the Mother of God.
Luc. 11, 27. 28.
And it came to pass, as he spake these things, a certain woman of the people lifted up her voice, and said unto him, Blessed is the womb that bare thee, and the breasts which thou hast sucked. And he said, Blessed are they that hear the word of God, and keep it.
(1) The feast of the virgins of Mary is celebrated today, as she was conceived without original sin; which feast has caused much discontent, strife, and strife among the monks, without any benefit or piety, since not one letter of it is written in the Gospel or in the Scriptures. By this we shall also see how the devil has blinded and deceived us, so that we have done most that which we are not commanded to do nor need to know; but what we are commanded to do we leave undone. Thus it has always gone, and is still going, and will go, because the world stands: therefore let no one be offended at it; for the world remains the world, do as you will. Now much has been said this day about original sin, if God would have it right; therefore we must also speak a little of it, but first let us look at the gospel a little.
2 In this gospel is recently understood everything that serves us for our salvation, namely, to hear God's word and to keep it. For the soul of man can be preserved by nothing else than the word of God, which is its food and pasture; and as much as it makes use of it, clings to it, and believes in it, so far is it saved and helped. Therefore St. Paul says Rom. 1, 16: "The gospel" or word of God "is the power of God to all those who believe in it. Therefore, God cannot punish or afflict people more than by depriving them of this food. Unfortunately, when we were under the papacy, we learned what it was to lack the word of God.
Necessity. And therefore, because it is so necessary for the word of God, the Lord also sets it higher than his own honor and also his mother's honor.
3. we are to learn that human emotion and the pleas of nature are completely condemned and rejected by Christ, and that it is not good what our reason deems good and what has great prestige in the eyes of the world, even what seems to be the most holy. What could this woman have done more deliciously before the world than to stand before all the people and praise the mother who has given such a son to the world, whom all men's eyes behold, whom all the world follows, whom everyone loves, who helps everyone and does good? Still Christ falls here to and pushes her praise down. The good woman speaks out of a carnal feminine affect; just as one often hears such foolish feminine speech as when one says: Blessed is the mother who carries a priest. And as one still finds many a mother, when she hears some learned pious preacher at whom all the world gapes, she says: "Oh, would God that my son would also become such a man. These are carnal thoughts, which the Lord here completely rejects, and shows us what is more necessary than this, namely, to hear God's word and to keep it. For so he says to the woman who praised him before the people, saying, "Blessed is the womb that bore thee, and the breasts which thou hast sucked:
Yes, blessed are those who hear and keep the word of God.
4. as if the Lord would say, I may not have carnal praise; it is also mine to give.
1952 x. i5, 48-si. On the Day of the Conception of Mary, the Mother of God. W. xi, W04-2s "7. 1953
Mother therefore not blessed. Your praise is unjust, because you do not yet understand the things that are of God, you seek the benefit and pleasure of the flesh, you please yourself with such feminine harmful thoughts, so you do not attain salvation and happiness for your soul. Therefore, turn your heart away from such useless, futile, vain thoughts, and learn that those are eternally blessed who diligently hear God's word, and shut it up in their heart, putting all their comfort and trust in it; for it cannot deceive. These are they that build their house upon the rock, which the tempestuousness of the waters and winds cannot overpower, Matt. 7:25; therefore believe on the Son of God, and thou shalt be saved.
5 Thus we see that God's word always strives against human fleshly affections and thoughts, and can never agree with them. In the same way we have a story in Matthew Cap. 12, 46-50: When the Lord was preaching a long sermon to his disciples and to the people, his mother and his brothers were outside, wanting to talk to him. Then said one to the Lord, Behold, thy mother and thy brethren stand without, desiring to speak with thee. And the Lord said unto him that told him, Who is my mother, and who are my brethren? and stretched forth his hand over his disciples, and said, Behold, this is my mother and my brethren. For whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother. This he says here still more clearly, saying, "Blessed are they that hear the word of God, and keep it." That is enough about the gospel; now let us also say a little about original sin.
From Original Sin.
First of all, it is to be noted what original sin is, so that we can understand how the Virgin Mary was freed from it. Original sin, as all doctors unanimously write, is nothing else but a representation of the original righteousness, with which original sin we were punished in paradise by Adam's first sin; and therefore it is called original sin that we did not commit it.
We do not have them, but we bring them with us from our parents, and they are imputed to us no less than if we had done them ourselves. For just as a son possesses his father's goods by inheritance and right, if he has not won them, so he is also obliged, according to the same hereditary justice, to pay the debt left after his father's death, because he possesses and holds his father's goods. For he who wants to have the benefit, also bears the damage. This is also the case with the original sin, which we did not commit, but our parents did: we must also help to bear and pay for it.
This is to be understood thus: Before Adam ate of the forbidden tree, he was created righteous, pious and holy by God, had in himself no desire nor inclination to evil, neither to pride nor to anger, neither to unchastity nor to any vice; but was only inclined to goodness, chastity, meekness, love, humility, and other virtues, which he did by nature, without distinction, and had no regard for anything else, because of which he did; just as we now naturally like to see, hear, eat, drink, walk, feel, talk. And so it would have been easy for us there to keep all virtue, as it is easy for us now to see, hear, speak, and the like; and it would have been possible for us to do all good works cheerfully and easily, which we cannot do now without great hard work, toil, temptation, danger, sin, and trouble. For as Adam was then, so would all of us who are born of him have been. And therefore, as has been said, it is also called hereditary righteousness, that it is innate to us from our coming and from our first father by birth; just as one would call sight and hearing hereditary. For as sight and hearing were in Adam and Eve, so they are inborn in us by birth. That such hereditary righteousness was in our first parents, Adam and Eve, is attested to by Moses in the 1st book Cap. 2, 25. by these words: "They were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed.
1954 IS, 51-83. On the Day of the Conception of Mary, the Mother of God. W. XI. 2607-2609. 1955
They would have been born, and they would have been able to abstain even naked; for they did not then feel any evil inclination of one toward the other, as all men feel now.
8. secondly: But as soon as they ate of the forbidden tree and sinned, this hereditary righteousness fell and was corrupted. Then evil lusts began to be stirred up and to grow in them; then they were inclined to pride, unchastity, the pleasure of the flesh, and to all sins, as we are now; for as Adam and Eve were then after the transgression, so are all their children. For as he had a flesh poisoned with sins: so also all his children, born of him, are like unto such a flesh, inclined to all evil: and the sin that was in the parents is also inborn in all their children. Just as a leprous father gives birth to leprous sons and daughters from a leprous mother, just as the parents are of the flesh: so we are all born in and with sins from our sinful parents. Therefore all living men are inclined to evil, as it is written in Genesis: "When the Lord saw that the wickedness of men was great in the earth, and that all thoughts and actions of the heart were evil continually, then it grieved him that he had made men upon the earth, and it grieved him in his heart," Genesis 6:5, 6. 6, 5. 6. And after the flood the Lord said: "I will no longer curse the earth for the sake of mankind, because the thoughts of man's heart are evil from his youth", Gen. 8, 21.
(9) Therefore from this first inherent sin flow so many sins that man is burdened with, as murder, adultery, theft, and innumerable other vices, that it should also be called original peccatum, that it is the origin and beginning of all other sins; for all sins come from the evil affections of our heart, as Christ says in Matthew 15:19: "Out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, fornication, theft, false witness, blasphemy." And in another place he also says: "When the heart is full, the mouth overflows," Matth. 12, 34. From all this it is now clear and evident,
that original sin is nothing other than all the wickedness and inclination to evil that all men feel in themselves, which is born of pride, anger, envy, unchastity and other vices; for so were Adam and Eve also after the transgression.
10 Thirdly: Now God has decreed that no one shall be saved unless he is clean from this sin. For this reason God has given commandments forbidding this sin, so that we may again be righteous and just as Adam was before the sin. But because we cannot do this, he gave Christ, his only Son, to die for us, that through his blood he might save us from this original sin, and from all the sins that flow from original sin, and make us free. Therefore Christ teaches us to believe in him and to call upon him for grace, by which this sin is cleansed. Which is no other thing than preaching the gospel, as he said to his disciples, "Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature; He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned," Marc. 16:15, 16. For when we are baptized and believe, we receive grace, which contends against the evil affections in us, and casts out original sin and blots it out; so that good and honest desires arise in us for humility, chastity, meekness, and all virtues, and then good works are also done with a merry heart. All this is the result of the grace we received in baptism through faith in Christ, for it is impossible that such grace should be idle in us; it must do good works. The Lord Christ says this very well in a beautiful simile to his disciples after the Lord's Supper, when he said: "I am a true vine, and my Father is a vinedresser. Every branch of mine that bringeth not forth fruit he will cut off; and every branch that bringeth forth fruit he will cleanse, that it may bring forth more fruit. You are now clean because of the word that I have spoken to you. Abide in me, and I in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself,
he abideth in the vine: so also ye abide not, but in me. I am the vine; ye are the branches. He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing. He that abideth not in me is cast away as a branch, and withered, and is gathered, and cast into the fire, and burned. If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you. In this my Father is honored, that you bear much fruit, and become my disciples," John 15:1-8.
11. so that we should not forget this, God has ordered and sent us to speak the faith and pray the Lord's Prayer, so that we may daily practice faith and prayer and always call upon His grace against original sin. For as long as we live here, we are not without sin; evil lusts and desires still remain in us at all times, tempting us to sin, against which we must contend and fight, as St. Peter says in his 1st Epistle Cap. 2, 11. 12. "Dear brethren, I exhort you, as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul; and lead a good walk among the Gentiles, that they which afterredep from you, as from evildoers, may see your good works, and glorify God, when it shall come to pass." Therefore, we must always exercise ourselves, and must always pray and fight against sin, because we live here until we die, because there the whole flesh is killed first.
(12) Fourthly, since original sin is taken away in baptism, why do you say that it still remains and that one must always contend with it? To this Augustine answers thus: Original sin is indeed forgiven in baptism, not that it is no longer there, but that God no longer wants to reckon it; just as the Samaritan there in Luke, Cap. 10, 34, 35, when he poured oil and wine into the wounded man's wounds, he did not heal him so soon, but led him to the inn and let the innkeeper take care of him until he came back. So all sins are taken away through baptism,
so that God does not reckon them: but therefore they are not gone; but they must be healed continually, as they have begun to be healed. But when we die, they will all be completely healed. Therefore, as often as you feel that you are tempted to impatience, pride, unchastity, and other sins, know that you feel the deadly darts of original sin, which the devil has shot into Adam's flesh, from which your flesh was born, and immediately remember that you are resisting these darts, and pray to the Lord Jesus that this sin may not prevail and overcome you, but that it may be overcome by His grace.
So Paul says to the Galatians Cap. 5, 16. 17: "Walk in the Spirit, and you will not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit lusts against the flesh. These are contrary to one another, that ye do not the things that ye would." And to the Romans Cap. 13, 13. 14. he thus says: "Let us walk uprightly as in the day, not in eating and drinking, not in chambering and lusting, not in strife and jealousy; but draw near to the Lord JESUS CHRIST, and do not after the prudence of the flesh to atone for its lust." You may also see the whole seventh chapter of Romans. Whoever therefore contends with his sins, not only will the sin not be imputed to him by God, however much it may still live in him, but he will also receive a crown and be saved from it. But those who do not contend against their sins, but consent to them, fall again into original sin, and become as they were before baptism.
Fourteenth, the fifth: From this now arises a question, with which one deals from time to time: How is it that parents bear children in original sin, if they are baptized and the original sin is forgiven them? To this Augustine answers once again, and says a beautiful similitude and says: Just as a grain, which one throws into the field without ears and husks or chaff, does not give of itself other grains, without husks, without stalks and without ears, as it is openly in the day: so the baptized children give birth to other children.
1958 L.iL.ös-s7. On the Day of the Conception of Mary, the Mother of God. W. n, 2612-26IS. 1959
baptized parents do not have children without original sin, even though they, the parents, are baptized and freed from original sin through baptism. And another example says, of the olive tree, that if you plant a fruit of it, it does not grow into a good olive tree, but into a wild one; so it is here also: although the parents are saved from original sin through baptism, they still bear their children with original sin. This is the whole cause: for the flesh of man can never fully come to its purity in this life, so that it would be without air and sinful desire; therefore parents cannot conceive nor bear children without such lust and desire.
Therefore also David says in the 51st Psalm v. 7: "Behold, I am made in iniquity, and my mother conceived me in sins." And this is what St. Augustine says: Original sin does not come from the tribe or birth, but from lust; as if he wanted to say: If parents could conceive and give birth without lust and desire, no child would be born in original sin. But God, the Lord, tolerates such lust and desire in parents, for the sake of marriage, which He has instituted, and for the increase *] of the human race, but especially and most nobly for the sake of baptism and faith in Christ. For such desire cannot be wholly taken away in this life; neither must the human race be begotten and thus multiplied. For this reason there is much preaching of youthful womanhood in the New Testament, praising and exalting it very highly, so that if one did not want it, he would not be allowed to have such a desire, but from the beginning he would erase original sin; but it is easy to see what it is.
16) Sixthly, this is also the reason why Christ wanted to be born of a virgin through the Holy Spirit without a man, namely, so that he would not also be stained with original sin, which naturally follows the human birth of man and woman, as we have heard. Therefore, of this Son of Mary alone it is said, as Elizabeth said to Mary, "To give birth is to give death.
*) (b)
The fruit of your womb", Luc. 1, 42. For the fruit of all other women is maledicted, for she was conceived in sins, as has been said; from which malediction she will not be delivered, unless she keeps to this virgin fruit of Mary, to the Lord Christ, which is done through baptism and faith in the same Christ. For there she is born again into another fruit and becomes a spiritual fruit. Therefore Christ said to Nicodemo, "Unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God," John 3:3. But how this rebirth is to take place and how it is to be done spiritually, he told him in verse 5, saying, "Unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God."
17 And for this cause also it is said, as the angel Gabriel said unto Mary, Thou art blessed among women, Luc. 1:28: For there is no woman so holy, neither hath there been, neither shall there be, that beareth the fruit of her womb: for there is none that conceiveth without lust and sin. The saying of David remains true: "Behold, I was made in iniquity, and my mother conceived me in sins"; all the children of men must bear this title, excluding the one Christ. Here also the free will is struck down; for no one can resist such lust by free will, since it has eaten through man from the crown of his head to his heels.
18 The seventh: Because the Virgin Mary was also born naturally of father and mother, many have said that she was also conceived in original sin; but they all agree that she was sanctified in the womb and that her parents conceived without lust and desire. But some have wanted to boast of the means, and said that the human conception is twofold: one, which comes from the natural mingling of male and female; the other conception occurs when the body is prepared in the womb and when the soul is poured out by God, the Creator. We do not speak of the first conception here; it is also
not much about it, although the Virgin Mary was conceived in the common way of all men; so that in this way only Christ was excluded, who also was conceived in this way alone without the help of a man. For it had to be so that Christ would be conceived, God and man, perfect in all limbs; and for this reason it was necessary that there should be the most spiritual and holy conception. But in the virgin Mary's conception, which body was made in time, according to the custom of other children, until the infusion of the soul, it was not necessary that such a conception should be; for it could be contained from original sin to the soul. [But what God did with Mary in the other conception is not indicated to us in Scripture; therefore nothing certain may be preached here either. But thanksgiving (thoughts) are free of duty, let anyone think what he will; but still, that he make no article of faith out of it.*]
(19) But the other conception, namely, the infusion of the soul, is believed to have taken place without original sin, so that in the infusion of the soul it was also cleansed from original sin and adorned with God's gifts, to receive a holy soul infused into it by God, and thus the first moment it began to live, it was without all sin. For before she lived, one might well say that there was neither sin nor non-sin, which is only due to souls and a living human being.
(20) Thus the Virgin Mary is the means between Christ and other men. For Christ, when he was conceived and lived, was full of grace at the same moment. The other men are without grace both in the first and in the second conception. But the Virgin Mary, though she was without grace in the first conception, was full of grace in the second. And this not unreasonably; for she also was a means between all births; for she was born of the Father and of the Son.
*These words have c and d, with which they close the sermon. The §§ 19-21 are only in a and b and were probably omitted later for the sake of their content. D. Red.
Mother, but she gave birth without a father, and became a mother partly of a son in the flesh and partly of a son in the spirit. For Christ is conceived both of her flesh and of the Holy Spirit. But Christ is a father of many children, without a physical father and without a physical mother. Just as the Virgin Mary is the means between the physical and the spiritual birth, the end of the physical and the beginning of the spiritual, so she is the means between the conception. For as other men are conceived in sins both in soul and body, but Christ without sin both in body and soul: so Mary the Virgin was conceived without grace in the body, but full of grace in the soul.
21 These are the words, when the angel Gabriel says to her, "You are among women who have been given in marriage. For one could not say to her: You are blessed, if she had ever been under the malediction; it was also right and proper that this person should be without sin, from whom Christ should take the flesh, which should overcome all sins. For this is called giving the gift of divine grace, that is, that which is without sin. Others have written much more about this, and have shown beautiful causes, which would be too long to relate here. That is enough for this time; we want to call upon God for mercy.*)
*Luther speaks of the sinless conception and birth of the Holy Virgin only in one other place, and that is from an earlier year, 1520, where he writes: "They (the papists) have admitted in our Lady's conception that it is neither heresy nor error that some hold that she was conceived in original sin, although conciliarities, the pope, and several others hold otherwise. Cf. Walch XV, 1845 (old edition); Erl. A. 24, 131.-One would be very mistaken if one wanted to think that Luther believed that Mary was not a sinner and had become blessed in a different way than other people. She was a sinner like other people, who was led to salvation through much tribulation in faith in Christ. This was Luther's teaching. This is irrefutably evident from the two sermons on the first Sunday after Epiphany, which are found in this volume Columne 428 ff. and 442 ff. Cf. also Col. 1840, 8 13: "And thereby all Christians are equal, and one has no more of Christ than the other: St. Peter is no more than the thief on the cross; Mary, the mother of God, no more than Mary Magdalene the sinner." D. Red.