Fifteen years ago, I wrote against usury, since it was already so violently torn down that I could hope for no improvement; since then, it has risen so high that it now does not want to be a vice, sin or disgrace, but boasts of vain virtue and honor, as if it does great love and Christian service to the people. What then will help and counsel, since shame has become honor, and vice has become virtue? Seneca speaks from natural reason: Deest remedii locus, ubi quae vitia fuerunt, mores fiunt (Where vices become virtues, there is no hope of help). Germany has been what it should have been; the tiresome avarice and usury have ruined it to the ground.
But I ask all preachers and pastors, for God's sake, not to remain silent nor to desist from preaching against usury, to admonish and warn the people. If we cannot prevent usury - for this has now become impossible not only for our preaching, but also for the entire secular government - we may yet snatch some from such Sodoma and Gomorrah by our admonition. But if we also have to let some good friends perish inside with Lot through their courageous will, so that they will be saved.
We will not remain in it, nor share in its sin and punishment with silence; but, as much as we can, let the cry be heard that usury is not virtue, but great sin and shame. Therefore let every man be driven by his conscience and office, from which he is obliged to admonish or teach his parishioners from time to time during the year to be on guard against usury and avarice, so that the rogue may be stripped of his robes, under which he has adorned himself as if he were right and pious. And that I make it short and show the most necessary and the greatest, shall be told to the people clearly and plainly:
3 First of all, lending and borrowing, where money is lent and more or better is demanded or taken in return, is usury, condemned in all laws. Therefore all those who take five, six, or more in a hundred from borrowed money are usurers; they know how to judge themselves by this, and are called idolatrous servants of avarice or mammon, and may not be saved unless they repent. In the same way, it should be said of grain, barley and other goods, that if one demands more or better for them, it is usury, stolen and stolen goods.
4. for "borrowing" is what it means when I ever-
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I will lend my money, goods or equipment to anyone, so that he may use it as long as he needs it or as long as I am able and willing, and he will return it to me in due time as well as I have lent it to him; just as one neighbor lends another bowls, pots, beds, clothes, so also money or money's worth, for which I am to take nothing. This time we are not talking about giving or gifting, nor about buying or selling, nor about re-sellable interest; but about lending, in which usury now does almost all its business, especially in money lending. For this reason, the piece is to be diligently imagined by the people, and is not a great high wisdom, but is quite easy to understand, and a very rough text, namely, whoever lends something and takes something in return over and above it, or - which is as much - something better, that is usury. For lending is not to take back anything more, but the very same thing that is lent, as the prophets, Christ himself, also teach the secular laws.
(5) If any man shall contend, that it may be the case, and thereafter, that he must take more or better than he hath lent. Such shall be heard apart from the sermon, or shall be referred to the lawyers, who have orders to judge or instruct in this matter for the sake of their oath and office; but the sermon shall always continue, insisting that it is usury whoever lends what he also lends, and takes something more or better. And do not let this text come from the pulpit, nor force it, for it is the right text and the text of all rights. If there is a case that needs a gloss, look for it especially among the pastors at home or among the lawyers; otherwise, if one were to put everything in the pulpit that is sought and written about usury and sharp handles, and is still sought and written, then Judgment Day would come sooner than we began to preach about usury.
6th Secondly, someone will cry out here: if this should be so, then almost the whole world would be damned in usury; for such lending is now common through all classes. But let not such cries deceive thee, that thou begin to dispute of the above text; preach thou evermore, and bid them with such cries to me, or to my like, or to the right
If they fail to seek it when they know that you have not invented or written the text, you are not to interpret or direct it. If they fail to seek it, when they know and should know that you have not invented the text, nor have you raised it, nor is it your duty to interpret or direct it, let each one ask his conscience for advice or seek other understanding from higher scholars, as I have said.
(7) Although it is a very lazy plea, it is also justifiable for any village priest to use the customs of the world against the law or God's word. What is the world but doing wrong, being stingy, usurious and indulging in all kinds of vice and wickedness? Is not this a mean cry: the world is evil, full of infidelity, respects neither virtue nor honor, is neither shame nor discipline etc. Therefore, you must not turn around and say: the whole world does this. For no learned doctor can advise you against this, but a shepherd boy can tell you: the world certainly does this, but it should not do this. Therefore stay at home with this excuse, that if it should be so, then all the world would be damned. For it is not new, nor strange, that the world is desperate, cursed, damned; it has always been, it will always be: if you follow it, you will also remain with it in the abyss of hell. Therefore it is said: Fiat justitia, et pereat mundus (let justice be done, even if the whole world perishes); do not consider what the crowd or the world does, but what is right and what the crowd should do.
(8) Thirdly, if any man say, If these things be, who will lend or help another? I will also keep my money, grain and goods, and lend nothing to anyone. I answer: Of course, the secular law does not force you to lend, give or sell anything to anyone, and does not punish you if you let it stand; without the authorities being obliged, in time of need or other necessity, to force the peasants, burghers, nobles, and such like, to sell grain and not to allow them to wantonly cause unnecessary hardship; for in doing so they do as much as steal and rob it in the market, from the houses, from the bag, and from the treasury.
thus also make usury out of the purchase. But this is now too much for one mouthful; we must now deal with the one piece as usury in lending; if we had controlled it - after the last day - we would also read the text of the usury of purchase well; also what Christ's law answers here, we want to strike out a little afterwards. However, do not let such a saying or plea mislead you, but stick to the text and say: No one or anyone, one or everyone, lends; so it says: Whoever lends and takes something in return is a usurer. Do not leave the text if a hundred thousand objections come.
(9) And such a plea is as false as that, and needs no better answer than is the custom of the world above. Dear, what is it that thou sayest, Who will lend, if it be so? Is it not known that the world does no good? as Psalm 14:3, 4 says, God looks at all the children of men from heaven, and finds not one among them that does good. What then is new or strange, that thou shouldest say, Who will lend to another in vain? For to lend in vain is a good work; therefore no man among the children of men doeth it: but so do the children of men: they lie, deceive, steal, take, rob, without the sword to hurt, or to defend: otherwise the children of men do according to their ways; so the sword doth not force them to do good, but constraineth them not to do evil, as much as it can.
(10) To the fourth, Junker Wucher thus says: "Rather than the heats are now, I do my neighbor a great service by lending him a hundred to five, six, ten, and he thanks me for such lending as a special kindness; asks me for it, and also offers himself willingly and unceremoniously to give me five, six, ten florins of the hundred; should I not take this without usury with a clear conscience? Who would consider a gift usurious? Here I say: Let you boast, decorate and clean, whoever wants to, nevertheless do nothing about it, stick firmly to the text: one should not take anything more or better on loan. But whoever takes more or better, that is usury, and is not called service, but harm done.
to his neighbor than is done with stealing and robbing.
(11) It is not all service and good to one's neighbor that is called service and good; for an adulteress and an adulterer do great service and good to one another; a horseman does great horseman service to a murderer, that he helps him to rob on the road, to fight against land and people. The papists do great service to our people by not drowning them all, burning them, murdering them, or letting them rot in prison; but they let some live and chase them away, or take away what they have. The devil himself does great, immeasurable service, help and advice to his servants; he makes rich, great, powerful lords out of them. Summa, the world is full of great, excellent, daily services and benefits, and even the pious must often be glad that they keep something from the wicked and accept it as a benefit. The poets write of a cyclops (giant) Polyphemus that he promised Ulysses that he would befriend him, that he would first eat his companions, and then eat him; yes, it was also a service and a fine boon.
Now noble and ignoble, peasants and burghers, buy up, stop, spend a lot of time, increase grain, barley and everything that is to be had, then wipe their mouths and speak: Yes, what one must have, that one must have; I leave it to the people to serve, could I and would I keep it. So God is finely deceived and fooled, and how can the poor, merciful God see anything else here but vain service, good works and benevolence? He must not let it be noticed that they stink; the children of men have become so holy before he becomes aware of it. So now no one can be usurious, stingy or wicked; the world has become holy, everyone serves the other, no one harms the other.
(13) Thou shalt speak of this, O preacher, and not hold thy peace, but shalt plainly and distinctly shew the people that what is done contrary to the word of God, and contrary to law, is not called service, nor is it called good; for he saith, Thou shalt
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Serve God alone. What does not serve his word or right may boast of service and good deeds, but it serves and benefits a foreign god, the devil. Therefore, whoever lends and takes more or better sins against God as a usurer. But if he does a service with it, he does it to the wretched devil, even though a poor needy man needs such a service and must take it for a service or benefit, so that he will not be eaten completely. Likewise, whoever, forced by great need, offers or gives five or more to the hundred, must let it be called a service, even if he does it unwillingly. But you are neither safe nor excused if you take it; you are even worse if you take it as a right, and boast of your taking it as a service and a benefit; for you do not take it as a free gift, you know that for sure, and your conscience cannot deny it; but you take it as a right profit from your hundred guilders.
14 For a gift is not a real gain, but a thing freely given and taken, which does not happen in such trade, as you know. And yet you decorate it, lie about it, and call it a gift, when in truth it is profit and usury, given to you by the poor man in his need, who must let it be called a gift to you for your will and service, who would not otherwise look upon you as a miser, that he would give you a husk of oatmeal, let alone five or ten florins, or that he should call it a service done to him by you; but he does you and must do you such service, if he wants to have money otherwise. For it is not the way of the world, though it has superfluities, to give or bestow much, even to poor friends and to those who have great need of it. How much less will someone give to you, who are an ogre, a stranger and perhaps a general curse, abomination and proverb because of your avarice and usury? But I am getting too far from the text, and such disputations belong to the special conversation. But you, preacher, confidently drive the text in the pulpit, that borrowing and taking over is usury, and give them after it.
with you in the house, where they want to knock, Disputirens enough or direct them to the lawyers that they bring you of this text a better gloss.
(15) So that you are not so completely unprepared, and they do not take you for a childish bladder, you may, if you wish, also note this further report in this matter; although it seems better to me, for the sake of your peace and quiet, that you refer them to the lawyers; whose oath and office, as said above, is to judge and teach in such mortal, perishable, miserable matters of the world; especially where one wants to be clever and pointed against the text. But that you remain stiff and firm on the text, namely, that lending and borrowing is usury. All lawyers and jurists will have to confirm this text to you, not only according to the Gospel, which is none of their business, but also in their books. Therefore you cannot err in the text, the gloss may be as good or as bad as it likes; yet you have preached rightly against usury: lending shall not take over, or it is usury and not lending.
16 So now, for the sake of peace and quiet, if it would be too difficult for you to suffer, or if you would like to understand it yourself, this is the report: It can happen, or often does happen, that I lend you, Balthasar, a hundred guilders, in such a way that I must have them back on Michaelmas for my needs, or, if you fail to do so, I will come to harm. When Michaelmas comes and you do not give me back the hundred guilders, the judge will take me by the neck or put me in jail or in obedience, or other such misfortune will come upon me until I pay; there I will sit or remain stuck, miss my food and recovery with great damage; there you will bring me to death with your delay and reward me so badly for my good deed. What shall I do here? My loss keeps watch, because you delay and sleep, and daily expense or damage goes on it, as long as you delay and sleep. Who shall now bear or pay the damage here? Because the damage watch will be at last an unpleasant guest in my house, until I perish.
17 Well, here we have to talk about the worldly and legal aspects of the matter - we have to save the theology until later. So you, Balthasar, owe me to give me over the hundred guilders everything that the Schadewacht has spent on it with all expenses; for it is your fault that you have left me like this, and it is just as much as if you had taken it from me unjustly. Therefore it is fair, also according to reason and natural right, that you reimburse me for everything, both the principal sum and the damage; for I did not lend you the hundred guilders to ruin myself or you to ruin me with them, but I wanted to help you without my damage. All this is so clear and bright that if all law and jurisprudence books were lost, reason would still have to set how weak it would be.
18 Such a pity is called the Latin interest of the lawyers, and such a loan is certainly not usury, but a right praiseworthy, honest service and good work, shown to the neighbor. And if the person is a Christian, it is also a Christian work, which God wants to reward not only here on earth, as He does to the worldly, but also in the next world, as David says, Ps. 112, 6: In memoria aeterna erit justus etc. (in eternal memory). (in eternal memory will be the righteous). For God will never forget a Christian good work; the worldly good works he pays here on earth, after that they are forgotten; so also law and worldly rule can teach and preserve no more than such worldly, perishable good works.
(19) Now there is one more thing that can happen about this guard, and that is: If you, Balthasar, do not give me back the hundred florins on Michaelmas, and if I am about to make a purchase, so that I can buy a garden, field, house, or whatever kind of land I want to have great use or food for myself and my children, then I will have to let it go, and you will cause me harm and hindrance with your delaying and sleeping, so that I will never be able to make such a purchase. If I had not lent you my hundred guilders, but kept them at home, I could pay the judge with half of them.
pay, with the other half buy the garden; now I have lent it to you, you make me a twin from the damage guard, that I cannot pay here and cannot buy there, and thus to both parts must suffer damage; that is called one duplex interesse, damni emergentis et lucri cessantis (a double damage guard, namely of the resulted damage and the escaped profit), as well as they can have it talk.
20 Here one must now leave the jurists the various disputation, whether one hundred guilders, missed, at the same time both damages or the twin bring. For if Hans owes a hundred guilders, then only the one damage guard is there; if he owes fifty, then both damage guards may be there; for no one can pay a hundred guilders with one and at the same time buy the garden for a hundred guilders. It is also different whether the garden was for sale or for sale, since Hans borrowed the hundred guilders from himself; for what is not yet for sale, if there is already cash, no one can buy; item, that Hans might well have lost the hundred guilders through theft, robbers, fire and the like, so that he could neither pay nor buy; for money is an uncertain, changeable thing, on which one cannot act with certainty. It behooves the lawyers to judge and consider such and such innumerable circumstances or coincidences, so that the guardian of damage or interest does not become a rogue and usurer; and wise people may well be lacking here. Also, how can one make everything so pure in the impure law that the world needs in this miserable life? It is enough that it be coarse, plain, simple law; subtle and sharp it cannot be, or it gets such nicks that it cannot even cut butter, since it should fail to cut blocks and chunks. It is another thing with Christ and his gospel.
(21) But you, preacher, have enough here for you to be able to distinguish what usury is; namely, if Balthasar has not returned the hundred guilders on Michaelmas, and Hans has had to pay over it and has suffered damage, then Balthasar shall reimburse him for the payment damage according to secular law. If he has prevented Hans from returning the
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If Hans wants to be strict, Balthasar must also yield something; or let it - that is better - be tolerated and settled by good friends; for it is difficult and dangerous to estimate and meet the same purchase damage at the same time, because the purchase was never made before, nor was it decided how much the garden would have cost, and perhaps another garden could still happen as well. In the other damage of the payment, the expenses can easily be counted; but the gospel will judge much more simply in this; as hereafter.
22 But look at this and notice well, my priest, that such lending, since damage guards or interest reigns within, does not happen in the dealings now, but everything is vain usury with them. For after they have heard that Hans has suffered damage with his lent hundred florins and demands cheap reimbursement of his damage, they plump down and add such two damage guards to each hundred florins, namely the payment of expenses and the missed garden purchase; just as if such two damage guards had naturally (by nature) accrued to the hundred florins; where there are hundred florins, they make out and calculate such two damages, and take reimbursement of such damages from it, which they have not suffered after all. Because you have a hundred guilders, you do not owe that you have to pay on Michaelmas, and therefore no garden is for sale that you could buy on Michaelmas; and yet you add these two damages to your certain hundred guilders and take five, six, ten guilders annually for them, just as if you were Hans, who is missed and prevented by Balthasar. No, you hear it, you are not the same Hans; for there is no Balthasar who makes such a Hans; you invent for yourself that you are such a Hans, without any Balthasar; therefore you are a usurer, who atones for your imaginary damage from your neighbor's money, which no one has done to you, and you cannot prove it nor calculate it. The lawyers call such damage non verum, sed fantasticum interest, a damage that everyone dreams up for himself.
(23) Yes, you say, it is possible and could happen that my hundred florins would suffer such two damages one day. You are right. Let us now act against each other right away: Your hundred florins might one day suffer such two damages, so I might one day give you five or six florins; let us be equal and let the florins lie still, as long as your hundred florins do not suffer these two damages, so long I will not give you anything; then we are one in the matter, and lending is right. It does not apply to say: the damages could happen that I could neither pay nor buy; but it means: the damages have happened that I could not pay nor buy. Otherwise it is said: Ex contingente necessarium, from that which is not, make that which must be; from that which is uncertain, make a vain certain thing; should not such usury eat up the world in a short time?
24) Summa, it is now said enough that lending should not take over and should be done to the poor for service or benefit. The text holds fast, and it is also easy to understand that paying damages is not to give or take more than lending; for it happens to be misfortune that brings the lender back without his will, of which he must repeat himself. But in dealings it is the reverse and quite the opposite; there one seeks and devises damages on the neighbor needed, wants to feed oneself with it and become rich, lazily and idly splurge and flaunt other people's work, care, danger and damage; that I sit behind the stove and let my hundred guilders advertise (work) for me in the country; and yet, because it is borrowed money, certainly keep it in the bag without all danger and care. Dear, who would not like this?
(25) And what is said of borrowed money shall be understood also of borrowed corn, wine, and such like merchandise, that such two damages may occur therein; but that these damages shall not have naturally accrued to the merchandise, but may happen by chance, and therefore shall not be reckoned for damages sooner than they are done and proved; where they are demanded and taken without that, that it may be known,
it is usury and injustice. But when and where such damages occur, because this is a vast and infinite thing, for the sake of innumerable coincidences, let the jurists advise in this, or - which is certainly the best - arbitrators, theidingsmen, or good friends act and mediate in it, and then it is right and peace. For no law will ever be found so pointed and certain that it can encompass all coincidences or circumstances, as Aristotle, Eth. 5, teaches of the έπιείχεια. Or, if it is invented - that is, invented - it is the greatest injustice, according to the saying of the cleverest Roman Scipio: Summum jus, summa injuria: narrow right, far wrong; item: too sharp becomes chipped; therefore, one must strike on both sides and let equity be the master of all right.
(26) All this is legal, and lawyers should teach it; but since they are not preachers, it remains dead and buried in their books at home, so that it does not resound among the people, and we preachers must speak and admonish it, if we do not want to be antinomians and go to the devil with the world through foreign sin. Although the lawyers are not all excused by this; for those who read in the schools should diligently teach it to the youth, and those who act in court should seriously inform the parties of it; so it would certainly get a little among the people. But much more should the jurists do it, who are chancellors and councilors at court; for thus it could and should come down from above to the very lowest. But if they keep silent or stop up high, we poor preachers will achieve little with our cries here; but where we convert one, they will convert many thousands. Therefore, according to our preaching, let usury with all its sins be imposed on the lawyers. For if those who are to keep the dam do not help, our fence will not withstand the flood. Let every man keep his conscience according to the measure of his station and office; we preachers can counsel in this soon and easily, as those whom no one or even few follow.
27. you say: the world cannot exist without
To be usurious. That is certainly true. For no regiment in the world will be, nor has been, so stiff and stately as to be able to ward off all sins. And if a regime could ward off all sins, the original sin, the source of all sins, together with the devil - of which the Jurassic know nothing - will still remain, which must always be warded off as much as possible. Therefore the world cannot be without usury, without avarice, without pride, without fornication, without adultery, without murder, without stealing, without blasphemy and all kinds of sins; otherwise it would not be the world, and would have to be the world without the world, the devil without the devil. But whether they are excused by this, they will find out. The Lord says, Matth. 18, 7.: "There must be trouble, but woe to the man by whom trouble comes." Usury must be, but woe to the usurers.
28. worldly law is a weak, low, impure law, which poorly preserves temporal peace and the life of the belly, to increase and nourish the human race for the sake of the saints to that eternal life. Therefore it cannot ward off all sins, but as much as it is possible. As a shepherd cannot keep all the sheep from the wolf, dying, and other pestilences; yet he shall ward off where he can, and not leave room freely for the wolf or pestilences. So also the secular government should not give free room to sin, but it should prevent in the strictest way it can. There will be sin enough without his will, and will remain, that is said: World can not be without usury, not without murder, without adultery. For it is unprevented, and before it is known, it is done; otherwise there would be no need of law, nor of lawyers, nor of princes, where it could be averted and prevented beforehand; but where it cannot be averted, that it should nevertheless be prevented, that is, punish the evil done, and deter the evil to come, as much as it is possible.
29 It is the same with usury. It is not possible to prevent usury so purely that it does not exist; but if it happens, or if it grows and becomes so prevalent that it finally wants to be a free virtue, then it is possible and necessary to control and prevent it. In the same way as murder and adultery, forbid how you can
30. such are the histories and jurists called, ex malis moribus bonae leges fiunt; econ- tra, ex bonis legibus mali mores fiunt, lex est virtus peccati (From evil morals come good laws; again, from good laws come evil morals, because the law is the power of sin) 1 Cor. 15, 56. Inventa lege, inventa est fraus legis (With the law also arises the abuse of the law): Wickedness compels to order good law; against good law all wickedness happens, the world cannot and will not be otherwise, because without spirit and grace it must be preserved by law and compulsion alone, what is preserved externally. Therefore, where the secular regime cannot help or becomes evil itself, does not want to help - as is unfortunately the case now in many parts of Germany - or does so itself, so that it is said that there is no longer any honor or virtue, even in some high princely states, especially of the cardinals and bishops: then God must control, as he did with Sodom, with the Flood, with Babylon, with Rome and the like, so that they have come to nothing. So we Germans also want to have it and do not stop raving until one says: Germany has been; as one must say of Rome and Babylon.
Thus one reads of the usury that at the time of Solon the city of Athens was so highly corrupted by the usury that not only the grounds and goods overloaded, but also the citizens had to sell themselves to the usurers to serfs. Then Solon set such a measure that henceforth no more villeins could be made, and that no usury had to be taken from the land; in addition, the usury was so high that no more of the money could be taken than the centesima, that is, the hundredth part,
was allowed to give. The hundredth was called, if in the hundredth month so many interests were given that it became equal to the main sum, that is, according to our calculation twelve florins (florins) annually on hundred florins, every month one florin; because they took all months interest. With this measure Solon made again many citizens free and many goods again free. So also Aristotle writes, Polit. 6. that a pious lord, called Oxolus, had set that one should not give usurious interest from lying grounds.
Item, one reads of the great Alexander that he paid usury for his men of war over the fifty-nine tons of gold, so that he got rid of them, and also had to "reduce the usury. This is what usury does; where the princes and lords do not watch well, it grows and rises in a short time, before one looks around, to such an extent that it soon eats up and devours land and all goods, so that in the end one must intervene by force and defend oneself; as has happened in our time and is still happening through the merchants and companies, so that Germany has almost been devoured. God grant also once a Solon or Alexander, who will stand against usury, amen.
33) It is also written about the Romans in the Histories: Since in Rome at one time usury had gained the upper hand, two men were appointed, Valerius Publicola and M. Rutilius, who had to moderate usury, and paid partly from the city hall and partly from the goods of the debtors, perhaps to avoid riots and other unpleasantness. Afterwards, however, a guild master, called Genutius, soon decreed that it was absolutely necessary not to practice usury. When a rich man, called Papyrius, wanted to disgrace a young man, because he had become his bondman through usury, a law was decreed that usury should not make him a bondman. When the usury had become so great that it caused a riot and the people left the city, the chief ruler *), Hor-
tensius, also to control usury. This is found in Titus Livius. Item, the first emperor Julius, when he found that usury had risen too high, he decreed that one had to let go of all the principal sum that was received for usury; and hard before him Cicero, when he became governor in Asia, he forced and confiscated usury, that one alone should give the centesimas, the hundredth, that is, twelve annually. For before they had to give four centesimas, four times twelve, that is, four florins every month, so that Brutus, the steward, locked up the council of Salamis in the council house and let some die of hunger. It is also written in the law books how often it was forbidden that one should not take usuras usurarum (compound interest), which is now called the envelope. Item, where it was found that the usurious interest twice exceeded the principal money, one should take nothing more.
34 Thus it is that usury has always caused heartache, and all pious, laudable princes and lords have had to deal with it, and all wise, sensible pagans have scolded usury exceedingly, when Aristotle, fol. 1, says that usury is contrary to nature for the reason that it always takes more than it gives. This abolishes the means and standard of all virtue, which is called equal and equal, aequalitas arithmetica. He goes on to say that money is by nature barren and does not increase; therefore, where it increases, as in usury, it is contrary to the nature of money. For it neither lives nor bears, as a tree and field does, which yields more every year than it is; for it does not lie idle, nor without fruit, as the florin does by nature. Item, Ethic. 4 writes that usurers are shameful traders - which St. Paul, 1 Tim. 3, 2. and Tit. 2, 7. severely forbids the bishops - because the usurer takes, he says, when he should not, and more than he should. But this is called feeding shamefully, who takes from other people, steals or robs, and is called, with permission, thieves and robbers, who are used to be hanged on gallows; without that a usurer is a beautiful thief and robber and sits on a chair, therefore they are called chair robbers.
35. Cato, the Roman councilor, a great
a serious enemy of all vices, since he wants to praise agriculture, he writes in the beginning of his book thus: "Our ancestors considered it so, and also set it so, that a thief should be punished twofold, a usurer fourfold; therefore one can well reckon, he says, how much a more harmful man they considered a usurer, neither a thief. Item, the same Cato speaks, 2 Offic: Dear, what is usury but murdering people?
36 These things have the heathen done and said; what shall we Christians do? The heathen have reason to reckon that a usurer is a manyfold thief and a murderer; but we Christians hold them in such honor that we almost worship them for the sake of their money, not considering what a great mockery and dishonor we thereby do to the Christian name and to Christ himself. For even if we were not Christians, reason would have to tell us as well as the heathen that a usurer is a murderer. For he who sucks out another's food, robs and steals, does as great murder, as much as he who causes one to die of hunger and to perish. But this is what a usurer does; and meanwhile he sits securely on his chair, if he should hang cheaper on the gallows, and be eaten by as many ravens as he would have stolen guilders; where otherwise there would be so much flesh on him that so many ravens could get into it and divide it. Meanwhile, the petty thieves who have stolen guilders are hanged; as the same Cato, the enemy of usurers, says: "Petty thieves are caught in sticks, great thieves are decked out in gold and silk; but it will undoubtedly happen that we will also have to suffer with the usurers in the end and pay for them, because we do not punish them nor strive against them.
37 And what shall we say of the Gentiles? Let us read Nehemiah 5:11, where it says how the Jews, after their return from Babylon, in their distress also had to give the hundredth or centesimal, that is, the monthly usury, to their brethren. The monthly usury or centesima is such an old thing and such a misery that it seems that the Gentiles learned it from the Jews afterwards; for the Jews reckon all their feasts, transactions, and beings
or the Jews learned it from the Gentiles at that time; for Nehemiah had been long before the Romans and Alexander reigned, more than three hundred years before the birth of Christ. And if one wants to doubt the centesim, the interpretation in the text is very clear, because he says, Cap. 5, v. 15: "The princes who were before me took 40 sekels from the people, along with grain, oil and must. Now 40 sekels make ten florins, for a sekel is a place (a quarter of a florin): so the grain, oil and must may easily have borne two florins or more, so that it bore twelve florins a year, one florin every month, that is centesimam, the hundredth.
38 When the people cried out and lamented, v. 11, the pious prince Nehemiah intervened freshly, scolded the usurers, ordered them to restore the fields, the house, the vineyard and everything, and to refrain from the hundredth or monthly usury. But he had the grace of God that the people obeyed him and followed him, and thus controlled the usury, as necessity forced it; for the people had been sucked dry that they were no longer able to do anything, and sold themselves, their daughters and sons to the pagans, who had previously been severely detached from the pagans. We Germans are in need of such a Nehemiah now, and if things do not change, a Nehemiah must come, or Germany will become serfdom with princes, lords, lands and people of the usurers; it has eaten during these twenty years, even ten years, that one's heart must be frightened by it who looks at it a little; and it rises, eats, gorges without ceasing, the longer, the more ghastly.
39 For I have been told that ten guilders, that is, thirty per hundred, are now taken annually at each Leipzig market; some also add the Naumburg market, so that it becomes forty per hundred; whether it is more, I do not know. Fie on you! Where the hell does that end up? These are not monthly interest or centesimae, that is, twelve per hundred annually, but trecentesimae (the three hundredth) and even more, that is, three guilders and seven groschen per month. This is not called annual interest, nor monthly interest, but
Weekly interest, right Jewish daily usury. Now whoever has a hundred florins in Leipzig takes forty a year, that is, a peasant or burgher eaten in a year. If he has a thousand florins, he takes four hundred annually; that is, a knight or rich nobleman eaten in a year. If he has ten thousand, he takes four thousand annually; that is, a rich count eaten in a year. If he has a hundred thousand, as it must be with the great merchants, he takes forty thousand annually; that is, a great rich prince eaten in a year. If he has ten hundred thousand, he takes four hundred thousand a year; that is, a great king eaten in a year; and suffers no danger over it, neither in body nor in goods, works nothing, sits behind the stove and roasts apples. So a stool robber would sit at home and eat a whole world in ten years.
40 Now here should be a Nehemiah, Solon, Alexander, these would be princely deeds, which they are obliged to do. But, you priests and preachers, think and preach such things to your princes and lords, provoke and exhort them to control such devils, and to save and help the poor. You lawyers do the same. For to you priests I write this most of all to remind you of your office, for otherwise I have almost despaired of the matter, so that we may save our consciences and not burden ourselves with other people's sins in hell, as I said above. Also that the usurers must know, if some of them would get a conscience and recognize their damned nature, which rages against God, right, reason and nature. For whether the princes can help in this, I do not know, because it is extremely high, deep, far, wide and everywhere torn and perhaps too long asleep.
(41) Here, the transactors and usurers will cry out: one should keep letters and seals; to this, the jurists have answered soon and abundantly: In malis promissis (i.e. in bad promises - namely, letters and seals are not valid). So the theologians say: the letters and seals, which some have given to the devil, are nothing, even if they are sealed and written with blood. For what
If it is against God, right and nature, it is a nullity (nothing). Therefore, only a prince, who is able to do it, should take fresh hold of it, break seals and letters, and not take offense at being scolded for his honor or faith. For honor, faithfulness and faith kept means he who keeps God's obedience, faith and vows. Again, that is called doing against honor, faithfulness and faith, who does not tear such seals and letters - where he can - or destroys them. Thus Nehemiah stands with his beautiful and mighty example, takes away the usurers' overgrown fields, vineyards, oil gardens, houses and the centesimas, Neh. 5, 11. He still does too little, that he does not force the usurers to pay back also all other excess of the stolen and robbed goods through usury. But they must also return it before God, or be guilty of returning it. For God is not satisfied with a person's refraining from usury, but also wants to reconcile his neighbor and forgive sin on both sides.
Accordingly, because God wills it, we let princes do what they can or want to do. It is not for us preachers to celebrate here. And here let us be bishops, that is, watch carefully and keep watch - for our salvation is at stake. First, that we confidently rebuke and condemn usury in the pulpit, saying the text diligently and aridly, as said above, namely: Whoever lends and takes above or better is a usurer and condemned as a thief, robber and murderer; ut supra (as said above). After that, if you know and know such a one, that you do not give him the sacrament nor absolution, as long as he does not repent; otherwise you make yourself partaker of his usury and sins, and lead with him to the devil for the sake of someone else's sin, if you were as pure and holy for your sin as St. John the Baptist. For this is what St. Paul says to Timothy, 1 Tim. 5, 22: "Do not lay hands on anyone soon, and do not make yourself a party to other people's sins"; item Rom. 1, 32: "Not only are they worthy of death who do it, but also those who consent to it or have pleasure in it."
43. third, that when you die, you will
and do not bury him among other Christians or go to the grave with him unless he has first atoned for his sins. But if you do, you make yourself partaker of his sins, as was said above. For because he is a usurer and an idolater who serves mammon, he is an unbeliever and cannot have the forgiveness of sins, the grace of Christ and the fellowship of the saints, nor be able to have them, but has condemned, separated and banished himself as long as he does not recognize himself and repent.
(44) This speech may seem hard to some, and it may frighten some. To the little wretches it will sound terrible; I mean those who alone take five or six to the hundred; but the great world-eaters, who cannot take enough to the hundred, you cannot make it too hard for them. For they have given themselves up to mammon and the devil, let us cry out, and ask nothing of them. Of the same I have said especially that one should leave them both alive and dead to the devil, as they wish, and have no Christian fellowship with them.
And if they wanted to pretend that we priests wanted to be lords, they would have to take control over them by force, as now some of the sheriff's men, as well as citizens who know how to build, and wealthy village fools, are crying out. If the priest does not preach what they like to hear, it must quickly be said: they want to be our lords, and the coarse, unladylike Lüntrosfe, the city rascals and the village hicks have not yet learned so much that they could make a distinction between the word of God that is preached and the person of the preacher; but where the word of God and their own conscience punishes them, that must have been done by the poor priest; so that they seek that one should not preach the word of God, but nevertheless want to have eaten the gospel. Why are you angry with the priest, fool? Be angry with your own wickedness or with God, whose word reproaches you, who can give you enough anger.
46 Therefore, if such usurers are angry that you do not absolve them, nor give them the sacrament, nor bury them, let them go to the lawyers and give a good, honest account that they are not usurers. If not, then say: You are forbidden, first of all
882 E. 23:305-307. V. Of the ten commandments in particular. Seventh commandment. W. X, 1051-1053. 883
by God that you shall not take a usurer for a Christian, and of the same commandment he himself is also guilty of not taking himself for a Christian. Secondly, the emperor has also forbidden that a usurer should not be considered a pious man. By the same right he should not consider himself a pious man. For what are we that we should take away or pervert the right and judgment of God and the emperor? And how would I come to put my soul for you and with you, and condemn myself with your sin, if you are such a felt man, who does not put a penny to my food or a poor man's need, but rather robs and steals from both? Even so it does not help you and condemns me if I absolve you right away. For God and the emperor do not accept it in their right. Therefore, repent and do right; if not, you can just as easily go to the devil without me and my absolution, as you can go to the devil twice with my absolution and take me with you through your fault, without my fault. No, companion, it means, you go, I stay here; I am not a priest, that I go with everyone to the devil, but that I bring everyone with me to God.
But how? If it should happen that old people, poor widows or orphans, or other poor persons, who have learned no other nourishment up to now, have a thousand florins or two in trade, and if they should let it go, they would have nothing else and would have to warm their hands on the begging staff or die of hunger. Here I would like the jurists to set a relief of the sharp law; and it should be considered that all the above-mentioned princes and lords who controlled the usury, as Solon, Alexander, the Romans, have not been able or willing to make everything pure, Nehemiah also did not refund everything, Nehem. 5, 15. And here belongs the saying that is threatened: the world cannot be without usury; but that it is not exactly usury, nor a right, but a necessity, almost a half-work of mercy for the poor, who otherwise have nothing, and does not particularly harm others. Would
also disputing whether there might not be an interest or a guard of harm here, because they have been seduced and neglected to learn anything else, and it would be unkind to make them beggars or let them die of hunger, because no one would be helped by this, and without the neighbor's ruin such a thing would happen as ex restitutione vaga (from an indefinite substitute right).
48 But it is not in my judgment that I would not like to help advise, so that no one would have to despair in sins. Therefore, I fear that if the sovereign were to be called upon in this matter and he were to find a reasonable remedy, epiikia (equity) or amnesty (remission of punishment) with reasonable jurists, preachers and councillors, then the conscience would be satisfied. Otherwise I know well what sharp rights can be introduced; but necessity breaks iron, and can also break a right; since necessity and necessity are very different, and also make very different times and persons. What is right out of necessity is wrong in necessity. And again, he who takes bread from the baker's store without famine is a thief; if he does it in famine, he does right, for one is obliged to give him; and many such things. But let him who needs it seek it, as I said, from his lord, priest and pious scholars; what they advise him, let him follow, for it cannot all be written down on paper.
49 May now serve or help that the emperor Justinianus reduces the usury so to those of the nobility that they may take four florins, to the merchants eight, to the others six, and thereby speaks that he wants to moderate the old, hard, heavy burden. If, I say, it can serve here, then I will gladly join in and help to carry it before God, especially where it would be a poor person and an emergency usury or merciful usury. Otherwise, if it were a wanton, stingy, unnecessary usury aimed at vain trade and profit, I would not join in - for lending should not and cannot be trade, commerce, or profit - nor advise, but let the emperor answer for it, not even considering that this is the emperor's opinion. Nor can the emperor teach good
Works that belong to heaven; it is enough for him that he teaches good works for this temporal life, as his words read: he wants to alleviate usury in such a way that he moderates the hard, heavy burdens. Therefore it is not enough to heaven to be obedient to the emperor's rights; and yet what he gives by grace is to be accepted, especially in such hardships, as well as in temporal goods, which are subject to his rule. Even now is not the time that one can gain wealth with five or six florins per hundred, especially when the poor do not have to pay such interest again, but need it for their daily bread. But further, the secret good advice of pious people may be the master here. For the pastors should throw such sharp disputations out of the pulpit and direct them to the lawyers or bonos viros (pious men); enough is shown herewith for instruction.
50 From this it can be seen what a dangerous thing usury is, how it devours the world, and also leads good people into it unawares, so that they can neither get behind nor in front of it, and in the end it must be controlled with great force, and the pious must be advised with the highest wisdom; so that no right can be found to ward off the shameful vice sufficiently. That is why St. Paul says, 1 Tim. 6:9: "Those who want to be rich fall into the devil's snare and temptation, and into many useless and harmful lusts, which drown a man in damnation." He saw, of course, how in the Roman empire avarice and usury had plagued the world and were still plaguing it; for who can tell how many evil, shameful lusts and thoughts a usurer must have in order that his usury may devour him to the utmost; day and night they are vain money and avarice.
(51) Why do they not let them be content with what God gives? as he says, 1 Tim. 6:8: "If we have food and clothing, let us be content. This is said to all Christians, both rich and poor. The cause is this, saith he, v. 7: "We have brought nothing into the world; no doubt we shall bring nothing out." A prince has according to his person food and
He can no longer consume anything for his own person; he must leave the rest behind him as well as a citizen, farmer and beggar. But avarice and usury scrape and gather as if he wanted to consume it all or take it out into the world with him; yet he must have no more than food and cover from it, and remains the rhyme of all men: Fill and cover, around and on, with it. What is above this he may well have with God, as David and rich men; but others need it with him. He has nothing but food and covering from it, like another man. Even though the food and clothing is more delicious, it is still nothing more than food and clothing. For his house, castle, land, clothes, and all that is, is his covering. Food, drink, wine, beer is his fodder; for fodder here does not mean horse feed, nor cover a pigsty or sack, but every man's need according to his condition with all goods; Otherwise all men must eat hay and straw, princes and lords also, because it is said to all Christians, namely, that in custom we cannot have more of all goods than fillings and coverings; one as well as the other, in which each should be sufficient for him, whether the filling and covering must be unequal according to the person's inequality.
52 Let this be said enough according to worldly law, which controls and prevents usury, as to the heathen, among whom, as said above, usury in moderate cases is abated, or - to speak properly - tolerated and left unpunished, for reasons of avoiding greater evil; just as many other things are tolerated and left unpunished among them, which Christ does not allow, as envy and all secret deceit, cunning and malice, which are not to be told. So Moses also allows for divorces and many more things that Christ does not allow His Christians, Matth. 19, 8. For worldly law rules the earthly, mortal, changeable kingdom; Christ's law rules the heavenly, eternal, unchangeable kingdom. Therefore his law is called Sceptrum rectitudinis, a straight scepter, Ps. 45:7, that is, a completely pure, perfect law, since there is no flaw, defect, bend, spot, or wrinkle in it, so that his law cannot suffer usury or evil. And where it is held and
886 E. 23.310-312. B. Of the ten commandments in particular. Seventh commandment. W. X, 1056-1059. 887
Christians, there is certainly no usury, and as little as a Christian is a pagan or a Jew, so little is he a usurer.
For this is his law and this is how he teaches his Christians, that they should deal with temporal goods in three ways, of which we have often spoken and of which Matth. 5, 42. Luc. 6, 30. clearly states: First, that they should give gladly: Omni petenti tribue, "You shall give to everyone who asks you." But he that giveth useth not usury: for he giveth freely, and covetth nothing in return: therefore there can be no usury among Christians. On the other hand, they should gladly lend, or let them borrow; of this Christ says, Luc. 6, 35: Mutuum dantes etc. "You shall lend and hope for nothing" or wait. So he who lends will not, of course, lend uselessly. Thirdly, a Christian should also let him take the cloak for his skirt, of which Matt. 5:40, 41; in which he understands suffering, all kinds of injustice and violence; as he himself interprets and says there, "Whoever forces you to go one mile, go with him two; do good to those who persecute and hate you." Now he that keepeth and doeth these things, how can he be usurious? He does not usury with men, but he usurps God very well. More about this later.
54. Here thou sayest, Shall this be, who will or can be a Christian? Answer: Whoever wants to be blessed in the kingdom of heaven can be a Christian. Yes, who can be so blessed? Answer: Whoever wants to be a Christian can be blessed. Christ will not judge or bend his word after us, nor turn or direct it; for it is said: Virga aequitatis virga regni tui, "thy kingdom's scepter is an even, equal, straight, upright scepter," Ps. 45:7. There is no other way, we have to follow it and send ourselves after it; the cubit must not be measured according to the cloth, but the cloth according to the cubit, otherwise the measuring would be nothing; the weight must not be weighed according to the goods, but the goods according to the weight; otherwise what would be the weight? The Sophists and Papists and Mahomet also found it difficult and unbearable, so they devised something lighter and better and teach that Christ did not command such things.
It is advised to all Christians, but only to the perfect; so that everyone is free to keep it, whoever wants to; namely, if he wants to earn more and higher than eternal blessedness, he may keep it; if he wants to be content and desire nothing more than to be blessed, he may leave it, but is not obliged to keep it.
(55) Therefore they have made such fine Christians of us, that we have to buy the rest of the merits of the saints, even of the priests and monks; that is, vain heathens and Turks, and made worse than heathens and Turks of us. They reproach us for forbidding good works. Let us look at the text here, and we will find who they are that forbid good works. For here they not only forbid good works, but also take away the doctrine of Christ, wherein he teaches good works, and say, One must not hold such doctrine, nor do such good works. Dear, what good works remain, since the doctrine of good works is rejected, condemned, and destroyed? only those that we ourselves choose, without and against God's commandment; as the Turks, the Tartars, and the Jews do. Therefore the world has become full of monks, plates and masses, but devoid of true Christians and good works, such as giving, lending and suffering. But we, who teach and require such good works according to Christ's words, must be called those who forbid good works. Are they not fine saints? who not only condemn the doctrine of good works, so that they forbid all good works; but also say that we forbid good works, who yet against their condemning and forbidding teach such good works. So what they teach heretically and devilishly they blame on us, and what we teach Christianly they boast about, the tender little pious.
[From the give.]
(56) Yes, you say, how can I give to everyone? It would have to be, as they say, a rich merchant who should feed us; it is impossible even for the emperor to give to everyone, God alone is able and no man. I have preached and written enough about this, and others with me; also
If one looked diligently at the text, everyone could see it for himself just as we have seen it, so that one would not need our interpretation for this. But because we are not all diligent enough, one must point out the text to the other with his fingers, so that he can see it himself, so that he does not have to believe us, but sees and understands the word of the Lord himself.
57 First, when our Lord speaks thus, Matt. 5:42, "Thou shalt give to everyone," it does not mean that I should give to all men or to all the poor of the earth, for he well knows that it is impossible; but in this place he speaks against the Jewish mind, which had this text before it in the law, v. 43, "Thou shalt love thy friend, and hate thine enemy. From this they taught and held that one should not give to everyone, but only to one's friends, because one should only love one's friends and hate one's enemies. Against this Christ says: "You should give to everyone, that is, not only to your friend but also to your enemy, and not exclude anyone in his need or thirst, whether enemy or friend. His words give this clearly and plainly, that he says there, v. 47: "If you give or do good to your friends alone, what great thing have you done? Do not the wicked and the publicans do likewise, and give to their friends? As the world's way is to say, Look over the fence and over again; but if my neighbor alone will say to me, Dear, look over the fence, that is, see how I am, help and advise me, be a good neighbor; but he will not hear that I say again, Dear, look over again, too, and be a good neighbor; then the world's friendship is over. For it does not look over the fence, where one does not want to look over again. So the Greeks say: Hand washes hand. But a Christian should always look over the fence for necessity, if his neighbor never wants to look over again, as Christ teaches here; for God will well repay such with a superfluous rich look. Thus St. Paul, Rom. 12, 20, cites Solomon's saying, Proverbs 25, 21, 22: "If thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, water him" etc. And Moses himself, Ex 23, 5: "If thou seest thine enemy, feed him.
of the donkey fall under the load, so leave everything and help him up" etc.
58 Secondly, such a man is not called one who otherwise has enough or can have enough; for there are, especially at this time, many evil peelers beyond measure, who are poor, needy and beggars and cheat the people, to whom one should let Master Hans give his alms with rope and sackcloth, if the authorities were not so lax and lazy and let the gallows be set up in the streets and celebrated in vain. So there are many more of the lazy people who are fresh, healthy and strong, who could well work, serve and feed themselves, but rely on the Christians and pious people to give gladly. And where giving is not enough, they make up for it by stealing, even by taking freely in public, in the courtyard, in the street, even in houses; that I do not know whether there ever was such a time when stealing and taking were so common, and yet all the gallows stand so completely empty, keeping vain holidays through all the year. Christ did not command such to give here, but only to the poor in your city or around you, as Moses also teaches, Deut. 24, 14, who cannot work, serve and feed themselves or their faithful work and service is not enough. Here you should help, give, lend, be it friend or foe. A Christian can do this well and it is not too difficult for him, especially when the rulers are resisting the foreign beggars and pranksters, or unknown and lazy people.
59 Third, if a Christian is to give, he must first have; what has nothing, gives nothing. And if he is to give tomorrow, or the day after tomorrow, or for a year, for Christ calls me to give as long as I live, he cannot give it all away today. Therefore, since the Lord Christ gives to give, he gives it freely to those who have and are able to give. Otherwise it is said: Rough me in the hand. But the monks have masterfully escaped this commandment. Some have had nothing to leave and have sought their belly alone in the monastery, even in the kitchen; some have given everything away in one day; but all of them have taken for eternity and have given them their
890 D 23, Z14-Z16. B. Of the ten commandments in particular. Seventh commandment. W. x, losi-nM. 891
For the rest of their lives and until they have received more than the world itself. Yes, that is finely given: a penny for a thousand guilders, that is very cheap. Against this St. Paul teaches the Corinthians, 1 Ep. 8, 13, 14, that he does not want them to give in this way, ut aliis remissio, ipsis tribulatio sit, so that they should suffer hardship, and those to whom they give should be in good spirits. No, this is not what our Lord Christ desires, that I should make myself a beggar with my goods and the beggar my master; but that I should take care of his need and help him as much as I can, so that the poor eat with me and I do not eat with the poor, or take from my house what they need and give it to strangers. This a Christian may well do, even against his enemy, though a Jew or a Gentile would not do it against his enemy. That is, when he says, "Give to everyone who asks you"; but he cannot ask who does not need it, but must be a knave.
60 There is also a lot of suffering. Sometimes it takes a great deal and too much for its useless, shameful splendor and glory. The devil may give them enough. Christ speaks to his Christians, who are called to suffer with him and who need the life of this world for eternal life, each according to his state; as he says, Luc. 12, 29: "You shall not go up high." Who can give enough, lend enough or let take enough, what a pope, cardinal, bishop, prince, lord, nobleman, burgher, peasant needs or is in need to squander for his pride, splendor and courage? It is said: Habentes victum, for the need of the body we should all have enough, and no one should let the other, not even the enemy, starve, as St. Paul says, 1 Tim. 6, 8: God gives us all abundantly enough for the use etc.
61) Above all this, there is one more thing to be noted in giving, which does not concern the outward hand, bag, or box, but the heart, so that it is not a false, mischievous giving, of which the Lord says, Matt. 6:3: "When you give alms, see that your left hand does not know what your right hand is doing. We have done this diligently there and elsewhere, but we must also do it here. For it is not enough that
you give, as now said, to both. You give to both friends and enemies; item, only to the needy; item, that you may also keep food with your own and give more another time as long as you live; but here see to it that such giving is done as St. Paul teaches, Rom. 12:8.He that giveth, let him give simply," that is, with a simple heart, not for the sake of vain honor; and do what he can to forget it, as if he had never given or done nothing; or else the devil's stench is apt to hang on it, that one may tickle himself with such good deeds, and want to be seen. They are the ones who let the trumpet sound before them, as Christ says, Matth. 6, 2, and like to hear say: Behold, behold, how he and he gives, help God, he will give himself to death. They have lost their reward and such giving is completely lost and in vain.
62) Even more wicked are those who give in such a way that they want to capture those to whom they give, and seek their enjoyment beyond measure shamefully. For they want them to be celebrated, and in return they do, suffer, speak and serve as they please, and no one can thank them enough. As if I give ten florins to a poor man in his need, so that I may please him greatly, and then I need him so much and use and serve him, that I would not be able to obtain it with a hundred florins from my servant or maid, to whom I must give or pay it as wages for his work and service; for such giving I and you yourself would not like either, hoping that we would buy it much nearer elsewhere or earn it in wages. Just as some nobles, towns and villages are now playing with their parish lords, who did not endow such parishes, nor did they give anything to them; Nevertheless, because they have to lend the parishes, they want to make villeins out of the parish lords, and do not want to suffer that according to such an example, which they themselves give, the princes, from whom they have their fiefs, should also make them villeins or do what the princes desire, but they want to have what they want from the parish lord as gratitude, to suffer from their overlord what they desire; They owe them so much gratitude that it is only fair to do so. Now
What kind of giving is this? It is, as said above, giving a penny for a thousand guilders; that is truly bought very cheaply. Dear, I'd like to know that stuff, too. Nevertheless they want to have the glory that they are called givers and not takers, Christians, and will be saved.
(63) From this you see that the giving mentioned above, where the hand or bag gives, is not difficult for both friends and enemies. But this giving out of a simple heart is difficult and makes few Christians, yet it costs neither money, nor effort, nor labor, but only that the heart may be right in it. For he who gives a penny from a simple heart gives more in the sight of God, even if he gives a hundred and a hundred thousand guilders from such a false heart; for God does not consider it a gift. Where will the little disciples and the little brothers of the florin remain, who are now vain takers and yet want to be called givers? I have often seen with great displeasure that princes, lords, nobility, burghers and peasants spend so shamefully much on courtyards, splurging, gambling, etc., so that they could help many poor people if they wanted to give the tenth, even the hundredth part of it. But against this I consoled myself, thinking, If they give it all to the poor, they will give it out of such a false heart; so it is much better for them to give away a thousand florins in the devil's name, than to give a penny in God's name; than those who are not worthy in the sight of God, that they should give a penny or a farthing to God's service and honor. For those who give away a thousand guilders in the name of the devil cannot boast that they gave it for the sake of God or to the poor; nor can they make a profit or do service on it, as the false givers do, and must condemn themselves. But those who give a florin in God's name almost want to call on God Himself; they may desire such great thanks, rejoicing and service in return. So not only is mammon their god, but through their mammon they also want to be god to all the world and to be celebrated; and the poor, even if they cannot have mammon for God, nor do they want to have it for God, they should nevertheless be his god.
God in his idols - I should say gods - or shall die of hunger. Such giving is not giving even with reason, but taking back sevenfold.
64 Sirach calls them fools, that is, godless people, and says, Cap. 20:14, 15: "The fool's gift will not do you much good; with one eye he gives, and with seven eyes he sees what he gets in return. He gives little, and gives much, and proclaims it like a winecaller" etc. Read on there how he paints such disgraceful people; how they complain that one is not grateful nor faithful for their good deeds or bread that they have given to someone to eat etc. They are almost of the kind that are sung about in the song of St. Martin:
You dear St. Martin, you much dearer!
What are you looking for N. among the great thieves?
They sacrifice a penny to you and steal your horse: they are such bad thieves, they would be worth hanging some day.
In the same way, I see that almost many monasteries and convents have been built, masses and services have been arranged, to buy God's kingdom for the evil false coin, which is called our work and merit, which God will burn with hellish fire, as one is wont to burn false coin; of this elsewhere.
[From borrowing.]
65 Secondly, lending is to be spoken of in the same way as giving is spoken of. First, that a Christian should lend not only to a friend but also to an enemy, as the Lord says, Matth. 5, 46. and Luc. 6, 34: "If you lend to your friends alone, what do you do that is special? Do not the wicked also lend to one another, that they may receive the same in return? Secondly, to lend to the needy, and not to the wicked, or to the lazy, or to the froward, as is said above of giving; of which Sirach saith, Cap. 29, 4: "Some think they have found what they borrow," but do not think to render it. Such lazy rascals abuse this commandment of Christ and rely on the fact that one owes to lend; therefore one should not lend to them. Thirdly, that one lend so that one has it to lend, and can lend tomorrow or for the year. Otherwise
The proverb is right: If you do not give it back to me, I can no longer lend it to you, that is, I must refrain from doing so, because I no longer have it to lend. For here it is, as Sirach says in 29 Cap. V. 10, that many a man would gladly lend, but he must fear that he will lose what is his, and you may write or read the whole of this chapter here; for it tells very well how it is with lending; of which also the saying went in the schools of old: Si commodaveris, non re- habebis; si rehabebis, non tam cito; si tam cito, non tam bonum; si tam bonum, perdes amicum. (If you lend, you are in danger of not getting it back; but if you get it back, not so soon; but if soon, not so good; but if just as good, you lose a friend).
Again, the children of Adam are so bitter, if they should lend a turnip to the one who has offended them, they would rather give him everything that the countrymen curse, and yet they want to be called Christians and go to the sacrament. Therefore, everyone should see according to his conscience when, where, how much and to whom he should or must lend or give. In this, no other measure can be set than the neighbor's need and the Christian love that God has commanded to be shown to the neighbor, as we would have it shown in the same case by others, whether we were friends or enemies.
67 Such lending is neither difficult nor impossible, that the sophists here have not had cause to change our Lord's commandment, and to make of it discretion, which they call consilia or counsels; for reason teaches us that one should do to another what one would have another do to him, as the Lord says there, Matth. 7:12: "Do to others as you would have them do to you; this is the law and all the prophets"; indeed, all natural law also says this. Now it is certain that I would like to be given, to be lent, to be helped in my need. Again, it is certain that no one should give me, lend me, help me, when I do not need it, when I am lazy, when I am a mischievous man, when I want to spend money, when I do not want to work, when I do not want to do anything, when I could do it, when I am healthy, when I am strong, and when I do not want it.
Nothing, but that the people are too pious and give me enough, because they should beat me cheaper to the distemper and chase out to the country or hang me on the gallows.
(68) But this is hard and rare lending, as it is said above of giving, that I should lend simply or from a simple heart, not coveting anything in return, or taking my neighbor captive or making him a bondman. I am not speaking now of usurious lending, as above, but of lending without usury, to enemies as well as to friends, even if one is able according to the outward work. For as the givers want to be celebrated and worshipped by those who receive it, so the lenders also want to be celebrated by those who have to borrow it from them; therefore Christian lending is rare, as well as giving; for the seven eyes, as Sirach says, Cap. 20, v. 14, do not allow the simple eye to see.
69 And summa, such sorrow and heartache that one man would like to be another's god, comes from the apple in paradise, when Adam and Eve wanted to be gods in the name of the devil; everyone still has the same apple in his stomach, it always spills out, does not want to be digested. For even the right saints still have something in them, at least of the gröbs (core of the apple, thus the actual germ). Therefore we see how some take pleasure in other people suffering hardship, and especially the idolaters, as St. Paul calls them, Eph. 5:5, the miserly and usurers, to whom it is a matter of great concern that one needs them and has to ask and call upon them for help. Do you not know them? Look at those who hold the grain, how they hope, how happy they become when it becomes expensive, how sad they become when it becomes cheap; so that some even think about it themselves, as an example that God considers the other usurers and miserly people all worthy of the same right and judgment. And it would also be a pity that they should be hanged legally and honestly by public executioners, but should become shameful executioners of their own accord, and should make themselves shameful, so that they themselves may be devils and death, as all the world's murderers and robbers would have liked to be.
70 But Christ, our Lord, has here in reply
He commanded that no one should want to be another's god, but that everyone should be another's servant according to love, John 13:14, that no one should hope and rejoice in another's need and misfortune, but that he should be compassionate and merciful to his neighbor's need and misfortune, and gave an unspeakable example of this himself, as St. Paul says, Phil 2:6, 7. Paul says, Phil. 2, 6. 7., "being in divine honor and lord of all, he would not esteem it robbed - nor grown, nor ambitious - but emptied himself of all, and became our servant and minister." But the covetous usurp, avarice, rob and steal their divine honor and dominion over the poor and needy, taking pleasure and delight in the fact that they are rich with money and others poor; that they have to rule with money and others have to worship them; Thus they follow their father, the devil, who in heaven also wanted to increase the deity and to make it rich with his high "angelic" wealth, adornment and glory, in which he was created above all angels; but he fell and thereby lost both usury and the principal sum, and from the most beautiful image of God he has become the most abominable enemy of God, 2 Pet. Jude v. 6.
There is no greater enemy of mankind on earth, after the devil, than a miser and a usurer, for he wants to be God over all men. Turks, warriors, tyrants are also evil men, but they must let people live and confess that they are evil and enemies, and can, indeed must, sometimes have mercy on some; But a usurer and a miser, who would that all the world should perish in hunger, thirst, misery, and want, as much as is in him, that he might have it all alone, and that every man should receive of him as of a god, and be his bondman for ever; there his heart laugheth, and his blood is refreshed. Besides this, however, he will appear in marten skirts (coats of marten fur), golden chains, rings and clothes, wipe his mouth, let himself be looked at and boasted of as a noble, pious man, who is also much more merciful, neither God himself, nor the Mother of God and all the saints are much more kind, and should this - is the world not plagued?- with a thousand, hundred, and one saints?
The poor man shall be paid fifty guilders or, if he is of low standing, one guilder.
(72) From the beginning and always, many fine men have written fiercely against usury, how the usurers have suddenly and terribly perished, with horrible examples. And go the sayings in all languages: Male partum male disperit; Male quaesitum male perdit; De male quaesitis non gaudet tertius haeres. Omnis dives aut iniquus - says St. Jerome, - aut haeres iniqui. (As won, so zerronnen; Unjust good does not prosper; The unjustly acquired does not come to the third heir. - Every rich man, says Jerome, is either an unjust man or the heir of an unjust man). In addition, there are daily visible, tangible, tasteable, smellable, audible, and to all the senses demonstrable examples: The unrighteous good does not thrive nor does it come to the third heir, and no unrighteous good has ever come to the third heir. To this the Scripture agrees with vain thunder and hellish fire that God wants to exterminate them - as it is written in the first commandment, Exodus 20:5 - in the third and fourth generation. Nevertheless, all this notwithstanding, the idolaters, usurers, and covetous go blindly, obstinately, insanely, madly, foolishly, obsessively, furiously, and yet they do it knowingly. So sweet is the poison of the apple in paradise, that they want to have Mammon as their god, and through his power become gods over poor, corrupt, wretched people, not to help nor save them, but to corrupt them even more and more.
Because the secular rulers are lazy and slothful in this, or in part too weak to prevent such misfortune, the priests should teach and accustom the people to regard usurers and miserly people as devils in the flesh, and to bless themselves before them wherever they are heard or seen, and to learn to think that Turks, Tartars and heathens are angels in comparison with a usurer. In the same way, schoolmasters should teach and accustom boys and young people to be afraid and to say "Fie you! They have many beautiful fables in which the pagans complained about avarice and usury; as that Cerberus,
898 E. 23, 323-325. B. Of the ten commandments in particular. Seventh commandment. W. X, 1071-1073. 899
the hound of hell, has three mouths that cannot be sated, and what they write of Hercules' great deeds, how he forces so many monsters and monstrous abominations to save land and people. For a usurer is a great monstrous monster, like a bear wolf that devastates everything, more than a Cacus, *) Geryon **) or Anteus †) etc., and yet adorns himself and wants to be pious, that one should not see where the oxen, so he pulls backwards into his hole. But Hercules shall hear the cries of the oxen and the prisoners, which cries now call all princes and lords lamentably, and seek Cacus, even in cliffs and rocks, and loose the oxen again from the villain. For Cacus is called a villain, who is a pious usurer, steals, robs, eats everything and yet does not want to have done it, and no one shall find him; like the oxen, pulled backwards into his hole. The usurer also wants to pretend to the world, as if he were useful and gave oxen to the world, if he pulls them to himself and eats them.
Of suffering and taking.
74 Third, the Lord teaches his Christians, Matt. 5:40, that they should suffer and have theirs taken, because they should not establish a new reign, nor avenge themselves, so that they could not take back what was taken from them by force and injustice; they had to suffer, especially where it happened for the sake of Christ and the gospel. As we see, then, that the dear holy martyrs did and suffered all things from the Gentiles,
**Geryon was a giant with three heads, or composed of three bodies. Hercules stole his herds from him, which were guarded by the giant Eurytion, and slew Geryon himself when he pursued him.
D. Red.
Let them take everything, even life and limb, before they deny Christ or let them take it.
(75) But how if there have been some here who have not suffered or been taken, or have not suffered with a simple heart, but have sought honor and glory thereby, as the false givers and lenders do? But this needs no questioning; for false martyrs have been very many, as Manichaeans, Arians, Donatists, Pelagians, who extolled beyond measure their great patience and sufferings; as St. Augustine writes of the Donatists. Satan's wickedness is so deeply poisoned in Adam's children that he can make false not only the giving and lending and all good works, but also the suffering or patience, and much more false neither the good works. For there is no man more obdurate, haughty, and unyielding than a false martyr, who knows and can boast how great, high, long, deep, wide, and broad suffering and cross he must bear, and all this for God's sake.
For they have heard how suffering is such a gloriously great thing in the sight of God, which Christ praises so highly, Matth. 5, 11, and they invent causes themselves and want to be like the true holy martyrs; just as now, in our time, the red spirits, Anabaptists and the like are most stiff-necked because they consider themselves to be vain martyrs, where they are not allowed their raging and frolicking. A barefoot monk, who should not have his devout will, would not change places with St. Paul for his suffering; he makes such a great holy martyr out of himself. So the world is always full of martyrs, but the other part fills hell and is missing from heaven.
(77) For they stop and look only at the suffering or patience - should it be called patience - and do not first ask whether it is suffered in a simple way or out of a simple heart, nor the right or cause of the suffering, which Christ sets forth so clearly and brightly, Matth. 5:10: Propter me, propter justitiam: "Blessed are those who suffer for righteousness' sake," or "for my sake"; do not say, "Blessed are those who suffer for their wickedness, for their self-will, for their
For the sake of honor, avarice, or fame, for the sake of their fictitious devotion and chosen spirituality. The cause for which you suffer must first be certain and right; it must not be a fictitious suffering or cause; as St. Augustine also often says the fine saying: Non poena, sed causa facit martyrem: Suffering does not make a martyr, but right cause of suffering makes martyrs; otherwise the devil, damned, thieves, murderers, peelers, and wicked men would be greater martyrs than all the saints; as it is said, It will be more sour to deserve hell to the devil martyrs, neither heaven to the right martyrs. Behold what harlots, knaves, murderers suffer against a pious quiet citizen or peasant.
But how do we present Christians hold this doctrine of Christ's suffering? after the worldly rulers have become Christians, who do not suffer Christians to be taken or harmed, and their protection and protection is not to be despised, but to be used as other goods and creatures of God, with thanksgiving etc. For the Christians among the Turks must hold and suffer such doctrine more than we know or believe. Among us, the papists, the most holy Christians, are now suffering great torture and crosses beyond measure, before which they cannot sleep or rest, so that they are unable to sufficiently persecute, murder, drown and fill the world with blood in order to honor God and preserve the holy church, for which they are waiting for countless crowns of honor in heaven.
79) But, without joking, where is such suffering among us, who have the protection of secular authorities, that nothing may be taken from us, nor may we be offended, because they have accepted the word of God? For the others, who follow it, give their subjects enough suffering and plagues, as we see before our eyes, and now it is said of the papists and their raving. Where, I say, is our suffering? I will soon tell you: Go up through all ranks from the bottom to the top, and you will find what you are looking for, namely, where you will find a Christian pious farmer who shows his neighbor, poor Christian pious farmer, or his poor parish priest Christian love and faithfulness with giving, lending, giving advice.
or help in his need; on the other hand, you will find more than a thousand unchristian peasants who do not give a penny to either priest or neighbor, even if they have to suffer famine; but stingy, snatch, scrape to themselves, increase and overpay, counterfeit, embezzle, take, steal, rob secretly wherever they like, be it the lordship, the priest or the neighbor; And if they could drink everyone's blood, they would do it to fill their avarice, which cannot be filled; of course, all the devout Christian peasants in a whole dominion could be brought into a village, which nevertheless would not be large. Such peasants will teach you that you must keep this doctrine of suffering and overcome evil with patience; for so did the peasants in Israel to their priests, Levites, brothers and friends; as we read in Malachi, Cap. 2.
80 Likewise, look among the citizens; do you find a town hall where the mayor and councilors are serious about the gospel, or a faithful Christian citizen who gladly gives, lends, helps etc. ? On the other hand, you will find many town halls and even more citizens, who so much hate or despise the gospel, priests and poor citizens, where they can, toil, plague and martyr; and are as stingy, if not more, than any unchristian farmer. In addition, they seek vain tyranny, violence and honor against whomever they can, be it priest or poor man; so that I think one should be able to put all pious Christian councillors and citizens of a principality in a city, which would also not be particularly large. These are also masters in teaching to keep Christ's word of suffering.
81. Then go among the nobility and officials, and count them all for me, who mean God's word with earnestness; for they are the ones who eat up God's word before all others with great love; if you find one who is serious about giving, lending, helping his neighbor; then you shall find more than a hundred of them again, who do the antagonism with great violence, so that there would not have to be a large castle, where the Christian, noble, proud nobility of a whole principality would not be with each other.
could live and dwell. And if you do not know what suffering is according to the teachings of Christ, be so bold as to tell the word of God to someone who is against him, or do not worship him for God, whatever he wants and however he wants, then you will also get what you seek. And especially we shall be praiseworthy and glorious in our dealings with those to whom we have committed avarice and usury, in which they have been drowned to the depths of hell, and whom we consider to be unchristians, and to whom we do not want to offer a sacrament or allow communion with the church, when we cannot do so in our conscience. Last of all, look at the high princes; where one or two are Christian, they are wild game in heaven, the others all remain hellfires with the devil and cause enough suffering and misfortune to Christians.
82 And though the Lord preached and commanded such suffering to all his Christians in general, he commanded it especially to the apostles and their heirs. The devil is especially hostile to them because they must publicly punish vice. The peasants, burghers, nobles, princes and lords do not want and cannot suffer this, but, like their god and lord, the devil, they want to freely do what they desire with impunity, and to be loved and praised for it. Therefore, the devil is not only hostile to pious pastors and preachers, but also to evil ones, and to all who study, or, as he calls it, become scribes. For he fears that a scribe or scholar might become a preacher, and a wicked pastor might one day become pious; he has none to suffer in his kingdom. No wonder, because if he wants to keep laymen, so that no one studies, he knows how soon both priest and books would perish; therefore he is hostile to all scholars and scribes, even those who do not harm him, but serve him very powerfully; he may also be hostile to all feathers and geese for the sake of the writing feathers that come from the birds.
So now he says: it is not necessary to let the priests become lords. They do not say this because they are afraid that the priests will become lords; they themselves know that they are lying about this when they take hold of it.
that the parish lords are forbidden to become lords; since no one can deny that no parish lord has anything of his own in the parish, but are guests in the parish estates and must leave them behind them when they die. And where one or two are beggared (come to something), so that they buy a little house for their widows and orphans, then the others are all vain beggars, leave vain beggars behind them, both widows and orphans, and even if they earn something of their own, they must nevertheless remain here with it among lesser peasants or citizens, because they cannot ride high nor sit with ten horses. They know, see, hear and grasp this very well, and very well indeed; they still scold and mock such poor people and say: priests do not have to be lords. This reminds me just as when the rich man in the Gospel said of poor Lazarus, "Lazarus need not be master of my house," to whom he did not begrudge the barks and crooks that fell to the dogs under his table. Dear one, how far are such scoffers from those who crowned our Lord with thorns, spitting at him and saying: God greets you, dear king?
84 Therefore, I say, they do not speak these things because they are concerned that the pastors will become masters; but out of great courage they make such larvae, so that they may dampen the preaching ministry, make themselves free and secure against the truth, to hear where they are criminal. But the gospel cannot do without such people, if it is to perish otherwise soon, and we must have them, if we are to suffer evil otherwise for Christ's sake. For it must be fulfilled by our people that the Lord says, Matth. 13, 57: "No prophet is pleasant in his own country"; and Christ, Luc. 13, 33: "It is not good that a prophet should perish outside Jerusalem" Joh. 1, 11: "He came into his own, and his own received him not." If our gospel is the right light, it must truly shine into the darkness, and the darknesses must not understand it. If we do not want to suffer this and have the world differently, we may go out to the world or create another world that does what we or God wants; this world wants it and will do it.
do not do. We may happily surrender and consider this.
It was not that a prophet was ever slain by the surrounding nations or enemies, but the people of God and their kings pursued them even into foreign lands; as Ahab pursued Elijah, 1 Kings 19:2.Jerusalem, the holy city of God, the bridal chamber of Christ, the dearest fruit on earth, the joyful host of all angels, the matron of all saints, even had to murder God's prophets and finally crucify the Lord Himself, Matth. 23, 37. Thus the church did not like to curb all the power and art of the world, not even the Roman Empire, since it was the most powerful and raged against it. But the holy fathers, bishops and teachers did it first with heresy, then also with violence, until the most holy Father became church, God and everything; then Christ was crucified and buried with all the prophets, apostles and saints.
If our gospel is to receive its due and glory, our preachers or pastors and Christians must do it: first with false doctrine, then with violence, which two have been the devil's armor from the beginning, namely lies and murder. And praise be to God, the spirits of the mob have begun with lies; the peasants, burghers, nobles, and lords confidently press on with ingratitude, contempt, hatred, pride, and all kinds of deceit, and when the prelude is finely begun, the right song will of course begin, otherwise it is not already half sung and half played. But defy your neck and call them unbelievers or enemies of God, who despise his word; much less will they suffer it, as Jerusalem, the holy city, would suffer it, that Isaiah called it a whorehouse and a den of murderers, Isa. 3, 9. So are our Christians now in many parts; they want to be evangelical, they hold the word in high esteem and are vain saints; but they are hostile to the pastors and preachers who preach the word and tell them the truth; just as Jerusalem also held God's word in high esteem, but the prophets were not to preach it or had to die and perish.
And what shall we preachers, pastors, scribes complain of? See the world in itself; see how one country hates another, as Whales, Spaniards, Hungarians and Germans; how one prince means another, one lord means another, one citizen means another, one peasant means another, with Christian love and loyalty, that is, envies, hates, picks, torments, harms and does all misfortune or ever wishes it, and everyone would like to be and have everything alone; That whoever looks at their nature and doings with an evangelical heart, must almost think that not men, but vain devils are raging among human larvae or forms. And it is a wonder how the world can stand for a year. Where is the power that can keep everything in such disunity, enmity, hatred, envy, robbing, stealing, scratching, tearing, harm and unspeakable malice that it does not fall daily in a heap? It is God's miraculous and almighty power and wisdom that must be felt and grasped in this, otherwise it could not stand for so long.
Therefore do not worry where you will find suffering, there is no need; just be a pious Christian, preacher, priest, citizen, farmer, nobleman, gentleman, and carry out your ministry diligently and faithfully; let the devil worry where he finds a piece of wood, from which he will make a cross for you, and let the world worry where it finds a piece of rice, from which it will make a scourge over your skin, even if the authorities put you in prison. For no authority will be so wise and powerful as to protect and guard you from the devil and evil people and from all evil, even if it is completely pious and diligent; only be you a true Christian, who suffer with a simple heart for God's sake and do not give yourself cause to suffer, as do the false, fainthearted martyrs and monks, or loose boys who bring themselves into misfortune or to the gallows with their wickedness.
(89) And remember the little chicken in Aesop, which was bitten by roosters; when it saw that the roosters also bit each other, it comforted itself and said: I will now bear my suffering all the better, because they also bite each other. Should not the world bite and trample us Christians, if they also bite each other among themselves?
shamefully bite and trample? Why do we want to have it better in the world, neither the world has it under itself, which must suffer itself, more than it can bear? Let this be said enough of the law and teaching of Christ, how one should give, lend and suffer, so that usury and avarice can have no room among Christians. But if it finds room, then there are certainly no Christians, they boast as they wish. For Christ says, Matth. 6, 24: "You cannot serve God and mammon at the same time"; and St. Paul, Eph. 5, 5: "Idolaters or idolaters cannot inherit the kingdom of God." Avarice is called idolatry, as now everyone knows well, praise to God!
But if a servant of mammon cannot be saved, who is no more than a miser and whose life is called idolatry, where will the usurer remain? What servant can he be called if the miser is called the devil's servant? for a miser and a usurer are nevertheless far apart. A man can be stingy with his own goods, so that he does not take anything from anyone, does not kill anyone, and does not spoil anyone positively, that is, by action or access, without, like the rich man in the Gospel, Luc. 16, 21.He does private (by omission), that is, by not helping when he should help, and does harm, that is, he looks on and lets it happen when he can and should prevent it; as the common saying of Ambrose testifies: Pasce esurientem; si non pavisti, occidisti: feed the hungry; if you do not feed him, it is as much as if you had strangled him. But a usurer is a positive murderer; for not only does he not help the hungry, but he also snatches from his mouth the morsel of bread that God and pious people have given him for his body's need, not asking that all the world die of hunger, that he have only his usury.
91. Yes, you say: I am not stingy and usurious to the poor, but to the rich and to those who have it, therefore I murder and corrupt no one. Thanks be to you, my dear fruit, first of all, that you know yourself to be a miser and a usurer, that is, the devil's servant and God's, and the enemy of all men. Secondly, that you teach us how you should not
If you neither destroy nor murder the poor, but suck the rich and the haves, that is, if you nevertheless confess yourself to be a thief and robber, that is truly fine and well excused; for I would not have known that before, and I should almost have to recant that I was wrong, since I called you the greatest murderer and robber. But hear, thou most understanding usurer and murderer, my answer: over whom is it chiefly, when thou usurpest? Is it not on the poor alone, who in the end cannot keep a penny or a morsel of bread from your usury, because everything is increased and inflated by your usury? Over whom did the usury pass, Neh. 5, 3. when poor people finally had to sell their house, farm, vineyard, fields and everything they had to the usurers? Likewise, in Rome, Athens and other cities, when the citizens became bondmen because of usury, as was said above, over whom did it pass? Did it not go over the poor? Yes, they had been rich, and usury had eaten them up to their own bodies.
92) Does the devil thank you that you don't grow anything for the poor? What did you want to usury, since there is nothing? It is almost well known that you do not drive your usury upon a single bag, but you start with the rich and make them beggars; and from this beautiful excuse of yours, that you do not rob the poor, it follows just as much that you murder vain rich people, for you make them beggars and drive them into poverty, let alone that you should help them out of poverty. So with this pretty excuse you make yourself not only a murderer of the poor, but also of the rich, yes, only of the rich, and you are such a mighty god in the world, who makes rich and poor one thing, without murdering them sooner, you have made them poor first; this is your great love and friendship.
Moreover, even if the rich could struggle and endure the evil of your usury, the poor man, who has not a florin to eat in a week and has many children, cannot earn bread with his hard work, because avarice and usury have taken everything away from him.
so increases and exaggerates. Again, over whom does your avarice and usury go? Dear, excuse yourself here again and say: You exaggerate or usurp, so that the rich may have cause to give the poor more alms and earn the kingdom of heaven; and thus you usurp the rich in two ways: first in themselves, and secondly in the poor to whom they must give, so that you may get everything the sooner. Boast, then, that you have done a good work and a service to the rich, that you have given the rich cause for good works; how could you get a better fame that would be more fitting for your usury? For so the devil also gives cause to do good works without ceasing, when he afflicts many people whom it is necessary to help for God's sake.
(94) Nevertheless, in a short time your usury and avarice have brought it about that whoever could feed himself with a hundred florins some years ago cannot now feed himself with two hundred florins. Usury sits in Leipzig, Augsburg, Frankfurt and similar cities and trades with sums of money; but we feel it here in our market and in the kitchen, that we keep neither penny nor farthing; we priests and preachers and those who live on interest, have no trade and cannot increase our penny, feel well how close the usurers sit to us; they eat with us from our kitchen, drink the most from our cellar, toil and scrape us, so that our bodies and lives are in pain. Peasants, burghers, and nobles can increase their grain and labor, double or triple their pennies, and thus bear usury all the more easily; but those who, as they say, have to feed on the string, have to hold out and let themselves be flayed and strangled.
95 But now no preaching helps, they have grown deaf, blind, senseless, they no longer hear, see or feel anything; only that we preachers are excused on that day and on their last, when they must go to hell, so that they have no excuse or blame us, as their pastors, that we have not admonished, punished and taught them, and thus with them for the sake of other people's sins also to the devil.
would have to. No, they alone shall go to hell; we have done our part, according to our office we have punished and taught them diligently; let their blood and sin be and remain on their own heads, and not on us.
96. Last of all, lest the covetous and the usurers think that we are trying to put them out of business and ruin them; Let us give them good and faithful counsel, so that they may be full and satisfied with stinginess and usury; and if a preacher can say that he knows a rich gentleman who is very glad to let him usury, he will seek and call out where there are miserly men and usurers, so that they may come confidently, stinging and usury as much and as high as they can, and he will give them enough to usury, not only ten or twenty to the hundred, but a hundred to a florin and a thousand to a hundred; He also has mountains of silver and gold in abundance, so that he can do it easily and well. The same Lord is called God, Creator of heaven and earth, and through His dear Son He offers us in the Gospel: "Pray and lend, and it shall be restored to you," not only equally, but much more, namely, a full measure, a shaken measure, a squeezed measure, a superfluous measure. Now bring sack and bag, barrel and bottom. Do you hear me? So much shall be given back to you that all the sacks and barrels will be too little and too small and so full that you will no longer be able to go in, but will have to go over. And again, "He that leaveth any field or house for my sake shall have it again an hundredfold, and life eternal with it."
Why does one not stingy and usury here, since one can fill and satisfy avarice and usury? and instead seeks insatiable avarice and usury among men, who can give little back and do not satisfy, but only irritate avarice and make it thirstier? Isn't it the wretched devil that one can't pay off this rich lord, who offers to become everyone's interest man and fiefdom man? wants to give usury to everyone, and no one wants or likes it. He himself calls it usury and desires such usurers, Proverbs 19:17: Qui miseretur, etc. "He who gives to the poor or does good, usurps.
910 E. 23, 336-338. B. Of the ten commandments in particular. Seventhcommandment. W. X, 1086-1089. 911
from the Lord." Where are you miserly insatiable usurers? Here you come and grow life and all satisfaction, here and there eternally, without any harm to your neighbor; you who with your cursed usury become murderers, thieves, scoundrels and the worst, most hostile, most despised people on earth, who also lose body and soul eternally, who cannot keep the usurped goods, nor bring them to the third heir, as said above; But here you can become vain holy usurers, who would be dear to God, all angels and men, and who can never lose your usury.
98 Therefore see if the children of men are not senseless, possessed with all devils, that they despise such a rich Lord with his rich, eternal offer of usury, and turn to the harmful, damned, murderous, thieving usury, which cannot remain either and pushes them to hell. Therefore, a usurer and miser is truly not a right man, nor does he sin humanly. He must be a bear-wolf, above all tyrants, murderers and robbers, almost as evil as the devil himself, and not as an enemy, but as a friend and fellow citizen, sitting in common protection and peace, and yet robbing and murdering more horribly, neither an enemy nor a murderer. And if the highwaymen, murderers and commanders are beaten and beheaded, how much more should all usurers be beaten and beaten and all miserly men be chased away, cursed and beheaded? especially those who wantonly commit theft, as the nobility and peasants are now doing most wantonly.
(99) Let them go, and see, O priest, as it was said above, that thou be not guilty of their sins. Let them die like dogs, and let the devil devour them body and soul. Let them not come to the sacrament, to baptism, nor to some Christian fellowship. For when a plague will come upon Germany, as it cannot stay away for long, avarice and usury will be the main mortal sin, therefore we will all have to suffer God's wrath and rue, because we have suffered such damned people among us, neither punished nor increased, but had fellowship with them. And in particular
Princes and lords will have to answer heavily for wielding the sword in vain and letting such murderers and robbers, usurers and miserly men murder and rob freely in their lands with usury and wanton taxation. And even if they remain unpunished because of their own sin, God shall punish them for the sake of such foreign sins, so that they become poor, perish, perish from the land and people, or wither and die with their family and tribe, as has happened to many. For God is more hostile to usury and avarice than any man thinks, because it is not a simple murder or robbery, but a manifold, insatiable murder and robbery; as we have heard above. Therefore let every man look to his office, temporal and spiritual, which is commanded to punish the vicious and to protect the pious.
Let this be enough of an illustration of usury. A preacher can bring out more from the books that are written against usury and avarice and preach the horrible, terrible examples of how God, and the devil himself, have always messed around with usurers and avaricious people, killed them shamefully in body and soul and wiped out their tribe to the ground, and let their property fall into disrepair, who did not believe that God's wrath would be as great against them as the present usurers, until they have experienced it; as these also have to experience, as we see daily before our eyes and will see more and more of such examples.
(101) I have not meant the interest for sale here; for what is a right honest purchase is not usury. Thus, praise be to God, it is well known what interest is, according to the secular laws; namely, that there should be a pledge and not too much is sold by the hundred, which is not to be spoken of now. Let each one take care that the purchase is honest. For now, in all other sales, too, a great deal of falsehood is needed; someone else may strike it out. I crossed out some of them fifteen years ago. May God have mercy on us and make us devout, so that we may honor His name, increase His kingdom and do His will, amen.