Shadows of My Father

by Christoph Werner

  Now it came to pass that Johannes became involved in a dispute whirling around Andreas Osiander about the doctrine of justification as taught by Melanchthon. Osiander, otherwise a respected man of the Reformation, differed with the teaching of Melanchthon on one important point. While Magister Philippus was of the opinion that man, even after the justification by faith, remains a sinner before Christ, Osiander and his friends believed Christ’s righteousness would become the essential component for the believer. We see here how such a question, unanswerable really, can once again lead to years of—if not eternal—discord, and how little the combatants were prepared to exercise Christian humility and forgiveness.

  New concerns for Mother: in the summer of 1551 she received a letter from Duke Albrecht that criticized the conduct of her son. Johannes had been involved in some quarrels that he would have done well to avoid. So he refused her request to finance her son’s trip to Italy or France in order to complete his law studies. He wrote: “We find that Our Gracious Will for him has not served as we hoped.”

  I have to say that Mother here does not act exactly modestly when addressing such wishes. She probably did not have the correct picture of the academic achievements of her son, who did not lack for diligence but probably lacked the intellect. How he was to supply the latter, I do not know.

  But she was then satisfied when the duke, in respect for the services of Father, offered to finance Johannes’s further studies in Königsberg or Wittenberg. Johannes returned to Wittenberg, where Mother received him with joy. Here he once again resumed his studies.

  This happened in 1551. I was eighteen years old at the time, studiosus medicinae at the University of Wittenberg, and was happy to have my brother here, whose support my ailing mother urgently needed.

  Now events concerning my life, the town of Wittenberg, and our mother began to hurtle along.

  In the summer of 1552, it pleased God once again to punish Wittenberg with the plague, which for our mother had disastrous consequences. However, God acted perhaps with a view toward my fate since the events brought me into contact with Anna von Warbeck, which will soon be told.

  The town council of Torgau offered the university—professors and students as well as our family—the Saxon Residence as a refuge. Torgau was a large town and had at the time about six thousand residents, including those living outside the city walls, journeymen, and servants. On the 17th of July, the professors began their lectures in rooms of the disbanded Franciscan monastery.

  Mother hesitated because she wanted to wait for the harvest to ripen and store it for the next winter. Much, however, was not harvested as, in addition to the plague, a great drought was added in the summer of 1552. So grain for bread was scarce and therefore all the more expensive.

  As the plague moved into the Black Monastery, she resolved to follow the university mainly out of fear for us—myself and my sister, Margarethe. She also knew that only in Torgau could I continue my studies. For herself, she seemed to have no fear. Or rather, after observing an illness in her for some time, I suspected it was exhaustion and physical weakness, a sort of life fatigue, as though in her desire for her beloved husband it was only the concern for her children that prevented her from following after him. She also told me she no longer felt strong enough to care for the plague-infected who would, as her experience told her, be brought in numbers to the Black Monastery because it was believed by many that the genius loci oder Lutheri would help in healing.

  So in September we moved away again to Torgau, where the council already on the 25th of July had closed the gates of the town to strangers in order to prevent the plague from entering. We were, however, told that for the blessed widow of Luther and her children an exception would be made.

  Shortly before the Torgau Gate, after about a half day’s hard journey, it happened: we were sitting in the cart and Mother was driving when the horses shied, reared, and threatened to bolt. Mother, as always, made a quick decision, though she was fifty-three years old and not well, and jumped out of the cart before I could prevent her in order to calm the animals. The horses finally calmed down, but Mother in the process was thrown into a ditch beside the road, which in spite of the drought still contained water. As she was soaked through and apparently injured, Margarethe, who had accompanied the accident with a shrill but not helpful cry, and I lifted her into the cart. She moaned loudly and complained of pain in her hip.

  In Torgau we took her to a house on the Scharfenberg where she had been offered accommodations. The house was owned by the Karsdörfer family. Michel Karsdörfer had been the ducal cook, although at the time of our arrival he had already passed away. So only his widow and her children lived then in the house, which offered plenty of space.

  Immediately behind the front door to the left there was a large, bright room that we had permission to use for Mother. She lay in bed with her face to the window, through which she could see the tower of the elector’s—the former elector’s—residence.

  From then on, her condition worsened. She could only lie in bed, and for three months she stayed in the house, in which more than twenty-five years before, after her flight from the convent, she first met the love of her life, Martin Luther.

  I derive a little comfort from the fact that my sister, Margarethe, so selflessly nursed Mother in order not to have her attended to by strangers, and also that Mother was able to witness Margarethe’s eighteenth birthday on December 17th, 1552. My engagement, which rightly could be called a good match, she could also approve with great happiness.

  She died on the 20th of December, 1552. I sat by her bed on a stool and held her hand until it became cold. Margarethe, on the other side of the bed, could barely see because of the tears. The strange thing for me—only now understandable after having seen many people mourn—was that immediately after the passing away, we were so overcome by a strong hunger that for a while we forgot our sadness and fell in heartily when the widow, in whose house Mother lay and to whom she bequeathed her fur coat and silver, brought us a cold meal of bread, lard, pickled cucumbers, and slices of cold roast, served daintily on two boards with two mugs of beer. Only then could we, to some extent strengthened, return to our dead mother and once again take up our mourning.

  Today I am quite certain that my mother, by falling into the ditch and getting thoroughly soaked, died of pneumonia as well as of her terrible grieving. In addition, by the symptoms and attendant pain, the fall had broken her pelvis, and had she recovered, she would never have walked again without assistance. This kind of fracture, after many years, I could verify. Out of respect and consideration for my readers, I will not say more here. The medici among you know what I am speaking about.

  What the people after the death of my father had failed to provide for Mother, they seemed to want to atone for through honors and tributes.

  There appeared at the university a worthy notice from Magister Philippus, which stated:

  During the entire time of her illness she had taken comfort in the words of God, and with the warmest prayers had desired a peaceful departure from this sorrowful life; also she had prayed that God may protect the church and its children and that the pure doctrine that the Lord has given this last age through her husband’s voice may be inherited unadulterated by the coming offspring.

  With all due respect for Magister Philippus, I must make some objections. Our mother was a pious Christian, without doubt, and I hope to meet her again in heaven. That she, during her last days, was concerned with the purity of the Lutheran teaching and with the fate of the church is—and I, along with my sister, was often by her bed and spoke much with her—a great misrepresentation of what actually took place. She was worried about her salvation, that is correct, but also about whether her husband in heaven would again recognize her: “If my dear master again recognizes me and calls me by my name, and we are together again as we were here below,” she said to me shortly before her death in these words. Then she looked with eager eyes at the soaring tower of th
e residence in the middle distance as though it were an announcement of the heavenly Jerusalem.

  She was at the time so very much aged, sick, gray with thinning hair that I said to her that Father would certainly recognize his sweetheart, because in heaven it is not the eyes that speak, it is the heart.

  Quite literally true has been the description of her and our lives after Father’s death: “With her orphaned children she was forced to wander like an outlaw under the greatest threats. Much ingratitude had she experienced, and that from the very people from whom, because of the service of her husband to the church, she should have expected help. In this she was certainly deceived.”

  Indeed, Father had changed the world. Many have become rich through his service, from the printers, who were required to pay him no royalties and did not consider it necessary, even after his death, to pay Mother anything for the numerous reprints, to the nobles and princes, who could take possession of church property, which was one of the reasons why many clung strongly to the Reformation.

  The university honored the widow of Dr. Martin Luther on the 21st of December, 1552, with a great procession that followed the coffin at three o’clock. My brothers and I of course accompanied it.

  She was entombed in the town church in Torgau, where otherwise only members of the electoral court, such as the 1503 deceased Countess Sophie, mother of our elector John Frederick, could find their final rest.

  I add that we, the sons Johannes, Martin, and I, for this honor paid three guldens into the community chest. Her tomb received a stone tablet with her portrait on it—I know not who created it or how it was paid for. In January 1552, with the university we returned to Wittenberg.

  It should certainly be said that the university, or rather more precisely, the members, students, and teachers, etc., thanked the town of Torgau for its hospitality by performing a comedy by Plautus, The Captives, in which we, Luther’s sons, took part. In the prologue written for the performance, Wittenberg and Torgau appear as the sisters Leucoris and Argelia. Leucoris deplores the age, which was not favorably inclined toward education; Argelia comforts her. Their father is the Elbe River, and their small brothers are the Elster and Mulde Rivers. A thoroughly heartfelt prologue, which received much acclaim, was together with the whole play intended as an impressive thanks of the students. Later, as the prologue was printed, Magister Philippus inserted two eulogies to Torgau, for which the town council thanked the Praeceptor Germaniae with a keg of beer, obviously an amount that the town thought a fitting equivalent for the praise the famous man had bestowed on it. Mother did not live to enjoy the beautiful play. If she had, she would hardly have been able to witness it since she was all the time bedridden.

  Chapter 12

  . . . describes what happened after my mother’s death and how I became a doctor.

  Now our dear mother was dead, and we were truly orphans. But thank God, we were now so far grown that we could be left behind without great concern. Johannes was twenty-six, Martin twenty-one, I was twenty, and Margarethe was eighteen years old.

  Mother at her death had debts of 1000 guldens but also the property in Zülsdorf, the sale of which brought in 956 guldens and reasonably took care of the debt.

  I will now first tell how we siblings proceeded with the legacy of our parents before I turn to the sweet theme of my love.

  Our brother Martin lived on the ground floor of our parents’ house, the Black Monastery. He was married to Anna Heilinger, daughter of the Wittenberg mayor. If this marriage was happy, I have my doubts. Martin’s wife soon died in childbirth, and I believe Martin was troubled in spirit after that. He did not finish his theological studies and led an unseemly life in my parents’ house. I use an example from the year 1563 to illustrate this life I deeply disapproved of, although I did feel sorry for him.

  In that year the dukes Ludwig Ernest and Barnim of Pomerania entered Wittenberg University and the Black Monastery, which still at the time had a good reputation as a hostel. The dukes and their attendants lived on the second floor, in the former living room of our parents, and felt very disturbed because on the third floor, contrary to the agreement with the landlord, Martin Luther Jr., there were French, Polish, Swabian, and Frankish students, and day and night they stomped around and made noise. The dukes’ tutor sent home an angry note: “Things with Martinus’s son have got down to a very bad state; he lives on the ground floor and is reported to be in great poverty, has nothing in the house either to eat or to drink, behaves very flippantly, boozes, and has a lot of riffraff around him.”

  I must add that my brother, to my shame, expected to be provided for by the other houseguests. This questionable expectation was declined, so he used a key he had duplicated, whereby he served himself directly from their provisions. The tutor of the young dukes swiftly procured another apartment for his protégés. My poor deranged brother died at thirty-four years old in AD 1565 in Wittenberg.

  God be merciful to his soul, he was an unhappy man. Our father, who had chosen this son for theology and the profession of pastor, would have been deeply disappointed and would not have understood. At the end of his life, he had already become discouraged in his quest for the renewal of the church, and the failure of his son would have been one of the saddest occasions.

  After Mother’s death, it was necessary to split the legacy of our parents justly. I was aware that in spite of all my love for my siblings, I could not be too modest. Even if my Anna von Warbeck was well provided with a dowry, I must not fail to add my own assets so as not to damage my status in the marriage.

  At the end of June, we met with our guardians, Jacob Luther, Philipp Melanchthon, and Ambrosius Reuter, to share according to Father’s will. We brothers received Wachsdorf, which, being a patrilineal fief, we had a right to inherit. Margarethe received two gardens in the Wittenberg suburbs and an orchard on the Saumarkt, which altogether had a value of 500 guldens.

  The value of Wachsdorf was higher, and to avoid an unjustified advantage for the brothers, Margarethe received an additional 125 guldens to be equally compensated. This money was to come from the still-outstanding 1000 guldens the counts of Mansfeld had donated, and the rest of the money would be split equally between us siblings. The proceeds from the rental of rooms in the Luther House (as it would soon be called) would also be divided among us. However, Margarethe should take the most valuable or best pieces of all of the domestic appliances of tin, brass, copper, furniture, and silver.

  There was some difficulty in explaining this generosity to my Anna. Though, additionally, we brothers did receive—which Anna did not want to regard as just compensation—Father’s library, which was estimated to be worth 800 guldens. Seen from today, this estimation seems downright ridiculous, because for a library of books with my father’s notes, one would today pay a great sum.

  On the 5th of April, 1554, the inheritance contract was signed and witnessed by Johannes Schneiderwien, Magister Philippus, Jacob Luther, and Ambrosius Reuter.

  Our brother Johann, to whose experiences with women I will come back in connection with my pertinent attempts with Anna, went into the service of Duke John Frederick, who was released from his captivity, at the ducal chancellery in Weimar and soon received the title of chancery-councillor at the ducal court. He established a household with Elisabeth Cruciger, who had been a widow since 1550 and was the daughter of a close friend of Father’s. She also brought a small son to the marriage. Johannes had a daughter with her, Katharina, born in 1554.

  A word about our sister, Margarethe. As the reader will remember, she was the sixth child born to our parents, in 1534. She was named after our Mansfeld grandmother, Margarethe. One of her godparents was Count Joachim of Anhalt, who suffered from despondency, temptations, and dejection and therefore during multiple visits from Father to Dessau in the summer AD 1534 had to be consoled. Here Father had the opportunity to urge him to become godfather to the child already in Mother’s womb.

  Margarethe married Georg von Kunheim in AD
1555, son of the adviser of the same name to Duke Albrecht of Prussia. She had been introduced to him in the house of her guardian, Melanchthon. The young couple lived in the house of our parents, since he had not yet finished his studies. She birthed four sons and five daughters, of which three survived. My sister died early at the age of thirty-six years in 1570 and rests with five of her children in the church in Mühlhausen in the Duchy of Prussia.

  At first she was judged not befitting enough by the guardians of her future husband and by Duke Albrecht, but she loved Georg so much and pestered Melanchthon so long that he finally interceded for her with the duke with an emotion you would not normally expect from this rational character: “I surrender to the hope that Your Highness may be filled with compassion toward the virtuous and well-endowed maid and daughter of Luther in the face of such love that surpasses even the most ardent maternal love.”

  Additionally, there was no denying the fact that it was not easy to ignore the name of the great Reformer, which distinguished Margarethe.

  Georg, in 1572, two years after the death of his beloved wife, was married a second time with Dorothea of Ölssnitz, with whom he also diligently procreated. From the marriage came four daughters and four sons.

  As when eating a meal one will often, especially as a child, leave the tastiest bits until the end, I only now come to Anna and myself.

  My understanding of women at the time was based primarily on ignorance and inexperience, and since until then I had only occupied myself with my own body and the pleasures to be had there, these feelings had something ambiguous, unclear, even mushy-foolish about them.

  My brother Martin and I decided soon after our return from Eisleben, as we accompanied our father’s body, that if we could obtain such sexual pleasure by ourselves—unfortunately looked upon as sinful—then unimagined heights might be reached in intercourse with women.