Collected Works of Martin Luther

by Martin Luther

  It is fanatical therefore to dispute concerning God and the divine nature without the Word and without some veiling representation. Yet thus do all heretics; and they think and dispute respecting God with the same security as they would respecting a hog or a cow. Therefore they receive a reward worthy their temerity; for by these means they are dashed on the rocks of every peril. Hence he who would contemplate such mighty things in safety and without danger must confine himself with all simplicity within those representations, signs and veils of the divine Majesty, his word and his works. For it is in his word and his works that he reveals himself unto us; and such as attain unto the knowledge of these are like the woman laboring under the issue of blood, healed by touching these hems of his garment.

  Those on the other hand who strive to reach God without these veils and coverings, attempt to scale heaven without a ladder, that is, without the Word; and in so doing are overwhelmed by the majesty of God, which they vainly endeavor to comprehend, and they fall and perish. And so it befell Arius. He conceived the imagination that there was some medium between the Creator and the creature; and that by that medium all things were created. Into this error he necessarily fell the moment he denied contrary to the Scriptures a plurality of persons in the divine nature. But as he discussed these things without the Word of God and depended solely on his own cogitations, he could not but be thus dashed to pieces.

  Thus the monk of the Papists, because he follows not the Word, imagines such a God to be sitting in heaven as will save any one who is covered with a cowl and observes a certain strict rule of life. Such a one also attempts to ascend into heaven by his own cogitations without God as revealed in his Word, or without the revealed face of God for his guide. Thus also the Jews had their idols and their groves. The fall and the destruction of all are alike. They are precipitated and dashed to pieces; because every one leaving the Word follows his own imaginations.

  If therefore we would walk safely we must embrace those things which the Word teaches, and which God himself has willed us to know; and all other things which are not revealed in the Word we must leave. For what are those things to me, which God did before the world was made, or how can I comprehend them? This is indulging thoughts upon the naked Divinity. And these are the thoughts by which the Jews suffer themselves to be led away from this text; and which thus prevent them from believing in a plurality of persons in the deity; whereas it is evident that Moses employs a plural noun.

  The papal decree condemned the Anthropomorphists (manlikeners), because they spoke of God as they would of a man, and attributed to him eyes, ears, arms, etc. An unjust condemnation truly! For how otherwise can man talk with man concerning God? If to think thus of God be heresy; then for a certainty is the salvation of all children, who can only think and speak thus as children concerning God, at an end for ever. But to say nothing about children, give me the most learned doctor in all the world; how otherwise will even he speak and teach concerning God?

  An injury therefore was thereby done to good men; who, though they believed God to be omnipotent and the only Saviour, yet were condemned merely because they said God has eyes by which he looks upon the poor and needy, and ears by which he listens to their prayers. For how otherwise can this our nature understand the spiritual reality of God. Moreover the Scriptures use this form of speech. Wherefore such were undeservedly condemned. They should rather have been lauded for the simplicity which they studied; which is so requisite in all teaching. It is absolutely necessary that when God reveals himself unto us, he should do so under some veil of representation, some shadowing manifestation, and should say, “Behold under this veil thou shalt surely discover me.” And when we embrace God under this veil or shadow, when we thus adore him, call upon him, and offer to him our sacrifices, we are said rightly to offer our sacrifices unto God!

  It was thus doubtless that our first parents worshipped God. In the morning when the sun rose they adored the Creator in the creature; or to speak more plainly they were by the creature reminded of the Creator. Their posterity retained the custom, but without the knowledge; and hence the custom lapsed into idolatry. The cause of this idolatry was not the sun; for he is a good creature of God; but the knowledge and the doctrine became by degrees extinct; for Satan cannot endure true doctrine. Thus when Satan had drawn Eve from the Word, she fell immediately into sin.

  To return then to the Anthropomorphists. I consider that they were condemned unjustly and without cause. For the prophets represent God as sitting on a throne. When foolish persons hear this their thoughts are immediately picturing a golden throne, marvellously decorated, etc., though they must all the while know that there can be no such material throne in heaven. Hence Isaiah says “that he saw God sitting on a throne; and his train filled the temple,” Is. 6:1. Whereas God cannot absolutely or by real vision appear to be thus represented or seen. But such figures and representations are well-pleasing to the Holy Spirit; and such works of God are set before us by the means of which we may apprehend God by our understanding. Such also are those figures when it is said that “He made the heavens and the earth”; that he sent his Son; that he speaks by his Son; that he baptizes; that he remits sins by the Word. He that does not understand these things will never understand God. But I say no more here; since these things have been frequently and abundantly discussed by me elsewhere; yet it was necessary to touch upon them on the present occasion for Moses’ sake, whom the Jews here so severely attack, in the exposition of which we are proving the plurality of the divine persons in the deity. Now let us proceed with the text.

  III. V. 3. And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.

  Moses has already said that the rude mass of heaven and earth which he also calls “darkness” and “the deep,” was made by the Word; and that work ought to be considered the work of the “first day.” Yet, it is now for the first time that Moses uses the expression “God said, Let there be light,” etc. A marvelous phraseology this indeed; unknown to any writer of any other language under heaven, that God by speaking causes that to exist, which had no existence before. Here therefore Moses sets before us the medium and instrument which God used in performing his works, namely the Word.

  But we must here carefully mark the distinction in the Hebrew language between the words AMAR and DABAR. We render each by the terms to say or to speak. But, in the Hebrew there is this difference: AMAR only and properly signifies the word uttered. But DABAR means also the thing or substance uttered. As when the prophets say “This is the Word of the Lord,” they use the term DABAR not AMAR. Even at this day the new Arians blind the eyes of those unacquainted with the Hebrew language by saying that the term in question implies, and is, “a thing created;” and that in this way it is that Christ is called the Word. Against this impious, and at the same time ignorant, corruption of the term Word, the reader is duly warned, and exhorted to remember that Moses here uses the word AMAR which simply and properly signifies the word uttered; so that the word uttered is something distinct from him who utters it; as here is also a distinction between the person speaking and the thing spoken.

  Therefore we have before proved from this text a plurality of persons; so here is also an evident distinction of persons; for it affirms that it is God the speaker, if I may so express myself, who creates; and yet he uses no material; but creates the heavens and the earth out of nothing by the sole word he utters.

  Compare here the Gospel of St. John “In the beginning was the Word.” He exactly agrees with Moses. He says that there was no creature whatever before the world was made. Yet God possessed the Word. And what is this Word and what does it do? Hear Moses. The light, says he, as yet was not; but the darkness out of its nothing-state is changed into that most excellent creature, light. By what? By the Word. Therefore, “in the beginning” and before every creature is the Word; and it is so powerful that out of nothing it makes all things. Hence that irrefragably follows, which John eloquently adds, that the Word was and is God! And yet,
that the Word is a person different from God the Father; even as the Word, and he who utters the Word, are things absolutely distinct from each other. But at the same time this distinction is of the nature that the most perfect oneness, if I may so speak, of unity remains.

  These are lofty mysteries, nor is it safe to go further into them than the Holy Spirit is pleased to lead us. Wherefore here let us stop; content with the knowledge that when the unformed heaven and unformed earth, each enveloped in mist and darkness, had stood forth created out of nothing by the Word, the light also shone forth out of nothing; and even out of darkness itself by the Word. The first work of the Creator Paul speaks of as a marvellous work; “God that commanded the light to shine out of darkness,” etc. The command of God, says he, made that light. This therefore is enough for us and sufficient to confirm our faith, that Christ is truly God, who existed with the Father from all eternity before the world was made; and that by him, who is the wisdom and word of the Father, the Father made all things. It is remarkable also that Paul in his passage makes the conversion of the wicked the work of a new creation, and a work wrought also by the Word.

  But here reason impiously busies itself with foolish questions. It argues, if the Word ever existed, why did not God create the heavens and the earth before by that Word? And again, Since the heavens and the earth were first made, when God began to speak, it seems to follow that the Word then first had existence, when the creatures began to exist, etc. But these impious cogitations are to be cast from us for concerning these things we can determine nothing nor think aright. For beyond that “beginning” of the creation is nothing but naked and divine essence; naked deity! And since God is incomprehensible that also is incomprehensible which was before the world; because it is nothing less than naked God!

  We believe it right therefore to speak only of “the beginning,” because we cannot advance beyond the beginning. But since John and Moses affirm that the Word was “in the beginning,” and before every creature, it of necessity follows that the Word was ever in the Creator and in the naked essence of God. Therefore he is the true God; yet so, that the Father begets and the Son is begotten. For Moses establishes this difference when he names God, who spoke and the word which was spoken. And this was enough for Moses to do; for the clearer explanation of this mystery properly belongs to the New Testament and to the Son, who is in the bosom of the Father. In the New Testament therefore we hear the literal names of the sacred persons, the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost. These indeed are indicated in certain psalms, and in the prophets but not so distinctly expressed.

  Augustine explains the word somewhat otherwise. For he interprets the expression “said” in this manner. “Said;” that is, it was so defined from all eternity by the word of the Father; it was so appointed of God. Because the Son is the mind, the image and the wisdom of God. But the true and simple meaning is to be retained. “God said;” that is, God by the Word made and created all things. This meaning the apostle also confirms when he says, “By whom also he made the worlds,” Heb. 1:2. And again, “All things were made by Him and for Him,” Col. 1:16. And within these limits ought to be confined every thought of the creation; our duty is to proceed no further; if we do, we fall headlong into certain darkness and destruction.

  Let these facts therefore be sufficient for us in any question concerning the world and its creation. With respect to the material of the world that it was made out of nothing; as the light was made out of that which was not light, so the whole heavens and the whole earth were made out of nothing; as the Apostle says, “He calleth those things that are not, as though they were,” Rom. 4:17.

  With respect to the instrument or medium which God used, it was his omnipotent word which was with God from the beginning, and as Paul speaks, “before the foundation of the world,” Eph. 1:4. Therefore when Paul says in Col. 1:16, “All things were made by him,” for he uses the preposition, after the Hebrew manner, for per; the Hebrews thus use their letter BETH; this and all similar passages are taken from this verse of Moses, who is here speaking of the Word uttered, by which anything is commanded or demanded.

  This Word was God, and was an omnipotent Word, spoken in the divine essence. No one heard this Word uttered but God himself; that is, God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Ghost. While it was uttered the light was generated; not out of the material of the Word nor out of the material of the speaker, but out of darkness itself. The Father spoke within, the work was immediately wrought without, and the light existed. In the same manner also were all things afterwards created. These facts, I say, concerning the manner of the creation are amply sufficient for us.

  IV. But here again a well known question is perpetually agitated, namely, of what kind was that light by which the original unformed mass of heaven and earth was illumined, seeing that neither the sun, nor the stars, were then created; and yet the text shows that this light was real and material. This fact has given occasion to some to have recourse to an allegory, who would explain the matter thus: “Let there be light;” that is, the angelic nature. And again, “God divided the light from the darkness;” that is, he separated the holy angels from the wicked angels. But this is to trifle with allegories, utterly out of place and not to interpret Scripture. Moses is here historically recording facts. He is moreover writing and penning a record for unlettered men; that they may have the plainest possible testimonies concerning the great creation. Such absurdities therefore are not here to be tolerated.

  A second question is here also agitated, namely, whether this light moved itself with a circular motion. I confess that I for my part know not the truth of the matter. But if any one desires to know what I consider the nearest to the truth my opinion is, that this light was movable, so that its motion from east to west, or from its rising to its setting formed the natural day. Although it is difficult to describe the kind of light it was, yet I am by no means inclined to think that we should depart, without cause, from the plain grammar of the subject; or that we should use any violence by wresting from their common meaning the plainest terms. For Moses distinctly affirms that “there was light;” and he reckons this as the “first day” of the creation.

  My opinion is therefore that this was true and real light; and that it revolved with a circular motion as the light of the sun revolves. I believe however that this light was not so clear and splendent as it afterwards was, when augmented, ornamented and beautified by the light of the sun. Even as the sacred Scriptures testify that in the last day God will make the present light of the sun, now unclean, in comparison with its future brightness, far more splendid and glorious; as therefore the present light is as it were a thick and imperfect mass of light, when compared with that light which shall be, so that original light was imperfect when compared with the light that now shines. Such are my sentiments concerning these two questions. Moses then proceeds to say:

  V. 5. And there was evening and there was morning one day.

  We must here first observe that the Jews begin their day differently from us. With them the day commences from the evening and the setting sun and terminates on the evening following. We begin our day with the rising sun. And it is very remarkable that the Jews derive their term evening, which they call AEREF, from ARAF which signifies “to mingle or confound.” In the same manner from the term AREF they form their expression AROF, which our countryman renders by Cynomia, “dogfly,” which may signify “a confused fly.” Because in the evening, the appearances of things are confused and indistinct, and when the light is removed cannot be clearly discerned.

  V. Moses has taught us concerning the first day. We shall see however that Moses retains this same expression “God said” in the creation of all the other creatures. “And God said let there be a firmament,” etc. The very repetition of this same expression ought to be most delightful to us, because as I said, it brings to us a mighty testimony for the confirmation of our faith; that the Son, in these eternal things, is very God; and that in the unity of the
divinity there is a plurality of Persons; because the speaker is one Person and the Word spoken another Person.

  In this manner also the Psalmist speaks, “By the Word of Jehovah were the heavens made,” etc., Ps. 33:6. And Solomon implies the force of this wonderful phrase of Moses, when he writes that the divine wisdom was as it were the handmaid of the Creation. “I was set up from everlasting, from the beginning, before the earth was, etc.; when he established the heavens, I was there; when he set a circle upon the face of the deep,” Prov. 8:23, 27. Here Solomon shows that he fully understood this doctrine of our religion, so plainly set forth by Moses; and that he understood it in a manner beyond the knowledge of the ignorant multitude, who heard these things, and read them, but understood them not. For had not Solomon fully understood this mystery, he could not have spoken thus. But he drew all these things from this verse of Moses, as from a deep and holy fountain. Another proof of this his divine knowledge is Prov. 30:3, “What is his name, and what is his Son’s name, if thou knowest?”

  I believe also that there were similar writings of other holy men, such as of Enoch, Elijah, etc., in which there existed many testimonies of the same kind. But as even at the present day, these things though plainly revealed in the New Testament remain hidden, and are by many not only not received, but fiercely opposed, so to a much greater extent did it happen among the Jewish people, while the holy fathers set these mysteries before the wise in divine things, with the greatest skill and wisdom.

  To us it is great consolation to know that these divine mysteries were thus shadowed forth by Moses from the beginning of the world; that in these divine beings there is a plurality of persons and yet a unity of the divine essence. And if there are some who do not believe, but fiercely oppose this doctrine, what is that to us? Abraham saw three, and adored one! And the Holy Spirit says, Gen. 19:24, “Then Jehovah rained fire from Jehovah out of heaven.” Although fanatics understand not nor regard these words, yet we know that they are the words not of a drunken man, but of God.