverendi Patris D. D. Martini Lutheri, plenae salutaris & Christiane eruditinis, Bona fide & diligenter collectae.” Humanists used the term enarratio to describe a line-by-line commentary on classical texts.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 10 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

Chapter One

Prophets and Apostles at the Professor’s Lectern A DELUGE OF BOOKS In his preface to the 1539 Wittenberg edition of his German writings, the fifty-five-year-old Doctor Martin Luther expressed reluctance about his books going to print. There was nothing new about the demand for Luther’s works to be published, and the Reformer had never before hesitated to utilize the power of the printed treatise in furthering his agenda. Modern scholars regard the Reformation as a revolution unleashed by the printing press, and Luther himself is recognized as the greatest master of the printed text in his age. But in the 1530s, there was something new afoot regarding Luther and his writings. Pressure was mounting for a collected edition of Luther’s writings in both German and Latin. Sermons and treatises composed for specific occasions, some edifying, many polemical, were to be preserved for posterity, and Luther didn’t like it. He expressed his disapproval in letters, in conversations at table, and now in the preface for an edition that he could not hold back. 1 “Gladly would I have seen my books altogether remain in obscurity and gone to ruin,” he begins, and he cites reasons. He shudders at the example he is giving, for the church has built up vast libraries of many books in addition to the holy scripture, yet to little profit.2 Precious time 1See 2WA

WA 50:654; and LW 34:281–82 for a selection of texts. 50:657.1–8 (LW 34:283). Luther expressed a similar regret about his own books distracting

XXXXX

10

Luther's Genesis.book Page 11 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

PROPHETS AND APOSTLES AT THE PROFESSOR’S LECTERN

11

that could be used to study the scripture slips by, the pure knowledge of God’s word is finally lost, and the Bible lies forgotten in the dust. Luther acknowledges that it is profitable and necessary that some writings of the church fathers and councils have remained “as witnesses and histories.” Nevertheless he does not think it a shame “that many books of the fathers and councils have by God’s grace gone to ruin. For had they all remained, no one could have gone in or out for all the books, and still they would not have done better than one finds in the holy scripture.” When Luther and others took up the task of translating the whole Bible into German, it was their hope that there would be less writing and more studying and reading of the scripture. “For all other writings ought to lead into and to the scripture, as John to Christ—as he says: ‘I must decrease; this one must increase’—in order that anyone might drink out of the fresh source himself, as all the fathers who wanted to do something good had to do.”3 In 1539, Martin Luther had been a doctor of theology for nearly twenty-seven years; his position at the University of Wittenberg was lecturer on the Bible. In the midst of everything he had become entangled with as the central figure of the Reformation, Luther had maintained throughout those years, with some interruptions, a rigorous schedule of lecturing and preaching from the Bible. This impulse to make the Bible heard in the life of Christendom characterized not only this activity in the university and in the parish of Wittenberg, but all Luther’s reformatory work. He hoped that his students and the ecclesiastical estate and indeed every Christian might “drink out of the fresh source” of the word of God. Since June 1535, Luther had been engaged more or less regularly in lecturing on the book of Genesis. This task occupied Luther for ten years, nearly to the end of his life, and he would conclude it with the touching words, “This is now the dear Genesis. Our Lord God grant that after me others do better. I can no more. I am weak. Pray God for me that he may grant me a good and blessed last hour.”4 His words reflect an attitude of humility frequently expressed when he considered the prospect of publication of these lectures. At table on 29 May 1538, Luther said of the lectures, “It is a disorderly and imperfect lecture, by which I give to others an 3

readers from the Bible in the Genesis lectures when he discussed the problem of the incestuous union of Lot and his two daughters after the destruction of Sodom. WA 43:93.38–94.15 (LW 3:305–6; 306n77). 3WA 50:657.8–17 (LW 34:283); WA 50:657.18–24 (LW 34:283–84). 4WA 44:825.10–12 (LW 8:333).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 12 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER ONE

12

occasion for reflecting; therefore, it would not be advisable to publish it. It is too weak.” Years later, when he had a look at the first printed sexternio of the lectures as they were being prepared by the printer, Luther again noted the weakness of his effort and sighed, “Moses is not a bad prophet; he wants very much to be worked out. I haven’t done him justice.” 5 Luther’s disparagement of his own writings again recalls the 1539 preface where he groaned about the proliferation of books in Christendom. He wanted every person to go to the fresh spring himself: For neither councils, fathers, nor we (even if it can come to the highest and the best attempt) will do as well as the holy scripture—that is, God himself—has done. (Although we must have also the Holy Spirit, faith, divine speech, and work, if we shall be saved.) As such [saved] ones, we must let the prophets and apostles sit on the lectern, and we here below at their feet must hear what they say, and not say what they must hear.6

In this way, the doctor of theology captured his attitude toward his vocation as lecturer on the Bible. Though rarely brief with words, Luther nevertheless describes his task as one of hearing rather than speaking. Prophets and apostles assume the role of speaking from the professor’s lectern, while the professor sits alongside his students at their feet and listens.

A BOOK TO BE HEARD Luther’s understanding of his task as an interpreter of scripture is echoed by William A. Graham, who notes that by ignoring the fundamental orality of sacred scriptures in the history of religion, historians have failed to discover the great chasm that exists not so much between literate and illiterate societies as between “our own modern, Western, post-Enlightenment world of the printed page and all past cultures.”7 Graham points out that Luther saw the Bible as “a manuscript with a voice—or, still better, a manuscript that was the medium of God’s voice. It was the most natural 5WA Tr 3, no. 3888; WA Tr 4, no. 4845 (July 1543), both quoted in Meinhold, Genesisvorlesung Luthers, 20. 6WA 50:657.25–30 (LW 34:284). There is an important parallel to this statement in the Genesis lectures: “Therefore the church is the disciple of Christ, sitting at his feet and hearing his word, so that she may know how to judge all things” (WA 42:515.1–2; and LW 2:353). 7Graham, Beyond the Written Word, 7, 29 (emphasis Graham’s). Graham cites McLuhan (Gutenberg Galaxy) as an “eccentric, often infuriating, but also often prescient” exception, among modern studies, which points to this chasm.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 13 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

PROPHETS AND APOSTLES AT THE PROFESSOR’S LECTERN

13

thing in the world for him to talk…of God speaking in what he wrote.” In the semiliterate world of sixteenth-century Germany, even a slogan like sola scriptura, pointing as it did to the written word, was nevertheless an idea focused not so much on the medium of communication as on the speaker, that is, on God.8 As Luther said, “It is after all not possible to comfort a soul, unless it hear the word of its God. But where is God’s word in all books except scripture?”9 Graham notes Christian thinkers tended to “speak scripture” in their writing; scripture is internalized to such an extent that “it determines mental constructs no less than rhetorical constructs.”10 In Augustine’s Confessions, for example, on every page the bishop of Hippo’s written reflections reveal how scripture pervades Augustine’s mind and therefore his written words.11 For Augustine and later for Luther as an Augustinian friar and university professor, the Bible’s idiom became a part of one’s mind and speech. Luther’s 1539 preface also illustrates this conclusion. After citing Augustine as a worthy example since he was subject to the holy scripture alone, Luther directs his readers to a right way of studying theology. Drawing upon the words of Psalm 119, Luther commends three practices: oratio, meditatio, tentatio. First, you should know that the holy scripture is such a book that it turns the wisdom of all other books to foolishness, because not one teaches of eternal life except this one alone. Therefore you should straightway despair of your reason and understanding. For with these you will not attain eternal life, but with such arrogance will plunge yourself and others with you from heaven (as happened to Lucifer) into the pit of hell. But kneel down in your little room and pray to God with genuine humility and seriousness that he through his dear Son will give you his Holy Spirit, who enlightens you, leads, and gives understanding. Just as you see that David in the above-mentioned Psalm always prays: “Teach me, Lord, instruct me, lead me, show me.…”

8Graham,

Beyond the Written Word, 63, 150. 10/1/2:74.32–75.4 (emphasis added). 10 Graham, Beyond the Written Word, 165. 11Edmund Hill (“St. Augustine’s Theory and Practice of Preaching,” 591) writes of the classical tradition of rhetoric that Augustine had imbibed, that the professional orator “spoke in the idiom of ” the classical authors and “tried to fit his mind to their minds, and the more he succeeded in fitting the world of his own experience into the categories of theirs, the better an orator he was thought, and thought himself, to be.” 9WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 14 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

14

CHAPTER ONE Second, you should meditate, that is, not only in the heart but also outwardly always working and massaging the oral speech and spelled-out word in the book, reading and rereading what the Holy Spirit means there, with diligent attention and deep reflection.12 And take care that you do not become satiated, or think that you have, once or twice, read enough, heard, said, and understood it all to the bottom. For then you will never become an especially good theologian, and are like the unready fruit that drops off before it is half ripe.… Third, there is tentatio, Anfechtung. It is the touchstone, which teaches you not only to know and understand but also to experience how right, how true, how sweet, how lovely, how mighty, how comforting God’s word is, wisdom beyond all wisdom.13

With these three “rules,” Luther lays out a way of approaching scripture appropriate to the text.14 First, spoken prayer (oratio) must precede study of scripture because as it is God’s words that bear eternal life, God alone grants their true understanding. Second, the words of the Bible, specifically identified by Luther as the oral speech of the Holy Spirit, cannot be grasped fully except by outward “working and massaging,” which Luther terms meditatio. Finally, the word of God is grasped not only by understanding but also through experience, specifically the experience of tentatio or Anfechtung, the struggles with God and the devil that had plagued Luther since his days in the monastery. Luther’s approach to the study of theology as he describes it in this text is hardly an objective, scholarly task of investigating the Bible as an ancient text whose meaning can be discovered by scientific methods of exegesis, using sixteenth-century tools of philology. In Luther’s understanding, theology, that is, study of the Bible, is a spiritual discipline grounded in the conviction that the written text is the word of God, who 12Note the rhythmic quality of Luther’s German in this passage as he describes meditatio: “Nicht allein im hertzen, sondern auch eusserlich die mündliche rede und buchstabische wort im Buch imer treiben und reiben, lesen und widerlesen, mit vleissigem auffmercken und nachdencken, was der heilige Geist damit meinet” (emphasis added). I have translated “treiben und reiben” as “working and massaging.” Treiben means to push, propel, stimulate; reiben means to rub. According to a standard glossary of early modern High German, a “reiberin” is a bathmaid. Götze, Frühneuhochdeutsches Glossar, 175. 13WA 50:659.5–14, 22–29, 50:660.1–4 (LW 34:285–87). On the importance and interpretation of this preface for analyzing Luther’s view of scripture, theology, and the theologian at work, see esp. Bayer, Martin Luthers Theologie, 15–40. 14Oswald Bayer notes that in Luther’s understanding, “it is not the interpreter that interprets the scripture but the scripture that interprets the interpreter. The scripture therefore takes care of its own interpretation; it is its own interpreter. Sacra scriptura sui ipsius interpres.” Bayer, Martin Luthers Theologie, 62–83, quote at 65.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 15 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

PROPHETS AND APOSTLES AT THE PROFESSOR’S LECTERN

15

not only spoke in ancient days to prophets and apostles but who, through the mediation of their written words, continues to speak in the present. God’s words are prayed over, meditated upon, and experienced through life’s trials. Luther’s three guidelines originated in his monastic experience of spiritual discipline but were transformed by his Reformation insights. The Reformer’s 1539 preface, which served not only as a foreword to his published collected works, but was also printed and distributed independently,15 reveals the enduring legacy of the Reformer’s monastic experience long after he had repudiated monastic vows and even after his marriage had transformed the cloister in which he lived in Wittenberg into a new kind of spiritual household. In his lectures on Genesis at the University of Wittenberg, Luther practiced the kind of engagement with scripture he commends to others in the preface to his collected writings. In his classroom, the Reformer sought to shape his students and therefore the life of the church by letting the word of God be the principal speaker in an exercise of spiritual formation. The rhetoric of the 1539 preface was no game of affected humility. In it, Luther addressed preachers and cautioned them to keep at the center of the church’s life the holy scripture and its gospel, rather than the books of theologians and especially the “excrees and excretals of the pope.” 16 Exposition of the Bible in the classroom, from the pulpit, and in printed treatises consumed Luther’s entire career. His expositions of scripture did not focus on the illumination of a dimly perceivable ancient text but rather were always the proclamation of the word of God for the church in the present. Not only his many thousand sermons but also his devotional, doctrinal, and polemical treatises were a public preachment of the word of God. His activity in the university classroom was no different. Just as he recommended to others in his 1539 preface, so Luther himself practiced Bible study as a spiritual discipline. His expositions reveal that his focus was on proclaiming the word for the spiritual edification and formation of his hearers. Study of the Bible became a spiritual event rather than

15 WA 50:655–56 lists the imprints of the collected edition and of the preface in two separate editions: at Nürnberg (1539) and Augsburg (1540). The title of the separate editions is instructive: “A Christian judgment of Doctor Martin Luther on his own books, together with an instruction on what is involved if one wishes to study in the holy scripture correctly and, after that, to write good books.” 16WA 50:658.16. I have used the translation of LW in rendering Luther’s playful “des Babsts Drecket und Drecketal” (LW 34:284). Note that Luther clearly identifies the anticipated audience for this preface (and the entire edition of his collected works) as students of theology and preachers. See WA 50:660:21, 23–28 (LW 34:287).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 16 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

16

CHAPTER ONE

a scholarly endeavor for the professor and student in the sixteenth-century university. As opposed to most modern practice, scholarly detachment was not a goal, and the worlds of the text and its reader purposefully became merged. Or, as one scholar describes a similar phenomenon in John Calvin’s exegesis, scripture “absorbs” the world of the reader.17 In the experience of Luther in the lecture hall of Wittenberg, the Bible spoke directly to the “today” of Luther and his hearers as he lectured on the sacred text.18 It is thus significant that Luther’s published lectures on biblical texts were entitled not commentaries but Enarrationes—from the verb enarrare, meaning “to speak, tell, or set forth in detail.”19

ENGAGING HIS STUDENTS In the preface “To the Pious Reader,” penned on Christmas 1543 for the first volume of the published Genesis lectures, which appeared under the title In primum librum Mose enarrationes, Luther describes the printed lectures as preserving a certain unpolished and extemporaneous character. He did not prepare them for publication, he says, but gave them “so that I might serve the students present at the time and exercise both my hearers and myself in the word of God, and that I might not finish the death of this body in lazy and wholly useless old age—as the psalmist provoked me: ‘I will sing to God as long as I live.’” He notes that his words were recorded and collected by his students Caspar Cruciger and Georg Rörer, and that they and his former student Veit Dietrich wanted them published. Though Luther thought their labors should be spent on a better author, he nevertheless approved their desire to aid the church by bringing these lectures to publication. Later he reflects, “Everything was said extemporaneously and popularly, just as the words came into my mouth, often even mixed with 17Greene-McCreight (“We are Companions to the Patriarchs,” 213–24) uses Calvin’s exegesis as a concrete example of the kind of “world-absorbing” exegesis theorized by such theologians as Hans Frei, George Lindbeck, and Bruce Marshall of the so-called Yale school of narrative theology. For more on this subject, see the systematic treatment and extensive bibliography in Parsons, Luther and Calvin on Old Testament Narratives. 18Hagen (Luther’s Approach to Scripture, 73) asserts that, to understand Luther’s exegesis, “it is necessary to eliminate all notions of distance, development, evolution, and progress, and to see Luther as a part of the world of the Bible.” For the focus of Luther’s expositions on the “today” of the hearer, see especially Hendrix, “Luther Against the Background.” 19Hagen, Luther’s Approach to Scripture, 64. See also Hagen, “What Did the Term Commentarius Mean?” 13–38. Humanists used the term enarratio to describe a line-by-line commentary on classical texts. See Grafton and Jardin, From Humanism to the Humanities, 212–13.

1_Luther Page 17 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 1:54 PM

PROPHETS AND APOSTLES AT THE PROFESSOR’S LECTERN

17

German, and certainly more verbose than I wanted.”20 In other words, Luther himself suggests that the printed text of these lectures provides a record, through his students, of Luther in the oral environment of the lecture hall. He was “exercising” himself and his students in the word of God. He relates this exercise in the word to singing in praise to God. The environment is extemporaneous, the language verbose, yet Luther goes on to say that he is not conscious of having said anything false, that he avoided obscurity, and to the best of his ability, handed over clearly that which he wanted to be understood. Then, in a remarkable passage, he continues: Why pile up words? Is it scripture that we treat—scripture, I say, of the Holy Spirit? Who could be suitable for this (as Paul testifies)? It is a river, as Gregory says, in which a lamb goes on foot and an elephant swims. It is the wisdom of God which makes the wise of the world fools, even the prince of the world himself, and which makes infants eloquent and the eloquent infants. Finally, he is not the best who comprehends everything and who fails at nothing (for such a one never was, is, or will be), but who loves the most, as Psalm 1 says: Blessed is he who loves and meditates upon the law of the Lord. It suffices absolutely that this wisdom pleases us, to be loved and to be held in meditation day and night.21

Luther portrays himself humbly before the scripture, unable to master the depths of its waters, yet confident that his love of the word will suffice. 22 He goes on to remark on the failed attempt of the church fathers to understand adequately the first book of Moses. He also ridicules those such as Erasmus who attempt to comprehend the scriptures “with pure latinity or paraphrases” while they are themselves devoid of the Spirit and understanding and thus are, “as it is said, ‘Asses [listening] to the lyre.’ ” The proverb (Asini ad lyram) is from On the Consolation of Philosophy by Boethius, who wrote of being comforted by his “nurse Philosophy” while imprisoned and awaiting execution. “‘Do you get the message?’ she asked.

20WA

42:1.2–8; WA 42:1.14–19, 23–29. 42:1.30–2.13. The phrase from Gregory is from Moralia in Job, Ad Leandrum 4 (CCSL 143:6.174–78). Gregory had written, “Quae videlicet si ad allegoriae sensum violenter inflectimus, cuncta ejus misericordiae facta vacuamus. Divinus etenim sermo sicut mysteriis prudentes exerciet, sic plerumque superficie simplices refovet. Habet in publico unde parvulos nutriat, servat in secreto unde mentes sublimium in admiratione suspendat. Quasi quidam quippe est fluvius, ut ita dixerim, planus et altus, in quo et agnus ambulet et elephas natet.” 22For the medieval tradition of the vastness of scriptural truth, often described figuratively as the depths of the seas or other waters, see Lubac, Medieval Exegesis, 75–82. 21WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 18 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

18

CHAPTER ONE

‘Has it penetrated your mind, or is it a case of the donkey listening to the lyre?’”23 A tantalizing conjecture is that Luther intends Lyram from the proverb as a pun on the name Nicholas of Lyra, the Franciscan friar whose Postilla litteralis on the Bible was an important medieval commentary on the literal sense of scripture. Here Luther ridicules contemporary humanists who champion the literal sense of scripture but who, without the Holy Spirit, remain ignorant of its spiritual significance.24 For his part, the professor regards his own commentary as but a few goat hairs consumed in offering and sacrifice to God, and asks that the Lord Jesus Christ grant that others follow who might do better.25 The preface gives a clear picture of what Luther means by “exercising” himself and his hearers in the word of God. For Luther, lecturing on the Bible was not simply or primarily an exercise in philology or mere grammar—what today might be called a historical-critical or historicalgrammatical exegesis of the ancient text, to be distinguished clearly from whatever present application the interpreter might seek to draw by a dialogue between the text and the reader. Rather, engaging the holy scripture is itself a spiritual exercise in which speaker and hearer are both confronted by the word of God, which must be loved—that is, must become identified with one’s own experience of life and not read with scholarly detachment.26 The historical narrative of Genesis becomes the medium through which God speaks and thus applies the interpretation of the Holy Spirit to present circumstances. To read in Luther’s Genesis lectures is to stand by an open window through which we can hear the professor at work, engaging his students in an exercise of spiritual formation.

A WINDOW INTO THE LECTURE HALL In the introduction to his lectures on Psalm 90, which he began late in October 1534 and completed on 31 May 1535 (just before commencing 23WA 42:2.14–17. The proverb is from Boethius, Philos. Cons. 1.4.1 (CCSL 94:6); Eng. trans. from Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy, 8. I am indebted to Anthony Grafton for pointing me to Boethius; the source is not given in Delius, Quellen. 24This ridicule comes through frequently in the lectures. E.g., “Erasmus, homo ad miraculum usque eruditas et facundus, quoties de iustificatione et rebus fidei loqui incipit, miserrime balbutit et ineptit: in aliis rebus explicandis foelicissimus.” WA 42:596.21–23 (LW 3:67). 25WA 42:2.18–24. 26For more on this joining of experience with reading of scripture, see especially Bayer, “Von Wunderwerk”; Asendorf, “How Luther Opened the Scripture”; and Junghans, “Die Worte Christi geben das Leben.”

Luther's Genesis.book Page 19 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

PROPHETS AND APOSTLES AT THE PROFESSOR’S LECTERN

19

his lectures on Genesis), Luther wrote: Moses is the source from which the holy prophets and also the apostles, inspired by the Holy Spirit, extracted divine wisdom. This being the case, we shall not live up to our calling better and in greater harmony with God’s will than by leading our followers to this source and showing them in our own way the seeds of divine wisdom which the Holy Spirit, through Moses, has sown in such a manner that neither reason nor the power of human nature, if it does not possess the Holy Spirit, can see or understand them.27

Moses is, according to Luther, the ultimate source of those prophets and apostles who speak from his classroom lectern, and Luther made clear in this lecture that his purpose would be to lead his students to that source. In Psalm 90, the prophet is Mosissimus Moses—“Moses at his most Mosaic”—“a severe minister of death, the wrath of God, and sin.” 28 Gordon Isaac characterizes Luther’s published lectures on this psalm as a rhetorical defense of Moses’ ministry of the law, specifically aimed at establishing the authority of Moses, which at the time was under attack by the antinomian John Agricola and his followers.29 Agricola, a former student and disciple of Luther, had attacked Philip Melanchthon regarding the nature of Evangelical catechesis, specifically the teaching of repentance (poenitentia) in the Visitation Articles, which Melanchthon had written and promoted in 1527. Delivered in late 1534 and from May through June 1535, the lectures on Psalm 90 show Luther addressing the authority of Moses and the law, in particular the law’s role in producing repentance in both unbelievers and Christians, in the aftermath of the attacks of Agricola against Melanchthon. Luther himself was not a chief actor in this dispute, but he defended his colleague Melanchthon from the attacks of his former disciple.30 At the conclusion of the Psalm 90 lectures, Luther again voiced his intention to interpret Genesis, should the Lord lengthen his life, so that “when our end comes, we shall be able to die joyfully in the word and work of God.”31 27WA

40/3:484.13–27 (LW 13:75). 40/3:486.26 (LW 13:77). 29See Isaac, “In Defense of the Ministry of Moses,” 187–99. 30On the dispute, see Wengert, Law and Gospel. 31WA 40/3:593.32–35 (LW 13:141). According to Rörer’s notebook, alone preserved among the notebooks used in preparing the lectures for publication, Luther had closed his lecture with the words: “Postea suscipiam praelegendam Genesin, ut operemur quidquam et ita in verbo et opere dei moriamur. Habetis psalmum Mosi, quantum dominus mihi dedit, a me explicatum.” WA 40/3:594.1–3. 28WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 20 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

20

CHAPTER ONE

Luther’s own battle against antinomianism as a movement of “false brethren” within his own circles really heated up in early 1537 when Agricola, now in Wittenberg and a guest in Luther’s home from January to March, again began circulating attacks against the teaching of the law in the church.32 At table on 21 March 1537, Luther was shown some theses or statements that were apparently being circulated about Wittenberg, theses that “declared that the law should not be preached in the church because it does not justify.”33 Even before his own controversy with Agricola came to a head, Luther was deeply troubled by the attacks and motivations of his former student: To think that this should be said by our own people even in our lifetime! This is the opinion of Agricola, who is driven by hatred and ambition. Would that we might pay heed to Master Philip! Philip teaches clearly and eloquently about the function of the law. I am inferior to him, although I have also treated this topic clearly in my [lectures on] Galatians.34

In sermons delivered on 20 September and 6 October 1537, Luther clearly presented his views of law and gospel; at the end of November, Agricola criticized Luther in a letter and Luther responded by publishing the antinomian theses and his own countertheses.35 By late 1537, the controversy had led to a public disputation, and over dinner sometime between 1 November and 21 December Luther again spoke (“with a deep sob” says the recorder) about Agricola: “How painful it is to lose a good friend, one who is cherished with a great love! I’ve had him at my table, he has laughed with me, and yet he opposes me behind my back.”36 In January 1539, Luther’s Against the Antinomians appeared.

32On Luther’s role in the antinomian controversy, see Brecht, Martin Luther: The Preservation of the Church, 156–71; Edwards, Luther and the False Brethren, 156–79; and the introduction to Luther’s treatise Against the Antinomians in LW 47:101–6. 33As recorded by Lauterbach and Weller, in WA Tr 3, no. 3554; and LW 54:233. 34WA Tr 3, no. 3554 (LW 54:233). In the “Argument” that prefaces the 1535 edition of his second lecture series on Galatians (1531), Luther carefully distinguishes Christian righteousness from political righteousness, ceremonial righteousness, and “the righteousness of the law or of the Decalogue, which Moses teaches. We, too, teach this, after the doctrine of faith.” WA 40/1:40.15–27 (LW 26:4). Such dialectics are quite similar to Melanchthon’s approach. On the latter, see Wengert, Law and Gospel; and Wengert, Human Freedom, Christian Righteousness. 35Brecht, Martin Luther, 159–60. Of the sermons, delivered on 30 September and 6 October 1537 (LW 22:13–48), Melanchthon remarked in a letter to friends, “I would be beaten if I could preach so clearly about the law.” Quoted in Brecht, Martin Luther, 159. 36WA Tr 3, no. 3650a (LW 54:248).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 21 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

PROPHETS AND APOSTLES AT THE PROFESSOR’S LECTERN

21

Luther, His Students, and the Antinomian Challenge At the same time as he was writing Against the Antinomians, Luther was lecturing on Genesis chapters 17 and 18.37 The narrative of Genesis 18 is about the destruction of Sodom, and Luther made use of it to provide both instruction concerning the law and pastoral advice for his students. The text reveals how Luther emphasized the responsibility of Evangelical pastors to teach the law in the churches and how bitterly the Wittenberg Reformation had by this time come into controversy over the law. Luther sought to form in his students a view of pastoral ministry where the preaching of the law is necessary, both as preparation for the gospel and as ongoing instruction for Christians whose lives and salvation continue to be threatened by sin. Commenting on the text in Genesis 18:19, where God says that Abraham has been chosen “that he may charge his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice,” Luther cited parallels in 1 Corinthians 20 and Romans 15, which teach that the biblical record of such punishments of old was “written for our instruction” (Rom. 15:4). From this, he taught his students that the gospel is to be preached to the troubled, but the law should be presented to those who lack proper fear of God “in order that they might cease sinning, having been admonished by the examples of others.”38 He called those who contend that the law should not be preached in the church “pernicious doctors,” as they only increased the security of those already secure.39 “As a matter of fact, God wants the consuming by fire of the Sodomites and that lake of bitumen to be visible continuously to this day, to be stirred up by sermons and made known among all posterity, so that at least some may be corrected and learn to fear God.” Luther notes that Saint Paul instructs preachers to “rightly divide” the word. So the professor counseled his students to consider their hearers: there is one kind of doctrine for the penitent, but another for those like the pope and the bishops who persecute Evangelical

37The chronology is determined by Lauterbach’s Tagebuch from 3 February 1538 (WA Tr 3:575– 77, no. 3731), which mentions that Luther is lecturing on Genesis 17, and a letter from Luther to Melanchthon on 2 March 1539 (WA Br 8:379.41–44), which indicates that on that day (a Sunday) Luther is turning to prepare his lectures on Genesis 19. Meinhold, Genesisvorlesung Luthers, 132; WA 42:vii–viii. 38WA 43:34.5–8 (LW 3:222). 39WA 43:34.10. Such labels are frequent. Other names for the antinomians as a group in the lectures include “Pseudoprophetae” (WA 43:45.6), “novi isti Prophetae” (WA 43:46.15), “stulti et coeci Antinomi nostri” (WA 43:49.10–11).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 22 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER ONE

22

churches. Should the gospel be preached to them? “In this way they will become more hardened, and sin more securely. Consequently, they should be pounded by the hammer of the law; to such the Sinaitic lightning and thunder must be revealed.”40 Clearly in the foreground was Luther’s intent to prepare his students for the challenges of ministry in the Evangelical churches. He advised his students of how many people, even within their own churches, would be offended by the preaching of the law—they won’t want to stop sinning and they won’t want their consciences burdened. The antinomians defended the proposition: “If anyone was an adulterer, so long as he believed, he will have a propitiated God.” Luther admonished, “‘But what kind of church will it be,’ I ask, ‘in which such a horrible voice resounds?’” The professor taught his students to distinguish two kinds of sinners. First, there are those who shudder with their whole being and grieve at what they have done, and desire and strive never to do such things again. “These are not secure in sin but terrified, and dreading God’s wrath they are saved if they apprehend the word of the gospel and have complete trust in the mercy of God for Christ’s sake.” But the second kind are “those who do not grieve but rather rejoice when they have obtained their desire; they seek occasions for sins, and indulge in them securely, for they are destitute of the Holy Spirit and are not able to believe.” Preachers who preach to such men about faith only deceive them.41 At the end of his comments on this text, Luther noted that those who say the law should not be taught in the church “do not know Christ and are blinded by their pride and wickedness.” For here Moses relates specifically that God wants the destruction of Sodom to be taught in the church. Why? Because the church is never completely pure, but always the majority are wicked, as the parable about the seed teaches. No, rather indeed the true saints themselves, who by faith in the Son of God are righteous, have the sinful flesh, which by assiduous reproof ought to be mortified, just as Paul says: “If we would judge ourselves, we would not be chastened by the Lord.” 1 Corinthians 11.

Then came the admonition to the students: “Therefore remember this passage, which alone is sufficient for refuting antinomians.” 42 In this way, 40WA

43:34.13–28 (LW 3:222–23). 43:35.5–20 (LW 3:223–24). 42WA 43:36.18–30 (LW 3:225). Such admonitions to his students are frequent, e.g.: “I warn you XXXXX 41WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 23 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

PROPHETS AND APOSTLES AT THE PROFESSOR’S LECTERN

23

the Reformer related the word of God in the scripture to the present lives of his students and the broader Evangelical community as it was struggling with internal dissension regarding the role of the law. Frequent repetition is characteristic in the lectures, in the exposition of individual passages, and throughout the exposition of the narrative as a whole. Luther himself was sensitive to the fact that his repetitiveness in the classroom would have the quality of “verbosity” on the printed page. This itself probably has a great deal to do with Luther’s recommending the commentaries of others over his own. Luther’s exegetical works have often been criticized by modern scholars for their length, for their focus on the edifying application of the text rather than on the meaning of the text in its original context, and for jumping from the ancient text to present concerns. Such judgments are often based on a very different concept of what biblical exposition is.43 Luther’s lectures on Genesis are his longest exposition, but placed within the medieval tradition of enarratio (for example, Bernard of Clairvaux’s Sermons on the Canticles of Solomon) they are not exceptionally long.44 Such a comparison, however, begs the question of the validity of comparing Luther’s works to the monastic tradition of enarratio. Whatever his indebtedness to his monastic experience, Luther was not preaching in the cloister but lecturing to students in the University of Wittenberg, the center of a reformation that had made a sharp break from monasticism. Although Luther’s expositions did indeed continue a monastic tradition of enarratio, his use of this tradition must be analyzed in terms of the new context in which Luther was practicing biblical exposition.

43

to beware such men…” (LW 3:243; cf. LW 3:254). See also LW 4:154 (on the need to learn Hebrew in order to refute the glosses of the rabbis). 43Hagen (Luther’s Approach to Scripture, 5) notes the difference between historical analysis of ancient texts in nineteenth- and twentieth-century scientific exegesis, and, in stark contrast, the “monastic discipline of the sacred page,” the tradition in which he characterizes Luther’s expositions. “By nineteenth–century standards, Luther comes off as a mediocre, medieval exegete. However, in terms of medieval standards of biblical enarratio, Luther was a giant.” 44Between 1135 and 1153, Bernard preached and prepared for publication eighty-six sermons on the first two chapters of Canticles (1:1–3:1); the sermons take up the first two volumes of the critical edition. See Froehlich, “Christian Interpretation of the Old Testament,” 497–500. Luther’s four large tomes on Genesis were also not unusually long for sixteenth-century commentaries on the first book of the Bible. Williams (Common Expositor, 6–8) points out that among the thirty-five Latin and six English commentaries on Genesis published between 1525 and 1633, the size ranges “from octavos of three hundred pages to fat folios of over a thousand pages.” The Spanish Jesuit Benedictus Pererius’s commentary was published over the course of a decade in four large volumes.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 24 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER ONE

24

As Luther continued his lectures, his repetition of key themes reflects his central concerns in preparing his students for life not in a cloister but in the new world of the Evangelical church in sixteenth-century society. Although his text was the book of Genesis, his lectures reveal that present-day concerns were his primary focus; one example is the challenge of antinomianism from within the Wittenberg community. The basis of his concern was clearly the students themselves and the communities in which they would serve as preachers who proclaim both the law and the gospel. In the 1539 preface to his German writings, Luther taught his readers that real study of theology and the word of God happens as Christians in prayer (oratio) “work and massage” the words of the biblical text (meditatio) in the midst of the experience of spiritual struggle (tentatio). This role of experience is abundantly evident in these passages, where the professor was teaching his students to distinguish law and gospel, for it was precisely when Luther was in the midst of heated controversy with Agricola that the bitterness of this battle loomed so large in his exposition of Genesis. Other passages in Luther’s exposition of Genesis 19 express these themes with the same fervency.45 The last passage in which Luther engaged the antinomians with such zeal was in his comments on Genesis 21:15–16, which he delivered sometime before October 1539.46 Here the invective reached a climax just at the time when the bitterness between Luther and his former disciple Agricola became irreparable. The text itself does not seem to suggest a focus on the need for preaching the law, but Luther drew the experience of this Wittenberg crisis into his discussion nonetheless. In his comments on the spiritual crisis Hagar faced when she and her son were expelled from the household of Abraham, her pronounced despair became a figure illustrating the power of the law as preparation for grace (opus alienum).47 Luther noted that, in opposition to “our antinomians,” the law precedes solace. Ishmael and Hagar had both acted proudly toward Isaac and 45Cf.

LW 3:240–43, 268–69, 281, 314. October 1539, Luther was lecturing on Genesis 22. See WA 43:200n2; and Meinhold, Genesisvorlesung Luthers, 134. 47Luther notes that it is Satan who makes Hagar’s physical affliction (her expulsion) a spiritual one, thus multiplying her affliction. But this cannot occur in those who know not their sin: “For Satan makes those who are secure altogether invincible, just as our antinomians are. But those who have a feeble and timid heart he dashes to the ground with his terrors as with the force of a thunderbolt” (LW 4:48). On Luther’s interpretation of Hagar, see also Mattox, Defender of the Most Holy Matriarchs, 139– 70. 46In

Luther's Genesis.book Page 25 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

PROPHETS AND APOSTLES AT THE PROFESSOR’S LECTERN

25

“it was necessary that this state of mind be overcome by knowledge of the law and by mortification.” The passage instructs about the use of the law: Paul [in Gal. 4:30] calls the voice [vocem] of Sarah (“Cast out the slave woman”) the voice of the law. He does not say, “What does Sarah say?” but, “What says scripture?” Therefore, even if Moses with his written law was not yet in existence, still the law was there in its use and exercise, because “to cast out” is the voice of the law.48

The ensuing commentary was a working and massaging of the word eiicere, meaning “to cast out.” “Therefore let us hiss off the stage [explodamus] the antinomians, who cast out the law from the church and want to teach penitence through the gospel.” Yes, people should be comforted, but only “those who truly with Ishmael and his mother, having been cast out from the house, the fatherland, are gradually wasting away from hunger and thirst in the desert, who groan and cry out to the Lord and, having been conquered, are already despairing. Such are fit hearers of the gospel.” These Luther contrasts to those who feel themselves to be in grace because of some carnal prerogative, who seem to be not in the desert but in paradise: “These must be bashed and smashed with the hammer of the law— no, rather much more must be brought down to nothing.”49 Using themes now familiar to his students, Luther says: Whatever there is of the law, whatever there is of the will of the flesh and of man—of this it is said: “Cast it out!” For God cannot bear the presumption of Ishmael; that is, he does not want us to glory in our physical birth, in our strength, in the freedom of our will, in our wisdom and righteousness. All this must be mortified; all this must be despaired of, just as Hagar despairs in this place. Where this has happened and we have been thrust down to hell, there the time is for calling us back through the sweet voice of the gospel, which does not say “cast out!” but “have heart, son, your sins have been remitted to you.” Because the scripture says, this is the work of God: “to lead down to hell and to lead back, to kill and to bring back to life.” This is the reason why Ishmael and Hagar are cast out, namely that the horrible and unrestrained presumption regarding proper righteousness may be killed.50 48WA

43:170.27–31 (LW 4:49). 43:170.32–42 (LW 4:49). 50WA 43:171.1–2, 7–18 (LW 4:49–50). 49WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 26 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

26

CHAPTER ONE

Before Ishmael was cast out, he was proud and secure, “an antinomicus Epicurus.”51 Teachers of the church must “be able to refute and crush the gainsayers and to comfort again those who have been refuted and crushed, lest they be devoured.” Luther applied the principle to the pope, for the papacy must first be killed and the pope reduced to nothing before God, or it will never be “even the smallest part of the church.” But those who feel themselves humbled may cast themselves at the feet of the heavenly Father, clinging like the Canaanite woman (Matt. 15:22–28) to the mercy of God. Like Ishmael whose voice was heard by the Lord (Gen. 21:17), there is comfort for those who have been humbled: “Therefore this is a very great comfort for all those who feel that they have been cast out, that is, who acknowledge their sins and tremble before the judgment of God. For he does not want to cast such people aside, nor can he do so….”52 In later lectures, after the antinomian controversy had subsided in Wittenberg, Agricola and others are mentioned occasionally but there is no extensive treatment of their error.53 By 1545, when Luther lectured on Genesis 48, he taught extensively on law and gospel without even mentioning the controversy. A different focus pervaded the lectures as Luther connected the necessity of the law to the upholding of discipline by means of rewards and punishments, noting also (in relation to Jacob’s blessing Joseph’s younger son Ephraim rather than the older son Manasseh) that God is not bound to the law and even jurists proclaim a certain moderating of the law through Aristotle’s principle of ∆epieivkeia (gentleness and fairness).54 Luther and his listeners’ exercise in the word was caught up by other experiences that shaped his enarratio in new and different ways.

Joseph as Figure of the Cruciform Pastoral Life Another interplay between life experience and ancient text, particularly revealing of how Luther attempted to form his students spiritually, concerns the aged professor’s hopes and encouragement for this next generation of 51WA 43:172.3–4 (LW 4:51). Here it is abundantly clear that for Luther the antinomians and those (for example, Erasmus) he called “Epicureans” were of the same stripe. Also see WA 43:180.39– 40 (LW 4:63). 52WA 43:172.15–17; 174.5–6, 26–32; 176.14–18 (LW 4:51, 54–55, 57). 53E.g., WA 43:426.38–427.13 (LW 4:404–5) (lectures on Genesis 25, delivered after November 1540); and WA 44:55.32–56.10 (LW 6:75–76) (on Genesis 31:43, delivered after February 1542). The chronology is reckoned by Meinhold, Genesisvorlesung Luthers, 134–37. 54WA 44:703.30–706.39 (LW 8:170–76). Aristotle’s principle of “moderation” tempers the severity of law with mercy or a general concept of fairness.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 27 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

PROPHETS AND APOSTLES AT THE PROFESSOR’S LECTERN

27

pastors for the Evangelical church. Luther’s hopes were expressed clearly in early 1538 when he was lecturing on Genesis 17 and God’s reaffirmation of his covenant with Abraham, now confirmed sacramentally by the sign of circumcision. God promises Abraham that he and his descendants will receive the land of Canaan as an everlasting possession. Luther taught his students that though Abraham died without possessing the land, he nevertheless possessed it by virtue of God’s promise and, even after his earthly life was done, possessed it through his descendants as one who lives: “the God of Abraham is the God of the living.” Luther began to meditate upon his own death and whether the promises he believed would continue to be fulfilled after his earthly life was over, and whether he would be glad in the face of death as Abraham surely was with the assurance of God’s promises: If I were able to think in this way, and could conclude with certainty (yet I pray God every day that I may be able to do so, and I know that he will hear me) that when I die I shall not die but shall live and declare the works of the Lord; likewise, that the word and true worship of God will remain among these students whom I leave behind when I die; and that these same students will be the cause of salvation for the whole world—in what frame of mind do you suppose I shall meet death? You do not suppose, do you, that I shall be afraid and not prefer to say with Simeon: “Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace”?55

Here the Reformer expressed the great hope—and his certainty through God’s faithfulness—that his own confession of the gospel would live among his students after his death. Such passages in the lectures unveil the close relationship between professor and students in the classroom. Luther instructed them as to the seriousness of their studies, warning them about God’s judgment upon immoral persons and the greedy, and urging them to deal carefully with sexual temptation.56 The professor exhorted his students to consider how pastors should humbly serve their people, especially through the pastoral practice of private confession and absolution.57 He encouraged them in the cultivation of humility and prayer in the Christian and pastoral life.58 55WA 42:634.1–7 (LW 3:120). Meinhold’s assertions that this and other personal references to Luther’s prayer life are extensive interpolations of the editors are not supported by strong evidence, in my view. See Meinhold, Genesisvorlesung Luthers, 169–71. 56E.g., LW 3:254; 4:154; 5:372; 6:318; 7:74–77. 57E.g., LW 6:163, 297–98. 58E.g., LW 3:311–13.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 28 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER ONE

28

Perhaps the most remarkable picture of Luther’s practice of pastoral formation of his students shines through his extended enarratio on Joseph as true martyr, a figure for the pious of every generation, a narrative “set before us in the church by the Holy Spirit for our instruction.”59 Commenting on Joseph’s experience when his fidelity to his master Potiphar was rewarded with anger kindled by the false witness of Potiphar’s wife, Luther forewarned his students: “You must never hope that the world will acknowledge and remunerate your faithfulness and diligence; for it does the opposite, as this example attests.” Luther urged his students to reflect: If I am a pastor or the director of the studies of young people or in any other position, I shall perform my duty diligently, not because I am expecting some reward from those whom I serve—for I am simply giving up all hope of gratitude—but I shall imitate the kindness of my heavenly Father, who scatters his blessings, gives gold, silver, fruits, peace, and good health even to the unthankful and the worst men.60

“You will not change the world,” the old professor went on to say. But the students can remember that they take up the office for God’s sake, not the world’s. Joseph’s reward of prison reveals him as a true martyr and “Christ, the bishop of souls who is mindful of hell and death, is the only one who sees Joseph, the only one who cares about him.” Yet Christ, present with Joseph, grants him a resolute heart, and the Holy Spirit is given as a gift that “shines forth on the outside, with the result that this grace is seen in the demeanor, the words, the face, and the gestures.” 61 God governs the saints in a way that they may see him from the back; he seems at first to be the devil, not God, but this is his way in governing his saints. The professor shares with his students his own struggle with God over God’s way of proceeding with his saints. But the Lord laughed at his wisdom: “Come now, I know that you are a wise and learned man; but it has never been my custom for Peter, Dr. Martin, or anyone else to teach, direct, govern, and lead me. I am not a passive God. No, I am an active God who is accustomed to do the leading, ruling, and directing.” 62 In this 59WA

44:366.31–32 (LW 7:90). 44:371.18–26 (LW 7:97). 61WA 44:371.37–39, 372.31–33, 38, 373.37–374.4, 33–34 (LW 7:97, 99–101). 62WA 44:375.31–376.31 (LW 7:103–4). The figure of God revealing himself “from the back” comes from Exodus 33:18–23 and 1 Corinthians 1:25, and expresses Luther’s “theology of the cross,” wherein God reveals himself “through suffering and the cross.” See Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation of 1518, Theological Theses nos. 18–21 (WA 1:353–74, esp. 354.15–22; 361.25–362.33 [LW 31:35–70, esp. 40, 51–53]). See also Lohse, Martin Luther’s Theology, 36–39, 106–7. 60WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 29 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

PROPHETS AND APOSTLES AT THE PROFESSOR’S LECTERN

29

way, Luther counseled the young to remember that human wisdom is passive and must be mortified. They must choose a path different from those who cannot bear this mortification, like the Sacramentarians, who by rejecting the physical or corporeal presence of Christ in the Eucharist prescribe to God where the body of Christ must be. “Let him direct you. Do not direct him. Then things turn out well. Then God bestows far more than we are able to accomplish by our own counsels and wisdom…. Therefore close your eyes, and all disputations about heaven and earth will vanish.” 63 All the works of God in his saints reveal that he exalts them “so that in trials they learn patience in faith and hope, even though hope is truly patience itself, because our life must be hidden. Es sol heissen, Thu die augen zu. Close your eyes and sustain yourself with the word, not only in perils and conflicts but also in the chief articles of Christian doctrine.” 64 Like Joseph, Luther and his students are tormented by countless sufferings that endure too long: “Thus today we are tormented and afflicted by Satan and the world in various ways. The pontiffs and cardinals persecute us; the heretics, the Sacramentarians, the Anabaptists, and others harass us. But what else should you do than wait for the Lord?”65 On the last day, however, Luther and his hearers will accuse themselves and acknowledge that their patience was too limited. God will produce fruits a hundredfold from Joseph’s sufferings. Luther therefore urged his hearers: Learn, therefore, to trust, believe, wait, and endure, and to depend on the Word and say with St. Paul: “The sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed in us.” Es ist zu gering, “this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison.”66

63WA 44:376.32–377.11 (LW 7:104–5), italics indicate original text in German. Here and in the next quotation (see also WA 42:323.35–39) Luther uses the phrase “close your eyes” in two ways— first, to allow the word to speak even in the face of reasonable contradiction; second, to comfort oneself by the word in the midst of suffering, in the hope of future glory. On the broader significance and monastic background of the phrase, see Posset, “Bible Reading ‘with closed eyes’”; and Oberman, Reformation: Roots and Ramifications, 80. 64WA 44:378.1–6 (LW 7:106). Scott Hendrix (Ecclesia in via, 219–32) identifies the hope of the Christian as the link between the church on earth and the church triumphant in heaven in Luther’s ecclesiology as developed in the Dictata, the Psalms lectures of 1513–15. In the Genesis lectures, Luther says that hope exists to sustain the Christian in present suffering, urging his students to close their eyes to the experience of suffering because future glory awaits. 65WA 44:396.7–10 (LW 7:131). 66WA 44:398.40–399.4, 24–25, 400.8–12 (LW 7:135–37). Note the German phrases in this and the following passage, which are a few of many examples where the published text preserves the mixture of German and Latin that Luther mentions in the preface. Even the skeptical Meinhold views such XXXXX

Luther's Genesis.book Page 30 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER ONE

30

Accordingly, we do not groan, weep, and suffer in vain. Everything is written and noted down in God’s commentaries. This means that God has looked closely into it. God does not look at us from afar but is close to us…. What we suffer is exceedingly little and light, since we know that the glory and redemption will be greater than what we can attain by any things or words. Nevertheless, God observes that light and little suffering.67

Just as God was present and spoke to Pharaoh through his dreams that the word of God might be revealed and understood, so Luther believed the word works at all times in the world, “sometimes more darkly and at other times more clearly.” Under the papacy, too, people were saved by the word, through faith in the promises given there. “Today, too, thanks to the kindness of God, it resounds in our churches, but more clearly than in former times. But every day we advance from clarity to clarity, as though from the spirit of the Lord.”68 It is as though I were walking in a field and from a long way off saw a man walking along. At first he seems to be a horse or a tree. When I come close, I gradually begin to recognize him more and more as a man till at last I see this or that man as a particular person. This is how our knowledge advances. At first it is confused, but later it is clearer and more specific. For at the beginning, when God’s word is offered, it is not fully understood at once. Nevertheless it is apprehended, even though weakly, not that the knowledge of Christ may be obscured but that it may be exercised and daily increased until it is perfected. The same thing happens in the change of our will, which also advances daily, when we gradually learn more and more to hope, trust, and be patient. It is one and the same faith, therefore, that begins, makes progress, and reaches perfection. For we are changed into the same likeness. But the word has been given that it may be exercised and may exercise you every day and hour until you grow into a perfect man.69

All these examples—those revealing how Luther dealt with the antinomian challenge as well as those in which he uses Joseph as a figure of the 67

passages as indicators that Luther's original diction is preserved here. See Meinhold, Genesisvorlesung Luthers, 150–58, 170. 67WA 44:401.1–9 (LW 7:138), italics indicate original text in German. 68WA 44:401.28–33 (LW 7:138–39). 69WA 44:401.34–402.6 (LW 7:139).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 31 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

PROPHETS AND APOSTLES AT THE PROFESSOR’S LECTERN

31

cruciform life of the Christian—illustrate how the professor in his lectures practiced what he describes as “exercising myself and the hearers present in the word of God” and how he used this exercise to form his students spiritually. It is a kind of spiritual exposition of the scripture, which conforms to the three “rules” of David in Psalm 119—oratio, meditatio, tentatio—as commended by Luther to the readers of the preface to his collected writings. Prophets and apostles sit on the professor’s lectern, and professor and students hear God’s own voice through the scripture that speaks to the present spiritual struggles of Luther and his students as he lectures on the sacred text. In the published form of his lectures, the reader is privileged to “hear” Luther speaking in his university classroom, instructing, admonishing, and encouraging his students as he attempted to prepare them for pastoral life in the Evangelical churches of the Reformation.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 32 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

Chapter Two

The Professor and His Text The chief means at Luther’s disposal for the spiritual and pastoral formation of his students was the text of holy scripture, and an examination of his expository practice in the lecture hall shows how he used the Bible to shape his students spiritually and to prepare them for service in the changing churches and society of the sixteenth century. The essential questions to examine are how Luther viewed his text and taught his students to view it; how he understood the practice of biblical exposition as carried out in the sixteenth-century University of Wittenberg in relationship to past and contemporary practices; what tools and authorities he used, how he used them, and how he taught his students to use them; and finally, how he interpreted the text so that its authority as the word of God spoke to the present experience of his students and of the church and broader society in which they lived and later would serve as pastors. Examining these questions reveals how Luther, through his expository practice, attempted to form a new Evangelical identity among his hearers as he engaged the biblical text and the traditions of Genesis exposition from the patristic and medieval past.

GENESIS—THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES AND THE HOLY SPIRIT From the first page to the last, the published text of the Genesis lectures reveals Luther in his classroom encountering a written text through which he believes God is speaking to him. Here God speaks in the simplest words yet reveals the most difficult content (res), from the record of creation at 32

2_Luther Page 33 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 1:48 PM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

33

the beginning of time to Joseph in Egypt declaring his faith in the timedistant resurrection of Christ—Joseph, who Luther believed was among those raised in Jerusalem at the death of Christ as recorded in Matthew 27:52–53.1 Luther time and again conveys the conviction that before him on the lectern was the Holy Spirit’s book, speaking through his prophet Moses, revealing the word of God through the words of the book.2 This conviction is seen first of all in the way Luther repeatedly refers to the Holy Spirit’s work of revelation, using phrases such as “through the enlightenment of the Holy Spirit,” “an unusual fullness of the Holy Spirit,” or “equipped with the Holy Spirit.” Many of these phrases refer directly to the text of Genesis itself, with phrases such as “it is not idle chatter when the Holy Spirit says” and “we hear the Holy Spirit speaking here, and his mouth is chaste.” Through the text, the Holy Spirit reveals not only what happened in the history of the patriarchs but also how these events provide God’s commentary on human life. An example is where Luther explains: “it is not enough for the Holy Spirit to state: ‘Adam knew Eve’; but he also adds ‘his wife.’ For he does not approve of roving lust and promiscuous cohabitation.”3 These and many additional examples from the first volume of the published lectures, which Luther saw and endorsed with his own preface and postscript, contradict Peter Meinhold’s assertion that such equation of the words of the text to the word of the Holy Spirit reflects a later construct of verbal inspiration characteristic of the editors but alien to Luther’s theology.4 Meinhold’s criteria for judgment here 1Note the opening lines of the lectures: “The first chapter is written with the simplest words [verba], but it contains most important and very obscure content [res].” WA 42:3.15–16 (LW 1:1). The last page of the printed enarrationes shows Luther’s view of the text as Christian revelation: “Ioseph hic fidem suam declarat, cum in eorum numero esse cupit, qui resuscitandi erant cum Christo, et credo eum una cum aliis sanctis, quorum mentio fit Mathaei 27. rediise in vitam.… Sed ad testificandam fidem suam in Christum, iubet ossa sua deferri in terram Chanaan.” In Genesin enarrationum (1554), CCLIr; cf. WA 44:824.38–825.4 (LW 8:333). On Joseph among those raised in Jerusalem, see also WA 44:813.22–27 (LW 8:318). 2Luther’s view identifying the biblical text as the word of God has been denied in some Luther scholarship. Commenting on and reacting to a particular vein of scholarship indebted largely to the hermeneutic interests and theories of the theologian Gerhard Ebeling, Ulrich Asendorf (“Das Wort Gottes bei Luther,” 32) has noted that “in the course of existential theology, the word of God was generally kerygmatized, thoroughly and in full harmony with one side of Luther’s understanding of the word of God,” but that “in recent times the interest, in a kind of reaction, is clearly once again turning to the word as scripture” (emphasis Asendorf ’s). 3WA 42:112.42–113.1 (LW 1:149); WA 42:178.27–28 (LW 1:240); WA 42:179.3 (LW 1:240); WA 42:252.36, 253.5–9 (LW 1:344); WA 42:335.31–32 (LW 2:103). 4Meinhold, Genesisvorlesung Luthers, 371–73. Meinhold calls this “the most conspicuous incongruity [Inkonzinität] within the revision: the strong suggestions of the doctrine of inspiration.” Meinhold provides no analysis of Luther’s understanding of scriptural inspiration but merely asserts XXXXXXXX

Luther's Genesis.book Page 34 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER TWO

34

clearly were not Luther’s theology (in any period of his life) and manner of expression but rather modern arguments about the nature of the Bible and theological language, which are combined with nineteenth- and early twentieth-century negative judgments against Lutheran theology as it developed after Luther’s death. More fruitful for understanding how Luther shaped his students’ perception of the biblical text will be analysis of passages in which such language pervades the published lectures. In practice, Luther’s belief that the Holy Spirit has spoken in the text of the scripture as recorded by Moses led him to reject any stepping away from the text as written, even when it involved contradicting the witness of the church fathers or of reason. For example, when Luther rejected patristic allegorical or figurative interpretations regarding the days of creation in Genesis 1, he concluded his argument by stating, “If we do not comprehend the reason for this, let us remain pupils and leave the magisterium to the Holy Spirit.” In another passage where he rejected speculative metaphysics and asserted that the Word (the person of Christ) is God yet is distinct from the Father, Luther concluded, “These are difficult matters, and it is not safe to advance beyond the limit to which the Holy Spirit leads us.” Likewise on the issue of the cosmology espoused by the opening chapters of Genesis: “Moses says with clear words that the waters are above and below the firmament. For this reason I take captive here my understanding and agree with the word even if I do not comprehend it.” 5 Luther’s adherence to the clear words of Moses in the text of Genesis is reflected also in what appears to be a most bland genealogical table, namely, the genealogy at the end of chapter 10. The professor told his students that this chapter should be esteemed as “a mirror in which is seen what we human beings are, namely, creatures so deformed by sin that we do not know our own origin—no, not even God himself, our maker— unless the word of God reveals these (as it were) glimmers of divine light to us from afar.”6 Then, in a passage that demonstrates the professor’s high regard for this text, he concluded:

5

that what is contained in the text of the published lectures reflects the views of the redactors rather than those of Luther. This illustrates the inadequacy of Meinhold’s method of tracing the “alien theology” (Meinhold’s phrase) present in the printed lectures. For recent literature on Luther’s understanding of biblical inspiration, see note 17 below. 5WA 42:5.14–18 (LW 1:5); WA 42:14.12–13 (LW 1:17); WA 42:20.40–42 (LW 1:26). 6WA 42:409.14–19 (LW 2:208–9). On Luther’s use of the particle imo to contradict but then intensify the previous phrase (similar to the German interjection doch), see Oberman, “IMMO,” 17– XXXXXXXX

Luther's Genesis.book Page 35 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

35

Therefore we have reason to regard the sacred Bible highly and to consider it a most precious treasure. For this very chapter, even if it is judged full of dead vocables, nevertheless contains something like a thread that is drawn from the first world to the middle and to the end of all things. From Adam the promise concerning Christ is passed on to Seth; from Seth to Noah; from Noah to Shem; and from Shem to this Eber, from whom the Hebrew nation received its name as the heir for whom the promise concerning Christ was destined in preference to all other peoples of the whole world. This knowledge the sacred records reveal to us. Those who are without them live in error, uncertainty, and infinite ungodliness; for they are ignorant even of themselves—who they are and whence they came.7

Luther’s confidence in the sacred text did not prevent him from asking tough questions of it, however, or from sometimes simply musing over its strange silence. In his commentary on day two of the creation week, the professor remarked candidly, “Here Moses seems to be forgetting himself, because he does not deal at all with two very important matters, namely, the creation and the fall of the angels.… It is surprising that Moses should remain silent about such weighty matters.” He lamented the rashness of later commentators who in the absence of clear statements in scripture “usually consider themselves free to come up with imaginary ideas.” The professor related some of these ideas (which he would not compel anyone to believe), then surmised that Moses omitted such details because knowledge of them is not necessary for “uncultivated and inexperienced people.”8 In a similar manner, Luther later commented on the verbosity of a text whose wordiness he attributed both to Moses and the Holy Spirit: In this passage we see Moses using a great abundance of words and repeating the same things to the point of being tiresome. How often he mentions the animals! How often the entrance into the ark! How often he mentions the sons of Noah, who went in at the same time! In this instance the decision must be left to men who are spiritualminded; they alone know and see that the Holy Spirit repeats nothing in vain. 7

19, 34–38. I have translated the particle accordingly throughout this study, with some variation of “no, not even” or “no, rather much more” and the like. 7WA 42:409.21–29 (LW 2:209). 8WA 42:17.36–37, 18.6–7 (LW 1:22); WA 42:18.14–15 (LW 1:22–23); WA 42:18.19–22, 24–27 (LW 1:23).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 36 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER TWO

36

Others, however, who are weaker in spirit, can imagine that since Moses was deeply moved by the vastness of the wrath when he wrote these words, he wanted to emphasize the same things more often. For troubled souls are fond of repetitions…. In this way this repetition reveals the magnitude of feeling and the greatest disturbance of soul.… Therefore, this is not a purposeless tautology or repetition. The Holy Spirit is not wordy without purpose, as the ignorant and sated spirits think who, once or twice having read through the Bible, then toss it aside as though they knew it well and there were nothing more in it that they might learn.9

Such characterizations of the text of Genesis as repetitious for good reason were frequent throughout the lectures. Commenting on the agreement Abraham made with the Hittites for a burial spot for Sarah, Luther noted that “Moses was quite verbose” in his description of the contract. The Holy Spirit describes both the politeness of the Hittites and the modesty of Abraham’s request in order to show that “he requires and thinks highly of such virtues.” Luther in turn admonished his students, “Therefore, learn from this example to control your manners in such a way that you accustom yourself to politeness, modesty, and respect toward all. It is for this reason that Moses so diligently and copiously sets before our eyes the example of Abraham….” In this verbose text, Moses and the Holy Spirit teach the whole doctrine of ethics better “than Aristotle, the jurists, and the canonists have propounded it.” Later, citing again the apostle’s statement that everything in scripture is written for our instruction (Rom. 15:4), the professor wondered aloud “why Moses has so much to say about such unimportant matters.” Then he answered himself: “There is no doubt, however, that the Holy Spirit wanted these things to be written and to stand out in our doctrine; for nothing insignificant, nothing purposeless is put before us in holy scripture.”10 In another passage, sprinkled with phrases in German, Luther again cited Romans 15:4 as he reflected on why the Holy Spirit records such “servile and despised works” as those of Genesis 29:1–3, where Jacob meets the shepherds of his kinsman Laban at the well near Haran. “If we believed firmly, as I do (even though I believe weakly), that the Holy Spirit himself 9WA

42:326.22–31, 327.7–10 (LW 2:90–91). 43:284.34–37, 285.9–12, 285.16–20, 286.1–3 (LW 4:207–9); WA 43:292.8–10 (LW 4:217); WA 43:332.10–16 (LW 4:274). 10WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 37 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

37

and God, the maker of all things, is the author of this book and of matters so unimportant, as they seem to be to the flesh, then we would have the greatest consolation, as Paul says.” In Luther’s understanding, God takes pleasure not only in the “glorious and extraordinary virtues of the saints but also cares about their most insignificant little works, because they are the works of God.” “Yes, listen to Christ, he does still better.” Luther notes that God cares for his saints so that even the hairs of their head are numbered (Matt. 10:30). “These things are described in order that we may see how tenderly God loves and embraces us, and what great and anxious concern he has for us. So closely does he look at men that he is afraid I may lose a hair.” In the same vein, Luther writes: “When the Holy Spirit goes along so weakly in describing his saints, he means that the most insignificant of all the works of the saints pleases God very much. A Christian is something precious. There is nothing so insignificant in him that it does not please God.”11 Later in this passage, the text describes Jacob’s meeting Rachel. Luther calculates Jacob to have been eighty or at least seventy-eight at the time. The old man is described as falling in love, in childish and carnal fashion, with the bright-eyed girl and not her homely older sister. Luther asked why the Holy Spirit records such things. In the end, after offering various reasons, Luther concluded, “Here the Holy Spirit teaches that such a choice has not been condemned by God. For he commends it, or rather yields to the wish of this most holy patriarch in order that he may love a beautiful woman more than one who is ugly. He lets it happen.”12 Throughout this passage, which is marked by Luther’s spontaneous dips into German, one can “hear” Luther talking with his students about the scripture as the words of Moses and the words of the Holy Spirit. Passages like this are common throughout the lectures: “womanish” things are recorded to support the dignity of marriage, “carnal things” so that the love between husband and wife is treasured as something created and ordained by God, not disgraceful and forbidden as the monks suggest.13 The “rhetoric of the Holy Spirit” in holy scripture praises the good of God’s creation rather than dwelling like Pliny on the perversions and violence of nature.14 11WA 43:618.27–34, 618.40–42, 619.18–19, 619.28–31, 619.39–42 (LW 5:274–77), italics indicate original text in German. 12WA 43:627.18–27, 628.40–629.1 (LW 5:288–90), italics indicate original text in German. 13WA 43:623.14–21 (LW 5:282); WA 43:624.11–12, 624.14–16 (LW 5:283). See also WA 43:655.28–656.32 (LW 5:329–30); WA 43:658.24–659.7 (LW 5:333–34). 14WA 43:124.28–36; LW 3:347. Cf. Pliny Natural History 8.25 (as noted in LW 3:347n26).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 38 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER TWO

38

However, the Holy Spirit can also record in detail the obscene history of Tamar’s incest with her father Judah (Gen. 38): But the diligence of the Holy Spirit in describing such a shameful and obscene history is marvelous. He brings out everything, even to the very last little detail, and so much so that he does not disdain to speak of the birth of the twins and the bursting of the afterbirth. Why did the completely clean mouth of the Holy Spirit lower itself to the basest and most ignoble matters, yes, to matters that are even repulsive, filthy, and subject to damnation, as though these things were particularly profitable for the instruction of the church of God? What does that have to do with the church? I reply as before. These things are mentioned for the sake of Christ, who is described throughout all holy scripture as our blood relative, our brother, and more closely joined to us than any other relation of ours.15

The obscene story shows how the Holy Spirit is present in the text of Moses. He “descends with his completely pure mouth and speaks even about that filth of sin and horrible incest, to signify that Christ’s flesh was in Judah and Tamar, and that he is also close to men who sin, although there is not only great baseness and filth but also damnation and guilt before God.” Luther thus explicitly compared the Holy Spirit’s presence in the text to the incarnation of the Son of God. As God descends and is made flesh in the man Jesus, so the Holy Spirit descends and is present in this narrative of the obscene. “Although he does not commit such deeds and is not the author of sin and corruption, yet if he were not present or were not close to sinners, who would be willing to cleanse and correct that baseness of the flesh?” One might expect these words to refer to Christ. But the referent of the pronoun is the Holy Spirit—whose presence in the narrative “is so close that he employs his tongue to tell of the filthiest and basest things.”16 Luther thus impressed upon his students the intimate connection between the spoken words of the Holy Spirit and the words of the text as written by Moses.17 What is striking about Luther’s descriptions is his

15WA

44:327.17–27; LW 7:35, italics indicate original text in German. 44:328.13–17 (LW 7:36); WA 44:328.19–23 (LW 7:36–37). 17One cannot accept, therefore, the view of Miika Ruokanen (“Does Luther Have a Theory of Biblical Inspiration?” esp. 12), who states that a concept of verbal inspiration of scripture is incompatible with Luther’s thought; see also Ruokanen, Doctrina Divinitus Inspirata. If, in fact, Luther did not XXXXXXX 16WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 39 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

39

emphasis that the Holy Spirit is speaking in the text Moses wrote precisely where human reason and even traditional piety find the text unreasonable, unedifying, and even morally repulsive. Luther’s understanding that such offensive passages are sometimes literal and historical can be contrasted with the instruction of Augustine: “We must first explain the way to discover whether an expression [in scripture] is literal or figurative. Generally speaking, it is this: anything in the divine discourse that cannot be related either to good morals or to the true faith should be taken as figurative.”18 These examples of the professor at work in the classroom show further that while, in Luther’s understanding, the word of God is much more than its written form in holy scripture, nevertheless scripture is to be identified as the word of God. For Luther, the word of God has a number of varied and related identities that include the second person of the Trinity, the gospel, law and gospel, oral proclamation (kerygma) of the gospel, and finally, the written record of prophets and apostles through whom the Holy Spirit speaks. The professor taught his students to identify the words of his text as words of the Holy Spirit. He was teaching his students to sit with him at the foot of the lectern on which the book of the prophets and apostles sits and to approach God’s book differently from the way “the unbelieving Jews and the godless papists” trifle with holy scripture. Such interpreters want “to be teachers of the Holy Spirit and to teach him what or how to write.” In stark contrast, Luther urged his students: “But let us be and remain pupils, and let us not change the word of God; we ourselves should be changed through the word.”19

DIVINE SCRIPTURE AND HUMAN AUTHORITIES Although “unbelieving Jews” and “godless papists” received the brunt of Luther’s criticism throughout the lectures for their trifling with God’s

18

have a particular theory about how such inspiration of Moses’ words has occurred, this does not negate Luther’s clear belief in the fact of such inspiration any more than Luther’s disinterest in formulating a theory explaining the real presence of Christ’s body and blood in the elements of the Lord’s Supper negates his firm belief in the reality of that sacred mystery. For a systematic treatment of Luther’s view of inspiration and other aspects of his understanding of scripture, see Thompson, A Sure Ground on Which to Stand. 18Augustine, On Christian Teaching, trans. Green, 77. 19WA 43:87.39–40 (LW 3:297).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 40 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

40

CHAPTER TWO

word, the professor made clear from his opening remarks onward that, even among the very best Christian commentators on Genesis, this attempt to be teachers of the Holy Spirit rather than to remain his pupils has been common. Luther’s opening words, as recorded by his students, expounded upon his view that the first chapter of Genesis is written in “the simplest language” yet contains “the greatest and most obscure content.” Responding to an erroneous tradition passed down from Jerome that Jewish practice forbade study of the text to anyone under thirty years of age, Luther argued that rabbis even twice that age had failed to comprehend these very serious matters.20 Among Christian interpreters, the chapter had not fared much better. Luther advised his students, “among the Hebrews, the Latins, or the Greeks there is no guide whom we could follow with safety in this area.” Their professor would have to proceed without a guide, doing the best he could.21 According to Luther, the problem was that the commentators were trifling with the Holy Spirit’s words: Hilary and Augustine, as it were the two greatest lights of the church, perceive a world created suddenly and at the same time, not successively through six days. And Augustine amuses himself marvelously in his treatment of the six days, which he makes mystical days of knowledge in the angels, not natural ones. Hence in the schools and church, disputations concerning evening and morning knowledge are customary, which Augustine introduced and which are diligently recited by Lyra. Whoever wants to know these things, let him seek it from Lyra.22

In this way, Luther established in his opening lecture the key theme for his exposition of Genesis as it relates to traditional interpretations. He asserts that although the opening chapters of the Genesis narrative are 20“Primum caput simplicissimis quidem verbis est scriptum, sed res continet maximas et obscurissimas. Quare apud Ebraeos (sicut D. Hieronymus testatur) prohibitum fuit, ne quis ante annum aetatis trigesimum illud legeret aut enarraret aliis. Voluerunt enim, prius totam Scripturam bene cognitam esse, quam ad hoc Caput perveniretur. Sed neque ista ratione aliguid promoverunt Iudaeorum Rabini; nam etiam bis triginta annos et amplius nati pueriliter in suis commentariis de his gravissimis rebus nugantur.” WA 42:14–21 (LW 1:3). Luther thus cites Jerome for his (erroneous) knowledge of this Jewish custom. Jerome records this in his letter to Paulinus (Ep. 53), which, either as a whole or in a digested version, prefaced many manuscript and later printed editions of the Bible with or without the Glossa ordinaria, and was therefore widely known. It is very likely that Luther cites this text from his copy of the glossed Bible. 21WA 42:3.22–23, 4.21–23, 6.9–10 (LW 1:3–6). 22WA 42:4.26–31 (LW 1:4).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 41 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

41

written in clear language, the Holy Spirit recorded words that unveil the unfathomable mystery of God and his creation. The Reformer further insists that there has been a lot of manipulating the Holy Spirit’s words in both rabbinic and Christian traditions. While readers can learn from Moses that the world has not existed for more than six thousand years, philosophers look to Aristotle, who posits an eternal world. Luther thus criticized the Scholastic tradition of reconciling the text of scripture with Aristotelian philosophy. Luther went on to criticize Augustine for playing with allegories and thus making no real contributions, because the Holy Spirit wants to teach about real creatures and the real world. If one does not understand why God created in this pattern of time described in Genesis, “let us rather confess our ignorance than distort the words beyond their content into an alien sense.” Luther concludes that Augustine’s opinion should be dismissed, for Moses spoke “properly, not allegorically” about the six days, “just as the words sound.” The professor taught his students that various opinions of the philosophers can be found in the commentary of Nicholas of Lyra, but in the end, they can be disregarded. “Let us turn to Moses as the better Doctor, whom we can follow more safely than the philosophers who dispute without the word about unknown things.”23 At the outset of his lecture, Luther emphasized that while the text before them is divine scripture, the various authorities that have been engaged in the tradition of Genesis exposition are human authorities and must be regarded as such. Despite his view that rabbinic and Christian traditions of exegesis were not needed for proper exposition and certainly were not reliable guides, he engaged these views often in his exposition of Genesis, especially in the opening chapters of the book. Through most of this engagement, however, Luther criticizes the tradition and attempts to show his students a better way. The repeated mention of Lyra is an important clue to Luther’s sources. “Lyra,” as Luther labeled it throughout the lectures, denotes one of the most popular Bible commentaries of the late Middle Ages, the Postils (both the Postilla Literalis and the Postilla Moralis) of the Franciscan friar Nicholas of Lyra (1270–1349). In referring his students to Lyra in this opening lecture, the professor may have been directing his students to something quite concrete: one or more volumes that they could easily

23WA

42:3.22–5.32 (LW 1:3–6). See esp. WA 42:3.30–5.18, 30–32.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 42 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER TWO

42

consult in the library of the University of Wittenberg, as is documented in a catalogue recorded in 1536, soon after these opening lectures were delivered. The label may have referred to the four volumes of a 1489 Venetian edition of the Postillae Nicolai de Lyra super Vetus et Novum Testamentum cum libello contra judaica perfidia present in the library. Or, perhaps more likely, Luther may have been pointing his students to the seven unbound folios of the Textus bibliae cum Glossa ordinaria Nicolai de Lyra Postilla printed by Froben and Petri for Amerbach in Basel in 1507/8.24 In the glossed Bible, Luther’s students had at their fingertips what Karlfried Froehlich has described as “more than just a convenient exegetical tool, an encyclopedia which one would consult from time to time.” They had in their library a resource whose “parts were read and studied coherently because they presented everywhere the combined theological authority of Scripture and Tradition in an easily accessible form.” 25 From its second printed edition (1495) onward, the glossed Bible was produced “by that divine new art of printing” in editions that included in its already massive text the Postils of Nicholas of Lyra.26 In the laudatio of the index volume from the particular edition available in the University of Wittenberg library, its editor, Conrad Leontorius Mulbrunnensis, voiced the claim, “Whoever you are, splendid reader: public proclaimer of the divine word in the churches of Christ, private discussant, or speaker at some event; behold, here you have before your eyes in the briefest form all your materials and subjects.”27 With editions of these traditional texts in reach at their own university library, Luther’s students could easily follow their teacher’s oftrepeated instruction to consult Lyra should they want more information from human authorities regarding the riches available in Genesis. Luther’s lectures, however, not only engaged tradition but also taught these students how to evaluate it according to principles common among

24Kusukawa,

Wittenberg University Library Catalogue, 17. “Extraordinary Achievement,” 15. 26 Bernardino Gadolo, dedicatory preface to Biblia Latina cum Glossa Ordinaria (Venice, 1495), quoted in Froehlich, “Extraordinary Achievement,” 19. Froehlich notes, “On the strength of Gadolo’s arguments, no printer after Paganinus [Venice, 1495] could afford, or dared to print, the Glossa Ordinaria without Lyra any more.” 27Froehlich, “Printed Gloss,” xx. For more on Lyra, see the essays and bibliography in Krey and Smith, Nicholas of Lyra. For Luther’s use of Lyra, see Kalita, “Influence of Nicholas of Lyra,” as well as the limited references in LW. On the importance of Lyra’s Postils and their dependence on Rashi (Rabbi Schlomo Yitzhagi, 1040–1105), see Hailperin, Rashi and the Christian Scholars. Hailperin (263) notes, “The well-known couplet which has been applied to Luther, Si Lira non lirasset, Lutherus non saltasset, is but an adaption of the older couplet, Nisi Lira non lirasset, nemo Doctorum in Bibliam saltasset.” 25Froehlich,

Luther's Genesis.book Page 43 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

43

reformers in the sixteenth century. Among sixteenth-century reformers the principle of sola scriptura did not mean that the expository tradition could or should be ignored or that scripture should be promoted within the church without gloss or comment. It meant that scripture was the supreme authority over all other authorities.28 Luther made this clear in his very first lecture and his engagement with human authorities demonstrated this principle throughout his ten years of lecturing on Genesis. One can view Luther as defining precisely his understanding of this principle in his exposition of Genesis 1, where again and again he referred to arguments of church fathers and pagan philosophers. Sometimes he also cited the exegesis of “unbelieving” rabbis. With all these authorities, Luther noted their arguments, sometimes agreeing with them, but always leaving the magisterium to the Holy Spirit. Disagreeing with Augustine’s statement in his Confessions “that matter is almost nothing, so close to nothing that there is no intermediate reality,”29 Luther appealed to 2 Peter 3:5–6, applying the principle that scripture should be interpreted by other passages of scripture.30 Later, Luther drew upon the teachings of Aristotle concerning the unique nature of heaven. “Even if these ideas are not certain,” Luther continued, “they are nevertheless useful for teaching because they contain principles of the beautiful arts gathered from plausible reasoning. It is barbarian if anyone wishes to neglect or despise them, especially since in some respects they are in agreement with experience.”31 Luther opined that the philosophers have often treated such subjects better than theologians, such as Ambrose and Augustine, who had “rather childish ideas” and should rather have kept silent on these topics as Jerome did.32 As Luther and his 28Among the better recent studies, see Lane, “Sola Scriptura?” 297–327; Lotz, “Sola Scriptura: Luther on Biblical Authority,” 258–73; Thompson, A Sure Ground on Which to Stand, esp. 249–82; and Ward, Word and Supplement. Edwards (Printing, Propaganda, and Martin Luther, 109–30) perpetuates a common error by viewing Luther’s publication of guides to the interpretation of scripture (including glosses in his “September Testament” of 1522) as contradicting in practice his appeal to the sole authority of scripture (at Worms, for example). But the Wittenberg Reformation never denied but rather addressed the need for trained pastors to teach the Bible and prepared printed materials for literate laypeople to do the same within the household. 29WA 42:7.23–26 (LW 1:8). As the editor of LW notes (1:8n16), Luther’s source here may well be Lyra’s introduction to Genesis 1. 30 The principle that scripture interprets scripture goes back to Augustine (On Christian Teaching, trans. Green, 37), who wrote: “In clearly expressed passages of scripture one can find all the things that concern faith and the moral life.… Then, after gaining a familiarity with the language of the divine scriptures, one should proceed to explore and analyse the obscure passages, by taking examples from the more obvious parts to illuminate obscure expressions and by using the evidence of indisputable passages to remove the uncertainty of ambiguous ones.” 31WA 42:21.14–18 (LW 1:27). 32WA 42:22.4–6 (LW 1:28).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 44 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER TWO

44

students considered Moses’ record of the works of God, he taught them to develop a method of reasoning different from philosophy: Therefore, concerning the causes of these things, we Christians must think differently from the philosophers. And if certain things are beyond our comprehension (like those here about waters above the heavens), we must believe them and admit our lack of knowledge rather than either wickedly deny them or presumptuously interpret them in conformity with our understanding. For we must preserve the phrases of holy scripture, and abide in the words of the Holy Spirit….33

In his comments on Genesis 1:14, Luther later engaged the favorite pseudoscience of his colleague Philip Melanchthon: astrology. “Geniuses must be allowed their pastime!” the professor exclaimed. “Therefore if you put aside all superstition, it does not offend me greatly if anyone exercises his ingenuity in toying with those predictions.” On the other hand, So far as this matter is concerned, however, I shall never be convinced that astrology should be numbered among the sciences. And I shall adhere to this opinion because astrology is entirely without proof. The appeal to experience has no effect on me. All the astrological experiences are purely individual cases. The experts have taken note of and recorded only those instances that did not fail; but they took no note of the rest of the attempts, where they were wrong and the results that they predicted as certain did not follow. Aristotle says that one swallow does not make a spring….34

33WA

42:23.19–24 (LW 1:30). 42:33.34–34.8 (LW 1:45). In his introduction to the Genesis lectures in LW, Jaroslav Pelikan (LW 1:xi) indicates that such references to astrology may be some of the few examples where the text of the Genesis lectures “sounds more like Melanchthon than like any Luther we know.” Yet both here and in the citation Pelikan refers to (LW 1:31n57), Luther makes quite clear that superstitious elements (that is, astrological predictions) of the “science” of astronomy do not hold weight with him. In the sixteenth century, astrology and astronomy were not carefully distinguished. The clearly facetious tone in the reference here is evidence yet again that it is Luther’s language and thinking that are preserved in the text and not Melanchthonian views of the editors. In 1540 Luther quipped at table with a similar tone: “Philip Melanchthon detained me for a day with his incurable belief in astrology, for it was a new moon.” WA Tr 5: 5369, cited and translated in Oberman, Luther: Man between God and the Devil, 330. On this issue, the text of the Genesis lectures sounds exactly like Luther. Unlike Luther, Melanchthon took astrology very seriously, as his intervention in Luther’s travel schedule shows. One tastes the flavor of Melanchthon’s very different estimation of astrology in his oration On the Dignity of Astrology (1535) where, for example, he writes, “Perhaps astrology would have to be considered an art if it consisted only of conjectures; but it is the art of things that do not fail.” [Melanchthon], Orations on Philosophy and Education, 121. 34WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 45 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

45

On the same passage in Genesis, Luther engaged Plato and his claim in the Timaeus that the heavenly bodies consist of both mass and intellect. But this opinion must be entirely rejected, and our intellect must adjust itself to the word of God and to the holy scripture, which plainly teaches that God created all these things in order to prepare a house and an inn, as it were, for the future man, and that he governs and preserves these creatures by the power of his word, by which he also created them…. Here I have considered it necessary to repeat the principle I mentioned several times above, namely, that one must accustom oneself to phrases of the Holy Spirit…. Thus we see that the Holy Spirit also has his own language and way of expression, namely, that God, by speaking, created all things and worked through the word, and that all his works are some words of God, created by the uncreated word. Therefore just as a philosopher employs his own terms, so the Holy Spirit, too, employs his.35

Luther rounded out the discussion with an important principle for his critical use of scientific and philosophical sources of knowledge, a maxim for the relationship between the various sciences including theology: “Every science should make use of its own terminology, and one should not for this reason condemn the other or ridicule it; but one should rather be of use to the other, and they should put their achievements at one another’s disposal.” Here Luther cited Aristotle’s view that in the maintenance of a city, a variety of craftsmen are necessary.36 Luther employed this same critical use of his sources when it concerned patristic authorities. An important passage for viewing Luther’s attitude toward these authorities in relation to holy scripture is his comments on the creation of Eve in Genesis 2:21. Luther began by dealing with the issue of the days of creation as a literal and not figurative description of the events of creation. Then he said: 35WA 42:35.22–41 (LW 1:47). Among Luther scholars there is considerable interest in the careful distinction the Reformer draws between the language of philosophy and that of theology (“the language and way of expression” of the Holy Spirit). See, for example, Bielfeldt, “Luther and the Strange Language of Theology.” For a systematic theologian’s analysis of the philosophical and theological knowledge of God in the Genesis lectures, see Asendorf, Lectura in Biblia, 299–376. In reconstructing the themes of the Genesis lectures, it is important only to note how Luther’s distinction supports both his understanding of the text of Genesis as the word of God and his view of all human authorities as subject to that divine scripture. 36WA 42:36.12–16 (LW 1:48). The editor of LW provides a reference to Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 5.5. As is generally the case, no specific citation is provided either in the original imprint of the published lectures or in WA.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 46 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

46

CHAPTER TWO That Adam was created on the sixth day, that the animals were brought to him, that he heard the Lord giving him a command regarding the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, likewise that the Lord sent a sleep upon him—in all these things it is manifest that they pertain to time and physical life. Therefore it is necessary to understand these days as real days, contrary to the opinion of the holy fathers. For wherever we see that the opinions of the fathers are not in agreement with scripture, we reverently bear with them and acknowledge them as our forefathers [Maiores]. But nevertheless we do not on their account deviate from the authority of scripture. Elegant and true is the maxim of Aristotle in the first book of his Ethics: “Better it is to be a defender of truth, than to be too much devoted to those who are our friends and relatives.” And this is, above all, the proper attitude for a philosopher. For although both, truth and friends, are dear to us, preference must be given to truth.… If a pagan maintains that this must be the attitude in secular discourses, how much more must it be our attitude in those that involve the clear witness of scripture that we dare not give preference to the authority of men over that of scripture! Human beings can err, but the word of God is the very wisdom of God and most certain truth.37

This passage shows clearly how Luther applied the authority of scripture in his thinking and lecturing. The church fathers are to be respected—but not against the authority of scripture. The fathers were “friends” for Luther, who was steeped in their writings, but truth must be preferred even over friends. The truth is found most certainly in the word of God, which is related in this passage specifically to the scriptural text. When their statements are not based upon or even contradict scripture, Luther regards the church fathers no differently than the pagan philosophers. This is seen clearly as Luther goes on in this lecture to engage Aristotle, who follows the judgment of reason and declares that neither a first man nor a last man can be conceded. Luther replies, “Reason would compel us, too, to pronounce the same thing, if it were without this text.”38

37WA 42:92.9–26 (LW 1:122). The ellipsis in the quotation indicates where the original text repeats in Greek the previous sentence, which is a variant of a proverb going back to Aristotle. On the fascinating history of this proverb and its textual variants, see Tarán, “Amicus Plato sed magis amica veritas.” Tarán cites Luther’s use of the proverb in his treatise De Servo Arbitrio (The Bondage of the Will), but not this reference in the Genesis lectures. See also Grafton, Commerce with the Classics, 196–97. 38WA 42:92.36 (LW 1:123). See also WA 42:92.39–40, 93.12–13: “Idem de mundo quoque pronuntiandum esset, quem ideo aeternum Philosophi statuerunt.... In hos labyrinthos deducitur ratio, cum destituta est verbo et sequitur suum iudicium.”

Luther's Genesis.book Page 47 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

47

Finally, Luther summarized his views regarding these various authorities of church fathers, philosophers, reason itself, and scripture: Therefore let us learn that true wisdom is in holy scripture and in the word of God. This gives information not only about the matter of the entire creation, not only about its form, but also about the efficient and final cause, about the beginning and about the end of all things, about who did the creating and for what purpose he created. Without the knowledge of these two causes our wisdom does not differ much from that of the beasts, which also make use of their eyes and ears but are utterly without knowledge about their beginning and their end. Therefore, this is an outstanding text. The more it seems to conflict with all experience and reason, the more carefully it must be noted and the more surely believed.39

Luther’s expository practice in the lecture hall at Wittenberg shows that sola scriptura did not mean for him (or for most sixteenth-century reformers) that human authorities have no place in biblical exposition. Luther maintained a remarkable command of a broad range of intellectual tools and sources, not only in the Christian tradition, but also in the texts of classical antiquity. These he used, often as negative examples, but sometimes constructively as well. He demonstrated a remarkable flexibility with the opinions of others when no scriptural issues were being obscured or contradicted, whether these views were rooted in pagan or Scholastic philosophy, patristic authorities, or even the pseudoscience of astrology. Yet, true to his own convictions expressed in the 1539 preface to his German writings, Luther’s chief concern was that the prophets and apostles be heard, for no one else “will do as well as the holy scripture—that is, God himself—has done.”40 His confidence in this assertion led Luther many times in the Genesis lectures to wrestle with difficulties of chronology and history.41 The same confidence in the truthfulness and clarity of Moses’ account led Luther to harsh criticism of patristic exposition (and criticism of Lyra, who Luther believed yielded too much to the fathers’ authority) when it sacrificed the light of God’s word for “obscure and most foolish allegories.”42 Commenting on Augustine and Gregory allegorizing the 39WA

42:94.3–11 (LW 1:125). 50:657.25–27 (LW 34:284). 41For example, see LW 4:184–86; 5:337–40; 6:178–79; 7:3–9; 8:84–89. During the early years of his lectures on Genesis, Luther also wrote and, in 1541, published a chronology of world history, his Supputatio annorum mundi (WA 53:22–184). 42Mattox (Defender of the Most Holy Matriarchs, esp. 109–37) emphasizes that Luther’s interpreXXXXXXXX 40WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 48 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER TWO

48

curse on the serpent recorded in Genesis 3:14, Luther said, “We shall disregard such destructive and foolish absurdities and proceed by a new route, unconcerned if the footprints of our predecessors lead elsewhere.” “For we have the Holy Spirit as our guide. Through Moses, he does not give us foolish allegories, but he teaches us about most important events, which involve God, sinful man, and Satan, the originator of sin.” Sticking to his text, Luther adhered to its historical and literal meaning.43 This was the sola scriptura principle at work, as prophets and apostles spoke from the professor’s lectern.

THE LIMITS OF PHILOLOGY Luther’s turn away from patristic and medieval allegory to the historical and literal sense of the sacred text has been the subject of several studies that relate this turn to the beginnings of his Reformation theology.44 That each of these studies deals with Luther’s exegesis of the Psalms is significant. The patristic and medieval tradition of Christological exegesis had in various ways located Christ and Christian themes in the Psalms by positing various levels of meaning, whereby the historical person speaking in the Psalms (usually David) became representative—through allegory, typology, and/or anagogy—of Christ, the church (militant on earth or triumphant in heaven), and/or the Christian. Through this threefold application of spiritual meanings, the ancient text became relevant to

43

tation of the women of Genesis reveals a great deal of continuity between Luther and the tradition(s) of Genesis exposition. Though this may be true in specific passages, Luther’s general willingness to challenge and sometimes even harshly criticize previous interpretations predominates in the published lectures. This tone is established from the very first lectures on Genesis 1. Even if it is the case that their professor’s interpretations sometimes owed more to his predecessors than he indicated in the lectures, what these students heard and recorded and what later generations read emphasizes Luther’s independence and criticism much more than his acceptance of his predecessors’ expositions. It is noteworthy that Mattox’s opposite conclusion was reached from his analysis of Luther’s exposition of passages like Genesis 18, where Luther largely adopted the patristic interpretation of the three visitors as revelation of the Trinity. Luther’s trinitarian orthodoxy is well established; therefore it is not surprising that he would find common ground here. Commenting on Genesis 1:1–2, for example, Luther taught his students, “Indeed, it is the great consensus of the church that the mystery of the Trinity is set forth here.” WA 42:8.23–24 (LW 1:9). 43WA 42:138.1–6, 14–15, 31–35; 42:138.40–139.1 (LW 1:185). 44See, for example, Ebeling, “Beginnings of Luther’s Hermeneutics,” 129–58, 314–38, 451–68; Hendrix, Ecclesia in via; Preus, From Shadow to Promise; and Raeder, Benutzung des masoretischen Textes bei Luther.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 49 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

49

Christian experience and the church’s liturgical life. Luther’s earliest lectures on the Psalms (1513–15) have been described as having first achieved the highest form of this Christological tradition and then surpassed it by abandoning levels of meaning, asserting that the historical person David as a prophet does not merely symbolize or represent Christ and the Christian, but speaks prophetically of the person of Christ and of Christian experience.45 Already in these early lectures, Luther was finding the Christian meaning and spiritual significance of the Psalms in the literal and historical words. Luther abandoned a method of spiritual interpretation that was influenced by Neoplatonism and was commonly used starting with the early church fathers, which located the Christian, spiritual meaning of the scripture above and not in the historical and literal meaning of the words. Luther looked instead for the spiritual and Christian meaning in the history itself. Spirit above the letter became spirit in the letter. Scott Hendrix has noted Luther’s increased attention to the Hebrew language of the text when the embattled Reformer turned to the Psalms a second time between 1519 and 1521 (later published as the Operationes in Psalmos). In these lectures, Luther drew heavily upon his study of Hebrew from 1515 to 1518, emphasizing the importance of knowing the language and paying careful attention to the words of the text. He was utilizing the tools of philology, the study and analysis of grammar. Viewed in the context of the history of biblical interpretation, Luther’s expositions stand in stark contrast to the patristic and medieval tradition: he located theologically rich and edifying meaning not merely in Christological interpretation but in the contemporary application of the Psalms to Christian life. 46 This turn from tradition had great significance for Luther’s reading of the other, much more preponderant, genre of Old Testament literature: historical narrative such as is found in Genesis. Luther found spiritual significance in the most mundane (and sometimes even obscene) details of the Holy Spirit’s words. For Luther, Christ and the Holy Spirit were present in the events and lives of the patriarchs and not merely symbolized by them as in the threefold method of patristic and medieval spiritual interpretation.

45See

esp. the works by Ebeling, Hendrix, and Preus in the preceding note. Hendrix, “Luther Against the Background,” 232–33, where he highlights Luther’s description of his exposition as grammatica theologica (“theological philology”). See also Hendrix, “Authority of Scripture at Work”; Raeder, Grammatica Theologica; Raeder, Hebräische bei Luther; and Raeder, Benutzung des masoretischen Textes bei Luther. 46See

Luther's Genesis.book Page 50 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

50

CHAPTER TWO

Careful attention to the words of the text could lead one to discover and proclaim their presence. One might expect, then, to find Luther building upon his earlier discovery of the value of Hebrew grammar and applying in full force the vast resources in Christian Hebraica that were coming off the presses in the first half of the sixteenth century.47 While Luther did utilize Hebrew grammar and vocabulary to engage and often to criticize the Christian tradition of commentary on both the letter and the spirit of the text, he did not advance beyond his early lectures to abandon the Latin text of Jerome and the Postils of Lyra to dive deeply into the riches of Hebrew study and its tools. Instead, we find him warning his students of the limits of philology and the dangers lurking in a kind of Bible study that, especially among Evangelical reformers, was increasingly looking to Jewish traditions and tools for analysis of the Old Testament. The complex reasons for Luther’s ambivalence and even hostility have been explored in relation to the broader historical context by Jerome Friedman. Friedman concludes that Luther attained only a basic knowledge of Hebrew and never became a scholar of Hebrew philology as that field came to full flower in his time. Scholars of Christian Hebraica became embroiled in the intellectual and political crises of the sixteenth century, both between papal and Protestant theologians and between various figures and centers of Protestantism. The Wittenberg solution to that problem was to respond polemically to a developing scholarship that Luther viewed as a threat. The Wittenberg theologians declined to accept the humanist program of Christian Hebraica, but instead developed a severely truncated form of Hebrew study, Friedman concludes. As illustrated by the publications of the university’s Hebrew professor, Johannes Forster, the Wittenberg reformers held the view that a true recovery of knowledge of the Hebrew Old Testament required illumination not from rabbinic sources and tools but from study of the New Testament, which alone revealed the Bible’s true meaning. 48 In Luther’s lectures on Genesis there are several passages that fit into this historical context and illuminate it. The basic elements of Luther’s 47On developments in Christian Hebraica in the first half of the sixteenth century and their contribution “to the intellectual climate of crisis and change characterizing the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries,” see Friedman, Most Ancient Testimony (quotation from p. 1). See also Friedman, “Sixteenth-Century Christian-Hebraica.” 48Friedman, Most Ancient Testimony, esp. 120–37, 164–76. Note the title of Forster’s Hebrew lexicon, published in 1557: New Hebrew Dictionary, Not Arranged Out of the Comments of the Rabbis nor Out of the Foolish Imitation of Our Native Doctors but Out of Our Own Treasures of Sacred Scripture and Developed by an Accurate Collation of Biblical Passages, Annotated with Passages and Phrases from the Old and New Testaments (quoted from Friedman, Most Ancient Testimony, 120).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 51 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

51

view can be seen in the following analysis and in other passages where the professor utilized the resources of Hebrew grammar but also warned his students of the limits of philology for understanding the meaning of God’s word. The passage is from Luther’s comments on the story of Cain’s unaccepted offering and God’s address to him (through Adam, says Luther). After citing Augustine’s rendering of the passage (Gen. 4:7), Luther noted that Augustine had not understood the Hebrew text accurately, “although the meaning he derives from his translation is good and theologically sound.” The Septuagint translators likewise had inadequate knowledge of Hebrew, and Luther, “passing by both the translations and the opinions of others,” followed “the peculiar nature of the Hebrew” and offered his own translation.49 He then began a discourse on the relationship between grammar and exposition, in which he criticizes a twelfth-century Jewish commentator named Gerondi: Further, nature is thus ordered that, as the philosopher [Aristotle] also testifies, words should be subject to the content [res], not the content to the words. And of note is the opinion of Hilary, which the Master [Peter Lombard] also cites in the Sentences, that words should be understood according to the subject matter. Therefore in every exposition the subject should be considered first; that is, it must be determined what is under consideration. After this has been done, then the words should be adapted to the content if the character of the language so permits, not the content to the words. Because the rabbis and those who follow them do not do this (for they have lost the content and adhere only to the words), they often arrive at the most absurd opinions. Since they do not have thoughts that are worthy of the spiritual things with which the sacred records deal, they digress from the content and drag the words into vain and carnal thoughts. Moreover, since it is certain that the Jews have let go of Christ, how, then, can they correctly understand the things either of the gospel or of the law? They do not know what sin is, what grace is, what righteousness is. How, then, can they properly explain passages of this kind? Somewhat like them are our sophists, for what do they have about such things that is sound? Therefore, the content not understood, it is impossible for the words to be correctly understood. For even if knowledge of the words ordinarily comes first, nevertheless

49WA

42:194.31–195.2 (LW 1:263).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 52 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

52

CHAPTER TWO knowledge of the content is preferable. For when the content is changed, the words are also changed to another meaning, and an entirely new grammar comes into being. Gerondi has the optimal knowledge of the words (just as today there are many who far surpass me in knowledge of Hebrew grammar). But because he does not understand the content, he distorts this passage.50

Gerondi’s distortion was his understanding that because Cain was the firstborn, had he only done well, his offering would have been more acceptable than Abel’s.51 To this, Luther replied with his own conviction about the passage: In the first place, as I have said, it is necessary that we have the content. But the content that cannot escape notice—undoubtedly the basic issue—is that nothing is pleasing to God unless it is done out of faith. [Here Luther cites Romans and Proverbs]… The second basic issue is that sin is something so enormous that it can be blotted out by no sacrifices or other works, but only by mercy, which must be accepted by faith. In like manner, the first promise of the woman’s seed, without whom no one is redeemed, reveals and confirms this. The rabbis do not have these foundations. For this knowledge comes only from the spirit of Christ, who, like the noonday sun, illuminates darkness. Therefore whatever contends with these basic issues, let us repudiate as wicked and false.52

What are the basic contours of this approach to the scripture and its interpretation? First, Luther guides his students into an analysis that appeals to “the peculiar nature of the Hebrew” over Augustine and the Septuagint translators, who did not adequately grasp its meaning. He appeals to “the philosopher” (Aristotle) for his first principle of interpretation: meaning cannot be determined from words because the meaning of words is determined by their usage in a particular context. Therefore the content (res) of a passage informs the meaning of words and thus their translation. Understanding the words of the holy scripture requires

50WA 42:195.3–24 (LW 1:263–64). References within the text are to Aristotle Rhetoric 3.1–2; and Hilary On the Trinity 2.5 (see LW 1:263nn26, 27). Gerondi was a twelfth-century Jewish commentator whose interpretation Luther probably knew only through the Hebraica biblia latina by the Basel Hebraist Sebastian Münster. See Delius, Quellen, 41–42. 51WA 42:195.24–29 (LW 1:264). 52WA 42:195.38–196.9 (LW 1:265).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 53 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

53

thoughts worthy of the spiritual things with which the scripture deals. But the rabbis and the Christian Hebraists who look to their interpretations have dispensed with this content: how can the Jews who have lost Christ rightly understand the gospel and the law? Like the Scholastic theologians (“our sophists”), rabbis, and Hebraists who focus only on grammar cannot comprehend the new grammar that arises when words speak of spiritual content revealed in the whole of Christian scripture. Although Luther cites Gerondi as an example, it is the only time he mentions this commentator; otherwise, nothing about Gerondi appears to interest Luther, as the name is mentioned without explanation or comment. What is significant to Luther is this rabbi’s erroneous interpretation and its influence upon sixteenth-century Christian Hebraica. Are the words of God addressed to Cain interpreted through the context (and thus the res) of later Jewish belief in the significance of Cain’s status as the firstborn son, or through the broader Old and New Testament commentary upon Cain and Abel offered through Proverbs and Romans, which points to the centrality of faith and God’s loathing of the sacrifice of the wicked? Grammar and words cannot establish the content of the passage; rather, the content determines the understanding of the words. Therefore, for Luther, one cannot discover the meaning of a passage in scripture using only philology and grammar. Meaning must be related to the res, the message of the passage as a whole in relation to the message of scripture as a whole, that is, the gospel of Jesus Christ. Luther’s later remarks on Genesis 4:13–15 show the essential parameters of his theological insight in this regard, an insight that applies not only to rabbinic commentary but to any exegesis of the Bible that fails to see its res throughout as Christ and the gospel: The rabbis distort the meaning of scripture almost everywhere. Therefore I am beginning to hate them and to advise that those who read them read with careful judgment. For even if they have possessed certain things, for example through tradition from the fathers, nevertheless they have distorted things in various ways…. Hence it causes us much work to maintain a pure text from their glosses. The reason for the error is that they are indeed philologians but they have no knowledge of the content [res]; that is, they are not theologians. Therefore they are compelled to twaddle and to crucify both themselves and scripture. For how is it possible for you to judge correctly about things that are unknown?…

Luther's Genesis.book Page 54 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER TWO

54

Thus we see that philologians who are nothing but philologians and have no knowledge of theological matters have their cruxes in such passages and they crucify not only scripture but also themselves and their hearers. First the meaning should be established in such a manner that it is everywhere in agreement; afterwards philology should be applied. But the rabbis do the opposite. For this reason, I regret that our teachers and holy fathers have, for the most part, followed them.53

Later in the lecture, Luther noted that the rabbis come up with such “nonsense” because “they have cast aside the light of the New Testament.” He complains that he has to work doubly hard to “safeguard the text and to cleanse it from such distortions.” Nevertheless, he cites their arguments occasionally to show that he has taken them into account. “For we read and understand them; but we read them with critical judgment, and we do not permit them to obscure Christ or to distort the word of God.” 54 These passages reveal a great deal about Luther the expositor. They show his engagement with the philological research of both Christian and Jewish interpreters of the Old Testament, yet also his biting criticism and even hatred of exposition that fails to allow every passage of scripture to be interpreted in the light of the whole, especially in the light of the New Testament. These passages also reveal his sense of the threat to the gospel and Christian theology posed by rabbinic commentary. Luther viewed this threat as verified in history going back to Jerome, and his fear therefore did not arise solely from his acute sense of the present eschatological struggle between God and the devil, with his allies the papists, the Turks, and the Jews. Luther’s frequent and harsh criticisms of rabbinic traditions of Genesis interpretation demonstrate that, for Luther, exposition of the scripture was a theological task, one that cannot be done without a theological mooring centered in Christ and the gospel—that is, in the light of the New Testament as the fulfillment of Old Testament hope. It is therefore necessary to distinguish Luther’s anti-Judaism—which includes both his understanding of what the scripture (both the Old and New Testaments) teaches regarding “Abraham’s descendants according to the flesh” and his concern to preserve a Christian reading of the Old Testament from anti-Christian rabbinic influences—from his anti-Semitic opinions

53WA 54WA

42:218.19–30, 219:34–40 (LW 1:296, 298). 42:223.10–16 (LW 1:303).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 55 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

55

and his extreme views regarding the place of nonconverting Jews in a society he viewed as a Christian society caught in an apocalyptic struggle. The latter can indeed be viewed, as suggested by Bernhard Lohse, as “a marginal theological issue, not at all part of the central themes,” while the former is as much at the center of Luther’s theology as the Bible itself.55 Luther reiterated these criticisms of Jewish interpretation throughout his lectures on Genesis. This emphasis reveals how central these issues were to the older Luther as he taught his students how to read the great prophet of the law as Christians. When he commented on Genesis 16, Luther cited Horace (Ars poetica) to support his contention that once the content (res) of a passage is firmly grasped, the meaning of the words comes easily. He warned his students “not to give any credence at all to the rabbis when you read their explanations.”56 As examples, he noted that Lyra followed Rabbis Solomon and Kimalthi, and all three failed to comprehend Hagar’s reaction to the angel who visited her in her wilderness despair (Gen. 16:7–14). Luther asserted that these commentators explain words but never grasp the meaning. Luther, on the other hand, cited Isaiah and commented theologically on God’s paradoxical revelation of himself in affliction: Hagar, in viewing God turned away from her, realizes that there in his back he is showing her his face.57 The passage is an extensive treatment of Luther’s theology of the cross, which he formulated against Scholastic theology and had enunciated powerfully at the Heidelberg Disputation in 1518. But here in the Genesis lectures, Luther’s focus was not on the sophism of Scholastic theologians but on the exegesis of Nicholas of Lyra and its dependence on the rabbis. As the lecture continued, that focus turned to the philological program of humanism as developed by the Christian Hebraists of the Reformation. Luther taught his students that, just as the Scholastic theologians erred in using Aristotle to define theology, so the Hebraists were erring in using the rabbis to explain the scripture of the Holy Spirit. He taught them, “It is not grammar—the only thing the rabbis have—that gives us this meaning; it is the knowledge of sacred matters. Since the rabbis lack this knowledge, they should be completely disregarded.” For Luther’s students there came a

55Lohse, Martin Luther’s Theology, xi. On the broader issues of anti-Semitism in the sixteenth century and Luther’s central role, alongside others (such as Erasmus of Rotterdam), see Oberman, Roots of Anti-Semitism. 56WA 42:597.17–31 (LW 3:68–69); WA 42:599.4–9 (LW 3:70–71). 57WA 42:599.10–18 (LW 3:71). See also WA 42:599.19–600.19 (LW 3:72–73).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 56 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER TWO

56

warning: he who sins against the grammar commits venial sin. But it is a mortal sin to violate the content, which is “nothing else than a knowledge of the New Testament; for when this is understood well, the entire scripture of the Old Testament is clear.” Since the rabbis reject Christ, what can be learned from them? “Nevertheless, today many outstanding and learned men consider it great wisdom if they have acquaintance with all the nonsense of the rabbis.”58 Luther was teaching his students not to be impressed. Throughout ten years of lecturing on Genesis, Luther engaged his students in intermittent but oft-repeated polemic against Hebraists, both rabbinic and Christian. For while the Jews have sacred scripture, their own prophet Isaiah testifies that they are like a man “who is holding a book but does not know the letters and for this reason is unable to read.” Scripture remains for them “a closed and sealed book that they cannot open.”59 Hebraists seek to open the scripture through grammatical rules and study of the vowel points, but the result is only ambiguity, for the pointing and study of it are both uncertain, Luther believed, as he noted in his lecture on Genesis 47:31: Here the interpreters are at variance because of the difference in the points, which in the Hebrew language lead to many instances of ambiguity because the method of pointing is uncertain in a high degree. And if we did not have the New Testament, there would be no use for the Hebrew language, and we could gather nothing certain from it. This is clear from the Hebraists, who pervert and obscure the holy scripture in a wretched and horrible manner because they are destitute of the true light of scripture. In such darkness they follow nothing else than the very capricious method of pointing, which is full of ambiguity. The fathers and prophets had a very thorough and sure knowledge of the sacred language, but it perished together with their regime.60

Continuing his argument, Luther noted that the Basel Hebraist Sebastian Münster had quoted somewhere a rabbi who said, “holy scripture cannot be understood without what is above and what is below,” that is, without the vowel points in Hebrew that appear above and below the consonants. Luther argued that even in the time of Jerome, the Bible was read without vowel points, while in more recent times, certain “Hebrews” 58WA

42:600.20–30 (LW 3:72–73). See also WA 43:142.28–145.4 (LW 4:10–13). 42:575.29–31 (LW 3:37–38). 60WA 44:682.20–38 (LW 8:141). 59WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 57 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

57

claimed to have a more complete understanding of the language and its meaning. The professor was skeptical, however, and told his students that such interpreters are enemies of the scripture, not friends. He felt free to disagree with them regarding the pointing, unless their interpretation agreed with the New Testament. “Hence I do not worry much about the above and the below of the rabbis. It would be better to read scripture according to what is inside. And the New Testament gives us an inner understanding, not an upper or a lower one.”61 The passage illustrates a recurring theme in Luther’s polemic against the grammarians. Knowledge of the Hebrew of the Old Testament was incomplete and uncertain; the humanist quest to restore the language applied the tools of philology, but Luther believed that this resulted in ambiguity rather than a definite reading (a common claim of papal theologians against humanist critiques of the Vulgate as well). Since the Old Testament was the revelation of God who sent Jesus Christ, restoration of the language could proceed only by appeal to the New Testament, the completion of this revelation. But the Christian Hebraists, following the scholarly traditions of humanism, looked rather to knowledge of Hebrew grammar and its rabbinic teachers for this restoration. Luther was convinced it was a project bound to fail. In one passage, Luther compared their project and its results to the failures (that is, the ambiguities) of Scholasticism: The grammarians quarrel about the word Jischak; and, to tell the truth, I do not know its origin. The Hebraists, who use words in an ambiguous manner, have not yet investigated it. They are also inept at deducing the sure and true meaning of expressions in other passages, but they have very great skill in obscuring words and meanings. Yet a teacher should not be ambiguous, for then he will teach nothing correctly. But ambiguity must be removed from what is stated, that is, by a teacher and orator, whom it behooves to use words in only one meaning and to devote his attention to correctness. Accordingly, the Hebrew interpreters teach with most unhappy results, since all their studying consists in ambiguities. The only thing they are capable of is sophistry.62

61

WA 44:683.3–13 (LW 8:141–42). 44:424.6–15 (LW 7:168). See also WA 44:135.24–136.12 (LW 6:181–82), another passage where Luther asserts that only through knowledge of the New Testament can knowledge of Hebrew grammar be restored. 62WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 58 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

58

CHAPTER TWO

Luther was convinced that knowledge of grammar, ambiguous evidence regarding the meaning of words and their pointing, and all the philological tools ever produced could not get inside the Holy Spirit’s text, but truly did remain “above” and “below” it. With this play on words, criticizing the philologians’ scientific analysis of Hebrew vowel points, the professor taught his students to view Christian Hebraica as a tool but also as a threat to a true understanding of the very text these philologians were seeking to recover and restore. Like the Scholastic theologians, humanist scholars of Hebrew were using a different language than that applied by the Holy Spirit in his book, and they could not understand this new grammar.63 Worst of all, those like Erasmus who remained in the papal church were utilizing learning and eloquence in service to the wrong causes: Germany has never had more talented and more learned men. But if you appraise the situation properly, there have never been more villainous men—men who by their eloquence, their knowledge of languages, and other gifts were able to give outstanding support to the church. These men hire out their service to tyrants and to the pope; they are the bitterest enemies of the church.64

Increasingly toward the end of the 1530s and 1540s, Luther believed that the tools of philology were being used wrongly also among Evangelicals to undermine a Christian reading of the Old Testament. He expressed his caution toward rabbinic interpretations of Genesis in his lectures on Genesis 25:21, where he noted some rabbinic interpretations (which he calls “Jewish nonsense”) “for the sake of those who at some time or other will read the commentaries of the rabbis.” The professor advised his students to read the Jewish interpretations with discretion, but his words reveal his bitterness: We acknowledge, of course, that it is a great benefit that we have received the [Hebrew] language from them; but we must beware of the dung of the rabbis, who have made of holy scripture a sort of latrine in which they deposited their foulness and their exceedingly foolish opinions. I am advising this because many today, even among

63On the “new language” of theology in the context of the polemic against Scholasticism, see Bielfeldt, “Luther and the Strange Language,” and the literature cited there. These passages in the Genesis lectures reveal that Luther utilized the argument also in his polemic against Christian Hebraists who argued for the primacy of philology in the task of theology and scriptural exposition. 64WA 43:104.18–22 (LW 3:319).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 59 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

59

our own theologians, give too much credit to the rabbis in explaining the meaning of scripture.65

These same fears would lead Luther in the later years of his life to publish some of the most violent polemics ever issued from his pen, his later writings on the Jews. In the lecture hall, the professor’s response was more restrained, but its theological basis was the same: the Hebrew scripture is a Christian book, and Moses, the prophet of the law, was also the prophet of Christ. Lecturing on Genesis 42, Luther taught his students explicitly that Moses teaches about sin and that “ignorance of sin necessarily brings with it ignorance of God, Christ, and the Holy Spirit and all things.” Without knowledge of sin and redemption through Christ, scripture remains a closed or sealed book, and the Epistle to the Romans is its door and key.66

GENESIS AS CHRISTIAN REVELATION Luther taught his students how to read Genesis as Christians in the face of what he believed were rising tendencies among humanist scholars to follow the rabbis and thus read Moses like the Jews. A corollary to this instruction is his assertion of the superiority of the New Testament to the Old Testament. While perhaps Luther’s greatest contribution and originality vis-à-vis his predecessors was to view the Old Testament as clearly proclaiming the promise and not just shadows of Christ,67 this does not mean that he had no appreciation of the difference between the testaments. In his lectures on Genesis 1, for example, Luther taught his students that the plural noun Elohim indicates the Trinity. Then he elaborated: But, you say, these evidences are too obscure to prove so great an article of faith. I answer: At that time, these statements had to be made so obscurely by divine counsel, or at least because all things were reserved for that future Lord for whose advent was reserved the restitution of all things, of all knowledge and of all revelations. Therefore, what had previously been taught through enigmas, as it were, Christ explained and commanded to be preached clearly. And nevertheless, the holy patriarchs had this knowledge through the Holy Spirit, 65WA

43:389.9–10, 20–25 (LW 4:351). WA 44:506.1–7, 507.14–19 (LW 7:278, 280). 67This is the thesis of Preus, From Shadow to Promise. See also Bornkamm, Luther and the Old Testament, esp. 247–60. 66

Luther's Genesis.book Page 60 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER TWO

60

although not so clearly as now, when we hear named in the New Testament the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. For when Christ came, these seals had to be broken; and what had been communicated in obscure words previously, solely out of reverence for the future teacher, had to be preached clearly.68

For Luther, this superiority of the New Testament revelation is not limited to superior knowledge, but consists also of a superior covenant. In his exposition of Jacob’s blessing of Joseph’s sons in Genesis 48, Luther compared “the glory of the blessing of the fathers with our own glory in the New Testament. For there is no doubt that the kingdom of Christ excels the kingdom of Moses and of the fathers.”69 The comparison demonstrates the difference between the covenants, the old and the new. Under the old covenant, Israel had both physical and spiritual promises, the former conditional, the latter unconditional. But because a spiritual and eternal blessing had been included in that physical blessing, which stated: “I am the Lord your God and the promised Christ,” therefore he says: “I cannot cast Ephraim off or destroy him completely, but I am compelled to have mercy on him. I am indeed horribly angry with the idolaters. But I am God and not a man. Therefore, on account of my promise I will preserve Ephraim.”70

“But the spiritual promise in the New Testament is far more illustrious,” Luther continued. He highlighted the promises given to the New Testament church and concluded: “if we are not kings and have no temporal kingdom, as the Jews did, nevertheless we possess a spiritual kingdom in which we live in Christ.” For Luther, the promises of the New Testament, like the Old Testament, give no benefit without faith. But when the gifts of God are received in faith the Christian already possesses the kingdom of God.71 Luther always viewed scripture in terms of its res, the main subject matter, the content of the whole. As that res is fully and finally revealed in the New Testament gospel, so the Old Testament had prepared for that evangelical revelation by way of the promises of God. What distinguishes the New Testament believer from the patriarchs and believing Israel of the Old Testament is that the church not only has the promise of Christ’s 68WA

42:44.26–36 (LW 1:59). 44:709.32–34 (LW 8:179). 70WA 44:710.17–24 (LW 8:180). 71WA 44:710.31–711.6 (LW 8:180); WA 44:712.19–22, 713.38–40 (LW 8:182, 184). 69WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 61 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

61

advent but also has the risen Christ present in her midst as she awaits his glorious and visible appearance at the last day.72 What this meant for Luther as expositor of Genesis is that the spiritual meaning and enduring relevance of the sacred book is located not in allegorical or typological interpretations but in the appropriation of the historical narrative—that is, in the history itself.73 The way Luther accomplished this, and the manner in which this spiritual exegesis relates to the issue of scriptural authority, is of critical importance in understanding how Luther dealt with the whole subject of allegorical interpretation and the spiritual understanding of the Old Testament. In his lectures, Luther frequently criticized the commentary tradition when it engaged in allegorical interpretation. He criticized Lyra for yielding “too much to the authority of the fathers” and as a result interpreting the narrative of the temptation of Eve as an allegory of the lower reason being assailed by the devil’s evil prompting. Yet in the same passage Luther went on to show his own skill in allegorizing, even though the words are then “both less pertinent and too weak in debate.” God’s judgment on the serpent, that it will creep upon the ground, symbolizes how the devil creeps: “that is, he no longer attacks the godly with open force but makes use of his wiles.” But while one may arrive at such ideas by way of allegory, “they do not bring out Moses’ meaning, and for this reason they are not pertinent.”74 Toward the end of his exposition of the chapter Luther laid out the basic features of his attitude toward the allegorical interpretation even of such obscure passages as Genesis 3: But, I ask you, is this not a desecration of the sacred writings? Origen makes heaven out of paradise and angels out of the trees. If this is correct, what will be left of the doctrine of creation? Particularly for beginning students of the sacred scriptures it is, therefore, necessary that when they approach the reading of the ancient teachers, they read them with discretion, or rather with the definite intention to disapprove of those statements for which there is less support. Otherwise they will be led astray by the authority of the name of the fathers and teachers of the church, just as I was led astray and as all the schools of the theologians were. Ever since I began to adhere to the historical meaning, I myself have always had a strong dislike for allegories and

72Preus,

From Shadow to Promise, 225; and Hendrix, Ecclesia in via, 232. Bornkamm, Luther and the Old Testament, 258–59. 74WA 42:141.8–13 (LW 1:188); WA 42:141.16–18 (LW 1:189). 73See

Luther's Genesis.book Page 62 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER TWO

62

did not make use of them unless the text itself indicated them or the interpretations could be drawn from the New Testament. But it was very difficult for me to break away from my habitual zeal for allegory; and yet I was aware that allegories were empty speculations and the froth, as it were, of the holy scriptures. It is the historical sense alone that supplies the true and sound doctrine. After this has been treated and correctly understood, then one may also employ allegories as an adornment and flowers to embellish or illuminate the account. The bare allegories, which stand in no relation to the account and do not illuminate it, should simply be disapproved as empty dreams.… Therefore let those who want to make use of allegories base them on the historical account itself. The historical account is like logic in that it teaches what is certainly true; the allegory, on the other hand, is like rhetoric in that it ought to illustrate the historical account but has no value at all for giving proof.75

The outlines of his critique and his limited use of allegorical interpretations throughout the lectures are evident in this one passage, as well as his clear distrust of patristic exegesis in its frequent use of the allegorical art. That Luther himself used allegory in places was not inconsistent. While he taught that allegorizing often undermines the authority of the scriptural text by imposing meanings that the text in no way supports, he acknowledged that allegorical meanings used in conformity with the faith can serve as “elegant pictures.” Allegories, Luther says, “must either be avoided entirely or must be attempted with the utmost discrimination and brought into harmony with the rule in use by the apostles,” which he later identified as conforming to the faith.76 Luther used allegories as Christ and the apostles themselves used them in the New Testament, as shown in his comments on the Flood: When we condemn allegories, we are speaking of those that are fabricated by one’s own intellect and ingenuity, without the authority of scripture. The others, which are made to agree with the analogy of the faith, not only embellish doctrine but also give comfort to consciences. Thus Peter turns this very history of the Flood into the most beautiful allegory when he says in 1 Peter 3: “To this figure of the Flood

75WA 76WA

42:173.20–174.2 (LW 1:232–33). 42:367.14–16 (LW 2:150); WA 42:367.27–28 (LW 2:151).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 63 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

63

corresponds baptism and it saves us….” This is truly a theological allegory, that is, one in agreement with the faith and full of comfort.77

In contrast to theological allegories that appear in the New Testament, such as this one developed by Peter, or by Jesus in the typology of the bronze serpent applied to his Crucifixion, or by Paul of the supernatural rock in 1 Corinthians 10, the early church fathers often invented allegories that concerned not the faith but “philosophical ideas, which are profitable neither for morals nor for the faith, not to mention that they are even rather silly and absurd.”78 Far worse, however, were the papists, who used allegories to support their quest for power.79 At the end of this section, where Luther displayed for his students his skill in theological allegorizing after the manner of the apostles, the professor concluded with a remark illustrating how closely his view of the use and abuse of allegory was related to the question of scripture’s authority. “Pay attention to the historical accounts,” Luther urged them. If you want to use allegories, “follow closely the analogy of the faith, that is, adapt them to Christ, the church, faith, and the ministry of the word…. Let this foundation stand firm, but let the stubble perish.”80

THE EXERCISE OF THE WORD The allegorical method had been developed in the early church primarily as a means to reconcile Old Testament texts—deemed unreasonable, unedifying, or even immoral—with Christian doctrine, the proclamation of the gospel, and Christian piety. But for Luther, the entire Old Testament, including and even especially the historical narratives of the patriarchs,

77WA

42:367.37–368.10 (LW 2:151). 42:368.17–19 (LW 2:152). 79Luther refers to the papal bull of Innocent III, Sicut universitatis Conditor of 3 November 1198, which, through allegorical interpretation of the sun and the moon, claimed that God “has established in the firmament of the universal church, which is signified by the name of heaven, two great dignities,…the pontifical authority and the royal power.” Quoted in LW 2:152n40. Luther later remarked, “Thus if someone should state that Christ is the sun and the church the moon, illuminated by the grace of Christ, he might be in error; nevertheless, his error is such that it rests, not on an incorrect basis but on a solid one. But when the pope declares that the sun is the papal office and the moon is the emperor, then not only is the application silly and foolish, but even the basis is evil and wicked. Such allegories are thought out and devised, not by the Holy Spirit but by the devil, the spirit of lies.” WA 42:371.19–25 (LW 2:156). 80WA 42:377.20–24 (LW 2:164). 78WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 64 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER TWO

64

speaks through its rich narrative to the New Testament believer of what it means to live by faith. In his essay “Luther Against the Background of the History of Biblical Interpretation,” Scott Hendrix concludes that what distinguished Luther most clearly from the previous exegetical tradition was that Luther’s expositions function less as scientific analysis of the original meaning and more like sermons—“as models of the word at work.” The Wittenberg professor “did not expect his interpretation to exhaust the possibilities of scripture for all time but to speak the crucial, liberating word for his ‘today.’ ”81 What this means for the Genesis lectures is that Luther gets inside the text by driving to the meaning of the historical-literal or prophetic-literal sense of a passage, and then comes out of the text by giving testimony or enarratio on the basis of that literal meaning. Luther, in his lectures on the Bible, related his text to human experience by allowing the text to interpret the subject, the reader. Hendrix concludes that in Luther’s understanding, scripture’s authority over the reader is established “not because we make it relevant to our own experience, but because it conquers our misconception of our experience and opens our eyes to what our experience really is and to what God is really doing.”82 Here one can see clearly the legacy of Luther’s monastic experience: Luther was practicing a monastic tradition of exegesis that Karlfried Froehlich calls “affective interpretation,” which he describes as having “a strong psychological component involving the affects, not just soul and mind…. The goal was not so much the elucidation of the biblical text but its existential application, the self-analysis of the hearer or reader with the help of the text.”83 Throughout his lectures on Genesis, Luther engaged his students with a kind of spiritual interpretation of the historical narrative that bears the marks of this monastic tradition of “affective interpretation.” Through spiritual enarratio or testimony, by which prophets and apostles speak from the professor’s lectern, Luther enabled his students to taste the holy scriptures and their life-giving message. This, not Christological interpretation, was the real center of his Christian reading of the Old Testament. Luther did not need to treat the letter ascetically that he might

81Hendrix, 82

“Luther Against the Background,” 238–39. Hendrix, “Authority of Scripture at Work,” 154. See also Bayer, Martin Luthers Theologie,

62–83. 83Froehlich, “Christian Interpretation of the Old Testament,” 498. For the early development of such monastic traditions of reading Christian scripture, see Burton-Christie, Word in the Desert.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 65 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

65

ascend to the spirit of the text.84 Rather, he taught his students to meditate upon the historical narrative so as to exercise both himself and his hearers in the word of God. The Holy Spirit was present in the history.

The Rustling of a Leaf This “exercise of the word” was at work in the professor’s enarratio on the condition of Adam after the Fall in Genesis 3. In interpreting this passage, Luther told his students that Lyra’s commentary was again confused by its dependence on the rabbis with their various explanations of the phrase ad auram diei (Luther did not appeal to the Hebrew text). Luther identified the phrase more simply as referring to the place or to the time of day—the evening when the heat subsides and the breeze blows. He linked auram to spiritum and suggested that the reference is simply to the wind (ut accipiamus spiritum simpliciter pro vento): “after their conscience had been convicted by the law, Adam and Eve were terrified at the sound of a leaf.” The professor worked and massaged this brief phrase in the historical narrative to support the argument that the loss of original righteousness is evident in the terror of the human conscience before God. The “breeze of the day” rustles a leaf in Eden as Adam seeks to hide from God. Moses emphasizes that it is wind in the daytime: For he does not say this about the wind in the night, in order to exaggerate the enormous trembling that followed sin, as if he were saying, “Thus they were trembling, so that in the clear light of day they were afraid by the sound of a leaf.” What would have happened if God had come in darkness and by night? For there the terror is far greater. For just as light makes men full of courage, so darkness increases trembling. This trembling, by which after their sin Adam and Eve were overcome in the very light of day, is a manifest sign that they had fallen completely from faith.85

Luther applied his principle of letting scripture interpret scripture, drawing upon the penalties following sin recorded in Leviticus 26:36, where Moses proclaims that “sinners will be afraid of a falling leaf and will flee as from a sword.” His conscience overcome, the sinner cannot even think; he is like a soldier so stricken with fear that he stands motionless to 84Compare Beryl Smalley’s description of the asceticism of much patristic and medieval Bible study: “The spiritually minded commentator will accept the letter, but treat it ascetically, as the good religious treats his flesh, in order to devote himself to the spirit…. We are invited to look not at the text, but through it.” Smalley, Study of the Bible, 2. 85WA 42:127.30–36 (LW 1:170).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 66 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER TWO

66

be slain. “Such a horrible penalty follows sin that by the sound of a leaf the conscience is afraid—no, rather much more it cannot sustain the most beautiful creature, the very light of day, by which we are refreshed so by nature.” So great is original sin that by contrast it shows the original righteousness lost. In righteousness, man was so confident in God that he feared nothing. Consider how fearless Eve was as she listened to the serpent. In the same way, before sin Adam and Eve were not seeking hiding places, but were praising God.86 But now they are terrified by the sound of a leaf. Oh, how serious a fall, to slip from the highest security, trust, and delight in God into horrible trembling, that man flees from the sight of God more than from the sight and presence of the devil! For Adam and Eve did not flee the devil: God, their builder, they flee—him they judge for themselves more grave and more formidable than Satan. Satan, however, is better than God, for from Satan they do not flee. Therefore this trembling truly is a fleeing and hatred of God.87

In his lecture, Luther “massaged” his text so that he indulged a simple historical narrative—a phrase of three words!—instead of treating it ascetically. The spiritual meaning and significance of the text are present in the letter and in the history, and there is no need to seek it in allegory or shadows of Christ. The Reformer’s approach to the historical narrative bears resemblance to the Antiochene tradition of theoria, wherein contemplation of the text facilitates an ascent of the soul to profound spiritual understanding and experience of the divine.88 But the resemblance obscures a fundamentally different soteriology. For Luther, the exercise of the word takes place here in the earthly realm precisely because God is present in the words of the text through the Holy Spirit who speaks there. As God speaks in holy scripture, the hearer, the reader, the interpreter, the lecturer, and the preacher all become passive and silent before the word. As Luther proceeds in this passage to lecture on Adam’s confrontation 86WA

42:127.37–128.13 (LW 1:170–71). 42:128.13–19 (LW 1:171). 88Karlfried Froehlich describes the Antiochene exegesis of the fourth century as an overdrawn reaction to Alexandrian allegorism, whose differences are more methodological than soteriological: “Origen, as we saw, did not deny the historical referent of most texts, and the Antiochene theologians admitted a higher sense of scriptures which they called theoria, a term used by Plato but now turned into a weapon against Alexandrian allegorism.… Yet, at close inspection both allegory and theoria speak about the same anagogical dynamic Origen so eloquently described: the biblical text leads the reader upward into spiritual truths that are not immediately obvious and that provide a fuller understanding of God’s economy of salvation.” Froehlich, Biblical Interpretation in the Early Church, 20–21. 87WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 67 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

67

with God, the sacred text lays bare the human will and intellect. Thus when Adam responds to God by hiding, and then by fleeing with excuses and lies and blasphemy and despair, the professor reminds his students, “We must not think that this happened to Adam alone. We, each one of us, do the same thing; our nature does not permit us to act otherwise after we have become guilty of sin.”89 It is fascinating to explore how this theme of trembling at the rustling of a leaf recurs throughout the Genesis lectures. For example, a discourse on Abram’s tentatio, or spiritual struggle, following his victory in battle (Genesis 14) can be taken as illustrative of the pattern God follows in dealing with his human creatures; trembling at the sound of a rustling leaf characterizes the experience of trial in the lives of God’s saints.90 In contrast, when the people of Sodom are smitten with blindness, they do not accept it as punishment inflicted by God; rather they suspect some magic or view afflictions as the caress of God’s bosom. But the godly, when they suffer some affliction, “they are terrified and fear God’s wrath. They conclude that the scourge is being sent by an angry God, not by Satan. For this reason, they are greatly terrified at the sound of a falling leaf.” The reality of their condition before God is opposite to what they believe.91 Thus also Joseph’s brothers, with consciences greatly burdened but not forsaken, tremble and say to one another, “What is this that God has done to us?” (Gen. 42:28). Their hearts fail them because they each have a guilty conscience. Luther drew again and again upon this passage and finally turned in his lecture to address the guilt-stricken brothers as if they were present in the room: “Do you ask why God does this? But why do you not rather say: ‘Why did we do this to God, or why do we not confess our sin?’ Now, because it does not please you to utter this confession, be afraid indeed, tremble, and shudder every moment at the rustling of any dry leaf.”92

The Fearful Play of God Hidden and Revealed The narrative of Joseph and his brothers also brings to its climax a theme Luther developed throughout his lectures on the patriarchal history: the 89WA

42:131.14–16 (LW 1:175). 42:554.6–8 (LW 3:8). 91WA 43:64.3–16 (LW 3:264). 92WA 44:500.29–501.1, 20–29 (LW 7:271–72); WA 44:504.17–30 (LW 7:276); WA 44:505.12–17 (LW 7:277). Luther’s spontaneous dips into German in these passages are lost in the English translation, but they support the conclusion that the published lectures preserve Luther’s words in the lecture hall. 90WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 68 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

68

CHAPTER TWO

fearful play of God with those he loves. The theme first emerged when Luther began lecturing on Genesis 22. The date was 27 October 1539, the day after the Wittenberg community had buried Luther’s friend Dr. Sebald Münsterer, as noted in a marginal comment in the original edition of the lectures.93 Luther talked about the climate of fear in Wittenberg at the outbreak of the plague, inviting his students to flee Wittenberg should they be afraid, but sharing his own belief that fear itself was the chief cause of the calamity. Death was in the air and on the mind of professor and student alike. As Luther began to proclaim the word in Genesis 22, he noted the great temptation Abraham faced as he was commanded by God to sacrifice his son, a temptation St. James failed to grasp in his cold statement that nobody is tempted by God (James 1:13). Luther recognized the command as God contradicting himself, an irresolvable contradiction.94 Yet “even though there is a clear contradiction here—for there is nothing between death and life—Abraham nevertheless does not turn away from the promise but believes that his dying son will have descendants.” Present experience came to the fore in Luther’s exposition: “Yesterday we buried our very dear friend Dr. Sebald. Therefore he is now lamented as though he were dead. But we know that he is living: for because he died in the true confession of the Son of God—and God (Matt. 22) is not the God of the dead but of the living—he too lives.”95 Although the students could not comprehend this trial, they could observe it from afar and do better than St. James, who taught that the passage dealt with a work. Rather, “it is the faith that we admire and praise.” By observing the trials of the saints and their faith, Luther and his students were encouraged in their own trials. 96 Some minutes later, Luther focused on the action of Abraham. Taking the knife in hand, moving it close to the throat of the dearly beloved and obedient son, the dearly beloved father is ready to slay him. The text then abruptly turns to record the angel of the Lord calling out to Abraham. “There you see how securely the divine majesty plays in death and 93In Genesin enarrationum (1550), CLXXXVIIv, reproduced in WA 43:200–201n2; and LW 4:91n1. The extensive marginal comment is unique in the two volumes of the 1550 Nürnberg edition. Marginal comments are in all other cases limited to brief phrases highlighting the content of a paragraph or giving a name or source reference mentioned in the paragraph. 94WA 43:200.30–201.5, 201.24–32 (LW 4:91–92); WA 43:202.37–42 (LW 4:93–94). 95 WA 43:204.10–16 (LW 4:96). The reference to Matthew 22 is given in this way (and in this strange position) in the text of the lectures; Luther was referring more specifically to Jesus’ words recorded in Matthew 22:29–32. Luther’s printed lectures generally indicate only chapter numbers for biblical references, but verse numbers are generally supplied in LW and in the margin of WA. 96WA 43:204.30–33 (LW 4:96); WA 43:205.14–15 (LW 4:97).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 69 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

69

with all the power of death.”97 To a community living with death in its midst, Luther described death as a plaything in the hand of a majestic God. Natural death is a simple thing, but “to feel death, that is, the terror and fear of death—this indeed is real death,” the death of the soul. Thus, in the midst of death’s terrors Abraham and Isaac both die: Two amazing instances of deaths of this kind are combined here in the utmost patience and obedience. For to Abraham it would have been more tolerable to die a natural death even seven times than to be an onlooker—no, rather much more to be the slayer of his son. Thus both are killed, since they see and feel nothing other than death. Nevertheless, before God they did not die, as we shall hear later on. For they have death for play and jest, no differently from the manner in which we are accustomed to play with a ball or an apple.98

Father and son grasped the victory God was granting in this trial. Holding to the promise in the face of its contradiction, they were persuaded “that this entire action was play and not death.” Through the law, Moses proclaims, “In the midst of life we are in death, according to that ancient and pious hymn in the church.” Luther continued, “But the gospel and faith invert this hymn and thus they sing: ‘In the midst of death we are in life. Thee we praise as our Redeemer, having raised us from death and saved us.’”99 The professor comforted a community wracked by death and proclaimed its contradiction: But in truth these things have been recorded not for the sake of Abraham, who is long since dead. But for encouraging and endowing us with courage, that we may learn that with God death is nothing and that we may sing: “In the midst of death we are in life. Whom shall we praise except Thee, our God?” This is the evangelical hymn; the other one is of the law.100

97WA

43:217.28–218.4 (LW 4:114–15). 43:218.8–10, 218.21–26 (LW 4:115). 99WA 43:218.33–219.4 (LW 4:116). The passage powerfully supports the closing lines of Oberman’s biography of Luther: “Luther learned to draw life from the struggle against the Devil. For the just shall live by faith, and ‘life’ does not begin in Heaven. According to the medieval memento mori, in the midst of life we are surrounded by death. Luther’s faith enabled him to vigorously turn this on its head: ‘In the midst of death we are surrounded by life.’” Oberman, Luther, 330. 100 WA 43:219.34–38 (LW 4:117). The other hymn having to do with the law that Luther mentions is a popular medieval hymn based upon Psalm 90, which Luther himself translated: Mitten wyr im leben sind. The first stanza reads, in the English of LW 53:274–76 (cf. WA 35:453–54): In the midst of life we are / Aye in Death’s embraces; / Who is there who help us can / And in favor place us? / Thou only Lord, thou only. / In sorrow from our sins we turn; / That have made thy anger burn. / Holy and XXXXXXXXX 98WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 70 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER TWO

70

Perhaps it was the next lecture101 when Luther returned to the theme of God’s fearful play and described his contradictory words and works as a “salutary lie”: And how fortunate we would be if we could learn this art from God! He tempts us and proposes an alien work, that he may be able to do his own. Through our affliction he seeks his own play and our salvation. God said to Abraham: “Kill your son, etc.” How? With playing, simulating, and laughing. Surely a happy and delightful amusement! Thus he sometimes feigns to withdraw rather far from us and to kill us. But who believes that he is pretending? Yet with God it is a game and—if we were permitted to express it in this way—a lie. It is indeed a real death that all of us will have to meet. But God does not carry out in earnest what he is showing. It is pretense and trial [tentatio], whether we are willing to lose present things and life itself for the sake of God.102

In this way, an old professor spoke to his students in the midst of death about death as God’s plaything, a test to stretch their faith, just as God had used death to test and stretch the faith of Abraham. The later chapters of Genesis convey in powerful narrative how God played with Joseph and his brothers with a similar game. Luther again and again repeated this theme of God’s play. The Reformer used this narrative to highlight the elements of comedy in the divine drama of life in Christ. Just as God plays games with those whom he loves, so Joseph plays “a wonderful kind of game” with his brothers, “a game that humbles them greatly, trains them, and brings with it important and serious results.” As a ruler in Egypt, Joseph treats his brothers like strangers and deals harshly with them when they appear seeking grain. He does this not out of revenge or hatred, as shown by his secret tears (Gen. 42:24). But to them he pretends he is a tyrant. God plays this way in the world: “Reducing man to nothing, giving him up to death, and afflicting him with disasters and troubles without number—this is not playing, is it? It is a game of a cat 101

righteous God, / Holy and mighty God, / Holy and loving gracious Savior, / Everlasting God, / Let us not be drowned / In the pains of bitter death. / Kyrie eleison. 101Luther seems to have drawn his lecture of 27 October 1539 to a close at the end of comments on Genesis 22:10, where his recorded words read: “Haec de historia ista vere spirituali dicta sufficient, quam quidem ego carnalis et unus de pedibus asini, qui non ascendit in montem, non possum perfecte assequi aut enarrare: tantum tamen docere volui, quantum mihi per tenuitatem meam cogitare et intelligere licuit.” WA 43:223.26–29 (LW 4:122). 102WA 43:229.36–230.8 (LW 4:131).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 71 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE PROFESSOR AND HIS TEXT

71

with a mouse, and this is the death of the mouse.”103 But at the end of all such histories it is revealed that the divine drama is a comedy, and that “in the catastrophe of the comedy it appears that God has been playing with them in a most kindly manner and has not dealt otherwise with them than with dearly beloved sons.”104 When Joseph finally reveals himself to his brothers—“I AM JOSEPH”—this is finally “the climax and the exceedingly sharp epitasis of this history.” The whole story is a beautiful example of how God deals with sinners he calls to be saints: For when he afflicts the godly and conceals the fact that he is our God and Father and rather conducts himself as a tyrant and judge who wants to torture and destroy us, he says at last in his own time and at a suitable hour: “I am the Lord your God. Hitherto I have treated you just as if I wanted to cast you off and hurl you into hell. But this is a game I am wont to play with my saints; for if I had not wished you well from my heart, I would never have played with you in this manner.”105

Luther’s interpretation of the Joseph narrative could be identified as typological interpretation: Joseph typifies God and thus symbolically reveals in the events of history what the words of the prophets might just as well proclaim. Central to the patristic and medieval view of symbolic interpretation was the belief that God reveals himself not solely through words but through the events themselves that the words describe. Only God, who controls all history and brings all things to pass according to his will, can so identify words and the events they describe so the two become one. Thus only God’s book, the Bible, can be interpreted in this way, that both words and events participate in God’s self-revelation.106 But for Luther, the exercise of the word was not grounded in artful interpretation, discovering the hidden revelation of God in the shadows of multiple meanings in the divine text. Though to Luther, Joseph does represent God and thus can be identified as a type—and though Abraham the 103WA

44:466.28–30 (LW 7:225), italics indicate original text in German. 44:466.39–40 (LW 7:225). 105WA 44:582.14–36 (LW 8:4–5). The capital letters reproduce the orthography of the original imprint, In Genesin enarrationum (1554), CLXv. 106This view was codified by Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologiae, 4 [Ia, 1, 10]): “The author of the scriptures is God, who has power to endow with significance not only words but also things themselves. In every science words have meaning; in this science alone what is meant by the words has further meaning.” The teaching goes back to Augustine’s discussion of words as the signs of things in On Christian Teaching, trans. Green, 8–67. On medieval developments, see Minnis, Medieval Theory of Authorship, esp. 33–39, 73, and 247n1. See also Evans, Language and Logic of the Bible: The Early Middle Ages; and Evans, Language and Logic of the Bible: The Road to Reformation, 7–19. 104WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 72 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

72

CHAPTER TWO

beloved father and Isaac the beloved son clearly typify the Father and Son of the Holy Trinity—this identification and its application were not the focus of Luther’s exposition. Multiple meanings in the text carried no particular interest for the Reformer, who rather focused his gaze and his proclamation on the single meaning of the historical narrative itself, how the history reveals God’s dealings with his saints. By relating the patriarchal history to life experience in the present, Luther’s exposition provided a mirror through which both he and his students could view themselves— how their experience of life and death is interpreted by the word of God. For Luther, this Christian reading of the Old Testament was grounded in this exercise in the word that allowed professor and students alike to hear the word of God speaking in the historical narrative, unveiling and interpreting universal Christian experience and thus their own experiences. Prophets and apostles sat on the lectern as professor and students sat below at their feet to hear. It seems fair to say that this exercise of the word was Luther’s own way of developing the practice of “affective interpretation” that he had inherited through his experience in the cloister. But in Luther’s university lecture hall, this exercise of the word took decisively new turns.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 73 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

Chapter Three

The Arena of God’s Play— Christian Life and Holiness in the World The view that Luther’s expository practice exhibited the contours of monastic “affective interpretation” supports a strain of Luther interpretation that objects to the tendency, common among both Protestant and Roman Catholic Luther scholars, to view Luther’s monastic experience simply as a phase in his development. Ulrich Köpf, for example, notes that in Luther’s earliest lectures on the Psalms (1513–15), the Reformer did not merely criticize monastic abuses but also radicalized the monastic reform agenda by extending its call of repentance to all Christians. Later, in his treatise On Monastic Vows (1521), Luther himself attributed great significance to his experience in the cloister as a significant catalyst for his critique of medieval piety. Köpf concludes that Luther’s new Reformation theology of justification owed a great deal to his monastic background, but at the same time “knocked the bottom out of ” the traditional rationale for the ideal of monastic life.1 Köpf and other interpreters place Luther and the Reformation in a long line of reforming movements that originated with monasticism, claiming that this monastic background and origin significantly shaped the Reformation in ways not sufficiently recognized by most historians. 2 1Köpf, “Martin Luthers Lebensgang als Mönch,” esp. 188, 193, 200–201. See also Moeller, “Die frühe Reformation,” esp. 80–82. 2In this way, Bernd Moeller, arguing that without humanism there would have been no ReformaXXXXX

73

Luther's Genesis.book Page 74 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

74

Luther has been termed a “monastic theologian” who was influenced more by monastic traditions of reading than by the Scholastic method with its quaestio or the humanist biblical project with its confidence in the sufficiency of philology.3 Thus, Luther belongs much more to the medieval tradition of sacred reading, the lectio divina, than he does to the rising historical criticism that began with humanism and reached full flower in the biblical exegesis of the Enlightenment and its nineteenth- and twentieth-century heirs.4 In the lecture hall at Wittenberg, Luther exercised himself and his students in the word of God, practicing a kind of Bible study that emphasized spiritual formation through the affective application of biblical text to present experience rather than through philological erudition or dialectical reasoning. One might see the influences here of “monastic theology” and even draw a mental picture of students gathered around the professor with his text, just as monks gathered around their abbas to hear the word of God. Such a view would rightly discern the centrality of the Bible in Luther’s own spiritual formation and in his practice of forming his students spiritually. The analysis of Luther’s practice of biblical exposition in this monastic tradition must take into consideration not only its continuity with the past but also its clear break with monastic traditions of Christian faith and life. For inseparably connected with Luther’s meditative, spiritual, and “affective” exposition of Genesis was a new conception of Christian life and holiness that marked a revolutionary break with monasticism. Indeed, through his teaching of the justification of the sinner before God by faith alone, Luther fundamentally challenged not only monasticism but also the 3

tion, asserted that Luther’s Reformation discovery of justification by faith came not from the intellectual world of humanism but was “a monastic discovery.” Moeller, “German Humanists and the Beginnings of the Reformation,” esp. 36, 23. 3See esp. Schwarz, “Luther’s Inalienable Inheritance of Monastic Theology,” 430–50. Schwarz explores Luther’s personal experience with monastic traditions of theology and concludes that the inheritance of monastic theology is incorporated into his Reformation theology “in such a way that it is transformed into something new” (432). Schwarz’s definition of “monastic theology” as “theological thinking which was at home in monasticism independently from university theology” (431) is helpful, especially since some historians see Luther as a “monastic theologian” without defining the term. On monastic theology in the broader context of a monastic culture, see Leclercq’s classic study, Love of Learning. 4Hagen (Luther’s Approach to Scripture) explores Luther’s approach to scripture as a monastic “discipline of the sacred page” and contrasts this sharply with the modern approach to scripture and exegesis, the approach presupposed by much of modern Luther scholarship. Asendorf (Lectura in Biblia, esp. 19–32, 42–51, 62–67) follows Hagen in viewing Luther as a practitioner of “monastic theology” and sees Luther’s lectures on Genesis as a “third theology” of the Reformer, a “summa theologiae” in Luther’s most mature stage of theological development.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 75 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

75

view of Christian life and holiness that had been predominant in the Catholic Church since at least the fourth century. In the Genesis lectures, he expressed the combination of affective biblical interpretation with the Reformation theology of justification by faith alone in a way that allows one to trace the biblical shape of the new Evangelical identity as it applies to Christian life and holiness. A contrast must first be drawn between Luther’s concept of holiness and one passed down from the early church through the Middle Ages. No later than the fourth century, renunciation of the world began to characterize what constituted holiness in the Christian life. The ascetic tradition of the desert fathers, beginning with Saint Antony (ca. 251–356), was the concrete expression of biblical truth in the life of the hermit—radical separation from the world was an important aspect of the holiness of that life.5 Peter Brown has shown how the holy man of antiquity also functioned as a living source of salvation for those Christians who did not separate themselves from society but rather remained “in the world.” “Give me a word, Father. How can a layperson—a person ‘in the world’—be saved?” The answer: “Send me a man, that I might drink salvation from him.”6 The holy man who renounced the world became a mediator, bestowing holiness upon Christians who sought salvation even while remaining in the world. Brown further notes that, in the West during the sixth century, “a subtle but decisive shift” took place in “the emergence of the belief that entire convents and monasteries possessed a collective power of prayer that was somehow stronger than the prayer offered by any one holy person.”7 By the fourth century, the cult of the saints had already become a localization of this source of holiness—not only in the living holy man or holy community but also in the transportable relics of the holy dead, carefully controlled under the patronage of a bishop. By the sixth century, confession and penance also became the chief form of piety for lay Christians, East and West, if they were serious about their salvation. By the turn of the eighth century, concern arose for the fate of the individual soul after 5Burton-Christie (Word in the Desert, viii) explores the ascetic movement of the desert fathers in terms of its scriptural hermeneutic “that demands, ultimately, that the meaning of a text be expressed in a life.” 6Brown, Rise of Western Christendom, 255; and Brown, “Rise and Function of the Holy Man,” 149, quoting S. Pachomii vitae sahidice scriptae. On the role of holy men see also Brown, Authority and the Sacred, esp. chap. 3. 7Brown, Rise of Western Christendom, 226.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 76 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

76

bodily death. The linking of the mass to the soul’s deliverance (and thus the doctrine of purgatory), confession as a remedy for sin, and the proliferation of monasteries show that the general concept of holiness Luther met in the sixteenth century had very deep roots indeed.8 It was hardly only the product of late medieval anxieties in the aftermath of the Black Death. Holiness as renunciation of the world, or, in its place, the access of holiness through holy communities and the holy places of the dead, was an inheritance from early Christianity that had largely assumed its “modern” shape by the seventh century.9 Brown emphasizes that the critical developments of the fourth to seventh centuries changed the western Catholic understanding of holiness and its access through penance so fundamentally that modern western Christianity really finds its roots in this period of late antiquity and the early Middle Ages. In view of this, it can be concluded that Luther’s critique of papal Christianity in the sixteenth century, in terms of its idea of holiness and its penitential system (thus the doctrine of justification), went far deeper than the widespread reform movements of the later Middle Ages, during the so-called Age of Reform (often assigned the dates 1200–1600, or perhaps 1400–1700). While this view of Luther’s reform is certainly not new, it has in recent years been hotly debated. When one views Luther’s teaching of justification, not in the abstract as a theological formulation, but rather in a concrete example where God justifies an actual sinner who is living by faith, the relationship between justification and life comes into view. It becomes clear that Luther’s “Reformation discovery,” viewed against the sweep of Christian history, was not only a break with medieval Scholastic soteriology. Nor was it only the rejection of the particular form of the mediation of holiness represented by medieval monasticism. It was instead a decisive break with the Catholic concept of Christian life and holiness that had taken shape in the postapostolic early church. This concept of holiness included the ascetic tradition of the desert fathers, and it also comprised its broad application to the Catholic Church by bishops like Ambrose and Augustine in the West and Athanasius and the Cappadocian fathers in the East. In view of this, Luther’s “theology of the cross,” as expressed in the Heidelberg Disputation of 1518, was not only a repudiation of medieval Scholasticism. It was also a repudiation of the early Catholic soteriology— 8Brown, 9Brown,

Cult of the Saints; and Brown, Rise of Western Christendom, 257, 265. Rise of Western Christendom, 265.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 77 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

77

both eastern and western—that described the way of salvation in terms conforming to the Neoplatonic concept of “procession and return,” the return of the soul, exiled from God, by means of a necessary escape from the world.10 Luther’s soteriology was also a break from the Augustinian tradition, for Augustine had expressed the Christian teaching of salvation in language he adopted from Neoplatonism, centering on the ascent of the soul.11 Luther’s understanding had implications for the place of salvation as the work of God, as described by Hans Iwand: “Precisely here lies the break of the Reformation from the medieval church—since the way of the cross, in which God leads us, is not life in the church, but the way of the people of God in the world.”12

HOLY PLACE, HOLY WORK, AND HOLY ORDER Luther clearly enunciated his ideas regarding the holy life in 1528, in the third part of his Confession Concerning Christ’s Supper. Here, Luther confessed his faith “before God and the world, point by point,” because he saw already at that time how his writings were being used by others, whom he called “Sacrament- and Baptism-fanatics,” to confirm their own errors.13 The relevant passage in the Confession clarifies Luther’s concept of the location of holiness and the conception of Christian life presented to his students in his university lectures on Genesis. After condemning “both the new and the old Pelagians” with their glorification of free will and their deficient understanding of original sin, Luther rejects “as sheer devil’s rabble and error all monastic orders, rules, cloisters, religious foundations, and all such things devised and instituted by men beyond and apart from scripture….” He concedes that “many great saints have lived in them” but notes that even at the present time 10See

Forde, On Being a Theologian of the Cross, esp. 5. “Theologia Crucis,” 381. On Augustine’s use and development of Neoplatonic concepts in his theology, there is of course a large bibliography. See, for example, Leigh, “Augustine’s Confessions as a Circular Journey,” 73–88; and O’Meara, ed., Neoplatonism and Christian Thought. 12Iwand, “Theologia Crucis,” esp. 396 (emphasis added). The reference in this quotation to the Reformation’s break with the medieval church must be understood to include a break, in this respect, with Augustine himself, as Iwand makes clear. 13St.A 4:245.4–8 (LW 37:360). Luther viewed the disagreements with his theology expressed by Zwinglians and Anabaptists not as legitimate disagreements to be met in dialogue (though he did meet with Zwingli and others the next year at Marburg) but as the work of Satan. He writes: “I am serious. For by God’s grace I know a great deal about Satan; if he can pervert and confuse God’s word and scripture, what will he not do with my or someone else’s words?” St.A 4:246.1–4 (LW 37:361). 11Iwand,

Luther's Genesis.book Page 78 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

78

many of the elect “are seduced by them” yet by faith have finally “been redeemed and have escaped.” He does, however, concede that monasteries and the like might be “kept for the purpose of teaching young people God’s word, the scripture, and Christian discipline,” while warning, “But to seek there a way of salvation, that is the devil’s teaching and creed. 1 Timothy 4 etc.”14 In contrast to monastic orders, the Reformer identifies three “holy orders and true religious institutions established by God”: “the office of priest, the estate of marriage, the temporal authority.” After discussing briefly the ecclesiastical offices denoted by the term Pfarramt, describing it as a holy estate accepted by God, Luther continues: Likewise, any fathers and mothers whose house is well-governed, and children raised to the service of God, [this] is also sheer “holy place” [heiligthum] and holy work and holy order. Similarly, where children and servants are obedient to parents and masters is also sheer holiness [heiligkeit], and whoever is found therein, he is a living saint on earth. Likewise also prince or sovereign, judge, civil servant, chancellor, notary, laborers, maids, and all such servants—all obedient subjects—everything is sheer “holy place” and a holy life before God. For these three institutions or orders are included in God’s word and command. But what is included in God’s word, that must be a holy thing [heilig ding], for God’s word is holy and sanctifies everything that is connected with it and is in it. Over all these three institutions and orders is the common order of Christian love.15

A careful reading of this passage reveals that Luther has not only crafted a radically new concept of holiness and Christian life but also redefined its arena, locality, or place. The ancient concept of salvation mediated through the holy man (the desert anchorite), through holy communities (monasteries), and through holy places (the graves of the martyrs and their transported relics) now finds a new place of mediation: in the holy office of the church (the Predigtamt and other offices that support this ministry of the word), in the holy household, in the holy civic life of and under temporal authorities. God’s word establishes and must govern all of these. Luther teaches here that while monasteries and the like have no institution in God’s word, these three orders are included in God’s 14St.A 15St.A

4:249.5–10 (LW 37:363); and St.A 4:249.21–27 (LW 37:364). 4:250.1–19 (LW 37:364–65).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 79 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

79

word and therefore “must be a holy thing.” Christian love reigns above all three orders as the common order that defines them. Love makes these orders identifiably Christian, as good deeds are done: “feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, forgiving enemies, praying for all men on earth, suffering all kinds of evil on earth, etc.”16 Luther was careful to note, however, that to be in the three orders as established by God as located in the world is not a way or means of salvation. Mediation of salvation is through faith in Christ alone, while holiness exercised in the orders of God’s world is joined to such faith but in itself is not a guarantee of the existence of saving faith. Even the godless can participate in the holy works of God through their participation in God’s orders (when their actions are not contrary to God’s word), for God’s word sanctifies these orders: For it is entirely different to be holy and to be saved. We become saved alone through Christ, but holy both through such faith and also through such divine institutions and orders. Also the godless may indeed have much about them of “holy thing,” but they are not on that account saved therein. For God wants to have such works [done] by us to his praise and glory. And all who are thus saved in the faith of Christ do such work and retain such orders.17

The basic principle conveyed here is that the “holy thing” (heilig ding) is a reality worked by God in the world and in the orders God has created in the world. Participation in those orders means participation in God’s holy work, but that does not necessarily mean salvation. Luther conceives holiness, then, as a quality God works in the world he created by means of the orders he has instituted for its continuance and stability (creatio continua, in dogmatic terms). This stands in sharp contrast to the holiness defined in Catholic Christianity since at least the fourth century as a quality separate from the world and mediative of salvation. The concepts have been precisely inverted. Catholic holiness meant separation from the world, and this separation mediated salvation, both for the holy and for those in the world who through various means participated in that holiness: through the prayers of the holy man or holy community, or through relics, icons, and penance. Evangelical holiness, as Luther conceives it, takes place in the world through the holy orders instituted by 16St.A 17St.A

4:250.19–22 (LW 37:365). 4:251.1–7 (LW 37:365).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 80 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

80

God’s word, but does not mediate salvation. Even the ungodly can participate in some way in holiness, for holiness is God’s work in the world and remains holy even when done through the agency of human beings who are not holy. Those who believe in Christ, however, not only participate in God’s holiness, but also do so to his praise and glory, all the while striving for the maintenance of such divine orders in God’s world. Later in the Confession, Luther returns to the theme of holiness and Christian life when he addresses the topic of the sacraments. Marriage and the office of priest are not to be made into sacraments because “these orders are sufficiently holy in themselves” and therefore they need no sacramental status to make them holy. He views the mass, “when it is preached or sold as a sacrifice or good work,” as an abomination, and confesses his own participation in it: “For as I indeed have been a great, grievous, despicable sinner, and also damnably spent and wasted my youth, still my greatest sins were that I was so holy a monk and with so many masses over the course of fifteen years so horribly angered, tortured, and plagued my dear Lord.” He gives thanks that God’s grace led him out of this abomination and advises people “to abandon religious foundations and cloisters with all their vows and to enter into the true Christian orders, in order to escape such abominations of the mass and blasphemous holiness as chastity [that is, celibacy], poverty, obedience, through which men attempt to become saved.”18 With striking clarity Luther confesses a faith in which the holiness of ancient Catholic Christianity—and not only its late medieval corruption—is identified as abomination and blasphemy. Though monasticism and the mass as a sacrifice for sins are the focus of Luther’s criticism, the new holy orders he identifies are just as significant. Luther replaces the Catholic tradition of holiness—withdrawal from the world for the sake of salvation—with an Evangelical holiness that instead engages the world, expressing itself precisely in the holy orders God has instituted in the world. This understanding permeated the professor’s exposition of the Genesis narrative. There, in the lives of the patriarchs, Luther saw the holy work of God enacted in these believers as they lived in God’s world. Through “affective interpretation” in the monastic tradition of biblical reading, the narrative became a “mirror of life”19 wherein Luther viewed 18St.A

4:256.3–15 (LW 37:371), emphasis added. phrase is from Bornkamm, Luther and the Old Testament, 11–44. Timothy Maschke (“Contemporaneity: A Hermeneutical Perspective in Martin Luther’s Work”) explores a similar theme. See also Nestingen, “Luther in Front of the Text.” 19The

Luther's Genesis.book Page 81 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

81

his own life and the life of his contemporaries. Ecclesia, politia, and oeconomia—church, politics or the civil realm, and the household—were the terms used throughout the lectures to denote the three holy orders God has instituted in the world through his word.

CIVIL GOVERNMENT AS HOLY ORDER Civil Government and the Care of the Churches Noteworthy passages where Luther taught his students about the holy order of civil government are his lectures on the narratives of Abraham and Sarah, and later Isaac and Rebecca, when they sojourn in the land Gerar among the people ruled by Abimelech (Gen. 20). Toward the end of his lectures on this narrative, Luther noted how all three holy orders are represented in the characters of this account: Abraham is an example for preachers, Sarah for the mistresses of households, Abimelech for rulers.20 After Abraham’s lie about Sarah being his sister was exposed to the king through a threatening dream from God (for Abimelech had taken Sarah— Gen. 20:2–5), the ruler rebukes Abraham for his lie, but then blesses him with gifts of sheep, oxen, and servants. Luther noted that “in order that nothing that could be desired in a godly king may be lacking,” the text tells the reader how Abimelech regarded Abraham as a prophet. “In keeping with the duty of a king,” Abimelech honors and upholds Abraham in his prophetic office. This Philistine king is an example of how the godly prince, as opposed to the tyrant, supports the ministry of the word. Luther commented on how the Electors of Saxony in his own time were rulers of this kind. “They believed that the care of the churches was their main concern.” They established schools and provided ministers for the churches, while other princes “persecuted the word and troubled the churches with their tyranny.” Abimelech “belongs to the catalog of the holy rulers whose duty is not to build monasteries but to support the prophets and defend the church of God.” His example stands in stark contrast to some rulers in Luther’s day among his own people “who seize the income of the churches and defraud the pious teachers of their salary” or, like the papists, who “add persecution and the sword.”21

20WA 21WA

43:132.7–14 (LW 3:357). 43:131.7–14, 25–31 (LW 3:356); WA 43:131.37–39, 132.1–3 (LW 3:357).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 82 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

82

In his exposition of Genesis 21, Luther contrasted “our own princes” who support the churches with those nobles, burghers, and peasants who stir up hatred against the church’s ministry. Courtiers are too often like Abimelech’s advisor Phicol, Luther said, for, while they appear to pay attention to the interests of their rulers, they actually are serving their own advantage, gaining power for themselves. The Reformer complained, “We, too, have our Phicol-like courtiers, who burn with envy and hatred against the ministers of the churches and block all ways by which they suppose we are able to prosper.”22 Such perverse wisdom may well lead in Germany to the reassertion of papal power, Luther reasoned, as ministers of the word, neglected and unsupported even in their basic needs, turn again to ambition for managing civil affairs. Princes, indulging themselves in pleasures, meanwhile leave the care of the government to the ministers of the churches. At this point, Luther clarified the separation of civil and ecclesiastical offices, but complained that he teaches this to no avail. 23 The laziness of magistrates and their stinginess toward ministers devoted to the word combined with the political ambitions of bishops to lead toward the reassertion of ecclesiastical authority over the civil authority as well as in civil affairs: But thus it has been arranged: those who give nothing to Christ the beggar give a superabundance to a glutton, and those who do not feed a hungry man themselves perish from hunger. I would not readily impose political administration on our necks again, but because the magistrates are sleeping soundly and put their obligation into the hands of others—therefore, “If these were silent, the stones would cry out.”24

There are also positive examples in the Genesis narrative, and Luther utilized them as he tried to form in his students an Evangelical understanding of what constitutes a holy life in the civil realm. Abimelech respects Abraham as a prophet of God, while Abraham in turn upholds civil authority by his oath to the king. His oath is a “living witness” against those who disparage civil matters, like the “monkish clods” who are “dead

22WA

43:188.19–21, 189.10–11, 24–26 (LW 4:74–75). is the distinction of the “two kingdoms,” but these terms are rare in the lectures (but note well WA 44:772.24–773.16 [LW 8:263–64]). On the distinction, see Bornkamm, Luther’s Doctrine of the Two Kingdoms. For the two kingdoms in the Genesis lectures, see the discussion in Asendorf, Lectura in Biblia, 468–83; and Whitford, “Cura Religionis or Two Kingdoms.” 24WA 43:189.34–190.22, 30–34 (LW 4:76–77). LW adds a reference to Luke 19:40. 23This

Luther's Genesis.book Page 83 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

83

to the world and nevertheless very much alive in all kinds of vices” and the “foolish mob of the Anabaptists” who lower the authority of the civil government by their opposition to oaths in a court of law. The later conflict between Abraham and Abimelech over a well of water (Gen. 21:25–26) illustrates how God humbles both of them through their errors: Abraham for being suspicious and Abimelech for not knowing about the abuses of his servants. Luther described the king’s ignorance as an example of how God wanted him to realize that his government was partial—as his ignorance of his servants’ actions reveals—while “God [alone] is at the head of the universal government.” According to Luther’s exposition, the incident teaches two things: the limitation of civil government under the authority of God and the duty of people to assist the government by reporting wrongdoing—something few people do for fear of inciting the hatred of their neighbors.25 The picture Luther draws here is of the function and duty of the civil government to provide hospitality for the church in the world. Though Abimelech is not a son of Abraham and thus is not numbered with the people of God, his actions toward Abraham nevertheless reveal that he was indeed a “holy ruler” who recognized his role in the holy work of protecting God’s prophets. His heir, a second Abimelech (Luther believed the name might be the title of a ruler, like “Pharaoh,” rather than the name of a person), likewise demonstrated his fear of God when he warned his people not to touch Rebecca, Isaac’s wife. This ruler detested adultery and his warning reveals that he was “a man who fears God and is pious.” Luther taught his students that the church needs such “holy and pious hosts” in the world: “For the church and the apostles must have a nook where they may live.”26 Though not a son of the promise, Abimelech became a sharer in it through his saintly hospitality. Moreover, the Lord shows kindness to his saints even in the midst of their exile from the land of the promise, for “he provides excellent, quiet, and safe hospitality and grants peace in the midst of their enemies.” In the same way, Luther noted how in his own day God provided for the church: “If one or another prince does not want to protect us, God will give someone else to provide hospitality in a kindly manner.” The later provision of God for his people when they sojourned in Egypt likewise reveals the role civil authorities play in God’s work of 25WA 26WA

43:191.1–11, 17–20 (LW 4:77–79); WA 43:194.30–195.7, 17–24 (LW 4:83–84). 43:463.23–464.14 (LW 5:51–52).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 84 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

84

providing for his church. It is the “ordinance of the Holy Spirit, who mandates to princes the care of the food supply and other necessary matters.” 27 Whether carried out by holy rulers like Abimelech or among the Egyptians, who despised the Hebrews for their vocation as shepherds, the care of God’s people was all the holy work of God for the sake of the church during its sojourn in the world: The existence of a state and civil governance [politia] must not be credited to princes or kings, who are generally ungodly and the worst of men; but all things are preserved on account of the word, baptism, and the holy seed that is left in the church. For if the world were without the godly and those being saved, it would not stand; and when the last saints are living, the last day will soon come. For God has no concern for civil governance and the household except for the sake of the church.28

Sporadically throughout the lectures, Luther used the example of rulers like Abimelech and Pharaoh to praise—sometimes by name—the princes who supported the Reformation. He did this especially in the case of Elector Frederick the Wise, who had died over a decade before in 1525, and John Frederick, Duke of Saxony, Elector, whom Luther praised as a prince who bore up under the immense burden of governance.29 This positive view of the prince as confessor of Christ and protector of the church was often conveyed in the sixteenth century through woodcut prints portraying rulers like John Frederick as witnesses to the events of Christ’s life, such as his baptism (fig. 1).30 The professor also accented negative examples where princes in Germany, even those who supported the Reformation, “seize and plunder the churches” and “the fat of the monasteries and the associations,” taking the income for themselves rather than using it to provide for the needs of pastors.31 Where God institutes civil government as a holy order for the 27WA

43:464.14–17, 465.3–11 (LW 5:52–53); WA 44:416.31–36 (LW 7:158). 44:559.12–18 (LW 7:348–49). 29WA 44:416.37–417.6, 626.5–7, 656.34–37 (LW 7:158–59; 8:63, 106). Frederick’s name appears in capitals for emphasis in the original imprint; In Genesin enarrationum (1554), fol. CLXXv. 30Geisberg (German Single-Leaf Woodcut, 2:615) incorrectly identifies the Elector in the print as Frederick the Wise. On the use of such prints as propaganda, see Scribner, For the Sake of Simple Folk, esp. 226–28. 31WA 44:625.2–3, 625.37–626.4 (LW 8:62–63). John Calvin likewise complained in his 1543 treatise Supplex Exhortatio ad Caesarem de Necessitate Reformandae Ecclesiae, addressed to Emperor Charles V, about princes confiscating ecclesiastical properties rather than using them for the endowment XXXXXXX 28WA

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD Figure 1. Lucas Cranach the Younger. Prince John Frederick and Martin Luther Witnessing the Baptism of Christ. Vienna, ca. 1548. Photograph courtesy of the Warburg Institute.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 85 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

85

Luther's Genesis.book Page 86 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

86

hospitality of the church in the world, Luther says, the devil incites greed, with the result that the ministers of the word have to live upon the spoils of Egypt “gathered under the papacy.” Evangelical institutions such as churches and schools often had to live on the incomes remaining from ecclesiastical properties gathered under the papal domination of the church, when these had not been plundered by the princes. At the last day, Pharaoh “will condemn the princes and magistrates of Germany,” for he kept his hands off the property of the priests of Egypt. But in the Evangelical territories of Germany, parishes and schools are despoiled, inviting the judgment of God.32

Civil Government and the Punishment of Sinners In Luther’s view, God’s holy work through civil authorities goes beyond its support of the church and its ministry. God also uses civil governments to deal with sin in an evil world. Luther’s mental universe included a view of the world where uncurbed sin, unpunished crimes, and violent insurrection were a constant threat to the church and all creation. In the early 1520s, Luther reacted sharply to the outbreak of violence during the early progress of the Evangelical movement in Wittenberg. Luther’s response to the Peasants’ War likewise demonstrated his aversion to violent insurrection and his concern to distinguish the freedom of the gospel from egalitarian movements that claimed support from Evangelical teaching. The Reformer’s lectures on Genesis in the last decade of his life reveal his mature position on issues that emerged in the political turmoil and social unrest of the sixteenth century. The social conservatism of Luther’s worldview is illustrated well by his exposition of the flight of Hagar in Genesis 16.33 Here, Luther spoke critically of Hagar because she had fled from her mistress, Sarai, who had dealt harshly with the maid after Hagar had conceived Abram’s child and on this account now despised her mistress. Drawing on Genesis 16:9, where the angel of the Lord tells Hagar to return to her mistress and submit to her, Luther noted that this is the preaching of the law that produces terror: “When the angel is speaking, horns come forth from the face of Moses, or unbearable rays of light, at which the wretched woman is terrified.” She 32

of schools and the ministry of the churches. See Calvin, “Necessity of Reforming the Church,” 209–11. 32WA 44:670.28–671.7 (LW 8:125–26). 33Mattox (Defender of the Most Holy Matriarchs, 139–70) provides a helpful study of Luther’s interpretation of Hagar in the context of the exegetical tradition.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 87 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

87

is commanded to remain in her vocation, for if God does not change the station of a person through death or through the judgment of “superiors,” it is a sin to abandon one’s vocation. In contrast to Jewish commentators and Lyra, who claim that God worked a miracle for Hagar—by reconceiving in her the child that (they say) had died in her womb—Luther assumed a much simpler explanation of God’s law at work to bring Hagar to repentance.34 In the crucial passage, Luther described the application of the law as a benevolent work, a work that God accomplishes through the holy orders he has instituted in the world: Hagar is being punished by her mistress Sarai, and Hagar does not bear this punishment calmly but tries to help herself through flight. Even though she sins by doing this, God nevertheless has regard for her affliction and consoles her. What could be called more benevolent? Therefore let us accustom ourselves to patience and calmly bear even lashes and blows—children from their parents, subjects from the magistrate, and pupils from the teacher. For submission is pleasing to God, if we allow ourselves to be chastised.

Luther continued in this lecture to note how “nature” grumbles when it feels the blows and then despairs of God’s grace—“these evils [of grumbling and despair] arise from ignorance of sacred matters.” Such matters are the work of God, the care he shows through the discipline administered by parents and magistrates.35 In other words, the punishment administered by proper authorities is God’s work through the holy orders of the household and the civil realm. Luther’s rhetoric of discipline and its relationship to the civil magistrate recalls a body of historical and sociological scholarship developed by Gerhard Oestreich and others, which tied the concept of “social disciplining” to the rise of absolutist states in the age of confessionalization. 36 Robert Bast, however, has demonstrated that the political paternalism characteristic of absolutist monarchies in the early modern era was not conceived by the Reformation, but was already a major theme in the late medieval catechetical project of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. 37 34WA 42:592.35–40, 593.2–11 (LW 3:62); and WA 42:594.18–37 (LW 3:64–65). See also Mattox, Defender of the Most Holy Matriarchs, 147–48. 35WA 42:597.1–16 (LW 3:68). 36For a study surveying the literature, see Hsia, Social Discipline in the Reformation. For a vigorous criticism of Oestreich’s approach, see Miller, “Nazis and Neo–Stoics.” 37Bast, Honor Your Fathers. The concluding lines of Bast’s study read: “It will no longer do to claim that Early Modern rulers ‘arrogated to themselves the image of a benevolent, authoritarian XXXXX

Luther's Genesis.book Page 88 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

88

Yet the concept in western society that the state has a role in social discipline and that this role also incorporates religious ideology within the purview of state interests has even deeper roots, in the Roman Empire. For example, the understanding that the religion of the populace was a state interest motivated and shaped the sporadic persecution of Christians, who refused to cooperate with the particularly Roman view of communal religious practice as a necessary expression of civic virtue and loyalty to the state. In the post-Constantine Roman Empire, the religious coercion of the populace became a challenge for the state that was not abandoned, but instead developed in the religious edicts of the later Roman Empire and, after the empire’s dissolution, into the central problem in the relationship between church and state throughout the Middle Ages.38 This glance at a problem of considerably distant provenance serves to indicate a crucial point: the events of the sixteenth-century Reformation did not give birth to an ideology of the “social disciplining” function of the state; rather, they provided a new context to an age-old ideology and new societal structures in which the seeds of tolerance were already being sown.39 These new structures stemmed from the loss of papal hegemony over western Christendom, often viewed as a process of secularization.40 Yet these new structures were just beginning to develop when Luther was lecturing on Genesis from 1535 to 1545. Passages where Luther’s reading of Genesis provides insight into his thinking regarding civil government as a holy order performing the work of God offer quite a different perception of this historical process. As Luther read the sacred text in the light of events in his own day, he described for his students a reconfiguration of a Christian society rather than a process of secularization. The Reformer saw in the text events that illustrate God’s way of working in the world 38

father supervising the citizens’ [Hsia]. The appropriation of the language of paternalism and the coercive control of life and doctrine were the ripe fruits of a harvest that catechists had been cultivating for centuries” (237). 38For a careful analysis see esp. Brown, “Religious Coercion in the Later Roman Empire.” Brown describes the “policy of religious discrimination” in late Roman North Africa as an “atmosphere [that] cannot be summed up in a code of rules”: “Thus, this ‘atmosphere’ caused long-established Roman laws—such as those against magic—to cast a considerably longer shadow under a Christian government” (307). For Augustine’s pivotal role, and the development of his “attitude” (rather than “doctrine”) of religious coercion, see Brown, “St. Augustine’s Attitude to Religious Coercion.” 39For a fascinating analysis of this new historical context and important changes that were taking place already early in the Reformation (in the 1520s), see Seebaß, “Confessionalization and Tolerance.” 40For an insightful survey of the secondary literature and its themes, see Headley, “Luther and the Problem of Secularization.” For more on the Reformation as a resacralizing rather than secularizing movement, see also Karant-Nunn, Reformation of Ritual; and Hendrix, Recultivating the Vineyard.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 89 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

89

through the coercive responsibilities of authorities, both in civil society and in the life of a Christian household. Drawing from the scripture a view of civil government wherein its function of disciplining is understood in sacral terms, Luther viewed civil government as a holy order that mediates God’s holy work of disciplining the erring. In his exposition of Genesis 19, Luther discusses the methods by which each of the three orders punishes sin. Parents are to maintain strict discipline in the home over domestic servants and children, the officers of civil government “bear the sword for the purpose of coercing the obstinate and remiss by means of their power of discipline,” and the church governs by the word and the power of excommunication. “By this threefold authority God has protected the human race against the devil, the flesh, and the world, to the end that offenses may not increase but may be cut off.” The work of all three orders is the work of God: “Thus the divine majesty is everywhere discernible, as it makes use of the service of human beings in accordance with its manifold wisdom and unlimited insight.” When these orders do not uphold their God-given office of censuring sin, “they take the sin of others upon themselves.” Sins of individuals become “sins of the city or public sins” if they are not punished by the government, “and public disasters are always wont to result from them.” Later Luther added, “In the state it is not rare to find examples that show that ruin and terrible disasters of the people have followed whenever the government has either supported or defended manifest sins.” God’s wrath comes when sins prevail. Therefore, officers of the state must not “wink at any offense, however small,” but should flee if iniquity prevails, “lest they become partakers in the sins of others.”41 The pervasiveness of this ideology, its grim assessment of the threat of sin and crime upon society, and its relationship to the teaching of holy scripture are all powerfully corroborated in a popular woodcut print executed by Luther’s friend and fellow Wittenberger, Lucas Cranach (the Younger), in 1540 (fig. 2). The print portrays four criminals executed in Wittenberg on the day of SS. Peter and Paul in 1540: they are hung upon great wooden beams: the two on the right have their intestines spilling out of pierced abdomens, their corpses stiff and arms upheld from the swelling of rigor mortis. The text framing the illustration above and below, in the largest type of the page, quotes the Bible. Above the portrayal is written, “Paul in Rom XIII: The powers or authorities are not a terror for those 41WA 43:74.37–75.13 (LW 3:279); WA 43:75.36–38 (LW 3:280); and WA 43:76.15–19 (LW 3:281).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 90 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

90

CHAPTER THREE

Figure 2. Lucas Cranach the Younger. Four Executed Criminals. Gotha, 1540.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 91 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

91

who do good but for those who do evil. For it [the authority] does not bear the sword in vain. It is God’s servant, an avenger over those who do evil.” The text below quotes Psalm 83, with its heady description of the threat criminals pose for society at large: “They devise crafty schemes against Thy people, and consult together against Thy sheltered ones.” A longer text in smaller type below the illustration conveys the justice of this grotesque and final form of public punishment. It also conveys the horror the viewer and reader must perceive in crime as the work of the devil, who seeks always to undo and destroy the holy works of God. One of the executed is described as a woman about fifty years of age, who had, together with a son she had conceived through illicit relations with the devil, yielded herself to the fiend, bearing sorcerers, changing the weather, and poisoning many poor people’s cattle.42 The popular woodcut conveys the mentality of the age differently than does the social analysis of scholars who compare the sixteenth century with modern secularized societies. In sixteenth-century Germany, the punishment of criminals, even in its harshest form of public execution, was viewed as a critical function of civil government for the defense of the innocent from the grave threat of violence and the disruption of civil order by evildoers. Their crimes were viewed as the hideous work of the devil, while the task of punishing them was the holy work of God through civil authorities established as holy orders in the world. It was, as one skeptical modern scholar has described it, “God’s just vengeance”—a view of crime and punishment that was inseparable from the concept of sin and atonement imbedded in the Christian economy of salvation. 43

Punishment by Civil Authority as God’s Instrument for Salvation This view of the civil authority’s responsibility for curbing evil and punishing criminals also has a complement in Luther’s exposition of scriptural texts. Already explored is how Luther used the incident of Hagar’s flight to illustrate the salvific, correcting function of the law as the work of God. A more expansive treatment is found in Luther’s exposition of the Joseph narrative, in which the professor showed his students how God had played “a wonderful, if painful, kind of game” through Joseph in the lives of his brothers. For, Luther says, contrary to the teaching of the Scholastic theologians, 42The print has been published in Geisberg, German Single-Leaf Woodcut, 2:639, but I have not seen this print discussed in any secondary literature. 43Gorringe, God’s Just Vengeance.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 92 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

92

sin cannot be purged through satisfactions achieved by a cooperating human will. No, “the punishments and disasters of the human race, plague, wars, and famines belong here, in order that sin may be made known and palpably manifested in us, until we understand what we are in God’s eyes.” God plays his game not so people may despair or be destroyed, but so he may “lead us to a knowledge of our foulness. Yet not in such a way that we despair, but rather that we cry to him and invoke his mercy and learn that he shows his mercy wondrously, as Psalm 16 [17:7] says. For this is what he has meant with his game.”44 Luther noted that Joseph’s actions toward his brothers when they met him again as ruler in Egypt were a marvelous portrayal of God’s play with his saints in the world. The reality of Joseph’s attitude toward them was hidden by his outward actions. “Thus Joseph is very gentle and mild toward his brothers, for several times having turned away he weeps, and by weeping he testifies that he is totally prepared to forgive them, yet nevertheless he treats them harshly, rages, is angry as with spies, throws Simeon into chains and, with whatever methods he can, he terrifies them.” In the same way, God, just like a parent or schoolteacher who chastises the child so that he may improve, plays a game with his saints in their afflictions: Thus in the end we shall come to the knowledge of God and learn his goodwill. For this is not a matter of what the papists wish to achieve with their foolish penance, namely, that God may be placated by rendering satisfaction. They do not know what sin is. They do not know that God plays with his saints in this way—not that they may perish, but that they may recognize in him what he preaches concerning himself in Jeremiah 3: “Because I am holy, says the Lord, I will not be angry forever.” Then he adds these other words: “Nevertheless, acknowledge your iniquity, because against the Lord your God you have walked crookedly,” etc.

Luther went on to emphasize: “To feel God’s wrath is a sure sign of life.” Unlike the papists and cardinals, the Turks, and all the ungodly, who do not feel the wrath of God and thereby show that they are not alive, the godly accustom themselves to this “cruel play” of God.45 They trust that, although the play is painful, its goal is their healing and salvation.

44WA 45WA

(LW 7:233).

44:468.5–16, 21–38, 469.33–42 (LW 7:227–30). 44:471.5–8 (LW 7:231); WA 44:471.12–16, 34–40 (LW 7:231–32); and WA 44:472.14–29

Luther's Genesis.book Page 93 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

93

The role civil government plays in this particular work of God is explained by Luther in his lectures on Genesis 42:18–20, a passage where Joseph continues his dreadful play with his brothers. Here Joseph’s anger is simulated, not real. It is like the story Augustine tells of how his mother laughed at him when he complained that his teacher had flogged him at school—nevertheless, she did not wish him ill. But how can a father or mother laugh when their son is flogged? It really is customarily done thus, that parents chastise their children, teachers their students, the magistrate punishes the guilty and is minister of wrath and the sword. For this purpose it hangs thieves, punishes brigands by the head [decapitation], and nevertheless it is not delighted by punishments of this kind. For it prefers that each person do his duty and not deserve any penalty.46

Just as a student will not make progress without the discipline and chastisement of the teacher, so the goal of all punishments of children is to prevent them from throwing off parental authority and eventually incurring much greater punishments before judges and executioners. With adults, it is the same way. “Therefore God sends blows through the government, famine, plague, the sword, Turk, pope, devil, etc. Why? So that we may cry out when we are flogged.” The example of Joseph’s treatment of his brothers applies to one’s whole life, Luther told his students. The experience is most difficult, but the admonitions are useful. Christ is our very sweet Joseph, who died for us, shed his blood for the remission of sins, and therefore cannot be alienated from us. Nor does the Father hate us, for he sent the Son. Much less, in truth, the Holy Spirit, because he teaches these things and consoles, and nevertheless conceals and covers this love, often with horrible indications of wrath.

This work of God is necessary, painful though it is, because “grace does not have a place there, unless we acknowledge sin and humble ourselves, and to such an extent are reduced to nothing, so that we feel ourselves damned. Otherwise one holds it as no sin.”47 Luther developed this concept of the fearful play of God throughout the Joseph narrative. What is critical to recognize is that this play of God takes place in the world through the three holy orders of household,

46WA 47WA

44:487.27–35 (LW 7:254). 44:488.34–36, 489.4–10 (LW 7:255–56); and WA 44:489.23–26 (LW 7:256).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 94 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

94

CHAPTER THREE

church, and civil government. Civil government has a sacred role to play in God’s world, not only in the work of curbing sin through the rigorous work of punishing criminals, but also in the work of preparing God’s people for the gift of his grace. God hides his love in the alien work of the law mediated through civil government, through natural disasters, through threats coming from political enemies, heretics or ecclesiastical tyrants, and even through the devil himself. The law reduces the sinner to nothing so that God in grace may then create anew (creatio ex nihilo).

Divine Limitations on Governmental Power and the Duty of Resistance Because civil authority is a holy order and holy work of God in the world, it is subject to the limitations placed on it by God, who alone has universal authority. This limiting is a neglected aspect of Luther’s understanding of civil authority and governmental power.48 Yet these divine limitations on civil authority, as well as the duty of Christians to resist the abuse of governmental power, were an important theme in his lectures, finding expression in places where the narrative of Genesis describes the abuse of authority entrusted to the three holy orders. A fascinating example is found where Luther lectured on the story of Jacob’s deceiving Isaac and obtaining the blessing meant for the firstborn son, at the instigation of his mother, Rebecca (Gen. 27:5–10). Here Luther noted that the text poses “an almost unsolvable problem”: “Did Rebecca and her son Jacob have the right to lie?” Claiming (incorrectly) that church fathers such as Augustine ignored this passage, the professor suggested a possibility for its resolution.49 Rebecca must have been induced to contrive this deception on the advice of someone else, and Luther believed that someone must have been the patriarch Eber. Clearly her deception could not be excused if she did not have some clear instruction that it would be through her intervention that God’s prophecy would be fulfilled, namely, that “the elder shall serve the younger,” through the blessing of Jacob rather than his elder brother. Whatever the cause for her boldness,

48A recent brief treatment seeking to rectify this lacuna is Whitford, Tyranny and Resistance. See also Whitford, “Duty to Resist Tyranny”; and Whitford, “Cura Religionis or Two Kingdoms.” 49See LW 5:111n14. For examples of the way several of the church fathers and Luther dealt with such problems of moral failure (e.g., Sarah’s lie; Rachel’s theft of her father’s household gods) in the Genesis narrative, see Mattox, Defender of the Most Holy Matriarchs. Mattox does not address the narrative of Rebecca’s deception, however.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 95 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

95

Luther reasoned that it is clear from God’s own promise that his intent was to break the normal law of primogeniture. God has the right to abrogate his own laws. Though it was truly a sin when Isaac’s own wife and son deceived him, nevertheless, “as it pleased the Lord, so it happened.” Using traditional terminology, which divides the Decalogue into two tables (or tablets), with the first describing man’s duty toward God and the second describing man’s duty to his neighbor, Luther notes that God abrogates his own law in the second table (which requires obedience to parents and respect for civil laws) and enjoins obedience to the first table (which requires obedience to God’s own word, in this case that “the older shall serve the younger”).50 Luther’s exposition of the narrative became the basis for an argument for resistance to the emperor where the word of God is at stake, a position Luther had enunciated as early as 1523 in his treatise Temporal Authority, to What Extent It Should Be Obeyed.51 The crucial passage in the Genesis lectures notes, “If the government tolerates me when I teach the word, I hold it in honor and regard it with all respect as my superior. But if it says, ‘Deny God; cast the word aside,’ then I no longer acknowledge it as the government.” The same point is made regarding the limitations of parental authority; for example, if parents require devotion to “papal idolatry.” While the rule is that government, parents, and every other authority are to be obeyed, in the case of religion, there is an exception to the rule: “The first table must be given precedence over the second table.” Luther cited Acts 5:29 to justify this exception, and then stated: This is the way we, in carrying on the work of the gospel, decide against the authority of the emperor and the pope and against all the ungodliness of the pope without any preceding legal hubbub. We made no charges against the pope. Nor could we do so, for there was no judge. We have honored the pope, our parents, and the emperor. But because Christ says, “My sheep hear my voice; a stranger they will not follow, but they will flee from him,” we should not have waited until a decision was reached in human fashion whether we did right or wrong by separating ourselves from the pope; because when one has learned what God’s will is, there must be no debating about rights, rules, or the like, but God’s command must be obeyed without any

50WA 51WA

43:504.36–37, 505.5–11, 505.41–506.12, 506.33–507.12 (LW 5:110–14). 11:245–80 (LW 45:75–129).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 96 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

96

deliberation. For neither the pope, nor parents, nor the emperor have this title: “I am the Lord your God.”52

Thus Luther solved the ethical problem the narrative poses: for while the law ordained that Esau had the rights of the firstborn, God overruled the law and established Jacob over Esau. In doing so, he established the limitations of human powers in all three holy orders as subject to God and his word. In another passage where he made a similar argument, Luther supported the right of resistance to human tyranny in the case of abuse by the orders established by God.53 Here, the narrative is about the response of Rachel and Leah to Jacob’s indication that he would now leave Laban’s household (Gen. 31:4–16). Luther noted that in their response, Laban’s daughters did not honor their father. They had said “such impious, horrible, and almost murderous things about their father,” that he had treated them as foreigners, had sold them, and was greedily using up the money given for their dowry. Luther excused the dishonoring words of these two daughters, for the fourth commandment ceases to apply. “For what paternal quality does Laban have that is worthy of honor? He is a beast and a monster! But how will you honor him as a parent who does not want to be a father…and has degenerated into a tyrant?” Rachel and Leah had endured their father’s tyranny for twenty years. Their complaints were indeed bitter, but their father had become “an abortive monstrosity of nature.” Though their words cannot be praised, nevertheless their sin was “venial and tolerable. For what good can be said of a dog?” The professor’s language was direct: “Laban is a dog,…an example that all men should execrate and flee.”54 Rachel’s later theft of Laban’s household gods provides another opportunity for the professor to teach these distinctions. Here the distinctions are made even more clear, for Luther at least partially justifies

52WA

43:507.13–15 (LW 5:114); WA 43:507.15–28 (LW 5:114–15); and WA 43:507.31–42 (LW

5:115). 53The right of resistance by “lesser magistrates” to the civil authority of the emperor was debated vigorously among the Lutheran reformers and politicians in the late 1520s and early 1530s and was eventually accepted by Luther. The doctrine became central to Lutheran resistance to the Interim law of 1548 by which Emperor Charles V sought to return Evangelical churches to Roman governance and liturgical forms until a council could meet to resolve the religious division created by the Reformation. See Whitford, Tyranny and Resistance; and Smith, “Lutheran Resistance to the Imperial Interim.” 54WA 44:11.3–22 (LW 6:16); WA 44:12.9–15, 24–26 (LW 6:17–18); and WA 44:13.6–9, 20 (LW 6:18–19).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 97 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

97

Rachel’s theft for two reasons. First, she steals property that was owed to her, which is (Luther argued) an upholding of the second table—she had “just cause by civil and natural law” to respond to her father’s “cruelty and tyranny” by seizing some of his property. Second, by her theft, she made Laban’s idolatry more difficult to practice, and thus her action upheld the first table.55 In this context, Luther taught his students to distinguish carefully and precisely. Foremost, the first table takes precedence over the second table. Still, the heretics also draw this distinction and “under this pretext abolish the second table.” The pope boasts that his authority outstrips that of the magistrate and even emperors and kings. Likewise, Jerome had so glorified monasticism that he had counseled the disregard of parents: their tears should be scorned as their children “flee naked to the cross of Christ.” Luther countered such views by a careful dialectic: one must first establish the right way to appeal to the first table. “If it is a matter, or cause, of God, then it is rightly stated: ‘Trample a mother’s breasts under foot; despise her tears.’ But if not, remember that obedience should be shown by you with all reverence and that likewise their faults and infirmities should be endured, provided only that they are not in conflict with the first table.” Later, the professor made the relevant point for his students in view of new issues that had arisen in the 1540s: However, there is need of careful distinction and accurate logic so that we do not confound these things, or, as the pope and the fanatics do, abuse this distinction. For they, with great danger to the church and state, arrogate the first table to themselves, although they despise it and really trample it underfoot…. But here there is need of accurate judgment so that the distinction is correctly applied and the commandments and teaching of the pope are weighed in accordance with the true meaning of the commandments of the first table. For I, too, teach that our prince does not have to obey the emperor, and I absolve him from obedience not only to the pope but also from obedience to the whole empire and the emperor. But by what right? Here is it necessary for me to see that I rightly define and distinguish obedience. I do it by this right, namely, because the emperor and pope give orders and instructions contrary to the first table. Therefore neither the prince nor the people are bound to obey commandments contrary to their obedience to God.

55WA 44:18.25–31 (LW 6:26); and WA 44:19.32–38, 20.30–33 (LW 6:28–29). On Luther’s interpretation of this passage, see also Mattox, Defender of the Most Holy Matriarchs, 206–9.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 98 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

98

The passage continues in this fashion to distinguish carefully between what God himself has spoken, and the “human obedience” owed to parents, teachers, masters, and magistrates. “The dialectic of the Holy Spirit teaches this distinction,” and everything depends on having pastors, teachers, and students who learn carefully this dialectic.56 For Luther and the students in his lecture hall, the narrative of Genesis presented life in the world as a holy work of God. Through civil government, God works through the orders he has established for creation and especially for the protection of his faithful people. Yet Luther was also bequeathing to his students a clear basis for resistance to abuses of human authority: what God had instituted as a holy order was subject to his word, and Christians were obligated to obey God rather than men in the event of contradiction between them. Although there would be a serious division among Luther’s followers soon after his death over what would constitute both abuse of governmental authority and legitimate resistance to it, the text of the Genesis lectures shows that the Reformer conveyed in his classroom a rich teaching that provided part of the background for this aspect of developing Evangelical identity.57

THE HOUSEHOLD AS HOLY ORDER If life in the civic community and under temporal authority is a holy place where God continues his work in the world, then, for Luther, the foundation of such a civic community, the household, is especially a place where God performs his holy work.58 In his exposition of the narrative of 56WA

44:19.39–20.19 (LW 6:27–28); WA 44:21.11–26 (LW 6:29–30); and WA 44:22.5–11 (LW

6:30). 57In spite of the view of Peter Meinhold and others that the published Genesis lectures betray a “Melanchthonian” influence from the editors, it is interesting that these passages clearly lay out a view of civil authority that was employed not by Melanchthon but by his opponents in the controversy over the Interim. This controversy eventually split the Lutheran Reformation into two embattled parties: Philippists vs. Gnesio-Lutherans. On the development of resistance doctrine among Luther’s followers, see Olson, “Theology of Revolution”; Shoenberger, “Luther and the Justifiability of Resistance”; Shoenberger, “Development of the Lutheran Theory of Resistance”; Smith, “Lutheran Resistance to the Imperial Interim”; Whitford, Tyranny and Resistance, 55–109; and Whitford, “Duty to Resist Tyranny.” On the controversy over the Interim and the theological and political division of the Lutheran Reformation, see Olson, Matthias Flacius and the Survival of Luther’s Reform, as well as studies on the Interim in general; for example, Luttenberger, Glaubenseinheit und Reichsfriede; and Rabe, Reichsbund und Interim. 58On the household in Luther’s Genesis lectures see also Jordon, “Patriarchs and Matriarchs as Saints.” Jordon’s focus is theological rather than historical, and is related to an ecumenical interest.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 99 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

99

Abraham as the story of the life of faith,59 Luther unveiled for his students how life in marriage and the household is an arena where God works out his “play” of creating holiness in sinful human beings. Throughout the passages where Luther taught this view, he showed domestic life to be the location of God’s sanctifying work and practiced a form of homiletic iconoclasm. He polemically ridiculed monasticism and celibacy as false forms of holiness without God’s word and command. Therefore, Luther believed they are the creation not of God, but of the devil.

The Household as the True Monastic State As Luther began his treatment of the Abraham narrative, he made clear that the sanctification of this “most holy man” was entirely the work of God. Through Abraham, God was bringing about a “rebirth of the church” from a “new stem,” because Abraham did not start out as a believer in the true God. As the prophet Joshua testifies, Abraham was an idolater when God called him, “righteous, not before God but before Nimrod, whose worship he was imitating (Josh. 24).” The professor explained how God had accomplished in Abraham his work of creation from nothing, calling Abraham out of a “wretched state” into something entirely new: Therefore this passage is important for confirming the doctrine of grace over against the worth of merits and works, which reason extols so highly. For if you should ask what Abraham was before he was called by a merciful God, Joshua answers that he was an idolater, that is, that he deserved death and eternal damnation. But in this wretched state the Lord does not cast him away; he calls him and through the call makes everything out of him who is nothing.60

In Luther’s exposition, Abraham’s life thus portrays the work of God’s justification of the ungodly: he was “Satan’s captive slave,” “merely the material that the divine majesty seizes through the word and forms into a new human being and into a patriarch.” In Abraham, the universal rule is proved: “of himself man is nothing, is capable of nothing, and has nothing except sin, death, and damnation; but through his mercy Almighty God brings it about that man is something and is freed from sin, death, and 59Juhani Forsberg (Das Abrahambild in der Theologie Luthers) provides a view of Luther’s theology through the Reformer’s interpretation of Abraham, concluding that, for Luther, Abraham is a paradigmatic figure of the life of faith, hope, and love; he is the origin and type of the true church; and he is the example of the true saint living under the cross. 60WA 42:437.10–15 (LW 2:246).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 100 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

100

damnation through Christ, the Blessed Seed.” Thus, in stark contrast to the view of Jewish commentators, Abraham is chosen not because of his merits, but precisely because he had none. God bypasses the righteous man Shem, who still lives with his household in Salem, and elects instead this idolater from Ur of the Chaldeans.61 Like all the saints of God, “even if they are good and holy in appearance,” Abraham was subject to death before his call. Nevertheless, when he is called (through the voice of Shem, says Luther), Abraham believes and obeys. He throws out the religion of his father’s house and shows a remarkable obedience by leaving home, fields, fatherland, and relatives, and “goes into exile, uncertain where he would be able to settle.” His wife, too, exhibits the obedience of faith, for Abraham and Sarah forsake everything at God’s call. Using language that reveals the influence of Luther’s monastic experience even as he rejected and transcended it, he described Abraham and Sarah as holy people who far surpass the holiness of the monks of his day: The monks consider it a matter of great praise that they forsake everything, although they find more in the monasteries than they left in the home of their parents. But whom will one compare to this monk Abraham, who forsakes his native country, relatives, paternal estate, home, and everything, and simply follows God when he calls him into exile? Among others, of course, he has godly Sarah as his companion in this monastic state. She does not realize that she will have to spend the first night in some inn when she could be living in luxury and comfort at home.62

The passage and its broader context is a commentary on the difference between righteousness as the creation of human beings and therefore meritorious, and righteousness as the creation of God and therefore by grace alone. Abraham is the true monk, forsaking everything simply to follow God. Sarah is motivated not just by “her wifely affection,” but by the aid of the Holy Spirit, who “moved her womanly heart.” God moves both Abraham and Sarah to enter what Luther calls, in noteworthy language, “this monastic state.” That is, they become exiles from the world and its comforts, martyrs to the world and ascetics by virtue of everything they forsake in order to follow God’s call. It is the uncertainty of his future that constitutes Abraham’s exile. This true monk “set out without knowledge of 61WA 62WA

42:437.27, 31–36 (LW 2:247); and WA 42:438.34–439.8 (LW 2:247–49). 42:439.9–20, 440.25–32 (LW 2:249, 251); and WA 42:441.15–21 (LW 2:252).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 101 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

101

where he is going. He gives up a sure habitation and goes in pursuit of an uncertain one.”63 Unlike the monks, with whom the professor contrasts rather than compares them, Abraham and Sarah are in exile even as they live in the world. They have possessions but live “as though they did not have them, as the Letter to the Hebrews bears witness: ‘Dealing with the world as though they had no dealings with it.’ ”64 By God’s holy work in their lives, the arena of their holiness has a different location: In this way they live in the world at all times. They are indeed occupied with household and civic duties, they govern commonwealths and rear families, till fields, carry on commerce or manual occupations; and yet they are aware that they are exiles and strangers, like their fathers. They make use of the world as an inn from which they must emigrate in a short time, and they do not attach their heart to the affairs of this life. They tend to worldly matters with their left hand, while they raise their right hand upward to the eternal homeland…. No matter how they may be treated in this inn, it is satisfactory to them; for they know that eternal mansions have been prepared by the Son of God.65

This passage shows how Luther was passing on to his students a new understanding of what constitutes the martyrdom of dying to the world and living in hope of another life where the kingdom of God is fulfilled. Holiness is achieved not by forsaking the place of this world, but rather by transforming its significance. In later passages, Luther contrasted this holiness of Abraham and Sarah in their worldly location with the hypocrisy of the monks, who claim to forsake the world but in fact abandon the responsibilities of family life for more certain security and abundance. “What do these swine, who are looking for nothing but fattening food, lack in their diet, and a most luxurious one at that?”66 Luther’s iconoclastic 63WA

42:441.22–25, 30–31 (LW 2:252). 42:441.37–39 (LW 2:252–53). The biblical quotation, as LW notes, is actually from 1 Corinthians 7:31. But Luther clearly was also keeping in mind the key themes of Hebrews 11, where the patriarchal saints and heroes of faith are described as living by a faith that “is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” (Heb. 11:1, NKJV). In this passage, Luther’s students would have easily followed his conflation of the theme of Hebrews 11 with the quotation from 1 Corinthians 7:31. For a convincing analysis of the importance of a whole body of memorized scripture for Luther in his lectures and his students in hearing them, see Hagen, “It Is All in the Et Cetera.” 65WA 42:441.40–442.7 (LW 2:253). Scott Hendrix (“Martin Luther’s Reformation of Spirituality,” 262–65) utilizes this passage to conclude: “In Luther’s reformation of spirituality, the Christian lives in the world neither as a mystic nor as a monk, but as a guest” (262). 66WA 42:454.28–32 (LW 2:270). 64WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 102 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

102

CHAPTER THREE

view of monasticism was more specific in its critique than popular medieval anticlericalism—the Reformer and the movement he led did not adopt a general anticlericalism but vigorously defended the pastoral office. But Luther’s invective in this passage does reflect a view of monasticism that is portrayed visually in many popular woodcut prints from Reformation Germany, which depicted monks not as holy men whose prayers benefit society but rather as gluttonous drunkards whose origin is demonic and whose destiny is damnation (figs. 3–4).67 In the lecture hall, Luther contrasted Abraham with Antony, Benedict, Francis, and other famous monks in history, who are “utter filth in comparison with the precious jewels of our own monk.” For the monks throughout church history obey only what they impose upon themselves, while true obedience is to obey “what the Lord has commanded you through his word.”68 In contrast, Abraham and Sarah are occupied with the daily life of this world, yet they tend to these affairs without their hearts attached to them. This world, together with its duties, is only an inn, a temporary place of shelter while they make their emigrating sojourn toward the promised land. Even bad treatment in this inn is of no matter, for they are headed outward and upward from this world’s miseries. Luther amplified this latter point throughout his treatment of the Abraham narrative: marriage and domestic life is a place of tentatio, yet true believing monks like Abraham bear patiently and in faith the trials of this life in the world. When Sarah and Abraham continue to bear the suffering of childlessness, even in the face of God’s promise that their descendants will number as the stars, “the godly spouses take counsel together.” Saintly Abraham resigns himself to take Sarah’s maid Hagar in order to bear a child, submitting to his wife’s “honorable and godly plans” that were inspired not by unbelief, but rather by her faithful clinging to the promise God had made to her husband. But then her maid despises this most holy woman (“Sanctissima Sara”)—such is the thanks of the world for kindness

206.

67For an analysis of these and other prints, see Scribner, For the Sake of Simple Folk, 84–100, 190–

68WA 42:454.34–36, 455.7–22 (LW 2:270–71). Although Luther includes Saint Benedict in his indictment of this kind of false holiness, Benedict’s Rule actually condemns with similar language the kind of monks he calls “sarabaites” who, approved by no rule, live loyal to the world and “lie to God by their tonsure.” See Fry, ed., Rule of St. Benedict, 20–21. Nonetheless, Luther saw the corrective to such “holiness” not through a movement of monastic reform and renewal, as witnessed throughout the Middle Ages and which included also Luther’s own order of Observant Augustinians, but rather in a Reformation that abandoned the cloister as a means of such renewal of biblically defined holiness. On Luther and the monastic reform movement of which he was a part, see Oberman, Luther, 50–53, 113–50.

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD Figure 3. Lucas Cranach the Younger. Evangelical Service and the Damnation of Papal Clergy. Dresden, ca. 1540. Photograph courtesy of the Warburg Institute

Luther's Genesis.book Page 103 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

103

Luther's Genesis.book Page 104 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

104

CHAPTER THREE

Figure 4. Above and facing page, Lucas Cranach the Younger. Evangelical and Catholic Services. Berlin, ca. 1545. Photograph courtesy of the Warburg Institute.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 105 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

105

Luther's Genesis.book Page 106 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

106

shown by the saints of God.69 Treating this particular form of tentatio borne by the faithful, Luther enjoined his students to display kindness even to the ungrateful, in sharp contrast to the “holiness” of the monks: The monks, who had no knowledge of God or of people, withdrew into the deserts and there lived for themselves. But this is by no means Christian. You should remain in the world and among people; and you should endure the annoyances of the world and of Satan, and not be overcome by the flesh. For to overcome the malice of human beings is the mark not only of a man but of a Christian.70

In contrast to the monks’ withdrawal, Abraham shows tremendous patience and kindness in the midst of the challenges of married life. When Sarah complains to Abraham that the maid is looking upon her with contempt, even placing the blame upon her husband, Abraham “prefers his barren and aged lady to the pregnant mother”—he gives permission to Sarah to do with Hagar as she pleases. Luther explained at this point that the passage reveals the trials of marriage and home life, trials that are reflected also in the other two holy orders established by God: In the household, quarrels and disputes arise between husband and wife. In the state the peace is disturbed in various ways. In the church sects are established. The result is that he who observes these things rather carefully almost begins to despair of a happy outcome. But these histories teach and admonish us to prepare ourselves for bearing troubles and for overcoming them with patience, and not to be among those who want to be husbands or rulers of the state without having any trials. For these are futile thoughts of people who know nothing about this life.71

The world is a place of trials—of tentatio. This is precisely why the world and the holy orders God has established in it are the place where God alone creates true monks like Abraham and Sarah out of the nothingness of human sin and idolatry.

Sarah’s Holy Vocation In other passages Luther elaborated more fully on what holiness in the 69WA 42:583.16–35 (LW 3:48–49). On Luther’s interpretation of the strife between Hagar and Sarah in comparison with medieval interpretations, see Mattox, Defender of the Most Holy Matriarchs, 139–70. 70WA 42:585.7–10 (LW 3:51). 71WA 42:587.24–29, 35–39, 588.1–2 (LW 3:55).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 107 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

107

worldly calling of marriage and the household means for women.72 A revealing commentary is based upon the narrative in Genesis 18:9–15, where three visitors from God are telling Abraham that Sarah would have a son and the text says that Sarah was in the tent. “An indifferent heart reads this and pays no attention to it,” commented Luther; “but by means of these few words the Holy Spirit wanted to set before all women an example to imitate, so that…Sarah might give instruction about the highest virtues of a holy and praiseworthy housewife.” In sharp contrast to women who are “in the habit of gadding and inquiring about everything with disgraceful curiosity,” who idle at the door and “look either for something to see or for fresh rumors,” Sarah reveals the opposite virtues and receives high praise in Luther’s exposition. “If she had been inquisitive after the fashion of other women, she would have rushed to the door, would have seen the guests, would have listened to their conversations, would have interrupted them, etc.; but she does none of these things,” the Reformer mused. “She busies herself with her own tasks, which the household demands, and is unconcerned about the other things.”73 Luther explained that all this conforms to the biblical teaching as taught by the apostle Paul in Titus 2:5, that a believing woman should be “a domestic, so to speak, one who stays in her own home and looks after her own affairs.” The professor recalled how the Gentiles (gentes) portrayed Venus as standing on a tortoise, “for just as a tortoise carries its house with it wherever it goes, so a wife should be concerned with the affairs of her own home and not go too far away from it.” Thus Sarah is praiseworthy for remaining “in her little shell” and minding to her household tasks while Abraham visits outside.74 Then Luther said: This modesty or restraint surpasses all the acts of worship and all the 72There is a large and rapidly growing body of literature on the Reformation and gender, and thus the impact of the Reformation on the lives of women. In addition to Mattox, Defender of the Most Holy Matriarchs (esp. 109–37), see especially the following studies: Karant-Nunn, “Kinder, Küche, Kirche”; Karant-Nunn, “Transmission of Luther’s Teachings on Women”; Lindberg, “Future of a Tradition”; Ozment, When Fathers Ruled; Ozment, Protestants, 151–68; Roper, Holy Household; Wiesner, Gender; Wiesner, “Luther and Women”; Wunder, He Is the Sun, She Is the Moon; and Zophy, “We Must Have the Dear Ladies.” Also consulted were two unpublished doctoral dissertations that explore the Genesis lectures on this theme: Jordan, “Patriarch and Matriarchs,” 214–71; and McGuire, “Mature Luther’s Revision of Marriage Theology.” Primary texts and helpful introductions are collected in Karant-Nunn and Wiesner-Hanks, Luther on Women. 73WA 43:18.12–17 (LW 3:200); and WA 43:18.24–28 (LW 3:201). 74WA 43:19.29–39 (LW 3:201). The original 1550 Nürnberg edition of the lectures captured Luther’s emphasis by placing in the margin the phrases “Sara in tabernaculo” and “Sara ovj ikwroı”; In Genesin enarrationum (1550), fol. CXIIr.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 108 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

108

works of all the nuns, and these words, “Sarah is in the tent,” should be inscribed on the veils of all matrons; for in this way they would be reminded of their duty to beware of inquisitiveness, gadding, and garrulousness, and to accustom themselves to the diligent care of family matters. For with this brief statement Moses has described all the virtues of a good housewife, one who willingly stays at home and takes care of the household, in order that the things her husband provides may be properly allotted and administered. Our opponents, the papists, boast of their great and wonderful works. But they laugh at us when we bestow praise on such activities in the household and in the civil realm, for they regard these as insignificant and ordinary.75

In this way, Luther used a seemingly insignificant phrase in the Genesis narrative, “She is in the tent,” to draw a picture of Sarah as exemplifying the biblical prescription of the woman’s vocation in the Christian home. He contrasted this picture with the traditional papal view of holiness that scoffs at household and civic life as worldly and thus unholy. This contrast was a lively theme in his lecture as well as several pages in the published text. Sarah’s modesty and restraint are a domestic work, yet Luther asks, “What virgin or widow could be compared to her?” The papists view the union of male and female as standing in the way of saintly religious exercise, as too ordinary and common, but “their eyes should have been fixed on the originator of the civil realm and the household.” The “final cause” or goal of marriage is the creation of a church and the healing of the disease of sin, serving as a roadblock to sin’s progress. Other works of the household, like the proper raising of children and the discipline of domestic servants, likewise have neither outward show nor a reputation for saintliness, but this is because a judgment on these works was reached on the basis of reason rather than the word of God. Reason looks to outward appearance and ignores the command of God. A monk takes pride in his vow of poverty but shuns obedience to parents and other authorities, brings up no children, and “grows fat on the sweat of the poor.” Luther sharply contrasts Abraham and Sarah to this description: But Abraham, the pious head of the household, is truly poor. For he obeys when God calls him into exile. Nowhere does he have a fixed place.… Sarah, his companion, willingly follows her husband into exile, looks after the domestics and the home, is obliging toward the 75WA

43:18.40–19.8 (LW 3:201–2).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 109 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

109

neighbors, and is obedient to her husband. These are the highest virtues. There is nothing like them in all human traditions. Learn, therefore, to regard them highly and, since they are ordinances of God, to prefer them to human traditions, however splendid and showy.… Therefore, let us take note of this example, that Sarah is praised for diligently doing her duty in her home. For if a mistress of the household desires to please and serve God, she should not, as is the custom in the papacy, run here and there to the churches, fast, count prayers, etc. No, she should take care of the domestics, bring up and teach the children, do her work in the kitchen, and the like. If she does these things in faith in the Son of God and hopes to please God for Christ’s sake, she is holy and blessed.76

In this way, the vocation of the holy woman fulfills the commands of God rather than human traditions. This picture the Reformer drew of the subordinate and devoted housewife must be considered alongside passages where he focused on other aspects of the believing woman’s calling. Of first importance is the calling of every believer, male and female, to obedience to the word of God. At times, this may conflict with the subordination of wife to husband or of men and women to the authority of civil government. 77 In a later passage reflecting on the narrative of Abraham and Sarah, Luther emphasized the primary vocation of belief in a way that highlighted marriage as a calling that exists and grows as a companionship of spiritual equals. The narrative is the incident recorded in Genesis 21:10–11 when Sarah, offended by the mocking of her bond servant Hagar’s son Ishmael, tells Abraham to cast out the slave woman and her son. “And the thing was very displeasing to Abraham on account of his son,” the scripture says. Luther explained that the objection might be made that Sarah’s reverent 76WA 43:19.17–24, 19.28–20.36 (LW 3:202–4). Mattox (Defender of the Most Holy Matriarchs, 116–19) analyzes the continuity between Luther and patristic traditions of interpreting Sarah as an example of Christian holiness, who exhibited especially the virtues of hospitality and modesty. Nevertheless, as Mattox concludes, “Luther’s deeply traditional praise for Sarah’s virtue thus results in a deeply untraditional critique of the religious life” (119). 77See the chapter “Women’s Defense of Their Public Role” in Wiesner, Gender, 6–29. Wiesner quotes the German noblewoman Argula von Grumbach: “I am not unacquainted with the word of Paul that women should be silent in church [1 Tim. 1:2] but, when no man will or can speak, I am driven by the word of the Lord when he said, ‘He who confesses me on earth, him will I confess.’ ” (24– 25). Answering sharply a Catholic student’s satirical poem criticizing her, Grumbach replied, “I answer in the name of God / To shut the mouth of this bold snob. / …He tells me to mind my knitting. / To obey my man indeed is fitting, / But if he drives me from God’s Word / In Matthew ten it is declared / Home and child we must forsake / When God’s honor is at stake.”

Luther's Genesis.book Page 110 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

110

obedience has now disappeared. “This is rather dictatorial,” Luther concluded about Sarah’s instruction to Abraham that he cast out Hagar and Ishmael. He suggested that this became a quarrel that lasted quite a long time, a source of conflict. Luther first opined that Sarah’s words should not be interpreted as a demand but rather as a request expressed “with the utmost reverence and humility.” Noting Sarah’s own position of authority as mistress over the household, Luther showed that Sarah does not lay claim to this power over her bond servant but rather “submits the matter to the master of the house with reverence and humility,” pointing out a way to restore harmony.78 Yet Luther did not let the matter rest there. He went on to portray Abraham’s concern for his son Ishmael as a human and therefore understandable affection that nevertheless distracts him from the word of God. God had told Abraham and Sarah, “I will establish my covenant with Isaac.” Yet Sarah considered these words more carefully than Abraham did. Luther explained, “For it is not without reason that the saintly mother opposes her husband’s will in this manner. It is her purpose to prevent Ishmael from coming into the inheritance together with Isaac.” Sarah understands that there is a difference between Ishmael and Isaac as a result of God’s promise. “She neither wants Ishmael to be made the equal of her son in the inheritance, nor does she invent this difference because of a womanly affection.” Sarah contends with her husband on the basis of God’s promise and she does not give up even when “this state of affairs gave rise to much disagreement between the saintly spouses.” Yet valid reasons motivate Abraham: “How, then, could he tolerate it that Sarah wanted [Ishmael] cast out of the house?” In his answer to this question, Luther taught his students that conflicts in the household are the occasion for spiritual training far more rigorous than monastic discipline: For these reasons a division arose in Abraham’s household, and without a doubt, as happens, each side had its applauders and instigators. Accordingly, those who declare that the household is a vulgar kind of life can learn from these examples that in wedlock there is far severer exercise of faith, hope, love, patience, and prayer than there is in all the monasteries. For the monks neither see nor undergo trials as grievous as these, but they cultivate swinish emotions and are envious of the better bread and wine of others.

78WA

43:148.35–149.24 (LW 4:18–19).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 111 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

111

These spouses, however, are fighting about the promises, and they are doing so in the fear and obedience of God and in true humility. But these very excellent virtues are obscured when they are dismissed as works done by the laity and common to all spouses, while it is said to be an outstanding virtue to shut oneself up in a monastery, to torture oneself with fasts, to be sad, etc. This account is useful for comforting spouses, in order that they may not think it strange if disputes arise among even the most affectionate and the holiest people.… [I]n marriage there are such varied exercises in piety and love, while…the self-chosen forms of worship of the monks are nothing but dung. For what holiness can it be to do nothing except what pleases yourself? And yet they boast that they have renounced themselves and their possessions.79

At this point, Luther continued to contrast this false renunciation of the papists with the true renunciation of the self that married partners voluntarily offer. Because of “abominable celibacy,” the whole papacy has no knowledge of this martyrdom (martyria). The papists called married life a “secular life.” But for Luther, married life “surely has a place among the highest levels of spiritual life.” Abraham and Sarah’s conflict reveals the cultivation of sentiments that takes place in marriage: it is the perfect illustration of the Evangelical view that marriage and family life are schools for character. “We are to know,” Luther taught his students, “that those who live a pious life—in the household, in the civil realm, or in the church—will not be without crosses and troubles.” Abraham later discovered how severe these crosses could be when he was forced to banish his son Ishmael along with the boy’s mother: Abraham was no ordinary Christian or confessor, if I may express myself in this way. No, he was a martyr of martyrs. For who is there who does not know how intense a father’s affection toward his children and wife is? It is easier for a parent to suffer death than to forsake his own or to permit great harm to be done to them. But everything must yield to a command of GOD; and if you want to be a Christian, this is not a matter of wearing a black or gray garment. No, everything must be risked, not only wife and children but your very own life. For Christ teaches clearly, “He who loves father and mother more than me is not worthy of me.” That is, “When I come with My

79WA 43:149.39–41, 150.13–15 (LW 4:20); WA 43:150.20–31 (LW 4:21); and WA 43:150.35– 151.16 (LW 4:22).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 112 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

112

word and command, then you must forget everything you have and possess in this whole world.”80

Luther openly contrasted Abraham’s true martyrdom through the trials and tribulations of family life to the false asceticism he saw in the monasticism of his own day: What, I ask you, have you ever heard or read about this denial in the writings of any monk? To be sure, they inscribe “Deny yourself ” on the doors of their dwellings. But if you judge the matter on the basis of their actions, this means nothing else to them than to forsake a poor kitchen and enter a rich one; to shun the inconveniences and hardships of the world, that is, of the household and of the government; to enjoy a life of ease and fatten yourself like a pig and begrudge everybody whatever he has. Oh, what an easy and pleasant mortification of the flesh!81

The essential theme of Christian holiness as envisioned in the monastic withdrawal from the world—martyrdom through the renunciation of this life’s loyalties, comforts, and enjoyment—is present in the Reformer’s portrayal of Abraham. But Luther redefined the theme so that renunciation occurs in a new and different holy place—in the worldly calling of marriage and family life. Sarah, too, displays such characteristics of the true monastic, holy life, in contrast to the false holiness of the nunneries. When she is buried, Luther notes how verbose the Holy Spirit is in the account and claims that it is all to honor “that most noble matron Sarah.” In her governance of the household, “she was a far more excellent abbess than ours are.” The works of the abbesses are nothing but “horrible idolatry,” while Sarah managed her household commendably.82 In doing so, Sarah was participating in the holy work of God.

THE DISTINCTIVE HOLINESS OF CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE WORLD Bernd Moeller has suggested that Luther’s Reformation should be viewed as a monastic movement. While the ancient and medieval way of reform meant withdrawal from the world in order to harbor a distinctively holy 80WA

43:151.17–20, 26–29 (LW 4:22); WA 43:151.37–39 (LW 4:22); and WA 43:165.8–18 (LW

81WA

43:165.19–25 (LW 4:41–42). 43:284.34–285.9 (LW 4:207).

4:41). 82WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 113 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

113

life and protect it from the corruption of the world and its demonic powers, the sixteenth-century Reformation viewed the papal church and its institutions, including monastic institutions, as places of corruption, indeed as the seat of the antichrist and the whore of Babylon. Luther and his earliest followers—many of the clergy coming like him from monastic orders—regarded the way of obedience not as a journeying from the world into the cloister, but from the cloister into the world. 83 As in reforming movements throughout the Middle Ages, going back even to their origins in the asceticism of the desert fathers and in the communal monasticism in the orders inspired by Saints Jerome and Augustine in the fourth century and Saint Benedict in the sixth, so too Luther’s reform was initiated as a call to carve out a distinctive arena for the cultivation of holiness. But for Luther, the holy orders God has established in the world mark the arena of this holy life. The “spiritual athletes” are no longer an elite of cloistered monks and nuns, but now all Christians are a “priesthood of all believers,” empowered by the gospel to live in the freedom of faith and the service of love. From late antiquity through the Middle Ages, the clergy stood unchallenged in western Europe as “the circle of spiritual power.”84 But the Reformation successfully challenged this view of both the nature and the place of spiritual power, extending it to all Christians who lived their everyday life by faith and love. In a recent work, Scott Hendrix pursued this theme and identified the common goal that motivated Luther and most other reformers of the sixteenth century—Evangelical, radical, and Catholic reformers alike—as the rerooting or recultivation of a more genuine Christianity in a Christendom that had become corrupt. The common goal of the Reformation was that both teaching and life in the church and the broader Christian society be reformed so that Christendom might become—either once again or perhaps even for the first time—fully Christian. 85 83Moeller, “Die frühe Reformation.” Moeller concludes, “The step into the world offered for such monastics so to speak the fulfillment of that which at one time the step out of the world should have offered, namely the opportunity for perfect obedience vis-à-vis the will of God” (88, emphasis Moeller’s). See also Köpf, “Heilige und Modelle des Verhaltens.” 84Brown, “Rise and Function of the Holy Man,” 137–38, on the “holy men” of the East Roman towns of late antiquity. Brown concludes: “Much of the contrasting development of western Europe and Byzantium in the Middle Ages can be summed up as a prolonged debate on the precise locus of spiritual power. In western Europe, the circle of spiritual power was drawn from a single locus. The clergy stood unchallenged, under the awesome shadows of the long-dead heroes of the faith” (139). 85Hendrix, “Rerooting the Faith”; and Hendrix, Recultivating the Vineyard, xvii–xix. The persistence of medieval forms of piety in the sixteenth century has also been explored, most notably by Bossy, Christianity in the West; and Duffy, Stripping of the Altars.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 114 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

114

Luther’s lectures on Genesis reveal various ways the professor attempted to form in his students an understanding of holiness and Christian life that sharply distinguished a developing Evangelical identity from a Catholic identity that had assumed its basic shape at least by the sixth century. Thus Luther rejected as sub-Christian not only medieval or late medieval forms of Catholic piety but the very concept of holiness defined by the fourth-century movement of the desert fathers, by bishops of the Catholic Church in the later Roman Empire, and by the earliest forms of monasticism—in the Catholicism of both the West and the East.86 Luther himself recognized that his teaching was a challenge to this Catholic identity. This was demonstrated throughout his reforming career in his focus on the doctrine of justification of the sinner as the article by which the church stands or falls, and his repeated assertion that many of the church fathers had already obscured this doctrine. God’s gracious justification of the ungodly apart from works had been taught purely, the Reformer believed, by only a few heroic Christians throughout church history. The fact that not just Saints Bernard, Francis, Dominic, and the Carthusians were targets of his invective against the false holiness of the monks, but also Saints Antony, Hilarion, Jerome, and even Augustine, makes it clear that Luther also recognized the radical content of his teaching of holiness in the Genesis lectures.87 By this last decade of his life when he was lecturing on Genesis, Luther often had to confront the reality that the freedom of the Christian he had proclaimed in the gospel had resulted not only in a booming Evangelical movement—something Luther remarks on many times in these lectures. In his eyes, the preaching of the gospel had also brought about the renewed opposition of the devil and the formation of all sorts of alternative “false gospels.”88 In the Reformer’s many bitter battles—with Andreas Karlstadt and the “fanatics” at Wittenberg; with Erasmus, whose doctrine of free choice and confidence in human righteousness Luther strenuously opposed; and in his bitter polemics against Sacramentarians, papists, Jews, and Turks—the common thread was his conviction that the 86On

early church developments, see esp. Brown, Body and Society. WA 43:430.32–34, 431.10–20, 437.9–18 (LW 5:3–4, 13); WA 44:527.14–21, 530.19–531.3 (LW 7:307, 312) (SS. Francis, Dionysius, Antony, Bernard, Hilarion, Malchus); WA 43:130.25–33 (LW 3:355) (SS. Antony, Hilarion, Jerome); and WA 42:441.5–6, 442.15–19 (LW 2:251, 253) (SS. Augustine, Jerome, Gregory, Francis, Dominic). 88Luther’s recognition of this reality is an important theme in the interpretation of the Reformer and his movement by Heiko Oberman. See, e.g., Oberman, Luther, esp. 8–12, 209–71. 87E.g.,

Luther's Genesis.book Page 115 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

115

ultimate warfare was between God and the devil over nothing less than the salvation of sinners. The crucial question of what defines and bestows the holiness that justifies the sinner before God was always at the center of the conflict in the Reformer’s life. The conception of “holy place, holy work, and holy order” clearly outlined by Luther in his 1528 Confession found concrete expression through the lives of the patriarchs in his university lectures on the Genesis narrative. Luther’s critical distinction in his Confession between being holy and being saved draws the dividing line not between the (outwardly) good and evil, but between those who believe in Christ and those who do not, and it is this faith that alone is reckoned as righteousness that justifies one before God.89 In Luther’s view, the call of the idolater Abraham shows clearly that this divine election is entirely by grace alone. But if faith alone justifies sinners, and not the truly good work of participation in God’s holiness in the holy orders of God, what is there that can mark out and define a distinctively Christian existence in the world? Is there not a specifically Christian content to Christian life, in addition to faith, that defines this life compared to the life of unbelievers who, even though they are unbelievers, may perform their functions quite well in the holy orders of God—the civil realm, the household, and even the church? This question raises a basic issue that has long been debated about the Protestant Reformation: Was the Reformation unleashed by Luther actually a giant step in the direction of the secularism that characterizes modern western societies? Put in another way, was the attempt by Luther and other Evangelical reformers to lead the people of their society “to think and act as Christians” too idealistic an endeavor to be achieved realistically? Was it in fact a failure? These are questions pursued in a vast literature stemming largely from the provocative work of Gerald Strauss.90 Defining the contours of the new Evangelical identity Luther was seeking to form in his students through his Genesis lectures contributes an important feature to this discussion. It also contributes to the larger question in church history of whether the attempt to Christianize societal institutions and not just individuals and 89Timothy Wengert has explored how this distinction was carefully worked out by Luther’s colleague Melanchthon against both antinomianism and the Pelagianism of Erasmus. See Wengert, Law and Gospel; and Wengert, Human Freedom, Christian Righteousness. 90Strauss, Luther’s House of Learning. Strauss cites and engages his critics in Strauss, “Reformation and Its Public.” For the latest installment in and reconfiguring of this debate, see Hendrix, Recultivating the Vineyard, 148–51.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 116 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

116

ecclesiastical institutions has in fact led to the secularization of the church rather than to the Christianization of society. Stated in another way, was the attempt of Luther and other Evangelicals to obey God by leaving the monastery and entering the world in the end too great a leap?91 It is far easier to define and create a niche for holiness when that holiness is circumscribed, contained in holy men, holy places, and holy liturgies that are untouched by the world. By defining the world as the arena of God’s play, do God’s faithful ones fall prey necessarily to the lord of this world, God’s enemy, the devil? Luther sought to carve out a place for holiness by his insistence that the three orders of God must be governed by his word. Thus, not only the institution of civil authority by God and therefore the requirement of obedience to it, but also the limitation of that authority by God’s word and therefore the right and duty of resistance to its abuses, constituted for Luther and most other sixteenth-century Evangelicals the right ordering of civil authority. Similar structures and mentalities also exist for the household as holy order and therefore as a holy place of God’s holy work in the world. Abraham and Sarah were true monastics not simply because they were married, but because their faith and obedience to God’s call ordered their marriage and domestic life. When God called them from idolatry in Ur to worship of the true God in Canaan, they went as exiles from their homeland and sojourned in a land they did not know and indeed would never own. Their marriage was a holy place where God worked holiness through the struggles and challenges of home life. In a later lecture, Luther described the layman Abraham as “the holiest patriarch of all” precisely because he “says nothing about miracles or about prodigious works and endeavors like those of which monks and hermits boast,” but rather walks by faith. He does so even when, because he did not own even a foot of space in the promised land, “it was necessary for him to hang suspended between heaven and earth.” Luther defines the true saints as those who live in the world and toil for the world’s benefit, fulfilling their responsibilities in the world even while they place their hopes in another world entirely by seeking first the kingdom of God. 92 Other passages reveal the professor teaching his students that there is a difference between human righteousness and the divine righteousness that consists of living in the world by faith, and that the godly will always 91As

suggested by Hendrix, Recultivating the Vineyard, 151–55. 43:100.6–8, 23–38 (LW 3:315–16); WA 43:291.3–8 (LW 4:215–16); WA 43:417.35–39 (LW 4:391–92); and WA 44:351.3–9 (LW 7:68). 92WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 117 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

117

live discontentedly in this life precisely because they are always seeking another kingdom.93 Finally, Luther explored the challenge of godly discipline against the internal raging of lust in a series of passages that illustrate the Reformer’s views of true chastity and a holy sexuality within the order of marriage. Modern analysts tend to see in Luther an unfortunate cleaving to Augustine’s understanding of human sexuality as inherently sinful as a result of the Fall and consequent original sin, even while Luther freed himself from the tradition that developed from this view, namely, that celibacy was a form of holiness superior to marriage.94 Such characterizations of Luther as preserving far too much of the medieval mentality tend to assume that modern sexual ethics have arrived at a maturity and freedom unknown not only in the patristic and medieval traditions but also in the Reformation and early modern Protestantism. It is debatable whether sexuality in the highly secularized and modern West should be the standard against which views on sexuality of earlier Christians are evaluated, especially since Luther’s views were, in general, similar to the views of most Protestant Christians in his own time. Luther’s basic convictions about the sinful condition of human sexuality—after the Fall of humankind’s first parents—show the degree to which he sought to define a distinctive holiness of Christian life in the orders God established in the world. The Reformer lamented the wickedness of human nature displayed in the many girls “who prevent conception and kill and expel tender fetuses, although procreation is the work of God!” He noted that the divine order of marriage itself is too often engaged for the wrong reasons. There are four classes of spouses, he said: those who seek through marriage to have offspring (these, he says, are few and “are really angels in comparison with the others”); those who marry to avoid sexual promiscuity (“fornication”); those who desire wives not to have children but “to have a pretty girl to give them pleasure”; and finally, those who deserve to suffer in marriage because they “marry old ladies for the sake of wealth or honor.”95 Luther marked out the ideal of a holy sexuality within marriage and often quite personally encouraged his students to discipline themselves so that they might participate in this holy kind of 93WA 43:430.23–435.42 (LW 5:3–10); WA 43:612.12–616.15 (LW 5:266–72); and WA 43:672.25– 675.36 (LW 5:353–54). 94See McGuire, “Luther’s Revision of Marriage Theology”; Jordon, “Patriarchs and Matriarchs,” 140–46; and other sources listed in note 72 above. 95WA 43:354.18–20 (LW 4:304); and WA 43:354.22–42 (LW 4:304–5).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 118 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

118

CHAPTER THREE

life, even though human sexuality is always imperfect, he believed, on account of lustful thoughts. Abraham, Jacob, and Jacob’s many wives all exhibit the angelic nature of seeking sexual intercourse not for selfish pleasure but in order to participate in the divine and holy work of procreation.96 Joseph becomes an example of how threatening the attacks of the devil are against God’s holy ones, for he is confronted with an “outrageous” temptation when Potiphar’s wife seeks to seduce him: “This temptation is one of the most violent of all on account of the excellent and completely safe occasion and opportunity for sinning.”97 But it is Isaac who provided Luther with the perfect example for the students in his lecture hall. Isaac was chaste for forty years before he married Rebecca, long after “the well-known first passion of youth.” He “endured that conflict and contended most valiantly with the flame and his flesh, because he was a true and complete human being just as we are.” For twenty long years Isaac fought against the natural urges of fallen sexual desire: “he was taught by his father that one must contend against these flames, first by reading holy scripture and praying, and then by working, being temperate, and fasting.” In doing so, Isaac “is surely a martyr, because he is crucified every day by the passions of his flesh.” His figurative martyrdom was an example for Luther’s students to imitate: If you feel the flame, take a psalm or one or two chapters of the Bible and read. When the flame has subsided, then pray. If it is not immediately checked, you should bear it patiently and courageously for one, two, or more years and persist in prayer. But if you can no longer endure and overcome the burning desires of the flesh, pray that the Lord might give you a wife with whom you may live in a pleasing manner and in true love.98

The passage has the flavor of the holy man’s guiding counsel. Luther engaged his students with an “affective interpretation” of the sacred text, where the written word takes on an oral character through his working and massaging of the words and events and persons of the narrative. As 96E.g., WA 42:581.23–32 (LW 3:46); WA 43:650.38–652.28 (LW 5:322–24); and WA 43:670.8–23 (LW 5:350). This view of a chaste sexuality for procreation among the patriarchs even in their polygamous marriages is also found in Augustine, On Christian Teaching, trans. Green, 80–81. Luther was certainly familiar with this work, but he does not name a source. 97WA 44:356.21–357.3 (LW 7:76). On Luther’s traditional interpretation of Joseph and the temptation from Potiphar’s wife in the context of the exegesis of previous and contemporary Catholic interpreters, see Mattox, Defender of the Most Holy Matriarchs, 225–47. 98WA 43:376.26–377.15 (LW 4:333); and WA 43:377.18–23 (LW 4:333–34).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 119 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

119

Luther talked personally with his students in the lecture hall about the intimate secrets of sexual life and the challenge of sanctifying the human passions, indeed he did not challenge the patristic view of human sexuality as intrinsically sinful because of the Fall. What he did do was identify an entirely different holy place where the holy life can be cultivated, that is, in marriage and family life. In another passage contrasting Jacob’s continence in his several marriages with the false celibacy of the papists, the Reformer asserted two things. First, papal celibacy—as defined by a permanent vow and the renunciation of marriage—is powerless in the formation of true chastity, and he charged (unfairly) that monasteries are “now mere brothels.” But second, even in its fallen and sinful state, human sexuality can in God’s holy order of marriage be properly disciplined, with the result that God’s work of creation is achieved through it.99 In these ways, Martin Luther sought to define a holy place for Christian life in the world.

THE TRUE CONTEMPLATIVE LIFE Still, Luther did not conceive of holiness primarily in the terms of new Evangelical ethics. Luther was concerned not chiefly with morality but with reconfiguring the nature of Christian life and sanctification. Life in the world becomes the holy place of God’s holy work because the experiences of this life—precisely because it is a communal life of saints and sinners—are experiences through which God reveals himself and transforms sinners. This becomes evident in the many passages where the professor defined for his students the nature of the true contemplative life—a life where God reveals himself to sinners precisely in the holy place of their vocation in the world. In a passage already explored for its discussion of the necessity of preaching the law to the secure—not only to unbelievers in society but also to the erring within the church—Luther spoke to his students extensively about how God uses his creatures to accomplish his works in the world. The professor related how the Scholastics had distinguished 99WA 43:627.18–631.6 (LW 5:288–92); and WA 43:650.38–651.28 (LW 5:322–24). Mattox (Defender of the Most Holy Matriarchs, 21–23) traces the influences of the church fathers in what he calls Luther’s “ascetic exegesis” of the matriarchs, especially regarding their sexual self-discipline. While there is certainly continuity, Luther nevertheless defined married sexual life as a holy vocation (perhaps the most holy vocation) of the Christian. Not ascetic renunciation of sexual life but its disciplining through sanctified marriage and procreation was the theme that came through clearly in the Genesis lectures.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 120 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

120

between God’s absolute power and his ordered power, and noted that the absolute power of God truly does have to do with things that are beyond human understanding. He taught his students that this distinction should be upheld as the canon or rule by which they should “judge the pope and the world in all their wisdom, namely, that God regularly does everything through the ministry of human beings.” By this rule he concluded, “Nobody will obtain salvation through so-called spiritual speculations without external things.”100 Luther continued this lecture with a discourse on the contemplative versus the active life. He told the story of “a certain father in the desert” (Saint Antony) who warned his monks who loved speculations against the presumption of thinking they had “one foot on the threshold of heaven,” cautioning his hearers to draw it back and not follow with the other foot. Luther drew from this a right way to contemplate spiritual things— namely, by reflecting on one’s baptism, reading the Bible, hearing sermons, honoring father and mother, and aiding brothers in distress. The professor warned his students against those who “speak most contemptuously of the active life,” naming George Witzel, an early follower of Luther who had returned to the fold of the papal church and had reproached the reformers for teaching too much about external things and not enough about spiritual things. Luther advised his students: But beware of these snares of Satan, and set up a definition of the contemplative life different from the one they taught in the monasteries, namely this: The true contemplative life is to hear and believe the spoken word and to want to know nothing “except Christ and him crucified.”101

The passage shows Luther’s new definition of what really constitutes the true contemplative life. Christ alone, “with his word, is the profitable and salutary object of contemplation.” Luther decried the speculations of the monks “and now [Kaspar] Schwenckfeld and others” who disregard the flesh of Christ and speculate about the majesty of God in heaven. Such men imagine that they “are sitting in God’s bosom,” but actually they are “deceived by Satan, who makes sport of hearts by means of such deceptions.” Luther also named Jean Gerson as one who has written about the contemplative life with high praise, but claimed that though the unlearned 100WA 101WA

43:71.7–37 (LW 3:274–75), on Gen. 19:14. Cf. chapter 1, pages 21–22, 24 above. 43:72.4–23 (LW 3:275–76).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 121 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

121

receive these writings as the oracles of God, actually “they accept coals as treasure.” The professor concluded, “Hence, if these good-for-nothing contemplators should call you either an externalist or a worldling, do not let this bother you. Give thanks to God for the word and these externals, and leave these high-sounding speculations to others.” While Luther noted that he himself had once read such books “with great zeal,” he urged his students to read them “with discretion.” They should direct their attention rather “to the ordered power of God and the ministrations of God, for we do not want to deal with the uncovered God.” This is found in the incarnate Son of God, “the child lying in the lap of his mother Mary and…the sacrificial victim suspended on the cross; there we shall really behold God, and there we shall look into his very heart.” The professor told his students about a nun who delighted in her solitary contemplation, imagining herself regally dressed as the bride of Christ while the rest of the nuns recognized the mockery: “for instead of a crown on her head they saw cow dung.” Whether it happened this way or not, Luther mused, the story shows how people are deceived by their contemplations, for God deals with his people not through these, but rather through the ministry of the word.102 Luther’s discussion of the ordered power of God in this passage reveals his understanding of the external means of grace, a central concern that the Lutheran Reformation maintained in opposition to many other sixteenth-century reformers and an aspect of Luther’s thought familiar to most scholars. Not always recognized, however, is the relationship between the means of grace (God’s instruments of salvation employed within the holy order of ecclesia) and the life of God’s people in the world. Yet this is an important theme that the professor emphasized in his lectures on Genesis. In his ridicule of the speculative life in these lectures, it is clear that Luther was not simply seeking to replace speculation of God’s uncovered majesty, a theology of glory, with contemplation of the crucified God in Christ, a theology of the cross. Rather, Luther reconfigured the entire concept and practice of contemplation and knowledge of God according to his Reformation soteriology of justification by faith. Because God justifies the ungodly by grace through faith in Christ alone, contemplation and the true knowledge of God no longer have a role in the achievement of salvation, the return of the soul to its source in God. In

102WA

43:72.23–73.23 (LW 3:276–77).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 122 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

122

CHAPTER THREE

Luther’s soteriology, contemplation was not simply redefined but was replaced with something new.

Not Contemplatio but Tentatio In his book Pater Bernhardus: Martin Luther and Bernard of Clairvaux, Franz Posset views Luther as an example of a monastic theologian at work, drawing out ways Luther’s language and theology reflect the deep influence of the writings of the founder of Cistercian monastic reform. Posset draws attention to but does not explore the fact that, in his triadic “rules” for Bible study (oratio, meditatio, tentatio), Luther shows both indebtedness to and the transformation of the monastic devotion to Bible study as lectio, oratio, meditatio, and contemplatio.103 Several extensive passages in the Genesis lectures reveal that this transformation was decisive: Luther was not only continuing a tradition of monastic meditative reading but also was radically transforming that tradition. He was shaping it for a new context: the life of all Christians who live by faith in the midst of rather than separated from “worldly” vocations. Luther recognized that dropping lectio from the schematic of monastic Bible study was incidental, for reading is assumed and even the oral and aural quality of reading aloud is emphasized by Luther. Both Luther and the monastic tradition looked to the word of God for divine revelation about God and about the meaning of their own human experience. But for Luther, God reveals himself in the word, not through contemplatio in a solitary life or a cloistered community, but rather in the tentatio of communal life in the world. Through the spiritual struggles and suffering that Christians encounter in their marriage and family life, in the civil community, and in the community of saints and sinners called the church, God accomplishes his holy work in the holy place of life in the world. Luther makes this transformation clear in an extended treatment of Rachel, who in the exegetical tradition of allegorical interpretation, had been made a symbol of contemplation. The pertinent passage begins with Luther commenting on Rachel’s complaint to Jacob in Genesis 30: “Give me children, or I shall die!” The professor described the account as an

103Posset, Pater Bernhardus, 133–50. Of the change in the schema, Posset only notes, “It is difficult to say whether [Luther] intentionally wanted to depart from the well-known monastic scheme: lectio, oratio, meditatio, contemplatio.” Posset’s reticence illustrates the limitations of viewing Luther within the Catholic theological tradition rather than focusing on how he sharply departed from it with his Reformation soteriology of justification by faith alone.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 123 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

123

example of how the Holy Spirit saw fit to praise such “human, carnal, and womanish” things as Rachel’s envy of Leah when the older, homely sister gave birth to children while the younger beauty remained barren. “Why does the Holy Spirit, whose mouth is completely pure, speak about these things with such zeal?” the professor asked. He contrasted the Holy Spirit with “the most holy pope” and “the altogether chaste monks and nuns” who view this “carnal” account as not worth reading. They say, offended: “In accordance with his holiness, the Holy Spirit could have spoken about heavenly and other more sublime things.” But the Holy Spirit is not moved: “Because those men have a loathing for these small things, the Holy Spirit in turn hates such proud and boastful saints, does not acknowledge them as his own, leaves them in their glory, pride, and vanity, and descends to his creatures, cares for them, and honors them. For he himself created the world.”104 The Reformer taught his students that the Creator does not despise his work in the world: though celibacy is a gift of God not to be scorned, it is also not to be commended so highly that marriage is scorned. Through such accounts as the story of Rachel, the Holy Spirit shows that God delights in things the papists despise: the management of the household, the pure and maternal hearts that so crave the gift of childbearing, the life of hardship and trouble with which these saints of God were afflicted in the world. Jacob exemplifies a saint who by faith supports a large family when he hardly has a cent, serving fourteen years for Laban merely for food. In this account, the Holy Spirit “enfolds most precious gems of the greatest virtues, which these swinish papists do not see.” Luther believed that the papists are lost in their “idleness and luxury,” and that they “spend their lives without toil and without trial. Therefore, we should unravel holy scripture in another and better way.”105 Luther was saying not only that the contemplative life of the cloistered celibate is wrongly focused— namely, on a speculative theology of glory—but that its location as separate from the world is a hindrance to the revelation of God through tentatio in worldly life. The contrast becomes most glaring where Luther dealt specifically with the ancient tradition of identifying Rachel as symbolic of the contemplative life in order to redeem the stories of the patriarchs and make them 104WA

43:655.28–656.8 (LW 5:329). 43:656.10–16 (LW 5:330); WA 43:656.22–658.29 (LW 5:330–33); and WA 43:658.33– 659.4 (LW 5:333). 105WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 124 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

124

CHAPTER THREE

edifying for Christians.106 The professor related Saint Augustine’s report in the Confessions of how he as a Manichee had derided the accounts of the patriarchs “as completely lustful men.” He likewise named Gerson, Bonaventure, Hugo of St. Cher, Origen, and Jerome as people who were offended at these narratives of the patriarchs. Indeed, Luther asserted that “no one of the fathers ever saw” how these accounts of Jacob and his several wives and their childbearing are not accounts of “concupiscence and lustful acts befitting pimps” but rather are godly accounts of how the patriarchs and their wives desired offspring. While the church fathers avoided the scandal of such carnal accounts through allegorizing, Luther walks in a different expository path, for, as he says, “the footsteps of the fathers frighten me.” The fathers by “those speculations of their allegories” did nothing but “obscure doctrine and the edification of love, patience, and hope in God.”107 Luther’s antipathy to allegory emerged not only in response to interpretations that do not agree with “the history,” that is, the historical sense of the written text. Rather, Luther taught his students the principle that “allegory is pernicious…especially when it takes the place of the history, from which the church is more correctly instructed about the wonderful administration of God in all the orders of life, in the household, in the civil realm, and in the church.”108 Allegorizing interpreters do not see the governance of God “hidden under this ordinary outward appearance of the household and marriage” but instead “attach to it a foreign meaning concerning the contemplative and active life.” Rachel, the beautiful girl loved by Jacob, represents the contemplative life, while Leah signifies the active life. These interpreters of the scripture allegorize like this “for the purpose of elevating themselves above every other kind of life.” For the active life is characteristic of people who are engaged in household and political activities, who sweat in the field and in the house. This is a most troublesome and ugly life, just as Leah had weak eyes. But the contemplative life is found in the monasteries, in the associations of the priests who are free from household and political 106WA 43:666.15–669.25 (LW 5:344–49). For Luther’s earlier interpretation of Leah and Rachel as figures of the church as expressed in his sermons on Genesis delivered in 1519–21 and 1523–24, see Hiebsch, “Figura ecclesiae.” 107WA 43:666.17–35 (LW 5:344–45). But compare Augustine’s similar treatment of the chaste, procreative sexuality of the patriarch and their wives in Augustine, On Christian Teaching, trans. Green, 80–81. 108WA 43:667.4–8 (LW 5:345), emphasis added.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 125 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

125

annoyances, who sit at leisure and speculate about God, pray, fast, have their visions, revelations, illuminations. And finally the satanic madness and illusion of the allegory concerning the speculative life proceeded so far that no one seemed to be a monk in the true sense of the word unless he had special revelations…. They dreamed of nothing else than the mutual discussions of Christ, of angels, of saints, of Mary with the souls.109

Continuing, Luther named the revelations of Saint Bridget of Sweden as “satanic illusions” by which he himself as a monk would almost have been deceived, had not Johann von Staupitz, his abbot and father confessor, ordered him to take up his doctorate in theology and become a teacher. Luther mentioned yet again how the monastic life was compared to “beautiful and beloved Rachel” while “the household and politics were compared to ugly Leah.” He blamed this on allegory, which “like a beautiful harlot…fondles men in such a way that it is impossible for her not to be loved, especially by idle men who are without tentatio.”110 In Luther’s view, therefore, the problem with allegory is not simply the breaking of a hermeneutic rule, a violation of the text. When it is only such a violation of the (historical) text, Luther in many places condones allegories and even plays with them himself, as long as they are not used to support doctrine that is not established by the historical sense of scripture. In this respect the Reformer only continued the careful interpretation of sacred scripture already advocated by Saint Thomas and others who had insisted long before Luther that only the historical sense of scripture be appealed to in the definition of Christian doctrine.111 Luther, however, also hated allegories because (he says) they are the product of a wrong conception of what constitutes the experience in which God reveals himself to human beings. It is the speculative life in the cloister that must be rejected: First of all, the historical sense must be sought. It gives us correct and solid instruction; it fights, defends, conquers, and builds. If this is genuine and pure, an allegory may be sought later, not a monastic allegory or one concerning the speculative life, but one that is in agreement with history and embraces the relics [reliquias] of the holy 109WA

43:667.10–29 (LW 5:345–46). 43:667.30–36, 668.3–5 (LW 5:346–47). 111On Thomas, see Froehlich, “Christian Interpretation of the Old Testament,” 538–46. For Luther’s comments in the Genesis lectures on Saint Bernard as “a wonderful artist in catachreses” (catachresibus, from the Greek for “unusual or inappropriate use of language”), see Posset, Pater Bernhardus, 157–61. 110WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 126 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

126

cross—that is, the doctrine of the cross, of faith, of hope, of love, and of patience. Not a monk, who sits and speaks with Christ and boasts of apparitiones and of having heard the voices of angels or of the Blessed Virgin Mary. For he sits in idleness without cross and tentatio. Such a speculative life is cursed and damned.112

For the Reformer, the true contemplative life is part of the active life, not a contrast to it. To the apostle Paul’s conception of Christian life as “faith working through love, likewise patience in the cross,” Luther connects a contemplative and active life that takes place “not only in the monasteries among the monks and the lay brothers but also in the household and civil realm among all men who live in faith and are exercised by deeds, no matter how obscure.” The professor says he teaches this “with special zeal and indignation” because the Manichees of all ages despise these spheres of human activity even though they could never do without them. No, in comparison with these women and their domestic life, the monastic contemplative life “stinks before God, yes, even in your own conscience.” Luther ruminated on the profound chastity of Rachel, who so far from being driven by lust for sexual pleasure rather gave her maid to Jacob as a wife—so desperately did she wish to bear children. She so wanted to become a mother and increase the household of Jacob that she succumbed to that “ineffable sobbing” that God, in his own time, finally remembers and hears and answers.113 Her great trial (tentatio) was the reproach of her childlessness. Like her mother-in-law, Rebecca, Rachel suffered the trial of prayers long unanswered. 114

The Journey of Faith: A Cruciform Life in the World Rachel’s struggle with childlessness and long-delayed answer to prayer illustrates the centrality of trial, of tentatio, in the lives of God’s saints. This important theme, woven throughout the Genesis lectures, found its most sustained treatment in the way Luther dealt with the sufferings of Jacob and Joseph. Suffering and the cruciform life are necessary for the lives of God’s saints, for it is the deliverance from the despair of long-endured suffering that reveals how creation from nothing, creatio ex nihilo, is the special work of God also in the realm of salvation, that is, soteriology. Just as 112WA

43:668.14–21 (LW 5:347). WA 43:668.36–40 (LW 5:348); WA 43:669.4–8, 19–22 (LW 5:348–49); WA 43:670.17–22 (LW 5:350); and WA 43:675.32–676.1, 29–41, 677.9–22 (LW 5:358–60). 114WA 43:392.12–19, 393.19–36, 394.26–31, 395.1–33 (LW 4:355–60). 113

Luther's Genesis.book Page 127 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

127

God in grace had called Abraham from the nothingness of his idolatry and made him into the father of all believers, so now God would act in the lives of Jacob and Joseph, first reducing them to nothing and then recreating them through a lifelong process of transformation. Luther began to weave this theme into the narrative as it tells about Jacob’s returning from Laban’s household and preparing to meet his brother Esau (Gen. 32:3–23). The prospect of encountering his brother’s wrath because of his deception twenty years earlier causes Jacob great alarm. “But how does this alarm of the patriarch suit so holy a man, so that he is cast down from such great triumph and the joy in which he had exulted into such profound despair?” the professor ponders. “Does it become him to waver and doubt so? To be sure, had we been there, we would probably have done worse.”115 Then Luther noted the parallel fears of Peter when walking on the sea, and of Moses when, at the Red Sea, the people clamored against him because Pharaoh’s pursuing army had them trapped and they thought they would surely be destroyed. It is precisely in the midst of such despair that God is truly God among his people. When everything seems impossible and lost and “all their wisdom has been devoured” (Ps. 107:27), God displays his power over all things. “For he once created all things out of nothing; he still retains this ability and in the same manner still preserves and governs all things.” The condition of Jacob’s family and household church when their bishop, teacher, and comforter “wavers and becomes afraid” surely leaves those who rely on him without hope. Yet this is God’s purpose, concluded Luther, quoting the apostle Paul, “that we may not rely on ourselves” (2 Cor. 1:9). Like Christ sweating blood in the Garden of Gethsemane, “such, indeed, is the life of all the saints, whose examples are set before us that we may be instructed and learn not to trust in ourselves but in God.” Luther warned his students against a predestinarianism that fails to utilize the means God provides his creatures in their distress. His final word was clear: “Do your duty and leave the outcome to God.”116 In his lecture on the text where God changes Jacob’s name to Israel (Gen. 35:9–10), Luther once again dealt with the relationship between the cruciform life of God’s saints and the theme of the active versus the contemplative life. The professor cited Lyra’s discussion on this theme, where 115WA

44:74.30–33 (LW 6:100–101), italics indicate original text in German. 44:74.34–39, 75.5–29 (LW 6:101–2); WA 44:75.36–40, 76.22–23, 37–40 (LW 6:102–3); and WA 44:77.15–78.14 (LW 6:104–5). 116WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 128 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

128

CHAPTER THREE

the Franciscan Bible scholar explains that Jacob has that name “on account of the active life, because he tramples underfoot the passions of the flesh, but [he] is called Israel on account of the speculative life, for he now sees God.” Luther omits such views; he says, “for I think that not even the fathers themselves understood what they taught concerning the twofold life.” He explained that the monks view the active life as the curbing of lusts and the practice of mortifying the flesh, the same thing “that fanatical [Thomas] Müntzer called entgroben, that is, the correction of the coarser vices,” while heathen (ethnici) simply called it external discipline. Then Luther summarized his own view: But theologically the active and speculative life should be defined much differently. For this is such, especially at the present time, that one’s eyes brim with tears. For it does not consist of pleasant speculations and consolations, such as those of the monks; but he who wants to be an Israel and conquer God must be engaged in those exercises of which we spoke previously, namely, begging, seeking, knocking, and retaining the word and the promise. This is the true speculative life of the godly, where reason and imagination fail, where the senses and understanding are mortified with all their powers, and where a man lives solely by the word of God.… Other speculations of the monks are imaginings—cold, dead, and dangerous—because they proceed from their own will and reason, without the word and the promise. Therefore they are to be avoided. He who wants to speculate about GOD successfully in a pious manner should not do it without the word but should apprehend the incarnate Son and begin from the manger and the swaddling clothes in which he is wrapped until he comes to the ascent into heaven.117

The passage shows how, for Luther, the true speculative life is not an exercise of a mind freed from the affairs of the world. Rather, “the true speculative life of the godly” is a life in the world where faith is exercised rigorously and precisely through the trials (tentationes) of everyday existence, while the believer clings in prayer to the word and promises of God even when all seems hopeless. As Luther continued in this lecture, he taught his students that God’s law establishes the active life not in monastic traditions of mortification but in “those things that belong to our vocation in external life.” Thus the active life is pursued through the trials 117WA 44:193.14–29 (LW 6:260–61); and WA 44:193.32–39, 194.4–9 (LW 6:261), italics indicate original text in German.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 129 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

129

experienced in one’s vocation, wherein one practices the duties commanded in the Ten Commandments, while the speculative life pertains to the gospel and the practice of believing in God’s promise. “The outstanding example of this,” the Reformer reasoned, “is the Canaanite woman in Matthew 15, who is very well exercised in the speculative life and who presses on in such a manner that she does not allow herself to be repelled by any words, however harsh. She knocks at and pounds the door so long until Christ is compelled to yield and listen to her and to praise her faith and perseverance.”118 The remainder of the Genesis lectures, namely, in the Joseph narrative, are an extended development of this exposition. Luther introduced Joseph as a seventeen-year-old who “has the Holy Spirit and is filled with the grace of God and his good will,” who lives “a most holy life in the church of Jacob” yet is “overwhelmed by a wretched misfortune.” Both Jacob and Joseph are examples that provide consolation for Christians: “for if such experiences befell the patriarchs, who were full of the Holy Spirit, why are we surprised or why do we murmur when we suffer similar things?” They both fall into that line of saints that is continued in the New Testament, who have the promise of God that they will be vindicated in the end as they are transformed (Rom. 12:2). “But this transformation hurts!” Luther exclaimed, before his students.119 This painful transformation envisioned by the Reformer as a cruciform life lived in the world was part of a revolution in Christian soteriology. God does not sanctify sinners who are justified by faith by calling them to withdraw from the world as ascetics or “spiritual athletes,” who then intercede on behalf of those who remain in worldly vocations. On the contrary, God sanctifies sinners precisely by working through their worldly lives as they live by faith. Later in the Joseph narrative, when he focused on the painful agony that Jacob experienced in the face of his son’s apparent demise, Luther developed this theme of the redemptive purpose of suffering in the Christian life. With language that shows his familiarity with the Neoplatonic myth of the journey of the soul through its procession from God and return back to its origin in God,120 the Reformer reconfigured that journey. Luther taught his students that when Jacob and 118WA

44:194.22–32 (LW 6:262).

119WA 44:262.16–27, 23–24 (LW

6:351); and WA 44:263.24–33 (LW 6:352), italics indicate original text in German. 120For some helpful literature on the Neoplatonic myth of the soul’s journey in the Christian tradition, see page 77, note 11 above.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 130 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

130

CHAPTER THREE

Joseph were put through their very hard trial, “in a manner plainly different from and contrary to the promise,” this is the way God works, and “such is the life of the saints in this world.” Jacob realized this. Through the trial, “all human wisdom must be reduced to nothing.” Luther continued: It must finally come to this! All things have been made and are restored through the word. From the word we are created, and we must return to the word. The sophists also spoke in this way, but without understanding, saying: “We must return to the beginning from which we proceeded.” This is easily said speculatively, but practically it is work and toil to be reduced in this way, to die, and to pass away into nothing so that nothing seems to be left either of life or of carnal feeling except the word.121

The problem Luther identified here with the Scholastic theologians (the sophists, he calls them) is not that they practice speculative theology and assert its role in the journey of salvation, but that they view the speculative life in the wrong way. They view the speculative life as a process of ascent, where Luther views it as descent—yes, in fact a descent into death and even into hell. The Scholastics view the journey as the ascent of the soul from the world to God by the progressive shaking off of worldly attachments. But Luther views the journey as the experience of God reaching down into the lives of sinners in the midst of this worldly life and its sufferings. Through the word and the promise of baptism, absolution, and Holy Communion, God grants faith and hope in the midst of the despair of daily life and finally in the midst of death. “These [the use of these means of grace] are not speculative matters,” the Reformer concluded, “but they are taken out of the midst of the real experiences of life, and they should not only be heard or contemplated once in life but should be repeated and practiced often.”122 Baptism brings a man into the kingdom of God—but this means a life of daily struggle against sin and despair. The journey is a “groaning that God wants to arouse in the hearts of the saints so that they do not become secure and full and perish from 121WA 44:269.31–33, 270.1–3 (LW 6:360–61); and WA 44:270.10–18 (LW 6:361), italics indicate original text in German. On the important influence of the writings of (Pseudo-)Dionysius the Areopagite on the medieval Scholastic development of the Neoplatonic myth of salvation as the journey of the soul from and back to its origin in God, see Rorem, Pseudo-Dionysius, and its bibliography. 122WA 44:270.18–27 (LW 6:361). The difference between Luther and the Scholastics expressed in this passage is also the difference between Luther and early Christian biblical interpreters—both the Alexandrian and the Antiochene schools—who viewed Bible study as a means of the soul’s ascent to God. See Froehlich, Biblical Interpretation in the Early Church, 15–23.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 131 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

131

indifference and from sluggishness of spirit.” Luther elaborates on Jacob’s suffering with this theme: “This is certainly unmitigated and continuous death! Therefore, Jacob goes under here! Jacob endured his last trial, which kills him, for his most beloved son is lost.” He is a wretched man who endures “a perpetual killing that endured for twenty-two years.” For in this time between Joseph’s apparent death and Jacob’s journey to Egypt, this loving father lived “in exile and hell itself.”123 In his lectures on the rest of the Genesis narrative, Luther treated these themes of Jacob’s and Joseph’s sufferings in their earthly life as the means by which God worked their transformation and salvation. He characterized Jacob’s sufferings as punishments from God—as the rod of iron God used to force the patriarch to judge properly the magnitude of sin— not to damn him but to save him.124 God sends “the bad little black dog Remorse” to bite his saints all their lives without ceasing, even though their sin is forgiven.125 It is the mark of Christians not to be angry in the midst of suffering although the flesh is accustomed to such grumbling. Rather, Christians hold on to the consolation that the more such sufferings “torment, afflict, and crucify us, the more they increase our glory and crown in heaven.” Quoting the dictum of Saint Gregory, “The ungodly do good to us by doing evil,” the Reformer explained that “God humbles those who are his to exalt them; he kills them to make them alive; he confounds them to glorify them; he makes them subject to raise them up.”126 As he concluded his lecture on Genesis 37, Luther portrayed the sale of Joseph into slavery by his brothers as an occasion of suffering not only for Joseph but also for Jacob and even his grandfather Isaac. Three generations of saints thus endured unspeakable suffering and grief. Their examples, the professor taught his students, “are set before us that we may accustom ourselves to endurance in afflictions so that we may not be impatient and murmur, no matter by how many great disasters we are overwhelmed.” Events such as these are not signs of God’s wrath but are “proofs of grace for the testing of our faith.”127 Luther considered Joseph’s life “the holiest,” and his and his father’s sufferings are the mark of their 123WA 44:270.27–39, 271.5–12, 25–26, 272.8 (LW 6:362–63), italics indicate original text in German. 124WA 44:275.13–24, 34–37 (LW 6:368). 125“Da kumpt hernach darauß das krauen im nacken, das schwartz böse hundlin der Rewling, das heißt dein lebtag, hort nicht auff, etiam si sit remissum peccatum.” WA 44:276.12–15 (LW 6:369–70). 126WA 44:298.37–39 (LW 6:399); WA 44:299.23–24 (LW 6:400); and WA 44:299.39–300.4 (LW 6:400–401). The dictum in this last passage is found in Gregory, Moralia in Job 11.2 (see LW 6:400n45). 127WA 44:302.42–303.2, 304.3–5 (LW 6:405–6); and WA 44:304.18–19 (LW 6:406).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 132 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

132

CHAPTER THREE

greatness, with whom the legends of the saints—Francis, Ambrose, Augustine, and others—pale enormously: What is read in the legends of the saints is pure child’s play. These [patriarchs] are examples that show what the Christian life is and what the true exercises of piety and patience are. Very well, then, Joseph is gone! So we let him rest in hell. Joseph is already buried; let us permit him to rest in (Schola), in hell—as his father says, in his School.128

Luther’s play on the Hebrew word Sheol (Schola) with the German word Schul (school) brings out how the Reformer views the sufferings of this worldly life as the school of experience through which God reveals himself and also conveys his gift of salvation to sinners. One last set of passages shows how the professor described this experience of suffering in daily life in the world in contradistinction to the religious life of the monasteries and their devotions. Commenting upon Genesis 43:6, where Israel (Jacob) complains against his sons as they wish to take his youngest son, Benjamin, to Egypt with them, Luther focused on Israel’s “struggle and victory of faith.” He charged that the papists and monks, “absorbed as they are in their devotions,” have been blinded to the spiritual message of this text. The Reformer recalled how once he, too, could not rest if he did not celebrate mass daily—as a good papist he was as “a kind of madness” absorbed in (religious) activities invented by men, while he omitted what was commanded by God. Later he said that the pope and schismatic spirits (here he named Thomas Müntzer) both “invent saints who are Stoics and without any sense of grief or joy.” Luther ridiculed such apathy, championed as a virtue by old church monastics and Reformation radicals alike, as a “virtue” abominated by God. 129 In sharp contrast are the patriarchs. Far from being apathetic—that is, unaffected by and indifferent to the sufferings and worries of daily life in the world—these true saints are instead “human beings struggling with flesh and blood.” Their sufferings and misfortunes were all part of “a pleasant and agreeable game by which God plays with us as a father plays with his children.” When Judah offers his own life as a surety for Benjamin (Gen. 43:8–10), neither Jacob nor Judah can comprehend the wonderful 128In Genesin enarrationum (1554), XXVIIIr; and WA 44:304.20–27 (LW 6:407), italics indicate original text in German. In the original imprints (and in WA), Hebrew words are transliterated. 129WA 44:532.1–5 (LW 7:313–14); and WA 44:533.13–21 (LW 7:315). See also LW 7:342. Although he does not use the term “apathy,” the same themes are treated under the topic of “freedom from care” by Douglas Burton-Christie in his study of the desert fathers. Burton-Christie, Word in the Desert, 222–33.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 133 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

133

plans of God. Jacob prays in the midst of his despair; “here the dimly burning wick shines forth.” His struggling life is a grand contradiction: “He despairs. Yet he does not despair. No one understands these emotions of the saints unless he learns by experience. For here the greatest strength has been joined to the greatest weakness.”130 The professor was teaching his students that God’s work of revealing himself, of saving sinners, of transforming their lives is work that happens, not in the otherworldly, apathetic life of the monastery—nor in the radical reformers’ withdrawal from society—but in the struggles of faith experienced in the world with all its challenges and contradictions to the life of faith. This running polemic against monasticism came to its sharpest point when the Reformer lectured on the text of Genesis 45:1–3. The text narrates how Joseph, after playing “God’s game” with his brothers, finally reveals himself to them. Luther described Joseph as a man who had been reduced to nothing and then elevated to the highest place in Egypt, now ruling over the brothers who had sold him. But in his self-disclosure, Joseph once again reduces himself: “Here he is again brought down to nothing and is that very Joseph who was cast into the pit, sold, and consigned to slavery.” He is again the son of a shepherd, their brother. He “is not puffed up in his prosperity but fears the Lord.” His actions show how the true saints attend to their duties in the world even as they confidently place their hope in the world to come. Yet such men also “retain their natural affections and the emotions implanted in their nature, because the Holy Spirit does not extinguish them but renews, inflames, and supports them in a wonderful manner.” This, Luther reasoned, has to be emphasized because the papists teach contempt of parents by elevating monasteries, “for which parents should be cast off and trodden underfoot.”131 The Reformer cited again the “horrible statement of Jerome” about abandoning parents and running straight to Christ in the monastery. 132 Luther offered his students a radically different view that encapsulates his perspective on the Christian life: They did not run to Christ, as they were thinking. No, they ran away from Christ to the cloister. For are not parents, wives, and children saints and Christians? Peter has a wife and children; but when it is 130WA 44:535.1–2 (LW 7:319); WA 44:535.8–10, 21–24 (LW 7:319); WA 44:539.32–540.2 (LW 7:324); and WA 44:542.3–7 (LW 7:326–27). 131WA 44:593.33–594.9 (LW 8:20). 132Cf. WA 43:266.35–40 (LW 4:181). See also page 97 above.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 134 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER THREE

134

demanded of him to face martyrdom, he rightly leaves them behind. Or if it is such a great thing to enter a monastery, what view will have to be taken of the patriarchs and other saints? Yet this is how they taught in the past, and the pope has confirmed this impiety with his decretals, by which he has placed the sanctity and the highest virtues of Christians in the life and orders of the monks. But this is not piety. No, it is the abomination and working of error, as Paul foretold in 2 Thessalonians 2. If you desert your parents for Christ’s sake, you are acting properly and in a pious manner. But to trample them underfoot on the basis of superstition or unrestrained will and by choice is neither pious nor human; it is satanic.133

In stating that monastic withdrawal from the world (the oeconomia or family life, in this case) into the cloister is a running away from Christ, is an abomination, and is satanic, Luther expressed a central feature of the new Evangelical identity he was forming in his students: the rejection of monasticism as a valid form of Christian life. Popular single-leaf woodcut prints in Reformation Germany portray this iconoclastic ideology with vivid images. Men and women of the monastery are portrayed not as mediators of the holy, but as self-indulgent instruments of Satan and his demonic world from whom they had their origin. Monastic institutions that had originated in the Christian church in the milieu of the late Roman world and had endured for centuries, together with the holy men and women who bound themselves to these institutions, were now viewed from a totally contrary ideology of value. No longer were they viewed as guarantees of God’s favor upon all Christendom for the sake of those laypeople who had not the wherewithal to make such a commitment to God. In Reformation Germany, Evangelicals portrayed the holy men of the past and present as under God’s judgment. Luther’s lectures on Genesis reveal the Reformer proclaiming the scripture in a way that gave divine authority to this iconoclastic view of institutions that had been at the center of Christendom for over a thousand years. The Genesis lectures also show that this Evangelical view of monasticism cannot be viewed simply as the fruit of a long-seething anticlericalism among the laity and a turn toward secularism. What Luther conveyed to his students throughout ten years of lecturing on the book of Genesis is that this monastic and ascetic concept of holiness was insufficient and ill133WA

44:594.15–26 (LW 8:20–21).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 135 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

135

conceived, the product of human rather than divine righteousness. Holiness and the sacred space of Christian life were not to be abandoned, but rather redefined. Pilgrimage was no longer a journey to the holy place of a saint’s relics, but the journey of Christian life in the world with all its spiritual and physical trials. Ordinary Christians and pastors, together with their children and their wives (sometimes several wives—not concurrently, but in succession because of death) were pictured on epitaphs in some Lutheran churches that portrayed them as men and women who had served God in holiness, justified by faith. The women’s veils and gowns in these portrayals are hardly distinguishable from the habits of Catholic nuns, but the religious community here portrayed was that of an Evangelical Christian household, not the ascetic community of the cloister (figs. 5–7).134 The epitaph of Margarete Brenz, the wife of Johannes Brenz, the Reformer of Schwäbisch Hall, is instructive of this Evangelical (Lutheran) piety. Margarete is portrayed in her stone epitaph as a veiled woman kneeling before the crucifix. The text reads, “Margarete, the noble wife of her distinguished husband, left her body here; her spirit waits with the stars. Once she had Brenz; now she has Christ in heaven, whom she piously worshiped, justified by faith.”135 As he had confessed clearly in the third part of his 1528 Confession Concerning Christ’s Supper, Luther conceived an entirely different Heiligthum, or holy place, for the cultivation and exercise of holiness and Christian life. Evangelical holiness was defined in terms that included all Christians and not just clerics and monks. Its place was not the cloister, nor was it limited to the sphere of churchly life. Rather it comprehended, in addition to ecclesia, vocations in the realms of politia and oeconomia as well, as Christians lived out their vocations in each of these realms by faith. In these three “holy works and orders of God,” and particularly in the tentatio experienced by Christians living in these holy orders, God works his divine righteousness in the lives of his people. Salvation is the work of God alone, who descends into the affliction and despair of earthly

134On the remarkable collection of epitaphs in St. Michael’s Church in Schwäbisch Hall, the church of the Lutheran reformer Johannes Brenz, see Wunder, Personendenkmale der Michaelskirche; and Scheller-Schach, “Ein imaginäres Grabmuseum,” 43–61, which also provides several additional examples of epitaphs from the fifteenth through eighteenth centuries. 135See Wunder, Personendenkmale, 12 and fig. 9; and Scheller-Schach, “Ein imaginäres Grabmuseum,” 47. Other epitaphs portray whole families, dressed in robes, with married women always wearing a head-covering. The epitaph of Pastor Johannes Weidner (d. 1606) and his family (figs. 6–7) illustrates the genre.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 136 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

136

CHAPTER THREE

Figure 5. Epitaph for Margarete Brenz (1500–48), St. Michael’s Church, Schwäbisch Hall. Photograph by Christoph Baisch, Evangelical Congregation of St. Michael and St. Katharina, Schwäbisch Hall.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 137 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

Figure 6. Epitaph for Pastor Johannes Weidner (d. 1606) and his family, St. Michael's Church, Schwäbisch Hall. Photograph by the author.

137

Luther's Genesis.book Page 138 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

138

CHAPTER THREE

Figure 7. Detail, epitaph for Pastor Johannes Weidner (d. 1606) and his family, St. Michael's Church, Schwäbisch Hall. Photograph by the author.

life and creates out of nothing; that is, he justifies sinners. As Luther interpreted the lives of the patriarchs of the Genesis narrative, it was clear that his Reformation discovery of justification by faith was at the heart of his theology and interpretation of scripture. He also made clear that the justifying work of God cannot be separated from God’s sanctifying work. Those whom God justifies by faith alone, he also makes holy, precisely in the midst of the affliction and despair of their sinful, earthly lives. Luther believed that to withdraw from earthly life into the cloister is to run away from Christ, for Christ’s work as the incarnate God was precisely to descend into earthly despair and death and from there to arise and be glorified as the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep in him (1 Cor. 15:20). Luther’s portrayal of the “Christian saints” in Genesis describes the work of God in Christ in terms that originate from and reveal the legacy of his experience in the monastery. The elements of monastic culture are all present in his exposition, portrayed in the “true monk” Abraham and his holy wife Sarah, as well as in the lives of their descendants. Life is a journey into exile in search of God and his promised land. Worldly relationships

Luther's Genesis.book Page 139 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHRISTIAN LIFE AND HOLINESS IN THE WORLD

139

and goods, and even sexuality in marriage, are construed in terms of “having them while not having them”; that is, these relationships and things are not ends in themselves simply to be enjoyed; rather, their use is to be carefully disciplined lest their enjoyment distract from God’s purposes. A spiritual martyrdom that consists in living by faith in the midst of the tentatio of daily life is at the center of Luther’s conception of how God works in the lives of sinners to make them holy. All these are monastic themes, now reconstructed according to the elements of a new Evangelical identity. In this sense, the Reformation was indeed a new monasticism, the broadening of the monastic ideal so that it applies to all Christians.136 Luther’s lectures on the Genesis narrative reveal the contours of this ideal as the Reformer saw it exemplified in Christian believers of the patriarchal age. The texts show that Luther construed this ideal in a way that applied it to all Christians. At the same time, the Reformer inverted the Catholic concept of the way of salvation, which drew its inspiration from the Neoplatonic soteriology of the ascent of the soul as well as from ascetic views that emerged in the early centuries of church history. Luther was reading history correctly when he placed at the center of his polemic against monasticism not only the early and high medieval figures of Benedict, Francis, and Dominic, but also the early church fathers who crafted this legacy and gave it its western shape: Ambrose, Jerome, and Augustine.137 The characterization by scholars today of Luther’s theology as a “monastic theology” relates back to the introductory statements of this chapter. Monastic themes pervade the Reformer’s portrayal of the lives of the Christian saints in Genesis, revealing how Luther did indeed owe a great deal to his experience in the cloister. This experience cannot be regarded simply as a phase in his life that was transcended through his disappointment and then his Reformation discovery of justification by faith. Nor can the influence of his experience in the monastery be viewed as ending with his break from the papal church, his disavowal of monastic vows, or the “iconoclastic act” of his marriage in 1525.138 Martin Luther’s 136Moeller, “Die frühe Reformation.” See also Hendrix, Recultivating the Vineyard, 24–29. This claim is also seen clearly in Luther’s objection, voiced already in the 1523 treatise On Temporal Authority, to the restriction of the ethics of the Lord’s Sermon on the Mount as “counsels for the perfect” rather than an ethics for all Christians. Luther developed this thought most comprehensively in his sermons on Matthew 5–7, given in 1530–32 and published, probably by Georg Rörer from his stenographic notes, in 1532. The published text is given in WA 32:299–544 (LW 21:1–294). 137On the early church developments see especially Brown, Body and Society. 138This characterization is from Oberman, Luther, 282, and is cited also by Jordon, “Patriarchs and Matriarchs,” 116.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 140 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

140

CHAPTER THREE

experience as an Augustinian friar continued to live in his approach to scripture, in his view of the centrality of holiness in Christian life, and in the very idealism of his reformative work. Yet in all of these ways, that monastic experience was transformed so that his theology was no longer directed to the community of the cloister139 but to the community of the broader Evangelical church, both laypeople and clergy. This new Evangelical theology addressed the whole church with a teaching of justification and life that had as its agenda the deeper Christianization of a corrupted Christendom.140 The Genesis lectures reveal how a former friar sought to develop in his students at the university an Evangelical identity that redefined holiness and expanded its location. The whole world was to be seen as the holy place where God, through holy orders, works to bring salvation and righteousness to ordinary people caught in the despair and nothingness of sin and Satan’s kingdom.

139This is how “monastic theology” is defined by one of its most prolific and insightful historians, Leclercq, Love of Learning, esp. 19. 140Hendrix (Recultivating the Vineyard, 29–35) notes also the medieval and Erasmian humanist precursors to Luther’s agenda. On Erasmus’s critique of late medieval piety in relation to later developments in the Reformation, see also Eire, War Against the Idols, esp. 28–53, and the bibliography cited there.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 141 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

Chapter Four

The Reconstruction of the Christian Past With the location of God’s holy work broadly expanded to the whole world, sixteenth-century reformers and those who followed them were confronted with a gigantic task in preserving the unique identity and character of God’s people as a holy church as distinct from the world. For Luther, the preservation of the church as the first and foremost of God’s holy orders was the reason for the existence of the other two, namely, household and civil authorities. In the Genesis lectures, the professor attempted to form in his students an understanding of the church and its history that would enable these young men to deal with questions that had plagued Luther and his followers since early in the Reformation. For in following a heretic condemned by the institutions of both papal church and empire, the Evangelical party of the Reformation was faced with the question of how they could be considered the church or a part of the church. In a sermon on John 16 given in 1537—probably in June or July and thus not long after his return, gravely ill and expecting to die, from the gathering of Evangelical princes and theologians at Schmalkalden 1— Luther himself acknowledged how difficult it was to refute the charge that in their preaching against the papal church Evangelical reformers were preaching against the church of God and even against God himself. For, Luther had to admit, the papal church still had God’s word and the office 1See

the introduction to the sermons in LW 24:ix–x.

141

Luther's Genesis.book Page 142 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FOUR

142

of preaching, the holy scripture, baptism, and the sacrament of the altar. 2 Nevertheless, in their criticism of the papal church, sixteenth-century reformers were continuing a search for the “true church” that had been endemic in movements of reform throughout the Middle Ages and especially since the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. With the same goal of identifying what and where the true church is, Luther used the Genesis lectures to convey to his students a view of history that provided continuity between the Reformation and the true church from its very beginnings, thus giving historical background and, so to say, a pedigree to the new identity he was seeking to shape in his students.

HUMANISM AND HISTORY The Utility of History Johann Huizinga once wrote that history is “the intellectual form in which a civilization renders account to itself of its past.”3 From Origen and Augustine through the Middle Ages, Christian theologians and historians read holy scripture and other historical writings as records that revealed not only deeds done (res gestae) but also the higher spiritual meaning that those deeds signified. The science of history and the art of historical writing were likewise central to the Renaissance humanist program of studia humanitatis. Donald Kelley notes that the humanist historical project, which already included a sharp critique of papal institutions, became in the Reformation a “massive project of revisionism” that sought “to rewrite history so that it would convict the Roman hierarchy and justify the ‘true religion’ which Luther and his colleagues were preaching.”4 With their slogan ad fontes (to the sources), Renaissance humanists offered a critique of their present culture and the recent past and sought in classical antiquity a form of redemption. Petrarch, for example, described his age as the “dregs of time” and a “middle age,” and believed that “once there was, and yet will be a more fortunate age.” “What is all history but the praise of Rome?” he asked hyperbolically, and in the question is hidden a view of history wherein antiquity bears a considerable authority.5 2WA

46:5–6 (LW 24:304); noted also by Althaus, Theology of Martin Luther, 336. “Definition of the Concept of History,” 9. 4See Kelley, Faces of History, 75–98, 167. 5Petrarch Epistolae metricae 3.33, translated in Kelley, Faces of History, 130–31; and Petrarch, Apologia contra cuiusdam anonymi Galli calumnias, in Opera omnia (Basel, 1554), 1187, translated in XXXXXX 3Huizinga,

Luther's Genesis.book Page 143 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

143

Evangelical reformers in the sixteenth century likewise criticized the papal church of the present and recent past on the basis of an appeal to antiquity, in particular to the authority of apostolic scripture, which they cited against “human traditions” of more recent provenance in the history of the church. They also based their agenda for reform, though in differing degrees and in a variety of ways, on an appeal to antiquity in the particular form of primitive Christianity, citing in their support the witness of the early church fathers and creeds.6 Humanists and reformers thus engaged in an enterprise of critical history: their agenda included a sharp critique of traditions concerning the Christian past as they had been envisioned and defended by adherents to the papal church. Their agenda also included the reconstruction of the Christian past according to a historical vision that would confer legitimacy to Evangelical theology and to the new orders of church life that the reformers were promoting.7

Demolishing “History”: Lorenzo Valla and Martin Luther One way of wrestling with this relationship between humanism and the Reformation is comparing the uses made of history by the pre-Reformation Italian humanist Lorenzo Valla and the German reformer Martin Luther. A striking characteristic of Valla’s demolition of the forged Donation of Constantine is the humanist’s sharply rhetorical style from the first page to the last of his Oratio.8 Valla writes, he says, “against not only the dead, but the living also, not this man or that, but a host, not merely private individuals, but the authorities. And what authorities! Even the supreme pontiff….”9 Throughout the text Valla identifies himself with the Catholic faith while at the same time offering cutting criticism of “ridiculous legends,” “spurious teaching,” “papal tyranny,” and similar targets.10 He exposes the Donation 6

Kelley, Faces of History, 131. See also Kelley, “The Theory of History,” 747–48. 6The important fact that not all Evangelical reformers viewed the authority of the early church in the same way is demonstrated in Markschies, “Die eine Reformation und die vielen Reformen.” For Luther, see also Headley, Luther’s View of Church History, esp. 162–81. 7There is a growing literature on this subject. See, for example, Gordon, “Changing Face of Protestant History and Identity,” and the other essays collected in the two volumes of Gordon, Protestant History and Identity. 8Carlo Ginzburg investigates the relationship between rhetoric and proof in Valla’s treatise, arguing against the postmodern assumption that rhetoric and proof are incompatible. Valla employed Aristotle’s approach, which he received via Quintilian, wherein proof is the “rational core of rhetoric.” Ginzburg, History, Rhetoric, and Proof, esp. 62. 9Valla, Treatise, 21. 10Consider the appeal for reform in the following quotation: “We detect spurious coins, we pick XXXXXXX

Luther's Genesis.book Page 144 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FOUR

144

as a forgery and uses it as evidence in an indictment of the papal church. In the closing pages of the text, Valla scorns papal power as the cause of great crimes and varied evils. He describes the pope as “a people-devouring king,” who “enriches himself at the expense of even the church and the Holy Spirit as old Simon Magus himself would abhor doing.” Valla finally closes with an appeal for the pope to abandon temporal pretensions and to be “vicar of Christ alone and not of Caesar also!”—to be the Holy Father of the church, stopping the wars of others rather than himself stirring up wars among Christians.11 This humanist’s demonstration that the Donation of Constantine was a medieval forgery was not merely an exercise of proof through scientific philology but a rhetorical attack on papal power, both for its temporal pretensions and for its spiritual abuse of the liberty of Christians: The Roman church has prescribed! Keep still, impious tongue! You transfer “prescription,” which is used of inanimate, senseless objects, to man; and holding man in servitude is the more detestable, the longer it lasts. Birds and wild animals do not let themselves be “prescribed,” but however long the time of captivity, when they please and occasion is offered, they escape. And may not man, held captive by man, escape?12

Carlo Ginzburg judges that Valla’s oration was not printed until 1506 because it provoked such a scandal over its unprecedented violent language against the papacy. The German humanist Ulrich von Hutten soon recognized the utility of Valla’s treatise for his own anti-Roman program and republished the text in 1518.13 It was Hutten’s version that Martin Luther read in February 1520, confirming his own growing conviction that the papacy was the very antichrist prophesied in holy scripture: that demonic power rising within the church that would oppose the gospel. 14 Thus, in a direct way the humanist’s demolition of a key pillar of the medieval order gave inspiration to the growing radicalism of Luther’s Reformation agenda. Luther’s call for an academic debate over the practice of issuing indulgences, through his Ninety-Five Theses posted in October 11

them out and reject them; shall we not detect spurious teaching? Shall we retain it, confuse it with the genuine and defend it as genuine?” Valla, Treatise, 153. 11Valla, Treatise, 179, 183. 12Valla, Treatise, 173. 13Ginzburg, History, Rhetoric, and Proof, 55. 14Oberman, Luther, 42. For a compelling history of Luther’s path to this conviction, see Hendrix, Luther and the Papacy.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 145 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

145

1517, had by 1520 long since degenerated into an ecclesiastical trial in which the main issue had become papal authority.15 As a result, Luther’s steady stream of major treatises published in 1520 was the fruit of his own study of church history in which he had engaged as preparation for his debate in Leipzig with Johann Eck in July 1519, where Eck had made papal authority the chief issue. A celebrity after his debate with Eck, Luther went on the offensive with his Appeal to the Christian Nobility of the German Nation, wherein he called for Christian temporal rulers to act for the reformation of the church in the face of the pope’s refusal to sanction reform. Here the battle is clearly engaged: as both a “court-fool” and a sworn doctor of holy scripture, Luther calls on civil authorities to tear down the walls erected by the papacy that had established its tyranny over German rulers and people. Luther took up not only the analysis but also the rhetoric of Valla’s treatise on the Donation of Constantine to expose the papal pretension: to the pope’s assumed authority over the German emperor, Luther replied, “[The Romanists] take the heavenly and kingly form from Christ and give it to the pope, and leave the form of a servant to perish completely. He might almost be the Counter-Christ, whom the scriptures call antichrist, for all his nature, work, and pretensions run counter to Christ and only blot out Christ’s nature and destroy his work.”16 The radicalism of Luther’s rejection of Rome’s sacramental system in The Babylonian Captivity of the Church was merely the theological application of this essentially historical outlook on the church’s institutional life. The same is true of Luther’s audacity in his Open Letter to Pope Leo X, which prefaced his treatise The Freedom of a Christian. Here the Wittenberg friar took the pope to school and not only corrected the pope’s counselors, who ascribe to him the sole right of interpreting scripture, but also played a pun on his title, vicar of Christ: See how different Christ is from his successors, although they would all wish to be his vicars. I fear that most of them have been too literally his vicars. A man is a vicar only when his superior is absent. If the pope rules while Christ is absent and does not dwell in his heart, what else is he but a vicar of Christ? What is the church under such a vicar but a mass of people without Christ? Indeed, what is such a vicar but an antichrist and an idol? How much more properly did the apostles 15For an overview of these developments, see Lindberg, “Prierias and His Significance for Luther’s Development,” 45–64. 16WA 6:404–69, quote at 434.13–17 (LW 44:165).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 146 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FOUR

146

call themselves servants of the present Christ and not vicars of an absent Christ?17

As used by Luther, Valla’s critique of papal abuses and temporal pretensions had become a rejection of the papacy altogether. Luther’s disdain of medieval traditions that defined the papal church’s history and identity in 1520 found its most comprehensive formulation in a treatise written for laypeople in response to an attack, also written for lay Christians, by the Franciscan friar Augustine Alveld in May 1520. Within two weeks and under the title On the Papacy at Rome against the Most Celebrated Romanist in Leipzig, Luther took up his pen to refute Alveld’s claim that the papacy holds its spiritual authority by divine order (de jure divino). He constructed an opposing view of the church that was radically different from the traditional view taught by Alveld. For Luther, “Christendom means an assembly of all the people on earth who believe in Christ.” Its essence, life, and nature are those of a spiritual and not a physical assembly; its unity is of true faith, hope, and love, apart from which “no unity— be it that of city, time, persons, work, or whatever else it may be—can create Christendom.”18 Later Luther added, The kingdom of God…is not in Rome, is not bound to Rome, and is neither here nor there. Rather, it is where there is inward faith, whether the man be in Rome or wherever he may be. Therefore, it is a stinking lie to say that Christendom is in Rome, or is bound to Rome, much less that its head and power are there because of divine order…. There are many Christians who are in the physical assembly and unity but through their sins they exclude themselves from the inward spiritual unity.19

Already by June 1520 (the treatise was printed in Wittenberg on 26 June 1520),20 Luther had advanced beyond Valla’s refutation of the Donation of Constantine and its rejection of the temporal claims of papal power to a demolition of the whole edifice of medieval Catholic ecclesiology. Both projects were essentially works of historical criticism: even for Luther, the instrument of dismantlement was his own use of history in

17WA

7:48.11–18 (LW 31:342).

18WA 6:292.37–38, 293.10–12 (LW 39:65). See also the introduction to the treatise in LW 39:51–54. 19WA 20WA

6:293.22–27, 294.1–3 (LW 39:66). 6:281 (LW 39:53).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 147 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

147

polemics that emerged from his wrestling with papal traditions and consequently his rejection of papal claims.21 Historian Patrick Geary neatly paraphrases an argument of John Pocock when he writes, “When traditional relationships between present and past break down, those most affected by this rupture respond by reshaping an understanding of that which unites past and present in terms of some new continuity in order to defend themselves from the effects of this rupture.”22 In the case of Valla and Luther, both humanist and reformer participated in the reshaping of historical understanding to create continuity, but were also active agents in precipitating the rupture. They each subverted “history”—papal traditions, including even a forged document about the church’s past—as part of a program to reconstruct the past in the service of present concerns. For Valla, a humanist under the patronage of a Renaissance prince, present concerns had to do with the political and military contest between the papacy and Valla’s patron, Alphonse of Aragon.23 For Luther, the Evangelical Reformer, historical criticism was employed to defend the Reformation in the face of condemnation by the magisterium of the church and the papacy itself. Luther followed up that humanist critique and early Reformation dismantling of papal traditions concerning the history of the church with a reconstruction of the Christian past that gave provenance to his new Reformation ecclesiology. This reconstruction can be discerned in his lectures on Genesis.

GENESIS AS THE HISTORY OF THE CHURCH BETWEEN GOD AND THE DEVIL In his biography of Luther, Heiko Oberman notes that Luther’s way of measuring time was hardly that of the modern approach, with its notions of progress and tolerance. Today’s reader must first understand Luther in

21The polemical exchanges having to do with his ecclesiastical trial were critical for the development of Luther’s thinking on the issue of papal and church authority. On this, see especially Hendrix, Luther and the Papacy; and Lohse, Martin Luther’s Theology, 85–126, as well as the bibliography cited there. 22Geary, Phantoms of Remembrance, 8, citing Pocock, “Origins of the Study of the Past,” 217. Pocock had written: “If a traditional relationship with the past has been ruptured, the first instinct of society’s intellectuals may be to restore it, and this may be attempted by reshaping myth, by historisation or by the construction of a new image of the past in terms of some new continuity of which society has become aware in the present.” 23Ginzburg, History, Rhetoric, and Proof, 54.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 148 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FOUR

148

the light of his apocalyptic conviction that opposition to the gospel in his own day was to be expected: “the devil would not ‘tolerate’ the rediscovery of the gospel; he would rebel with all his might, and muster all his forces against it.… For where God is at work—in man and in human history— the devil, the spirit of negation, is never far away.” Analysis of Luther’s lectures on Genesis both confirms Oberman’s judgment and reveals that, for Luther, the centrality of the battle between God and the devil in the life of Christian believers was not simply a by-product of his conviction that he was living in the last days of human history. For Luther, “history ‘sub specie aeternitatis,’ in the light of eternity,” pertains not only to the last days but to human history from its very beginning, or rather from the inbreaking of the devil’s rule in human history, which happened (Luther believed) on the day after God created Adam.24 If one looks at Luther’s understanding of history as it appears in his Genesis lectures, the basic elements of his historical vision come clearly into focus. Striking for their ubiquitous occurrence and paradoxical quality were Luther’s comparisons between the primeval world prior to the great Flood in Noah’s time and the world in Luther’s own time. There is a characteristic primitivism in Luther’s view of the world’s earliest history.25 To be expected from a traditional Christian anthropology is Luther’s view of Adam before his fall into sin, which he contrasted to the present corrupted state of the human creation.26 The created world was perfect before sin: “The air was purer and more healthful, and the water more prolific; yes, even the sun’s light was more beautiful and clearer. Now the entire creation in all its parts reminds us of the curse that was inflicted because of sin.” But even after the Fall, in Luther’s understanding, the primeval history of the patriarchs in Genesis reveals a world far less deteriorated than in later generations. In his comments on Genesis 5, Luther described “the greatest glory of the primitive world, that it had so many good, wise, and holy men at the same time.” These holy men were not plain people but “the most outstanding heroes this world has ever produced,” next in stature to Christ and John the Baptist, whose grandeur and deeds Luther and 24Oberman,

Luther, 12.

25Headley notes that Luther applies the term “golden age” to several periods in history, including

his own, but nevertheless the idea of a golden age “properly pertains in its full implications to the age before the Flood.” Headley, Luther’s View of Church History, 118–19. 26Thus Adam “had the clearest eyes, the most delicate and delightful odor, and a body very well suited and obedient for procreation. But how our limbs today lack that vigor!” WA 42:76.16–18 (LW 1:100).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 149 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

149

his hearers would behold and admire on the last day.27 Luther contrasted sharply the age of the New Testament (continuing as it did through his own day) to this great age of faith in the first world: Our age, which is the age of the New Testament, to which Christ was manifested, is the hulls and dregs, as it were, of the world; for it values nothing less than it values Christ, who was most precious to the first world. What is the cause of this most serious evil? Surely it is our sacred flesh, the world, and the devil.… Therefore just as the first world was the best and the holiest, so the last world is the worst and most iniquitous.28

Luther’s description of the primeval “first world” of the patriarchs before Abraham as an age of faith in Christ is of crucial significance for his understanding of the Old Testament as a Christian book with a Christological message.29 For Luther, time is ever the same since the Fall and the promise of redemption through Christ, first given to Adam and Eve. Yet in Luther’s thought this is paradoxically held in dialectical tension with the view that the world and human society are getting worse as time advances.30 The New Testament brings a greater revelation and thus the New Testament believer stands in a privileged position as regards faith in Christ.31 Still, Luther regards the believers of the Old Testament, and especially those of the first world before Abraham, to be superior because of the strength of their faith in the Christ whom God had promised. In striking contrast is all later history, especially the world in Luther’s own day. “The world is deteriorating from day to day,” Luther told his students, and he cited as evidence the callous attitude that was developing toward the newly widespread disease of syphilis. He opined that so little is thought of the disease “that even friends who are bantering among themselves wish each other a case of syphilis.” In his comments on the narrative of Noah, Luther described the age as a golden one, the excellence, splendor, and 27WA

42:153.1–3 (LW 1:204); and WA 42:245.38–39 (LW 1:334). 42:260.40–261.1–2, 9–10 (LW 1:354–55). 29See chapter 2, pages 59–63 above. 30For more on this paradox, see Headley, Luther’s View of Church History, 106–61. 31Luther speaks at times of the obscurity of the Old Testament revelation in comparison with the “clearer light” of the New Testament, for example, on Genesis 3:1: “This account is so obscure in order that all things might be held over for Christ and for his Spirit, who was to shed light throughout the entire world like the midday sun and to open all the mysteries of scripture.” WA 42:109.28–30 (LW 1:145); see also WA 42:162.32–163.3 (LW 1:217–18). 28WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 150 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FOUR

150

magnificence of which later generations have never matched. But God destroyed it nevertheless, “for the sake of frightening us thoroughly, as it should be.” “We may assume that the closer the world was to Adam’s Fall, the better it was,” Luther said in another place, “but it has deteriorated from day to day until our times, in which live the dregs and, as it were, the ultimate dung of the human race.”32 Yet at the same time, in Luther’s mind times do not change fundamentally. Ever since the Fall there has always been sin and unrighteousness, through which the devil wages his warfare against God, with the children of God caught in the middle. Thus, Luther described the church as having an outward appearance and lot that “are the same from the beginning of the world until our time.” Believers in God must “learn to endure the rage and the blows of Satan as he tries to tear the church of Christ to pieces and establish his own church.” God worked judgment upon the world in Noah’s time for the same conditions under which he will bring the final judgment upon the human race: The Flood came, not because the Cainite race had become corrupt, but because the race of the righteous who had believed God, obeyed his word, and observed true worship had fallen into idolatry, disobedience of parents, sensual pleasures, and the practice of oppression. Similarly, the coming of the last day will be hastened, not because the heathen, the Turks, and the Jews are ungodly, but because through the pope and the fanatics the church itself has become filled with error and because even those who occupy the leading positions in the church are licentious, lustful, and tyrannical.33

What appears to be a certain primitivism in Luther’s mental world must therefore be qualified carefully. For Luther, the first world as described in the primeval history of Genesis is a superior world, closer to the perfection of the original creation and less advanced in its deterioration. Adam’s misfortunes as a result of God’s judgment upon his fall into sin were thus “insignificant in comparison with ours,” Luther said, “for the more closely the world approaches its end, the more it is overwhelmed by penalties and catastrophes.” At the same time, however, human history has since Adam’s fall been characterized by the same warfare: it is caught in the warfare between God and the devil, and therefore, in this most elemental

32WA 33WA

42:154–155.1–2 (LW 1:206–7); WA 42:264.15 (LW 2:3); and WA 42:266.39–40 (LW 2:7). 42:425.1–2, 5–6 (LW 2:230); and WA 42:270.15–21 (LW 2:12).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 151 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

151

sense, time is ever the same. “For the history of every age bears witness to this: that the true church always endured hardships; but that it was the false church that carried on persecutions, while the true church was always condemned by that other hypocritical one.” The way Luther continued this thought reflects the compression of time that is presupposed as his world and the world of Genesis are merged: “Therefore,” Luther went on, “there is no doubt among us today that the church of the pope is the church of Cain. We, however, are the true church.”34 Thus Luther reaffirmed, as he approached the end of his exposition of the pre-Abrahamic history of Genesis, that in the most basic sense this first world was the same as his own. For Luther, the first world and his own day are connected by a critical thread, the promise concerning Christ, recorded in scripture, which alone grants self-knowledge as well as knowledge of this early history.35 In the closing lines of his comments on the primeval history Luther again mentioned this thread as he concluded these lectures on “the history of the first world, which has been faithfully presented by Moses as proof of the uninterrupted transmission of the promise concerning Christ.” It is all about “the history of the first church,” in contrast to the ungodly, with whom the Holy Spirit is not concerned. “But we observe that the true church is the object of God’s concern and that the Holy Spirit carefully describes its propagation from the beginning of the world.”36 In this way, Luther compressed all human history into the history of the church between God and the devil. To grasp adequately how Luther views that history in the light of his own experience some fifty-five hundred years after the beginning of the world, it is necessary to unveil Luther’s conception of the church from Adam throughout the first age.

The Genesis of the Church in Paradise Perhaps the thorniest and most perennial issue in the history of Christianity has been the relationship of the New Testament to the Old Testament in the Christian biblical canon. Another way of looking at the same subject is to ask about the relationship of the church following the incarnation and its corollary events to all prior history. Many controverted issues in Christian theology spring from this central problem. For example, the relationship between Christianity and Israel (now Judaism) and the related 34WA

42:155.30–32 (LW 1:208); and WA 42:188.25–29 (LW 1:254). the quotations from Luther’s comments on Genesis 10 in ch. 2, notes 6–7 above. 36WA 42:427.33–428.3 (LW 2:234–35). 35See

Luther's Genesis.book Page 152 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FOUR

152

question of the enduring validity of the Mosaic law—the basic matter of controversy during the age of the apostles—arises from and at the same time influences the way Christians have understood the Old Testament. Also, the meaning of the justification of the sinner and the means of its appropriation—the chief issue in controversy in the sixteenth-century Reformation (by faith and meritorious works of love or by faith alone?)— relates to this topic. How were Old Testament believers saved before the atonement worked by Christ on the cross? These issues spring from the question of the relationship between Christ and time.37 Patristic and medieval interpretation of the Bible dealt with the problem principally by means of figurative language. The Old Testament was revealed in the New (Augustine), and therefore the spiritual meaning of the Old Testament for the church was found by applying allegory and other figurative meanings to the historical or literal sense of the words. Thus, for example, Augustine viewed Cain and Abel as figurative of the two branches of the human race: “The one consists of those who live by human standards, the other of those who live according to God’s will.” He describes them figuratively as representing two cities, the city of man and the city of God, which coexist in history until its culmination in the eschaton (De civitate Dei 15.1). In this way, Augustine applied the principle enunciated in his De doctrina Christiana that “anything in the divine discourse that cannot be related either to good morals or to the true faith should be taken as figurative.”38 Luther approached the Old Testament quite differently—not as figure or allegory of a future church but as the history of the church in its earliest ages.39 The modern reader is confronted with a characteristic element of the mental world of Martin Luther: Genesis, the word of God given through the Hebrew prophet Moses, is the written history of the “primitive world” from Creation through the age of the patriarchs.40 This is important for Luther’s reconstruction of the Christian past, since that past—the church’s past—began not with the incarnation or Pentecost but with Adam in paradise. As a participant in the humanist historical project and subscribing to the humanist motto “ad fontes,” Luther, in his lectures 37For

the early church a definitive study is Cullmann, Christ and Time. Concerning the City of God, trans. Bettenson, 595; and Augustine, On Christian Teaching, trans. Green, 75. 39On Genesis as the history of the earliest church, see Pelikan, “Die Kirche nach Luthers Genesisvorlesung,” 102–10, later incorporated in Pelikan, Luther the Expositor, 89–108. 40WA 42:176.25–26 (LW 1:237). 38Augustine,

Luther's Genesis.book Page 153 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

153

on Genesis, was appealing to the ultimate source of antiquity. For him, neither the church fathers nor even the New Testament but the very first book of the Old Testament was the source that provided the historical material for a rhetorical critique of papal traditions of church history. Luther’s reconstruction of the church’s past would be built upon the history of the church he found recorded in the text of Genesis. This is seen in the Reformer’s exposition of the creation of Adam, who was created in such a way that “he was, as it were, intoxicated with rejoicing toward God.” Luther surmised that God then created the tree of the knowledge of good and evil “so that Adam might have a definite way to express his worship and reverence toward God.” The creation of this tree and the giving of the command not to eat of it were in Luther’s understanding the foundation of the Christian church. The tree “was Adam’s church, altar, and pulpit, in which he yielded to God the obedience he owed, in which he acknowledged the word and will of God, and gave thanks to God—no, even much more, at which he called upon God for aid against temptation.” Had Adam not fallen into sin by his disobedience to the command, “this tree would have been like a common temple and basilica to which people would have streamed.” Thus the tree was “not deadly by nature; it was deadly because it was stated to be so by the word of God.”41 The church was thus established before any household or government, before the creation of Eve, “without any walls and without any pomp, in a very spacious and very delightful place.” Here at the tree, Adam and his descendants would have gathered on the Sabbath day. After a fascinating aside in which Luther talked about his experience when he was “shaken by a fanatic” (referring to John Agricola and the early stages of the antinomian dispute), Luther reiterated that it was the command of God that established the church in paradise. “Adam had need of this command concerning the tree…that there should be an outward form of worship and an outward work of obedience toward God.”42 As it was by the word that the church was established, so it was by an attack against the word that Adam and Eve fell into sin and the original church was destroyed. Commenting on Genesis 3:1, Luther opined that 41WA 42:71.33–34 (LW 1:94); and WA 42:72.20–73.5 (LW 1:95). Note the comparison to WA 42:17.15–23 (LW 1:21–22), where Luther describes the creative word and says “that the words ‘Let there be light’ are the words of God, not of Moses; this means that they are realities.” Creation ex nihilo is a proper work of God for Luther because the word that God speaks creates reality. See, for example, Wingren, Creation and Law. 42WA 42:79.4–5 (LW 1:103); WA 42:80.19–23 (LW 1:105); and WA 42:82.41–83.6 (LW 1:109).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 154 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FOUR

154

Moses was expressing himself very carefully when he wrote, “The serpent said,” for he indicates therein that “with a word [the serpent] attacks the word.” The attack against the word was therefore the temptation that caused Eve (and Adam) to fall. Luther’s exposition is built entirely around this central idea concerning the nature of the church and its situation between God’s word and the devil who attacks the word: For when the gospel is preached in its purity, men have a sure guide for their faith and are able to avoid idolatry. But then Satan makes various efforts and trials in an effort either to draw men away from the word or to corrupt it. Thus even at the time of the apostles various heresies arose in the Greek Church.… Our age, too, has instances like these before its eyes, when, after the purer doctrine of the gospel came to light, several kinds of assailers of the works and the word of God arose. Of course, the other temptations do not cease; Satan still incites to fornication, adultery, and similar infamous deeds. But this temptation—when Satan attacks the word and the works of God—is far more serious and more dangerous, and it is peculiar to the church and the saints.43

Considering the centrality of the debate between “God’s word” and “human traditions” in the Reformation, one can immediately perceive what Luther had in view as he attempted to develop a new understanding of the church and its identity in his students. The thought did not remain implicit. For Eve, “the chief temptation was to listen to another word and to depart from the one that God had previously spoken: that they would die if they ate from it.” This holds likewise for the Christian in Luther’s day, as in every generation—for in this sense, all time is the same or only deteriorates further. When Satan sets before Christians another word besides that of God, they hardly realize it. People can be on their guard when Satan tempts to kill, to fornicate, or to disobey parents. “But here, when he propounds another word, when he discourses about the will of God, when he uses the name ‘God,’ ‘the church,’ and ‘the people of God’ as a pretext, then people cannot so readily be on guard against him.” Satan tempted Christ in the same way, but Christ held to the word. But sinful Christians, like Eve, are more easily duped: The source of all sin truly is unbelief and doubt and abandonment of the word. Because the world is full of these, it remains in idolatry, 43WA

42:110.24–28, 32–37 (LW 1:146–47).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 155 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

155

denies the truth of God, and invents a new god. A monk is an idolater. He imagines that if he lives according to the rule of Francis or of Dominic, this is the way to the kingdom of God. But this is equivalent to inventing a new god and becoming an idolater, because the true God declares that the way to the kingdom of heaven is by believing in Christ. Therefore, when faith has been lost, there follow unbelief and idolatry, which transfer the glory of God to works. Thus the Anabaptists, the Sacramentarians, and the papists are all idolaters—not because they worship stones and pieces of wood, but because they give up the word and worship their own thoughts.44

In this way, Luther’s reconstruction of church history functioned to establish a central Reformation conviction by way of a particular form of appeal to the scripture. Luther here taught righteousness through faith and not works by shaping a rhetorical argument on the basis of historical example rather than by offering proof from a propositional statement, say, from the New Testament Gospels or Epistles. Eve’s substitution of the devil’s word for the word of God becomes a figure for additional examples that Luther cites from his own contemporary world—the monk, the Anabaptist, the Sacramentarian. Luther’s rhetorical argument was similar to that of the apostle Paul, who defended the teaching of righteousness by faith through the example of Abraham (Rom. 4), but Luther argued more broadly through analogies beyond the biblical corpus. This approach corresponds directly with Luther’s view of the utility of history as he expressed it directly in another text from this same late period in his life, his Preface to Galeatius Cappella’s History, written in 1538. Citing the Roman historian Varro, he states, “the best way to teach is to add an example or illustration to the word.” Luther notes the usefulness of histories because they teach by examples that can be visualized, “as though one were there and saw everything happen that the word had previously conveyed to the ears by mere teaching.”45 In precisely this way, Luther’s exposition of Genesis provided his students with a visual picture of the devil at work in the history of the church: tempting Eve, tempting Christ, and tempting the monks and Anabaptists and Sacramentarians to replace God’s word with another word, to add to the word or distort the

44WA

42:111.9–10 (LW 1:147); WA 42:112.9–13 (LW 1:148); and WA 42:112.20–29 (LW 1:149). 50:383.1–13 (LW 34:275). On exemplar history as representative of the dominant view of history’s utility from antiquity through the eighteenth century, see Nadel, “Philosophy of History before Historicism.” 45WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 156 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

156

CHAPTER FOUR

word. Like Eve, who added the word “perchance” to God’s word that they will die if they should eat of the tree—revealing to Satan “that she has turned away from God and is ready to listen to another teacher”—so also “many of those who originally thanked God with us for his revealed word have not only fallen away but have become our adversaries.” In the same way, the Arians not only fell away from the faith; soon they “became the enemies of the church and persecuted it with the utmost cruelty.” So too the Anabaptists became, in Luther’s mind, persecutors of God who imitate Satan, while Luther’s most bitter enemies were “those who have fallen away from our doctrine.”46 The professor taught his students that it is all a matter of simple and absolute adherence to God’s word. “But what is more preposterous than that we undertake to sit in judgment on God and his word, we who ought to be judged by God? Therefore we must simply maintain that when we hear God saying something, we are to believe it and not to debate about it but rather take our intellect captive in the obedience of Christ.”47 It is noteworthy that Luther believed that the Fall, “the historical event of which Moses gives us an account in this present chapter,” took place on the Sabbath—that is, the day after the creation of the first man and woman.48 So compressed was Luther’s view of time that the same contest between God and the devil over the human creation’s obedience to the word began immediately at the end of the creation week and continued unabated until Luther’s time, not quite six thousand years later. Though the world has deteriorated over time, nevertheless the central dynamic of human and cosmic history remains precisely the same—a contest over the word of God with the church standing between God and the devil. Just as the contest had begun there, so also God gave the promise of victory over the devil on that Sabbath day in the Garden of Eden. As the Reformer continued his exposition, he focused on the promise that the woman’s seed would crush the head of the serpent (Gen. 3:15). “This, therefore, is the text that made Adam and Eve alive and brought them

46WA 42:117.18–19, 36–41 (LW 1:155, 156); and WA 42:118.1–7 (LW 1:156). On Luther’s views of those he considered to have betrayed the Reformation, see Edwards, Luther and the False Brethren. 47WA 42:118.28–32 (LW 1:157). At Worms in 1521, Luther grounded his refusal to retract his teachings in defiance of the authorities not by appeal to a conscience liberated from institutions of ecclesiastical and civil authority but rather to a conscience captive to the word of God. See his account in Luther at the Diet of Worms (1521), WA 7:814–57 (LW 32:101–31). Also see Oberman, Reformation: Roots and Ramifications, 65. 48WA 42:108.17–32 (LW 1:144).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 157 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

157

back from death into the life which they had lost through sin. Nevertheless, the life is one hoped for rather than one already possessed.” The Christian life as one of hope in an eternal future granted through the promise of Christ is lived by Adam and Eve in the same way as that experienced by Christians living after the incarnation: Therefore, just as our very life can be called a death because of the death that lies ahead of us, so also our righteousness is completely buried by sins. By hope we hold fast to both life and righteousness, things that are hidden from our eyes and our understanding but will be made manifest in due time. Meanwhile our life is a life in the midst of death. And yet, even in the midst of death, the hope of life is kept, since the word so teaches, directs, and promises.49

For Luther, the precarious place of the Christian and the church between God and the devil is not a reality experienced only in the last days, but has existed from the very foundations of creation and of the church. As the devil battles God over humanity and all creation, he seeks by the deceit of his own word to divide humankind from God. He also seeks to divide humankind from humankind by establishing his own church.

Church of Cain and Church of Abel The division of the human race between those who build a city in the world and those who long for a city beyond the world had been central to the Christian tradition of the West since Augustine (De civitate Dei 15). Martin Luther was certainly an heir to this Augustinian interpretation of universal history read in the light of the Christian revelation, and at some points his exposition in Genesis bears considerable resemblance to Augustine’s understanding. The similarity is present, for example, in the naming of the two opposing communities after Cain and Abel. It is seen as well in the commentary on Cain’s building of a city, which for both Augustine and Luther demonstrated that Cain’s hopes lay in the world, “while the children of God are concerned with another city, which has solid foundations and has been built by God himself.” 50 Yet there is also a critical difference. In Luther’s exposition, Cain and Abel are the beginning of a division, not between the church and the

49WA 50WA

96.

42:146.18–20 (LW 1:196); and WA 42:147.22–27 (LW 1:197). 42:232.9–15 (LW 1:315); cf. Augustine, Concerning the City of God, trans. Bettenson, 595–

Luther's Genesis.book Page 158 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

158

CHAPTER FOUR

world or between the society of God and that of human beings, but between two churches. Luther’s nomenclature is significant, and his use of the word church (ecclesia) is not incidental but fundamental to his reading of Genesis and his reconstruction of the Christian past. The Reformer understands the church of Cain and the church of Abel to be two communities, both of which claim the title and reality of being church but nevertheless exist in constant conflict with one another. For Luther, the division between Cain and Abel marks the beginning of a division that exists throughout human history. In his own day, the Reformer viewed this division as existing between the false church of the pope and the true church of the gospel, and this understanding pervades his exposition of Genesis from the narrative of Cain and Abel onward.51 In the lecture hall, Luther repeatedly identified the characteristics of the two churches as they can be identified in Cain and Abel, with the pride, hypocrisy, power, and violence of Cain contrasting sharply with the humility, faith, lack of position, and forsakenness of Abel. Cain is the firstborn son, and Adam and Eve place their hope in him alone, calling him their treasure while disregarding Abel. “But God reverses all this: Cain he casts aside, and Abel he makes an angel and the first among all the saints.” Cain is proud and puts his trust in his primogeniture, while Abel “by faith took hold of the promise given to Adam concerning the seed; and this faith is also the reason why he offered a better sacrifice than Cain.” The two brothers were two kinds of hearers of the word of God: Cain, the firstborn, who appears to be holy and believes that he is a lord, is wicked and does not believe the divine promise. Abel, on the other hand, who has no prestige and is thrust aside to tend cattle, is

51Mark Edwards (Luther and the False Brethren, 112–26) explores Luther’s 1531 lectures on Galatians (as well as some passages from the Genesis lectures) for what he calls “the mature paradigm,” that is, Luther’s tendency to draw parallels between his own experience with “false brethren” and the apostle Paul’s experience with false apostles at Galatia. Edwards appears to view Luther’s approach to the text as unique and related to the self-perception that he held a prophetic or apostolic office and thus possessed a unique authority among Evangelical reformers. But Luther’s tendency to view his own experiences as reflected in scripture and to interpret scripture in the light of those experiences is hardly unique and should not be construed primarily as a means of self-justification, as Edwards seems to suggest (see esp. 125–26). Writing about Philip Melanchthon’s exegetical writings and what influenced them, Timothy Wengert (Law and Gospel, 139) has insightfully suggested, “As important as it may be to notice the commentaries on an exegete’s writing desk, it is equally crucial to pay attention to the controversies raging outside the study door.” Most important to the present study is the way Luther used his text to reconstruct the Christian past in order to establish the historical continuity he believed existed between biblical events and those of the sixteenth century.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 159 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

159

godly and believes. Nevertheless, the wicked Cain covers up his wickedness both by listening to the instruction of his parents as if he took a profound interest in the word and by bringing an offering just as the other, godly brother does. This is an example of the twofold church, the true and the hypocritical one.52

The contrast is not between an outwardly wicked Cain and a pious Abel— between one who rejects God and the life of holiness and one who lives a life of good works toward God. Rather the contrast is between the outward appearance of holiness and the inner righteousness of faith, which Luther identified as the difference between the hypocritical church and the genuine one. All this came to the fore in Luther’s exposition as he commented on God’s rejection of Cain’s sacrifice and acceptance of Abel’s (Gen. 4:4): Here the church begins to be divided: the one church that is the church in name but in reality is nothing but a hypocritical and bloodthirsty church; and the other one, which is without influence, forsaken, and exposed to suffering and the cross, and which before the world and in the sight of that hypocritical church is truly Abel, that is, vanity and nothing. For Christ also calls Abel righteous and makes him the beginning of the church of the godly, which will continue until the end. Similarly, Cain is the beginning of the church of the wicked and of the bloodthirsty until the end of the world.53

At this point Luther cited Augustine, who “treats this history in a similar way in his book De civitate Dei.”54 But the Reformer was either underestimating or purposefully undervaluing the critical difference between himself and Augustine on this point. First, Augustine defined the two cities in terms of the object of their love (caritas)—whether it was directed toward God or the self (De civitate Dei 14.28)—while Luther defines the fideles in terms of their faith (fides).55 Furthermore, Luther’s division between two churches rather than between a holy church and an unholy world (or society) revolutionized the doctrine of the church in a fundamental way, so that Augustine’s definition of the church in terms of its Catholic unity could no longer function in Luther’s ecclesiology or in the Evangelical identity he was attempting to form in his students. For Luther, 52WA

42:182.28–29 (LW 1:245); WA 42:182.38–40 (LW 1:246); and WA 42:183.2–7 (LW 1:247). 42:187.13–19 (LW 1:252). 54WA 42:187.19–20 (LW 1:252). 55For more on this see Hendrix, Ecclesia in via, 155–215. 53WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 160 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

160

CHAPTER FOUR

the true church is not defined by catholicity or unity but by the word alone. The significance of this departure from the Augustinian and medieval doctrine of the church and the incorporation of Luther’s ecclesiology in the self-identity of sixteenth-century Evangelicals as the true church over against the false church of the pope would be difficult to overestimate. As Luther completed the picture of the two churches, he brought out the contrasts with repeated references to events in his own day, explaining that God directs the affairs of both churches, so that at times the true church is greater and at other times smaller, “yet always in such a manner that the hypocritical and bloodthirsty church enjoyed honor before the world and crucified the church that was the true one and was loved by God.” Luther taught that the humbled status and sufferings of the true church in the face of the hypocritical church’s claims and persecutions should be regarded as a source of comfort for true Christians, for it had been the same throughout the history of the church, beginning with Cain and Abel. The professor counseled his students: We today are not the first to whom it happens that we are deprived of the name “church,” that we are called heretics, and that those who kill us pride themselves on being the true and only church and maintain their claim to this name with the sword and with every sort of cruelty. The same thing happened to righteous Abel and also to our Lord Christ, who was not a priest or a king in Jerusalem but was driven to the cross by the priests and rulers. But, as Paul says, we must be conformed to Christ. Therefore, the true church is hidden; it is excommunicated; it is regarded as heretical; it is slain. But Cain has a glorious name; he alone has a reputation; he gives promise of great things to come. For this reason, his hostile heart impels him to fall upon his brother and slay him.… Similarly, Christ foretells that his church will be exposed to sundry dangers and that those who slay the godly will regard themselves as performing a service to God. Accordingly, those who want to be the most holy are the pestilence and persecutors of the church. On the other hand, the true church is not regarded as the church but, in harmony with the name Abel (who is not only a figure of the true church but its beginning), it is considered so worthless that its slayers believe that God cares nothing about it. For Cain is the lord and ruler who does everything and has the power to do everything. But this is the offense against which we must fight. We dare not come to believe that we are not the church because our adversaries condemn us with such assurance and persecute us with every kind of

Luther's Genesis.book Page 161 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

161

cruelty; but let us establish that the cross and those verdicts are true and infallible signs of the true church.56

Central to Luther’s reconstruction of the Christian past, therefore, was the way he showed by historical example that the situation faced by Evangelicals in the sixteenth century was not a tragic anomaly but rather a mark of the true church from its very beginning. The crucial divide is not between the church and an anti-Christian or secularized world but between the hidden, persecuted church and the powerful, hypocritical “purple-clad harlot going by the name of the true church.” The persecuted must await in hope the coming judgment between Abel and Cain, where God, according to Luther, would distinguish not only the church from the world but also the true, hidden, and righteous church from the false, visible, and hypocritical church. “God will announce his approval of that suffering and hungering church and also his condemnation of the hypocritical and bloodthirsty one.”57 Luther thus radicalized Augustine’s figurative use of Cain and Abel and conscripted the nomenclature into the service of a new ecclesiology, an ecclesiology built upon the Reformer’s teaching of the righteousness of faith. Thus, when he later described God’s acceptance of Abel and his offering but God’s rejection of Cain and his (Gen. 4:4–5), the professor noted that the text bears “the essence of our teaching” and “has to do with our conviction concerning justification.”58 The true church “walks in this trust in God’s mercy” while the other church not only does not have this faith but also persecutes it, maintaining instead “that it will please God because of its works.”59 Like Cain, the hypocritical church grows angry when reproved: This wrath of Cain we also observe in the Cainite church of the pope. What irritates the pope, the cardinals, kings, and princes more than that I, a beggar, give preference over their authority to the authority of God and in the name of the Lord reprove what deserves reproof? Even 56WA

42:187.24–26 (LW 1:252); and WA 42:187.31–40, 188.7–17 (LW 1:253). 42:189.3–12 (LW 1:254–55). 58WA 42:190.37, 192.1 (LW 1:257, 259). Luther’s own linking of ecclesiology with his doctrine of justification here, in lectures given sometime in 1536, supports the groundbreaking essay of Karl Holl (“Die Entstehung von Luthers Kirchenbegriff ”), which asserts that the ecclesiology Luther was developing in his first lectures on the Psalms (1513–15) already contained elements of his mature ecclesiology. For an endorsement and limitation of this assertion in its relation to Luther’s developing ecclesiology, see Hendrix, Ecclesia in via, 286. 59WA 42:192.11–12 (LW 2:259). 57WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 162 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

162

CHAPTER FOUR they themselves acknowledge that there are many things that are in need of a thoroughgoing reformation. But that an inconspicuous human being, and one who stepped out of an inconspicuous nook into public life, should carry this out—this is something utterly unbearable for them.60 Therefore they oppose us with their authority and attempt to overwhelm us by means of it. Indeed, no wrath in the entire world is more cruel than that of this bloodthirsty and hypocritical church.61

As Luther engaged the biblical text in the lecture hall at Wittenberg, he became absorbed as it were in the world of the Bible; all sense of historical distance was gone. The experience of Cain and Abel became a picture of Luther’s own experience as he wrestled with what he perceived to be an identical reality, a reality that is universally applied through the history of the church, from Creation until the last day. These characteristics of Luther’s lectures on Genesis are not isolated examples or infrequent asides; they pervade the entire exposition. Throughout his lectures on the primeval history of Genesis, the Reformer contrasted the fortunes of the hypocritical church with the misfortunes of the true one. He even analyzed this through a philological analysis of the names of Cain’s descendants: Mehujael, for example (Luther argued), is a name compounded from the Hebrew words for “to destroy” and “he began” or “he dared.” “Thus the meaning is that Cain’s posterity had now gained such an increase that it had dared to oppose itself to the true church and despise and pursue it, inasmuch as Cain’s descendants were superior in means, wisdom, glory, and numbers. This is generally the way the true church is overcome by the world and the false church.”62 Cain’s descendants introduce their own forms of worship “in order to suppress the church of Adam.” They place their hopes in surpassing the true church

60A striking historical example of Luther’s assertion here was the reaction of the bishop of Salzburg to the reading of the confession of the German Evangelical princes at the Diet of Augsburg in 1530. Justus Jonas reported that the bishop had remarked, “I desire [the Sacrament] under both kinds, and marriage to be free; I desire the mass to be reformed; I want freedom in foods and other traditions, and thus all order to be maintained. But the fact that one monk is bound to reform us all, that is to disturb peace; that is not to be tolerated.” CR 2:155. 61WA 42:192.33–193.2 (LW 1:260). 62WA 42:232.29–33 (LW 1:315). In his comments on Genesis 10 Luther cited Jerome’s Liber hebraicarum quaestionum in Genesin in the discussion of the identities of Noah’s descendants (e.g., LW 2:187n1, 189n9). But here Luther’s analysis of the name Mehujael is quite different from Jerome’s analysis in his Liber interpretationis hebraicorum nominum (CCSL 72.1.1:68). Jerome wrote, “Mauiahel quis est dominus deus uel ex uita deus.”

Luther's Genesis.book Page 163 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

163

in numbers, “as clear proof that they had not been cast off by God but were themselves also the people of God.” They are so successful that they have the leisure to invent music and the arts “because they wanted to be masters and were trying to win high praise and honor as clever men.” All this by sharp contrast to the true church, which “lies there despised and is harassed, suppressed, excommunicated, etc.”63 With such expositions, the Wittenberg professor replaced the patristic and medieval practice of spiritual interpretation through typology and allegory with a spiritual interpretation arrived at by way of a peculiar historical consciousness. Just as history teaches by example and impresses upon the learner images of the lessons to be learned, be they doctrinal or moral, so Luther’s enarratio on Genesis sticks to the history but utilizes it to invoke images of the experience of the church throughout time. Luther’s spiritual interpretation was grounded in the historical, literal sense of the written word, and the Reformer built upon that word a sermon for his students (and later the readers of the published lectures)—a sermon grounded upon history but addressing a universal present. In that sermon the experience of Luther’s present context intersects with the experience of the biblical patriarchs. So far, this experience had been framed in general terms. As Luther wove his way through the narrative of Noah, however, the general experience of the church was complemented by comments in which Luther’s own personal experience loomed ever larger.

Holy Apostates The great deluge that destroyed the world in Noah’s time, according to Moses’ account of the primeval patriarchal history in Genesis, was a visitation of the judgment of God due to the wickedness of human beings. Luther viewed this judgment as coming not because of the wickedness of the Cainite race but rather because the righteous sons of Adam, the descendants of Seth, had themselves fallen into idolatry and moral corruption. Again, Luther drew a parallel to the church in his own day, for as the descendants of Seth grew conceited and departed from the word, glorying in their own wisdom and righteousness, so the papal church had abandoned true knowledge of God and his word and had exchanged ecclesiastical distinction for “carnal luxury.” “Once the Roman Church

63WA

42:233.11, 234.2–3, 21–23 (LW 1:316–18); and WA 42:234.29–30 (LW 1:318).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 164 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

164

CHAPTER FOUR

was truly holy and adorned with the most outstanding martyrs, but today we see to what depths it has fallen.” In the same way, Luther read the Genesis text as indicating that the fall of the “sons of God” was occasioned by their desire for the daughters of men, whom Luther understood to be the descendants of Cain. From this illicit intermarriage between the two churches arose the Nephilim or giants, whom Luther described not as huge in stature but rather as “arrogant men who usurped both the government and the priesthood,” who are called Nephilim “because of their tyranny and oppression.”64 They are “of the world,” the text says, and by this Luther believed that Moses was “explaining the kind of power on which they relied, namely, secular or worldly power. They despised the ministry of the word as a worthless occupation. Therefore they seized upon a worldly occupation, just as our papists have done. They preferred the possession of abundant revenues and of secular realms to the hatred of all men because of the gospel.”65 In this way, Luther took a curious text describing a peculiar ancient reality and utilized it as a commentary upon a present and widespread spiritual condition, the despising of the ministry of the word. Again, historical distance is erased and the Nephilim of the primeval history correspond directly with sixteenth-century realities. With the rise of the Nephilim from the intermarriage of the two churches, Noah and his small family alone were preserved as the sons of God themselves fell under God’s judgment. The narrative describes God as saying, “My Spirit shall not continually judge in man, for he is flesh, but his days shall be a hundred and twenty years” (Gen. 6:3). Setting up his own reading against that of the Jewish rabbis and Origen, Luther argued that these words mean that God (or rather those patriarchs who were still preaching the word of God) was exclaiming, “My Spirit will no longer judge among men. That is, we are teaching in vain; we are warning in vain; the world does not want to be improved.” Thus the text became a vehicle by which Luther testified to his own experience as a preacher of the word of God. Like Elijah, who was regarded by King Ahab as the troubler of Israel, so Luther and those who had supported the Reformation “are 64WA 42:270.27–28 (LW 2:12); WA 42:283–84 (LW 2:31); and WA 42:285.3–4, 286.6–8 (LW 2:32, 34). In his survey of biblical commentaries on Genesis from the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, Williams (Common Expositor, 152) notes that “these commentators understood the giants and mighty men not as physically larger than other men before the flood, but as endowed with great strength, cruelty, and cunning,” but he does not cite Luther. On the tradition of the Nephilim as giants, see also Stephens, Giants in Those Days. 65WA 42:287.33–288.5 (LW 2:36).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 165 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

165

regarded as troublers of Germany today.” They were called agitators—but this was good, Luther thought, for it was the spirit of God striving with human beings, reproving and condemning them, even though they “want to have preached what pleases them.” Then Luther launched into a comparison with the papal church, which, by relying on the claim that the church cannot err, had become like the “sons of God” who were judged by God in the days of Noah: Is it not the very “sons of God” whom God threatens here, saying that he no longer wants to judge them by his Spirit? What can be more excellent than this name? Moreover, without a doubt they gloried in this name and opposed the fathers who threatened them; or at least they despised their preaching.… If a council ever takes place—which I doubt—no one will be able to strip our adversaries of this title “church”; and, supported by this one fact, they will condemn and suppress us. But the verdict will be different when the Son of man appears in his glory. Then it will be revealed that the holy martyr of God, John Hus, and Jerome of Prague were true and holy members of the holy church; but that the pope, the bishops, the doctors, the monks, and the priests all were the church of the malevolent in the pestilential chair, the true slaves of Satan who helped their father lie and murder. Such a judgment of God we see also in this passage. It does not deny that the descendants of the saints were sons of God. God leaves them this grand title, by which they became puffed up and continued to sin without concern; and yet he threatens these very sons of God, who were taking the daughters of men to wife, that he will not only remove the word from their minds and hearts but will also remove from their eyes and ears his officiating spirit, who preaches, prays, reproves, teaches, and sighs in his holy ministers.66

In this illuminating passage, Luther used what he understood to be God’s judgment against the “sons of God” in the text of Genesis to address a central problem that had plagued him ever since Sylvester Prierias issued the first official response from the Roman Curia to Luther’s Ninety-Five Theses in 1518. That problem was the authority of the papal church, which was setting itself, Luther believed, against the word of God. The professor built up a case from the Genesis narrative to show his students 66WA 42:271.6–7 (LW 2:13); WA 42:271.8–273.16 (LW 2:13–16); WA 42:276.10–13 (LW 2:20); and WA 42:276.18–24, 276.35–277.9 (LW 2:20–21).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 166 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

166

CHAPTER FOUR

that God’s judgment can also be proclaimed against the church itself, and that when the false church rejects that word of God, it persecutes the preachers who proclaim it. As the text proceeds to describe Noah alone as righteous in his generation (Gen. 6:8–9), Luther elaborated upon this picture in a very self-revealing way. For when Noah alone remained steadfast, retaining the true worship of God and pure doctrine, there is no doubt, Luther said, “that the perverse generation hated him intensely and harassed him in various ways while exposing him to ridicule: ‘Is it you alone who is wise?… Are the rest of us in error? Shall we all be condemned? Is it you alone who is not in error? Is it you alone who will not be condemned?’” He continued: “The wretched papists assail us today with this one argument, saying, ‘Do you think that all the fathers were in error?’” Later, the Reformer described this as an outstanding virtue in Noah, namely that “one man should defy the entire world and condemn as evil all the rest, who glory in the church, the word, and the worship of God, and that he should maintain that he alone is a son of God and acceptable to God.” Though Luther was clearly identifying his own experience with Noah’s as he understood it, he nevertheless stepped back from a complete merging of his own personality with the patriarchal hero’s. “If I had been aware that so many men in the generation of the wicked were opposing me,” he remarked, “I surely would have given up the ministry in despair. No one believes how difficult it is for one man to oppose the common opinion of all other churches, to contend against the views of very good men and very good friends, to condemn them, and to teach, live, and do everything in opposition to them.”67 As Luther continued, however, his self-identification with Noah became much more pronounced. In concluding the passage where he held up John Hus and Jerome of Prague as examples of great courage in the face of the condemnation of the entire world, the professor laid such examples before his students as profitable for their reflection. He encouraged them, like Noah, to confess: “I know that I am righteous before God, even though the entire world forsakes me and condemns me as a heretic and an unrighteous man.” Christ was forsaken, and Paul too; such experiences are nothing new but are common perils of Christian faith and life. “Therefore we must not despair in them but courageously hold fast to the sound doctrine, no matter how much the world condemns and curses it.” In his closing 67WA 42:300.23–27 (LW 2:54–55); WA 42:300.31–32 (LW 2:55); WA 42:301.15–18 (LW 2:56); and WA 42:301.30–34 (LW 2:56).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 167 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

167

comments on Genesis 7, Luther identified his own experience fully with the solitary faithfulness of Noah, as Luther too found his generation rejecting the preaching of the word: Let us not be concerned about how great and powerful the pope is.… Let us look on the word. If he embraces this, let us consider him to be the church; if he persecutes it, let us consider him to be the slave of Satan.… If I were the only one in the entire world to adhere to the word, I alone would be the church and would properly judge about the rest of the world that it is not the church.… Therefore let the pope, the cardinals, and the bishops either ally themselves with us or stop boasting that they are the church, which cannot exist without the word, because it is brought into existence by the word alone. Much hatred is heaped upon us when it is said that we have fallen away from the ancient church. The papists, on the contrary, boast that they have remained with the church and are willing to submit everything to the judgment of the church. But we are falsely accused. If we want to confess the truth, we fell away from the word by remaining in their church. But now we have returned to the word and have ceased to be apostates from the word.68

Here, as Luther’s “sermon” on Genesis 7 in the lecture hall at Wittenberg came to its hortatory climax, it becomes clear how Luther’s reconstruction of church history served as a foundation for a new Evangelical identity. The professor in his university classroom had created a selfunderstanding for an Evangelical church that had found itself persecuted even by that which claimed to be the church of God—indeed the Holy Catholic Church, the one church in all places, where unity under Christ is made visible by unity under Christ’s vicar, the pope in Rome. For Luther, God’s judgment against the “sons of God” in Noah’s day was a clear example from history that the name “church” could not be relied on to stave off the judgment of God upon those who forsake his word. Though the papists boasted that “Christ will be with his church until the end of the world, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it (Matt. 16),” the history of the Deluge warns of a different reality: The smugness and assurance before the Flood was similar, and yet we see that the whole earth perished. They indeed continued to boast that

68WA

42:324.17–30 (LW 2:87–88); and WA 42:334.25–335.2 (LW 2:102).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 168 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FOUR

168

God’s institutions were everlasting, and that God had never abolished or completely changed anything he had once created. But consider the outcome and you will realize that they were wrong, while Noah alone was right.69

Noah or Luther? Historical distance was submerged in Luther’s exposition as his own world had become totally absorbed by the world of the text. Noah is not only a type or figura70 of the New Testament church but was himself, alone, the true church in his generation. Luther’s own experience is merged with Noah’s, so that in speaking on this text, he is also speaking about himself. In Luther’s exposition of Genesis, Noah’s experience is an example from history that teaches far more than words can say. This experience of the Christian in the face of a persecuting counterchurch surfaced again in Luther’s introductory lecture on Genesis 11. The professor described the world after the Flood as being in “a blessed state,” with one language and a fresh memory of God’s wrath that “kept their hearts in the fear of God and in reverence for their ancestors.” But this blessed state was soon disturbed by Noah’s son Ham, who established a new kingdom of tyranny for himself just as his ancestor Cain had done. Thus “from Ham, as from a source of ungodliness and wickedness, the false and lying church takes its origin.” Summarizing the content of the chapter in these introductory lines, Luther saw Ham’s motive in moving east to build a tower at Babel expressed in the words of Genesis 11:4, “Come, let us build for OURSELVES a city and a tower.” The professor explained, “For this voice signifies secure hearts, both trusting in present things, not trusting in God, and despising the church that lacks all power and splendor.”71 The city and tower were not being built for God or the church of God but “to suppress the church.” The tower was to be a place of 69WA

42:307.21–28 (LW 2:64). (Scenes from the Drama of European Literature, 58) carefully distinguishes patristic and medieval figural interpretation (typology) from allegory in that the former maintains the reality of the historical events, that is, the figure (type) and the thing figured (antitype). “Figural prophecy implies the interpretation of one worldly event through another; the first signifies the second, the second fulfills the first. Both remain historical events; yet both, looked at in this way, have something provisional and incomplete about them; they point to one another and both point to something in the future, something still to come, which will be the actual, real, and definitive event.” As noted in chapter 2 above, Luther’s interpretation of the Old Testament is characterized by neither allegory nor typology but by a direct appropriation of the historical text for his “today” by means of enarratio or “the exercise of the word of God.” 71WA 42:409.31–38 (LW 2:210); WA 42:410.1–12 (LW 2:210); and WA 42:410.34–36 (LW 2:211). The capital letters reflect the orthography of the original Latin text: “Emphasis igitur in eo est, quod dicunt, ædificemus NOBIS ciuitatem & turrim, non Deo, non Ecclesiæ Dei, sed ad opprimendam Ecclesiam, Item faciamus NOBIS nomen.” In Primum Librum Mose (1550), CLXVr. 70Auerbach

Luther's Genesis.book Page 169 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

169

worship, for Satan’s way is to adorn himself with the title of God and “have superstition regarded as religion.” So also in Luther’s day, the greatest enemies of the church—both the Turk and the pope—“advertise themselves with the name of God and think that there is nothing they cannot obtain by means of this title. Meanwhile we hear ourselves called heretics, the seed of Satan, apostates, rebels.”72 This is the way things have always gone, Luther added, for every apostate turns to persecute his own kind, just as “Satan persecutes God and the church with a savage hatred now that he has separated from God and the angels, who are the heavenly church.… Thus, here in the midst of Babylon, [Ham] makes himself a kind of god and sets up a church for himself in order to crush the true church.” Then came the charge for Luther’s students, who were to respond in kind: Moreover, it is fitting for the godly to do the same, so that after they have deserted the church of Satan and have apostatized from it, they should also begin to hate it. Thus, by the grace of God, we are holy apostates; for we have defected from the antichrist and the church of Satan, and have joined ourselves together with the Son of God and the true church. With this it is fitting that we stand and attack the false church.73

Such words in the university classroom are reflected in the character of Evangelical identity in the sixteenth century and for generations thereafter, in that Evangelicals viewed themselves as the true church in a bitter conflict with the papacy. Luther was clearly aware of the hatred his words could generate between those who followed Evangelical doctrine and those who remained within the papal church. A recent cross-confessional study of Christian martyrdom in the sixteenth century opens with the telling lines, “Modern Western Christianity was forged in a crucible of conflicting convictions and dramatic deaths. In the sixteenth century thousands of men and women with divergent beliefs were executed for refusing to renounce them.”74 Martin Luther’s words in the lecture hall at Wittenberg 72WA

42:411.28–412.4 (LW 2:213). 42:412.12–14 (LW 2:213); and WA 42:412.17–21 (LW 2:213–14). Other texts in the Genesis lectures where Luther used the language of hatred toward the papal church, or more specifically the papacy itself, include WA 43:422.34–36 (“Ideo odio perfecto debemus illam bestiam odisse”) (LW 4:399) and WA 44:787.39–788.2 (LW 8:284). 74Gregory, Salvation at Stake, 1. Gregory’s book utilizes the martyrologies produced at the time of the conflict. The first of the sixteenth-century martyrologists was Ludwig Rabus, who earned the master of arts degree at the University of Wittenberg after some twenty months’ study there beginning XXXXXXX 73WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 170 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FOUR

170

reveal how such convictions were grounded in the word of God and inculcated in the students studying and meditating upon that word. The Reformer was willing to inspire in his students both conviction of Evangelical belief and hatred toward papists because he recognized in their present struggles the same enmity between God and the devil that had existed since the fall of Adam into sin on the very day after his and Eve’s creation. The ultimate battle was joined and apostasy from the papal church was obedience to God while obedience to the papacy was apostasy from God’s word, the very thing that, for Luther, defined the true church in every age.

Citizens in Hope, Sojourners in Fact The confidence Luther exhibited in the righteousness of his cause was not based solely on his reaction to the attacks and persecution of the papal church, however. It was also grounded in the conviction that the true church, defined by the word of God, is the creation of God and has the promise of a glorious future. The most sustained treatment of the church’s character in the Genesis lectures is the narrative of Jacob and Joseph (Gen. 27–50), which Luther picked up toward the end of 1541 after a yearlong absence from lecturing and continued until his last lecture on 17 November 1545.75 In these last four years of his life, the Reformer reflected often on the state of the church in a world that he believed was probably in the waning years of human history. Through the Genesis lectures, the professor can be observed as preparing his students for the difficulties of the present and future by repeatedly setting before them a picture of their identity as the true church. Like all the saints portrayed in Genesis—Abel, Noah, and others, but perhaps no one of them more than Jacob—as true believers, Luther’s students would find themselves constantly embattled, disappointed, and afflicted in the world. Yet they had God’s promise of a future glory so certain that its reality was more real than present possession of any of the glories the world could offer. Jacob’s life illustrates, in Luther’s exposition, the characteristics of the true believer in the world as caught up in the deepest affliction while at the same time holding on to God’s promise of future glory. Jacob’s difficulties began when he sought, instigated by his mother Rebecca’s counsel and 75

in December 1541, and who therefore may have attended Luther’s lectures on Genesis at that time. See Kolb, For All the Saints, esp. 41. On the martyrology of Rabus, see Gregory, Salvation at Stake, 139– 96). 75For the chronology, see LW 5:ix–xi and 8:ix–x.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 171 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

171

plan, to deceive his father Isaac into bestowing the blessing of the firstborn on him rather than his elder brother, Esau (Gen. 27:1–33). Luther regarded Rebecca’s plan as unraveling when Isaac asked searching questions in the midst of the deceptive drama while Jacob covered himself with lies. Where the text describes Isaac asking his son to draw near that he may touch him, and saying upon touching his son, “The voice is Jacob’s voice, but the hands are the hands of Esau,” Luther confessed that at this point he himself would have “let the dish fall and would have run as though my head were on fire.” With Isaac’s suspicion, Luther says that Rebecca and Jacob’s plan has come to an end, but GOD intervenes so that Isaac continues with the blessing of Jacob.76 In the professor’s lecture, the narrative became an example for contemporary instruction, to praise the power of faith and to illustrate the contradiction between the believer’s present experience and the reality God brings about through faith in his promise: For the word of God, especially the promise, does not speak of present things; it speaks of things that lie in the future and have been experienced by no one. Faith attaches itself to a thing that is still an utter nothing and waits until everything comes about. It is a knowledge and wisdom of darkness and nothingness, that is, of things that it has not experienced and are unseen and almost impossible. He who wants to be a Christian must meditate well on and fix this in his heart.77

Jacob’s present experience was that he faced the impossible. His father Isaac intended to bless Esau, for he wanted to uphold the law of primogeniture, but his mother Rebecca told Jacob to go and receive the blessing. “Here utter nothingness stands in the way; for the blessing belonged to Esau, not to Jacob.” But this possession was by law, while Rebecca was holding to faith in a promise God had made to her: “The older will serve the younger” (Gen. 25:23). Enlightened by the Holy Spirit, she does not cling to the law and rule to which Isaac remains inflexibly bound “like an immovable rock.” The professor drew counsel from the narrative that applied both to himself and his hearers. “We should adjust ourselves in the same way,” he told his students. “When we have the word, we should cast aside discussions contrary to the word and care about nothing, whether we are confronted with things that are foolish, impossible, or finally contrary 76WA 77WA

43:516.5–17 (LW 5:126–27). The capital letters reflect the orthography of the original text. 43:516.34–40 (LW 5:128).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 172 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FOUR

172

to the law of nature and of Moses.” In one’s calling and even in death, the true believer clings to the word of God even in the face of the impossible, like Moses, who spoke to Pharaoh as if the Israelites were already led out of the land.78 The last paragraphs in his lectures on Genesis 27 drew these thoughts into a discussion about the church in its worldly sojourn. The Reformer identified the church as “we who believe the word of God,” who have “a most certain promise” from God in baptism, the sacrament of the altar, and the power of the keys. There follows an important distinction, however: “But we are not Christians and have not been baptized in order that we may get possession of this land. Nor have we been baptized and born again into this life; we have been baptized and born again into eternal life.” In the world the church is subject to “countless persecutions of tyrants and devils; it is harassed and torn by false brethren in many most pitiable ways.” The church walks on the way of the cross, living and preserved by faith, “which concludes firmly that GOD does not lie.” This doctrine of the church, Luther concluded, is handed down by the Holy Spirit but the world and the flesh do not know it. “It teaches us that we are lords and heirs of eternal life in no other way than the way in which Jacob was an heir of the blessing. When he had obtained it, he was sent into exile from the land and the house of his father. For this is the way the Divine Majesty deals with his saints.”79 Jacob’s exile from his father’s house was his long sojourn to find a wife among his mother’s relatives in Paddan-aram after he had received the blessing through deception (Gen. 28:1–2). Thus, God’s administration of his plan for Jacob seems “undoubtedly foolish and absurd to our eyes,” for the son who received the blessing is exiled from the household while the elder brother, who had received a curse instead, was actually left in possession of the household and its blessings. According to Luther, this was always God’s way. This is the constant course of the church at all times, namely, that promises are made and then those who believe the promises are treated in such a way that they are compelled to wait for things that are invisible, to believe what they do not see, and to hope for what does not appear. He who does not do this is not a Christian.80 78WA

43:517.27–30 (LW 5:128–29); and WA 43:517.35–518.10 (LW 5:130). 43:556.23–27 (LW 5:185–86); and WA 43:556.28–38, 557.17–21 (LW 5:186–87). 80WA 43:567.10–13 (LW 5:201); and WA 43:568.36–39 (LW 5:202). 79WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 173 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

173

Jacob is tried in this way and no doubt sinned, but nevertheless he walked by faith, not a “formless faith [that] is powerless and cannot bear those assaults” but a faith that conquers the world.81 Jacob’s exile also leads to questions in Luther’s lecture about the place or location of the true church in the world. Where is the true church to be found? Is it among Rebecca’s idolatrous relatives, the descendants of Abraham’s brother Nahor? Jacob would find comfort in God’s promise, given to him at Bethel in his dream of the ladder to heaven, that the church was bound to the word alone and not to the location of his father’s household and thus to a visible community of true believers: [Jacob] is alone here, and besides him there is no one else, in order that we may learn that God’s church is where God’s word resounds, whether it is in the middle of Turkey, in the papacy, or in hell. For it is God’s speaking that constitutes the church. He is the Lord over all places. Wherever that one is heard—where baptism, the sacrament of the altar, and absolution are administered—there determine and conclude with certainty: “Here is surely God’s house; here heaven has been opened.”82

It is fascinating that these comments followed upon a discussion of whether the place called Bethel was the very place where the tree of knowledge stood in paradise, the very place where Christ was later crucified, called Calvary. Luther leaves such discussions, which he considers to be “harmless” even if not true, to the grammarians. He pointed instead to the omnipresence of God’s lordship and to the word as constitutive of the church. The professor taught his students that this passage defines what the church is and, more importantly, where it is: “For where God dwells, there the church is, and nowhere else.”83 God dwells, Luther insists, where God’s word is spoken. “But where God has not spoken or dwelt, there the church has never been either.” The Reformer went on to describe his “great struggle with the completely corrupt papists concerning the church.” He noted how the papists claim the name and title of church, and he acknowledged that baptism, absolution, the text of the gospel, and “many godly people” live among them. But he will not concede what the papists add: “that the pope and their pomp is the true church.” To accept the pope is to accept Christ’s enemy alongside 81WA

43:570.17–39 (LW 205–6). 43:571.10–26 (LW 5:207); and WA 43:597.1–6 (LW 5:244). 83WA 43:596.10–31 (LW 5:243); and WA 43:597.31–34 (LW 5:245). 82WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 174 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

174

CHAPTER FOUR

Christ, but Christ and Satan cannot rule the same house. “Accordingly,” Luther concluded, “if the pope should be honored, it is necessary for us to deny Christ.” In the end, the papists have the gospel and the sacraments in vain, “because Christ and Belial are not in accord. For the bed is narrow. Consequently, one of the two falls out, and the short cloak cannot cover both, as Isaiah 28 says.84 Upon awaking from his dream of the ladder to heaven, Jacob exclaims that God is in this place, for God had set up a pulpit there and preached to Jacob about the “uninterrupted continuance of the church.” Likewise faith seeks the church where the word is taught, where baptism and the Lord’s Supper are offered. In one of many passages where he referred to Saint James of Compostela, whose eventual resting place in Spain became a favorite place of pilgrimage for medieval Catholic Christians, the professor disregarded the holy site and located the church rather in a place of uncircumscribed location: There is no reason for you to run to S. James’s or to withdraw into a corner or to hide yourself in a monastery. Do not seek a new and foolish entrance. But look in faith at the place where the word and the sacraments are. Direct your step to the place where the word resounds and the sacraments are administered, and there write the title THE GATE OF GOD.85

Though because of “the blindness and stupidity of our minds” the glory of the church is hidden from believers’ eyes, God nevertheless is the one speaking through the human voice and gestures of a preacher, through physical bread and wine in the Lord’s Supper, at the laying on of hands of carnal men in ordination, in the water of baptism. But this is hard to believe, Luther acknowledged. The professor described how “another law in my members” fights against faith so that, he acknowledged, “I am not able to believe as much as I would want to believe.” The

84WA 43:597.34–598.28 (LW 5:245–46). Jonathan Trigg (Baptism, 176–79) utilizes this and the passage quoted above at note 83 in a careful analysis of the marks of the church as an “undefined boundary” between the true and false churches in Luther’s ecclesiology. He concludes that the marks function more strongly as an “identifying guarantor of the Church’s presence” than as “a boundary to define the limits of the Church.” One may accept this analysis and nevertheless recognize that, in the context of the sixteenth-century religious conflict, the hearers of Luther’s lectures and readers of the published text most likely would not have analyzed such abstract distinctions but rather would have heard Luther clearly identifying the papal church as a false church, the church of Cain in his day. 85WA 43:598.35–37, 599.7–17 (LW 5:247). The capital letters reflect the orthography of the original text.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 175 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

175

spirit, depressed by flesh and blood and sin (Heb. 12:1), “would gladly take hold of those things [the means of grace] and drink them to the full, so that it would be inebriated. But it is necessary to be content with a little, provided that the tongue is refreshed.” Through the struggles of faith, the believer has God’s promise that he is present to refresh the true church through the humble instruments of the word as it is ministered by pastors ordained by God through the laying on of hands so that, in Luther’s view, the absolution of these ministers is from God’s own mouth and hand.86 Luther taught his students that at the end of Jacob’s life when he blessed his sons and so constituted the twelve tribes of Israel, the issue of the church’s identity as true or false, godly or hypocritical, was reflected in the content of the blessing. Jacob, by inspiration of the Holy Spirit, elevated Ephraim over his elder brother Manasseh, and the younger brother received the blessing of primogeniture without merit and contrary to the law. It all happened in fulfillment of the promise of God, and this served in Luther’s exposition as an illustration of how the gospel must predominate over the law in the church’s preaching and teaching. Because the gospel is obscured rather than presented under the papacy, this antichrist “is altogether worthy of hatred; for he has taken away from us the glory of the promise and of faith as well as of the kingdom of God and of eternal life and orders me to show obedience to a fictitious person and the mask of the man of sin. He directs me straight to the devil’s backside.” Contrasting the ministry of the word and faith with the pope’s “horrible kingdom,” Luther described how he himself was “wretchedly enmeshed and held fast in those papal snares.” The professor told his students: Therefore let him who can be angry with the pope, execrate him, and curse him. For he has done more harm to the kingdom of Christ and the church than Mohammed. The Turk kills the body and plunders and lays waste the property of Christians; but the pope stresses his Koran far more cruelly, in order that Christ may be denied. Both, of course, are enemies of the church and the devil’s own slaves, because both reject the gospel. But the pope wants his canons and decretals to be adored in order that the light of the gospel may be suppressed and destroyed. Therefore let him perish eternally, and let all the angels and saints curse this monstrosity.87

86WA

43:599.33–600.17 (LW 5:248); and WA 43:600.23–27 (LW 5:249).

87WA 44:709.2–10, 16–18, 22–24 (LW 8:178); WA 44:714.27–34 (LW 8:185), italics indicate orig-

inal text in German; and WA 44:716.4–28 (LW 8:187–88).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 176 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

176

CHAPTER FOUR

The divisive rhetoric of such passages was vital to the character of Evangelical identity the Reformer was attempting to form in his students.88 Luther had been driven to this bitter dismissal of the papal church from the kingdom of Christ both by the conduct of his trial from 1518 to 1520 and by events over the next two decades. More important for the modern reader, however, is to reflect on the impact this kind of rhetoric must have had on the Reformer’s hearers, as well as on the later readers of the published lectures. Their identity as true church was established not only on the basis of an abstract theological construct that guaranteed God’s presence and the church’s reality wherever the word and sacraments were purely preached and rightly administered, as confessed at the Diet of Augsburg in 1530 (Augsburg Confession, Article 7). Evangelical identity was also established and nurtured through the casting of the papal church as enemy of the true church in a more profound sense than such hated and feared enemies as the Turks and their false Mohammedan faith. Singleleaf woodcut “political cartoons” of the period made ample use of these themes, portraying papal church officials as damned, and sometimes placing their figures together with images of the Turk.89 Both were portrayed as enemies of the kingdom of Christ and the true Christendom that the Reformation was seeking to revive in sixteenth-century society.

LUTHER AS HUMANIST AND HISTORIAN One of the characteristics distinguishing the Renaissance and the intellectual movement called humanism from the medieval past was a new historical consciousness. Humanists like Petrarch and Lorenzo Valla emphasized that a great chasm existed between present reality and the golden age of 88Examples of this rhetoric continue in other passages devoted to Jacob’s blessing of his sons. In a later passage, the Levites and Simeonites, cursed by Jacob for their fierce anger so that they will be divided and scattered among Israel (Gen. 49:5–7), are identified by Luther as the ancestors of unbelief among Israel, despite the remnant of true believers—including Moses, Aaron, Samuel, Zechariah, and John the Baptist—that comes from these tribes (WA 44:744.38–745.15; LW 8:227). Jacob’s curse on them is fulfilled, Luther believed, in Caiaphas and Annas and the descendants of Levi and Simeon who stir up the multitude before Pilate to demand the release of Barabbas instead of Christ (WA 44:737.20–24; LW 8:217). Likewise, in Luther’s day “the church has been gathered from those who are saints and those who are godless. But we cannot persuade the papists that they are Simeon and Levi. They claim to be children of Abraham, and they arrogate to themselves the name and title of the church” (WA 44:738.18–20; LW 8:218). 89For examples, see Strauss, German Single-Leaf Woodcut, 1:310, 1:314. These prints are discussed in Scribner, For the Sake of Simple Folk, 181–83. On papal officials portrayed as damned, see figs. 3–4 above and Scribner, For the Sake of Simple Folk, 84–100, 190–206.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 177 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

177

classical antiquity, and they termed the chasm the “middle age” (medium aevum).90 Yet, as illustrated by Valla’s Oratio on the Donation of Constantine, historical criticism could also be employed by humanists in a way that denied historical distance: Valla used his proof of a forgery as a rhetorical weapon in a contemporary battle between Valla’s homeland, Aragon, and the political pretensions of the papacy in Rome. History was used to dismantle papal traditions about the past as part of a program to reconstruct a better present. Humanism fostered a new historical outlook where the pursuit of truth by means of a return to authoritative sources from antiquity (ad fontes) became a vocation and newly emerging profession.91 For sixteenth-century humanists, a rhetorical use of history was an important tool for their agendas of civic, ecclesiastical, and intellectual reform. Though shaped by an Augustinian, universal framework guided by divine revelation in holy scripture, Martin Luther’s reconstruction of the Christian past shared with humanist historiography the use of history in shaping an agenda for reform.92 The published text of his lectures on Genesis shows how the Reformer constructed a historical pedigree for an Evangelical identity that fundamentally challenged the Augustinian understanding of universal history and ecclesiology that Luther had inherited from the medieval past. Like Lorenzo Valla, Luther used history not only to undermine the historical claims of the papal church but also to construct a new understanding of the past in a way that served his context, in which the chief antagonist to the true church was not pagan society but a false church enslaved by worldly and even satanic patterns of behavior. Chief among these patterns, in Luther’s estimation, was the way the false church claimed and was generally granted the title of church (even “Catholic Church”) and used this title to persecute the true church, which defined itself by its adherence to the word of God. Through historical study of the biblical text combined with his own method of spiritual interpretation, Luther communicated to his students a perspective of church history that shaped their identity as Evangelicals. It was a history that provided them

90Kelley,

Faces of History, 130.

91But this historical outlook cannot be identified with the historical positivism that first emerged

in the nineteenth century. For a fascinating study that connects historical writing in the midst of the religious conflict of the sixteenth century with the emergence of historical research and writing as a professional vocation, see Kelley, “Johann Sleidan and the Origins of History as a Profession.” 92As noted above (page 142, note 5), the Reformation, viewed in terms of the history of historical study, was “a massive project of revisionism.” Luther’s lectures on Genesis reveal that the Bible professor was an activist in this revisionist historical program, and did not leave it to his followers.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 178 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FOUR

178

with the certainty that their determined adherence to scripture in the face of condemnation by legitimate ecclesiastical and civil authorities would preserve them as the true church even when accusations by such authorities gave them the appearance of a heretical sect. As many of the passages explored here indicate, persecution from church authorities served to strengthen rather than weaken their identity as the true church, for such persecution had been a mark of the church since Abel was killed by Cain. In this understanding of the church throughout history, Augustine’s concept of catholicity and unity as marks of the church cannot function and has no meaning. In place of this tradition, Luther built an Evangelical identity based on a radically new ecclesiology, and this had sweeping cultural implications. The lectures on Genesis give a glimpse of Luther at work as a professor, forming an Evangelical identity in the hearts and minds of his students through a rigorous engagement with the biblical text as history— “the history of the first world.”93 By his interpretation of the Old Testament as a Christian book, Luther viewed the church’s life through the interpretive mirror of the word of God and saw himself and his hearers in the lives of the patriarchs. In so doing, Luther was practicing history according to Renaissance traditions grounded in the intellectual movement of humanism and shaped by its motto, ad fontes. For Luther, it was not enough to go to the sources of Christian antiquity, to the church fathers, or even to the New Testament. Influenced by their intellectual methods and especially attracted to the humanists’ study and use of history, the Reformer practiced humanism’s central tenet when he went to the original source par excellence. So that his students might “drink out of the fresh source” themselves, Luther turned to the first book of the Bible and the first book of written history: the book of Genesis, written by the first historian, Moses.94 Central to the picture the Reformer saw was the word of God begetting both belief and unbelief as the church lives between God and the devil. For Luther, though he clearly recognized the divisive nature of the 93WA

42:176.26 (LW 1:237). the quotation, see page 11; see also the text cited at chapter 1, note 27 above. On Luther as a humanist, see esp. Junghans, Der junge Luther und die Humanisten; and Dost, Renaissance Humanism in Support of the Gospel. The conclusion that Luther viewed historical study in the terms of humanism does not contradict his sharp critique of humanist biblical study as evaluated in chap. 2 above, but it does help to clarify where the Reformer saw the greatest value in the humanist program, and where he saw its value as limited and even attacked humanist scholarship. 94For

Luther's Genesis.book Page 179 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN PAST

179

identity he was seeking to form in his students, this could never be regarded as destructive.95 For the divine purpose in history, as Luther and also Augustine believed, is not the creation of an enduring city in the world but the creation of a believing community that would look toward a heavenly city. In this divine purpose man is the cooperator Dei.96 In Luther’s reading of the scripture he saw that the conflict of his own age, between true church and false church rather than between the church and the world, had existed from the very beginning, ever since the devil opposed God’s word with his own word. By his description of the progress of these two churches, Luther reconstructed the Christian past in such a way as to provide a clear picture of how Christian existence, caught in the cosmic battle between God and the devil, had endured since the beginning and would endure until the last day.

95Wriedt (“Luther’s Concept of History,” 31–32) poses the question “to what extent Luther and his followers were aware of the destructive nature of their teaching.” 96Wriedt, “Luther’s Concept of History,” 34. See also Headley, Luther’s View of Church History, 6: “Man’s role in the worldly Regiment is signified by the term cooperator Dei. Luther understands by this term not that man shares with God an equal power for action but that man is the instrument of God and responds to his agency.”

Luther's Genesis.book Page 180 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

Chapter Five

The Church and the World in the Last Days Through his use of the book of Genesis in reconstructing the Christian past, Martin Luther taught his students to view all human history since the Fall as being caught in an apocalyptic battle. This eschatological view of history profoundly affected the Reformer’s perception of both the present and future as he interpreted the primeval and patriarchal history recorded in Genesis in the light of events in his own day and believed that similar patterns would endure until the end of time. The prophetic and apostolic writings in Christian scripture were the sources of Luther’s apocalyptic worldview as he looked at the past, present, and future. 1 For Luther, God speaks to his people about the meaning of their present experience and future hopes and fears not only through apocalyptic books such as Daniel and Revelation but also through the biblical record of history in Genesis.

1Modern study of apocalypticism, following the canons of historical criticism with its various theories about the sources behind the biblical texts, tends to isolate apocalyptic books of the Bible (such as Daniel and Revelation) from the biblical canon and then treat them, together with noncanonical Jewish and Christian texts, as a distinct genre of literature. See, e.g., the introduction to McGinn, Visions of the End, 1–36, where McGinn notes, “Early Christian apocalypticism cannot be separated from the world of Jewish intertestamental apocalypticism” (11). This is problematic for evaluation of Luther’s apocalyptic view of universal history, which was formed not on the basis of a genre of texts within and outside the Christian canon but on the basis of holy scripture and its exposition. Luther did not utilize extracanonical Jewish literature from the intertestamental period. For Luther’s skepticism regarding other extrabiblical apocalyptic traditions, e.g., the Cedar of Lebanon prophecy and the medieval legend of the “Red Jews,” see, respectively, Lerner, Powers of Prophecy, 164; and Gow, Red Jews, 131–87, esp. 143.

180

Luther's Genesis.book Page 181 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD IN THE LAST DAYS

181

Luther’s view of his present and the future world was deeply shaped by an apocalyptic mentality.2 Apocalyptic themes in the lectures on Genesis illustrate Luther’s apocalyptic worldview and show the role these concepts played in the formation of an Evangelical identity in his students. By analyzing these themes, conclusions can be drawn about Luther’s understanding of the present and the future. Luther’s worldview as presented in the lectures also reveals how the Reformer’s apocalyptic mentality was shaped by his hearing of God’s word through scripture.

THE MINISTRY OF ANGELS In Luther’s apocalyptic worldview, cosmic warfare between God and the devil was waged in the physical world but with spiritual armies on both sides. The ministry of angels, the spiritual creatures God sends to protect his own and to defend them from attacks by Satan and his wicked angels, frequently receives attention in Luther’s exposition of Genesis where the text mentions angels.

Angels as Instruments of God for Preserving the World An example is Luther’s exposition of Genesis 19, which describes God sending angels to warn Lot and his family of the imminent destruction of Sodom. Luther taught his students that the text “serves to describe the duty and power of angels,” through whom, along with human beings, God governs the visible world. Believers can be comforted by the knowledge that “not one or two, but a great multitude” of angels are with them; indeed, without their protection “we would not be able to remain alive for a single moment.” As the biblical story of Job testifies, Satan has power to work all kinds of havoc in the life of the world, even infecting the body with disease. But God sends angels, Luther concluded, not only to foil Satan’s destructive designs but also to serve human beings by directing

2See esp. Oberman, Luther, esp. 67–81; Oberman, “Martin Luther: Vorläufer der Reformation”; and Oberman, “Martin Luther: Zwischen Mittelalter und Neuzeit” (Eng. trans. in Oberman, Reformation: Roots and Ramifications, 23–52 and 53–75, respectively). See also Edwards, Luther’s Last Battles, 97–11; and Headley, Luther’s View of Church History, 224–71. Criticizing Oberman’s view of Luther as apocalyptic prophet announcing the End Time and not as a reformer seeking transformation of church and society, see Lohse, “Luthers Selbsteinschätzung,” 162–66. On what Luther’s apocalyptic mentality meant for the Reformation and subsequent history, see Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis; and Barnes, “Images of Hope and Despair,” 141–84.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 182 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FIVE

182

physicians to discover new remedies—“this is not a matter of the diligence of human beings; it is a ministry of angels.”3 What Moses says in Genesis 19 about the good angels who are sent by God to warn Sodom teaches us, the professor told his students, to trust in God’s goodness to defend his people in the midst of an apocalyptic spiritual warfare: What Satan achieves through the Turk, the Roman pope, and the fanatical spirits, not only by attacking bodies but also by seizing souls and holding them captive (2 Tim. 2), everyone knows. But this protection of angels, which God wanted to be more powerful than Satan, consoles us. Therefore, wonderful is this government of God through his creatures, because angels, who support the godly, defend the entire human race, even though it is exposed to lions, wolves, dragons, and all the horrible leaders of Satan who have been trained to inflict harm not only with the sword, plagues, and countless diseases but also with heresies of every kind.4

Passages such as this illustrate how Luther taught his students to view their world and its conflicts and afflictions as caught up in apocalyptic warfare. As powerful and threatening as they may be, Satan and his many servants in the created order nevertheless are not as powerful as God and his invisible army of angels. But unbelievers and “Epicureans,” who live only for this life, believe none of this. Luther brought this out in his exposition of Genesis 32:1–2, where it is recorded that Jacob, on his return homeward from Laban’s household in Paddan-aram, met angels and recognized them as God’s army. Unlike many places where Moses testifies that one or a few angels appeared to the patriarchs, here Jacob comes across a multitude, like that heavenly host that sings the praises of God at the birth of the Christ (Luke 2). The angelic multitudes have this “higher office” to sing such praises as well as a lower duty to govern and fight on behalf of all God’s creatures. On the other hand, evil angels are the cause of horrible outrages and crimes in the world. People see the effect of the devil’s works but not the cause. Citing the book of Daniel, Luther taught his students that God controls the empires of the world, even those of the ungodly, through the

3WA 4WA

43:68.10, 17–18 (LW 3:269–70); and WA 43:68.35–69.8 (LW 3:270–71). 43:69.13–22 (LW 3:271).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 183 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD IN THE LAST DAYS

183

angels. In his classroom, the professor called this ministry of angels “a truly heavenly doctrine” that is beyond human reason and wisdom. 5 Contrary and false, Luther went on to note, is “the opinion of Erasmus and of all the Epicureans” who “deny this protection and ministry of angels, and, indeed, the very providence of God.” The professor surmised that they deny this because, like Cicero and others long before them, they see that wicked men are often more fortunate than godly men. Since the godly are oppressed and the wicked flourish, they ask, does it not show that “all things are borne along and confused by chance and at random and that this government is rather Satan’s,” even as Christ called Satan the prince of this world and Paul called him the god of this age? The Reformer replied that reason does indeed draw this conclusion and therefore denies the administration of the angels. But the “wonderful and incomprehensible wisdom of God, which reason does not grasp,” is revealed to any who want to open their eyes. These perceive the invisible reality that the devil is bound and held captive as though fetters and manacles had been put on him to such an extent that he cannot touch even a hair of our head except by God’s will and permission. If something adverse occurs, it must not be attributed to neglect on the part of the angels in their ministry, but it must rather be referred to the temptation by which the godly as individuals and the whole church are accustomed to be disciplined in this life. For the power of the devil is not as great as it appears to be outwardly; for if he had full power to rage as he pleased, you would not live for one hour or retain safe and intact a single sheep.6

The professor directed his students to ponder in their hearts the course of nature, in order to note that more good than bad occurs in this life and that “a very small part is subjected to the power of the devil.” God tolerates in his mercy even the wicked, until their sins “have been filled up,” at which point he withdraws his hand. Luther’s eschatological hope emerged as he noted the “wondrous government of this life” wherein the ungodly are fortunate and the godly bear adverse fortune. Nevertheless, “at the end of the world and after this life we shall see the most beautiful harmony and concord of this administration.”7

5WA

44:64.17–65.1 (LW 6:87–88); WA 44:65.8–20 (LW 6:88); and WA 44:66.13–16 (LW 6:89). 44:66.17–67.6 (LW 6:89–90). 7WA 44:67.7–10, 29–32 (LW 6:90–91); and WA 44:68.33–37 (LW 6:93). 6WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 184 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

184

CHAPTER FIVE

In later passages, Luther returned to this theme with specific reference to events in his own time. He noted that, like Esau who was prevented by God from taking revenge on Jacob upon his return to Canaan (Genesis 33), so “a secret, divine power was at hand” to check Hannibal at the walls of Rome, to limit the further advance of the pope’s outrages, and to hold the Turks back behind the boundary established by God. As always, “the devil’s ragings and efforts will last only as long as it seems good to God to let him loose for God’s glory and our mortification and well-being.” According to Genesis 35:5, “a terror from God fell upon the cities that were round about” Jacob and his sons so that they were not pursued as they journeyed to Bethel. In the same way, Luther explained, God alone fights for Germany against the Turk; “otherwise the Turk would have overwhelmed us in our laziness long ago without any trouble.” Germany should not trust in fortifications and weapons but in God. “If he wants me destroyed, he has no need to send soldiers, but if not, defiance [trotz] to all Turks, death, and the devil in hell!”8 These passages illustrate the critical point that Luther’s perception of his present world held in tension a fervent apocalyptic belief in the reality of unseen cosmic forces behind all worldly affairs and the confidence that God alone was in control of the whole theatrical stage of human history. Luther’s apocalyptic worldview, even with its blatant juxtaposing of God’s activity with that of “his omnipresent adversary, the Devil,” 9 was no gnostic, Manichaean dualism that postulates two equally powerful divine beings at war, despite the charge of Erasmus that Luther had indeed revived the ancient heresy.10 Rather, as these texts from the Genesis lectures make clear, Luther’s apocalyptic vision of his present world was characterized by a keen awareness and profound belief in God’s sovereignty and providential care of his creation in the midst of its cosmic warfare. Afflicted believers—confused and terrified by the fortunes of the ungodly and by the “ragings” of pope, Turk, and even nature itself—could take 8WA 44:116.28–117.10 (LW 6:156–57); and WA 44:180.39–181.3, 181.35–182.3 (LW 6:243–45), italics indicate original text in German. On the fortifications that surrounded Luther’s hometown of Wittenberg and their expansion under Elector John the Steadfast beginning in 1526, see Junghans, Martin Luther und Wittenberg, 17–20, 60, 121–22. 9Oberman, Luther, xix. 10See Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 46, 278nn102–3, citing Oberman, Luther: Mensch zwischen Gott und Teufel; and Boyle, Rhetoric and Reform. Barnes uses the word “gnosis” in his title, defining the term as “a saving (or at least salvation-serving) knowledge of transcendent mysteries,” but the focus here is the seeking of knowledge about God’s revelation of the future rather than a dualistic approach to reality. Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 16.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 185 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD IN THE LAST DAYS

185

comfort in the promise of God to make all things right in the end, and could trust in God’s governance through the angels in the meantime.

Christians as Instruments and Cooperators with God Despite this emphasis on God’s control of history, however, Luther did not view Christian believers solely as passive objects of the providential care of God through the ministry of angels. Human beings are also God’s instruments and cooperators with the Creator in the preservation of the world. It is important to note that in Luther’s worldview this cooperation is for the world’s benefit and preservation, not its judgment and destruction. This understanding is central to Luther’s apocalyptic vision of the world’s history and its future, and it distinguishes the Reformer sharply from certain disciples who were attracted to him early on, such as Thomas Müntzer and Melchior Hoffman, who viewed themselves as instruments of God either for the destruction of the godless or for leading God’s people to withdraw from the society of the godless.11 An important passage revealing Luther’s understanding of the cooperation of Christian believers in God’s preserving and blessing of the world is his exposition of the Joseph narrative, especially Genesis 39:5–6. Here the professor opened his remarks with the statement that the passage teaches that God blesses unworthy or ungodly men and indeed a whole land “for the sake of one godly and good man,” namely Joseph. Everything that occurred in Joseph’s life happened as part of God’s plan to bless him and his family. Sold as a slave, Joseph’s service in Potiphar’s house led to many benefits for Potiphar, and later to all Egypt. Luther drew from this a general parallel to the experience of the godly in the world. God blesses the ungodly world for the sake of the church: For if the world were without the church and the gospel were not taught and learned, the world would have perished long ago. Thus God is with us today, for we have the word and sacraments, he speaks and works through us, he frees many from death and eternal damnation. We are the saviors of the world: whatever good Germany has is not from its own power or virtue or wisdom but has been received from those rejected, despised, and accursed people who are called Christians.12

11On Müntzer, see Friesen, Thomas Muentzer; on Hoffman, see Deppermann, Melchior Hoffman. 12WA

44:345.38–39 (LW 7:61); and WA 44:346.15–22 (LW 7:62).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 186 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FIVE

186

Even so, the world repays the faithfulness of Christians with persecution. Luther pointed out that this characteristic of the world is true not only of the pope and cardinals, who enjoy all their wealth and glory “only by the benefit of the gospel,” but also of Luther’s own hearers in Evangelical Germany, who make miserable repayment for the faithfulness of their pastors: “Peasants and nobles, citizens and magistrates ravage and despoil the very people whom they ought to support, help, and cherish—and unite with for supporting the church, on which all their welfare depends. It must be so; it will never be otherwise.” Explaining why this is so, Luther cited the words of Christ to his disciples, “If you were of the world, the world would love that which is its own” (John 15:9), and noted that wicked men are honored in the world “because they are from the devil and the world.”13 “What do we care?” the professor exclaimed in German at the beginning of a section where he spoke to his students personally and from his own experience. “We who serve the most ungrateful world have the promise and hope of a heavenly kingdom, and so great indeed will be the compensation and remuneration for this wretchedness of ours that we will vigorously censure ourselves for ever letting a little tear or a single groan fall from us on account of this contempt and ingratitude.” The pious have the consolation of salvation and glory, which they seek and will find not in this life but rather in “another, better life.” Everything they do for the world they do for the glory of God, and thus like Joseph they do it “for the purpose of seeking the life to come.” Even when good things are received from God by the godly in this life, the chief reward is not this but rather “eternal life and everlasting joy.” “Farewell to the world, then, with its harpies! Let us do our duty, as we still teach by the favor of God and endure great troubles with the utmost patience.”14 The professor exercised his students in these themes from the word of God for several pages in the printed text of his lectures, which often breaks into German.15 Like Potiphar through the labor of his slave Joseph or like the king of Syria for the sake of Naaman (2 Kings 5), God has often blessed unbelievers through believers. Luther applied these biblical examples to his own context in Germany: “had it not been for our prayer and word, Germany would doubtless be in a different condition.… Our gospel is both Naaman 13WA

44:346.27–347.3 (LW 7:62–63), italics indicate original text in German. 44:347.20–40 (LW 7:64). 15See WA 44:347.20–354.34 (LW 7:64–73). 14WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 187 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD IN THE LAST DAYS

187

and Joseph. Our adversaries certainly do not acknowledge, nor do they believe, but let us acknowledge and be grateful.”16 Another passage where Luther reflected on the cooperative role of Christians in God’s preservation of the world is the narrative of Genesis 25:31–34, which records the story of Esau selling his birthright to his brother Jacob for a bowl of “red pottage.” The professor engaged the commentary tradition as passed on through Lyra’s postils, which had addressed the question whether both Esau and Jacob were guilty of simony—that is, the purchase and sale of spiritual blessings—in this transaction.17 Luther applied the topic of simony in interpretations of this text to the relation of the Evangelical churches to the papal church and the empire. He noted (once again), “Today the pope has the name ‘church.’ We do not have it.” But in Luther’s view the reality is that those who identify with his gospel are the church, “because we have the word, the sacrament, and the keys, which Christ left behind, not that they might serve our power and the desires of this life, but that they might prepare us for the advent of the Son of God.”18 In this clearly eschatological view of the church’s identity, Luther raised the question of simony by considering a hypothetical agreement to give the pope “so many thousand guldens annually” in exchange for freedom to preach the gospel freely and genuinely. “Would that be simony?” Luther asked his students. “No. For I am not buying something I [already] have before this, namely the proper use of the sacraments, the pure doctrine of the gospel, of faith, and of hope by looking forward to the future life.”19 The Reformer asserted that with such

16WA 44:348.15–20 (LW 7:65). Here at WA 44:348.15–18 (the ellipses indicate omission of parts of lines 16–18) is one of many examples where the printed text first records Luther’s words where he broke into German, and then adds what is clearly a Latin translation, thus creating dittography in the printed text. Such text-critical observations, also noted by Pelikan in the notes of the American edition (cf. LW 7:61n8), show how carefully the editors preserved their notes of Luther’s oral delivery while seeking to produce a readable printed version. It is quite possible, though it cannot be proven, that one set of student notes preserved the German phrase or sentence while Georg Rörer’s stenographic notes (using Latin abbreviations) simply translated it, and that the editor compiling the notes for publication preserved both versions. On this “doubled relation” in the Genesis lectures, see Meinhold, Genesisvorlesung Luthers, 202–9. 17WA 43:419.36–420.25 (LW 4:394–95, 395n82). 18WA 43:425.6–9 (LW 4:402). 19“Papa econtra nomen et titulum hunc sibi arrogat: quia est in possessione, et iactat se successorem esse Petri et Pauli. Iam si sic cum Papa pacisci velim, dabo tibi tot millia aureorum quotannis, et sinas me libere et sincere praedicare Euangelium. Essetne illa Simonia? Non. Quia ego non emo, quod antea habeo, scilicet legitimum usum Sacramentorum, sinceram doctrinam Euangelii, fidei, spei, expectationibus vitae futurae, quae omnia concessa mihi sunt etiam invito Papa, et absque eius autoritate.” WA 43:425.11–18 (LW 4:402). The Latin is a little obscure, but Luther clearly means that it would XXXXXXX

Luther's Genesis.book Page 188 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FIVE

188

an agreement he merely would be “seeking to rid myself of an annoyance by making payments” and in the process depriving the pope of his monopoly on the name “church.” Luther repeated the scenario several times, each time noting that the transaction would not be the purchase of spiritual goods. Since the Evangelical churches already have these things, the transaction would be merely the “redemption of a vexation” and the payment of money “in order that they may let us alone and the pope and the emperor may grant us peace.” Luther believed God had already granted to the Evangelicals the spiritual blessings, even against the objections of the pope. “But if [the papists] do not cease annoying us with their persecutions, killings, and robberies, we will bargain with them to the effect that they devour the red pottage.”20 Luther’s use of the narrative in this way reveals his attitude toward the plight of the true church in the age before the (second) advent of the Son of God. Though it is clear in many passages of the Genesis lectures that Luther viewed the time of Christ’s advent as imminent, the timing is immaterial to the Reformer’s understanding of how the church makes its pilgrimage toward its future glory. Christians are not merely passive in the face of the chaos and contortions of this age but have a clear role to play in the preservation of the church and the world. This role is clearly not that of the destruction of the godless or a revolutionary apocalyptic vision that calls for a withdrawal from society and its concerns. On the contrary, Luther taught his students that their responsibility in the world is to seek civil peace, for the sake of the gospel. The goal is the survival of the gospel and the reaping of its harvest. But the gospel is promoted not by hostility to or withdrawal from the world but rather by making a guarded peace, even with those very forces that seek the true church’s destruction. What distinguished Luther’s apocalyptic worldview from the revolutionary visions of a Müntzer or a Hoffman was not that these radicals viewed activist human cooperation as central to the apocalyptic moment while Luther viewed human beings as passive in the face of cosmic warfare between God and the devil.21 Rather, Luther viewed human cooperation

20

not be simony for the Evangelical princes to pay for the pope’s permission to allow the free preaching of the gospel (i.e., continue supporting the Reformation) because they have this right from God and have already been carrying it out without the pope’s permission. 20WA 43:425.18–426.1 (LW 4:402–3). 21Contrast the conclusion of Robin Barnes, “Apocalypticism,” in Oxford Encyclopedia of the Reformation, 1:64. See also Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 31–32; and Barnes, “Images of Hope and XXXXXX

Luther's Genesis.book Page 189 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD IN THE LAST DAYS

189

as devoted to the welfare and civil peace of the godless world while the radicals viewed human cooperation as devoted to the destruction or abandonment of that godless world. Luther taught his students that they had a role to play in the preservation of the true church and of the world in which it would exist throughout history, even in the midst of the chaos and embattlement of the world in its last days. In this teaching, Luther was reflecting the eschatological vision set out by Saint Augustine in the City of God, where the North African bishop had described the church throughout its history as God’s instrument both for the salvation of believers and for the preservation of the unbelieving world.22 What distinguishes Luther’s apocalyptic worldview from Augustine’s is not so much that Luther viewed the advent of the Lord as imminent, but that the lines of battle in the eschatological struggle are different. For Augustine the battle is between two cities characterized by two kinds of love: “the earthly city…created by self-love reaching to the point of contempt for God, the Heavenly City by the love of God carried as far as contempt of self.”23 The City of God, after the incarnation, becomes identified with the Catholic Church, a visible unity possessing holiness and distributing that holiness through its sacraments as it walks by faith and love toward the real object of its love, the Triune God. Augustine’s vision of the future focused on a church united in faith and love, utilizing where necessary the coercive power of civil government in order to promote that Catholic unity. In Luther’s historical and prophetic vision, the essential reality that motivates the historical process is not conflict between a city of God and a city of man, that is, between one holy Catholic Church and the world with its pagan religions and heretical sects, but conflict between two churches. 22

Despair,” 150–51. In none of these passages does Barnes indicate that Luther viewed human beings as active cooperators in God’s activity of preserving the world until its divinely appointed end. Oberman rightly calls this activity an “interim ethic” and a “rearguard defensive action,” but it remains unclear why this activity should be labeled “secular amendment.” Oberman, Reformation: Roots and Ramifications, 35–36 (emphasis added). 22See, e.g., Augustine, Concerning the City of God, trans Bettenson, 45: “[The pilgrim City of Christ] must bear in mind that among these very enemies are hidden her future citizens; and when confronted with them she must not think it a fruitless task to bear with their hostility until she finds them confessing the faith.” For reflections on Augustine’s view of history and the future in the City of God, see Maxfield, “Divine Providence.” On Luther and Augustine’s views of God’s purposes in history, see also Headley, Luther’s View of Church History, 266–67. 23Augustine, Concerning the City of God, trans Bettenson, 593.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 190 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

190

CHAPTER FIVE

One church has the name and appearance of the church. But in reality it is aligned with the devil and persecutes as a heretical sect the true church, which adheres to the word of God and in appearance is nothing and, in Luther’s present age, possesses nothing. For both Augustine and Luther, however, and in sharp contrast to apocalyptically inspired revolutionaries like Müntzer and Hoffman, in the eschatological struggle the church and its members would exist—however long history would endure—for the benefit and blessing of the unbelieving world, not for its judgment and destruction. Luther’s apocalyptic mentality, therefore, holds together a keen sense of the cosmic embattlement of the world in its old age with a positive and creative view of the church’s role in history, for however brief a time that history’s future course may continue. With Luther’s understanding that the antichrist was exposed and raging against the gospel, clearly he believed that the future course of the world would be short and the cosmic warfare in which it was caught would be increasingly intense rather than flagging. Luther’s apocalyptic worldview contains no elements of Christian progressivism or millenarianism. Nevertheless, in Luther’s view God is present with his church throughout history. The government of God through the created orders, visible and invisible, ensured that until the end of human history God’s purposes in the world would be fulfilled. For this reason Luther viewed his own age, the age of the renewal of the gospel, both as a golden age and as the dregs of time.

A GOLDEN AGE AND THE DREGS OF TIME “The Voice and Glory of the Churches” The eschatological and apocalyptic currents present in Luther’s identification of his own experience with the experience of the biblical patriarch Noah are revealed clearly in the professor’s exposition of Genesis 7:1, where God describes Noah as alone “righteous before me in this generation.” Enlisting 2 Peter 2:5, Psalm 14:2–3, and Luke 18:8 (“When the Son of man comes, will he find faith?”), Luther noted in his lecture that the last days of human history will be similar to the time of Noah. But in contrast to the time of Noah, when ungodliness was nearly universal, Luther described his own time as “still a golden age” in which the word and sacraments are proclaimed and administered properly in the churches of the

Luther's Genesis.book Page 191 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD IN THE LAST DAYS

191

Reformation. Civil government, though weak, still restrains wickedness. According to Christ’s prophecy (Luke 18:8) there will come a time when sound teachers are not to be found; Luther noted indeed, “the counsels of our adversaries are threatening to bring about this very situation.” Fervent prayer and great concern are needed “that a purer doctrine may be handed down to posterity,” for the world strives with great effort toward the kind of universal wickedness that characterized the age of Noah. If the world in its youth could degenerate so dreadfully, “what will be in store for us in this insane state of a world that is growing old?”24 Descriptions of the world in its old age and in the condition of insanity suggest Luther’s sense of the imminence of the last day, yet Luther viewed his day as at the same time the age of the recovery of the gospel—a gospel that must be handed down to generations that follow until the end of time appointed by and known only to God. The passage shows clearly that Luther could exhort his students to prayer and concern for future generations in the face of grave threats against the gospel and the ministry that proclaims it. This tension between a sense of spiritual degeneracy and the simultaneous renewal of the gospel can be seen in many passages of the lectures on Genesis. In comments on Genesis 31:19, where Rachel is described as having stolen the household gods of her father Laban, Luther reminded his students that the false church (with its idolatry) and the true church always exist together as wheat and tares (Matt. 13:25)—“it cannot be otherwise in the world.”25 Of his own time, Luther could say, “There is no idol or ungodliness in Wittenberg,” and point as evidence to the fact that in Wittenberg the pastor of the church (Johannes Bugenhagen) “teaches rightly and fights against idolatry and likewise censures the faults of men.” Also, the civil magistrate does not support idolatry. Yet, in the neighboring region of ducal Saxony, Duke Georg ordered the papal religion preserved and therefore “the church was not true and pure there.”26 True church and false church exist side by side as wheat and tares in the vast field of the world. Later in his lectures, Luther cited the example of Jacob’s faithful household to teach his students that the word like rain upon the earth is 24WA 42:321.22–26 (LW 2:84); and WA 42:321.27–34, 322.8–12 (LW 2:84–85). Philip Melanchthon is reported as expressing a similar view to his students in 1559: “You young people are now yet living in the golden time, but there will soon hereafter follow much more horrible, more afflicted times.” Quoted in Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 1 (see also 269n1). 25WA 44:23.20–25 (LW 6:32). On Luther’s and later Lutheran interpretations of this passage, see Mattox, Defender of the Most Holy Matriarchs, 206–23. 26WA 44:25.4–10 (LW 6:34).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 192 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FIVE

192

given not for only one or two but for the conversion of many. “You should not think that when I and Pomeranus [Johannes Bugenhagen] are removed, all good and godly men have been taken away. Our Lord God has more godly people. But for all that, the godly are miracles in the world and gifts of God because the greatest part is ungodly.”27 The most striking testimonies of Luther’s optimistic outlook toward the world in his present time were in his lecture on the blessing of Jacob upon his grandsons Ephraim and Manasseh and later upon his sons (Gen. 48–49). Luther noted how Jacob, contrary to the law, elevated the younger son Ephraim over his elder brother. In the same way, God blesses the church of the New Testament with spiritual and eternal blessings far outshining the temporal blessings promised to its elder brother, the church in the Old Testament. These riches come through the promises of the gospel. But the papal church had so valued temporal power and rewards that these promises had been “horribly obscured and suppressed”—so much so that Luther recalled at the time a monk who in the early years of the Reformation had exclaimed, “Good God! I never heard anything about the promises in my whole life.” In contrast, Luther could go on to assure his students, “At the present time, thanks to the boundless kindness of God, we have the most magnificent glory of Christ, as it appears from our sermons and the whole ministry.” Through baptism a pastor delivers an infant from the kingdom of darkness and brings it into the kingdom of light. It is not a temporal warfare or kingdom but a spiritual and eternal one that is in view: “For here I am not destroying the kingdom of the Turk or of Augustus or of the king of the Persians. No, I am destroying the kingdom of the prince and god of this world.” This is a glory “far greater and more lustrous than that of the fathers.”28 It is because this superior glory is obscured under the papacy that this “antichrist” is worthy of hatred.29 No other word can describe the intensity and sense of urgency present in Luther’s expressions in these texts. For the papal antichrist obscures in the church itself the very purpose and power of the church and its ministry. Called to wage cosmic warfare by utilizing the spiritual weapons of the word and sacraments, the papacy instead wields human weapons in the effort to preserve and increase its physical kingdom in this world. The professor used an apocalyptic image from Daniel 10:20 (“the prince of the 27WA

44:92.32–41 (LW 6:124), italics indicate original text in German. 44:709.32–37, 710.40–711.20 (LW 8:179–81); and WA 44:712.9–23 (LW 8:182–8). 29WA 44:714.27–34 (LW 8:185). See also chapter 4, pages 169, 175–76 above. 28WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 193 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD IN THE LAST DAYS

193

Persians”) to show that the metaphysical warfare God had waged on behalf of his Old Testament people as described by the prophet fades in comparison to the spiritual warfare engaged when a simple pastor or even a layman baptizes an infant and so plunders Satan’s kingdom.30 Luther went on to describe the spiritual power present in this New Testament people of God in a long discourse on the messianic prophecy of Jacob recorded in Genesis 49:11–12: Binding his foal to the vine and his ass’s colt to the choice shoot of the vine, He washes his garments in wine and his vesture in the blood of grapes; His eyes shall be red with wine, and his teeth white with milk.31

Dismissing the perplexities devised (Luther believed) by the grammarians over this passage, the Reformer interpreted the prophecy as speaking figuratively of the time of the Messiah: “Jacob is speaking through the Holy Spirit about the wonderful kingdom of Christ and its opulence.”32 Comparing the prophecy with passages in Ephesians 5 and Acts 2 about being filled with the Holy Spirit, Luther described the godly in the New Testament as so filled with the Holy Spirit “that they cannot keep from breaking forth into thanksgiving, confession, glorifying God, and teaching and sounding forth the word of the gospel.” Like the apostles and martyrs who were “inebriated with the Holy Spirit,” so throughout the time of Christ “we must become inebriated on the abundance of his house.” Luther taught his students that by receiving the Holy Spirit from hearing the word, “we become different men, just as an inebriated man conducts himself far differently than one who is fasting and famished.” Luther, according to his students’ record of his lecture, broke into German here and there as he described the kingdom of Christ not as a kingdom of law or the sword but as a kingdom where the people are filled with good things: He will inebriate and gladden the subjects of his kingdom, they will become totally different people; they will be completely changed. They will not eat chaff but grapes, and indeed the very finest, until they

30In Daniel 10:20, the angel Michael returns to fight against the spiritual “principem Persarum” who in the metaphysical realm fights on behalf of the Persian Empire and its king. 31WA 44:759.14–17 (LW 8:246). 32WA 44:759.18–761.17 (LW 8:246–48), quote at WA 44:761.14–16.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 194 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

194

CHAPTER FIVE become dead drunk. But they will be spiritually inebriated, so that men think of them and see them not differently than they judged concerning the apostles, that they are filled with new wine.33

Luther developed this text orally in a discourse that stretches over fifteen pages in the original printed edition prepared from the notebooks of his students.34 Apocalyptic language and themes surfaced frequently, especially in a passage where the professor expanded on this comparison with the apostles and martyrs by describing this inebriation as the condition of the church in his own day. Luther taught his students that it is necessary that “we are inebriated with the Holy Spirit and that we not fear the pope and the ragings of all the tyrants and devils. This is the voice and glory of the churches, that we have been bound to the vine so that we are inebriated with the Holy Spirit.”35 The repetition of phrases must have been mentally intoxicating as the professor worked and massaged his text through its oral proclamation. “I too have Satan as an exceedingly bitter foe,” Luther exclaimed. But though the devil hated him and had often sought his soul, the Reformer took comfort in the knowledge that all the hairs of his head are numbered (Matt. 10:30); that is, he and all Christians live under the protecting providence of God. The devil attacks Christians (Luther says “us”) with false doctrine and fanaticism, and these struggles are worse than open violence. “Yet here, too, we despise all men and all the wisdom and insolence of the world and break through, because we are not inebriated with the wine that makes life dissolute and disordered, but this is a holy drunkenness by which we become accustomed to discipline.” This “drunkenness” reigns in the time of the Messiah. “When the hearing of the peoples begins, they will become drunk and happy, and they will scoff at the devil and death in such a way that the world will regard them as insane and out of their senses.” Such Christians harm no one but seek to help even those who are hostile to them, for they “are inebriated and have the remission of sins and redemption from death and hell.”36 Indeed, we laugh at the devil and at the pope, who raves and rages more cruelly than Diocletian and all tyrants. Yet the pope, along with 33WA 44:761.18–34 (LW 8:248–249); and WA 44:761.38–762.3 (LW 8:249), italics indicate original text in German. 34In Genesin enarrationum (1554), CCXXVr–CCXXXIIr; cf. WA 44:760.32–779.4 (LW 8:248–72). 35WA 44:763.8–12 (LW 8:251). 36WA 44:763.19–30 (LW 8:251); and WA 44:763.37–764.3 (LW 8:252).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 195 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD IN THE LAST DAYS

195

his cardinals, is far more stupid than Diocletian, who was a wise and prudent ruler. They are asses pure and simple, without any sense and understanding. Therefore I do not care about the pope. The angrier he is, the less I am concerned about it. I know that we shall judge angels, as well as emperor, king, and the other evil worms, together with all rulers.37

This is apocalyptic language, but it is not concerned with the temporal imminence of the victory here predicted. Together with an intense sense of the cosmic and metaphysical reality and significance of spiritual warfare in the midst of everyday life, Luther’s words hold out the hope of certain triumph, whether that triumph occur in the near or the distant future. Far from being overwhelmed by pessimism in the face of threats looming against the Reformation—threats that were indeed very real in 1545 when Luther was delivering these lectures on the last chapters of Genesis—the Reformer here describes himself and his followers as living in a golden age.38 At that time, the armies of the emperor were preparing to attack Evangelical Germany and to compel the German states back into the fold of the papal church. Still, for Luther it is nonetheless the messianic age prophesied by Jacob. Inebriated with the Holy Spirit on the abundant wine of God’s promise in the word, Luther taught his students that they could be defiant in the face of papal and imperial threats and confident of ultimate triumph, though that triumph be delayed until Judgment Day itself.

The Plight of the Gospel in the World Such defiance in the face of looming threats and confidence of eschatological triumph did not mean, however, that Luther was oblivious to or unconcerned about the church’s present struggle in the world. Many passages in the Genesis lectures illustrate how Luther perceived the plight of the gospel in his own day, specifically in Germany. The Reformer was well aware of the good effect a supportive prince or city council could have on the life of the churches upholding the gospel. At the same time, Luther quite often expressed the judgment that supportive governments were rare indeed. The Reformer believed—and taught his students to believe—that as the true churches proclaimed the gospel they might find some support from Evangelical rulers. But more often they would meet indifference, 37WA

44:764.3–10 (LW 8:252), italics indicate original text in German. the reality of both pessimism and optimism in the older Luther’s view of the church, see Hendrix, “Kingdom of Promise.” 38On

Luther's Genesis.book Page 196 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FIVE

196

greed (leading to the plundering of ecclesiastical property that should be preserved for the church and its ministry), and tyranny and persecution of the gospel and those who believe and proclaim it. In his comments on Abimelech (Gen. 20), who represented for Luther a civil ruler supportive of the church in the patriarchal age, the professor included in his oral commentary both positive and negative examples among the rulers of his day.39 There were princes like those who confessed the Evangelical faith at Augsburg in 1530. But Luther argued that many rulers show contempt for the word, blame all evils on the gospel, and earn the just punishment of God, which will overtake all such despisers in due time.40 So also in another context Luther wondered aloud why God “revealed the light of the gospel” to the uncouth and rude people of Germany, a land where peasants, burghers, and nobles “are more like swine than like men.” He described the ministry as “successfully cleansed of all error and idolatry” but noted that the ministry is often reviled and ministers often killed. The renewal of the gospel and its occasional receptive hearing are nevertheless a miraculous divine work: Today we have the seeing eye, that is, the pure doctrine of the word; but we do not find a hearing ear, because our doctrine is held in contempt—no, rather much more, is horribly blasphemed. Where both are to be found, however, God has surely brought this about, and it is a divine miracle, in which God and the angels in heaven rejoice.41

As Luther noted, this miraculous combination of seeing and hearing is rare, and even in Reformation Germany the ministry of the gospel was despised and the gospel itself blamed for all kinds of evils. Just as the Canaanites no doubt blamed Abraham when along with his sojourn in Canaan came famine (Gen. 26), so, Luther argued, Satan stirs up blasphemy against God so that people claim that nothing good has resulted from the teaching of the gospel. The gospel is blamed as prices rise and prosperity decreases and morals grow more corrupt. The persecution of the gospel in the world is akin to Jacob’s mistreatment by his father-in-law,

39On

Abimelech, see chapter 3, pages 81–84 above. 43:119.29–121.18 (LW 3:340–42). See also WA 43:131.25–132.6 (LW 3:356–57). Luther also used Pharaoh’s invitation that Joseph’s entire clan come to Egypt during the famine as an occasion for praising the few rulers who support the ministry of the gospel, while he also complains in the same place about “our princes” who plunder the churches and their income. WA 44:624.40–625.6, 625.35– 626.9 (LW 8:62–63). 41WA 43:285.31–38, 287.15–23 (LW 4:208, 210–11); and WA 43:288.8–10 (LW 4:211–12). 40WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 197 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD IN THE LAST DAYS

197

Laban. Despite the world’s usury and greed and stinginess toward the true church and its ministers, the wealth of such “Labanites” eventually will be dissipated. But Luther promised his students, “One day you young men will see the children of greedy men in want and begging and, on the other hand, the promise of the Holy Spirit fulfilled: ‘I have not seen the righteous man forsaken, and his seed begging bread.’ ”42 An apocalyptic sense of crisis and confidence in its divine eschatological resolution emerge from Luther’s oral commentary on Jacob’s departure from the stingy “Labanites”: Thus we, too, can enjoy the spoils of the world with a good conscience, although we must snatch our food from the claws of harpies, the world, and the devil. For they hate us and say that they have no need for pastors and ministers. But God says to the contrary: “I have need of the church, and you are my ministers. Therefore endure wrongs and tyranny for my sake. I will take care to distribute some spoils among you; I will give you a good prince to offer you lodging. I shall not give you the world as I have given it to the Turk, and likewise to the Epicureans and usurers, before whom I must set the wealth of the world and whom I must fatten for the eternal fire. But to you I shall give a small portion that will be like spoils. If it involves you in great trouble and toil, consider that I have torn it away from the world like the possessions of Jacob and the spoils of the Egyptians.”43

Jacob, as noted in the previous chapter, was Luther’s chief example in Genesis of the church struggling through its worldly sojourn. As a result of Jacob’s wrestling with God (Gen. 32:24–30), he feels the pain in his thigh and walks with a limp the rest of his life. So also throughout its worldly sojourn the church’s glory will be hidden “under a dark and horrible cover.” Luther described “the state of our church” in similar terms. It has the word and the sacraments but also “an infinite number of adversaries—princes, nobles, citizens, domestics, and pupils, and finally our own flesh that we carry about with us.” The professor shared with his students how he himself often questioned why he had begun to teach after he saw “such contempt, aversion, and hatred for the word arising from men after the rebirth of the light of the gospel.” Yet it is God who is hidden; “this is his peculiar property.” It seems that God is forsaking the church as it is

42WA 43WA

43:435.26–436.19 (LW 5:10–11); and WA 43:683.5–684.12, 685.21–24 (LW 5:368–72). 44:16.39–17.8 (LW 6:23–24). See also WA 44:14.10–15.22 (LW 6:20–21).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 198 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FIVE

198

robbed of the patronage it is due. “But in faith, in the word, and in the sacraments he is revealed and seen.”44 For Luther, the plight of the gospel in the world is therefore to bear with the continuous opposition and affliction that God himself bears in his self-revelation to the world in Jesus Christ. It is God’s purpose in history to gather a church, and for this reason alone the world stands and empires are preserved. In one moment Luther exhorted his students to give thanks to God that many are gained through the word, while in the next he bemoaned the fact that in Evangelical Germany, where the gospel shines its light, there is little to be seen but gormandizing and squander and waste among princes. “Here there is no hope of improvement, but this breakdown of morals must be endured in this extreme old age of a mad world.”45 With such vivid expressions the Reformer described the age in which he lived both as a golden age of the renewed gospel and as the dregs of time, the extreme old age of a world gone mad.

INTERPRETING THE TIMES Luther the Prophet To this enigmatic epoch of his present world, Martin Luther proclaimed the word of God concerning the future. There is a sizeable literature on Luther as a prophet of God.46 Scholars have analyzed both Luther’s perception that he held a prophetic office and the judgment of many of his contemporaries and followers that the Reformer was uniquely called in his generation as a prophet and even as “the last prophet of the Holy Scripture.”47 Disputes among historians regarding these questions have centered not on the reality of Luther’s prophetic office but rather on the significance and specific meaning such a status had in Luther’s self-perception and how the Reformer as prophet functioned as an authority among later generations within Evangelical (Lutheran) communities. That the professor spoke prophetically to his students concerning the future of Germany and of the 44WA

44:110.12–33 (LW 6:147–48). 44:559.10–12 (LW 7:348); and WA 44:559.42–560.2, 33–41 (LW 7:349–51). 46Among the more important studies (ordered chronologically): Preuss, Martin Luther: Der Prophet; Hillerdal, “Prophetische Züge”; Oberman, “Martin Luther: Vorläufer”; Lohse, “Luthers Selbsteinschätzung”; Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis; and Hendrix, “More Than a Prophet.” For the image of Luther as prophet among his followers, see especially Kolb, Martin Luther as Prophet. 47Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 252, citing Graebner, Prognosticon oder Erklärung. 45WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 199 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD IN THE LAST DAYS

199

world is evident from many passages in the Genesis lectures.48 These inform our picture of the Reformer’s understanding of his office in the last decade of his life. They also yield important insights into his vision of the world’s future in the throes (he believed) of its last days. In several passages of the Genesis lectures, but most succinctly in his comments on Joseph’s dreams (Gen. 37:9), the professor held forth from his lectern on the subject of dreams and visions as revelations from God. The basic elements of Luther’s view were clearly laid out and oft repeated in an exercise of the word that extends over five pages in the original printed text.49 Luther introduced the subject with a caveat: he would explain the matter only briefly because he was not qualified either to have dreams or to interpret them, nor did he seek that ability or knowledge. He explained: I have concluded a pact with my Lord God that he should not send me visions or dreams or even angels. For I am content with this gift that I have, holy scripture, which abundantly teaches and supplies all things necessary both for this life and also for the life to come. This I believe…and I am certain that I cannot be deceived. However, I do not detract from the gifts of others, if God by chance reveals something to someone beyond scripture through dreams, through visions, through angels. They may be gifts, to be sure, but I am not concerned about them and do not desire them. For I am influenced by that infinite multitude of illusions, deceptions, and impostures, by which the world was horribly deceived for a long time through Satan under the papacy. I am also influenced by the sufficiency of scripture, and if I do not put my faith in this, I shall not easily believe an angel, a vision, or a dream.50

The important elements of the Reformer’s view of revelations beyond scripture are present in this one brief quotation and are further worked out through the remainder of his lecture on Genesis 37:9. The passage shows that what Luther believed he was given to say as a prophet of God was to be drawn solely from the Bible. Though he did not deny the existence of prophetic revelations beyond scripture, he did not seek them. He believed that such revelations were not only unnecessary but have often deceived those who believed them. 48For Luther’s prophetic posture in his other writings, see esp. Hillerdal, “Prophetische Züge”; and Edwards, Luther’s Last Battles, 97–114. 49In Genesin enarrationum (1554), VIr–VIIIr. Cf. WA 44:246.1–251.41 (LW 6:329–36). 50WA 44:246.11–22 (LW 6:329).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 200 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FIVE

200

As the lecture continued, the professor cited numerous passages from the Bible concerning dreams. The scripture, he explained, “sometimes approves of dreams and at other times disapproves of them.” Sometimes they have led people astray (Sir. 34), and sometimes they have increased in frequency, but the critical question remained whether God was feared (Eccles. 5). “Sacred history testifies that the holy patriarchs and prophets had dreams,” but while the Lord also told Aaron that though he revealed himself to prophets in visions and dreams, God spoke face-toface with Moses.51 Drawing conclusions from these passages, the Reformer outlined “three means of revelation from the beginning in the church of the fathers and prophets”: first and foremost is prophecy or inspiration; second are “visions or certain images and appearances”; and third, dreams. Then he explained, But since holy scripture both approves these three types of revelation and also condemns them, it seems that the same rule and judgment should be followed in regard to dreams that we are accustomed to follow in visions and prophecies, namely, the analogy of faith.… For they do not always arise only from God but also from the devil, who is God’s ape, and just as he is accustomed to awake prophets, so he also stirs up visions and dreams, God permitting this in his wonderful counsel.52

For Luther, therefore, revelations beyond holy scripture—whether prophecies, visions, or dreams—must be tested by the content of scripture, which he calls here the analogy of faith.53 The professor cited testimonies from the histories of the Gentiles about dreams and their interpretation, and mentioned the predictions of the fifteenth-century prophet and astrologer Johann Lichtenberger (d. 1503), and the De villa Dei of Arnold of Villanova (d. 1311), a Spiritual Franciscan and follower of Joachim of Fiore. Sometimes their predictions came true, sometimes not.54 But in the

51WA

44:246.31–247.4 (LW 6:330). 44:247.17–23 (LW 6:330–31). 53Later in the lecture, Luther described his judgment of dreams as “according to the norm and rule of the word of God.” WA 44:248.38 (LW 6:332–33). 54WA 44:247.27–39 (LW 6:331 and 331n13). On Luther’s view of Lichtenberger, see Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 146–47, and the preface Luther wrote to a new edition of Lichtenberger’s prophecies, WA 23:7–12. Barnes (146) judges that Luther published this edition “partly to oppose what he saw as the astrological excesses of his day,” spelling out his own position in the preface. Barnes mentions Arnold (or Arnald) only briefly (24, 241). On Arnold one may also consult Reeves, Influence of XXXXXX 52WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 201 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD IN THE LAST DAYS

201

scripture, when God reveals a dream to ungodly men like Pharaoh or Nebuchadnezzar, the divine interpretation is revealed not through ungodly or false prophets but through true prophets like Joseph or Daniel, “who teach its significance under the illumination of the Holy Spirit.”55 His conviction that prophetic status and the receiving of visions and dreams is no guarantee of divine inspiration or illumination distinguishes Luther and his followers from the prophetic traditions of the Middle Ages, which had a lively tradition of reliance on revelations that were beyond holy scripture. For Luther, prophecies, just like visions and dreams, were often the result of the devil’s inspiration, based on his own substantial knowledge of and lack of regard for human affairs.56 When Luther spoke of the future in the apocalyptic context of his age, this was not a claim to special revelation from God but was rather the faithful hearing of the word of God in scripture. Through the voice of the professor at his lectern in Wittenberg, the prophets and apostles who wrote the Bible were heard as speaking about the future of Evangelical and papal Germany. Luther spoke in ways that recalled not so much the grand sweep of history revealed through apocalyptic prophets but the clear judgment of God against sin and unbelief characteristic of the prophets sent by God to his people Israel, especially Elijah, Jeremiah, and John the Baptist.57

God’s Judgment Looming over Germany and the World In several passages of the Genesis lectures, Luther can be observed taking up the prophetic mantle by proclaiming to his students that their homeland of Germany was inviting the punishment and judgment of God by resisting the preaching of God’s word, both the law (judgment) and the gospel (grace). Luther expressed his belief of the imminence of the last day and final judgment in his exposition of the narrative about the Flood (Gen. 6). The Reformer applied this narrative to his day by focusing on the papists’ rejection of the gospel even as they claimed for themselves the 55

Prophecy, 314–17; and McGinn, Visions of the End, 222–25, 334, together with the bibliography cited in these works. 55WA 44:249.1–22 (LW 6:333). 56WA 44:247.34–36, 248.20–24, 249.34–250.14 (LW 6:331–34). 57Scott Hendrix (“More Than a Prophet,” 20) notes about Oberman’s “prophetic Luther”: “He was no longer just a new kind of theologian or a reformer of the usual type, who wanted to transform church and society. From Oberman’s pen he rose up as a prophet of God’s own reformation calling the people to repent and believe before it was too late. Luther began to look less like Ockham, Biel, Gerson, von Staupitz, or even Augustine, and more like John the Baptist.”

Luther's Genesis.book Page 202 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FIVE

202

title of church.58 But Luther did not limit his prophetic preaching of the law in the lecture hall to papists in his present-day Christendom. On the contrary, Luther taught his students that when God declared through Noah or one of the other patriarchs, “My Spirit shall not continually judge in man” (Gen. 6:3), this patriarch was carrying out a public function of the church in his own community by preaching toward the conviction and reproval of sin.59 This preaching threatened the most severe of all God’s judgments— God would withhold the gift of his word, “since all teaching is in vain.” The Reformer applied these words not only to papists but first of all to the situation in Germany during his own lifetime, when Satan “tries every means to obstruct the word of God” by the proliferation of sects. “What will happen when we are dead?” Luther asked, and then suggested that “whole packs of Sacramentarians, Anabaptists, Antinomians,” and the like were “eagerly waiting for any opportunity to establish their doctrines.” In this context, Luther exhorted his students to recognize that the twofold duty of a priest (pastor) is to turn to God in prayer for himself and his people, and “to turn from God to men by means of doctrine and the word.” But if this ministry is “abolished or corrupted,” people cannot pray but are taken over by the devil’s power and grieve the Holy Spirit, falling “into the sin unto death for which one may not pray (1 John 5).” Then the professor continued: Yet how common this sin is today among all classes! Princes, nobles, even commoners and peasants refuse to be reproved; they themselves rather reprove the Holy Spirit and judge him in his ministers. For they judge the ministry by the lowliness of the person. These are their thoughts: “This minister is poor and unimportant. Why, then, should he reprove me; for I am a prince, a nobleman, a magistrate?” Therefore, rather than put up with it, they despise the ministers together with the ministry itself and the word. Must we not fear judgment of God like the one he pronounces here upon the first world?60

Luther described how without the extraordinary strength provided by God “he would long since have been worn out and discouraged by this stubbornness of the unrepentant world.” Like Jeremiah, Luther wished

58See

chapter 4, pages 157–70 above. 42:273.3–5 (LW 2:16). 60WA 42:274.26–38 (LW 2:18); and WA 42:275.11–31 (LW 2:19). 59WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 203 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD IN THE LAST DAYS

203

sometimes that he had never undertaken the task of preaching. He told his students, “I often pray God that he would permit our generation to die together with us, because after our passing most perilous times will follow.” Like Elijah, the Reformer and his followers were regarded as “troublers of Germany.” “But it is a good sign, when men condemn us and call us authors of agitation. For such is the Spirit of God, who strives with men, reproves and condemns them.” Only at this point in the lecture did Luther begin to address this preaching of the law to the papists.61 Nevertheless the Reformer’s view of the universal and eschatological import of this passage came to the fore as he warned his students: Today, when the day of the Lord is drawing near, the situation is almost the same. We urge the papists to repent. We urge and warn our noblemen, burghers, and peasants not to continue to despise the word; for God will not leave this unavenged. But we are spending our strength in vain, as scripture says. Few faithful are edified; these are gradually taken away before the calamity, and “no one understands,” as is stated in Isaiah 56 [57:1]. But after the Lord has thus beaten out the wheat and has gathered the grain in its place, what do you think will happen to the chaff? It will inevitably be burned with unquenchable fire (Matt. 3). This will be the lot of the world. The world does not realize that this is being done now, that through the preaching of the gospel the wheat is being separated from the chaff and is being gathered into the granary, so that later on the chaff, that is, the mass of the unbelievers, who live in darkness and idolatry, may be consigned in the fire.… Those who allow this day of salvation to pass will have God as their punisher. For he is not inclined to take upon himself the useless task of threshing empty chaff.62

The passage reveals a great deal about Martin Luther’s understanding of himself as a prophet of God addressing church and world in the world’s last days. The gospel of God not only justifies sinners through faith but also separates those who believe from the mass of unbelievers who will be damned. Preaching the gospel is an eschatological act, always done in the shadow of the last day. That Luther viewed that day as imminent is clear throughout the passage and also later as he went on to apply to “our age” Christ’s prediction of the last days as similar to the days of Noah and 61WA 42:276.1–12 (LW 2:20); and WA 42:276.18–277.2 (LW 2:20–21). Some of these passages are cited above in chapter 4, page 165. 62WA 42:278.39–279.11 (LW 2:24).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 204 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FIVE

204

Lot (Matt. 24:37).63 But Luther neither calculated the time of the end nor did he suggest that the reality of God’s judgment upon sinners would be altered should that time in fact be in the distant future. In Luther’s understanding, the judgment of God that loomed over Germany and the world was not limited to the Last Judgment, the eschatological and eternal condemnation of sin and unbelief. The Genesis lectures also reveal Luther as a prophet of God proclaiming future temporal judgment upon papal and Evangelical Germany. God threatens this judgment, Luther believed, on account of the unbelief the gospel too often meets when it is proclaimed. An important passage expressing this is found in a predictable place: Luther’s exposition of the narrative about the destruction of Sodom (Gen. 19). In this context the Reformer warned that “a great and certain catastrophe is threatening Germany, and the more we cry out and the more earnestly we exhort people to repent, the worse our opponents become.” But this reproval from Luther and others met not repentance but blasphemy and persecution; the Reformer described his opponents as “utterly uncontrollable and…intent on their own destruction and that of all Germany.” God cannot continue to put up with such blasphemy for long. “Yet since the punishment cannot be averted, love prays that God may delay it, if perhaps some may still be converted.” This merciful love and prayer on the part of God’s faithful toward their enemies is balanced by their trust that at the proper time God will rain temporal as well as eternal punishment on those who continue in their unbelief. The papists as “the pests of the last times” fall under the eschatological judgment foretold by Peter (2 Pet. 2:6). Luther could therefore encourage his students to patience: “We shall wait patiently until the Lord destroys these Sodomites of ours, and we shall put forth every effort to avoid being found doing the wicked deeds of the church of the pope.” Nevertheless, as the example of a devastating earthquake that year (1538) in Naples had shown (in Luther’s view), such judgment could be present and temporal, not only reserved for the future and eternal punishment announced on the last day.64

63WA

42:279.12–18 (LW 2:25). 43:74.1–9 (LW 3:278); and WA 43:85.15–24, 86.1–4, 86.38–87.2 (LW 3:293–95). On the chronology, see LW 3:x, 295n64. Luther described the earthquake as occurring “not by some chance, as the papists think, but because of the sins of the people, of which there is no end.” WA 43:86.42–87.2 (LW 3:295). See also WA 43:360.4–6, 363.16–27 (LW 4:312, 317) for Luther’s predictions of calamity upon Germany after his death, as “Epicureans” continued to deny the future life and thus portrayed God’s threatening of punishment as ridiculous. 64WA

Luther's Genesis.book Page 205 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD IN THE LAST DAYS

205

A striking passage where the Reformer threatened temporal punishment upon Evangelical regions in Germany is his exposition of the slaying of the Shechemites by Simeon and Levi to avenge the rape of Dinah (Gen. 34:13–26). Just as the Shechemites foolishly fell into the brothers’ plot for retribution, so the histories of the nations as well as scripture testify that— precisely when judgment is looming—people and their rulers become caught up in common sins and become fools. Luther applied this to his present world: “Today also, when the Turkish armies are about to devastate Germany, all places must first be filled with usury, treachery, malice, treason, and persecution so that the iniquities of the Amorites are filled up; in short, we must act in such a way that our sins become ripe.” The folly of princes becomes the tool in God’s hands to punish the people for their sins and unbelief “because we do not listen and are not corrected by the voice and divine threatenings.” Later, as he described the cruelty of the slaughter, Luther noted how cruelty in human affairs, such as the slaughters and captivity perpetrated by the Turks, was the “secret judgment and wrath of God.” History is filled with such examples and Luther’s contemporary Germany would be no exception: So we today teach and charge our fellow citizens to hear and embrace the word of God with grateful hearts and to cease provoking God’s wrath with their cheating, plunderings, and usury. But there is no limit or end to their greed, rapacity, and cheating in their contracts and their whole life. Therefore, we move nothing forward by teaching and censuring, but sins are heaped up and go about with impunity. Therefore, when a prince comes and imposes a garrison on a city and when the soldiers wildly vent their madness on those whom they should have protected and defended, then we cry out that we are being oppressed unjustly, and we complain about the tyranny of the princes. But such things should have been thought of long before, and the Lord God should have been heeded when he gave warning of these things and invited us to repentance by his word.65

These passages demonstrate how Luther utilized historical narratives from Genesis in a prophetic preachment of God’s judgment against sin and unbelief in his own day, among his own people in Germany. They show that, for the Reformer, the preacher’s task was not solely the preaching of justification of sinners through the forgiveness of sins, but was also 65WA 44:152.35–153.6 (LW 6:206), italics indicate original text in German; WA 44:153.33–38 (LW 6:207); and WA 44:156.32–157.1 (LW 6:211).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 206 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FIVE

206

the preaching of God’s law and the threat of temporal and eternal punishment. This was especially true in regard to Luther’s message of judgment toward persistent sin and unbelief, manifest both among papal persecutors of the gospel and among “Epicurean” despisers of the gospel, and within Evangelical territories as well. These passages also reveal Luther instilling in his students an Evangelical identity that comprehended not only God’s mercy toward sinners but also his wrath against persistent sin and unbelief. Like the prophets of the Old Testament, Luther’s proclamation of God’s word in his lectures on Genesis spoke forth God’s judgment not only upon the sin of the “nations” but also upon the sin of God’s own people. For the Old Testament prophets, this meant preaching judgment against Israel as well as against Israel’s enemies. For Luther in sixteenthcentury Germany, this meant proclaiming the judgment of God against resistance and indifference to the gospel, not only among “papists” but also among Evangelical princes, burghers, and peasants. As Luther looked to the future in light of the indifference and resistance to the gospel in his own day, he viewed God’s judgment upon Germany as imminent and devastating. Lectures he delivered on the famine that plagued Egypt and Canaan in the days of Joseph reveal how the professor cultivated in his students an understanding of temporal affliction and suffering as instruments of God. Even as God shows forth his grace through the word, so too he sends famine and pestilence, and in this way he “disciplines his saints and strengthens their faith” even as he “punishes the ingratitude of the world.”66 In his comments throughout this passage, Luther viewed the future of his land with great foreboding. Quoting Augustine on the Psalms, the Reformer noted that there is no peace without righteousness. The people persist in sin and the government is silent. “Therefore,” Luther concluded, “the punishments will come. Then we will cry out, but God will not hear us as we cry out in our punishments; for we did not hear him crying out against our sins through his ministers.” Most emphatically censured were princes and city magistrates who did not properly support ministers of the word but rather despoiled parishes and schools. “Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, will stand up at the Last Judgment and will condemn the princes and magistrates of Germany,” the prophet Luther proclaimed, for unlike the present German rulers, the Pharaoh of Egypt had provided a fixed

66WA

44:664.39–665.38 (LW 8:117–18).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 207 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD IN THE LAST DAYS

207

allowance for the priests (Gen. 47:22). Germany is hastening toward its judgment: Therefore, the sins of Germany are ripening and the punishments will not delay. For already the princes are being sucked dry by the usurers, and plunderings of various kinds are increasing every day. Thus it comes about that what has not been given to God must be paid to the devil.… What Christ does not take, the treasury takes.… When you are not disposed to give a single groschen to a student or a minister of the word for the glory of God and our own salvation, you will be compelled later to pay 1,000 guldens to a godless soldier and to Satan.67

For Luther, the future was not completely subsumed under his belief in the imminence of the last day. Next to the final overthrow of the devil and his antichrist looms the lesser judgment of God upon those who despise his word and fail to uphold the ministry of the word. Though the last day could not be far off, in his lectures on Genesis, Luther often expressed the view that it would be after the death of his own generation. More immediately, however, Luther believed that God would act to discipline his faithful and punish those resisting the gospel while there was yet time for repentance.

The Back of God This revelatory and salvific activity of God in time, disciplining believers and punishing those who resist the gospel, is the key to grasping Martin Luther’s apocalyptic mentality. God’s future works would not be different in kind from the activity of God in the past and in the present. They would differ only in intensity, and since intensity is a relative concept, for Luther the signs of the last day must always remain obscure—until, that is, their fulfillment. Historians have recognized that Luther’s fervent belief in the imminence of the last day was determined largely by his belief, already by 1519, that in the papacy the antichrist had long since been established and was now being exposed.68 Since that discovery, there had been many other indications that the apocalyptic struggle between God and the devil was now approaching its period of highest intensity and thus its culmination. The Reformer sent by God (his followers believed) to renew the gospel had 67WA

44:666.34–667.38 (LW 8:120–21); and WA 44:671.1–27 (LW 8:126). (Luther and the Papacy) traces the development of Luther’s view that the papacy was the fulfillment of the biblical prophecy of the antichrist. See also Oberman, Luther, 67–72; and Oberman, Reformation: Roots and Ramifications, 30–33. 68Hendrix

Luther's Genesis.book Page 208 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

208

CHAPTER FIVE

been condemned by both church and empire. Those who followed the gospel had been persecuted by both papal and imperial authorities. Many had been martyred. Since the early 1530s, the threat of an imperial army crushing the principalities that had adopted the Reformation loomed large. The Ottoman Empire, viewed as a menace by those within the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation, had already crushed the Christian kingdom of Hungary and had for years threatened the eastern frontier of the empire itself. Many of Luther’s associates and followers had interpreted these and other signs as indications that the last day was near. Some even believed that its precise time could be predicted.69 But Luther treated this fascination with skepticism. As central as apocalypticism was both in his own mentality and in the thinking of his followers, what is striking is not Luther’s repeated indications that the last days must be at hand but rather his reluctance to go into the details of prophetic prediction and to calculate the times.70 The reason the Reformer held to this tension between belief in the nearness of the end and the reluctance to predict its timing—even when so many of his own followers were delighting in that speculative art—is his belief that the future remains hidden even though the basic patterns of history have been revealed. This aspect of Luther’s worldview is especially evident in his exposition of the Joseph story. Central to the dramatic structure of this narrative is that the climax or epitasis of Joseph’s life remains hidden—as in every good Greek comedy—until the end. The game that God was playing in Joseph’s life was an example of the saving activity of God in the life of every believer.71 Just as in the midst of his present sufferings, Joseph’s glorious future deliverance and elevation lay hidden until the climax of the comedy, so in the life of Christians—and therefore also for the church in every age—the future remains obscure until the last day dawns. Thus, in the present the experience of Christians is a time of suffering and the purposes of God cannot be perceived. The afflicted “struggle with unbelief,” “the flesh is distressed and tortured,” “reason despairs,” “the will murmurs,” and “finally all the senses are completely downcast.” But like a 69On the perception of the Turkish threat among Luther’s contemporaries, see Bohnstedt, “Infidel Scourge of God”; and Schwoebel, Shadow of the Crescent. For a fascinating study of the apocalyptic fascination among Lutherans throughout the sixteenth century and into the seventeenth, see Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis. 70Luther was skeptical also of his own attempts to interpret biblical prophecies of the end, e.g., in Daniel. See Hillerdal, “Prophetische Züge,” 115. 71See chapter 1, pages 26–30, and chapter 3, pages 126–34 above.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 209 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD IN THE LAST DAYS

209

schoolboy who needs the discipline of the switch and receives it despite his pain and howls, so much more did Luther believe that the original evil and sin in adults is purged only through pain. The difference between believers and unbelievers is not that God blesses the former in temporal life while he punishes the latter. Rather, the Lord disciplines both—but in the midst of the pain the unbeliever resists and refuses to endure it, while the believer recognizes such discipline as “necessary because of the flesh.” 72 The professor taught his students that holy scripture reveals this struggle and is the only book to do so. God kills and brings back to life. The apostle Paul experienced this pattern with the thorn in his flesh and by God’s revelation to him that only in his weakness could God’s strength reign (2 Cor. 12:7–10). “This is the doctrine of Christians,” Luther says. These things are taught in scripture “in order that we may know what the theology of the gospel is.” It is different from the teaching of the law and of philosophy. Most importantly, it is a doctrine that cannot be fully grasped until the very end of the story: “You shall see my back,” the Lord says to Moses when he asked that God’s face be shown to him; that is, “After the fact you will perceive my thinking.” Thus here Joseph and Jacob and his sons do not see the face; they see the back. For when Joseph was sold and his father was grieving, the face of God was hidden. Nor did any God appear, but the whole world seemed to be full of devils. Now that his counsel has been fulfilled and made manifest, they clearly perceive and recognize the good, acceptable, and perfect will of God.73

As Luther looked at the events of his time, he did so in view of the prophetic future, the end of history, the judgment of God at the fulfillment of the ages. Holy scripture teaches Christians to understand the sufferings and torments of the present in the light of the “wonderful government of God,” whose name bears witness to his faithfulness in the midst of the sufferings of the saints. The professor led his students to reflect on the present manifestations of this wonderful government: the pope and his confederates were raging furiously and there was no doubt that disasters were threatening on every side. What would they do in the face of such persecution? “We are not going to say, are we, that our religion is erroneous because kings and princes condemn it and cruelly persecute it? By no 72WA 73WA

44:585.6–11, 24–25 (LW 8:8); and WA 44:585.39–586.7, 15–19 (LW 8:9). 44:586.20–29, 587.5–20 (LW 8:10–11); and WA 44:601.13–25 (LW 8:30).

5_Luther Page 210 Thursday, December 27, 2007 8:20 AM

210

CHAPTER FIVE

means. But we shall determine as follows: ‘The Lord lives. I have been baptized. I have the word.’ ” In the face of all such afflictions, the flesh weakens but faith looks to God who is almighty. Just as Joseph in the end could see that God had worked through all his afflictions to preserve life (Gen. 45:5), so Luther believed that the apocalyptic struggles of the present will be unveiled in the denouement, the epitasis of the comedy. Luther taught his students to be patient as they behold only the terrible face of God: I do not know for what purpose God allows the Turk to rage and the pope to rave against the Christians. His face is altogether terrible when the Turk, the pope, and the tyrants rage with the sword and with slaughtering; but when heretics do so with their errors, heresies, and offenses, who will show us the face of God here—the face that we long to see? But nothing will happen. “You will see my back,” says the Lord. “Cling to my word, and believe. Entrust the administration and preservation of all things to me. Let me do as I please. But do not hesitate to risk wife, children, and all you possess rather than to reject or deny my word. If you do not see what I am doing now, Peter, you will know later.”74

In his lecture, the professor anticipated objections. What will happen in the meantime, as religion is destroyed? “What of it?” Luther replies. “Let God rule. Let him take care of this. The Lord will see to it that the church and a holy seed are preserved on earth.”75 “But you are being slaughtered in spite of this,” objects another. Luther does not care, for he believes in and confesses and calls upon Christ. The saintly fathers placed all their hope and trust in Christ and as a result benefited many people as Joseph did. It is only after the seed has fallen to the ground that “it becomes the physical and spiritual salvation of many lands.” God takes all the evil plans of the Turk and the pope and easily turns them into good. As Augustine said, “God is so good that he in no way permits an evil unless he knows how to draw good from it.”76 But after God has used his enemies 74WA 44:602.30–603.4 (LW 8:32); and WA 44:603.5–14 (LW 8:32), italics indicate original text in German. The cryptic reference to Peter in the last line probably alludes to the exchange recorded in John 13:7, with Matthew 16:23 also in the background. 75WA 44:605.38–40 (LW 8:36), italics indicate original text in German. On Luther’s optimism concerning the future of the church because of God’s control of the future, see Hendrix, “Kingdom of Promise.” 76WA 44:606.10–24 (LW 8:36–37). Cf. Augustine, Enchiridion on Faith, Hope and Love, 33: “For [God] judged it better to bring good out of evil, than not to permit any evil to exist.”

Luther's Genesis.book Page 211 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD IN THE LAST DAYS

211

for his own purposes, they will perish, according to the testimony of Daniel (12:7). When that will occur Luther did not say, but in this passage its imminence fades as the professor spoke of the ongoing activity of states and the procreation and education of children, many of whom “have not yet been born.”77 Luther later expressed his hope that “the day of our redemption and the Last Judgment” would come quickly—“for I long for it much more eagerly than I long for any physical liberation.” Any such relief would be replaced only by “another Mohammed and pope” and thus would be only a temporary change. Christians, instead, cast their burdens on the Lord (Ps. 55:22) and rejoice in the Lord in the midst of present anxiety (Phil. 4:4–6). “Let God care,” Luther concluded. “We are too stolid and wretched to be able to endure that mass of cares and worry about our affairs for even one moment.” The professor exhorted his students (and himself) to sustain themselves with the word and faith and not to doubt but to believe “that it has already been determined by God that he wants to turn these pains, troubles, and brief crosses with which the pope, the emperor, and Mohammed oppress us into everlasting and supreme joy.”78 If the apocalyptic mentality is correctly defined as a pattern of eschatological beliefs wherein all history is “a divinely predetermined drama in which the present is a time of crisis and in which a triumph of good over evil is imminent,” these passages of Luther’s lectures on Genesis illustrate how deeply his worldview was shaped by the Christian apocalyptic tradition.79 The interpretive problem turns, however, on the term “imminent.” Certainly Luther understood his age as an apocalyptic present, a time wherein the cosmic warfare between God and the devil was engaged with what appeared to him to be ever-increasing intensity. In this conviction, Luther was arguably no different from the writers of the New Testament, and indeed Jesus himself.80

77WA 78WA

44:609.39–610.4 (LW 8:42). 44:613.20–37 (LW 8:46–47), italics indicate original text in German; WA 44:614.3–8 (LW

8:47). 79Barnes,

“Apocalypticism.” See also Oberman, Reformation: Roots and Ramifications, 61. the “little apocalypse” of the synoptic gospels, the imminence of the last day is expressed through a compression of eschatological fulfillment with the apocalyptic events of the Jewish War and the destruction of Jerusalem, AD 70. The gospels record the promise of Jesus that “heaven and earth will pass away, but my word will never pass away. Of the day and hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but alone the Father” (Matt. 24:35, my trans. from Luther’s German Bible). On Jesus and New Testament apocalyptic, see especially Cullmann, Christ and Time. 80In

Luther's Genesis.book Page 212 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

212

CHAPTER FIVE

The Unity of History Central to Martin Luther’s apocalyptic view of the church and the world is that all human history from the Creation to the Last Judgment, stands before God’s back. God reveals himself through the cross and suffering: in the life of Christians in the world, in the Christian past, and in the apocalyptic present and future. This perception of the unity of all human history is more central to Luther’s thought than his belief in the imminence of the last day. In this understanding, Luther was not very different from Augustine. Both doctors of the church perceived universal history as the unfolding of God’s activity of judgment and salvation.81 The scourges of God— whether manifested in the history and destiny of Rome or in the persecutions of the true church perpetrated by emperor, princes, pope, or Turks— were visited upon Christian, pagan, and false Christian alike, but their ultimate purpose was opposite. For Christians and for all who come in time to believe the promise of God in the gospel, the scourges of God are instruments of discipline, of the purging of the flesh from its slavery to sin, death, and the devil. For those who continue to reject the gospel—pagans, Mohammedans, or false Christians of various kinds—the scourges of God are simply witnesses that testify throughout history to the future reality of the last day. On that day, God will turn around to show his glorious face to enemy and friend, for judgment and salvation. As Luther exercised himself and his students in the word of God from the book of Genesis, he utilized the narrative to develop in his students a perception that the present, like the past, is caught up in apocalyptic warfare, and the future is to be placed in God’s hands. Thus, apocalypticism in the Lutheran Reformation was an attitude toward universal history—the past and the present as well as the future. God was active in this history, not alone but through the ministry of angels and his human cooperators, and his activity was focused on the preservation and blessing of both the church and the world. This focus on the creative purpose of God through his instruments distinguishes Luther’s apocalyptic worldview sharply from revolutionary apocalypticists in every era. Instead of predicting the time of the end, Luther taught his students that God was active in history and that the 81The key difference, as noted in chapter 2, is that Augustine viewed this revelation of God in the Old Testament as a figure of a future reality, while Luther viewed it as a concrete reality already present through faith in the promise of the coming Christ. See also Headley, Luther’s View of Church History, 267.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 213 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD IN THE LAST DAYS

213

church had a role to play until the last day finally came. Just as Luther himself engaged in that cooperative role all the more because of his belief that the end of time was near, so he encouraged his students to be so engaged until that time of the end known only to God actually arrived. It is difficult to accept the view of some scholars that Luther’s students and later generations of Lutherans developed a different eschatology—a “Melanchthonian,” nonapocalyptic eschatology—demonstrated on the grounds that they attempted with some success to establish institutions that would preserve and perpetuate Lutheran doctrine for subsequent generations.82 They were doing nothing different from what their professor taught them to do, engaging as cooperators in the government of God for the benefit of the world until God alone would bring history to its end. Luther sought to develop in his students an understanding of their present world where both the renewal of the gospel and the frustrating resistance to it even within Evangelical communities were informed by the biblical narrative, especially the history of Noah. This view of the world also led them to perceive the present as the time of God’s activity, promising grace to those who believe while threatening judgment on the world. As long as this present time of God’s activity would endure, then, Luther’s students and the generations that followed them, if they were to remain true to what their teacher tried to impress upon them, could only continue to act as cooperators of God, reforming and improving the institutions of church, civil society, and the economic sphere arising from the household. The Reformer had taught them that the constant and ever more prevalent indifference and opposition to the gospel they would proclaim was merely the sign of their faithfulness to that gospel, and confirmation of their identity as part of the true church. So long as they proclaimed the true word of God— the condemning word of the law as well as the saving word of the gospel— they could be certain of this identity, living in an age of Christian renewal that was, at the same time, an age of moral and spiritual degeneracy. Finally, the future that Luther proclaimed on the basis of the holy scripture focused not on fantastic visions and dreams or calculations of

82See, for example, Headley, Luther’s View of Church History, 269–70. Oberman sees such “Besserung” as the responsibility of civil authorities in Luther’s view and faults Melanchthon for introducing a noneschatological “Erasmian erudition and reforming theology” that changed Luther’s “amendment” into “Reformation.” Oberman, Reformation: Roots and Ramifications, 43–52. See also Oberman, Luther, 72–74, but cf. 303–4. On the lack of evidence for this view, see Lohse, “Luthers Selbsteinschätzung,” 162–66, esp. 165–66n22.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 214 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

CHAPTER FIVE

214

the times, but addressed the word of God as law and gospel to a church and world rushing toward the last day. In his prophetic office, Martin Luther was more like Jeremiah preaching judgment on Judah and contradicting the lying prophets of his age than he was like Daniel or John in the Apocalypse, beholding visions from God that reveal God’s design for the unfolding of universal history. Luther’s students would perpetuate that prophetic role, and not only by projecting images of their professor as the great example of a prophet, teacher, and hero of the faith.83 Their professor had formed them into preachers of the gospel through the exercise of the word of God. By engaging themselves in the ministry of that word for the ongoing reformation of the church and preservation of the world, they would also take up the prophetic mantle. Proclaiming judgment and grace to their own generation, they and their hearers would behold the back of God until that great and final day when all history will meet its end and God will turn to show his face, revealing a new beginning.

83See

Kolb, Martin Luther as Prophet.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 215 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

Epilogue Luther completed his ten-year course of lectures on Genesis on 17 November 1545, just three months before his death on 18 February 1546. As he had predicted in the introductory lecture to his course on Psalm 90 in October 1534, the professor had devoted the rest of his life to the exposition of Moses. The day after Luther’s death, his colleague Philip Melanchthon announced to the students in his class on Romans, “Ach, dead is the charioteer of Israel, who has guided the church in this last age of the world.” On 22 February in his funeral oration, Melanchthon assigned the Reformer a place among the prophets, apostles, teachers, and pastors that God raises up from “the assembly of those who study—who read, listen to, and love the prophetic and apostolic writings.”1 Toward the end of the oration, Melanchthon exhorted the university community to acknowledge Luther as “a salutary instrument of God” whose teaching and career should be considered along with the histories of such leaders of the church as Jeremiah, John the Baptist, and Paul. Both Melanchthon’s announcement of Luther’s death and his funeral oration foreshadow the way the Reformer’s activity of teaching and leading the church was remembered by his students and other followers: to them, Luther was part of the company of the prophets and apostles.2 1CR 6:59; and CR 11:727 (trans. from [Melanchthon], Orations, 257). For an analysis of the oration and Melanchthon’s early biographies of Luther, see Weiss, “Erasmus at Luther’s Funeral.” I disagree, however, with Weiss’s view that places the diverse intellectual movement of humanism squarely within the narrower confines of Erasmian humanism, and thus with his claim that Melanchthon, by emphasizing the humanist elements (and the role of Erasmus’s own writings) in Luther’s education and intellectual development, was “making Luther the direct spiritual heir of Erasmus” (101 and passim). 2CR 11:733 ([Melanchthon], Orations, 263). On Luther among the apostles and prophets, see especially Melanchthon’s account of Luther’s death in his History of the Life and Acts of Dr. Martin XXXXX

215

Luther's Genesis.book Page 216 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

EPILOGUE

216

In his last days, Luther had left on the table by his deathbed a note he had penned in Latin, in which he ruminated upon the experiences of people in all three of the holy orders God has established in the world: of shepherds and farmers (oeconomia), of civil servants (politia), of pastors or bishops (ecclesia).3 As he prepared for the curtain to be drawn on his life as doctor of sacred scripture and reformer of the church, Luther ended that note with the words, No one should think that he has tasted Holy Scriptures sufficiently, unless for a hundred years he has governed the churches with the prophets. 1. of John the Baptist Wherefore enormous is the miracle

2. of Christ 3. of the apostles

Do not seek to fathom this divine Aeneid, but adore humbly its vestiges. We are beggars. That is true.4

The note reveals Luther’s insight into the relationship between experience and understanding. In daily affairs, years of experience are necessary, but understanding can be humanly achieved. In the study of holy scripture, however, divine grace and its concomitant humility are necessary, for to understand the word of God rightly is a miracle.5 Oswald Bayer writes of Luther’s view, “In one’s relationship to the Bible, the ‘divine Aeneid,’ the addressed reader should not nolens volens preserve a respectful distance that restrains envy, but ‘humbly’ seek the nearness of the holy book.” The reader “tastes” (gustat) rather than “understands” (intelligit) the 3

Luther: “After speaking these prayers several times, he was called by God into the everlasting School and into everlasting joys, in which he enjoyed the company of the Father, Son, Holy Spirit, and of all the Prophets and Apostles.” [Melanchthon], “Philip Melanchthon’s History,” 38. 3See Bayer, “Von Wunderwerk,” 268–71. 4“Scripturas sanctas sciat se nemo gustasse satis, nisi centum annis cum Prophetis Ecclesias gubernarit 1. Joannis Baptistae Quare ingens est miraculum 2. Christi 3. Apostolorum Hanc tu ne diuinam aeneida tenta, Sed vestigia pronus adora. Wir sind Bettler, hoc est verum.” (As given in Bayer, “Von Wunderwerk,” 258–59, from Ror. Bos. Q. 24s in the Universitäts-bibliothek Jena, with italics added in my translation to indicate the single German phrase.) 5Bayer, “Von Wunderwerk,” 265–66.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 217 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

EPILOGUE

217

sacred text as it is approached in the light of experience, in particular the experience of tentatio. As Bayer concludes, “Experience as such is not what makes the theologian, but the experience of scripture.”6 Luther remains a beggar before the sacred book, but in the company of this “inexhaustible book of experience” he can confess this poverty in confidence.7 Luther’s last note illuminates the way the professor taught his students to approach scripture and theology in the light of the human experiences that are embodied in the sacred narrative. By wrestling with the Holy Spirit’s words, the Reformer practiced the kind of Bible study he commended to others in the preface to his German writings in 1539. Through an oral exercise in the word of God, Luther and his students meditated on the biblical text, and the inexhaustible wealth of experience they found there shaped their own experience of Christian faith and life in the world. By using a spiritual, affective interpretation of Genesis in which present Christian experience was interpreted through the exposition of the historical narrative, Luther attempted to develop in his students a new identity as Evangelical Christians that was different from the Catholic identity of the medieval past. Driving this difference, first of all, was a new approach to the text of holy scripture. Neither medieval nor modern in his approach to scripture, Luther opened up to his students a way of interpreting the sacred text that allowed the word of God to speak directly to their contemporary experience. In Luther’s view, the narrative of Genesis did not need to be Christianized through figurative interpretation as the patristic and medieval threefold spiritual sense did. At the same time, for Luther the exposition of scripture cannot be limited to what moderns call exegesis, the historical and grammatical analysis of the “intended sense” of the text, a text that is viewed as a historically distant, ancient Near Eastern Hebrew narrative. In Luther’s understanding, the narrative of Genesis is Christian, precisely in its historical sense, for it is the history of the Triune God’s creation of the world and of God’s care for the world in its first and second ages. Its spiritual riches are in this history and therefore must be unveiled for the present reader on the basis of that historical narrative. For Luther, biblical exposition involved prayerful, meditative hearing of the text in the context of the struggles of Christian life in the world. What

6Bayer, 7Bayer,

“Von Wunderwerk,” 265, 271–75 (emphasis Bayer’s). “Von Wunderwerk,” 277–78.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 218 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

218

EPILOGUE

modern scholars call exegesis was for Luther merely preparation for a richly spiritual and theological approach to the text.8 The concepts here described show that the ancient and modern dichotomy between “spiritual” and “literal” (or “historical”) interpretation cannot be applied to Luther. Luther’s focus was on the historical narrative for its spiritual meaning and application to Christian life. Descriptive terminology should highlight actual practice, and it does no justice to Luther’s approach to the text to relegate the term “spiritual interpretation” only to the patristic and medieval practice of finding spiritual meaning in allegories and types rather than in the narrative history. The Reformer interpreted the historical narrative spiritually and affectively, in order to draw from it a commentary on the Christian experience of living by faith in the promises of God. Luther’s focus was on the present reality of Christian life in the history recorded in Genesis, while his predecessors focused on the allegorical or typological anticipation of Christian life as it would exist in the church of the New Testament. Luther’s practice of Bible study was also quite different from modern Bible study, which emerged from the philological disciplines of humanism in the sixteenth century and was radicalized by the development of historical criticism in the Enlightenment. Modern biblical scholarship assumes and emphasizes historical distance between the experience of the characters in Genesis and the experience of Christians in the present, while Luther used the historical narrative directly to interpret his and his students’ experience of Christian life. Luther’s criticism of patristic allegorizing on the one hand, while arguing on the other hand that humanist philology was incapable of grasping the theological content (res) of God’s word, make his approach to scriptural exposition one more way that the Reformer was planted squarely “between the Middle Ages and modern times.”9 In the lecture hall, Luther exercised himself and his students in the word of God in a way that allowed the experiences of the patriarchs to interpret their own experience of Christian life in the midst of the manifold 8Wilken (“In Defense of Allegory,” 208) argues likewise, but in defense of the allegorical approach of the early church fathers. One might observe that Wilken is here taking up the mantle of Henri de Lubac, who had argued for the fourfold sense in patristic and medieval Bible study as fundamentally Catholic and essential to the Christian reading of scripture as the word of God. See also Wilken’s foreword to Lubac, Medieval Exegesis, esp. 9–10; and Steinmetz, “Superiority of Pre-Critical Exegesis.” 9The phrase is Oberman’s. See Oberman, “Martin Luther: Zwischen Mittelalter und Neuzeit” (Eng. trans. in Oberman, Reformation: Roots and Ramifications, 53–75); and Hendrix, “More Than a Prophet,” 11–29.

Luther's Genesis.book Page 219 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

EPILOGUE

219

changes of their age. The experiences of Abraham and Sarah, of Jacob and Rachel, of Joseph and his brothers all illuminated the experiences of Luther and his students as they sought to understand the nature of their own life as Christians. The outcome of the Reformation for Luther and his followers, who first had been condemned by and then had broken from the Roman Church, brought radical change not only in ecclesiastical institutions, church doctrine, and religious ceremonies, but also in their conception of the Christian life itself. As Luther held up his and his students’ experiences to the mirror of the narrative of Genesis, he taught his students to see authentic Christian existence not as a withdrawal from the world but as a living by faith in the midst of worldly life. In the new identity the professor sought to forge in his students lay a new Christian culture, an Evangelical culture in which the understanding of how God works in the world had changed. With Abraham and Sarah and others as the new models of the religious life, the understanding of Christian life as a pilgrimage in the world changed in terms of its nature and location. The goal of union with God in the beatific vision was no longer the extraordinary quest of “spiritual athletes” who withdrew from the world and devoted themselves to contemplation in any of its many intellectual or mystical forms. Now this goal was the ordinary quest of every Christian, and it was realized by God’s revelatory activity and fearful play of announcing judgment and grace, of turning his back and then showing his face, in the midst of the struggles or tentatio of daily life. In the Evangelical culture of sixteenth-century Germany, this new conception of Christian life and holiness was established not only by dissolving the monasteries; it was also nurtured by their transformation into schools for the Christian education of the young. With the vernacular Bible and Luther’s catechism made available to most households, there was a new context for the holy reading of the sacred page. The Evangelical parsonage became a spiritual household for the modeling of Christian holiness, marked not by sexual renunciation but by a sanctified view of marriage and childbearing. Prominent, but most often lay, households of men, women, and children were sometimes portrayed in epitaphs and paintings hung on the walls of Lutheran churches as icons of piety, their figures adoring the crucified or glorified Christ, their hope of eternal life described as founded upon their justification by faith.10 This view of holiness and Christian life 10On the epitaphs at St. Michael’s Church in Schwäbisch Hall, see chapter 3, notes 134, 135. Scheller-Schach (“‘Ein imaginäres Grabmuseum,’ ” 45) notes of these epitaphs, ranging chronologically XXXXX

Luther's Genesis.book Page 220 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

EPILOGUE

220

that Luther saw in the narratives of the men and women of Genesis was a turn to the world and therefore was a form of secularization, but it was secularization with a specifically Christian content. It was, so to say, a Christian secularization, and Luther imprinted it on his students through his exposition of Genesis. Central to Luther’s world of faith as he interpreted it through the word of God in Genesis was also his view of the past, the present, and the future of the church and the world. His lectures on this most ancient historical narrative served as an avenue for the professor to take up the humanist interest in history and to use it for his own Reformation program. For Luther, the church’s experience throughout universal history was characterized most fully by its location in the midst of the cosmic battle between God and the devil. Its marks were the word and sacraments and its identity as true church was determined by faithfulness to the word. The catholicity of the church was no longer identified by an ecclesiastical culture united with the papacy in Rome but was for Luther a hidden reality with no visible boundary—the church’s catholicity was an object of faith rather than a visible mark. Luther saw his own strife with the papal church as a conflict between the word of God and the word of Satan that had been present in the history of the church since the fall of Adam. He taught his students to expect that conflict between true church and false church would characterize Christian existence until the end of time. The last days were at hand, and no matter how long they endured, God would preserve his church. But God would always preserve it as a little flock, persecuted by the false church, despised by the world, neglected by ungrateful rulers and hearers even where the Reformation had been accepted and implemented. When Philip Melanchthon, both at Luther’s funeral and in his early biography, placed the Reformer among the company of the prophets and apostles, he set the stage for Evangelical identity to become the Lutheran identity of later generations. Luther’s followers judged that he, more than any other teacher since the days of the apostles, had grasped the truth of God’s word and had taught correctly the doctrine of the gospel. 11 Luther’s 11

from the pre-Reformation fifteenth century to the post-Reformation eighteenth, that “almost half honor town councilors and Stättmeister, about a third are dedicated to clergy, only about 10 percent ascribed to learned citizens: jurists, physicians, and writers.” 11See esp. Kolb, Martin Luther as Prophet, 39–74. Among the wealth of evidence Kolb cites is this quotation from Luther’s follower Nicholas Selnecker: “We do not place our faith in Luther, as we place XXXXXX

Luther's Genesis.book Page 221 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

EPILOGUE

221

own view of his authority as teacher of God’s word was established in part on his belief in his status as a prophet called by God to reform the church by leading it back to scripture and the promises proclaimed there. But as he complained in the preface to his collected German writings in 1539, he was concerned that even his own writings might well distract Christians from drinking from the fresh source of the word of God. In the lecture hall at the University of Wittenberg, Dr. Martin Luther had sought to develop in his students an identity that was grounded in their own hearing of holy scripture as it interpreted their experience of life as Christians. Prophets and apostles were speaking from the professor’s lectern, and a professor and his students were sitting at their feet, listening to what they had to say.12

12

our faith in no other human being, but we love Luther because he leads us to Christ and because his writings are subject to the word of Christ. He instructs us out of this word” (72, quoting Selnecker, Recitationes aliqvot…[Leipzig: Georg Defner, 1581], 268).

Luther's Genesis.book Page 222 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:25 AM

BLANK

Biblio_Luther Page 223 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:02 PM

Bibliography SIXTEENTH-CENTURY EDITIONS OF THE GENESIS LECTURES Luther, Martin. In primum librum Mose enarrationes Reverendi Patris D. D. Martini Lutheri, plenæ salutaris & Christiane eruditionis, Bona fide & diligenter collectæ. Wittenberg, 1544. Microfiche, Universitätsbibliothek Heidelberg. ———. In primum librum Mose enarrationes Reverendi Patris D. D. Martini Lutheri, plenæ salutaris & Christianæ eruditionis, bona fide & diligenter collectæ. Hebre. XI. Fide Abel præstantiorem hostiam quam Cain obtulit Deo, per quam testimonum consequutus est, quod esset iustus, testimonium perhibente eius muneribus Deo, & per illam defunctus adhuc loquitur. [Nürnberg,] 1550. Bound together with In Genesin enarrationum (1550), Melanchthonhaus, Bretten. ———. In Genesin enarrationum Reverendi Patris, Domini Doctoris Martini Lutheri, bona fide & diligenter collectarum, per Vitum Theodorum. Tomvs Secundus Nunc Primum In Lucem Aeditus. Romanor. XIIII Credidit Abraham Deo, & Reputatum Est IllI ad Iustitiam. Hebre. XI. Fide & ipsa Sara sterilis uirtutem in conceptione seminis, accepit, & præter tempus ætatis peperit: Quoniam fidelem credidit esse eum, qui promiserat. Nürnberg: Ioannis Montani, & Ulrici Neuber, 1550. [Psalm. LXXXIX. Beatus populus: Qui scit iubilationem]. Bound together with In primum librum Mose enarrationes (1550), Melanchthonhaus, Bretten. ———. In Genesin enarrationum Reverendi Patris, Domini Doctoris Martini Lutheri, Bona Fide & diligenter collectarum, per Hieronymum Besoldum Noribergensem. Tomus Tertius Continens Historiam Duorum. Patriarcharum Isaac et Iacob: Nunc primum in lucem æditus. Cum Praefatione Philippi Melanthonis. Roman. IX. Non solum autem hoc, sed & Rebecca, quæ ex uno conceperat Isaac patre nostro. Nondum enim natis pueris, quum neq(ue) boni quippiam fecissent, neq(ue) mali, ut secundum electio nem propositum Dei maneret, non ex operibus, sed ex uocante dictum est illi: Maior seruiet Minori. Sicut scriptum est: Iacob dilexi, Esau uero odio habui. [Psalm. LXXXIX. Beatus populus: Qui scit iubilationem. Nürnberg: Ioannis Montani, & Vlrici Neuber, 1552.] Bound together with In Genesin enarrationum (1554), Universitätsbibliothek Heidelberg. ———. In Genesin enarrationum Reverendi Patris, Domini Doctoris Martini Lutheri, bona fide & diligenter collectarum, per Hieronymum Besoldum Noribergensem. Tomus Quartus Continens Historiam Sanctissimi Patriarchae Ioseph. Nunc primum in lucem editus. Hebræorum XI. Per fidem Iacob moriens singulis filiis Ioseph benedixit, & adorauit fastigium uirgæ illius. Per fidem Ioseph moriens egressionis filiorum Israel meminit, deq(ue) ossibus suis mandauit. Nürnberg: Excudebant Ioannes Montanus & Viricus Neuberus, 1554. [Psalm. LXXXIX. Beatus populis qui scit iubilationem. Noribergae. Excudebant

223

Biblio_Luther Page 224 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:02 PM

BIBLIOGRAPHY

224

Ioannes Montanus & Viricus Neurebus, 1554]. Bound together with In Genesin enarrationum (1552), Universitätsbibliothek Heidelberg.

MODERN EDITIONS OF LUTHER’S WORKS Luther, Martin. D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe. Edited by J. F. K. Knaake et al. 65 vols. Weimar: Böhlau, 1883ff. ———. D. Martin Luthers Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe, Tischreden. 6 vols. Weimar: Böhlau, 1912–21. ———. Luther’s Works. American Edition. Edited by Jaroslav Pelikan, Hilton C. Oswald, and Helmut T. Lehmann. 55 vols. Saint Louis, MO: Concordia; Phiadelphia: Fortress, 1955– 86.

OTHER PRIMARY SOURCES Aquinas, Thomas. Summa Theologiae: A Concise Translation. Edited by Timothy McDermott. Westminster, MD: Christian Classics, 1989. Augustine. Concerning the City of God against the Pagans. A new translation by Henry Bettenson with introduction by John O’Meara. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1984. ———. The Enchiridion on Faith, Hope and Love. With new introduction by Thomas S. Hibbs. Washington, DC: Regnery, 1996. ———. On Christian Teaching. Translated with introduction and notes by R. P. H. Green. Oxford World’s Classics. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997. Boethius. The Consolation of Philosophy. Translated and with introduction by P. G. Walsh. Oxford: Clarendon, 1999. The Book of Concord: The Confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church. Edited by Robert Kolb and Timothy J. Wengert. Philadelphia: Fortress, 2000. Bretschneider, Karl Gottlief, and Heinrich Ernst Bindseil, eds. Corpus Reformatorum: Philip Melanthonis opera quae supersunt omnia. Halle and Braunschweig: 1834–60. Calvin, John. “The Necessity of Reforming the Church.” In Tracts and Treatises on the Reformation of the Church: With a Short Life of Calvin by Theodore Beza, translated by Henry Beveridge. Historical notes and introduction added by Thomas F. Torrance, 1:121–234. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1958. Fry, Timothy, ed. The Rule of St. Benedict in English. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1982. Graebner, Paul. Prognosticon oder Erklärung: Über den Anno 1618. erschienen Comet Stern, und dessen Operation: Von Veränderung der höchsten Potentaten dieser Welt, und von dem Untergang dess Türckischen Kaysers, u. Beschrieben: Durch Paulum Gräbnern, Weyland Pfarrherrn im Stifft Magdeburg. N.p., 1631. Jerome. S. Hieronymi presbyteri opera. Part 1, Opera exegetica. Vol. 1, Hebraicae quaestiones in libro Geneseos; Liber interpretationis hebraicorum nominum; commentarioli in Psalmos; Commentarius in Ecclesiasten. Edited by Paul de Legarde, Germain Morin, and Marcus Adriaen. Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 72. Turnhout: Brepols, 1959. [Melanchthon, Philip]. Orations on Philosophy and Education. Edited by Sachiko Kusukawa. Translated by Christine F. Salazar. Cambridge Texts in the History of Philosophy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999. ———. “Philip Melanchthon’s History of the Life and Acts of Dr. Martin Luther.” In Luther’s Lives: Two Contemporary Accounts of Martin Luther, edited and translated by Elisabeth Vandiver, Ralph Keen, and Thomas D. Frazel. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2002.

Biblio_Luther Page 225 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:02 PM

BIBLIOGRAPHY

225

Valla, Lorenzo. The Treatise of Lorenzo Valla on the Donation of Constantine: Text and Translation into English. Edited and translated by Christopher B. Coleman. Renaissance Society of America Reprint Texts 1. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1993.

SECONDARY SOURCES Althaus, Paul. The Theology of Martin Luther. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1966. Asendorf, Ulrich. “How Luther Opened the Scripture.” Lutheran Quarterly 9 (1995): 191–99. ———. Lectura in Biblia: Luthers Genesisvorlesung (1535–1545). Forschungen zur Systematischen und Ökumenischen Theologie 87. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1998. ———. “Das Wort Gottes bei Luther im Sakramentalen Zusammenhang Patristischer Theologie: Systematische und ökumenische Überlegungen zu Luthers Schrift ‘Daß diese Worte Christi’ (1527).” Kerygma und Dogma 39 (1993): 31–47. Auerbach, Erich. Scenes from the Drama of European Literature: Six Essays. New York: Meridian, 1989. Barnes, Robin [Bruce]. “Images of Hope and Despair: Western Apocalypticism: ca. 1500–1800.” In Encyclopedia of Apocalypticism. Vol. 2, Apocalypticism in Western History and Culture, edited by Bernard McGinn, 141–84. New York: Continuum, 1999. ———. Prophecy and Gnosis: Apocalypticism in the Wake of the Lutheran Reformation. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1988. Bast, Robert James. Honor Your Fathers: Catechisms and the Emergence of a Patriarchal Ideology in Germany, 1400–1600. Studies in Medieval and Reformation Thought 63. Leiden: Brill, 1997. Bayer, Oswald. Martin Luthers Theologie: Eine Vergegenwärtigung. 2nd ed. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2004. ———. “Von Wunderwerk, Gottes Wort Recht zu Verstehen: Luthers letzter Zettel.” Kerygma und Dogma 37 (1991): 258–79. Bielfeldt, Dennis. “Luther and the Strange Language of Theology: How ‘New’ is the Nova Lingua?” In Caritas et Reformatio: Essays on Church and Society in Honor of Carter Lindberg, edited by David M. Whitford, 221–44. St. Louis, MO: Concordia, 2002. Bohnstedt, John W. The Infidel Scourge of God: The Turkish Menace as Seen by German Pamphleteers of the Reformation Era. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1968. Bornkamm, Heinrich. Luther and the Old Testament. Translated by Eric W. Gritsch and Ruth C. Gritsch. Edited by Victor I. Gruhn. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1969. ———. Luther’s Doctrine of the Two Kingdoms in the Context of His Theology. Translated by Karl H. Hertz. Facet Books. Social Ethics Series 14. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1966. Bossy, John. Christianity in the West, 1400–1700. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985. Boyle, Marjorie O’Rourke. Rhetoric and Reform: Erasmus’ Civil Dispute with Luther. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1983. Brecht, Martin. Martin Luther: The Preservation of the Church, 1532–1546. Translated by James L. Schaff. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1993. Brown, Peter. Authority and the Sacred: Aspects of the Christianisation of the Roman World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995. ———. The Body and Society: Men, Women, and Sexual Renunciation in Early Christianity. Lectures on the History of Religions, n.s., 13. New York: Columbia University Press, 1988. ———. The Cult of the Saints: Its Rise and Function in Latin Christianity. Haskell Lectures on History of Religions, n.s., no. 2. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981. ———. Religion and Society in the Age of Saint Augustine. London: Faber and Faber, 1972. ———. “Religious Coercion in the Later Roman Empire: The Case of North Africa.” In Brown, Religion and Society in the Age of Saint Augustine, 301–31.

Biblio_Luther Page 226 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:02 PM

226

BIBLIOGRAPHY

———. “The Rise and Function of the Holy Man in Late Antiquity.” In Brown, Society and the Holy in Late Antiquity, 103–52. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1982. ———. The Rise of Western Christendom: Triumph and Diversity, A.D. 200–1000. 2nd ed. The Making of Europe. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2003. ———. “St. Augustine’s Attitude to Religious Coercion.” In Brown, Religion and Society in the Age of Saint Augustine, 260–78. Burton-Christie, Douglas. The Word in the Desert: Scripture and the Quest for Holiness in Early Christian Monasticism. New York: Oxford University Press, 1993. Cullmann, Oscar. Christ and Time: The Primitive Christian Conception of Time and History. Translated by Floyd V. Filson. Rev. ed. Philadelphia: Westminster, 1964. Delius, Hans-Ulrich. Die Quellen von Martin Luthers Genesisvorlesung. Beiträge zur evangelischen Theologie 111. Munich: Kaiser, 1992. Deppermann, Klaus. Melchior Hoffman: Social Unrest and Apocalyptic Visions in the Age of Reformation. Translated by Malcolm Wren. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1987. Dost, Timothy P. Renaissance Humanism in Support of the Gospel in Luther’s Early Correspondence: Taking All Things Captive. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2001. Duffy, Eamon. The Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England c. 1400–c. 1580. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1992. Ebeling, Gerhard. “The Beginnings of Luther’s Hermeneutics.” Lutheran Quarterly 7, nos. 2–4 (1993): 129–58, 315–38, 451–68. Edwards, Mark U. Luther and the False Brethren. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1975. ———. Luther’s Last Battles: Politics and Polemics, 1531–46. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1983. ———. Printing, Propaganda, and Martin Luther. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994. Eire, Carlos M. N. War Against the Idols: The Reformation of Worship from Erasmus to Calvin. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986. Eisenstein, Elizabeth L. “The Advent of Printing and the Protestant Revolt: A New Approach to the Disruption of Western Christendom.” In Transition and Revolution: Problems and Issues of European Renaissance and Reformation History, edited by Robert M. Kingdon, 235–270. Minneapolis: Burgess, 1974. ———. The Printing Press as an Agent of Change: Communications and Cultural Transformations in Early Modern Europe. 2 vols. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979. Evans, G. R. The Language and Logic of the Bible: The Earlier Middle Ages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984. ———. The Language and Logic of the Bible: The Road to Reformation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985. Flachmann, Holger. Martin Luther und das Buch: Eine historische Studie zur Bedeutung des Buches im Handeln und Denken des Reformators. Spätmittelalter und Reformation, n.s., 8. Tübingen: Mohr, 1996. Forde, Gerhard O. On Being a Theologian of the Cross: Reflections on Luther's Heidelberg Disputation, 1518. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1997. Forsberg, Juhani. Das Abrahambild in der Theologie Luthers: Pater Fidei Sanctissimus. Stuttgart: Steiner, 1984. Freitag, Albert. “Veit Dietrichs Anteil an der Lutherüberlieferung.” Lutherstudien (1917): 170– 202. Friedman, Jerome. “Luther, Forster, and the Curious Nature of Wittenberg Hebraica.” Bibliotheque d’Humanisme et Renaissance 42 (1980): 611–19. ———. The Most Ancient Testimony: Sixteenth-Century Christian-Hebraica in the Age of Renaissance Nostalgia. Athens: Ohio University Press, 1983. ———. “Sixteenth-Century Christian-Hebraica: Scripture and the Renaissance Myth of the Past.” Sixteenth Century Journal 11, no. 4 (1980): 67–85.

Biblio_Luther Page 227 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:02 PM

BIBLIOGRAPHY

227

Friesen, Abraham. Thomas Muentzer, a Destroyer of the Godless: The Making of a Sixteenth-Century Religious Revolutionary. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990. Froehlich, Karlfried. “Christian Interpretation of the Old Testament in the High Middle Ages.” In Hebrew Bible, Old Testament: The History of Its Interpretation, edited by Magne Saebo. Vol. 1, pt. 2, From the Beginnings to the Middle Ages (Until 1300): The Middle Ages, in cooperation with Chris Brekelmans and Menahem Haran, 496–558. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2000. ———. “An Extraordinary Achievement: The Glossa Ordinaria in Print.” In The Bible as Book: The First Printed Editions, edited by Paul Saenger and Kimberly van Kampen, 15–21. London: The British Library; New Castle, DE: Oak Knoll Press, 1999. ———. “The Printed Gloss.” In Biblia latina cum glossa ordinaria: Facsimile reprint of Editio Princeps: Adolph Rusch of Strassburg 1480/81, 1:12–16. Introduction by Karlfried Froehlich and Margaret T. Gibson, 4 vols. Turnhout: Brepols, 1992. ———, ed. Biblical Interpretation in the Early Church. Sources of Early Christian Thought. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984. Geary, Patrick J., Phantoms of Remembrance: Memory and Oblivion at the End of the First Millennium. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1994. Geisberg, Max. The German Single-Leaf Woodcut, 1500–1550. Revised and edited by Walter L. Strauss. 4 vols. New York: Hacker Art Books, 1974. Ginzburg, Carlo. History, Rhetoric, and Proof. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England, 1999. Gordon, Bruce. “The Changing Face of Protestant History and Identity in the Sixteenth Century.” In Protestant History and Identity in Sixteenth-Century Europe. Vol. 1, The Medieval Inheritance, edited by Bruce Gordon, 1–22. St. Andrews Studies in Reformation History. Aldershot: Ashgate, 1996. ———, ed. Protestant History and Identity in Sixteenth-Century Europe. Vol. 1, The Medieval Inheritance. St. Andrews Studies in Reformation History. Aldershot: Ashgate, 1996. ———, ed. Protestant History and Identity in Sixteenth-Century Europe. Vol. 2, The Later Reformation. St. Andrews Studies in Reformation History. Aldershot: Ashgate, 1996. Gorringe, Timothy. God’s Just Vengeance: Crime, Violence, and the Rhetoric of Salvation. Cambridge Studies in Ideology and Religion. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. Götze, Alfred. Frühneuhochdeutsches Glossar. 7th ed. Kleine Texte für Vorlesungen und Übungen 101. Berlin: De Gruyter, 1967. Gow, Andrew Colin. The Red Jews: Antisemitism in an Apocalyptic Age, 1200–1600. Studies in Medieval and Reformation Thought 55. Leiden: Brill, 1995. Grafton, Anthony. Commerce with the Classics: Ancient Books and Renaissance Readers. Jerome Lectures 20. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1997. ———, and Lisa Jardine. From Humanism to the Humanities: Education and the Liberal Arts in Fifteenth- and Sixteenth-Century Europe. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1986. Graham, William A. Beyond the Written Word: Oral Aspects of Scripture in the History of Religion. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987. Greene-McCreight, Kathryn. “‘We Are Companions to the Patriarchs,’ or Scripture Absorbs Calvin’s World.” Modern Theology 14 (1998): 213–24. Gregory, Brad S. Salvation at Stake: Christian Martyrdom in Early Modern Europe. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999. Hagen, Kenneth. “It Is All in the Et Cetera: Luther and the Elliptical Reference.” Luther-Bulletin: Tijdschrift voor interconfessioneel Lutheronderzoek 3 (1994): 57–67. ———. Luther’s Approach to Scripture as Seen in His “Commentaries” on Galatians, 1519–1538. Tübingen: Mohr, 1993.

Biblio_Luther Page 228 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:02 PM

228

BIBLIOGRAPHY

———. “What Did the Term Commentarius Mean to Sixteenth-Century Theologians?” In Théorie et pratique de l’exégèse: Actes du troisième colloque international sur l’histoire de l’exégèse biblique au XVIe siècle (Genève, 31 août–2 septembre 1988), edited by Irena Backus and Francis Higman, 13–38. Geneva: Droz, 1990. Hailperin, Herman. Rashi and the Christian Scholars. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1963. Headley, John M. “Luther and the Problem of Secularization.” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 55 (1987): 21–37. ———. Luther’s View of Church History. Yale Publications in Religion 6. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1963. Hendrix, Scott H. “The Authority of Scripture at Work: Luther’s Exegesis of the Psalms.” In Hendrix, Tradition and Authority in the Reformation. ———. Ecclesia in via: Ecclesiological Developments in the Medieval Psalms Exegesis and the Dictata super Psalterium (1513–1515) of Martin Luther. Studies in Medieval and Reformation Thought 8. Leiden: Brill, 1974. ———. “The Kingdom of Promise: Disappointment and Hope in Luther’s Later Ecclesiology,” Lutherjahrbuch 71 (2004): 37–60. ———. “Luther Against the Background of the History of Biblical Interpretation.” In Hendrix, Tradition and Authority in the Reformation. ———. Luther and the Papacy: Stages in a Reformation Conflict. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1981. ———. “Martin Luther’s Reformation of Spirituality.” Lutheran Quarterly 13 (1999): 249–70. ———. “‘More Than a Prophet’: Martin Luther in the Work of Heiko Oberman.” In The Work of Heiko A. Oberman: Papers from A Symposium on His Seventieth Birthday, edited by Thomas Brady et al., 11–29. Leiden: Brill, 2003. ———. Recultivating the Vineyard: The Reformation Agendas of Christianization. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2004. ———. “Rerooting the Faith: The Reformation as Re-Christianization.” Church History 69 (2000): 558–77. ———. Tradition and Authority in the Reformation. Collected Studies Series. Aldershot: Ashgate/ Variorum, 1996. Herrin, Judith. The Formation of Christendom. Rev. ed. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1989. Hiebsch, Sabine. “Figura ecclesiae: Lea und Rachel in Luthers Genesispredigten.” Luther 74 (2003): 5–22. Hill, Edmund. “St. Augustine’s Theory and Practice of Preaching.” Clergy Review 45 (1960): 587– 97. Hillerdal, Gunnar. “Prophetische Züge in Luthers Geschichtsdeutung.” Studia Theologica 7 (1953): 105–24. Holl, Karl. “Die Entstehung von Luthers Kirchenbegriff (1915).” In Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Kirchengeschichte, vol. 1, Luther, 288–325. 7th ed. Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1948. Hsia, R. Po-chia. Social Discipline in the Reformation: Central Europe 1550–1750. Christianity and Society in the Modern World. London: Routledge, 1989. Huizinga, Johann. “A Definition of the Concept of History.” In Philosophy and History, edited by R. Klibansky and H. J. Paton, 1–10. New York: Harper and Row, 1963. Isaac, Gordon L. “In Defense of the Ministry of Moses: Luther’s Enarratio on Psalm 90, 1534– 1535.” PhD diss., Marquette University, 1996. Iwand, Hans Joachim. “Theologia Crucis.” In Nachgelassene Werke, vol. 2, edited by K. Steck, 381–98. Gütersloh: Kaiser, Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 1966. Jordon, Sherry Elaine. “The Patriarchs and Matriarchs as Saints in Luther’s Lectures on Genesis.” PhD diss., Yale University, 1995.

Biblio_Luther Page 229 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:02 PM

BIBLIOGRAPHY

229

Junghans, Helmar. Der junge Luther und die Humanisten. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1985. ———. “Die Worte Christi geben das Leben.” In Wartburg-Jahrbuch Sonderband 1996: Wissenschaftliches Kolloquium “Der Mensch Luther und sein Umfeld,” May 2–5, 1996, 154–75. Eisenach: Wartburg-Stiftung, 1996. ———. Martin Luther und Wittenberg. Munich: Koehler & Amelang, 1996. Kalita, Thomas M. “The Influence of Nicholas of Lyra on Martin Luther’s ‘Commentary on Genesis.’ ” STD diss., Catholic University of America, 1985. Karant-Nunn, Susan C. “Kinder, Küche, Kirche: Social Ideology in the Sermons of Johannes Mathesius.” In Germania Illustrata: Essays on Early Modern Germany Presented to Gerald Strauss, edited by Andrew C. Fix and Susan C. Karant-Nunn, 121–40. Sixteenth Century Essays and Studies 18. Kirksville, MO: Sixteenth Century Journal Publishers, 1992. ———. The Reformation of Ritual: An Interpretation of Early Modern Germany. Christianity and Society in the Modern World. London: Routledge, 1997. ———. “The Transmission of Luther’s Teachings on Women and Matrimony: The Case of Zwickau.” Archive for Reformation History 77 (1986): 31–46. ———, and Merry E. Wiesner-Hanks, ed. and trans. Luther on Women: A Sourcebook. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003. Kelley, Donald R. Faces of History: Historical Inquiry from Herodotus to Herder. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1998. ———. “Johann Sleidan and the Origins of History as a Profession.” Journal of Modern History 52 (1980): 573–98. ———. “The Theory of History.” In Schmitt, The Cambridge History of Renaissance Philosophy, 746–61. ———, ed. Versions of History from Antiquity to the Enlightenment. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1991. Klaus, Bernhard. “Die Lutherüberlieferung Veit Dietrichs und ihre Problematik.” Zeitschrift für bayerische Kirchengeschichte 53 (1984): 33–47. ———. Veit Dietrich: Leben und Werk. Einzelarbeiten aus der Kirchengeschichte Bayerns 32. Nürnberg: Verein für bayerische Kirchengeschichte, 1958. Kolb, Robert. For All the Saints: Changing Perceptions of Martyrdom and Sainthood in the Lutheran Reformation. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 1987. ———. Martin Luther as Prophet, Teacher, Hero: Images of the Reformer, 1520–1620. Texts and Studies in Reformation and Post-Reformation Thought, ed. Richard A. Muller. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books and Paternoster Press, 1999. Köpf, Ulrich. “Heilige und Modelle des Verhaltens in der protestantischen Gesellschaft.” In Modelli di santità e modelli di comportamento, edited by G. Barone, 243–62. Turin: Rosenberg and Sellier, 1994. ———. “Martin Luthers Lebensgang als Mönch.” In Kloster Amelungsborn 1135–1985, edited by Gerhard Ruhbach and Kurt Schmidt-Clausen, 187–208. Hannover: Kloster Amelungsborn, 1985. Krey, Philip D. W., and Lesley Smith, eds. Nicholas of Lyra: The Senses of Scripture. Leiden: Brill, 2000. Kristeller, Paul Oskar. “Humanism.” In Schmitt, The Cambridge History of Renaissance Philosophy, 113–37. Kusukawa, Sachiko. A Wittenberg University Library Catalogue of 1536. Medieval & Renaissance Texts & Studies 142. Binghamton, NY: Medieval & Renaissance Texts & Studies, 1995. Lane, A. N. S. “Sola Scriptura? Making Sense of a Post-Reformation Slogan.” In A Pathway into the Holy Scripture, edited by Philip E. Satterthwaite and David F. Wright, 297–327. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994.

Biblio_Luther Page 230 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:02 PM

230

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Leclercq, Jean. The Love of Learning and the Desire for God: A Study of Monastic Culture. 3rd ed. New York: Fordham University Press, 1982. Leigh, David J. “Augustine’s Confessions as a Circular Journey.” Thought 60, no. 236 (March 1985): 73–88. Lerner, Robert E. The Powers of Prophecy: The Cedar of Lebanon Vision from the Mongol Onslaught to the Dawn of the Enlightenment. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983. Lindberg, Carter. “The Future of a Tradition: Luther and the Family.” In All Theology is Christology: Essays in Honor of David P. Scaer, edited by Dean O. Wenthe et al., 133–51. Fort Wayne, IN: Concordia Theological Seminary Press, 2000. ———. “Prierias and His Significance for Luther’s Development.” Sixteenth Century Journal 3, no. 2 (1972): 45–64. Lohse, Bernhard. “Luthers Selbsteinschätzung (1985).” In Evangelium in der Geschichte: Studien zu Luther und der Reformation, 158–75. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1988. ———. Martin Luther’s Theology: Its Historical and Systematic Development. Translated by Roy A. Harrisville. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1999. Lortz, Joseph. “The Basic Elements of Luther’s Intellectual Style.” In Catholic Scholars Dialogue with Luther, edited by Jared Wicks, 3–33. Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1970. Lotz, David W. “Sola Scriptura: Luther on Biblical Authority.” Interpretation 35 (1981): 258–73. Lubac, Henri de. Medieval Exegesis. Vol. 1, The Four Senses of Scripture. Translated by Mark Sebanc. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans and T. & T. Clark, 1998. Luttenberger, Andreas Pius. Glaubenseinheit und Reichsfriede: Konzeptionen und Wege Konfessionsneutraler Reichspolitik 1530–1552. Göttingen: Vandenhoek & Ruprecht, 1982. Markschies, Christoph. “Die eine Reformation und die vielen Reformen, oder Braucht evangelische Kirchengeschichtsschreibung Dekadenzmodelle?” Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte 106 (1995): 70–97. Maron, Gottfried. Martin Luther und Epikur: Ein Beitrag zum Verständnis des alten Luther. Berichte aus den Sitzungen der Joachim Jungius-Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften e. V. Hamburg 6, vol. 1. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1988. Maschke, Timothy. “Contemporaneity: A Hermeneutical Perspective in Martin Luther’s Work.” In Ad fontes Lutheri: Toward the Recovery of the Real Luther: Essays in Honor of Kenneth Hagen’s Sixty-fifth Birthday, edited by Timothy Maschke, Franz Posset, and Joan Skocir, 165–82. Marquette Studies in Theology 28. Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 2001. Mattox, Mickey Leland. “Defender of the Most Holy Matriarchs”: Martin Luther’s Interpretation of the Women of Genesis in the Enarrationes in Genesin, 1535–45. Studies in Medieval and Reformation Thought 92. Leiden: Brill, 2003. ———. “Martin Luther’s Interpretation of the Women of Genesis in the Context of the Christian Exegetical Tradition.” PhD diss., Duke University, 1997. Maxfield, John A. “Divine Providence, History, and Progress in Saint Augustine’s City of God.” Concordia Theological Quarterly 66 (2002): 339–60. McGinn, Bernard. Visions of the End: Apocalyptic Traditions in the Middle Ages. Records of Civilization: Sources and Studies 96. New York: Columbia University Press, 1979. McGrath, Alister E. Iustitia Dei: A History of the Christian Doctrine of Justification. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998. McGuire, Marilyn M. “The Mature Luther’s Revision of Marriage Theology: Preference for Patriarchs over Saints in His Commentary on Genesis.” PhD diss., Saint Louis University, 1999. Meinhold, Peter. Die Genesisvorlesung Luthers und ihre Herausgeber. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1936.

Biblio_Luther Page 231 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:02 PM

BIBLIOGRAPHY

231

Miller, Peter N. “Nazis and Neo-Stoics: Otto Brunner and Gerhard Oestreich Before and After the Second World War.” Past and Present 176 (Aug. 2002): 144–86. Minnis, A. J. Medieval Theory of Authorship: Scholastic Literary Attitudes in the Later Middle Ages. 2nd ed. Middle Ages Series. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1988. Moeller, Bernd. “Die frühe Reformation in Deutschland als neues Mönchtum.” In Die frühe Reformation in Deutschland als Umbruch, edited by Bernd Moeller and Stephen E. Buckwalter, 76–91. Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 1998. ———. “The German Humanists and the Beginnings of the Reformation.” In Imperial Cities and the Reformation, edited and translated by H. C. Erik Midelfort and Mark U. Edwards Jr., 19–38. Durham, NC: Labyrinth, 1982. Muller, Richard A., and John L. Thompson. Biblical Interpretation in the Era of the Reformation: Essays Presented to David C. Steinmetz in Honor of His Sixtieth Birthday. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1996. Nadel, George H. “Philosophy of History before Historicism.” History and Theory 3 (1964): 291– 315. Nestingen, James. “Luther in Front of the Text: The Genesis Commentary.” Word & World 14 (1994): 186–94. Oberman, Heiko A. “‘IMMO’: Luthers reformatorische Entdeckungen im Spiegel der Rhetorik.” In Lutheriana: Zum 500. Geburtstag Martin Luthers von den Mitarbeitern der Weimarer Ausgabe, edited by Gerhard Hammer and Karl-Heinz zur Mühlen, 17–38. Archiv zur Weimarer Ausgabe der Werke Martin Luthers: Texte und Untersuchungen 5. Cologne: Böhlau, 1984. ———. Luther: Man between God and the Devil. Translated by Eileen Walliser-Schwarzbart. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1989. ———. Luther: Mensch zwischen Gott und Teufel. Berlin: Severin und Siedler, 1983. ———. “Martin Luther: Vorläufer der Reformation.” In Verifikationen. Festschrift für Gerhard Ebeling zum 70. Geburtstag, edited by E. Jüngel, J. Wallmann, and W. Werbeck, 91–119. Tübingen, 1982. ———. “Martin Luther: Zwischen Mittelalter und Neuzeit.” In “Gott kumm mir zu hilf ”: Martin Luther in der Zeitenwende, edited by H.-D. Loock, 9–26. Jahrbuch für Berlin-Brandenburgische Kirchengeschichte, special volume. Berlin: Christliche Zeitschriftenverlag, 1984. ———. The Reformation: Roots and Ramifications. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1994. ———. The Roots of Anti-Semitism in the Age of Renaissance and Reformation. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984. Olson, Oliver K. Matthias Flacius and the Survival of Luther’s Reform. Wolfenbütteler Abhandlungen zur Renaissanceforschung 20. Wiesbanden: Harrassowitz, 2002. ———. “Theology of Revolution: Magdeburg, 1550–1551.” Sixteenth Century Journal 3, no. 1 (April 1972): 56–70. O’Meara, Dominic J., ed. Neoplatonism and Christian Thought. Studies in Neoplatonism: Ancient and Modern 3. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1982. Ozment, Steven. Protestants: The Birth of a Revolution. New York: Doubleday, 1992. ———. When Fathers Ruled: Family Life in Reformation Europe. Studies in Cultural History. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1983. Parsons, Michael. Luther and Calvin on Old Testament Narratives: Reformation Thought and Narrative Text. Texts and Studies in Religion 106. Lewiston, NY: Mellen, 2004. Pelikan, Jaroslav. “Die Kirche nach Luthers Genesisvorlesung.” In Lutherforschung heute: Referate und Berichte des 1. Internationalen Lutherforschungskongresses, Aarhus, 18.–23. August 1956, edited by Vilmos Vajta, 102–10. Berlin: Lutherisches Verlagshaus 1958. ———. Luther the Expositor: Introduction to the Reformer’s Exegetical Writings. Saint Louis, MO: Concordia, 1959.

Biblio_Luther Page 232 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:02 PM

232

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Pocock, J. G. A. “The Origins of the Study of the Past: A Comparative Approach.” Comparative Studies in Society and History 4 (1962): 209–46. Posset, Franz. “Bible Reading ‘with closed eyes’ in the Monastic Tradition: An Overlooked Aspect of Martin Luther’s Hermeneutics.” American Benedictine Review 38 (1987): 293– 306. ———. Pater Bernhardus: Martin Luther and Bernard of Clairvaux. Cistercian Studies Series 168. Kalamazoo: Cistercian Publications, 1999. Preus, James S. From Shadow to Promise: Old Testament Interpretation from Augustine to the Young Luther. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1969. Preuss, Hans. Martin Luther: Der Prophet. Gütersloh: Bertelsmann, 1933. Rabe, Horst. Reichsbund und Interim: Die Verfassungs- und Religionspolitik Karls V und der Reichstag von Augsburg 1547/1548. Cologne: Böhlau, 1971. Raeder, Siegfried. Das Hebräische bei Luther, untersucht bis zum Ende der ersten Psalmenvorlesung. Beiträge zur historischen Theologie 31. Tübingen: Mohr, 1961. ———. Die Benutzung des masoretischen Textes bei Luther in der Zeit zwischen der ersten und zweiten Psalmenvorlesung. Beiträge zur historischen Theologie 38. Tübingen: Mohr, 1967. ———. Grammatica Theologica: Studien zu Luthers Operationes in Psalmos. 1st ed. Beiträge zur historischen Theologie 51. Tübingen: Mohr, 1977. Reeves, Marjorie. The Influence of Prophecy in the Later Middle Ages: A Study in Joachimism. Oxford: Clarendon, 1969. Roper, Lyndal. The Holy Household: Women and Morals in Reformation Augsburg. Oxford: Clarendon, 1989. Rorem, Paul. Pseudo-Dionysius: A Commentary on the Texts and an Introduction to Their Influence. New York: Oxford University Press, 1993. Rummel, Erika. The Confessionalization of Humanism in Reformation Germany. Oxford Studies in Historical Theology. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. Ruokanen, Miikka. Doctrina divinitus inspirata: Martin Luther’s Position in the Ecumenical Problem of Biblical Inspiration. Publications of Luther-Agricola Society, B 14. Helsinki: Vammala, 1985. ———. “Does Luther Have a Theory of Biblical Inspiration?” Modern Theology 4 (1987): 1–16. Scheller-Schach, Claudia. “‘Ein imaginäres Grabmuseum’: Epitaphien und Grabmäler in St. Michael in Schwäbisch Hall.” In Zum ewigen Gedächtnis: Beiträge einer Arbeitstagung des Württembergischen Landesmuseums Stuttgart des Historischen Vereins für Württembergisch Franken des Bildungshauses des Klosters Schöntal und des Vereins Künstlerfamilie Sommer im Jahr 1999, edited by Peter Schiffer, 43–61. Forschungen aus Württembergisch Franken 50. Stuttgart: Thorbecke, 2003. Schilling, Heinz. “Confessional Europe.” In Handbook of European History, 1400–1600, 2 vols., edited by Thomas A. Brady Jr., Heiko A. Oberman, and James D. Tracy, 2:641–81. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1996. Schmitt, Charles B., Quentin Skinner, Eckhard Kessler, and Jill Krange, eds. The Cambridge History of Renaissance Philosophy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998. Schwarz, Reinhard. “Luther’s Inalienable Inheritance of Monastic Theology.” American Benedictine Review 39 (1988): 430–50. Schwoebel, Robert. The Shadow of the Crescent: The Renaissance Image of the Turk (1453–1517). Nieuwkoop: De Graaf, 1967. Scribner, R. W. For the Sake of Simple Folk: Popular Propaganda for the German Reformation, rev. ed. Oxford: Clarendon, 1994. Seebaß, Gottfried. “Confessionalization and Tolerance: Early Resistance against the Cura Religionis in the German Imperial Cities.” In Caritas et Reformatio: Essays on Church and

Biblio_Luther Page 233 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:02 PM

BIBLIOGRAPHY

233

Society in Honor of Carter Lindberg, edited by David M. Whitford, 59–71. St. Louis, MO: Concordia Academic Press, 2002. Seeberg, Erich. Studien zu Luthers Genesisvorlesung: Zugleich ein Beitrag zur Frage nach dem alten Luther. Gütersloh: Bertelsmann, 1932. Shoenberger, Cynthia Grant. “The Development of the Lutheran Theory of Resistance, 1523– 1530.” Sixteenth Century Journal 8, no. 1 (1977): 61–76. ———. “Luther and the Justifiability of Resistance to Legitimate Authority.” Journal of the History of Ideas 40 (1979): 3–20. Smalley, Beryl. The Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages. 3rd rev. ed. Oxford: Blackwell, 1983. Smith, Wm. Bradford. “Lutheran Resistance to the Imperial Interim in Hesse and Kulmbach.” Lutheran Quarterly 19 (Autumn 2005): 249–75. Spitz, Lewis W. Luther and German Humanism. Aldershot: Variorum, 1996. Steinmetz, David C. “Divided by a Common Past: The Reshaping of the Christian Exegetical Tradition in the Sixteenth Century.” Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies 27 (Spring 1997): 245–64. ———. Luther in Context. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1986. ———. “The Superiority of Pre-Critical Exegesis.” Theology Today 37 (1980): 27–38. Stephens, Walter. Giants in Those Days: Folklore, Ancient History, and Nationalism. Regents Studies in Medieval Culture. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1989. Strauss, Gerald. Luther’s House of Learning: Indoctrination of the Young in the German Reformation. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1978. ———. “The Reformation and Its Public in an Age of Orthodoxy.” In The German People and the Reformation, edited by R. Po-chia Hsia, 194–214. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1988. Strauss, Walter L. The German Single-Leaf Woodcut, 1550–1600: A Pictorial Catalogue. 3 vols. New York: Abaris, 1975. Tarán, Leonardo. “Amicus Plato sed magis amica veritas: From Plato and Aristotle to Cervantes.” Antike und Abendland: Beiträge zum Verständnis der Griechen und Römer und Ihres Nachlebens 30 (1984): 93–124. Thompson, Mark D. A Sure Ground on Which to Stand: The Relation of Authority and Interpretive Method in Luther’s Approach to Scripture. Foreword by Alister McGrath. Paternoster Biblical and Theological Monographs. Carlisle, UK: Paternoster, 2004. Trigg, Jonathan D. Baptism in the Theology of Martin Luther. Studies in the History of Christian Thought 56. Leiden: Brill, 1994. Ward, Timothy. Word and Supplement: Speech Acts, Biblical Texts, and the Sufficiency of Scripture. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002. Weiss, James Michael. “Erasmus at Luther’s Funeral: Melanchthon’s Commemorations of Luther in 1546.” Sixteenth Century Journal 16 (1985): 91–114. Wengert, Timothy J. Human Freedom, Christian Righteousness: Philip Melanchthon’s Exegetical Dispute with Erasmus of Rotterdam. Oxford Studies in Historical Theology. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998. ———. Law and Gospel: Philip Melanchthon’s Debate with John Agricola of Eisleben over Poenitentia. Texts and Studies in Reformation and Post-Reformation Thought. Carlisle, UK: Paternoster and Baker Books, 1997. Whitford, David M., “Cura Religionis or Two Kingdoms: The Late Luther on Religion and the State in the Lectures on Genesis.” Church History 73 (2004): 41–62. ———. “The Duty to Resist Tyranny: The Magdeburg Confession and the Reframing of Romans 13.” In Caritas et Reformatio: Essays on Church and Society in Honor of Carter Lindberg, edited by David M. Whitford, 89–101. St. Louis: Concordia Academic Press, 2002. ———. Tyranny and Resistance: The Magdeburg Confession and the Lutheran Tradition. St. Louis: Concordia, 2001.

Biblio_Luther Page 234 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:02 PM

234

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Wiesner, Merry. Gender, Church, and State in Early Modern Germany. Women and Men in History. London: Longman, 1998. ———. “Luther and Women: The Death of Two Marys.” In Disciplines of Faith: Studies in Religion, Politics and Patriarchy, edited by Jim Obelkevich, Lyndal Roper, and Raphael Samuel, 295–308. History Workshop Series. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1987. Wilken, Robert L. “In Defense of Allegory.” Modern Theology 14 (1998): 197–212. Williams, Arnold. The Common Expositor: An Account of the Commentaries on Genesis, 1527– 1633. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1948. Wingren, Gustaf. Creation and Law. Translated by Ross MacKenzie. Philadelphia: Muhlenberg, 1961. Wriedt, Markus. “Luther’s Concept of History and the Formation of an Evangelical Identity.” In Protestant History and Identity in Sixteenth-Century Europe. Vol. 1, The Medieval Inheritance, edited by Bruce Gordon, 31–45. Aldershot: Scolar Press, 1996. Wunder, Gerd. Personendenkmale der Michaelskirche in Schwäbisch Hall. Schwäbisch Hall: Haller Tagblatt, 1987. Wunder, Heide. He Is the Sun, She Is the Moon: Women in Early Modern Germany. Translated by Thomas Dunlap. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1998. Zophy, Jonathan W. “We Must Have the Dear Ladies: Martin Luther and Women.” In Pietas et Societas: New Trends in Reformation Social History. Essays in Memory of Harold J. Grimm, edited by Kyle C. Sessions and Phillip N. Bebb, 141–150. Sixteenth Century Essays & Studies 4. Kirksville, MO: Sixteenth Century Journal Publishers, 1985.

Index_Luther Page 235 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:02 PM

Index Antiochene exegesis, 66, 130 antiquity biblical, 153 Christian, 178 classical, 47, 142–43, 155n, 177 late, 75–76, 113 anti-Semitic opinions, Luther’s, 55 Antony, Saint, 75, 102, 114, 120 apathy, 132–33 Apocalypse, 211n, 214 apocalyptic crisis or struggle, 55, 180, 182, 197, 207, 210, 212 mentality, 148, 180–81, 184–85, 188–90, 201, 207–8, 211–12 language, 194–95 prophets, 181n, 201 Aquinas, Saint Thomas, 71n, 125 Arianism, 3, 156 Aristotle, 26, 36, 41, 43–46, 51–52, 55, 143n Arnold of Villanova, 200 ascent of the soul, 66, 77, 120, 129, 130n, 139 asceticism, 66, 75–76, 100, 112–13, 119, 129, 134–35, 139 Asendorf, Ulrich, 6n, 18n, 33n, 45n, 74n, 82n Asini ad lyram, 17 astrology, 44, 47, 200, Athanasius, Saint, 76 Auerbach, Erich, 168n Augsburg, Diet of, 162, 176, 196 Augustine, Saint, 13, 39–41, 43, 48, 51–52, 71n, 76–77, 88n, 93, 94, 113–14, 117, 118n, 123, 124n, 132, 139, 142, 152, 157, 159, 161, 178–79, 189–90, 201n, 206, 210, 212 Augustinian tradition, 77, 157, 160, 177

Aaron, 176n, 200 Abel (patriarch), 52–53, 152, 157–63, 170, 178 church of, 157–63 Abimelech, 81–84, 196 Abraham, 21, 24, 27, 36, 54, 67–71, 81–83, 86, 98–102, 106–12, 115–16, 118, 127, 138, 149, 155, 173, 176n, 196, 219 absolute power, God’s, 120 absolutism, political, 87 ad fontes, 142, 152, 177–78 Adam, 9, 33, 35, 46, 51, 65–67, 148–58, 162– 63, 170, 220 Aeneid, 216 affective interpretation. See biblical interpretation: affective Agricola, John, 19–20, 24, 26, 153 Ahab, 164 Alexandrian exegesis, 66n, 130n. See also Biblical interpretation: allegorical allegory. See Biblical interpretation: allegorical Alphonse of Aragon, 147 Alveld, Augustine, 146 Ambrose, 43, 76, 132, 139 Amorites, 205 Anabaptism, 3, 4, 29, 77, 83, 155–56, 202 analogy of the faith, 62–63, 200 Anfechtung. See Tentatio. angels, 35, 40, 55, 61, 68, 86, 117–18, 125–26, 158, 169, 175, 181–85, 193n, 195–96, 199, 211n, 212 Annas, 176n Antichrist, papacy as, 113, 144–45, 169, 175, 190, 192, 207 anticlericalism, 102, 134 anti-Judaism, Luther’s, 54 antinomianism, 19–26, 30, 115n, 153, 202

Babel, tower of, 168

235

Index_Luther Page 236 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:02 PM

236 baptism, 63, 84, 120, 130, 142, 172–74, 192 Babylon (as seat of opposition to God), 113, 169 Barabbas, 176n Barnes, Robin, 181n, 184n, 188n, 191n, 198n, 200n, 208n, 211n, Bast, Robert, 87, 88n Bayer, Oswald, 14n, 18n, 64n, 216–17 beatific vision, 219 Benedict, Saint, 102, 113, 139 Benjamin, 132 Bernard of Clairvaux, Saint, 23, 114, 122, 125n Bethel, 173, 184 biblical interpretation affective, 64, 72, 73–75, 80, 118, 217, 218 allegorical, 17n, 34, 41, 48, 61–63, 66, 122, 124–25, 152, 163, 168n, 218 anagogical, 48, 66n ascetic, 64–66, 75n, 119n Christological, 48–49, 64, 149 figurative (see also typological), 24, 26, 28, 30, 34, 39, 45, 124n, 152, 161, 168, 193, 212, 217 history of, 1, 4, 49, 64 medieval, 4, 17n, 18, 23, 32, 48–50, 65n, 71, 74, 106n, 152, 163, 168n, 217– 18 patristic, 4, 32, 34, 40–41, 45, 47–50, 61– 62, 65n, 71, 109n, 163, 168, 217– 18 monastic traditions of, 64, 73–74, 80, 122, 125 rabbinic, 23n, 39–41, 42n, 43, 50–60, 65, 100, 164, 180n spiritual, 18, 31, 48–50, 51, 53, 61, 64, 65n, 66, 74, 132, 142, 152, 163, 177, 217–18; typological, 48, 61, 63, 71, 163, 168n, 218 See also Alexandrian exegesis; Antionchene exegesis; literal sense of scripture Biel, Gabriel, 201n Bielfeldt, Dennis, 45n, 58n Boethius, 17, 18n Bonaventure, Saint, 124 Bossy, John, 113n Brecht, Martin, 6n, 20n Brenz, Johannes, 135 Brenz, Margarete, 135 Brown, Peter, 3n, 75–76, 88n, 113n, 114n, 139n Bugenhagen, Johannes, 191–92 Burton-Christie, Douglas, 64n, 132n

INDEX Caiaphas, 176n Cain (patriarch), 51–53, 168, 178 church of, 151, 157–63, 174n Cainite race, 150, 152, 163–64 Calvary, 173 Calvin, John, 16, 84n, 86n Canaan, 27, 33n, 102, 116, 138, 184, 196, 206 Canaanite woman (of Matt. 15), 26, 129 Canaanites, 196 canon biblical, 151, 180n rule (or principle of reasoning), 7, 120 canonists, 36 Cappadocian Fathers, 76 Carthusians, 114 catechisms Luther’s, 19, 219 medieval, 87, 88n Catholic Church. See Roman Church, Eastern Catholicism Catholicism eastern. See Eastern Catholicism western. See Roman Church celibacy, 80, 99, 111, 117, 119, 123 Charles V, 8, 84n, 96n Christ, resurrection of, 33, 61 Christendom, 3, 11, 12, 88, 113, 113, 134, 140, 146, 176, 202 church Evangelical understanding of, 9, 141–42, 160–70, 177–79 on earth, 29, 48, 146, 210 triumphant, 29n, 48 church fathers, 11–12, 17, 34, 43, 46–47, 49, 53–54, 61, 63, 94, 114, 119n, 124, 128, 139, 143, 153, 166, 178. 218n. See also Desert fathers Chaldeans, 100 Cicero, 183 circumcision, 27 City of God, Augustine’s, 152, 157, 159, 189 civil realm or authority (politia), 5n, 78, 81– 98, 101, 108–9, 111, 115–16, 122, 124, 126, 141, 145, 156n, 178, 188–91, 196, 213, 216 comedy, catastrophe or epitasis of, 70–71, 208, 210 Compostela, St. James of, 174 confession (and absolution), 27, 75, 130, 173, 175. See also penance confession (of sin), 67 confession (of the gospel), 27, 68, 193 Confession Concerning Christ’s Supper, Luther’s, 77–80, 115, 135

Index_Luther Page 237 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:02 PM

INDEX

237

Confessions, Augustine’s, 13, 43, 124 confessional Lutheranism, identity of, 2, 220 confessionalization, 2, 87, 88n conscience, 22, 62, 65–67, 126, 156n, 197 Contemplatio (contemplation), 66, 119–26, 219 Cooperator dei, man as, 179, 185, 189n, 212– 13 councils, church, 11–12, 96, 165 Cranach, Lucas (the Younger), 89 Creatio continua, 79 Creatio ex nihilo, 94, 99, 126, 153n Creation, days of, 35, 41, 45–46 creeds, ancient 3, 143 crucifix, 135 Crucifixion, 53, 54, 63, 118, 120–21, 131, 160, 173, 219 Cruciger, Caspar, 16 cult of the saints, 75

Egypt, 33, 70, 83–84, 86, 92, 131–33, 185, 196n, 206 Egyptians, spoils of the, 86, 197 Electors of Saxony, 81 Elijah, 164, 201, 203 emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, 63n, 95–97, 145, 188, 195, 211–12. See also Charles V. enarratio, 9n, 16, 23, 26, 28, 64–65, 163, 168n end of time. See Judgment Day Enlightenment, the, 12, 74, 218 Ephraim (son of Joseph), 26, 60, 175, 192 Ephraim (tribe and later northern kingdom of Israel), 60 Epicureans, 26, 182–83, 197, 204n, 206 Erasmus of Rotterdam, 17, 18n, 26n, 55, 58, 114, 115n, 140n, 183–84, 213n, 215n Esau, 96, 127, 171, 184, 187 Eve, 33, 45, 61, 65–66, 149, 153–58, 170

Daniel, book of, 180, 182, 192, 208n, 211, 214 David, 13, 31, 48–49 De doctrina Christiana, Augustine’s, 39n, 43n, 71n, 118n, 152 Decalogue, 20n, 95, 129; two tables of, 95–97 Delius, Han-Ulrich, 6n, 18n, 52n desert fathers, 75–76, 78, 113–14, 132n devil, the. See Satan dialectic of the Holy Spirit, 98 dialetical reasoning, 20n, 74, 97–98, 149 Diet of Augsburg. See Augsburg, Diet of Dietrich, Veit, 6, 7n, 9n, 16 Dinah, rape of, 205 Diocletian, 194–95 Dionysius, Saint, 114n Dionysius the Areopagite, 130n disciple, 12n, 19, 24, 186 Dominic, Saint, 114, 139, 155 Donation of Constantine, 143–46, 177 Donatism, 3 deluge. See Flood dreams (as means of revelation), 30, 81, 125, 173–74, 188, 199–201, 213–14 Duffy, Eamon, 113n

fanatics, 4, 77, 97, 114, 128, 150, 153, 182, 194. See also Anabaptism, radical reformers, Sacramentarians false brethren, 20, 156, 158n, 172 firstborn, rights of the. See primogeniture, law of Flood, 62, 148, 150, 164n, 167–68, 201 Forsberg, Juhani, 8n, 99n Forster, Johannes, 50 Francis, Saint, 102, 114, 132, 139, 155 Franciscan order, 146, 200. See also Lyra, Nicholas of Frederick the Wise, 84 Frederick, John, 84n Frei, Hans, 16n Friedman, Jerome, 50 Froehlich, Karlfried, 23n, 42, 64, 66n, 125n, 130n

Eastern Catholicism, 40, 76–77, 114, 154 Ebeling, Gerhard, 33n, 48n, 49n Eber, 35, 94 Ecclesia, order of, 5n, 11, 78, 82, 115, 121, 135, 158, 216 ecclesiology, Luther’s. See church, Evangelical understanding of Edwards, Mark, 20n, 43n, 156n, 158n, 181n, 199n

Gadolo, Bernardino, 42n garden of Eden, 61, 151–53, 156, 173 of Gethsemane, 127 Geary, Patrick, 147 Genesis lectures, textual reliability of the published, 6–8 Georg, Duke of Saxony, 191 Gerondi, Rabbi, 51–53 gentiles, 107, 200 Germany, 3–4, 13, 58, 82, 84, 86, 91, 102, 134, 145, 165, 184–86, 195–96, 198, 201–8, 219 Gerson, Jean, 120, 124, 201n Ginzburg, Carlo, 143n, 144

Index_Luther Page 238 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 1:50 PM

238 golden age, 148n, 149, 176, 190, 191n, 195, 198 gnesio-Lutheran, 98n God’s love. See Love of God God’s wrath. See Wrath of God Graebner, Paul, 198n Grafton, Anthony, 7n, 16n, 18n, 46n Graham, William A., 12–13 Greek church. See Eastern Catholicism Greene-McCreight, Kathryn, 16n Gregory, Brad, 5n, 169n Gregory the Great, Saint, 17, 48, 114n, 131 Grumbach, Argula von, 109n Hagen, Kenneth, 16n, 23n, 74n, 101n Hagar, 24–25, 55, 86–87, 91, 102, 106, 109– 10 Ham, 168–69 Hannibal, 184 Haran, 36 Headley, John, 88n, 143n, 148n, 149n, 179n, 181n, 189n, 212n, 213n Hebraica, Christian, 50, 52n, 53, 55–58 Hebrew language, 23n, 49–52, 56–65, 132, 162, 217 nation or people, 35, 152 vowel points, 56–58 Heidelberg Disputation, 28n, 55, 76 Hendrix, Scott, 2n, 3n, 16n, 29n, 48n, 49, 61n, 64, 88n, 101n, 113, 115n, 116n, 139n, 140n, 144n, 147n, 159n, 161n, 195n, 198n, 201n, 207n, 210n, 218n hermeneutics, 1, 33n, 48n, 75n, 80n, 125. See also biblical interpretation Hilarion, Saint, 114 Hilary, Saint, 40, 51, 52n historical criticism, 18, 74, 143, 146–47, 177, 180n, 218 historical sense of scripture. See literal sense of scripture history of thought, 2n History of the Life and Acts of Dr. Martin Luther, 215n Hittites, 36 Hoffman, Melchior, 185, 188, 190 holiness, mediation of, 76, 78–79 Holl, Karl, 161n holy man, 75, 78–79, 99, 102, 113, 116, 118, 129, 134, 148, 165, 219 Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation, 208 Horace, 55

INDEX household (oeconomia), 15, 21, 24, 43n, 78, 81, 84, 87, 89, 94, 96, 98–112, 115–16, 123–27, 135, 141, 153, 172–73, 182, 191, 213, 219 household gods, 94n, 96, 191 Hugo of St. Cher, 124 Huizinga, Johann, 142 humanism, 7n, 9n, 16n, 18, 50, 55, 57–59, 73–74, 140n, 142–44, 147, 152, 176– 78, 215n, 218, 220 Hus, John, 165–66 Hutten, Ulrich von, 144 iconoclasm, 99, 101–2, 134, 139 incarnation of Christ, 38, 151–52, 157, 189 interim, imperial, 8, 96n, 98n identity Catholic, 114, 146 Evangelical, 2–5, 9, 32, 75, 98, 113, 115, 134, 139, 140, 142, 159, 160, 167, 169, 170, 176–79, 181, 206, 213, 217–21 idolatry, 60, 95, 97, 99–100, 106, 112, 115–16, 127, 150, 154–55, 163, 173, 191, 196, 203 Innocent III (pope), 63n Isaac (patriarch), 24, 69, 72, 81, 83, 94–95, 110, 118, 131, 171 Isaac, Gordon, 19 Ishmael, 24–26, 109–11 Israel, nation of, 60, 151, 164, 172, 175, 176n, 201, 206, 215 Iwand, Hans, 77 Jacob, 26, 36–37, 60, 94–96, 118–19, 122–33, 170–75, 176n, 182, 184, 187, 191–93, 195–97, 209, 219 James, Saint, 68. See also Compostela, St. James of Jeremiah, 201, 203, 214, 215 Jerome, Saint, vii, 40, 40n, 43, 50, 54, 56, 97, 113–14, 114n, 124, 133, 139, 162n, 165–66 Jerome of Prague, 165–66 Jerusalem, 33, 100, 160, 211n Jewish War, 211n Jews, 40, 51, 54–56, 59–60, 114, 150, 180n, 211n. See also biblical interpretation, rabbinic Joachim of Fiore, 200 Job, 181 John, Saint (author of the Apocalypse), 214 John, Saint (the Baptist), 11, 148, 176n, 201, 215–16

Index_Luther Page 239 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:02 PM

INDEX John the Steadfast, Elector, 184n Joseph, 26, 28–30, 33, 60, 67, 70–71, 91–94, 118, 126–27, 129–33, 170, 185–87, 196n, 199, 201, 206, 208–10, 219 Joseph’s dreams, 199 Joshua, 99 Judah (patriarch), 38, 132 tribe of, 214 Judaism, 151 Judgment Day, 150, 180, 191, 195, 201, 203– 4, 206–9, 211–14, 220 Junghans, Helmar, 18n, 178n, 184n jurists, 26, 36, 220n justification by faith, Luther’s “Reformation discovery” of, 74n, 76, 138–39, 148 Karlstadt, Andreas, 114 Kelley, Donald, 142, 177n keys, power of the, 172, 187 Kimalthi, Rabbi, 55 kingdom of God, 60, 101, 116–17, 130, 146, 155, 175–76, 186, 192–93. See also Two kingdoms, Luther’s doctrine of Klaus, Bernhard, 7, 9n Kolb, Robert, 9n, 170n, 198n, 214n, 220n Köpf, Ulrich, 73, 113n Koran, 175 Laban, 36, 96–97, 123, 127, 182, 191, 197 law, natural, 97, 172 lawyers. See jurists Leah, 96, 123–25 Leclercq, Jean, 74n, 140n Lectio divina, 74 Levi, 176n, 205 Levites, 176n Lichtenberger, Johann, 200 Lindbeck, George, 16n Literal sense of scripture, 18, 39, 45, 48–49, 62–66, 72, 124–25, 152, 156, 163, 177, 205, 217–218, 220 Lohse, Bernhard, 28n, 55, 147n, 181n, 198n, 213n Lombard, Peter, 51 Lortz, Joseph, 5 Lot (patriarch), 11n, 181, 204 love, Christian, 20, 78–79, 110–11, 113, 124, 126, 146, 152, 159, 189, 204 love, God’s, 37, 68, 70–72, 93–94, 160 love of the scripture, 14, 17–18, 215 Lubac, Henri de, 17n, 218n Lucifer, 13. See also Satan Lutheran Reformation. See Wittenberg Reformation

239 Luther’s monastic experience, 15, 23, 29n, 64, 73–74, 100, 122, 139–40. See also biblical interpretation: affective Lyra, Nicholas of, 6n, 18, 40–42, 43n, 47, 50, 55, 61, 65, 87, 128, 187 McGinn, Bernard, 180n, 201n magisterium papal, 5, 147 of the Holy Spirit, 34, 43 Malchus, Saint, 114n Manasseh, 26, 60, 175, 192 Manichaeanism, 124, 126, 184 Markschies, Christoph, 143n Marshall, Bruce, 16n martyrdom, 28, 78, 100–101, 111–12, 118, 134, 139, 164–65, 169, 193–94, 208 Mary, Blessed Virgin, 121, 125–26 Mattox, Mickey, 2n, 4, 6n, 7n, 9n, 24n, 48n, 86n, 87n, 94n, 97n, 106n, 107n, 109n, 118n, 119n, 191n Meinhold, Peter, 6, 8n, 12n, 21n, 24n, 26n, 27n, 29n, 30n, 33, 34n, 98n, 187n Melanchthon, Philip, vii, 6, 8, 19, 20n, 21n, 44, 44n, 98, 98n, 115n, 158n, 191n, 213, 213n, 215, 215n, 216n, 220 Melanchthonian. See Philippists medieval Catholicism, 4, 77, 80, 87, 146 Meditatio (meditation), 13–14, 17, 24, 31, 122 Memento mori, 69n mentality medieval, 91, 117 Luther’s, 86, 116, 150, 152, 208 See also Apocalyptic: mentality messiah, 193–95 messianic prophecy, 193 Michael, the angel, 193n middle Ages, 3, 41, 75, 76, 88, 102n, 113, 142, 176–77, 201, 217, 218 ministers (ecclesiastical). See pastoral office Moeller, Bernd, 73n, 112, 113n, 139n Mohammed, 175–76, 211–12 monastic theology, 74, 139, 140n monasticism, 14, 23, 73–74, 76, 80, 97, 99, 102, 111–14, 133–34, 138–39, 174. See also Luther’s monastic experience Moses, 9, 12, 17, 19, 20n, 22, 25, 32–39, 41, 44, 47–48, 59–61, 65, 69, 87, 108, 127, 151–52, 153n, 154, 156, 163–64, 172, 176n, 178, 182, 200, 209, 215 Mulbrunnensis, Conrad Leontorius, 42n Münster, Sebastian, 52n, 56 Münsterer, Sebald, 68

Index_Luther Page 240 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 1:51 PM

INDEX

240 Müntzer, Thomas, 128, 132, 185, 188, 190 Naaman, 186 Nahor, 173 Naples, earthquake in, 204 Nebuchadnezzar, 201 new grammar, Luther’s understanding of, 52–53, 58 neoplatonism, 49, 77, 129, 130n, 139 nephilim, 164, Ninety-five Theses, 144, 165 Noah, 35, 148–50, 162–68, 170, 190–91, 202, 204, 213 Oberman, Heiko A., 1, 2n, 6n, 29n, 34n, 44n, 55n, 69n, 102n, 114n, 139n, 144n, 147–48, 156n, 181n, 184n, 189n, 198n, 201n, 207n, 211n, 213n, 218n Oestreich, Gerhard, 87 Ockham, William of, 201n Old Testament, Christian reading of, 54, 58– 59, 64, 72, 149, 178, 218n Olson, Oliver, 8n, 98n oratio (as prayer), 13–14, 24, 31, 122 ordered power, God’s, 120–21 orders, monastic, 77–78, 102n, 113, 134. See also monasticism orders of creation (established by God), 77– 81, 89, 94, 96, 98, 106, 113, 115–117, 124, 135, 140, 141, 182, 190, 216. See also household (oeconomia); civil realm or authority (politia) Origen, 61, 66n, 124, 142, 164 original righteousness. See righteousness: original original sin, 66, 77, 117, 153, 209 Ottoman Empire, 208. See also Turks Paddan-aram, 172, 182 papacy institution of, 3, 9, 21, 26, 30, 58, 63n, 86, 93, 95–97, 109, 111, 120, 123, 132, 134, 144–47, 150–51, 158, 160, 165, 167–70, 173–75, 177, 182, 184–88, 192, 194–95, 199, 204, 209–12, 220, 236 decrees of, 15, 175 See also Antichrist, papacy as papal church. See Roman Church Papal Curia, 165 papal magisterium. See magisterium, papal papists, 39, 54, 63, 81–92, 108, 111, 114, 119, 123, 132–33, 155, 164, 166–67, 170, 173–74, 176n, 188, 201–4, 206

Paradise. See Garden, of Eden pastoral office, 2, 21, 26–28, 31–32, 43n, 84, 98, 102, 135, 141–42, 165, 173–76, 186, 190–93, 196–197, 202, 206–7, 214, 215–16 Paul, Saint, 7, 17, 21–22, 25, 29, 36–37, 63, 89, 91, 107, 109n, 126, 127, 134, 155, 158n, 160, 166, 183, 187n, 209, 215 Paulinus, vii, 40n peasants, 82, 186, 196, 202–3, 206 Peasants’ War, 86 Pelagianism, 77, 115n Pelikan, Jaroslav, 6n, 44n, 152n, 187n penance, 75–76, 79, 92 penitence. See repentance Pentecost, 152 Pererius, Benedictus, 23n Persians, king of the, 192–193 Peter, Saint, 28, 62–63, 89, 127, 133, 187n, 204, 210 Petrarch, 142, 176 Pharaoh, 30, 83–84, 86, 127, 172, 196, 201, 206 Philippists, 44n, 98n, 213 philology, 14, 18, 48–58, 74, 144, 162, 218 philosophy pagan (classical), 17, 41, 43–47, 51–52, 63, 209 See also Scholasticism piety, medieval, 73, 76, 113n, 114, 140n, 174 Pilate, Pontius, 176n pilgrimage, 135, 174, 188, 189n, 219 Plato, 45, 46n, 66n Pliny, 37 Pocock, John, 147 poenitentia. See repentance pope. See papacy Posset, Franz, 29n, 122, 125n Potiphar, 28, 185–86; wife of, 28, 118 predestination, 127 Prierius, Sylvester, 165 primitivism, 143, 148, 150, 152 primogeniture, law of, 52–53, 94–96, 158, 171, 175 procession and return. See ascent of the soul; see also neoplatonism Preface to Galeatius Cappella’s History, Luther’s, 155 procreation, 117–19, 124n, 148n, 211 Promised Land. See Canaan Protestantism, 4, 50, 73, 115, 117 Purgatory, 76 Quintilian, 143n

Index_Luther Page 241 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:02 PM

INDEX Rabus, Ludwig, 169n Rachel, 37, 94n, 96–97, 122–26, 191, 219 radical reformers, 3, 77, 113, 132–33, 182, 188–89. See also fanatics; Sacramentarians Rashi (Rabbi Schlomo Yitzhagi), 42n reason, human or philosophical, 13, 19, 29n, 34, 39, 43, 44, 46–47, 61, 63, 99, 108, 128, 183, 208. See also dialetical reasoning Rebecca, 81, 83, 94, 118, 126, 170–71, 173 Reformation, Protestant, 2–3, 31, 55, 73, 74n, 75, 77, 84, 87–88, 96n, 102, 107, 112– 13, 115, 117, 134, 139, 140n, 141–42, 144, 147, 152, 154–55, 165, 176, 177n, 181, 188, 190, 192, 195–96, 208, 213n, 219–20. See also Wittenberg Reformation Reformed church, 3–4 relics, 75, 78–79, 125, 135 Renaissance, 142, 147, 176, 178 repentance, 19, 25, 73, 87, 204–5, 207 resistance to tyranny, duty of, 94–98, 116 to the gospel, 206, 213 revisionism, historical, 142, 177n rhetoric, 13, 15, 19, 37, 52n, 53n, 62, 87, 143– 45, 153, 155, 176, 177 righteousness Christian, ceremonial, and political, 20n original, 65–66 Roman Church, 2–4, 58, 75, 76, 112, 114, 120, 139, 141–46, 163, 165, 167, 169– 70, 174n, 176–177, 187, 189, 192, 195, 219, 220. See also Cain, church of Roman Empire, 3, 88, 114, 142, 184, 208, 212 Rome, papacy at, 3, 9, 146, 177, 220 Rörer, Georg, 16, 19n, 139n, 187n Ruokanen, Miika, 38n Sacrament of the Altar, 4, 142, 162n, 172, 173, 187 Sacramentarians, 3–4, 29, 77, 114, 155, 202 sacraments, 3, 80, 174, 176, 185, 187, 189, 190, 192, 197–98, 220 Sacra scriptura sui ipsius interpres, 14n, 43n, 65 Samuel, 176n Sarah, 25, 36, 81, 86–87, 94n, 100–102, 106– 12, 116, 138, 219 Satan, 9, 14, 24n, 28–29, 48, 54, 61, 63n, 66– 67, 69n, 77–78, 84, 89, 91, 93–94, 99, 106, 114, 116, 118, 120, 125, 134, 140, 147, 149–51, 154–57, 169–72, 174–75,

241 177, 179, 181–84, 186–87, 190, 193– 94, 196–97, 199–202, 207, 211–12, 220 slaves of, 99, 165, 167, 175 Scheller-Schach, Claudia, 135n, 220n Schilling, Heinz, 2n Schmalkaldic League, 8 Schmalkalden, town of, 141 Scholasticism, 41, 47, 51, 53, 55, 57–58, 74, 76, 92, 119, 130 Schwarz, Reinhard, 74n Schwenckfeld, Kaspar, 120 science, 44–45, 47, 71n, 142 scripture interpreting scripture. See Sacra scriptura sui ipsius interpres Schwäbisch Hall, 135, 219n Schwärmer. See radical reformers secularization, 88, 91, 115–117, 134, 161, 220 Seeberg, Erich, 8 Selnecker, Nicholas, 221n Sermon on the Mount, 139n Septuagint, 51, 52 Seth, 35, 163 sexuality, patristic and medieval views of, 117, 119 Shechemites, 205 Shem, 35, 100 Simeon (son of Jacob), 92, 176n, 205 Simeon (of Luke 2), 27 Simeonites, 176n simony, 187 Smalley, Beryl, 65n social discipline, 87–89, 93, 108, 209, 212 Sodom, 11n, 21–22, 67, 181–82, 204 sola scriptura, 13, 43, 47–48 Solomon, Rabbi, 55 sophists. See Scholasticism soteriology, 66, 76–77, 121–22, 126, 129, 139 spiritual formation, 5, 9, 15, 18, 26, 31, 32, 74 spiritual interpretation. See biblical interpretation: medieval; patristic; spiritual Staupitz, Johann von, 125, 201n Stoics, 87n, 132 Strauss, Gerald, 115 students, notebooks of, 1, 2, 7n, 8–9, 16, 17, 19n, 194 table talk, Luther’s, 10–11, 20, 44n Tamar, 38 Temporal Authority (Luther’s treatise on), 95, 139 Ten Commandments. See Decalogue territorial church(es), 2, 3

Index_Luther Page 242 Wednesday, December 26, 2007 12:02 PM

INDEX

242 tentatio (spiritual struggle), 13–14, 24, 31, 67, 70, 102, 106, 122–26, 128, 135, 139, 217, 219. See also theology of the cross theology of glory, 121, 123, 130. See also contemplatio (contemplation); Scholasticism theology of the cross, 28n, 31, 55, 74, 79, 102, 121–22, 126–32, 159–61, 206, 208–9, 212 Theria. See Antiochene exegesis threefold spiritual sense of scripture, 48–50, 217. See also biblical interpretation: medieval; patristic; spiritual traditions, human, 109, 143, 154 tree of knowledge, 46, 153, 156, 173 Trigg, Jonathan, 174n Turks, 54, 92–93, 114, 150, 169, 173, 175–76, 182, 184–85, 192, 197, 205, 208n, 210, 212 two kingdoms, Luther’s doctrine of, 82n, 94n tyranny civil, 58, 81, 96, 164, 168, 172, 194, 196– 97, 205, 210 ecclesiastical, 94, 144–45, 150, 164 God’s pretended, 70–71 parental, 96–97

Weidner, Johannes, 135n Weiss, James Michael, 215n Wengert, Timothy, 19n, 20n, 115n, 158n western Catholic Church. See Roman Church Whitford, David, 82n, 94n, 96n, 98n Wilken, Robert, 218n Williams, Arnold, 23n, 164n Wittenberg Luther’s lecture hall (classroom) at, 1–2, 4, 6, 7, 15, 16, 19, 23, 27, 31, 32, 39, 47, 74, 98, 162, 167, 169, 183, 201, 221 town of, 8, 11, 15, 20, 24, 26, 68, 89, 114, 184n, 191 town, as place of publication, 9n, 10, 146 University of, 1, 11, 15, 23, 32, 42, 42n, 50, 64, 145, 163, 169n Wittenberg Reformation, 2, 4, 7, 8, 21, 43, 50, 86, 98n, 121, 212 Witzel, George, 120 woodcut prints, single-leaf, 84, 89, 91, 102, 134, 176 Worms, Diet of, 43n, 156n wrath of God, 19, 22, 36, 67, 89, 92–93, 131, 168, 205–6 Wriedt, Markus, 179n Yitzhagi, Rabbi Schlomo. See Rashi

universal history, 157, 177, 180n, 212, 214, 220 Ur of the Chaldeans, 100, 116 usury, 197, 205, 207 Valla, Lorenzo, 143–47, 176–77 Varro, 155 verbal inspiration, concept of, 33, 34n, 38n visions. See dreams (as means of revelation) Visitation Articles, 19 Vulgate, humanist critiques of, 57

Zechariah, 176n Zwingli, Ulrich, 77n. See also Sacramentarians