A psychological explanation of Luther’s mania for invective is also to be looked for in the admixture of vile ingredients which went to make up his abuse. So frequently had he recourse to such when in a state of excitement that they must be familiar to every observer of Luther’s development and general behaviour; it is, however, our duty here to incorporate this element, so characteristic of his polemics, in our sketch of the angry Luther.
The Unpleasant Seasoning of Luther’s Abuse.
The filthy expressions, to which Luther was so prone when angry, are psychologically interesting, throwing light as they do on the depth of his passion and on the all too earthly atmosphere which pervades his abuse. Had Luther’s one object, as writer and teacher, been to vindicate spiritual treasures he would surely have scorned to make use of such adjuncts as these in his teaching or his polemics. Even when desirous of speaking forcibly, as beseemed a man of his stamp, he would have done so without introducing these disreputable and often repulsive elements of speech. He was, however, carried away by an imagination only too familiar with such vulgar imagery, and a tongue and pen much too ready to speak or write of things of that sort. Unless he places pressure on himself a man’s writings give a true picture of his inner standards, and pressure was something which Luther’s genius could never endure.
Luther had, moreover, a special motive for drawing his creations from this polluted well. He wished to arouse the lower classes and to ingratiate himself with those who, the less capable they were of thinking for themselves or of forming a true judgment, were all the readier to welcome coarseness, banter and the tone of the gutter. Amidst their derisive laughter he flings his filth in the face of his opponents, of the Catholics throughout the world, the Pope, the hierarchy and the German past.
If at Rome they had to prove that the Keys had been given to St. Peter “the Pope’s nether garments would fare badly.” Of the Papal dispensation for the clergy to marry, which many confidently expected, Luther says, that it would be just the thing for the devil; “let him open his bowels over his dispensation and sling it about his neck.” — The Princes and nobles (those who were on the other side) “soiled their breeches so shamefully in the Peasant War that even now they can be smelt afar off.” — He declares of the head of the Church of Rome: “Among real Christians no one is more utterly despicable than the Pope ... he stinks like a hoopoe’s nest.” Of those generally who opposed the Divine Word he says: “No smell is worse than yours.”— “Good-bye, beloved Rome; let what stinks go on stinking.”
“It is stupid of the Papists to wear breeches. How if they were to get drunk and let slip a motion?” This concern we find expressed in Luther’s “Etliche Sprüche wider das Concilium Obstantiense” (1535). And it is quite in keeping with other utterances in the same writing. He there speaks of the “dragons’ heads that peep and spew out of the hind-quarters of the Pope-Ass,” and on the same page ventures to address our Saviour as follows: “Beloved Lord Jesus Christ, it is high time that Thou shouldst lay bare, back and front, the shame of the furious, bloodthirsty, purple-clad harridan and reveal it to the whole world in preparation for the dawn of Thy bright Coming.”
Naturally he is no less unrestrained in his attacks on all who defended Popery. Of Eck’s ideas on chastity he remarks: “Your he-goat to your nostrils smells like balsam.” Of Cardinal Albert of Mayence and his party he wrote, during the Schönitz controversy: These “knaves and liars” “bring out foul rags fit only for devils and men to use in the closet.” The epithet, merd-priest, merd-bishop, is several times applied by him to members of the Catholic hierarchy. “The poor merd-priest wanted to ease himself, but, alas, there was nothing in his bowels.”
The Jurists who still clung to Canon Law he declares “invade the churches with their Pope like so many swine; yet there is another place whither they might more seemingly betake themselves if they wish to wipe the fundament of their Pope.” The Italians think that “whatever a Cardinal gives vent to, however vile it be, is a new article of faith promulgated for the benefit of the Germans.” To the Papists who threaten him with a Council he says: “If they are angry let them ease themselves into their breeches and sling it round their neck; that will be real balsam and pax for such thin-skinned saints.” — The fanatics who opposed his teaching on the Sacrament were also twitted on the score that “they would surely ease themselves on it and make use of it in the privy.” The Princes and scoundrel nobles faithfully followed the devil’s lead, who cannot bear to listen to God’s Word “but shows it his backside.” How are we best to answer an opponent, even the Pope? As though he were a “despicable drunkard.” “Give them the fig” (i.e. make a certain obscene gesture with the fist). — Such is his own remedy in all hostility and every misfortune: “I give them the fig.” His usual counsel is, however, to turn one’s “posterior” on them.
The Pope is the “filth which the devil has dropped in the Church”; he is the “devil’s bishop and the devil himself.” — Commenting on the Papal formula “districte mandantes,” he adds: “Ja, in Ars.” They want “me to run to Rome and fetch forgiveness of sins. Yes, forsooth, an evacuation!”
Of the Pope’s Bull of excommunication he says “they ought to order his horrid ban to be taken to the back quarters where children of Adam go to stool; it might then be used as a pocket-handkerchief.” — We must seize hold of the “vices” of the Pope and his clergy and show them up as real lechers; thus should all those who hold the office of preacher “set their droppings under the very noses of the Pope and the bishops.” “The spirit of the Pope, the father of lies,” wishes to display his wisdom by so altering the Word of God, that it “reeks of his stale filth.” — These people, who, like the Pope, are so learned in the Scripture, are “clever sophists,” experts in equine anal functions. They have “taken it upon themselves to come to the assistance of the whole world with their chastity and good works,” but, in reality, they merely “stuff our mouths with horse-dung.”
Of the alleged Papal usurpations he exclaims: “Were such muck as this stirred up in a free Council, what a stench there would be!” — The same favourite figure of speech helps him against the Sacramentarians: “What useful purpose can be served by my raking up all the devil’s filth?” — This phrase was at least more in place when Luther, referring to Philip of Hesse’s bigamy, said, that he “was not going to stir up the filth under the public nose.” — After their defeat he refused to comply with the demand of the peasants, that he should support them in their lawlessness: They want us to lend them a hand in “stirring up thoroughly the filth that is so eager to stink, till their mouths and noses are choked with it.” But it is to the Pope and his followers that, by preference, he applies such imagery. “They have forsaken the stool of St. Peter and St. Paul and now parade their filth [concerning original sin]; to such a pass have they come that they no longer believe anything, whether concerning the Gospel, or Christ, or even their own teaching.”— “This is the filth they now purvey, viz. that we are saved by our works; this is the devil’s own poisonous tail.” — Of those who awaited the decision of a Council he writes: “Let the devil wait if he chooses.... The members of the body must not wait till the filth says and decrees whether the body is healthy or not. We are determined to learn this from the members themselves and not from the urine, excrement and filth. In the same way we shall not wait for the Pope and bishops in Council to say: This is right. For they are no part of the body, or clean and healthy members, but merely the filth of squiredom, merd spattered on the sleeve and veritable ordure, for they persecute the true Evangel, well knowing it to be the Word of God. Therefore we can see they are but filth, stench and limbs of Satan.”
At the time of the Diet of Augsburg, in 1530, he informed the delegates of his party: “You are treating, not with men, but with the very gates of hell.... But they have fallen foul of the wisdom of God and [the final sentence of this Latin epistle is in German] soil themselves with their own filthy wisdom. Amen, Amen.” — The wo
rds “bescheissen” and “beschmeissen” (cp. popular French: “emmerder”) flow naturally from Luther’s pen. Neobulus, the Hessian defender of the bigamy, he describes as “a prince of darkness,” who “has ‘defiled’ himself with his wisdom”; the papal “Jackanapes” who “declare that the Lutherans have risen in revolt,” have likewise “‘defiled’ themselves with their sophistry.”
He asserts he can say “with a clear conscience that the Pope is a merd-ass and the foe of God.” “The Pope-Ass has emitted a great and horrible ordure here.... A wonder it did not tear his anus or burst his belly.” “There lies the Pope in his own dung.” “The Popes are so fond of lies and scurrilities that their paunch waxes fat on them”; they are waiting to see “whether the Pope’s motions will not ultimately scare the kings.... The Papal hypocrites — I had almost said the devil’s excrements — boast of being masters over the whole world.”
Amidst these unavoidable quotations from Luther’s unpleasant vocabulary of abuse the historian is confronted again and again with the question: What relation does this coarser side of Luther’s style bear to the manners of his times? We have already pointed out how great the distance is between him and all other writers, particularly such as treat of religious subjects in a popular or polemical vein; obviously it is with the latter category of writings that his should be compared, rather than with the isolated aberrations of certain writers of romance or the lascivious works produced by the Humanists. Various quotations from contemporaries of Luther’s, even from friends of the innovations, have shown that his language both astonished and shocked them. It was felt that none other could pretend to measure himself beside this giant of invective.
Duke George of Saxony on one occasion told Luther in no kindly way that he knew peasants who spoke just the same, “particularly when the worse for drink”; indeed they went one better and “knew how to use their fists”; among them Luther would be taken for a swine-herd.
“Their inexhaustible passion for abuse,” wrote a Catholic contemporary in 1526, “makes me not a little suspicious of the teaching of this sect. No one is accounted a good pupil of Luther’s who is not an adept in abusive language; Luther’s own abuse knows no bounds.... Who can put up with such vituperation the like of which has not been heard for ages?... Read all this man’s writings and you will hardly find a page that is not sullied with vile abuse.”
It is true that the lowest classes, particularly in Saxony, as it would appear, were addicted to the use of smutty language in which they couched their resentment or their wit; this, however, was among themselves. In the writings of the Wittenberg professor of theology, on the other hand, this native failing emerges unabashed into the light of day, and the foul sayings which Luther — in his anxiety to achieve popularity — gathered from the lips of the rabble swept like a flood over the whole of the German literary field. Foul language became habitual, and, during the polemics subsequent on Luther’s death, whether against the Catholics or among the members of the Protestant fold, was a favourite weapon of attack with those who admired Luther’s drastic ways.
As early as 1522 Thomas Blaurer, a youthful student at Wittenberg, wrote: “No abuse, however low and shameful,” must be spared until Popery is loathed by all. Thus the object in view was to besmirch the Papacy by pelting it with mire. When, in 1558, Tilman Hesshusen, an old Wittenberg student, became Professor of Theology and General Superintendent at Heidelberg and thundered with much invective against his opponents and in favour of the Confession of Augsburg, even his friends asked the question, “whether the thousand devils he was wont to purvey from the pulpit helped to promote the pure cause of the Lutheran Evangel?” At Bremen, preaching against Hardenberg, a follower of Melanchthon’s, he declared, that he had turned the Cathedral into a den of murderers. In 1593 Nigrinus incited the people to abuse the Papists with the words: “Up against them boldly and fan the flames so that things may be made right warm for them!” George Steinhausen remarks in this connection in his History of German Civilisation: “Luther became quite a pattern of violent abuse and set the tone for the anti-popish ranters, who, most of them, belonged to the lowest class. On their side the Catholics, for instance, Hans Salat of Lucern or the convert Johann Engerd, were also not behindhand in this respect.... The preachers, however, were always intent on egging them on to yet worse attacks.”
The manner in which Luther in his polemics treated his opponents, wrote Döllinger in his “Sketch of Luther,” “is really quite unparalleled. He never displays any of that kindly charity, which, while hating the error, seeks to win over those who err; on the contrary, with him all is abuse and anger, defiance and contemptuous scorn voiced in a tempest of invective, often of a most personal and vulgar kind.... It is quite wrong to say that Luther in this respect merely followed in the wake of his contemporaries; this is clear enough to everyone familiar with the literature of that age and the one which preceded it; the virulence of Luther’s writings astonished everybody; those who did not owe him allegiance were not slow to express their amazement, to blame him and to emphasise the harmful effects of these outbursts of abuse, whilst his disciples and admirers were wont to appeal to Luther’s ‘heroic spirit’ which lifted him above the common herd and, as it were, dispensed him from the observance of the moral law and allowed him to say things that would have been immoral and criminal in others.”
Especially his obscene abuse of the Pope did those of Luther’s contemporaries who remained faithful to the Church brand as wicked, immoral and altogether unchristian. “What ears can listen to these words without being offended?” wrote Emser, “or who is the pious Christian who is not cut to the quick by this cruel insult and blasphemy offered to the vicar of Christ? Is this sort of thing Christian or Evangelical?”
Protestant Opinions Old and New.
Erasmus’s complaints concerning Luther’s abusiveness were re-echoed, though with bated breath, by those of the new faith whose passion had not entirely carried them away. The great scholar, speaking of Luther’s slanders on him and his faith, had even said that they were such as to compel a reasonable reader to come to the conclusion that he was either completely blinded by hate, or suffering from some mental malady, or else possessed by the devil. Many of Luther’s own party agreed with Erasmus, at any rate when he wrote: “This unbridled abuse showered upon all, poisons the reader’s mind, particularly in the case of the uneducated, and can promote only anger and dissension.”
The Protestant theologians of Switzerland were much shocked by Luther’s ways. To the complaints already quoted from their letters and writings may be added the following utterances of Zwingli’s successor, Heinrich Bullinger, who likewise judged Luther’s offensive tone to be quite without parallel: Most of Luther’s books “are cast in such a mould as to give grievous scandal to many simple folk, so that they become suspicious of the Evangelical cause as a whole.... His writings are for the most part nothing but invective and abuse.... He sends to the devil all who do not at once side with him. Thus all his censure is imbued with hostility and contains little that is friendly or fatherly.” Seeing that the world already teems with abuse and curses, Bullinger thinks that it would better befit Luther “to be the salt” and to strive to mend matters, instead of which he only makes bad worse and incites his preachers to “abuse and blaspheme.” “For there are far too many preachers who have sought and found in Luther’s books a load of bad words.... From them we hear of nothing but of fanatics, rotters, Sacramentarians, foes of the Sacrament, blasphemers, scoundrels, hypocrites, rebels, devils, heretics and endless things of the like.... And this, too, is praised by many [who say]: Why, even Luther, the Prophet and Apostle of the Germans, does the same!”
Of Luther’s “Schem Hamphoras” Bullinger wrote: “Were it written, not by a famous pastor of souls, but by a swine-herd,” it would still be hard to excuse. In a writing to Bucer, Bullinger also protested against endangering the Evangel by such unexampled abuse and invective. If no one could stop Luther then the Papists
were right when they said of him, and the preachers who followed in his footsteps, that they were no “Evangelists, but rather scolding, foul-mouthed buffoons.”
In answer to such complaints Martin Bucer wrote to Bullinger admitting the existence of grievous shortcomings, but setting against it Luther’s greatness as evinced in the admiration he called forth. The party interests of the Evangel and his hatred of the Papal Antichrist made him to regard as merely human in Luther, frailties which to others were a clear proof of his lack of a Divine mission. As Bucer puts it: “I am willing to admit what you say of Luther’s venomous discourses and writings. Oh, that I could only change his ways.... But the fellow allows himself to be carried away by the storm that rages within him so that no one can stop him. It is God, however, Who makes use of him to proclaim His Evangel and to overthrow Antichrist.... He has made Luther to be so greatly respected in so many Churches that no one thinks of opposing him, still less of removing him from his position. Most people are proud of him, even those whom he does not acknowledge as his followers; many admire and copy his faults rather than his virtues; but huge indeed is the multitude of faithful who revere him as the Apostle of Christ.... I too give him the first place in the sacred ministry. It is true there is much about him that is human, but who is there who displays nothing but what is Divine?” In spite of all he was a great tool of God (“admirandum organum Dei pro salute populi Dei”); such was the opinion of all pious and learned men who really knew him.
Collected Works of Martin Luther Page 749
