Collected Works of Martin Luther

by Martin Luther

  415. Disputation for the promotion of George Major and Joh. Faber. “Opp. lat. var.,” 4, p-473; Drews, p-830.

  Home-Postils, cp. No. 308. “Enarratio in I. librum Mosis,” cp. No. 328. Sermons, Erl. ed., 20², 2, p-266. Letters, De Wette, 5, p-709; 6, p-367; Erl. ed., 56, p-122, 242-244.

  1545. Diet of Worms. The Abschied hints at a religious conference and the imminent danger of a War of Religion. George, the Protestant Prince of Anhalt, is “consecrated as Evangelical Bishop” of Merseburg (Aug. 2). The “Wittenberg Reformation” (Jan.). The final edition of the German Bible. “Popery Pictured.” Luther goes in disgust to Leipzig (July, Aug.). Goes as arbiter to Mansfeld (Oct.). Duke Henry of Brunswick is taken prisoner by the Schmalkaldeners (Oct. 20). A final Bull of Dec. 4 convokes the Council to Trent for Dec. 13, where it is opened in the presence of 34 Fathers qualified to vote. The Schmalkaldeners’ meeting (Dec. 15) at Frankfurt to devise a counterblast. Death of Spalatin (Jan. 16) and of Albert of Mayence (Sept. 24).

  416. “Wider das Bapstum zu Rom vom Teuffel gestifft.” Erl. ed., 26, p-228; 26², p, 251.

  417. Verses to Cranach’s cuts in the “Abbildung des Bapstum.”

  418. “Wellische Lügenschrifft von Doctoris Martini Luthers Todt zu Rom ausgangen.” Erl. ed., 32, p-430.

  419. “Bapst Trew Hadriani iiii und Alexanders iii gegen Keyser Friderichen Barbarossa geübt.” Erl. ed., 32, p-396.

  420. Disputation for the promotion of Peter Hegemon (July 3). “Opp. lat. var.,” 4, p-480; Drews, p-903.

  421. “Wider die xxxii Artikel der Teologisten von Löven.” Erl. ed., 65, p-178.

  422. “Articuli a magistris nostris Lovaniensibus editi.” “Opp. lat. var.,” 4, p-492.

  423. “An Kurfursten zu Sachsen und Landgraven zu Hesse von dem gefangenen H. von Brunswig.” Erl. ed., 26, p-253; 26², p-281.

  424. Preface to the new edition of the “Unterricht” (No. 360).

  425. Preface to the first vol. of his “Opera Latina.” “Opp. lat. var.,” 1, p-24.

  German Bible, new ed., cp. No. 381. “Enarratio in Hoseam prophetam,” cp. No. 160. Sermons, Erl. ed., 20², 2, p-454. Letters, De Wette, 5, p-772; 6, p-413; Erl. ed., 56, p-147, 244, xli.-lxv.

  1546. The Diet opens at Ratisbon (March 29) without the Schmalkalden Leaguers. Luther’s last journey to Mansfeld (Jan. 23). His death at Eisleben (Feb. 18) and burial at Wittenberg (Feb. 22). — Treaty between the Kaiser and King Ferdinand, and Duke William of Bavaria in view of the eventual war (June 7). The Kaiser also makes an alliance with the Pope (June 7) and comes to an agreement with Maurice of Saxony (June 19). Schärtlin as commander of the South German townships begins hostilities at Füssen (July 9). Outlawry of Elector Johann Frederick of Saxony and of Landgrave Philip of Hesse (July 20). The Schmalkalden War (ending in the Kaiser’s victory at Mühlberg, April 24, 1547).

  426. Sermons. Erl. ed., 20², 2, p-574.

  Letters, De Wette, 5, p-801; 6, f.; Erl. ed., 56, p-165.

  XLII — APPENDIX II ADDITIONS AND EMENDATIONS

  [In the following Appendix we have ruthlessly excised all that seemed to us merely personal and to have no direct bearing on Luther. Many of the smaller emendations have already been incorporated in their proper place in the body of this translation. Note of the English Editor.]

  1-2. Luther’s Visit to Rome

  The Scala Santa: According to Paul Luther, when his father “was about to say the usual preces graduales in scala Lateranensi, there suddenly came into his mind the text of Habacuc ‘the just shall live by his faith,’ whereupon he refrained from his prayer.” As we pointed out in vol. i., , it is most unlikely that Luther should, at this time, have seen this text in such a light. Moreover, as it now turns out, Luther actually did perform the usual devotions at the Scala Santa. It is to G. Buchwald (“Zeitschr. f. Kirchengesch.,” 1911, ff.) that we are indebted for a quotation from a yet unpublished sermon of Luther’s own, which shows that he conformed to the common usage and ascended the famous steps on his knees: “I climbed the stairs of Pilate, orabam quolibet gradu pater noster. Erat enim persuasio, qui sic oraret redimeret animam. Sed in fastigium veniens cogitabam: quis scit an sit verum? Non valet ista oratio, etc.”

  As for the doubt expressed in the latter portion of the text, it seems at variance with Luther’s general credulity in those early days. On the other hand, it is by no means unlikely that the scepticism of the Renaissance suggested a doubt to Luther’s mind regarding this supposed trophy of Christ’s Passion.

  The projected General Confession: In “Colloq.,” ed. Bindseil (3, , n. 33), Luther says: “Causa profectionis meæ erat confessio, quam volebam a pueritia usque texere, et pietatem exercere. Erphordiæ talem confessionem bis habui. Sed homines indoctissimos Romæ inveni, qui me plus offendebant quam ædificabant” (cp. Mathesius, “Tischreden,” ed. Kroker, ). In this text it is to be noted that Luther falsely makes out the main object of his journey to Rome to have been his proposed general confession, and his progress in piety. The truth is that he went there first and foremost for the business of his Order. That the general confession was probably never made may be inferred from Luther’s use of the word “sed” in the above text (cp. vol. i., p-31).

  Oldecop’s account of Luther’s petition to be secularised: (Against Kawerau, “Schriften d. Vereins f. Reformationsgesch.,” 1912). Though but little notice has hitherto been taken of Oldecop’s narrative, yet there is no solid ground for distrusting it. As we were careful to point out (vol. i., , n. 1), he was indeed wrong in saying that Luther had gone to Rome without his superiors’ authorisation, for the journey was at least authorised by the seven priories whose representative Luther was. Luther had, however, no authorisation to seek secularisation, nor was his mission countenanced by the minister-general of the Augustinians. This may have led Oldecop to suppose that his whole undertaking was unauthorised. Regarding Jacob, the Jew mentioned in Oldecop’s account, Kawerau (ib., ) makes out a likely case for distinguishing him from his German homonym with whom (vol. i., , n. 1) we tentatively identified him.

  The outcome for the Order of Luther’s visit to Rome: Under the title “Aus den Actis generalatus Ægidii Viterbiensis,” G. Kawerau has published in the “Zeitschr. f. Kirchengesch.” (1911, ff.) a few short extracts from a MS. in the Royal Berlin Library. One of these seems to bear on Luther’s mission from the seven priories opposed to Staupitz: “MDXI. Jan. Appellare ex legibus Germani prohibentur. Ut res germanæ ad amorem et integram obedientiam redigerentur, Fr. Joh. Germanus ad vicarium missus est.” Hence Luther’s appeal was prohibited, nor had his mission the slightest support from Ægidius of Viterbo the minister-general. That, on the contrary, he was opposed to the movement then afoot against Staupitz, is also clear from the expression he uses on March 18, 1511, viz. that “obedience to the Order and its head” must be reintroduced into the German Congregation. At any earlier date (May 1, 1510) we are told that Staupitz himself had come to Rome “[Germanicæ] congregationis colla religionis iugo subiecturus.” His visit, however, had nothing to do with the matter of the seven priories, but concerned the general discipline of the Congregation.

  3. Luther’s conception of “Observance” and his conflict with his brother friars

  What we said of Luther’s early antagonism to the Observantines in his Order has been very diversely appreciated by Protestant experts. Kawerau and Scheel, for instance, are of opinion that no proof is forthcoming of the continuance of the conflict between Observantines and Conventuals. On the other hand, A. Harnack, K. A. Meissinger and W. Braun hold that the persistence of the conflict has been made out and that it really formed one of the starting-points of Luther’s new conception of faith. Modesty, however, dictates a protest on our part against being considered the inventor of this explanation, for it had, even previously, been suggested by Protestant scholars (cp. vol. i., , n. 3), though they may not have used it to such purpose. Again, a word of warning must be uttered against the supposition that, for instance as late as 1515-1516, there was still in Luth
er’s Congregation a clear-cut division between those devoted to the “observance” and the others who inclined to “Conventualism.” Of such a schism we hear no more after the Cologne Chapter of 1512. Nevertheless, that the partisan spirit that had once led to the appeal of the seven priories still smouldered, so much at least seems obvious from those addresses and writings of Luther in which he trounces the Pharisaism of certain members of his Congregation and their attachment to their statutes, privileges and exemptions. It must not be lost to sight that the Congregation to which Luther belonged was in name and fact an “observantine” one, having been founded to promote the stricter observance of the Augustinian Rule; for this reason it was exempted from the jurisdiction of the German Provincial of the Order and placed directly under the Roman minister-general, whose representative in Germany was the Vicar.

  Regarding the mediæval cleavage of several of the Orders into Observantines and Conventuals we must be on our guard against flying to the conclusion that all mere Conventuals were necessarily slack in the performance of their duties. This was by no means the case; in many localities the Franciscan Observantines, e.g. were scarcely more zealous than the Franciscan Conventuals, though the latter had at an early date mitigated their rule of poverty; much the same held good among the Dominicans, Servites and Carmelites. In the event, so far as the Augustinians are concerned, the Saxon Observantines, for all their “observance,” were among the first to fall before the storm let loose from Wittenberg, whereas the German Conventuals, under such worthy provincials as Träger and Hoffmeister, showed themselves better able to cope with the innovations. The Dominican Conventuals under a Vicar like Johann Faber also furnished several protagonists of the faith.

  In view of the doubts raised in certain quarters we shall now submit to a closer scrutiny Luther’s utterances on the question of the “observance.”

  On one occasion Luther complains of those who made so small account of obedience, though this virtue was the very soul of good works:

  “Tales hodie esse timendum est omnes observantes et exemptos sive privilegiatos; qui quid noceant ecclesiæ nondum apparuit, licet factum sit; apparebit autem tempore suo. Quærimus autem, cur sic eximi sibi et dispensari in obedientia velint. Dicunt propter vitam regularem. Sed hæc est lux angeli Satanæ.”

  Obedience is something which cannot be dispensed (non eximibilis, “Werke,” Weim. ed., 3, ; O. Scheel, “Dokumente zu Luthers Entwicklung,” 1911, f.; above, vol. i., f.). Truth, so Luther argues, hides its face from the unwise and the particularist:

  “Sic etiam omnibus superbis contingit et pertinacibus, superstitiosis, rebellibus et inobedientibus, atque ut timeo et observantibus nostris, qui sub specie regularis vitæ incurrunt inobedientiarn et rebellionem.” (Weim. ed., 4, ; above, vol. i., .)

  In the former text he was speaking of “all Observantines,” here he speaks of “ours,” presumably, of the more zealous Augustinians. These “observantes” are the same opponents whom he goes on to describe as “superbi in sanctitate et observantia, qui destruunt humilitatem et obedientiam.” The real meaning here of the words “observantia” and “observare” can scarcely escape the reader, particularly when Luther couples this “observance” with disobedience to superiors. Thus he says:

  “Nostris temporibus est pugna cum hypocritis et falsis fratribus, qui de bonitate fidei pugnant, quam sibi arrogant, per observantias suas iactantes suam sanctitatem.” (Ib., 4, .)

  “Observantia” means of course outward practices, but there can be little doubt that the word is here used in the more exclusive sense defined in the text first quoted. Thus he denounces those who defend their own “traditiones et leges,” which “usque hodie statuere conantur”; those who busy themselves about ceremonies and the “vanitas observantiæ exterioris”; he several times repeats the “usque hodie,” as though to show that the practices he had in view were present ones. (Cp. Weim. ed., 3, .)

  It must be borne in mind that Luther delivered his Lectures on the Psalms (in which most of the texts in question are found) to an audience composed in the main of young Augustinians sent by the various priories to prosecute their studies at Wittenberg. Some of these may well have brought with them some of those stricter ideas which the seven “Observantine” priories had once championed against Staupitz. To one, who, as Luther now was, was against such ideas, it was an easy matter, even though in itself wrong, to make the question one of obedience, by urging either that their exemption from the jurisdiction of the Provincial was irregular, or that Staupitz had now abandoned his one-time projects.

  Luther charges the other faction, not only with disobedience, but also with pigheadedness, e.g. in refusing to conform to the usages of the other priories, and in laying such stress on their own customs and institutions.

  “Nunc quam multi sunt, qui sibi spiritualissimi videntur et tamen sunt sanguinicissimi, ut sic dixerim, verissimique Idumæi. Hi scilicet qui suas professiones, suum ordinem, suos sanctos, sua instituta ita venerantur et efferunt, ut omnium aliorum vel obfuscent vel nihil ipsi curent, satis carnaliter suos patres observantes et iactantes; (such was the New Judaism of those), qui suos conventus, suum ordinem ideo laudant et ideo aliis præstare volunt ac nullo modo doceri, quia magnos et sanctos viros habuerunt, quorum titulum, nomen et habitum gestant, … O furor late regnans hodie! Ita nunc pene fit, ut quilibet conventus contemnat alterius mores acceptare adeo superbe, ut sibi dedecus putet, si ab alio, quam a se ipso doceatur aut recipiat. Hæc vera superbia est Iudæorum et hæreticorum, in quo et nos heu infelices comprehendimur. Quia cum in nullo similes patribus nostris simus, solum de nomine et gloria eorum contra invicem contendimus et superbimus.” (Ib., 3, .)

  Though what Luther here says might be applied to other religious Orders, yet it seems more natural to take it as referring chiefly to what was going on in his own.

  Luther’s then Conception of Cloistral Life and Religious Mendicancy: Luther spoke very plainly about that part of the Rule which enjoined mendicancy; as Conventuals no less than Observantines were bound to observe this enactment it follows that Luther’s attack was directed, not so much against the Observantines as such, as against any attempt seriously to put in practice the Evangelical Counsels. Thus, in the passage quoted above (vol. i., ) he says: “O mendicantes, mendicantes, mendicantes! At excusat forte quod elemosynas propter Deum recipitis et verbum Dei ac omnia gratis rependitis. Esto sane. Vos videritis.” (Weim. ed., 3, .) Here, it is true, he is speaking of the abuses to which the system led, yet he is also annoyed that their vow of poverty should be the motive of their preaching: “Horribilis furor et cæca miseria, quod nunc nonnisi ex necessitate evangelizamus.”

  Now, though these hasty words were open to a perfectly sound interpretation, yet their effect must have been to arouse a certain contempt for their calling in the minds of the young men to whom they were spoken. At any rate Luther had then not yet lost his esteem for the religious life, particularly as an incentive to humility and general Godliness. (See vol. i., f.)

  It is scarcely necessary to say that the fact that, in 1518 (at Augsburg), Staupitz released Luther “from the observance” has nothing whatever to do with the question in hand. Luther says: “me absolvit ab observantia et regula ordinis.” (Weim. ed., of the Table-Talk, 1, .) All that his superior did was to dispense him from his obligation of carrying out outwardly the rule of the Order, e.g. from dressing as a monk, etc. Even had Luther been a Conventual he could still have spoken thus of his having been absolved from the “observance.” It may be that Staupitz, for his own freedom of action, also absolved Luther from his duty of obedience to him as Vicar. Even so, however, Luther remained an Augustinian, returned to his monastery, wrote on behalf of the vows, and, long after, still continued to wear the Augustinian habit.

  One notice brought to light from the Weimar archives and published by Kawerau (loc. cit., ) is of interest. It deals with the practices of the severer Observantine priories (about the year 1489) with which the laxer members were later to find fault. Among th
eir practices was that of “not speaking at meal-time but of listening to a reader, of fasting from All Hallows till Christmas (in addition to the other fasts), of singing Matins every night, of abstaining from food and drink outside of meal-time, and of holding a Chapter every Friday with public admission of shortcomings and imposition of penance.”

  4. Attack upon the “Self-righteous”

  In 1516 Luther presided at Bernhardi’s Disputation, “De viribus et voluntate hominis sine gratia.” (Above, vol. i., f.) In the letter to Lang about it he says that Bernhardi had held the debate “motus oblatratorum lectionum mearum garritu.” Some opinions therein put forward had much scandalised the adherents of Gabriel Biel (“cum et mei [Gabrielistæ] vehementer hucusque mirentur”), but, at any rate, the Disputation had served its purpose (“ad obstruendum ora garrientium vel ad audiendum iudicium aliorum”). He goes on to speak of the offence his denial of the authenticity of the tract “De vera et falsa pænitentia” — hitherto ascribed to St. Augustine — had given at Wittenberg (“sane gravius offendi omnes”). Mathesius (above, vol. i., ) also alludes to the opposition he encountered about this time among his brethren. At any rate a few months later Luther could triumphantly tell Lang:

  “Theologia nostra et S. Augustinus prospere procedunt et regnant in nostra universitate, Deo operante.… Mire fastidiuntur lectiones sententiariæ, nec est ut quis sibi auditores sperare possit, nisi theologiam hanc … velit profiteri.”

  Before this, the young Professor (at Christmas, 1515) had told his hearers, that, just as the Prophets, wise men and scribes had been persecuted, so he was being persecuted now:

  “Sed state firmiter, neque moveatur ullus contradictionibus; sic enim oportet fieri. Prophetæ, Sapientes, Scribæ, dum mittuntur ad iustos, sanctos, pios, non recipiuntur ab ipsis sed occiduntur.”