Matth. 2, 1-12.
When Jesus was born in Bethlehem, in the land of Judaea, in the days of Herod the king, behold, the wise men came from the east to Jerusalem, saying: Where is the newborn King of the Jews? We have seen his star in the east and have come to worship him. When Herod the king heard this, he was afraid, and all Jerusalem with him; and he called together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, and inquired of them where Christ should be born. And they said unto him, In Bethlehem, in the land of Judaea. For thus it is written by the prophet: And thou Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, art by no means the least of the princes of Judah: for out of thee shall come to me the duke that shall be lord over my people Israel. Then Herod called the wise men secretly, and learned diligently of them when the star appeared, and directed them to Bethlehem, saying, Go and search diligently for the young child; and when ye find him, tell me again, that I also may come and worship him. When they had heard the king, they went. And, behold, the star which they had seen in the east went before them, until it came and stood over where the young child was. When they saw the star, they were greatly rejoiced, and went into the house, and found the young child with Mary his mother, and fell down, and worshipped him, and opened their treasures, and gave him gold, and frankincense, and myrrh. And God commanded them in a dream that they should not turn again to Herod. And they went again by another way into their own land.
(1) This gospel agrees with the epistle, and speaks of the bodily future of the Gentiles to Christ, which signifies and begins the spiritual future of which the epistle speaks. It is almost a terrifying and comforting gospel: terrifying to the great, learned, holy, and mighty, who all despise Christ; comforting to the lowly and despised, to whom alone Christ is revealed.
2) First, the evangelist draws Herod, the king, to remember the prophecy of Jacob the patriarch, who had said Gen. 49, 10: "The scepter of Judah shall not cease, nor a teacher from his thighs, until he who is to come". From this prophecy it is clear that Christ had to be present when
The kingdom or government of the Jews would be taken from them, so that no king or ruler from the tribe of Judah would sit on it. This was done by Herod, who was not of the tribe of Judah, nor of the blood of the Jews, but of Edom, a foreigner, set up by the Romans as king of the Jews, though with great displeasure of the Jews, that at thirty years he quarreled with them about it, shed much blood, and killed the best of the Jews, until he overpowered and conquered them.
003 Now when this first stranger had reigned thirty years, and had brought the reign under him, that he sat in it with quietness, and the Jews had surrendered, that there was no hope to be rid of him, and so the prophecy of Jacob was fulfilled: then was the time when Christ came, and was born among the first stranger, and stood up according to the prophecy. As if to say: The scepter of Judah has ceased, a stranger sits on my people; now it is time for me to come and also to become king, the reign is now mine.
4 The wise men are commonly called the three kings, perhaps after the number of the three sacrifices. So we leave that with the simple ones, because there is no great power in it. But it is not known whether they were two, three, or how many; but they were certainly from the rich Arabia or Seba; this is shown by the offerings: gold, frankincense, and myrrh, all three of which are delicious in the same country; and it is not to be thought that they bought them elsewhere. For it is the custom in the same Oriental countries to make gifts and worship of the best fruits of the land and their own goods; just as Jacob also commanded his sons in Gen 43:11 to bring of the best fruits of the land in Egypt as a gift, Joseph etc. If it had not been of their own land, why should they have brought frankincense, myrrh and gold, which grows in the land, and not so much silver and precious stones, or the fruits of another land?
5 Therefore, this gift will not be offered to Christ as painters paint, one with gold, another with incense, and a third with a censer.
Myrrh, but all of them gave all three pieces as a gift for one person. And they will have been a small group, among which some lords; just as now a prince or city would send some brave ones from them with a gift to the emperor, so it also happened here.
(6) Those whom the evangelist here calls Magos, we call in German Weissager, not as the prophets prophesy, but by black art, as the tarters or gypsies use; therefore the wise men and wise women are called, who can tell people all kinds of things, know many secret arts, and practice eternal magic; and their art is called Magia, and goes [sometimes by black art and *] by the devil's business; but not however as the witches and sorceresses do. For Magus imitates the right prophets [and prophesies like the right prophets,**] but not from God's spirit; therefore they sometimes meet in the same way; for their thing is not pure devil's thing like the witches, but mixed with natural reason and devil's assistance.
(7) Their miraculous deeds are also not only devil's ghosts like the witches' things, but mixed with natural works and devil's works; therefore a magician always imitates the right natural art. For there is much secret work in nature; he who knows how to apply it does miraculous things before those who do not know it, just as the alchemists make gold out of copper.
Solomon knew much of this secret knowledge of nature through the Spirit of God and used it especially well, 1 Kings 3:25, when he judged the two women over the living and dead child and found which one was the right mother from the very deepest reason of nature. Item, so Jacob 1 Mos. 30, 37. 38. 39. uses the same art, as he makes by the colored sticks, that vain colored sheep were born.
9. this art is a fine and quite natural art; from it come all that the physicians and their like of the powers of herbs, fruits, ore, stone and the like.
know, describe and need. Also it is often referred in the writing that it needs likeness of the animals, stones, trees and herbs etc. In the same art have used (practiced) almost very much the Persians, Arabians and the same Orientals; have studied in it and has been an honest art, has also made wise people.
(10) But after this, the swine and the rude heads, as is done in all arts and doctrines, fell too far out of the way, and mixed the same noble art with jugglery and sorcery, and wished to follow the same art and become like it. And since they were not able to do so, they abandoned the true art and became jugglers and magicians who prophesy and wonder by the work of the devil, but sometimes by nature; for the devil has kept much of such art and sometimes needs it in the magis. That now Magus has become a disgraceful name, and is no longer called, because they thus prophesy and wonder through the evil spirit; thus, nevertheless, that they sometimes hit and help, therefore that the work of nature, which may not lie, is mixed in, which the evil spirit can well do.
Therefore these magi or wise men were not kings, but learned and experienced people in such natural arts. Although there is no doubt that not everything was pure with them, that they also did a lot of conjuring besides; for even today these same Orientals have great and manifold sorcery, and since this art has been despised and declined, sorcery has come into all the world; and before that they had almost given themselves over to the course of the heavens and the stars. Thus the presumptuous reason has always mixed up what was good and disgraced it with its imitation and presumption, which drives it like monkeys to do everything it sees and hears. Thus false prophets do after right prophets, false saints after right saints, false scholars after right scholars; and if you look at the whole world, you will find that the work of reason is nothing else but a real monkey's game, so that it wants to follow what is good, and only perverts it, and deceives itself and everyone.
Therefore these magi were not other than what the philosophers in Greece and priests in Egypt, and that with us now are the scholars of the high schools, that is recently, they were the clergy and the scholars in rich Arabia; just as if now from the high schools spiritual, learned people were sent to a prince. For the high schools also boast how they teach the natural art, which they call philosophia, and is not only monkey play, but poisonous error and vain dreams.
For the natural art, which in ancient times was called magia and now is called physiologia, is that in which one learns to recognize the powers and workings of nature; as when a deer pulls the snakes out of the stone crevice with its breath through the nostrils, and kills and eats them, and then thirsts for a fresh spring because of the great heat of the poison, as the 42nd Psalm, v. 2, indicates. Item, as a weasel lures the snake out, if it sways before the snake hole with its tail, and then the snake crawls out angrily, so the weasel lurks over the hole, and the snake looks over itself after its enemy, then the weasel strikes its teeth of the snake into the neck beside the poison, *) and strangles thus its enemy in its own hole. In such arts the magi studied, in which great wisdom is hidden from Christ, and how man should conduct himself in his life. But this art is not remembered now in the high schools, and the peasants know more about it than our magi, the natural masters, so that they are not unreasonably called natural fools, who with so much cost and effort only learn behind them and are the devil's mocking birds. If we wanted to translate this gospel, we would have to say: The natural masters come from the exit, or the natural heralds from rich Arabia.
(14) Some also wonder how they have accomplished such a great journey in so few days; for they are thought to have come on the thirteenth day after the birth of Christ; and yet the scribes (geogra-
*) Poisoned, that is, the seat of the poison. D. Red.
phen) that the capital Saba lies in rich Arabia at sixty days' journey from the Mediterranean, which is not much from Bethlehem about three German miles. But such and such questions do not nearly trouble me: so also it is no article of faith to believe that they came on the thirteenth day.
(15) Neither is it necessary that they should come from the capital city of Sheba, or from the uttermost part of the land, which may not have been far from the border, in convenient time and natural manner. For Mary, as another woman, had to remain unclean and inside Bethlehem for six weeks according to the law, so that she might be found there for twenty or thirty days. However, I do not want to prevent the common delusion that it happened by miracles, as long as no one is forced as an article of faith, as they have done and continue to do in many such things. What the divine Scripture does not establish, there is no need to have for articles of faith.
16 Therefore this is the opinion of the evangelist: When Christ was born under the reign of Herod, the first foreign king, and the time of prophecy was fulfilled, behold, the great miraculous sign came to pass. His own and the countrymen and citizens did not seek Him, nor did they want to recognize Him; such a strange foreign people sought Him for many days' journey. To him the scholars and priests did not want to come and worship, to him the prophets and stargazers came. It was a great shame for all the Jewish land and people that they had given birth to Christ in their own land, and they had to learn about it first of all from foreign, pagan, faraway people. And before that they should have known it in the capital Jerusalem. This is a strong reminder to them to recognize and seek Christ. But their forehead was brass and their neck iron, as Isaiah Cap. 48, 4. says about them.
Where is the newborn King of the Jews? We have seen his star in the east and have come to worship him.
(17) Text and necessity compel us to speak a little further of the natural proclaimers or natural masters; for here the magi are from
have recognized the star of a king's birth, as they confess. It is to be known that the announcement of nature is conscious in part to every man. I know that a dog's tongue is healing for wounds; that a cat catches mice when it is full; that a hawk catches partridges, and so on; one knows more than the other about nature through his own experience or through other teachings. But God has not revealed all of nature, but the lesser part; so now reason is cheeky and wants to know more and more; therefore the study and research of nature has risen.
18 Now it is not possible that nature is known by reason after Adam's fall, who blinded it, further than experience or divine enlightenment gives. So the restless reason cannot remain still and be satisfied with it, wanting to know and see everything, like a monkey; therefore it starts and writes poetry, and investigates further than it is commanded, and despises what experience or God has given it, and yet does not grasp what it seeks. Thus all their study and knowledge is vain error and folly. Hence it came about that men, despising the natural art or not being able to attain it, divided themselves into innumerable parts and sects. Some have written about the earth, some about the waters, some about this, some about that, so that there has been no measure of bookmaking and study; finally, when they were tired of studying on earth, they went to heaven, also wanting to know the nature of the heavens and the celestial bodies, of which no experience may ever be had; there they have acquired quite free power to write poetry, to lie, to deceive, and to say of the innocent heavens what they have wanted. For as it is said: "Those who lie from distant lands lie by force, so that they cannot be denied by experience.
19 So also, because no one can reach to heaven and get experience of their doctrine or error, they lie with full and sure force; there they teach: He who is born in the sign must become a gambler; he who is born in the star must become rich or wise, item: He must become a gambler.
To be slain; item: He who builds on the day or this day, frees or goes out, it must go to him thus and thus; speak: The stars in the heavens are thus formed, and work such things in men, who are affected by such time. Help God, how all things here are subject to this art! Reason has fallen upon this with all its devotion, because it is great, coarse lies and pretty useless fables, in which, according to its blindness, it takes the greatest pleasure; for truth does not taste so good to it as fables and lies.
(20) At last the true heroes came forth, they lifted up their eyes, they did not deal with such children's work, but began to search the whole world in one heap, where it came from and where it was going; whether it had begun, or whether it was from eternity and would remain? whether there was also a Supreme over the world, who governed all things? Here is the noble light of nature, the pagan master, the archmaster of all natural masters, who now rules all high schools and teaches in Christ's stead, the highly famous Aristotle, who taught and still teaches that a stone is heavy and a feather is light, that water is wet and fire is dry. Item, a special masterpiece, that the earth is above and the sky below; which he proves with it, because the root of the trees and all plants are in the earth, and the branches go toward the sky. Now there is that above, where one draws the food with, and that below, where the food gives itself, as we see in man. Therefore man is an inverted tree. And so when the feather flies, it flies under itself; when the stone falls, it falls above itself.
021 Further, when he cometh to speak of the Most High, he decideth that the world hath been so from everlasting, and so abideth, and all souls die with the body. And the Most High sitteth over the heavens, and seeth nothing at all that cometh to pass; but as one that painteth blind fortunes, so he shaketh the heavens about for ever, once in a day: and every thing cometh as it cometh. And this is his cause: If he should see all things, he would see much evil and injustice, of which he would become displeased. So that he may retain his pleasure, he shall
See nothing but themselves, and so rule the world blindly; as the woman cradles the child in the night.
(22) This is the art of the high schools; whoever can do it or learns it, one puts on a brown beret and says: Worthy master artium and philosophiae. He who does not know this art cannot become a theologian, nor understand the Holy Scriptures, indeed, he must be a heretic and may never become a Christian. Tell me, what shall we call the people? They are neither magi, nor sorcerers, nor jugglers; but mad, mad and mad. Therefore, see if Christ has not paid us honestly for having despised the gospel, ungrateful to his grace, for which he has made us become such devil-worshippers, so shameful and disgraceful that we not only do not recognize such things, but seek them as great wisdom with great cost, effort and labor.
(23) St. Paul proclaimed all this when he said Col. 2:8: "Take heed lest any man deceive you through the natural arts, and vanity of deceit, which is not of Christ"; item 1 Tim. 6:20, 21: "Take heed to the things which are commanded thee, and avoid the unspiritual vain words, and the essays of false fame, whereof some have fallen from the faith. Here, truly, the apostle condemns the doctrine of the high schools in explicit words, so that nothing can be raised against it, because he wants everything that is not of Christ to be avoided. Thus everyone must confess that Aristotle, the supreme master of all the high schools, not only teaches nothing at all of Christ, but vainly such foolish things as are said that the apostle commands us to keep the doctrine that is commanded us to guard, and calls the natural Aristotelian art, unchristian vain words, since there is nothing behind it; in addition, a contradiction against Christ, which is only a false famous art. How could he have interpreted it more clearly than by calling it a false famous art? There is no greater glory than that of Aristotle's art in the high schools, and yet the glory is false; for the art is nothing but a contradiction, and to destroy Christ.
24 Therefore, dear human being, let natural
Art. If thou knowest not the power of any star, stone, wood, animal, or all creatures, which the natural arts seek, though they seek best, be content with that which thy experience and common knowledge teach thee. Nor is it important if you do not know everything; it is enough that you know that fire is hot, water cold and wet; that in summer there is different work to be done than in winter; know how to cultivate your field, cattle, house and children; that is enough for you in the natural arts. Then think how you can learn Christ alone, who will show you yourself, who you are, what your ability is. Thus you will know God and yourself, which no natural master nor natural art has ever known, as St. Paul teaches in 1 Cor. 2:8.
(25) Now that we come to the text, you may say, "Yes, now this gospel tells how these magi learned by the star the birth of a king, proving that the art of the stars is to be taught and known, because God Himself helps to do it, and causes a star to rise, thereby provoking and teaching the magi.
26 Answer: Stay with the example and learn how these magi learned from the star, then you will do right and not err; for there is no doubt that the sun, moon and stars were created, as Moses wrote in Genesis 1:14, to be signs and to serve the earth with their shining. By the sun you learn that when it rises, the day begins; when it sets, the day ends; when it is in the middle of the sky, it is noon; and so on, it is set for you as a sign and measure of time and hours, to guide your work and commerce. So also the moon and stars at night. For this you must continue to plow the sun and feed your field and cattle; after it is hot or not hot, you can work. Leave it at that, so much you should know about the sun and the sky; what you want to know more is not necessary for you and is vain presumption, in addition also uncertain and the most part erroneous. As when fools want to know how great the sun is, how high it is from the earth, how it has special power over the gold, and who
in the sun sign is born, he shall become wise; and of the fool's work much more, since they know no reason of.
(27) You should also know that if the sun loses its light, it is certainly an evil sign, because an accident will follow. It is the same when the comet, the tail star, shines; for experience teaches, as Christ says in Luc. 21, 25, that such signs are to be in the sun, moon and stars, signifying the final calamity of the world. So it is also a sign of great storms, lightnings, waters and fires in the air and on earth. But how this happens, or what natural power is in all this, or what works it secretly does, how the magi research and conjure: it is not useful nor necessary for you to know, it is enough that you recognize God's wrath in it and improve yourself. So these years are therefore out of measure many eclipses, many signs seen in many lands in the sky; for there is certainly present a great whirl. So also the eclipse in Christ's Passion signifies the misfortune that still has caught the Jews. Pleasures are signs, for which God has created them; but of uncertain kind, of which the jugglers write.
So also these magi did not have more than a sign at this star, did not use his also further than a sign; to this also God ordered him. Therefore, the stargazers and diviners may not strengthen their false art from this gospel nor boast. For even though these magi would have been otherwise trusted in the same art, they have not used the star here any further than as a sign. They do not say what Christ will be like in the future, nor do they ask how he will be, but are satisfied that it is a sign of a great king, and only ask where he is to be found.
And that Christ should ever shut the mouths of such talkers, he has provided a new star of his own for his birth, which would still be untarnished and untouched by their talk. Whether they ever wanted to say that he was born under the power of the stars, that he met them before and wanted to say: This star is not one of them,
of which your art writes. If in the stars of all men there are future cases, as you teach, then in this star of the same cases there must be none that is a new and different kind from those, and you have never known nor heard of him before. Further, if none of the other stars creates anything about Christ, but he has a new star of his own, it follows that they also create nothing about any other man, for he is always just a man like others. Again, if this new star creates nothing over other men, for it has not stood long, it certainly creates nothing over Christ, who is equal to all men. Therefore the natural art of the stars is a mere illusion.
(30) But how these magi recognized this star as such a sign that it certainly signified a newborn king, I cannot know; perhaps they found in their histories and chronicles that the birth of several kings was previously indicated in the sky or by a star. For one finds also in Latin and Greek histories, how some great princes and special people's future or birth is announced with miracles and signs in the air and sky by signs. So these magi knew well that this Jewish people was a specially chosen people of God, to whom God did and had done much before all peoples. Therefore, since this was such a lovely star, they certainly thought that God had given them a new king. But that some say that they had the saying of Balaam in Numbers 24:17, "There shall arise a star out of Jacob," etc., does not force anything; for it is more said of the spiritual outcome of Christ, and Christ Himself is the star. But whoever is not satisfied with this, think what he will; perhaps they have it from divine revelation.
(31) They also for the first time esteemed this king not for God, but after the common manner of temporal kings; even as the queen of rich Arabia esteemed Solomon, and came unto him with gifts of her land. Therefore they come to Jerusalem, the capital, hoping to find him in the royal court and splendor. For the star they saw over the land of Judah,
When they were still at home in rich Arabia, it will have passed after that they did not see him on the way until they traveled from Jerusalem to Bethlehem, as the Gospel says.
32 But when they say, "We have seen his star," they do not yet mean at that time that Christ created him, but that he is his because he is the sign of his birth; even as yet the astrologers call every man's sign his sign, wherein he was born, not that he was created. For Christ's divinity remains unexplained until his ascension, although it has been indicated many times.
33) So also that they want to worship him, they do it according to the opinion, as the scripture shows, that in the Orient the kings were worshipped; not that mau considered them gods, but the falling down before them and honors is called worshipping by the scripture, and gives it equal to God and men, as also the little word "Lord", "king", yes also the name "God", since he says to Moses 2 Mos. 7, 1: "Behold, I set thee for a god to Pharaoh the king."
When Herod the king heard this, he was terrified, and all Jerusalem with him.
34 Why are they afraid of this? The Jews were waiting for Christ, who was promised to them by God, as is said above in Genesis 49:10. Simeon and Hannah, undoubtedly many more holy people, were at Jerusalem at that time, who looked forward to Christ's future. Herod's fear was public: he feared the kingdom because he was well aware that he was a stranger and that he deserved evil for the Jews; he also knew that the Jews were waiting for Christ to redeem them, as Moses had done; his conscience worried that a rebellion would rise against him and that he would be expelled from the kingdom. Again, the Jews feared Herod and the Romans, that it would cost much blood if they had a new king. For they had previously withstood the Romans and Herod with great misfortune, and they were like the people of Israel in Egypt, when Moses was to lead them out, and they were to be driven out of the kingdom.
They were persecuted more severely than before, because they murmured against Moses, which was a sign of their weak faith; just as this frightening of Jerusalem shows unbelief, that they looked more to human power than to divine power.
35 But the holy people were not afraid, but were glad. But that the evangelist says that the whole city was terrified with Herod is not said of all the inhabitants or citizens of the whole city, but according to the way of the Scripture: when it mentions a city alone and not also the inhabitants, it does not mean all who are in it, but the several and greater part. As it is written many times in the book of Joshua, he destroyed the city and the city, and at the same time he killed all the inhabitants and living things in it.
And he gathered together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, and inquired of them where Christ should be born. And they said unto him, In Bethlehem, in the land of Judaea. For thus it is written by the prophet: And thou Bethlehem, which is in the land of Judah, art by no means the least of the princes of Judah: for out of thee shall come to me the duke that shall be Lord over my people Israel.
Here we ask: Why Christ did not let these Magi be led by the star to Bethlehem, but let his birth, which was now known, be investigated by the Scriptures? This is so that he might teach us to hold to the Scriptures, and not to follow our own conceit: For he will not give his scripture in vain: there he will be found, and nowhere else. He that despiseth and forsaketh them shall never find him. So we heard above, Luc. 2, 12, that the angel also gave a sign to the shepherds, not Mary nor Joseph nor any man, how holy they were, but only the swaddling clothes and the manger, where he was wrapped and laid, that is, the scripture of the prophets and the law; there he is wrapped, that has him, that only speaks of him and gives testimony of him, and is his sure sign, as he himself says Joh. 5, 39: "Search the scriptures, wherein ye think ye have life: for the same giveth witness of him.
nce from me." And Paul Rom. 3, 21: "Christ's righteousness is testified by the law and the prophets." Item, so we have also heard of Simeon and Hannah, that they signify the Scripture, which shows Christ and carries Him in its arms. And Luc. 16, 29. 31. Abraham would not allow the rich man in hell to send Lazarnm to his brothers, but pointed them to the Scriptures and said, "They have Moses and the prophets, let them hear them. If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they believe, though a dead man rise."
(37) Against this faithfulness and divine teaching, our scholars have now set up many ways to learn the truth. We must tell some of them, so that we know to beware of them. First of all, they have set up innumerable laws, statutes, articles and doctrines, invented by men; such as spiritual law and the like, orders, rules; which without doubt are not the swaddling clothes and manger of Christ, nor Simeon nor Hannah. And St. Paul diligently warned us against such teachings, so that we would remain with God's Word alone. For all the teachings of men are dangerous and finally lead away from the faith, as Solomon was seduced by strange wives; which Paul interprets Titus 1:14 and says that the teachings of men turn away from the truth.
038 But if any man had need of the doctrine of men, as one hath need of food, and drink, and raiment, they would be without hurt. No man eats and drinks, or dresses himself, to think that he will thereby become pious and blessed; for such an opinion or conscience would be gross foolishness in the sight of everyone: but his opinion and conscience to become pious is only this, that if he only firmly believes in Christ, he will become pious and blessed. The opinion is right and the conscience good. Therefore, he who fasts, works, wears the habit of a monk or a priest, or keeps the rule of his order, that he may observe as he eats and drinks, is not pious because he does so, nor evil because he does not, but knows that he is pious only by faith, he goes and does right; the doctrines of men do him no more harm than eating and drinking or dressing.
harm. But where are they who do this? Hardly one in a thousand; for they all commonly say, "If I should not become pious and blessed through such a life, order, rule and work, what was I doing in it, I great fool?
39 Therefore it is not possible that the doctrines of men should not turn away from the truth, as Paul says. For one thing must happen to the two: either that they be despised and forsaken, where it is said that they do not make one pious nor saved; or that conscience and opinion be entangled and strangled, where it is said that they make one pious and must be kept; for then faith must perish and the soul die, there is no help nor salvation. For faith cannot stand, nor suffer to be esteemed, and to have a conscience, as if any other thing were useful and necessary to be godly than it alone. Therefore, he who has it cannot observe the law of men, but keeps it as and when he pleases; he is a bad master of it. But he who has the law of men without faith cannot know faith, remains forever a servant of the doctrine of men, and never does any good work, as St. Paul says, Titus 1:16. Therefore, we must adhere to the plain, righteous Scriptures, which alone teach Christ, that through Him we become righteous in faith, and thereafter freely do all works for the good of our neighbor, as is often said.
40 Secondly, they set before us legends and examples of the saints, that they may also strengthen and establish their doctrine of men. And this is truly hard and corrupts innumerable souls; they come so secretly from Scripture and faith that no one can notice; they put before St. Benedict, St. Gregory, St. Bernard, St. Augustine, St. Francis, St. Dominic, and many great saints whom no one may deny that they are holy, but who lived and became saints in such human doctrines and orders. Tell me, how can a simple heart suffer such blows and remain in the faith? There must be an apostolic or evangelical spirit here to stay before it. Oh how sure they are, how clumsy they are! When they have brought up such saints' examples, they think they have lit the right lantern.
(41) If I said unto them, Such saints also have eaten, and drunk, and slept, and clothed themselves; is it not now also an opinion that we set up an order of eating, and an order of drinking, and an order of sleeping, and an order of clothing? So they say, "Yes, the dear fathers did not do this, but to become pious by it, as they did these things, which they considered good and holy ways. Here I answer, "If you say that the dear fathers became righteous through such practices, more than through eating, drinking, sleeping and clothing, you are obviously mistaken. For God has kept this secret, that He has never honored any of the saints with some miracle because of His works, but they were all full of the Spirit and faith. So you let go of their spirit and faith and take their outward nature alone. That is just as if a fool did nothing more all his life but sleep, because he had heard that St. Bernard had once slept, and wanted to become pious and blessed with it. Therefore, one does injustice to the saints by pretending that they have kept such orders in the opinion that they make them pious and blessed, and thus deceives the people with the lives and names of the dear saints.
042 And thou sayest, Yea, yet they have kept it, and have not rejected it, neither have they esteemed it so little as thou teachest to esteem it. I answer, It is not for thee, nor for me, to judge their minds and hearts; but this we say: It is not impossible that they have esteemed it too highly. But in this they have erred as men. For everyone must confess that the dear saints have erred and sinned. Therefore God wants us to look only at His word, and follow the examples of the dear saints no further than where they follow the word of God; but where they have erred as men, even besides following their own conceit or doctrine of men, then we should follow the pious Shem and Japheth, who covered their father Noah's shame, and not preach and gossip about it with the wicked Ham. In the same way we should keep silent about the infirmities of the saints and not spread them around, so that we only follow their strength. It is no wonder that the dear saints have stumbled and erred in this.
have. It is such a great thing about the knowledge of Christ and faith that only God's grace must work in us; flesh and blood say nothing about it, but only the Father in heaven, as Christ testifies Matth. 16, 17. Greater saints have probably erred in this, than St. Augustine, Benedictus, Gregory and their like. In the times of the apostles there were already such teachers, against whom St. Paul writes all his epistles, that he ever keeps the faith before the works and teachers.
43 And that you may marvel still more, the whole church, when it was still new and at its best, erred in this, that only St. Peter, Paul and Barnabas stood here and received that no law nor work would be necessary and useful to make godly, as all this is clearly described by St. Lucas in Acts 15:6. 15, 6. Now there were ever great saints, such as the apostles and their disciples; nevertheless they stood on it and would have remained on it, that laws and works were necessary for salvation, if St. Paul and Peter had not held against it, even they themselves would not have known it, if God had not made them certain of such opinion by miraculous signs from heaven, that only faith would be useful and necessary to make blessed; as Acts 10, 43. 10, 43.
44 Although St. Peter knew this and received help himself, he still erred in Antioch and had no need of such freedom, so that only St. Paul resisted him when he wrote Gal. 2:11; not that St. Peter thought he had to keep the law, but that he did not use the freedom he knew well for himself, and thought he had to shun it for the sake of others; which was not right and was punished by St. Paul. Therefore it is nothing, and nothing at all, if one presents examples of the saints, which they have led beside or apart from the Scriptures. It is just as deceptive, indeed much more so, than any heretic or false teacher's error, because true holiness adorns such infirmities too much, and God sends such things so that he may keep us by his Scripture and doctrine, apart from which there is no life nor light, even if all the angels taught it.
45. third, bring them to the Heili
They think that they have something here that no one should reject, and they always and forever fight to prevent us from coming to the truth of Scripture, and they begin to say that Scripture is dark, and they become many heretics from it.
(46) Is not this the chief of all blasphemies? But who is to say to them that the fathers are not also dark? or who is to say to us that the fathers do not err in their interpretation? Since it is obvious that they often err, often against themselves, often against each other, and rarely agree. God therefore sends and makes such interpretations of the fathers uncertain, so that we do not run away from His Scriptures on all sides, nor do we slip away and allow ourselves to be held back. Therefore let us know that it is not true which they say, The fathers enlighten the dark scriptures; they do wrong to the fathers, and lie to them. The work of the fathers is not to illuminate the Scriptures with their own glosses, but to bring forth clear Scripture, and thus to prove Scripture with Scripture, merely, without all their additions.
47 But that heretics come from the Scriptures is right; from what else should they come? There is no book that teaches faith more than the Scriptures. Therefore, just as no Christian can become a heretic except through the Scriptures, so no heretic can become a Christian except through the Scriptures. Christ alone is a sign of contradiction, Luc. 2:34, which men take offense at. Some fall and stand up; should he therefore be rejected, or should another Christ be set up beside him? If you do not need wine and bread, should you leave fields and vineyards or build others beside them? The evil spirit is hostile to the Scriptures, therefore he has made them infamous and suspicious with this cry by his blasphemous mouth.
(48) But what does this gospel teach? First, the magi do not inquire of the chief priest, nor say, Where is Annas, or Caiphas, or how hath this or that lived; but thus they say, "Where is the King of the Jews that is born?" Yea, Christ maketh them an example to us, and lacketh that they should see him at Jerusalem, in the holy city, at
seek him among the clergy, among the scholars, among the rulers. He is not to be found in holy places, nor in holy places; nor are they answered by the glories of men, but by what the Scriptures alone say of Christ; the Scriptures alone are to be sought among holy men and in holy places.
(49) This is a sufficient illustration for us that, regardless of all men's works, doctrine, gloss and life, we should pay attention only to the righteous Scriptures, and among all the saints' lives or doctrines keep the advantage, so that we do not go about picking up everything they teach or live, but keep a judgment about it, and receive with discernment only that which is according to Scripture. But what is their own without Scripture we are to regard as human and let it remain; as St. Paul teaches us 1 Thess. 5:21: "Try all things, and what is good keep." This is also what Moses meant in the Law, Deut. 11, 3. Deut. 14, 6. when he describes the clean and unclean animals, that all animals that do not split their feet and chew the cud should be unclean. These are the men who do not divide their feet, that is, who walk their lives in a plump way; what comes before them they pick up and follow: but the pure beasts are those who act with the Spirit's distinction in all outward conduct and doctrines; what they see agreeing with the Scriptures, that they keep, but what is without Scripture and purely human, that they leave aside, the saints be they how great they will or may. For there has not been a saint so perfect who has not had flesh and blood, nay, who has not had a continual conflict with his flesh and blood, that it is not possible to accept their things as spirit and as examples. Many times nature and reason must have interfered with it, which is not to be followed at all. Therefore Moses tells us to split our feet, and Paul to have the difference of the spirit and not to accept all works and ways.
50 Now in these three pieces, that is, the doctrine of men, the holy examples, the fathers' glosses, they think and everyone believes that they are going well, and there is no one who may doubt or contradict here, that they rule here with all certainty.
They think that no one has the Holy Scriptures but they alone, which they have well and deliciously put into these three vessels.
Above all this, they have fallen even further into the abyss of darkness, pretending that natural light and pagan art is also a good way to invent the truth. Now the high schools stand on it so groundlessly lost that they teach that without Aristotle no theologian, that is, the best Christian, may become. O blindness above all blindness! Now it would be to suffer if they were called natural arts, that fire is hot, making three and five eight, and the like; which all natural reason well knows. But they go about themselves, and invent vain dreams and useless thoughts of things that are nothing, and of which they know nothing; that it is a pity to think of their nonsensical foolish studying, that they put on so much cost and trouble, that the evil spirit has only his mockery of them, that God may afflict them, as they have deserved, that they have not abode by the true Scriptures. Therefore, they must vainly eat and corrupt such mud and stench of hell.
62. After that they fell into the hands of the devil and followed the examples of souls appearing and asking for help; they believed everything they said to the same spirits without any fear or hesitation. Because of this, the mass has come into such abuse with soul masses and sales that there is not enough to lament and pity, even if all the world cried blood day and night. The devil has allowed himself to be conjured and forced to speak the truth, and has made such a mockery and game out of our faith and sacrament as he himself has only wanted. This is all the merit and reward of our presumption, that we have not been content with God's Scriptures, and have taken our faithful God and Father for a fool and a brat, as he forbids to teach us in his Scriptures, and does not know or may not teach us what we should know, or what we need to know. Therefore he does us justice by making us the devil's disciples, because we despise his school.
53 Thus sayest thou, Shall it not be believed that walking spirits go astray?
and seek help? I answer, Let that walk which walketh; thou hearest what thy God commandeth thee: if thou holdest these spirits all suspect, thou sinnest nothing; but if thou holdest any to be righteous, thou art already in danger of error. Why is that? Because God does not want you to learn from the dead and investigate the truth: he himself wants to be your living, superfluous, sufficient teacher. You shall keep his word; he knows well what to tell you about the living and the dead, for he knows all things. But what he does not tell thee, nor will he tell thee, thou shalt not desire to know, and do him so much honor that thou thinkest he knoweth that thou needest not know useful nor good.
(54) Therefore, you should freely and cheerfully throw all such spirits to the wind and not be afraid of them, and they will leave you in peace. And if you have a poltergeist or a rumbling spirit in your house, do not make much dispute, and know that there is no good spirit and that it does not come from God. Take up the cross for yourself, and take faith to heart: if God has decreed to punish you, like the pious Job, then be ready and suffer it willingly; but if it is his own game, then despise him in strong faith and consider only freshly on God's word; for he will not bite at God's word for you, have no doubt about that. Although I respect that none of these poltergeists is ordained by God for punishment, but it is their own will of courage to frighten people in vain, because they no longer have the power to harm. For if he had power to harm, he would not show himself with much rumbling, but would execute his wickedness before you knew who had done it. But if a good spirit should come to you, it will not happen in this way, with much rumbling and such levity. Try this and show such faith, and you will see that such a spirit is not from God, and will depart. But if you do not believe, he will do well; for God's word is not there, which alone he fears.
55. the words of god, on which you should defy, are Luc. 16, 29. when Abraham said
to the rich man in hell, when he desired that Lazarus, who had died, should be sent to his living brethren from the world, and Abraham refused him, saying, "They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear the same." From which text it clearly follows that God does not want us to be taught by the dead, but to have held to His Scriptures. Therefore, as and where a spirit comes to you, do not ask whether it is evil or good; but only poke this word recently and contemptuously into its nose: Habent Mosen et prophetas; then it will soon feel what you mean. If he is good, he will love you all the better, because you will speak your word and the word of his God freely and cheerfully; if he is not good, as they all are who rumble, he will soon say goodbye. Item, the other word is Mosis, 5 Mos. 18, 9. 10. 11.He says, "Israel, when thou comest into the land which God giveth thee, see that thou learn not the abominations of the people which are now therein; lest there be found in thee any man that offereth his son or his daughter by fire, or any diviner, or any talebearer, or any spirit worshipper, or any witch, or any conjurer, or that asketh of diviners, or that worketh sorcery, or that asketh of the dead. Here you hear that it is a pagan abomination before God to ask of the dead or spirits, and strictly forbidden. On this word of Moses Abraham sees that he will not let Lazarum go to the living. So now you can say against these spirits: Non quaeras a mortuis, dicit Dominus: God says: You shall not inquire of the dead.
(56) God has so firmly held that there is no example, no story in Scripture, of the saints investigating the dead. Which is the third push, that you can say to the spirits: There is no example ever heard nor read in the Scriptures of such spirits and their nature; therefore it is to be despised and shunned as a devil's specter.
57 From this it is easy to see that Samuel's awakening was spooky, 1 Sam. 28, 12. For everything goes against this commandment of God; therefore it is not to be assumed that the right prophet Samuel was awakened.
by the soothsayer there. But that the Scripture is silent there, and does not say whether Samuel is right or wrong, it does so because it demands of everyone that he should ever know that through Moses God has forbidden to search the dead; and he never revokes his word, says Job, and Balaam Deut. 23, 19. And how should the sorceress have power over the saints, who are kept in God's hands alone?
58. But if it be said, With this manner also shall purgatory be denied, I answer, If thou believest not purgatory, thou art not therefore a heretic; for there is nothing of it in the Scriptures; and it is better that thou shouldest not believe that which is without the Scriptures, than that thou shouldest leave that which is in the Scriptures. Let the pope and papists be angry here, as they will, who make Purgatory an article of faith, because it has brought the whole world's riches to them, and innumerable souls into hell, who have relied on it to redeem themselves with works. God has not commanded you from purgatory, but that you ask nothing of the dead, nor believe what they say; let him be more certain and true to you than all the angels, let alone the pope and his papists, who, since all their things are lies and deceit, also make little faith of your purgatory. But if you want to pray for the dead, I will not refuse you. I think that purgatory is not so mean as they make it, but very few souls enter it.*) But, as I said, it is without any danger for your soul, if you do not believe the purgatory. You are no more guilty of believing than what is written. But if Gregory, Augustine and other saints with their sayings, glosses or examples of purgatory are also brought up here, you have heard above how far the dear saints are to be followed and believed. Who will make us sure that they are not deceived or mistaken in this, as in other many things?
59. our faith should have a reason,
*As is known, Luther later firmly rejected purgatory and intercession for the dead. D. Red.
who is the word of God, and not sand or moss, which is the delusion or work of men. To this also Isaiah Cap. 8, 19. 20. agrees: "If they shall say unto you, Let us inquire of the diviners and of the sorcerers, which go about in their sorceries; shall ye answer, Shall not a people inquire of their God alone, neither of the living, nor of the dead, but of His law and testimony? If they will not do so, they shall never see the morning light" etc. Behold, this also is a bright saying, urging and compelling, that one should search according to God's law and testimony all things that he desires to know; and he who does not do this shall be deprived of the morning light, which is undoubtedly Christ and the truth itself. And behold, since he had said that one should inquire of God, lest someone look into heaven and wait for a special thing from God, he shows where and from where we are to inquire of God, saying, "according to His law and testimony"; will not suffer to inquire even of God Himself, apart from the Scriptures, how much less will he suffer of others.
60. because Moses tells so many 5 Mos. 18, 10. 11., by which one investigates, namely eightfold, [so we want to indicate the same here, who they are and with what they deal.*]. The diviners, that is, those who tell of things to come, as, the stargazers and false prophets, by inspiration of the devil. Item, the diarists, that is, those who speak some days unfortunate, some days fortunate, to travel, to build, to marry, to clothe, to fight, and to all dealings. Item, the spirits, I don't know what else to call them, who conjure up the devil in a mirror, picture, stick, sword, glass, crystal, finger, nail, circle, rod and the like, and want to see secret treasures, stories and other things there. The witches, that is, the evil devil-whores, who steal milk, make weather, ride on goats and brooms, ride on cloaks, shoot people, paralyze, wither, torture the children in the cradle, charm the marital limbs and the like. Fifthly, the conjurers who bless cattle and people, the serpents, and the cows.
*) (g)
They can charm, promise steel and iron, and see a lot of things, and make whizzes and signs. Sixth, the soothsayers, who have the devil behind their ears, and can tell people what is lost, and what they will do or do not do, as the Tartars and Gypsies use to do. Seventh, those who practice sorcery, who can give things a different shape, so that a cow or ox appears to be a man in reality, and force people to love and lust, and do the devil's bidding. Last also the dead, the walking spirits.
(61) Behold, Moses forgot nothing and filled up all the gaps where one wants to search and learn apart from God's word; so he rejected conceit and natural reason many times, especially Deut. 12:8: "Thou shalt not do that which seemeth thee right. And Prov. 3, 5: "Be not wise in thine eyes, and rely not on thine understanding." That we may see how God does not want us to follow either that which is in or that which is above our reason, but only His word; that indeed Isaiah says above, neither of the living nor of the dead, but only of God in His law is to be inquired into. So also St. Peter, 2 Ep. 1, 19, says: "We have a sure and certain word, and you do right to look on it as on a luminous lamp in a dark place, until the day comes and the morning star rises in your hearts." Does not St. Peter here agree finely with Isaiah about the word of God and morning light? And when St. Peter says that the word alone is a shining light in a dark place, does he not sufficiently show that there is darkness, which this word is not?
This digression has been necessary for us to answer the false spirits and the teachings of men and to keep the holy Scriptures pure. Now we come back to the text, and learn from these Magis to ask: "Where is the newborn King of the Jews?" Let Herod ask of the priests and scribes; we ask of the born King alone. Let the high schools ask: Where is Aristotle? where is the pope? where is natural reason? where is Bernard? where is Gregory? where are the Concilia? where are the Doctores? etc.; we ask-
We are not content, nor are we satisfied: Where is Christ? and we are not content, nor are we satisfied, but we listen to the Scriptures that speak of him; we do not dispute how great and holy Jerusalem is, how high and mighty Rome is. We seek neither Jerusalem nor Rome, but the King Christ in his Scriptures. If we have them, we will leave Herod, priests and scribes with Jerusalem and Rome behind us and follow them until we find him.
Now here we see how the Scriptures and Christ have three kinds of disciples. The first are the priests and scribes, who know the Scriptures and teach them to everyone, and do not come there themselves. Is not this a great hardened hardness and contempt in the spiritually learned people? They hear and see that such great men of integrity come from such distant lands to seek Christ, and are told that a star from heaven testified to the birth; to this they themselves bear witness from the Scriptures. And because they are the priests and most learned, they should have been the very first to rush to Bethlehem with all joy and eagerness; indeed, if they had heard Christ born in the east, they should have run to him with body and soul, since all their hope and comfort was in Christ's future.
64 But they were afraid of Herod, who would certainly have killed them if they had confessed Christ with a word and wanted to accept him as their king; just as he killed Hyrcanus before for his sake and many things with him, and also had the innocent children killed because of him. So they forsook their Lord and King for fear of death, and remained under the tyrant Herod and the devil.
After that, since Christ did not show Himself anymore and did not break with worldly power, all this was put into contempt and oblivion, they thought that the magi were deceived; and so Christ grew up among them completely unknown, so that they did not know anymore where He came from, as it says in the Gospel of St. John, Cap. 1, 26. These are the disciples of Christ, who know the truth, but are not allowed to confess it or stand by it, therefore they are also lost, as Christ says Matth. 10, 32.
33: "Whoever confesses me before men, him will I confess before my Father; whoever denies me before men, him will I deny before my Father."
The other disciples are Herod and his people, for Herod searches the Scriptures and also believes them and holds them to be true; he also believes that Christ is proclaimed in them and has now been born; otherwise he would have despised all this and would not have taken it so seriously. So it is certain that he believed that it was God's word in the Scriptures that had to be fulfilled, and God's work that was fulfilled in this birth of Christ. Nevertheless, he sets himself up to run headlong against God's word and work, knowingly and publicly, thinking he can turn around what God says and does, whether he already knows that God says and does. Therefore he searches and listens to the Scriptures and Christ with great diligence, but only to destroy and nullify everything, because he is afraid that what God says, who cannot lie, will be true. Is this not an unbelieving, foolish presumption? Who would think that such a presumption should fall into a human heart? And yet all the world is always full of them, and the chiefs and the best are in all places.
67 The third disciples are the devout magi, who leave their land, house, and possessions, and put all things aside, that they may come and find Christ. These are they who freely confess Christ and his truth; but Herod, who persecutes and destroys them, and yet is a servant of God, goes into the temple and does as other pious people do.
68) It would also like to move here, why the evangelist changes the words of the prophet and says: "And you Bethlehem in the Jewish country are by no means the smallest among the princes of Judah; for from you shall come to me the duke, who shall be a lord over my people Israel"; but the prophet says thus, Micah 5, 1.: "And you Bethlehem Ephratha are small among the thousands of Judah, from you shall come to me, who shall be a lord in Israel". How do the two rhyme: "Thou art not the least," as Matthew says, and, "Thou art little," as Micah says?
69. the other disparity, that Matthew is among the princes of Judah", Micah, "among the
Thousands of Judah" is easily compared. For the Hebrew word, alphe, means princes and thousands, so that the prophet may be interpreted by whoever wants to, to princes or to thousands; just as if I said in German: There comes a duke, someone may point to a prince or to an army; for duke in German means, when an army moves along, or an army ride, and the whole troop and also the head or the prince of the same troop; and what the troop does, wins or loses, one says: That has done the duke or the prince. Also the law of Moses has an order, that over the lousy man a prince was set, 2 Mos. 18, 21. that equally so much is valid, so one says "under the princes", or "under the thousands"; because the opinion is nevertheless, that he means many heaps, of which every one was a thousand and had his prince, into which the people was divided. And among the same princes or thousands in the family of Judah, he calls the city of Bethlehem small and little; as we might say, Among the cities of Saxony, Wittenberg is little. But it pleased the evangelist greatly to say "among the princes" rather than "among the thousands"; for there need not be a thousand men, but it is enough that there be a separate government, in which there may be a thousand men, and that there be always such an authority as rules over a thousand. So let every town be called a mayor or a parish, that is, a thousand or a parish, in which there may be about a thousand, and have an aluph, a ruler or mayor; which would be the same if we translate the evangelist and prophet thus: And thou Bethlehem art a small or common city among the churches or cities of Judah. It was also compared to the other cities, such as Hebron, Kiriath Sepher and the like, a small city at that time.
70 But that the prophet calls it Bethlehem Ephrathah, and the evangelist, Bethlehem in the land of Judah, is also one thing; for both of them have spoken it with certainty, and have well signified Bethlehem, that it is the city, which in time past was called Ephrathah, and now Bethlehem, situated in the land of Judah. On Christ Day
In the first Gospel we heard why it was called Ephrathah and Bethlehem: that it was a land rich in grain; also that Ephrathah, the wife of the patriarch Caleb, was lying there, perhaps confirming the name; for Bethlehem is called a house of bread, and Ephrathah fertile, that there had been a fruitful land and good food in it.
71 Thus also it is easily united that the prophet says: "a Lord in Israel", and the evangelist: "a duke, who is a Lord over my people Israel", without the evangelist expressing the rule, how it is useful and governs the people.
Seventy-two: But how shall they agree with one another, that the prophet shall call the city small, and the evangelist shall not call it small? they are altogether contrary to one another. It is not strong enough if we want to say that the books are falsified. There must be no other opinion than that the evangelist looks more at the spiritual greatness, which the prophet also indicates; as if he should say: You Bethlehem are indeed small before men, but in truth you are not the least before God; because the Lord of Israel is to come out of you. So, what the prophet meant and yet kept silent, the evangelist expressed and fulfilled. This figure and manner of speaking, that one is silent and yet indicates something, is also almost common in common speech; as when I say, Thou art my friend, but thou art with my enemies; that is much said, Thou art not the least of my enemies. Item: The beggars are poor, yet they have much money, that is, they are certainly not the poorest. Item: As St. Paul says in Romans 2:22: "You do not worship an idol, but you rob God of what is his," that is, you worship no little idol, just so that you do not worship idols.
(73) That is enough of this, for it is no fun to labor much in this, nor is it necessary for a righteous man who gives glory to God and does not doubt that everything is well and rightly set forth in Scripture, even if he does not know how to prove everything; it is useful for scholars to defend Scripture against blasphemers and false teachers. Therefore we come to the understanding and opinion of the
Scripture, which does not speak here of a bad common lord in Israel, as there were many before: it must be a special one before all others, whom the prophets proclaim and announce so highly. For the saying of Micah is as if there had not been a Lord in Israel before, because he says, "Out of Bethlehem shall come to me a Lord in Israel. It is as if he said, "I will give the people of Israel a lord, so that they will have a ruler of their own; until now the kings and princes have only been servants, and the people have not been their own. But this shall be a Lord, and the people shall be his own.
Therefore, the elders have always understood such sayings, that Christ must not only be man, but also God, and that His reign would have no end, and that He would not rule in the flesh, but spiritually. For no man, nay, no angel has a people that is his; only God is a HEHR in his own people, as David says Psalm 7, 9. "The HEHR is himself the judge." And Gideon, Judg. 8, 23, when he was asked by the people to be their lord, he said, "Neither I nor my children shall be your lords, but God shall be your Lord." Therefore also God said 1 Sam. 8, 7. when the people asked of Samuel a king, "They have not rejected thee, but me, that I should not reign over them." Not that it was a sin to have a king, which He gave them; but that they trusted more in human help and government than in God alone, which was a grave sin.
(75) Now if Christ was to be the Lord of the people as his own, his reign could not be temporal or physical, but must be over all the people, past, present, and to come; therefore he must be an eternal Lord. This must certainly only happen spiritually. But now God gives him his own dominion, he may not be pure man; for it is impossible for God to give his honor, his dominion, his property, his people to another who is not the right true God; as he says through Isaiah Cap. 42, 8: "I will not give my glory to another."
(76) Therefore, after these words in the prophet Micah, "And his going forth is from the beginning, from the days of the world," as if to say, "I proclaim the Lord who will come from Bethlehem, but he will not begin there; he has already been in the beginning and from the world, all days, so that no day, no beginning, can be called, since he has not already gone forth and has his being. Now nothing has ever been from the beginning and all the days of the world, but only the right natural God; so also the going out from the beginning does not have to have one alone; because going out points to something, from which it goes out. Thus, Micah commands that this Lord must be God's natural born son and the one true God with him before all creatures, forever.
Again, if he is to come from Bethlehem in time, he must be a true natural man. And this is the main part of the Christian faith; this is his own people and the true Israel, which recognizes him for such a Lord and lets him rule and work in them. But those who do not believe this, he is not their Lord and they are not Israel.
78 From this it is easy to conclude how Christ had to die and rise from the dead in order to reign eternally and spiritually; for since the saying here implies that he had to become a true, natural, physical man, it follows that he had to change this same physical life into a spiritual, invisible life; since it was not possible for him to reign physically as far and as long as the prophet there indicates.
79. and says again, "Therefore he will give them until the woman gives birth, and the rest of his brothers will turn to the children of Israel; and he will stand and feed in the power of God and in the majesty of the name of his God. And they shall turn unto him: for then shall he be magnified unto the end of the earth." From these words it is clear that Christ's kingdom was to be increased by preaching and suffering until the end of the world, of which he says here that he *) will preach and feed in the majesty of God's name;
*) he will preach in the victory of God's name etc. (f g)
which indicates that he will have persecution because of his preaching. Therefore he also says that he will give the Jews a respite from their temporal nature and rule, until a new people is born. What a birth mother is the assembly of the apostles, which in the suffering of Christ was in the anguish of the birth of a new spiritual people, half of this Lord of Israel, as he himself proclaimed to them Joh. 16, 2.
Then Herod called the wise men secretly, and learned diligently of them when the star appeared. He directed them to Bethlehem and said, "Go and search diligently for the infant. And when ye find him, tell me again, that I also may come and worship him.
80 From this text it is clear that these magi find were neither kings nor princes, but bad honorable people, like the scholars and clergy. For Herod does not hold them in high esteem, but lets them travel to Bethlehem and wait for their business, telling them again as if they were his subjects; which he would not have done if they had been kings or great lords; he would have invited them to him, traveled with them, and held them in high esteem. For Herod, as all the histories write, was a splendid man, who knew how to keep people respectable and high in the worldly way, and wanted to be seen before the world. But now he calls them to him secretly, without all splendor and appearance, they must have been much lower than he was.
81 But why did he call them secretly? for the land was his, and he was mighty in all things. He did this because he knew that the Jews were enemies to him from the heart and would have liked to be rid of him; therefore he was afraid that if he called them publicly and the Jews realized this, they would come before him and instruct the Magos that they did not agree with him, so that the new king would remain before him.
But that he asks them about the time of the star, he does also out of the same concern, and had already decided with himself to kill the innocent children. For he thought thus: When the new king is born, the Jews will be glad and will keep him from me for a while.
I will hide him until he grows up, and then I will fall to him and throw him up and destroy me. Therefore I must come before them and cunningly find out the time of his birth; if he is then hidden from me, I will meet him among the heap when I have all the little children killed after that time, so that their concealment will not help them. But above this wise counsel, he is diligent that the new king may be revealed to him, and orders the Magi to tell him again; he poses quite spiritually and humbly, as if he also wanted to worship him.
If human wisdom would have helped, he would have acted skillfully enough by killing Christ. But it is true that Solomon says Proverbs 21:30: "Against God no wisdom nor counsel avails." And Psalm 33, 10: "God brings to naught the counsels of men, and hinders the thoughts of the nations." And Ps. 37, 32. 33.: "The wicked thinketh against the righteous, and seeketh how to slay him. But God laughs at him, and does not let him come into his hands." Herod must make such sayings true here without his thanks, and be an example of them to comfort us, that we are free and safe, fearing no one but God alone. If He is with us, neither cunning nor force can harm us.
When they had heard the king, they went. And, behold, the star, which they had seen in the east, went before them until it came, and stood over where the young child was. When they saw the star, they were greatly rejoiced.
84 He does not say that they have promised the king; but they have heard him say that he desires them to tell him again. But yet from the following answer, which they received in their sleep, it seems that they were willing to come to Herod again, in their simple mind that they did not know his wickedness and proposal and thought him a bad right man. From this we learn that the saints may well be deceived and misled by the pretty pretenses and glitter of the unbelieving saints, that they consider good what is not good; but at last they do not remain in it, they must rather come down from heaven.
to be taught and redeemed. Also the "hearing" may be said by the evangelist, that they heard the writing of the prophet from him, how the new king should be in Bethlehem, which they had asked for and all their desire was to hear.
This is an example of how the enemies of Christ are also useful at times and teach others rightly, just as Caiphas teaches rightly in John 11:50 that it is necessary for a man to die for the people, and Balaam speaks many beautiful sayings about Christ in Numbers 24, although they sometimes do this ignorantly without their thanks. So Christ teaches Matth. 23, 2. 3. the people, that they should hear and follow the scribes and special men, when they sat on the chair of Moses and taught, but forbade that they should not do according to their works. So these magi did right and gave us a good example, that they heard Herod; but not for Herod's sake, nor as said by him, but for the Scripture which he tells them, which they followed, and not Herod's works. Hence comes the good doctrine that one should hear the evil bishops and priests as well as the pious ones, and judge not by their lives but by the doctrine; but that the doctrine be all Scripture and not man's hand. For as the doctrine of the Scriptures is to be heard, if it be spoken by Herod, and be vain in murder: so again the doctrine of men is not to be heard, if it be spoken by St. Peter, Paul, or angels, and slag *) and perform vain miraculous signs.
(86) It is also said above how the saints often err and err in human doctrines and works. Therefore, God does not want us to look at their example, but at His Scriptures. For which reason he decrees that the saints often present human doctrines and works. Again, He causes the unholy to often teach the clear and pure Scriptures, so that He may keep us safe from both of them: on the left hand, in the evil life of the unholy; on the right hand, in the beautiful glorious life of the holy. For where you are not
*) slags, that is, hails. D. Red.
If you look at the Scriptures alone, the life of the saints is ten times more harmful, dangerous and annoying than that of the unholy, because they commit wicked, gross sins that are easy to recognize and avoid; but the saints lead subtle and beautiful appearances in the teachings of men, which would also deceive the elect, as Christ says Matth. 24:24.
(87) Now in the saints this kind of trouble is against the main thing, faith and its doctrine; but gross sins do not fight against faith or its doctrine. Though they fall from it, they do not storm against it: but the doctrines of men are vain storms against the faith and its doctrine; for they make a man forsake himself and his works; whereas Christ preserveth the saints in the midst of the doctrines and works of men; even as he preserved the three men, Hananiah, Azariah, Mishael, in Babylon in the midst of the fiery furnace. Therefore the lives of the saints are not to be followed as an example, but are to be avoided as miraculous signs, which are only to be praised and glorified; for he does not want to do miraculous signs to anyone in the fiery furnace; nor does he want to make a Bernard, Franciscus, Gregory, Benedictus or Augustine out of anyone.
88) The evangelist has seen that he silences Herod's name and says: "They have heard the king", calling him by the name of his honor and authority; just as John Cap. 11, 51. says that Caiphas did his prophecy not because he was called Caiphas, but because he was chief priest. Royal and priestly office are good and from God, although evil people use them badly; just as gold and silver are good and all creatures, and yet they may be used well or badly. So God needs Herod in the place where he may be used and where he is God's creature, and gives him to the Magi to use in the same place. Therefore they did not look at Herod nor listen to him, but to the king. For they cared not that he was evil in himself: they caught that in him which was of God, and good; even as the little bee sucketh honey out of the flower, and leaveth the spoil.
gift of the spiders. They heard him in that he commanded them to go to Bethlehem, and to inquire diligently after the child which the prophet preached, which he also had not of himself, but of the priests; but his evil counsel and manner, or his evil life, they would not or could not know. So we also should learn to hate the vices of men, yet love man, that we may separate honey and poison from one another.
(89) It is also stated here that this star must not have been as high as the others in heaven, but must have hovered close above them in the air; otherwise it would not have been possible for them to know whether it was above Jerusalem or Bethlehem. For the stars in the heavens, as astronomers and experience evidently show, because of their height, are not easy to tell over which city they actually stand. Sintemal two cities, which lie ten or more miles from each other, both think, the star stands above it. In addition one cannot recognize the same course with the face, although they run more briskly than no moment or lightning runs. But this star they have actually not see running, but in front of them go slowly, after they have walked or ridden. A star in the sky runs in an instant much further, as ten journeys are from Jerusalem to Bethlehem; because they run all day and night once around the earth and the sky. In the same way, all the stars go from the point of departure to the point of descent, and again from the point of descent to the point of departure.
90) But this star, because it goes from Jerusalem to Bethlehem with them, it went from midnight to noon; so that it was clearly found to be of a different kind, course and place than the stars in the sky. And it was not an attached star, as the astronomers call the stars; but a free star, which might have risen and fallen, moved in all places *). But so that the stargazers once the mouth is shut, that not the star had something special power in
*) wenken, that is, to waver, to deviate. D. Red.
Christ's birth and life. Nor may he have been so great as those above in heaven; though he appeared greater for his nearness. Recently, he has been a servant of Christ, and has had no dominion or power over Christ's birth.
91 But it is strange that the star should appear to them first of all, when they have no need of it, and now know the city where the child is; and before it was hid, when it was needful, and they knew not the city. But this was done to strengthen their faith by two testimonies; as it is written in the law of Moses that all things shall consist in two or three witnesses speaking. So these magi first heard the writing of the prophet at Jerusalem, as a witness of Christ's birth; so now the star agrees with him as the other witness, and also the same birth shows that they are now sure of their cause. The prophet says no further than Christ in Bethlehem; so the star goes no further than the child is in Bethlehem and remains above him; this has pleased them.
And they went into the house, and found the young child with Mary his mother, and fell down, and worshipped him, and opened their treasures, and gave him gold, and frankincense, and myrrh.
(92) It is diligently prevented that these magi have not found Christ by themselves, not by men, but only by the scripture of the prophet and star from heaven; so that all natural art, all men's reason, all light apart from the Spirit and grace, which boasts and misses to teach and rightly lead the truth, as now the blind people in the high schools pretend and are said above. It is finally decided here that Christ, the salvific truth, cannot be taught nor found by human teaching or help; but Scripture and divine light alone must show Him, as He says Matt. 16:17: "Blessed art thou, Simon Bar Jonah: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven." In this Christ also clearly rejects flesh and blood with his revelation that
If there is no natural light, no human being and no human intellect, as it certainly cannot show Christ, then it must certainly be darkness. The high schools, the devil's schools, are still raging, and not only praise the natural light, but also set it up as good, useful and necessary to recognize the Christian truth; so that it will ever become clear how no one but the devil himself invented the high schools to destroy and obscure the Christian truth, as has also happened, unfortunately and sadly. Item, so he also says Joh. 6, 44: "No one comes to me, my Father draws him". With this, all presumption of one's own and human reason is condemned, as it cannot lead rightly, and all who follow it must err. God is so diligent and strong that He resists natural arrogance in all places and wants us to recognize ourselves as blind men, to despair of our light, to give Him our hand alone, and to let Him lead us along paths that reason cannot recognize or follow.
Now here these magi teach us the right faith. After hearing the sermon and the word from the prophet, they have not been lazy nor slow to believe; and behold their offense and hindrance. First they make a mistake and come to Jerusalem, the capital city, and do not find it; the star has also disappeared. Let us not think that they thought, or if human reason alone had been there, they would have thought thus: O woe, we have traveled so far in vain, the star has deceived us, it has been a spook. If a king had been born, he would have been found cheaply in the capital and lie in the royal hall. But now we come, the star disappears, and find no one who knows anything about him; we strangers shall be the first to say about him in his own country and royal city. Ei, it will be all wrong.
94 They are afraid of it, his own people do not like to hear it and send us out of the royal city to a poor place; who knows what we will find? They also make themselves so cold and strange that no one goes with us and shows us the child;
They themselves do not believe that a king is born to them, and we come along and want to find one. O how wild and desolate it all still looks at a king's birth. If a young dog had been born, he would have cried out a little. Here a king is supposed to be born and everything is so quiet. Shouldn't the people sing and jump, light and light lamps, and decorate all the streets with lilies and roses? O of the poor king whom we seek! O we fools, who have thus let ourselves be fooled and fooled etc.
95 Without doubt, they are also still part flesh and blood and not without such or such thoughts and ideas, have suffered a good strong fight in their faith. For natural reason would not have existed in any way here, it would have quickly mooed *) and puffed itself up, if the king had not been found, as it thought to find him, and would have said: The devil has led me here; what kind of king should be born here, since all things are so quiet and miserable? Our shepherd has more crying when a child is born to him; and a cow when she calves is better known than this king.
Behold, this is what reason and nature always do, that it follows no further than it feels; if it feels nothing, then it may immediately deny God and say, as Ps. 14:1 said of it: "God is not here," the devil must be here. This is the light of the high schools that is supposed to lead them to God; yes, into abyss of hell. It may not be natural light and grace light friend. Nature wants to feel and be certain before it believes: grace wants to believe before it feels. Therefore nature goes no further than into its light. Grace steps happily out into the darkness, follows the mere word and scripture, let it appear otherwise or so; let nature think it true or false, so it holds fast to the word.
(97) Behold, for the sake of strife and battle, that the dear Magi have taken the saying of the prophet and followed it into such a wildly unshapely appearance of a royal birth, God has comforted them and strengthened them by the star that goes before them,
*Meowed, that is, expressed unwillingly. D. Red.
and was much friendlier to them than the first time. Now they see him from close by and he is their escort, they are sure of everything, they are not allowed to ask any questions; at the first time he was far away from them and they were still uncertain where they would find the king.
Thus it always happens in the Christian man that God becomes so warmly sweet to him after the temptation he endures, and is so closely and clearly recognized that the man not only forgets his fear and temptation, but also gains desire and love for more temptation, and becomes stronger for it, so that he is no longer so easily annoyed by the shapeless, unsightly life and nature of Christ. For he has now tasted and felt that this is the way it must be: whoever wants to find Christ, it is as if he should find nothing but shame.
Just as the magi should have been ashamed if they had been absent and said, as perhaps they also secretly said in their hearts: Well, how well we have started, dear, travel more some other time and look for new kings! That is, I mean, quite led on a monkey's tail, as Frau Putze, nature, is wont to do in all divine words and works. For the fact that these Magi were in such distress and were quite melancholy, since it felt so desolate, can be seen from the fact that they became so heartily happy when they saw the star. The joy shows how they did not carry a little shock and displeasure in their hearts and how they were highly challenged with unbelief. For there was cause enough to look at the nature. Therefore Christ probably says Matth. 11, 6: "Blessed is he who does not take offense at me." Yes, indeed, blessed; but it is hard and close; for the appearance is nothing at all that Christ should be there.
Now that the magi have come out of their temptation and are themselves born again with great joy, they are now strong and are no longer angry with Christ; they have survived the tragedy. Therefore, if they go into a poor house, they find a poor young woman with a poor child, and there is once so unlike a king that even her servant is more honest and
But in great, strong, full faith, they put out of their sight and sight everything that nature, with its conceit, would like to attract and move; they follow the saying of the prophet and the testimony of the star simple-mindedly, and considering him a king, they fall down, worship him and give to him. O how mighty faith has this been, how many things has he despised that would have moved nature. How many will have been there who thought: Oh, how these are the greatest fools, who worship such a poor child; they must certainly be enchanted to make a king out of it.
Now here lies the core of the Gospel, in which it teaches us the nature and quality of faith, that it is argumentum non apparentium (a certain confidence of that which is not seen). He hangs only on the mere words of God, and judges himself by the things which he does not see, for in the same word alone he sees many things which appeal to him, as if they were nothing and in vain, which the word tells him; and just as nature is called to go on the monkey's tail and jumps back, so he takes the right way and gets through, lets nature be wise and prudent, remains its fool and Thor, and so he comes to Christ and finds him. There then goes the saying of Paul 1 Cor. 1, 25: "The fools of God are wiser than all men; and the unwise of God are stronger than all men." For feeling and believing are not related to each other.
102) Now the fact that they gave the three gifts and worshipped him is not to be understood that each of them gave a special gift; but, as was said above, it was a common gift from the goods of their land, so that they might have known him as a king. Nor was the worship done as one worships God, for they have not yet, I think, recognized him as a god: but as it is used in the Scriptures to worship kings and great men, which was nothing else than to fall at the feet, to honor, as one now bows the knee; and it is done without speech of the mouth, only with gestures of the body.
103 But as they did with Mary and Joseph
I will leave the idle to ponder. The languages of the countries of the east are not so distant and foreign from the Hebrew language that they can easily understand one another. For as they spake unto Herod, and to the priests and citizens of Jerusalem, so spake they unto Mary and Joseph. And even if they had another language, yet the Jewish country people were busy and well known on the Red Sea, so that both languages will always have been known in both countries; just as in the German lands the Welsh are found, and in the French lands the Germans. Now the whole Red Sea is on one side vainly richly Arabic, since these Magi are Herkommen.
And God commanded them in a dream that they should not turn again to Herod; and they went by another way into their own land again.
Here it is evident that those who believe in God are kept in special protection by Him. For he has such exact regard for these Magos that he also takes care of their journey home and teaches them about it in their sleep.
(105) And why did he not let her come to Herod again, when he might have protected the child from all the world, if Herod had known and found it? This happened so that we should learn not to tempt God. What one can accomplish by means of the creature, one should not despise and say: Yes, I will believe God, it will be well; as if you did not want to work, and say: I will believe God, it will nevertheless grow well what should grow there. What would the creatures do if you did not need them? Genesis 1. He created and ordained all creatures with their works, and how man should use them and work, he will never revoke, or make his own for you.
(106) So you may ask: How can I believe and yet not try God, since you praise and preach vain faith and cannot shout it high enough? I answer: No sooner and no further shall you believe that you have God's word; for the essence and nature of the
ZZ8 2. 10, 380-382. on the day of the holy three kings. W. XI, 466-168. ZZ9
Faith is to build and rely on the Word of God. And where there is no word of God, there may and shall be no faith. Is this not clear and certain enough? That is why the words of God in Scripture are called testaments, testimonia, pacta, foedera (testimonies, contracts, covenants), so that they demand faith; he has never demanded faith in any of his works without a word.
107. but again he confirmed his words with works and miraculous signs, so that people would believe the words; so that Christ also says Joh. 10, 38: "If you will not believe me, believe the works. Wherefore if thou hast not the word of God, thou shalt always continue, and use thy strength, thy goods, thy friends, and all that God hath given thee, and so abide in the order appointed in Genesis 1. For he hath not given thee in vain, neither shall he make wine water, nor bread stones, for thy sake: but as he hath created each, so shalt thou leave it, and use it, until he compel thee by words or works to use it otherwise.
(108) But when the hour and place come that the creature is no longer able to help, and all your ability is too short, behold, the word of God comes immediately. For he has commanded us to consider him a god, that is, to give all good things to him. The saying and the word, although it is always valid, but in times of need, when nothing more can help, it is first recognized and used. Of this he says Ps. 50:15: "Call upon me in the time of thy trouble, and I will help thee, and thou shalt praise me." From this it is clear that one cannot tempt God in times of need; for all His words and promises apply to the time of need, when no one but He alone can help. Thus we read in Matth. 4, 7, when the devil challenged Christ to come down from the temple, "No," he said, "it is written, 'You shall not tempt God,'" as if to say, "I can descend the stairs, but it is not necessary to seek miraculous signs. Again, we read in the legends of the ancient fathers that two brothers were walking, and the one died of hunger for the sake of God, that is, he went down into the
Hell, because they came among wicked men, who gave them to eat, and the one refused, saying, He would not take bread of men, but waited from heaven for his food; but the other took and ate, and remained alive. What did the fool do but despise God's order in the creatures and tempt him? Let men be as wicked as they will, yet they are God's creatures, as well as the thistle and the thorn; if a thorn serves thee to prick a sward with it, or else for what purpose, wouldst thou not therefore regard it as a wicked prickly bush? So we read that Abraham and Isaac also gave up their own wives and let them be taken, so that they would not tempt God, let go what they could, did what they could; therefore God also kept them, so that neither they nor their wives would be harmed, indeed, He punished great kings because of it. From this it is clear enough how God's temptation was a mere wantonness and wickedness, done against God, except in time of need.
(109) In addition to trying, there is another trying, even in times of need, which is almost punished among the people of Israel and, unfortunately, is common to the former trying; it is contrary to the former. For that trying happens before one has God's word; this happens after one has God's word, namely, thus: If one knows that God has promised help in all distress, and one is not content with that, but goes on, and does not want to wait or wait for the same promise, agrees and sets the goal, place, time and way of his help; if it does not come as we want and desire, then faith is over. There faith is too long, here it is too short; there it is too early, here it is too late. On both sides they fall from the word. Those have faith without word, that does not count; these have word without faith, that does not help. The remedy is fine and blessed, both word and faith joined together in one, as God and man in One Christ is One Person.
(110) Now he who merely clings to the word, and trusts and waits for it, not doubting that what the word says will surely come, does not set a goal for it, does not agree with it.
He does not choose a time, a measure, or a way, but gives freely to God in His will and good pleasure to do His word when, how, where, and through whom He wills: this is a freely righteous faith that does not tempt nor tempt God.
Therefore, learn what it is to try God; it is easy to recognize; it is certainly an affliction of right faith. To faith belongs first of all God's word, as the foundation and rock of faith. Therefore, God's trying must be nothing else than dealing with God without His word, that is: if one believes, in that He has not commanded to believe and has not set a word; or if one does not believe, in that He has commanded to believe and has set His word. Now he hath not commanded that thou shouldest believe, that he will feed thee, when thou hast food for thee, or canst well find it without miraculous signs; but where thou canst not find it, he hath commanded that thou shouldest surely believe, that he will not leave thee. But thou shalt not set him a time nor a measure: for he will be free, how cheaply, and yet will not leave thee, how divinely; what more wilt thou have?
The same happened here with Christ. God might well have kept him from Herod's power. But because the matter could be helped without the public necessity of miraculous signs, he used the creature as an example, and led the Magi home by another way. For it would have cost wonders without need, if they would have come to Herod again, and would have named the house to him, where the child was found inside. But it also has its meaning, of which further is to be said.
II. of the spiritual meaning of this gospel.
The bodily birth of Christ means everywhere his spiritual birth, as he is born in us and we in him, of which St. Paul says Gal. 4:19: "Dear children, I give birth to you again, until Christ is prepared in you. Now for such a birth two things are necessary, God's Word and faith, in both of which the spiritual birth of Christ is accomplished. Therefore this gospel shows
Spiritually no more, for what is the nature of the divine word and of faith; also how it goes with those who are born that way; what the faith has for contestation and strife.
First: That Herod, the stranger, reigns in the people of God, God has shown what kind of regiment they led inwardly in their souls. They had rejected God, so that he no longer ruled in them by faith: they had become a vain Pharisaic, Sadducian, glib and biased people, who made themselves pious and blessed with the teachings of men and outward works; there was no faith, as the whole Gospel and life of Christ prove. Just as they, unbelieving in spirit, had set up a Herod in Christ's place, so they had to suffer a Herod in the flesh instead of the natural royal tribe of David, so that in both places Herod's rule would be the same. For in the Greek language heroes are called the great men, of great clamor and deeds, as there were Hercules, Hector, Achilles and the like, which in German we call giants, or in Saxon, Kerl; hence comes the name Carolus, which is as much valid with us as, Heros or Herodes with the Greeks. For Herod comes from Heros, and is called giant, gigantic, a Dieterich of Bern, or Hildebrand, or Roland, or whatever else one wants to call the same great murderers and people-eaters, who were also before the Flood; and Moses calls them Niphlim in Hebrew, Gen. 6:4, that is, as those who fall, because they attack other people and oppress them by force; and the people of Israel also slew many of them in the Promised Land, whose names were Enak, Rephaim, Emim. Enak means a golden chain; therefore they are called Enakim, Deut. 2:11, because they were nobles in the land and wore golden chains. Rephaim is the name of the saviors, because such people were considered to have saved the land and the people. Emim means the abominable, the fearful; therefore they were afraid of them.
(115) So Herods have always been, but called differently and differently; so also before the last day Herods must be invented, which Christ will associate with his future.
erase. They are now called pope, cardinal, bishop, priests, monks, the spiritual lords and holy fathers, who have to suffer the great injustice of being called shepherds of Christ's sheep, when in truth they are ravening wolves who devour Christ's people in body, goods and soul. They are the last and mightiest of men, giants, devourers of men and Herods, whom no one but Christ alone shall destroy from heaven.
Now Christ and Herod are quite unlike and completely opposed to each other. For Christ's character is not one of great things and great deeds, nor is there a giant or a man's work; but he is humble, that man thinks nothing of himself, that he is despised, and that he alone lets God be and do all things and have the name. Again, Herod's thing is to do great things, to be able to do everything, and to have the cry as if he were the one who had nothing wrong with him.
Because the Jews were inwardly right Herods, who thought much of themselves, of their works, and of a great reputation for the sake of their apparent life, that Christ's nature was of no value to them; therefore God also sent them a king Herod, who dealt with them in the flesh as they dealt with the souls in the spirit. They rejected Christ and God's nature, so he rejected their royal blood; and because he did not rule in their souls, he did not let their flesh and blood rule over their bodies and goods; and as they killed and oppressed the people spiritually with their regiment and doctrine of men, so he let them be killed, oppressed and martyred bodily by Herod. And so the bodily Herod was a punishment and sign of their spiritual Herod.
Just as in all sins one feels and hates the punishment, but loves the sin and does not feel it, so it happened to the Jews. They felt the physical Herod well and were hostile to him, but the spiritual Herod, their unbelieving, spiritual tyranny, they thought was delicious and good, presumed to earn much before God through their Pharisaic and sectarian nature in the doctrine of men and works of the law, and did not see that they deserved Herod's reign, which they could not get rid of, as they would have liked.
and also thought themselves "worthy" of their great, spiritual, holy being.
(119) So now we also feel our Herod almost well, that he is oppressing us and choking us in body and goods; but because we are not pure Christians and do not let Christ be our king in pure free faith, but let the spiritual being that now reigns and our own works please us, we cannot get rid of him, and there is no hope. We must let ourselves be devoured and corrupted; nothing can help it; it must be our physical and spiritual Herod at the same time.
120 Let this then be set as the first reason, that Herod means a regiment: not an evil regiment, as the worldly lords rule; for Herod himself was also a worldly lord, therefore his regiment must not mean a worldly and self, but a different and spiritual regiment. In the same way, the government must not govern physical people and goods, but spiritual people and goods, that is, consciences and the things that belong to salvation, such as good works, good life, doctrine and sacrament, and God's word.
121 Furthermore, this same spiritual rule cannot be ruled in more than two ways: once blessedly, when Christ alone rules in the right faith and the faithful gospel; on the other hand, corruptly, when a man rules here with works and the doctrine of men. Just as the people of Israel were once ruled by natural blood and their own kings, and at other times by Herod, a foreign king. Therefore Herod may mean nothing else than such a spiritual regime, which rules the people not by faith and gospel, but by works and the doctrine of men; and yet has the name and appearance as if it leads to heaven and teaches the people right, when it is nothing else but the lead and wide road to hell. Summa Summarum, Herod is the pope with his spiritual regiment. For there one sees no faith, no gospel, but only human doctrine and works, and yet has quite a great Herodian power and clamor. The consciences want to and may be led, fed and preserved by God's word alone; so leads and feeds the conscience.
He has them alone with his own snot and slobber, with indulgences, with orders, with keeping masses, with prayers, with fasting and the like; and in this he is a mighty giant, Roland and fellow.
For they say that the Christian church is preserved by the regiment, otherwise it would sink, where only faith and Christ should rule. That is why the peasants say: Kunz Hildebrand, the great whale, carries the world on his tail, that is, if the pope would act with his regiment, God would be much too weak, the world apple would certainly fall out of his hand, neither faith nor gospel would help. But now the pope comes to his aid, and lays the foundation for him, as many plates, caps, ropes, wooden shoes, bishops' and cardinals' hats, the sound of organs and the smoke of incense, the sound of bells and shooting lights, the noise in the churches and the currents in the bellies, especially those who fast and do not eat milk, eggs, meat and the like, in which the pope's holiness stands: then everything will be preserved. And since the pope is for, if such a spiritual, orderly, holy regiment would be done, where would the world stay? So we have what Herod and Christ are: two spiritual regiments, one unbelieving, the other believing.
Now, what is the star? It is nothing else but the new light, the sermon and gospel, preached orally and publicly. Christ has two testimonies of his birth and regiment: one is the writing or word, written in the letters; the other is the voice or words proclaimed by the mouth. The same word is also called by St. Paul 2 Cor. 4, 6. and St. Peter 2 Ep. 1, 19. a light and lucern.
Now the Scripture is not understood sooner than the light rises; for by the gospel the prophets are opened: therefore the star must rise first, and be seen. For in the New Testament the preaching is to be done orally, with a living voice, publicly, and to bring forth into speech and hearing that which was before hidden in letters and secretly in sight. Since the New Testament is nothing other than a revelation of the Old Testament, as Revelation 5:9 testifies, where the Lamb of God raised up the
Book with the seven seals. We also see in the apostles how all their preaching was nothing else than bringing forth the Scriptures and building on them. Therefore Christ himself did not write his teaching, as Moses did his; but did it orally, commanded it to be done orally, and gave no command to write. The apostles also wrote little, not all of them, but only Peter, Paul, John, and Matthew; of the other apostles we have nothing; for James and Jude, whom many think, are not the apostles' writing; nor do those who wrote do more than point us to the old Scriptures; as the angel brought the shepherds to the manger and swaddling clothes, and the star brought these magi to Bethlehem.
Therefore it is not at all New Testament to write books of Christian doctrine; but there should be good, learned, spiritual, diligent preachers without books in all places, who draw the living word from the old Scriptures and without ceasing preach it to the people, as the apostles did; for before they wrote, they had first preached and converted the people with the bodily voice; which also was their proper apostolic and New Testament work. This is also the right star that shows Christ's birth, and the angelic message that says about the swaddling clothes and the manger.
(126) The fact that it was necessary to write books is already a great abomination and an infirmity of spirit, that it was forced by necessity and is not the way of the New Testament. For since instead of the pious preachers there were heretics, false teachers and various errors, who gave the sheep of Christ poison for pasture, one had to try the last thing that could be done and was necessary, so that some sheep might be saved from the wolves; Then they began to write, and yet by writing, as much as it was possible, to lead the sheep of Christ into the Scriptures, and thus to procure that the sheep might feed themselves, and be preserved from the wolves, where their shepherds would not feed, or become wolves.
This is why St. Lucas also speaks in his preface, Luc. 1, 1. that he was moved to be
He was not willing to write the Gospel for the sake of some who had presumed to write the history of Christ; no doubt he saw how they did not handle it properly. In the same way, all of St. Paul's epistles are to the effect that he only preserved what he had taught before, and will no doubt have preached much more abundantly than he wrote. And if he would wish, there would be nothing better to wish than that all books would be destroyed, and that nothing would remain with all the world, first with the Christians, but the pure and true Scriptures or Bible. There is more than left in it all kinds of art and doctrine that are useful and necessary for a man to know; but wishing is now in vain, if God would that there were good books besides the Scriptures.
Now this is enough for this time, that this star is the bodily preaching and the light revelation of Christ, as he is hidden and promised in the Scriptures. Therefore, whoever sees the star will surely recognize the King of the Jews, the newborn Christ. For the gospel teaches nothing else but Christ; so also the Scriptures have nothing else but Christ. But he that knoweth not Christ may hear the gospel, or have the book in his hands, but he hath not yet his understanding. For to have the gospel without understanding is not to have the gospel; and to have the Scriptures without the knowledge of Christ is not to have the Scriptures, and is nothing else than to have this star shining, and yet not to see it.
129] So it is with these Herodians, and with them that were at Jerusalem: the star is over their land, and over their head, but they see it not. So when the gospel went out to the Jewish people, as Isaiah says in the epistle, they let it shine, and yet did not recognize it; of which St. Paul says 2 Cor. 4:3, 4: "If therefore our gospel be hid, it is hid in them that perish; in whom the god of this world," that is, the devil, "hath blinded the minds of them that believe not, lest the illumination of the gospel should shine unto them from the brightness of Christ." From this it is evident that unbelief alone is the cause of blindness, which does not see the gospel, although it shines and is preached without ceasing. For it is impossible
It is not that Christ and his gospel are known by reason, but only faith is the knowledge here. And seeing the star means the same faith.
130 And these Magi signify and are themselves the first part of the Gentiles, converted to the faith by the gospel. For the Gentiles were Magi, that is, natural men who lived according to reason, and did not have the law and the prophets as the Jews; but only walked according to nature, without divine laws and words. Just as the natural masters, like these magi, commonly go overboard and make sorcery and blessing out of the natural art, as was said above, so also nature, where it goes alone and is not helped by God's teachings, certainly goes the wrong way and comes out of itself in pure error and blindness, becomes a real sorceress and full of all kinds of superstition.
Thus St. Paul says Rom. 2, 14, that the Gentiles, because God's law is not given to them, still have natural consciences, and naturally do the works of the law, which they find written in their hearts. But as they have been far from the law and without God's law, so they also find themselves much closer and sooner to faith than the Jews. For this reason: the Jews had the law, relied on it, and thought they were doing enough for it by works; therefore they despised the gospel, as if they were not allowed to do it and it was a false thing, because it rejects the works in which they pride themselves, *) and only praises faith. The Gentiles had no cause for such puffing up, because they were without law; therefore they easily fell to the gospel, recognizing its benefits and their need.
132) That the magi come to Jerusalem and ask for the new king is nothing else than that the Gentiles, enlightened by the gospel, come to the Christian church and seek Christ. For Jerusalem is a figure and beginning of the Christian church, in which God's people are gathered together, and
*) to splurge, that is, to throb noisily. D. Red.
means in German as much as a face of peace; therefore that in the Christian church peace is seen, that is, a good conscience and peaceful confidence of heart have all who are in the Christian church and are true Christians, from the forgiveness of sin by God's grace.
133. Now in this peaceful place Herod, the man-eater, reigns and will reign forever; for all men and teachers of works have the plague in them, that by their nature they deceive, corrupt and destroy the right Jerusalem, singing the good consciences and pious simple hearts, teaching them to build on works and themselves; So that faith perishes, peace and a good conscience are corrupted, and a Herodian regime remains, which is of great appearance, clamor and works, and yet beside this is faithless and groundless. This is also the intention of the evangelist's text, when he says how Christ is born and sought in the very times of Herod, in the very city of his regiment. For the evangelical truth has all its disputes with the Herodian holiness, and as often as it comes, it finds Herodians who rule the people with human doctrines and works; and it comes only to condemn them, and to teach only God's grace for the works, only faith for the law, and to deliver the people of God at Jerusalem from the Herodian regime.
When Herod hears this, he is terrified and all Jerusalem with him. Why is this? Herod fears another, the right king, and wants to be king by force alone. This was fulfilled when, through the gospel, the Gentiles began to praise Christ and the faith against works and the doctrine of men. Then the Jews were angry and realized that if this were to happen, their things would be taken for nothing and their seemingly great nature in works and teachings would be put to shame; they did not like this and began to rage, as all the stories of the apostles show. For with this their authority, honor, power and wealth were about to take a great blow, all of which they had received in excess from such Herodian clergy rule.
For the doctrine of works and the doctrine of men always carry great money and goods. Again, GOt
The doctrine and work of Christ bring the cross, poverty, shame and all kinds of misfortune, which Herodian holiness does not like. Thus it always happens that those who have imprisoned and oppressed the poor people with erroneous consciences and human doctrines do not like to hear that the poor wretched consciences have received right understanding and instruction and seek the pure and honest word of God and faith, and say much that they want to have a new king and have seen his star; for with this the pope, bishop and the holy fathers and spiritual lords would not be able to fatten their bellies so well.
136 Therefore it is not at all convenient or advantageous for their Herodian regiment that the magi, the unlearned, the laymen, who are not supposed to know anything, begin to talk about the light of the gospel and ask about another being in the middle of Jerusalem, regardless of their spiritual splendor. This must have frightened Herod and his servants, for it would have been his bag and his belly. Yes, it frightens the whole of Jerusalem; for even many pious people, though they are hostile to the Herodian rule and would that it were not so, fear that the truth will be brought out at an inopportune time, that thereby a riot and confusion will arise in the world, that thereby the authorities will be touched, and yet perhaps not be overcome without great trouble. Therefore, they consider that it would be better to restrain the truth for a while, or to stir it up in such a way that Herod would not be frightened nor aroused to do greater harm.
137 But the magi do not ask about his terror or anger, they freely tell Jerusalem about the star and the new king, they do not care that the sky will fall. For one must neither confess nor deny the gospel for anyone's sake; it is God's word, which Herod shall yield to and follow: but if he rage, let him rage; Christ shall remain before him.
138 But now behold, Herod, first of all, thinking to get behind the new king not by force but by cunning, gathers all the scholars and diligently searches the Scriptures as if he would like to know the truth. And yet his opinion is that not the
Scripture, but his will and sense shall be rightly kept and accomplished. Here we come to the right virtue of Herodis: here we will see the pope and his own rightly painted.
But lest anyone think me contemptuous of the pope, and compare the clergy and its government so contemptuously to Herod, I hereby decree that I will do so in accordance with my Christian duty and the loyalty I owe to everyone, which my conscience compels me to render. I do not force anyone to believe me. If there is not truth and experience even all that I say, then punish me for lying, whoever will; I will do my brotherly duty enough and be excused before God. If anyone despises my faithful warning, let him answer for himself; I will have told him that Christ and his teaching may not yet suffer with the pope and the spiritual state. Therefore everyone must beware of them, as of his eternal ruin, and hold firmly to Christ alone. Whether this does not bring much good or honor to the pope and clergy, I am not interested: I am to preach Christ, not the pope's or clergy's good or honor. And what is said of the pope and the clergy is said of all those who oppress the people with works and their teachings, and do not teach the true faith, the pure Scripture, the one Christ, as the Jews also did, but very little, against the pope and his servants. Whoever wants to be deceived has hereby heard my opinion; I am innocent of his blood and destruction.
140 For Herod to gather together the princes of the priests and the scribes of the people, and to inquire after the birth of Christ, is just such a thing as is done by our spiritual government, and also by all unbelieving workers: they want to have the Scriptures for themselves, and what they teach is to be found in the Scriptures; but so that their opinion may pass away, and the Scriptures be directed after them. For they intend to use the Scriptures only to diminish the truth and confirm their deeds, just as Herod sought the Scriptures only to kill Christ.
141. so our Herod does with his
Herodists, the pope, seek the Scriptures, need them, but interpret them only to destroy the right understanding and to put his own sense into them. Even the elect are deceived with such a pretense, for there is no greater pretense that frightens and deceives all consciences than when one puts God's name forward and pretends that he only wants to seek and follow God's Scripture and Word, and yet underneath he only seeks the contradiction, to dampen the Scripture with all its content. That is why these magi do not see the star at Jerusalem, nor do they know where to go. And all those who come among such pretty, glittering people go astray and lose their right Christian mind over the seemingly great nature of the unbelieving saints, until they grasp the true Scriptures rightly and well.
Just as here both Herod and the magi have the scripture from the priests, but Herod has taken it in a wrong evil opinion. The Magi take them in right good opinion; therefore they come again to the face of the star, and are redeemed from the Herodian wrong being, under which they had lost the star. Thus the dispute between Herod and the Magi is witnessed here, which arises between the right and the wrong saints over the Scriptures: that the right saints become a little astray and lose the right light for a little while, but do not remain in it. They finally take hold of the right opinion of the Scriptures and come back to the clear light, leaving the Herodians to boast in their wrong opinion of the Scriptures.
143. *) About this St. Paul said 2 Tim. 3, 1-9.The last times will be dangerous, because people will come who think highly of themselves, stingy, arrogant, hopeful, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unspiritual, unmerciful, disruptive, slanderers, unchaste, unkind, heedless of good works, traitors, sacrilegious, puffed up, blind, who love pleasure more than God, have the appearance of a godly man.
*) §143-216 incl. have only the editions a to e (as does the Wittenberg Gesammtausgabe of 1563. D. Red.).
life, but they deny the power of it. Beware of these. They are of the same kind that go about the houses, and lead captive the women that are burdened with sins, and are led with divers lusts, learning always, and yet come never to the knowledge of the truth. And just as Jannes and Jambres resisted Moses, so these also resist the truth. They are men of mad senses, and unfit for faith; but they shall not stand the test of time, their unwiseness shall be made manifest before all: even as he was" etc.
I think that St. Paul did not mince his words here, and immediately pointed fingers at our spiritual masters and Herod's holy servants. There is not a single letter here that everyone does not see publicly ruling in the spiritual state. But they have a hard forehead and think that nothing is said about them; they think that because the pope confirms them with his parchment and lead, one would do them an injustice if one wanted to understand this about them. Therefore, we must read the rich text of Paul a little and see that we recognize Herod quite well. For he says that such a people shall come in the last days, which have now passed many years, and shall be dangerous, because few people shall be saved, because of such deceivers as destroy the faith, and strangle souls with the doctrines of men and their own trumpery.
Neither does the apostle allow himself to be understood by the common people, whom we now call the worldly or laymen; but his words are clear, and press upon the plate and cap people, upon the spiritual regiment. For among other of their noble virtues he freely states their chief virtue, that they have a pretense of spiritual life or worship, and yet renounce the deed. Who does not know who they are? Where is spiritual life, worship, holy estates, but in the monasteries and convents? Item, this he says: They run through the houses, and lead the women captive, and always teach them; is ever clearly said of the teachers and preachers, especially of
the mendicant order and country people. Item that they resist the truth, like Jannes and Jambres Mosi, also shows enough that he speaks of those who preach and rule among the people. But let us see one piece after another.
First, they are philauti, who think much of themselves, please themselves well; everything they do must be well and rightly done, they alone want to go to heaven, and they alone have taken the right path; they alone are the Christian church, they alone carry heaven and earth. The other people are poor sinners, in a perilous position, and must buy intercession, good works and merit from them. Finally, they have come to the point that all other Christians are called seculars, but they are called clergy; that it is not easy to explain how the title tickles them and how they think themselves so good in front of other classes, that of course there is no nation on earth to which the name philauti has been given more properly than to this one, and the apostle has hit them quite well with it; But their chief ruler, the pope, stinks of his own vain conceit and self-pleasure in all the world, so that they themselves must confess how his spiritual rights are all philauti, his own vain pleasure.
Help God, how much the abomination thinks of himself, how he likes his position so well, how impudently he separates himself from all Christians, not only secular but also clerical, does nothing more than tickle himself, so that he almost laughs himself to death with great courage; how all this must be publicly confessed by anyone who looks at his life, his rule, his bulls, his laws and teachings. After that, the others draw such poison from him, each in his own class; and he helps them with liberties, with protection, with blessings and praise. Then the laity also learn this from them, each in his good prayer and special way. This is the end of the Christian faith, which has its favor and discretion in Christ alone; all other beings are equal to him and respect none in particular before the other.
On the other hand, they are arrogant. This follows from the first, their own good pleasure,
that they exalt themselves in their hearts above all others; they think themselves better than anyone else. This is also seen superfluously in the pope and the clergy, so much so that they themselves impudently say and boast: The spiritual state is better than the secular, although there are Christians in it; but the Christian state alone is good, which may suffer no such difference, or must sink. Yes, this poisonous arrogance is the reason on which all their rule stands; for if they should not be better respected, all their nature and rule would have to come to nothing.
These two abominable, deep, great vices are so subtle and entirely spiritual that they do not see a glimpse of them; indeed, they take them for truth and thorough righteousness. So they go on with their devilish holy life, let themselves be called and honored holy, spiritual, blessed people because of such frightful badness.
150 Thirdly, they are hopeful; this follows from the other, from arrogance. For arrogance is not content to rise within itself; it breaks out, and wants to rise as high as it considers itself high, wants to float above, to sit on top, and thus to rise outwardly as it sits inwardly. For arrogance and hopefulness have this difference, that arrogance sits in the heart, while hopefulness is the outwardly upholding being and giving. Who does not see this in the pope and the whole spiritual state? Do they not in fact go over emperors, kings, princes, and all that is great and small on earth? They have set themselves above all people's goods, body and soul, and rule with free, unrighteous power, as if they had the best right and reason. And when one tells them how Christ forbade such hopefulness, when he said to the disciples Luc. 22, 25. 26. "He that will be greatest among you shall be least," and, "Ye shall not reign as the princes of the Gentiles," they break out all the teeth of the saying, and give a gloss which none but they alone shall give, saying, Christ hath not thereby forbidden authority and exaltation above others; but the opinion of the heart, that it should not be exalted, nor think itself better than others. For, as they say, it
may well be a prelate who is humble, who does not elevate himself above anyone in his heart, but who must nevertheless hover above outwardly. Therefore, they now use some sayings of the holy fathers, so that they only blind and fool themselves and everyone.
151. the apostle says of the outward ascent, knows almost well that he must be spiritually supreme who is to teach or govern the others: but they make spiritual that which is bodily; for they want to float up bodily, their goods, their honor, their gifts, their person, their being, their right, their regiment shall go over all goods, honor, person, being and regiment. There they want to go out and also go out there, the dear Junker, make us out of bodily goods, honor, person, gifts, clothes etc. spiritual things.
Christ was also spiritually supreme on earth, for he taught everyone as a teacher and master; but in so doing he placed his person above no man, even serving them with all that he had and was able. So, the prophets and apostles were undoubtedly the rulers on earth, spiritually; for they were the light and teachers of the world; but when did anyone ever set his person, his goods, his being above a man, let alone kings and princes? They were rather subject to them with body and goods and commanded to be subject to them as well; just as Christ himself was subject to Caesar, Matth. 17, 27. Dear Herodists, spiritual rule cannot be seen with the eyes, it rules neither over goods nor person, but over souls and spirits through the word of God. So you make a worldly regiment out of it and give it the name spiritual, only to cover and decorate the cursed court, so that you may not be subject to anyone, give no interest, no duty, no womb; but withdrawn from all duty, you may only take and rob.
I forgot and overlooked that I should have put avarice in the other piece, must bring it in here at the fourth. This vice is so gross in the pope and the clergy that stone and wood now cry out about it. But all this is still nothing compared to what few people see, namely, that the clergy is founded almost on pure usury.
is by the highly damned purchase of interest, which the pope has appointed as a restraint and patron of avarice and thus devours the world by and by; also the secret avarice, which reigns among them, stands among a thousand chewing one, that they become only spiritual for the sake of bodily food and supply.
The truth has invented the proverb: Despair makes a monk. For how many are they who do not become spiritual only because they worry that they cannot feed themselves, or must feed themselves with labor and toil? For even now bishops and canons become for this reason. But what is this but avarice, who does not trust God enough to feed him who created him? But some also become spiritual out of such despair that they otherwise do not trust to become blessed; but the latter is the lesser part, and is also not a good reason, therefore it is not well built on it.
Fifth, they are blasphemers. This must also follow from the previous virtues. For if their arrogance, pride, avarice and selfishness are to be maintained and endure, they must, indeed, arm themselves with armor and defend themselves against those who punish them by the Scriptures, as it is fair to punish and offensive to the Scriptures. Therefore, the pope must issue bulls and laws here, and denounce, condemn, blaspheme, and banish all who challenge his rule, and say that it is not the word of God, but of the devil, which resists his holiness and his clergy, and is to be avoided as the worst heresy; as also St. Peter 2 Ep. 2, 2. 2:2, that such a people should blaspheme the way of truth, and then say that they do all this for the glory of God and spiritual goods; and that their mob, their Herodians, should follow them, and spread such blasphemy and malediction as far as their avarice, arrogance and pride will go, so that the world will be full of blasphemy and malediction.
O God, Heavenly Father, of Your terrible wrath and judgment upon the world in these perilous and miserable times, and alas, that no one will recognize; will You then have created all men in vain?
157. sixth, they are disobedient to parents. God has commanded obedience to parents before all things and above all things. But what does the pope and spiritual regiment teach now? If a father has a priest or a bishop, he has raised up a lord over him, who is no longer indebted to him in any way to be obedient, for the sake of the great worthiness of the most holy Herodian clergy. Therefore, the people also live in a free, blameless life, as we see. God's commandment of the parents' obedience is broken, and they pretend that they are now under God's and higher obedience; yet God has not commanded a letter of their status, but they have chosen of themselves. Now, God does not revoke His commandment for His own sake, let alone for the sake of people's choice and exquisiteness. Item, the monasteries are also now in the mood to get rid of such God's commandment: son or daughter runs away from the father without his will into the monastery; the holy father Pabst judges this with his Herodists, it is right and well done, and immediately forces the people to tear up God's commandment for the sake of God's service. So now the whole spiritual state goes free and loose from this highest and first commandment of God of the other table.
But if thou wilt follow me, I will counsel thee out of all my spirit, in the name of Christ our Lord: If thy child becomes spiritual to thee without thy will, whether it be a priest, a monk, or a nun, thou mayest, if thou wilt, consent to it hereafter, and let the disobedience be done. But if you do not want to grant it, and perhaps you are worried that your child will not keep chastity, or otherwise get into an erroneous life, or perhaps become a false spiritual, or be in need, then do not make many disputes, go freely, and pull the child out of the monastery, out of the habit, out of the plates, and whatever it is locked (sneaked) into. Do not look at it if it had made a hundred thousand vows and all the bishops had blessed it in one heap. Your child is commanded to you by God to govern, and he will demand of you if you let him perish and if you can advise and help him. If anyone says anything to you, oppose God again.
The first commandment is that children should be obedient to their parents, before the parents take care of the danger and do not want to allow it. The pope's law also states that a woman may take her husband out of the monastery or priesthood without any obstacles. Now the fourth commandment, to be obedient to parents in things that are not against God, is God's commandment, as well as that husband and wife should not divorce.
Therefore I say that the pope, out of pure sacrilege, intends to take monks and nuns out of the monasteries, and has no power over them; the parents have power over them, and may leave their child in them or take it out, when and how they want, or as they see is of use to the children.
160 But if the Herodians say here that the parents' obedience is out here, because God's service is above the fourth commandment, commanded in the first commandment, you shall freely answer that the service of God is not a spiritual state, neither has he commanded anything of it, so they lie, and call their little fief the service of God. Worship is nothing else than keeping his commandments. But his commandments in the first tablet require faith and love of God; now those do not walk in the faith and love of God who become spiritual, but in the outward peculiar state, where there is less love and faith than in any marital or worldly state.
But now, unfortunately, many people like to see their children become spiritual, because they do not see the danger that is in it. Some also vow their child to the spiritual state. All this is only vain ignorance of the faith and the Christian state. But if the parents command something that would be against God's commandment, as against the faith and love of the neighbor, then they are not to be followed, since Christ's word: "He who loves father and mother above me is not worthy of me," Matth. 10, 37; otherwise the commandment of obedience is to remain. But the parents may and shall grant, and be entreated, where it is to be done, and where it is profitable for the child's soul.
162 Here now falls another piece, where also much lies, namely, of the children's marriage. No one is so foolish that he can't
But if it should happen, I think the child should put obedience above virginity, or ask the father for it. Likewise, one should not force to take this or that spouse, but it should be done with the consent of the child, as happened to Rebekah Gen 24:58. But if obedience forces, I consider it must be done.
But there is the question: Does the father have the power to break the marriage, if his child is betrothed without his will and against his will? Here the pope answers, saying no, dissolve the child from the father's obedience; but I say yes, and do not dissolve the child from the father's obedience, neither do I think that any man has power to dissolve before they have sat together. For where they have sat together, or have fruit, or are fond of one another, it is unkind that the father should wish to separate and tear, though he may have power; for though his power in this is great, yet he owes it to love and friendship to see something through the child's fingers, and to act with his will, lest such separation be purely self-will and wantonness, done without any cause.
For parents are sometimes more concerned with their own good will than with the child's good and need. Although a child should suffer, it is not right for the father, who is obligated to help his child kindly and according to his best interests and to use his power to his advantage; just as Manoah and his wife asked their son Samson to give them a wife, whom he desired and they did not like to see, Judges. 14, 3.
165. But if it happens that the maiden is secretly engaged and the father or father's governor gives her to another, she should trample on the pope's rope here, and without all the burden of conscience let go of the first and follow the other; for the pope has no power to act contrary to God's commandment, or to confirm the first vow and tear the other, thus misleading consciences, and saying that such a maiden is an adulteress if she lies with the other; and yet forcing her to
He says that she should suffer such things and not lie with him at will, nor should she demand the marital debt. O murderer of souls, how do you comfort consciences, how do you intertwine one with the other, so that there is no room for bliss, and you spend a very dangerous amount of time. But if the maid can ask to remain with the first, if she ever has great desire for him, she may well do so; otherwise the obedience will go for and for, demand marriage, and act as if she had never engaged anything. And if this rule had been kept in custom, the secret betrothal would have long since ceased, and the great mistaken cords of conscience would never have arisen in papal law.
Now you see, I think, how sharply St. Paul saw into the spiritual regiment, which teaches all children to disobey their parents, gives them freedom to take up worldly and spiritual positions, or ever to remain, if they have taken them up without their parents' will. And so God's commandment of obedience was purely abrogated and torn apart, yet the consciences were so miserably confused that they had nowhere to turn. Just as they disobeyed their parents and broke away from God's commandment through their spiritual holiness, they also taught the young secular people to do the same in the marital state.
But a pious child shall learn to honor his parents, and whatever they do to him that is not contrary to God's commandment, he shall put up with and let it be done. And if it could raise the dead, or if heaven were open before it, it should not do so if it knew that it was against its parents. For he who is obedient to parents is also obedient to God, whose commandment is obedience to parents; and therefore whatever is done contrary to the obedience of parents, if it is not required by God, let it be torn asunder, however good it may be, or however great God's service may be; for it cannot please God what is done contrary to parents, if they do not command contrary to God. Therefore, God speaks through Jeremiah Cap. 29, 6. to the parents: "Give wives to your children, and husbands to your daughters," etc. that not the children themselves take, but the parents have power to forgive them. Let that be enough of it this time; more might be said of it.
168. Seventh, they are ungrateful, not only to God, which must be necessary when they blaspheme him, condemn his word and tear up his commandments, but also to man; for they have great goods and honor from the princes of all the world, and that all their sweet life is the sweat and blood of others; nor do they realize this at all, that if a city or country should perish, they would do it no tax nor help from the rest of their wealth and treasures; there is no more evil than in my sack. If their interest and goods do not remain full and unchanged, there is no mercy with banishing, driving and torturing; no one thinks to himself: "Well then, we have such goods and other things from this and that family or country; because it has come to ruin and ruin, we want to show it love again and reach out to it. It is spiritual good, which does not have to serve worldly people; indeed, they consider it to be the greatest of evils, if they should be so grateful, and say: Whoever does this, devastates the property of the monastery, the convent, and the holy church. Therefore, so that the goods of the churches may ever remain, Christian love and natural gratitude must perish; they are still spiritual, holy people, and go to heaven alone, like a cow into a mouse hole.
To the eighth, those who respect no sacred thing. Here the apostle does them great violence by calling them anosios. Osios means consecrated, holy, spiritual, who are to handle holy things and are ordained to do so; as by consecration they become spiritual or holy. Anosios means unconsecrated or unspiritual. Is it not then a sacrilegious apostle who calls the clergy unspiritual and the consecrated unsanctified? They have plates, are anointed with oil, have white choir robes, say mass, sing high and read low, play the organ and whistle, ring bells and jingle bells, consecrate churches and chapels, burn incense and sprinkle water, carry crosses and banners, dress themselves in silk and velvet and, what is great, carry golden chalices and silver monstrances. If these are not spiritual things, what then is spiritual? so the pope and bishop must be
err. Truly, St. Paul is under the pope's spell, and speaks against the holy spiritual law, in which such so-called spiritual things are vainly dealt with.
No cow, donkey, or sow is so without sense that it does not recognize such things, that they are physical and external things, from which no one becomes spiritual or holy; nor must they now be called spiritual and consecrated things alone in this Herodian regiment. That is why St. Paul rightly calls them the unspiritual clergy precisely for the sake of this unspiritual spiritual nature, over which they leave the truly spiritual things. He has just seen in their perverse nature how they put on the clergy, and also perverse their name; as if he should say: They want to be the clergy, and say they act the spiritual things; they are more the unspiritual and go about with foolishness, leaving the right spiritual things.
For osios, or spiritual, means one who acts and administers the Word of God and the sacraments, so that he may bring himself and the people to God; this is actually the office of the clergy. But they do none of these; indeed, by their abuse of all the sacraments, first of all in the mass, they only bring themselves and everyone further from God; so they also preach no gospel and do no spiritual office rightly; of which much could be said. The apostle has understood with these words everything that concerns their actual ministry, of which they are called spiritual, saying: They do none of these, therefore they are more the unspiritual.
172. ninth, ruthless. They mean no one with a heart, that is, they take care of no one, let everyone go as he goes, drive as he drives; if they only have enough, they are satisfied. It is the duty of the clergy, as has been said, to look after people in spiritual matters; they should also see that no one suffers physical hardship from poverty. Now it is evident that there is no less care and acceptance of people in any people on earth than in the clergy; all the foregoing vices, avarice, ingratitude, and unspirituality, are responsible for this. There is only one people directed to his benefit and request, in worldly and spiritual goods.
If anyone wanted to reproach the pope and his followers for their kindness in shedding so much Christian blood, inciting all the world to war, and drinking, sucking, and flaying the world with indulgences and all kinds of evil, he would have done so. It is a peculiarly fine virtue of rulers when they take care of their subjects and take their cause and need to heart in worldly matters: it is much finer when the clergy also do so in spiritual matters, as they should if they were osii; but now they are anosii and astorgi, both unspiritual and unkind.
The tenth, they are disruptive, uncommon. But then St. Paul goes headlong into the sacred spiritual law, which teaches so much about privileges, liberties, exemptions, and hits the sacred scrinium pectoris (shrine of the heart) in Rome. Nature and God's order hold this: If people have to live among each other in the community, it is necessary that they do together and carry common burdens on common backs, do common work with common hands; thus the need of the common being unites them. Against this, the pope and spiritual law have their privilegia, libertates, immunitates, indulta, gratias, and vain extracts, that he with his own only need the use of common goods, let the others do the common work and carry common burdens; and would be the greatest sin, who would follow St. Paulo, and would have the privileges of the commonwealth. Paulo, and leave the privileges and carry the burdens and burdens with the congregation; whether they see that such their liberty makes eyes aching and is vexatious, embittering the hearts, for a just cause, and is thus contrary to brotherly love.
The most holy father, the pope, has authority over this, whether some clergymen want or have joined themselves to the congregation, to break all such covenants, to absolve from oaths and vows as have been made to the detriment of spiritual goods. It is a fruit of unkindness that they alone, and no one else, are free and rich, have satisfaction and pleasure, and live carefree without danger and worry.
176. uncommon and vain extracts must be their thing, therefore St. Paul calls them.
aspondos, the intemperate, the disruptive, whom no one can enjoy, and they want to enjoy everyone; who want to have the advantage in all things and reject the disadvantage from themselves; which is not to be suffered by anyone in a community; and is not only against Christian love, but also against natural equity and all people's reason.
177 Eleventh, they are slanderers or backbiters. O of the great vice which St. Paul here touches upon, which commonly reigns in the clergy before all men, even in those who are highly renowned before the world for discipline, honor, and honorable living. Only pay attention to how these people relate to other people's sins or infirmities, how they throw their love and favor on discipline, honor and respectability, how they apply themselves so earnestly to righteousness that there is no mercy or love left for their neighbor.
In order that we may know this well, we must take space for it and speak of it with leisure. In the previous vices, it is shown how this group holds itself against the person and goods of its neighbors. Here he actually says how they hold themselves against the sin of their neighbors. Oh how blind and ignorant they are here, how they are led by their own pleasure and pride. The Scripture teaches us to hold thus against our neighbor's sin:
First, that we should not be suspicious, but turn everything to the best, wherever we see our neighbor suffering, which is not public sin. For St. Paul writes in 1 Cor. 13:7: "Love thinks no evil," that is, it considers what is best for everyone, and is not suspicious of anyone, thinking that as it does and thinks, so does and thinks another. But even if she does something seemingly bad, she still means it well; that is why she interprets everyone else's actions for the best, no matter how evil they may seem.
180) On the other hand, if the neighbor's deed is publicly evil, so that it cannot turn out for the best, she does this: if it is secret, so that she alone sees or learns about it, she keeps silent and lets it be buried with her.
She does not tell anyone about it, and where she can, she covers it up so that no one will know about it, and thus keeps her neighbor in honor; yet she takes him before her, punishes him for it, and prays for him; she also has patience and mercy with him, thinking as that father says: "This one fell yesterday, today I fall;" or: "If he sins in this, I sin in the other; we may both have the same grace. Therefore she forgives and helps, as she asks to be forgiven and helped. Christ teaches this, Matt. 18:15: "If thy brother sin with thee, that is, secretly, that thou alone mayest see it, punish him between thee and him alone." And St. Paul Gal. 6:1: "If a man be overtaken in one fault, instruct him with a gentle spirit, ye that are spiritual, and see that thou be not also tempted."
181 Thirdly, if a neighbor's sin is done publicly, so that it cannot be covered up, but more people know about it, do it this way again: keep quiet, tell no one else, go and tell his superior, who has to punish him, and leave it at that; pray for him and have mercy on him as before. So we read in Gen 37:2 that Joseph told his father Jacob how his brothers had an evil cry: he did not tell their secret deed; but, as the text gives, the evil rumor of them, that their deed was no longer secret, but public, and people were talking about it.
182. In contrast, see what the lovers of all discipline and honor are doing now. First of all, because they think much of themselves secretly and are pleased with themselves, they think that no man does and means as well as they do, they are the most suspicious people on earth, full of useless worry and embarrassment, no one does right, they turn all things to evil; and whether the work is good, they think the opinion is bad. Then they inquire and ponder to know the opinion; they have no rest until they hear something bad from their neighbor. Oh what fine, honest people go in for this vice, and it can sometimes be seen as prudence, so that they are not deceived. But prudence looks on the accidental danger, and does so much that it may be certain and not be betrayed.
I will speak freely: I believe you mean no harm, but we are all human, it may change with you and lack, as well as with me etc. But suspicion looks only at the present work and thinks no good of it, not of the accidental danger; it thinks it is already spoiled, which prudence considers good, and provides means so that it does not become evil.
On the other hand, when suspicion secretly sees or learns of the misdeed of the neighbor, then it has its pleasure, then it can show how pious it is and how evil other people are, how dear it is to justice, discipline and honor. There the poor tax collector has to serve the Pharisee; there Noah has to show his shame to his son Harn. Well," they say, "what an honorable, pious man this is; everyone must know his neighbor's misdeed. Some also have their greatest pleasure, that they may say and hear of other sin, speak: It is true after all. This vice reigns more cruelly than anyone believes, especially in the seeming, respectable, chaste people: there is no covering up, no punishing, no correcting, no interceding; but only defiling and slandering: and yet they are holy spiritual people.
Third, when they want to punish or accuse, they do so mercilessly with them, as if they had no mercy, as if they had never done no sin, do not tell his superior, but publicly rebuke him in front of others who did not know it before. There the love of righteousness goes at a high price, depriving their neighbor of his honor, putting him to all shame; they care nothing for him, even if he should despair of it, throwing body and goods after it, and become a bold man; they have punished the sin as the pious honorable people, but another may see to the correction. They also reject him as one who will never be useful. O what a foolish nation of holy and honorable men this is; they have no conscience of it, and go and pray as if they had done well. Behold, to this vice they bring the former, that they are haughty, thinking much of themselves; and the two next, that they are ruthless, stubborn, and unjust.
People find who take care of no one, are of no use to anyone, seek only their honor in others, with disgrace and harm to them. For this reason, St. Paul calls them diabolos, slanderers and defilers, because they do not know how to deal with their neighbor's sin in any other way than to disgrace them, to publicly rob them of their reputation, so that they only show off how pious, chaste and honorable people they are. For if they were merciful or kind-hearted, they would only seek correction, not disgrace or condemn the person, but eradicate the sin.
(185) St. Paul has truly hit it right; for experience shows how nonsensical the clergy and their kind are to hear, laugh at, say, and spread other people's sin and shame, so that they are called diaboli. St. Paul always uses the word diabolus in this sense; although some call the devil by this name, which is also the way to expose, disgrace, spread and magnify the sins of men. But St. Paul, when he wants to call the devil, commonly speaks of Satanas. Thus he says 1 Tim. 3, 6: "A bishop should not be a novice, lest he become puffed up and fall into the judgment of the diaboli," that is, of the slanderer, lest he have cause to judge him evil etc.
Twelfth, they are unchaste. What should they do before such a hopeful, free, safe, idle, merry, and wanton life? How would it be possible for them to remain chaste with the previous pieces, as those who live chivalrously in vain virtues may hardly remain? Well, this vice is publicly enough known in them, they do it beyond measure and are nevertheless blameless. But no one is guilty of this unchastity except the pope, who has forbidden marriage to the clergy. If they were allowed to marry, many of them would abandon their former immorality and would have to enter into a different regime. The evil spirit knew this well, and so, in order to strengthen such immorality, he inspired the pope to forbid marriage, so that they would come into their own being and please themselves.
368 no, 4i3-4i5. On the day of the three kings. W. xi, 5yg-sn. 369
blinded, so that they do not recognize the previous eleven vices, never repent nor atone, but consider them great right and virtue, so they go to heaven. But this twelfth is so gross that they cannot deny it; then they repent and confess of it, and then become white as snow, like a sow that lies with its whole body in the mud, and keeps one ear or some bristles on its back clean.
187 To the thirteenth, they are wild, *) that is, completely untried, unbroken, unlamented people, who can understand no scolding at all; where you touch them, they break in two. And all this must follow from the free life in which they are brought up; like a child who is left to his own devices, like a child who is smoky, knotty, and troublesome; so these are also an awkward, clumsy, unpleasant people. They are accustomed to be honored, to be given enough, to have their way, to be left unpunished; therefore what they encounter otherwise they do not suffer. But if they were under discipline like others, they would often have to break and let themselves be broken, which they now do quite freely, and they would probably become meek and mild, so that one could deal with them harshly. This vice is sufficiently evident, especially in the monasteries, where they call themselves passionatos, who are easily angered.
Fourteenth, they have no desire for good, that is, they pay no attention to good, or are quite careless about doing good works, just as if they had no need of good works and knew another, better way to heaven. For they think they are so superfluously rich in good works by keeping mass and praying their horas that they sell the same to others; they know nothing of any other good works except such as their imposed and exquisite little works, since God has commanded nothing of them. Now those who are the most pious make wills at their death, donate mass and vigils, improve their presence **) and the holy churches' goods and worship. These are their good works; besides these they do in life no one else.
*) unmild (a).
**) Presence, that is, the fees that the clergy receives from the donors of a Mass or Vigil.
D. Red.
They are not good, nor can they be enjoyed: you would call this a good work, that they lay money on the poor people, as the Jews do, and grow out all the lands, planting their interest on all houses and heads. But that they should give freely, or borrow freely, think not; but they must gather it up for a will and for a soul. Therefore it is a proverb that the priest's will is a sausage, and remains a sausage, and becomes a sausage. So a will goes through and through the wills from one to another: it is not worthy to be useful to poor people. So also in other good works: visiting the sick, clothing the naked, comforting the afflicted, and so on, serving the neighbor and being useful, that is no care at all with them, that is no service with them; stay with their masses and church howls, make the mass a good work and sacrifice: the same costs neither trouble nor money, but it brings money and gives idle good days.
(189) Then they go on and interpret two kinds of works of mercy, spiritual and corporal, saying, The spiritual are better than the corporal; therefore they despise the corporal as the lesser, and hold to the spiritual as the greater; thus they come secretly and unawares from the way and commandment of Christ. For the spiritual works of mercy they interpret the mass and its commandment; therefore what is not mass and vigils stinks before their eyes. So completely they come to the forgetfulness and unawareness of the good works. Tell me, how would the devil blind them, but to teach them to call their mass and prayers spiritual and better works than the corporal ones, which Christ commanded and knows nothing of their spiritual works?
(190) Therefore, verily, the apostle hath well struck them, even herewith, in that he reproacheth them carelessly of good; saith not that they know not what good works are, but that they regard them not, knowing well that Christ hath commanded them, confessing also themselves that they are corporal works of mercy; but they come subtly behind with this gloss, and destroy them with their spiritual good works. Dear one, look in all the pens
and monasteries, and tell me, who enjoys a farthing of the people? whom do they serve? whom do they help? They pretend to be vain spiritual works of mercy, which are their idolatrous masses and evil murmurings and mutterings in the churches, which are not called good spiritual works by God, but by themselves, when it is certainly only the devil's ghost.
191 Now this would be to blame if only they alone would lead to hell with it for themselves; but now the damned people lead all the world to damnation with them, which also learns from them not to respect good works, follows and falls after them on mass, vigils, prayers, endowments and such devilish good works. So now they have good lazy days and are not allowed to do good to anyone, but let everyone give them and do good to them, so that now everyone goes along with them in spiritual good works, and the corporal good works remain alone: no man helps another, but everyone saves and drives on these spiritual works. These are indeed spiritual good works, but they are not done by the Holy Spirit, but by the evil spirit.
How much more blessed is the marital state or the worldly state. For the conjugal state compels one to do good deeds to one's children and servants. A married man must be physically useful to others than himself; and a worldly authority must be useful to its subjects; servant, maid, and all subjects must be useful and serve others. But this wretched people is of no use to anyone on earth, but lets itself be of use to everyone and is drowned in ignorance of all good; meanwhile they pray for other people and say mass for them, just as if the prayer and the mass were their own and not commanded to the whole congregation. O God of the damned being and perverse worship.
To the fifteenth, they are traitors. Where are you going, St. Paule? When are you going to stop? How do you bite, how do you poke, how do you poke so horribly at this tender bunch with the soft ears? Are they now also traitors and Judas' generation, who sold Christ? To what do they owe this? A traitor takes money or favors, and
With good words he leads his master or friend to death or danger; just as Judas took money and with a friendly greeting and kiss gave the Lord into his enemy's hand. Although the pope does this spiritually with his own without ceasing, taking the treasures of all the world and giving them indulgences; and his own also preach to the poor people of the pope lies of indulgences and false works; thus giving them good words and leading them from faith to works, so that they come from Christ into the snare of the devil; which is a great wretched desecration of souls in all the world. But it is spiritual; St. Paul must also be understood of bodily sedition.
194. There we read of popes, how many times they have incited kings and princes to the Turks and among themselves with good words, promised them heaven and thus deprived them of body and soul, filled the world with Christian blood; And they still do not stop betraying the poor people as often as they feel like it; they preach and preach how holy the wars are, which happen for the sake of spiritual goods and the church, when it is all to be done for the sake of their belly and are vain lies. Also, the pope has always used vain treacheries against emperors and kings for his own person; as the histories superfluously show. In this, the bishops and all the clergy stand with him and help him; otherwise, he would not have been able to do it. That therefore the treacherousness of them all is common, and the apostle calls them treacherous. Nor do they stop yet, where they may find and have cause, to betray and sell emperors and kings; for they cannot otherwise oppress and overpower them, they must now strike at this, now at that, that they may subdue one after another, and that they may soar above.
And in this they have no conscience; it is a great merit: whoever keeps it with the most holy father pope is not a traitor, but an obedient child of the Christian church. And as they betray kings, country and people physically, so they betray themselves spiritually among themselves, letting themselves be led with good words into treachery.
The people of the world, who are so pious as if it were a divine service, and who take the papal blessing and grace as a reward, help to betray the whole world. See how St. Paul has seen all things so clearly before, and how evenly he meets how things are now and have been for a long time, he does not miss by a hair's breadth.
The sixteenth, they are wicked, that is, they do such wickedness and all their iniquities freely, surely, impudently, without all fear of men and without all fear of God, as if it were impossible that they should err, or that there should be no one to judge and punish them; they are a foolhardy, frugal, presumptuous people, in all their nobleness. For since they have withdrawn themselves from all duties and judgments, there is no thing that occurs to them that they may not dare to do, even impudently and presumptuously, where they have only room and discretion.
197 This virtue appears especially in the pope, who is called plenitudinem potestatis, item, proprium motum et certam scientiam (own will and certain knowledge). The others also have them and call them zelum veritatis et justitiae, reverentiam ecclesiae (eleven for truth and justice, reverence for the church) and the like. If one of these lids is used, beware, for it is surely a vain sin and thirst.
For the seventeenth, they are puffed up, they have a great pompous heart; this is also to follow the next previous vice, the sacrilege, when they have committed treason and all wickedness in the most insolent way, boasting about it, puffing (blowing) and saying: Who will punish us for this? Who will defend us? Who will judge us for it? We are liberated and stripped of everyone; we are to judge and punish, no one is to judge or punish us. So they not only want to have freedom to do all evil, but also defy those who want to defend them, and be unjudged; one should also be silent and call them gracious nobles, let them do harm as much as they want, to body, soul, property and honor of all the world.
Of this vice also St. Peter 2 Ep. 2, 18 says that they will want to be unpunished and full of pompous words, talking as if their throats were swollen.
There are many laws of this kind in the papal law, where the pope puffs himself up like an adder and defies all the world not to tell him what to do, not to judge him, nor his own; and if the clergy follow him, they are all defiant and pompous, want to be unjudged by everyone, threaten with lightning, thunder, and four and twenty hells; as experience proves. For St. Paul says nothing of them that is not in public use with them: so they do nothing but fulfill St. Paul's words abundantly and exuberantly.
To the eighteenth, they are blind. Go on, holy apostle, go on, it is the scholars and the lights of the world who have power to make new articles of faith, and without them no one can interpret the Scriptures. You would like to make a riot and make the laity indignant against the clergy; then the worship would be perverted, and the heavens would fall, which alone are upon them. You should keep quiet, or only reproach the laity; for reproaching the clergy does no good, and makes the people disobedient and contemptuous of the spiritual authorities. So they do not improve themselves by it, become angry and angrier, should probably put you under ban and condemn and burn you for a heretic.
But why are they blind? Because they deal with such foolish work and raise up that even children and fools see how it is nothing. They do not see a speck of the true light of faith and gospel. Egyptian darknesses are over them and in them, which one can grasp with fingers; nor are there vain virtues with them. It is even now the highest virtue of the bishops that they are only big, coarse, unlearned asses' heads, and respect a disgrace where they should be learned.
The nineteenth: "They love pleasure more than God. There the apostle meets the common saying: The clergy have good days. If the life of pleasure is of the earth, it is their life; for they feed without labor on the sweat and blood of others, walk idly, eat and drink the best, clothe themselves in the best, have the best lands and houses, and the prettiest damsels, or any other pleasure and delight.
The fact that it is commonly said that the property belongs to the clergy.
But the holy cross, which Christ laid on all his own, which does not suffer pleasure, they have masterfully deceived; they have set it in silver, so that it is good to wear and does not hurt, yes, it sells its kisses and blessings and has become a useful servant for their pleasure. But the dear cross cannot enter their hearts, nor must it have anything to do with their lives, for their freedom, thirst, defiance and arrogance have put a bar in front of it. But they honestly carry their cross in silver to the praise of the Lord and thus go up to heaven from their mouths. When therefore the Lord shall say unto them, I have borne my cross myself, and have not commanded that ye should bear the same, but that ye should bear every man his own cross, and follow me: then shall they perhaps again deceive him, and invent two crosses, as they have invented two works of mercy, and say: Christ's cross is better than their own; therefore they have thought themselves the best, and have left their cross lying, that they might honestly bear it, nay, even honor and worship it for an idol; as they now, alas, lead the poor people, and teach them to worship wood, silver, or gold, pretending their relation and fame by the cross to God; just as if the poor common man could also invent their subtle foolishness when he invokes the holy cross. They are the enemies of the cross of Christ, that is summa summarum of it.
204. to the twentieth and to the last: "They have the appearance of the divine life, but they deny its power. How immediately the apostle goes, and comes before a strong question and objection, where someone would say, How can this be? They pray and sing so much, say mass daily, and worship with great adornment and honor; so do the clergy live in obedience, poverty, and chastity under their holy order and rule. To this, and all that may be brought up, the apostle gives a brief answer, saying, "Let it be but a vain appearance, glitter, and color, under which such abominable iniquity is covered, adorned, and fattened; for all their things are chosen, and are of the same nature.
They have invented it, and God has not commanded it. Thus they abandon God's commandments and cling to their own deeds, and are true rulers who do not do what God wants, but what they have chosen. The Lord Christ Himself Matth. 24, 15, when He wanted to call all this unrighteousness under such appearance recent, called it an abomination and said: "When you see the abomination in the holy place" etc. For it is an abomination that everyone dreads, that under such a small appearance such great, nasty, stinking vices should fatten and reign.
205. He also says noticeably: "They deny the power or strength of the divine life," which is said much more and harder than that they are without the power and action of the divine life. It is to deny and to resist. But what this is, we shall see hereafter, when we come further into Herod and his worship; now it is enough that St. Paul be recognized in this saying, as it agrees with this gospel, since the magi seek and have the Scriptures in right opinion, and Herod also has them, but only in appearance and wrong opinion, to prevent them for the sake of his regiment, as the papists also do. Therefore, let us consider St. Paul's saying to the end.
206. He saith, "Beware, and avoid them." In this he warns us to beware of the spiritual regime and state, and gives leave, yes, commands to run out whoever is in their way, as we shall hear, locks up all monasteries and convents, gets rid of priests and monks. As Christ also teaches Matth. 24, 16: One should flee from them and avoid them.
207) Further, he singles out some of them, saying, "Of these are they which go about the houses, and lead captive women laden with sins, and are led about with divers lusts; learning always, and yet never coming to the knowledge of the truth. Who can interpret this differently than the mendicant orders, which the apostle has clearly foreseen here? it is they who walk through the houses. St. Paul calls houses what we now call churches; for in his time there were
No churches, but the Christians came together in one house, as now ten or twenty neighbors would come together in one house among them, and preached there and prayed, and received the sacrament.
So now the mendicant orders run through all the parish churches that are not theirs and preach their sermon. This was given to them by the pope out of pure sacrilege and violence. The other thing is that they are almost the sole rulers of confession, which the pope also gave them out of the same power that he gave them to run through the houses. This is where the devil has his way; this is where the women attach themselves, especially those who secretly have great knots on them and, as St. Paul says here, are laden with sins. For the foolish women, when their conscience bites them and they do not know how to help and advise themselves, they run away and pour into their robes, thinking that they have hit it. There they are caught, and then they give and bear what they can and have. And the holy fathers then appear and preach about the sins to confess, say many examples, how some women condemned, appeared after death, confessed that they were condemned for slackening of confession, and lie so pontifically about the greatest lies that the stones would tremble and sweat.
Pay attention to their exemplary sermons, and you will realize that it is only women who have been condemned for slacking in confession, and not men; so that one might think that an arch-chief had devised the same exemplars, who would have liked to know the hearts and secrecy of women, and had seen how the womenfolk, out of natural pusillanimity, are naturally more shameful than men, he had thought: I want to advise them rightly and find out their heart through the horror of confession; and he succeeded through the help of the devil. But he also entangled and condemned many consciences who, out of insurmountable shame and stupidity, did not confess, and yet sinned against their consciences by doing so, because they believed it was necessary to confess, and yet did not do so. For as you believe, so God judges you; do you believe that you are guilty of something?
and thusts not, then you sin. I say my judgment that such a knave, who with such examples entangles and condemns the consciences with false faith, would be worthy that not only his body but also his soul would be torn and pulverized into a hundred thousand pieces by all devils. What horrible murders of souls do the infernal traitors and papal liars commit all over the world? O weep, whoever can weep, over such miserable destruction of poor souls.
When the poor, timid, female people, who are also naturally foolish and gullible, hear such a sermon and want to become devout and pious, they fall and are caught, seeking counsel and help from their spiritual father; so the coarse ass and blind leader, who knows nothing of faith or of Christ, goes to them and teaches them to atone for their sins by works and atonement. Then the torture begins, of which St. Paul says here that they always learn and never come to the knowledge of the truth: so the female conscience has no rest, her sins press and torture her; she would like to be rid of them and cannot; then follows, as St. Paul says here, that she is led by her sins. Then follows, as St. Paul says, that they let themselves be led by various desires: they begin and fast for water and bread, then they walk barefoot, and want to go to the saints; some scourge themselves to the point of blood, some give here to the church, there to the cup, and there is no end nor measure to the various desires; what they only hear is good to atone for sin, then they rise up, and out of all earnestness they desire to do so and find no rest. However, the spiritual holy father sits, has caught the poor animal, is probably worth more to him than so many milking cows. And where the women are caught, the men are soon caught too, and so must go what the secret confession forces.
211. but if one preached the right free punishment, saying thus: Dear women, if anyone has sin upon her, let her confess if she will; but if she confesses, or if she does not confess, let her have firm faith that Christ will forgive her sin; and let her confess it to him secretly, with all hearty confidence in his grace, which he has promised to all those who desire it, and do not doubt it,
then the sins are certainly forgiven; then also leave it, and practice good works towards her neighbors who are in need of her, invite poor people, wash their feet and serve them humbly. Behold, this would be a right way to restore a sinful woman, which would be done without difficulty, with pleasure and will that pleases God. But if this were to happen, the confession penny would be lost to the murderers of souls and spiritual priests, the milk in the cow would dry up, and the poor conscience would be loosed, no longer guided by their endless teaching and preaching; it would be too close to the holy, spiritual state, and should probably die of hunger because of it. For the apostle did not call women laden with sins for nothing; for the others, who are innocent, do not challenge them with such devil temples, doctrines and prisons. So that they do not lose their milk, they must put such fear on their consciences, first of all of the women who are easily seduced, and then most of all when they get pregnant with an evil sinful conscience. There is then nothing to advance that they do not follow, and cannot be presented to them enough. This then becomes unstable and finally desperate souls, who have learned to comfort themselves not on God's grace, but on their own works, and do not want to put away sin by sincere faith, but by satisfaction, which is impossible.
They say much that one should spare the clergy, neither scold nor punish them, but honor and excuse them. Yes, if they were only evil for themselves and only corrupted themselves, I would also be very silent; but their rule corrupts all the world. He who is silent about this and does not risk life and limb over it is not a true Christian, nor does he love his neighbor's happiness as his own. If only I could snatch the souls from their hellish dragon, I would scold them more moderately. They set fire to the city and say I should not shout fire or put out. "Let him be damned," says Jeremiah Cap. 48, 10, "who does God's work deceitfully, and keeps his sword from blood." God wills that one should strike freshly with his sword, that the blood may go after it; he who does the work unfaithfully, he is forsaken.
deit. So they want to have read only the feathers and to be covered with fox tails. Not so, dear man.
Further, St. Paul says: "Just as Jannes and Jambres resisted must, so these also resist the truth. This he says not only of the mendicant orders, but of all former clergy, how they resist the truth and do not want people to come out of their fearful regiment to the knowledge of free faith. Everyone is well aware of this now; they fear that their regiment and tyranny will perish. So, when the people of Israel in Egypt were oppressed by King Pharaoh, and Moses was sent by God to deliver them, he first did two miraculous signs to prove that he was sent by God: Then the two magicians of Pharaoh the king, Jannes and Jambres, performed the same miraculous signs; they stopped the king with them and destroyed Moses' miraculous signs, so that the people had to stay until the third miraculous sign, when they could do no more; then it was recognized that their thing was not right and Moses' thing was right.
Thus it is that the tyrants of God's people always have appearances, and, as the true saints, they are always in the way of the truth, and thus they hinder and hinder the simple, so that they cannot be loosed; for they are weak in conscience, and cannot freely judge between appearance and reason, between glitter and truth. So the poor people must always be caught by appearances and appearances, and they must be hindered and held back from the truth. So these magi at Jerusalem were also stopped by Herod, who posed as if he were seeking the Scriptures. And now, the spiritual splendor does no more than hinder people from faith and truth, because it seems so pretty and is so like God's service. Further, St. Paul says:
215. "They are men of mad mind, and of no use to the faith." There you have what they are in essence, their opinion and conceit is insane; for they insist that such is their nature and is no other, knowing nothing of faith. Faith alone makes unalterable senses and spiritual
Virgins; who teaches a right conceit and good opinion, which is that God's grace alone is our comfort. Whoever does not have this opinion is a Christian, as a whore is a virgin, even if he does the works of all the saints. And where there is such a crazy opinion, there is little hope that they will always come to right faith; especially if they come so far that they fight against it, and are first placed in it by baptism, and allow themselves to be deceived by it.
216] Further: "But they will not stand the test; their unwisdom will be revealed to everyone. The same will happen to the pope and our clergy; the truth will remain and be too strong for them; their glittering and deception must be revealed; no raging or blustering will help them, even if they had four thousand Turkish emperors on their side. Appearances and lies cannot survive, that is not possible, even if they save and defend themselves for a while. That is enough of Paul's saying. Now we come back to the gospel and its interpretation.
217 That Herod also called the Magi secretly and learned from them the time of the star that had appeared, means that the spiritual Herodists do not deny the gospel outwardly, but learn it from the true Christians, but only of the opinion that they need it for their will of courage; just as Herod here thinks to use the time of the star to kill Christ and to confirm his kingdom. As now, when the gospel is held up to our clergy, they do not deny that it is the gospel, they hear it and accept it. But they say that it is not the right understanding, that it has a gloss and interpretation, which should not be expected from anyone but them, and that everyone should confess to their interpretation. In this way they do not deny the gospel, but only take away all its power, and under the name and appearance of the gospel they pretend to their own dreams. That is St. Paul 2 Tim. 3, 5. have the appearance of a divine being and yet deny its power. He does not say that they do not have the power of the divine being, although this is also true; but much more harshly, that they also deny the same. With this he gives clarification
The church must understand that they are ungodly not only in life and conduct, but also in doctrine and rule, that they lead themselves with their lives and others with their doctrine out of the way of the Gospel and of salvation. This is what the pope does now with the clergy in all his sermons, almost shouting: Gospel, gospel; and yet they deny, condemn, malign everything that is in the gospel and all its contents. As Herod learns about the star, but still wants to destroy everything that the star indicates. Let us see some of their teachings to prevent ourselves from them.
218 The gospel teaches that salvation depends entirely on faith; they hear this and do not deny it. But because of this they take away all its power and say that faith without works is of no use; thus they secretly change from faith to works, so that they now publicly condemn faith and ascribe all things to works. So they keep the word "faith" only in pretense, and deny, condemn, malign everything that is the nature of faith, begin and divide faith into various parts; some they make the natural faith, some the spiritual, some the common, some the special, some the folded out, some the folded in, knowing even less what they are deceiving, the blind leaders, than no natural fool. The gospel knows nothing of their diverse faiths, has only the one that is based on pure grace of God, without any merit of works, of which they know not a single bit, yes, they condemn it as the worst heresy, and yet they say they want to defend the gospel and Christian faith.
219. Item, the Gospel says that Christ is our Savior; they hear this, but besides this, they detach and discredit all natural works, nature and quality of Christ, by publicly teaching that man can earn God's grace by natural powers and works. So they condemn Christ with all his works, as St. Peter 2 Ep. 2, 1. proclaimed of them, when he says: "There will be false teachers among you, who will deny the Lord who bought them." For so nature may of itself obtain God's grace, as now all the high schools,
If monasteries and convents teach and hold in harmony with the pope, Christ was born and died in vain. Why should he shed his blood to obtain grace for us, if we can obtain it ourselves through our nature? They still want to be Christians, and exalt the name of Christ, under which pretense they reproach and condemn the whole Christian being for heresy.
The gospel teaches that the law of God is spiritual and impossible to fulfill by nature, but that the Spirit of God must fulfill it in us through faith, Romans 8:2, 3. Thus they deny neither the Spirit nor the law, but take away all its power, and teach that man without the help of the Spirit may fulfill the law of God naturally in all his works, even though he does not thereby earn heaven. This is nothing else than denying the power of the law and the spirit and keeping only the names of it.
They go on to tear up God's law where they think it is too difficult for nature, making counsels and superfluous, unnecessary things out of it; as when they teach that it is not necessary or commanded that one love God with all one's heart, that one let the coat go with the skirt; item, that one should not quarrel in court; item, that one should lend and give to everyone, without enjoyment and without charge; item, that one should suffer injustice and do good to one's enemies etc. Thus they have abolished the whole true natural essence of the Christian state, which consists only in suffering injustice and doing good to everyone. After that, they set up their own commandment in place of such an essence, that they wear plates, caps, do not eat meat, eggs, butter, milk, and that they whistle a lot in the churches; and thus nothing remained of God's laws.
Item, the gospel praises the pure, mere grace of God, how this masses and destroys all sin? Now they do not deny the word "grace", but use it in a great pretense; but besides that, they teach all kinds of satisfaction for sin, stakes *), orders, sects and estates.
of repentance, of forgiveness of sins, to run away from God with it and to pay him for his grace. In this way, the nature and work of grace is destroyed and condemned to the ground, for it wants to be pure grace or nothing.
Item 223: The gospel teaches how through original sin all men are in wrath and disgrace, that all their works are thereby sinful. Thus they do not deny the word "original sin," but take away its force; they say that nature is still good, that its works are not sin, and that it may well prepare itself for grace; they also say that original sin has done no harm to nature that is damnable, but has only made it weak for good and inclined to evil. And if it does not follow the inclination, as it can of itself, it does not deserve hell, even though it may acquire the grace of God. Behold, this is just so much said: original sin is not original sin; and under the name the work and nature of sin is denied.
The Gospel teaches that love does not seek its own, but only serves others. Now they take the word "love" well, and separate from it all its kind, teaching that proper love begins with itself, and loves itself first and most. Then they say that love is enough, if one wants to do good to another, he should not do it and serve himself, for it would be dishonest for the pope to humble himself against an inferior, but he should let himself be kissed on the feet, and it is enough for him to form only one thought in his mind, which says: I do good to everyone, except my enemies. Behold, then, all the essence and power of love lies low; there remains only the mere poor name.
(225) The gospel teaches how hope is based on a mere divine promise, but they confess the word hope, teaching that hope is not based on a divine promise but on their own merits.
226 Item, the gospel teaches how God's providence is eternally certain; so they teach that it stands on free will and is uncertain.
227. And recently, they confess God and His name, but everything God ordains,
They tear it apart, destroy it and condemn it as the highest heresy, so that it is obvious how Christ's suffering is now spiritually fulfilled under the Pabst's rule. Behold, thus they have in their doctrine the appearance of faith, of hope, of love, of grace, of sin, of the law, of Christ, of God, of the gospel; and yet deny all the power and nature of the same, condemning all this also for the highest heresy. That is why the apostle spoke so harshly that he says: "They deny the power of the whole divine service and ministry, and walk only in appearance. Oh Lord God from heaven, where are the rivers of water, yes, rivers of blood, that should make our eyes weep in this last horrible, terrible time of the unspeakable, intemperate wrath of God against the world for its sin and ingratitude.
Further: Herod sends the Magi to Bethlehem, and orders them to search for the child with diligence, posing as if he also wanted to come and worship him. Here is our Herodists other piece means that they also live as they teach. Teaching and living are vain pretenses and denials of the truth; for life must be as the teaching leads it. So now the pope and the spiritual state do, letting the Christians be pious and calling them to seek Christ and the truth, but with this appendix, that they are to be his betrayers and serve him in such stings. For this is what the pope is now impudently and thirstily pretending to all the world: Let a man seek Christ and live well, but if he does not keep his command and his commandments, and serve him, and be subject to his obedience with all his good life, he may not be saved; so that people think that it is more, or as much, in his obedience as in God's commandments.
229 Behold, this is the addition of Herod, that he not only sends the Magi to Bethlehem, but also keeps them as subjects and obligated only to the treachery of destroying Christ. For all those who hold papal obedience as necessary to salvation, and damnable if it is not held, what else do they do but betray and overthrow Christ?
give Christ, that Herod may find him and kill him; because Christian faith cannot exist apart from such obedience or conscience; as has often been said. For faith alone must help, and such obedience must be considered useless for salvation, or if it is considered helpful and allowed, faith must perish, and so Herod must reign in Christ's stead. This means, truly, to hand over and betray Christ and his faith.
But when Herod says, "I will also come and worship him," everyone can see that he is lying, and that he is only speaking and pretending, but he is thinking of something else, namely, killing Christ and destroying his kingdom. Here you have presented the image of all unbelieving saints in Herod nicely and briefly. First, Herod does not pretend to do a bad work, nor does he say that he will give him gold or myrrh, nor that he will help him or be a good friend to him; but he pretends to do the highest and best work in the service of God, which is humility and worship, saying, "I will come as a humble man and show the highest honor, which is worship.
So do the Herodists, the clergy, who do not take up a small work, but the service of God, the very highest being; this they appropriate for themselves, there they exercise themselves inwardly, may freely say: The life of other people is temporal and worldly life, but they are in God's service day and night; and when the others work, they pray and serve God for the poor people. Do you not believe this? Well, then, ask the bells, for they ring for their service; so they walk humbly, let themselves be called God's servants before all men, and fatten their bellies under it quite well, snatch up all the world's goods and build houses as if they wanted to live here forever. Therefore, we must see the difference between right and wrong worship, so that we may recognize and avoid the heart and mind of the wicked Herod.
232. *) No better difference may be found
In this, then, we have God's word: whichever service is taught in it must certainly be the right service of God; but which is set up beside and apart from God's word, as invented by men, that must certainly be the false-appearing Herodian service. Now God's service is nowhere written except in His commandments. For there is no doubt that he alone serves God who keeps his commandments; just as a servant in the house is said to serve his master when he does and waits for what his master calls him to do; but if he does not do this, whether he would otherwise do the will of the whole city, it is not called serving his master. Thus, he who does not do God's commandment does not serve God, even if he keeps all men's doctrine and commandment.
The service of God is that you know, honor, and love God with all your heart, placing all your faith and trust in Him, never doubting His goodness, neither in living nor dying, neither in sinning nor in doing good, as the first commandment teaches; to which alone we may attain through Christ's merit and blood, who has acquired and gives us such a heart when we hear and believe His word; and nature may not have such a heart of its own. Behold, this is the chief and highest thing we call a sincere Christian faith and love toward God through Christ. Thus, the first commandment is fulfilled by us through Christ's blood, and God is served quite thoroughly.
Secondly, if you honor God's name, call on it in times of need, and confess it publicly before the tyrants and persecutors of this right worship, do not fear them, punish the Herodians, and defend as much as you can, so that they do not dishonor God's name with their false nature and teachings, presented under God's name, which is a great thing and brings the world upon itself. Behold, this is the other piece of worship, kept in the other commandment.
Third, if you bear the holy cross and must suffer much for such faith and confession that you must stake life and limb, goods and honor, friend and favor on it; that is, properly celebrated and sanctified the Sabbath, since it is not you but God alone who is at work in you, and you are only a suffering, departed one.
you are the following human being. This is the third piece of worship, written in the third commandment. Behold, this is the first tablet with the first three commandments, which are comprehended in the three pieces: faith, confession and suffering; thereby renouncing this life and the world and living only to God.
Fourth, we come to the other table, and henceforth you serve God by honoring your father and mother, being submissive and obedient, helping them where they need it, before all men on earth; so that without their will you also do not become spiritual before they need you or want to use you otherwise.
Fifth, that you do no harm to anyone's body, but do good to everyone, even to your enemies; visit the sick and the captives, and reach out your hand to all who are in need; bear a kind and sweet heart to all people.
236 Sixth, that you live chastely and temperately, or ever keep your marriage right and help others.
239 The seventh, that thou defraud no man, nor injure, nor advance in temporal goods; but lend, give, exchange to any where thou mayest, and keep thy neighbor's loss.
240. to take heed that thou guard thy tongue, that thou profane not any man, that thou slander not any man, that thou lie not to any man, but that thou cover every man, that thou excuse not any man, that thou spare not any man.
241. ninth and tenth, that thou covet neither man's wife nor man's goods.
Behold, these are the pieces of God's fundamental good service; this he requires of thee, and none else; what thou doest above this he respecteth not. It is also clear and easy enough for anyone to understand. Now you see that the right service must be common to all classes, to all people, and only this one can be found among God's people. And where any other worship is invented, it must surely be false and seductive; as there is one that will not be common, but keeps itself in some peculiar classes and people. This is what is said about the right, common, unified worship.
243 Now let us see the false, peculiar, partial, manifold God-
service, since God has commanded nothing of it, but is invented by the pope and his clergy. There you see various monasteries, orders and convents, none of which has anything in common with the other: One wears a large plate, the other a small one; one wears gray, the black, the white, the woolen, the linen, the hard clothes; one prays these days and times, the other other days and times; one eats meat, the other fish; one is a Carthusian, the other a barefooter; one has such ceremonies, the other such; one prays with the chair of Rome, the other with the bench of Jerusalem; one says mass like this, the other otherwise; one is bound in this monastery, the other in the other; one is praying here in the choir, the other in the other, and the churches are swarming full of murmurings. They also live in chastity and have various disciplines. And who can tell the innumerable, partisan, immense, spiritual pieces? Well, this service has broken out and born a greater one of itself; there is no goal nor measure, churches, chapels and monasteries, altars build, mass and vigils donate, horas erect, chasuble, choir caps, chalice, monstrance, silver image and jewel, candlesticks, candles, lights, incense, panels, bells testify. What a sea and forest is this thing! Here all the laymen's devotion, interest, money and goods have gone; that is to increase God's service and to provide for God's servants, as the Pope calls it in his holy law.
Now hold these pieces against the right worship, and tell me, where has God ever said one letter of the pieces to one? Do you still doubt that the whole spiritual state under the pope is vain Herodian things, glittering and deceitful, which only hinders the people and turns them away from the right worship? These are the altars and groves of which the prophets complain about the people of Israel, that there was no city, they set up their own grove and altar and abandoned the one temple of God. Thus, this idolatrous, superstitious, Papist, Herodian worship has filled all corners of the world, driving out and destroying the right true worship.
You may look around you and think, "Should so many people all at once be mistaken? Be careful and do not let the crowd challenge you.
Hold fast to God's word, he cannot lie to you, all men may lie, and as the Scripture Ps. 116, 11. says: "All men are liars. Do not be surprised that so many now err; for in Elijah's day there were only seven thousand devout men in all the nation of Israel, 1 Kings 19:18. Tell me, what were seven thousand men against all Israel, which were more than twelve times a hundred thousand valiant men, without wife and child? What were all the people against all the world, which all err? What then should be now; since Christ and the apostles have said such cruel things of these times, that even Christ himself says Luc. 18, 8.: "Thinkest thou that the Son of man also shall find faith on the earth, when he shall come?" It must be cruelly great, and great and many people must err, and those most thought least, the final Christ shall rule and deceive the world. We want to be sure, not to respect God's judgment and not to take his wrath to heart, so that it would not be a wonder if he would hardly keep one person pious on earth.
It is the last and worst time, which all Scripture has terribly threatened. Therefore, thank God that you see His word, which is right and wrong worship. See to it that you stay with it, and do not follow the heap that goes without God's word. If those hardly remain who have God's word and cling to it, where will those remain who follow their own noses without God's word? Therefore, whoever doubts, God's word and the right service of God convince enough that the pope is the final Christian, and the spiritual classes are his disciples, who deceive all the world.
Now behold, is it not well ordered? the Herodian service has bells of brass, and many of them, and great, to attract the people to such a service. As the service is, so are the bells or charms. To the right service God has given other and right bells, which are the preachers who are to ring and sound such service to the people. But where are they now? These are dead, unreasonable bells, which would be more useful if pots and pans were put on them.
So the service is also dead and useless, it would be better to do such a thing on the juggler's plan.
248 Behold, this is the worship of Herod, who poses as if he wants to worship Christ and serve God, and there is nothing behind it. Nor does he shine so beautifully that he also deceives many holy and pious people daily, and has often deceived them, as Christ says in Matth. 24, 24, that they will lead even the elect into error; as happened to St. Bernard, Franciscus, Dominic and the like, even though they did not drown in error, nor did they remain in it, because their right faith kept them harmless through such error and carried them out.
It happened also to these pious Magis: they had a good right faith and opinion; still they erred in Herod, considered his actions right and believed his lie, were also ready to follow him in it and to be obedient, if they had not been instructed differently from heaven. So it is also happening now and has happened in such a way that many obedient to the pope, of simple mind, believe that his actions are right and good, and thus err; but their Christian faith helps them so that such poison finally does not harm them, as Christ Marc. 16, 17. 18. says: "If they drink something deadly, it shall not harm them, if they believe in my name." But what is poisonous drink but such lies and glitter of false doctrine of unrighteous worship?
Now that we have recognized Herod's worship and seen his false, treacherous glitter, let us also see his false opinion and wickedness, so that he thinks to destroy not only the right worship, but also the king, Christ, and his whole kingdom. He is subject to do this in three ways. First, with the same glaring pretence of this false worship; for such false worship is a strong and, without special grace, an insurmountable stimulus to the right worship, so that St. Paul calls it energiam erroris, a powerful effect of error; and the people cannot resist such seduction unless valiant bishops and preachers stand there, and preach the right worship alone, that is, the right worship.
Keep the people to the true word of God and promise false worship, as the prophets did among the people of Israel and were all strangled because of it. For such preaching is a sore throat, and may not be suffered by the herod, the pope, and the spiritual, holy people. It does so much harm to the purse and to the soul of so many pious people that the devil, their teacher, does not like it.
251 Secondly, he destroys him by his teaching, of which it is said above. As he teaches works instead of faith against the first commandment, God's honor and work; in the second and third commandments he suppresses and teaches his own works and presumption, also forbids faith and confessing God's name. Teaches father and mother to be disobedient, against the fourth, as said above. Teach that it is not necessary to love the enemy and do good, against the fifth. Rupture marriage, against the sixth. Robbing and stealing unjust goods and allowing the same, against the seventh. Also teaches that it is not necessary to lend and give. Summa Summarum, he teaches that it is not necessary to love God and one's neighbor from the heart. This means, of course, that the whole Scripture and worship is destroyed.
Thirdly, he is not satisfied with such a poisonous example and deadly doctrine, he goes to them and exercises two kinds of violence on them: spiritually he banishes and damns the souls that do not follow him; and physically he burns, drives out, and persecutes their bodies, goods and honor in the most terrible way. What more shall he do that may be evil? I think he is a Herod; yet he must let Christ remain and may not accomplish his will. He destroys many of them, but faith remains until the end of the world, even though it is hidden, fleeting and unknown.
253. *) But here you may ask me: How should those do to him, who are now spiritually and under herod imprisoned in false service, in monasteries and foundations? I answer: You cannot do otherwise to him, you must give up the false service and keep to God's word and the right service, or do as you have done before.
*) §§ 253 to 312 incl. have the editions a to s alone (and the Wittenberg Gesammtausgabe of 1563. D. Red.).
the magi, drink the poison in faith, so that it does not harm you. You will find no other remedy, God's word will not change forever. Although I have also spoken of this in the other gospel above, I must still speak of it.
254 We set before us one who holds hard and argues against us that a priest, monk, or nun, or any other engaged and committed man, is bound to keep his vows, and may not leave them or walk in them all his life; and he bases himself on the Scripture, which says: One should keep what one vows. But we want to speak of the vows that God has not commanded, but which man does voluntarily. For that we vow in baptism to serve God and to keep His commandments, such vows God requires of all men, of which the Scripture says Psalm 22:26: "I will fulfill my vows to God"; and Psalm 116:18: "I will pay my vows to God before all His people," and the like; but He has not commanded the vows of the clergy.
With this counterpart we want to act in two ways. First, conclude thoroughly, since there is no doubt nor disputation. Secondly, dispute with him, research and seek the truth. In the first place, no one can and should doubt that everything that goes against God's commandment, whether living or dying, pledging or becoming free, speaking or remaining silent, is to be condemned and to be left alone, to be changed and to be avoided. For the will of God is to hover above and be done in heaven and earth, as we pray, even if a man could do all miracles. This is clear and certain enough. So now there is no doubt nor dispute, but it is definitely decided: If someone is a priest, monk, nun, or otherwise commits against God's commandment, that such priesthood and monasticism is nothing at all and all condemnable, and he is obliged to leave all this and to change. As if someone were a priest or monk, only of the opinion that he wanted to steal a cup or jewel, he is certainly against divine commandment.
*) To enter, that is, to enter an order.
D. Red.
If he has become spiritual according to the commandments, he has also sinned against them, and his vow does not bind him, and he should and may become worldly again freely, or must vow again from the heart and for a good reason. For his opinion has never been that he wanted to become spiritual; but if thievery had not driven him, he would certainly not have vowed anything and would not have regarded the state; therefore God cannot accept the vow, nor is he guilty of keeping it before him.
(256) But in the sight of men it is otherwise; for there he who vows must keep his vow, though he does not mean it with his heart. For man does not see another man's heart, therefore he accepts the vow as righteous, and believes it to have come from the heart; therefore he has the right to demand the same, and may honestly plead that the vower has now changed his mind and has repented him, which he does not owe him to believe: if he has lied before, then let the damage be his. But God cannot be deceived, and He judges only according to the heart; therefore, such a vow is not valid with Him, nor does He demand it, but is angry that He is thus tempted.
257 If then a man were to be spiritual against the first and highest commandment of God in the first tablet, he would be so much more guilty of forsaking his vows than this thief who vowed against the seventh commandment in the other tablet, as much as the first tablet and the first commandment are higher than the other tablet and the seventh commandment. For he who steals against the seventh commandment steals only temporal goods, the least of all creatures. But he who acts against the first commandment robs and denies God Himself, the highest good and Creator of all creatures; that even worse are the priests and monks who act against the first commandment, than this thieving rogue against the seventh commandment. How if we could prove that almost all priests and monks become spiritual against the first commandment, and become as little divinely spiritual, or perhaps less, than such thieving, false husks become spiritual? Oh, that would be to open monasteries and convents, to cut off monks and priests. Well then, look at it and listen.
The first commandment holds Christian faith in itself, for he who does not believe may neither have nor honor God: all unbelief is idolatry. Now Christian faith, which results only from God's grace, is acquired and given to us through Christ's blood, so that no work is useful or good to obtain God's grace. For this is too high for nature, which is only conceived and born in sins, and lives, works, and dies even in them, unless Christ comes to its aid, who alone through his work, not through our work, acquires for us God's grace; and thus through him we fulfill the first commandment, and have a God on whose grace we rely with all confidence, that without our merit he forgives all sin in Christ and makes us blessed, as is often said above. Therefore, it is impossible that this faith should suffer a reliance on works apart from itself, as if through them someone should obtain forgiveness of sins and grace, become pious and blessed; for this belongs to Christ alone, who does all these things through his work, and we should only believe this and turn to him for comfort.
Therefore there is no repentance, no satisfaction for sin, no obtaining grace, no becoming blessed, but only believing in Christ, that he alone has done enough for our sin, has obtained grace, and has made us blessed. After that, first of all, do the works freely in vain, in honor of him, for the benefit of the neighbor, not to become pious or blessed by them, or to put away sin; for this must be kept by Christ alone in faith and remain intact. He does not permit any angel, let alone our works, to put away sin, to acquire grace and to make us blessed; this is due to him, he has done it and does it alone, and he also wants us to believe it; and if we believe, we also have it. Of this St. Paul says Gal. 2:21: "If any man can be saved by the law and his works, Christ died in vain"; that is, if we can do so much that God forgives our sins, gives us grace and saves us, we cannot believe Christ. Why then did he die otherwise than to atone for our sins, and to obtain grace, and that we might be saved in ourselves and in the world?
To despair of our works, to think nothing of them, to defy Christ alone, and to hold with steadfast faith that he is the man whom God looks upon for us, and by his merit alone forgives us sin, and is saved and made blessed; that is a Christian faith, of which Christ says, Marc. 16:16, "He that believeth shall be saved; and he that believeth not shall be damned."
Now let us look at the clergy, and hold them against this first commandment and Christian faith. If a man is to become a clergyman or vow a Christian order, so that he will not touch the first commandment and deny God, his heart and mind must stand and not say otherwise than thus: Well then, I will become a priest, a monk, a nun, or else I will vow, not that I consider the state or order a way to salvation, nor that by such a life I intend to become pious, to atone for sin, and to acquire God's grace; God forbid that I should do so, for that would be too close to Christ and his blood, that would destroy all his merit and honor, and would be the highest denial of God and blasphemy. For all this I will wait for him in sincere faith, that he has done for me, of which I have no doubt. But if I ever have to do anything on earth, I will accept this life, practice it, mortify my body, and serve my neighbor as another man works in the field, garden, or trade, without all attention to merit and goodness in works. Behold, where opinion is not, Christ must be denied, and the first commandment must be nullified, and vain unchristian, unbelieving, Jewish, heathenish beings must be there. This is the powerful basic saying of Paul, Rom. 14, 23: "Everything that is not of faith is sin"; for without faith no one will be saved, Marc. 16, 16. So without it there must be neither righteousness nor truth.
Tell me now, how many priests and monks do you think you will find who become and live spiritually in such a Christian opinion? Do they not almost all say: If my order should be of no more value to me to atone for sin, to become pious and to go to heaven than a farmer's plow and a tailor's thimble, what would I do with it?
Am I then in the order and priesthood? No, I will do good works, say many masses, pray and do penance for myself and other people. etc. What are these words of an unbelieving heart, which has denied Christ, and which is devoted to his order and works, which it should wait for in Christ alone through faith?
262 As has been said above, it is the opinion and teaching of all clergymen that one may obtain God's grace and put away sin by one's own works. They are so impudent that they sell, promise and communicate their good works, merit and brotherhood to others; they refrain from doing to men that which is proper to Christ alone, namely, to put away men's sins and make them godly. Christ especially proclaimed this in Matt. 24:5, saying, "Many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ." Dear one, listen to the words: Is it not so, as is now said, that our priests and monks make themselves Christ? Though none of them say with their mouth, I am Christ; yet they say, I help other people, give them my merit, obtain grace for them, put away their sin; which alone is Christ's work and office. Thus they are Christ, even though they do not call themselves Christ. For Matthew, Cap. 24, does not say that they shall say, My name is Christ; but, I am Christ: I am Christ; not the name, but the office and work of Christ do they take for themselves.
Therefore we conclude here, without all dispute, and without question or doubt, that all clergymen who are not of the Christian above-mentioned opinion, priests, monks or nuns, have certainly vowed and live contrary to the first commandment of God, and are ten times worse than the thieving false mischief, of which it is said above. And they are certainly the lost multitude, Gentiles and Jews, the devil's own, as they go and as they stand; and it is they certainly and actually of whom St. Peter says 2 Pet. 2:1, 3: "There shall be false teachers among you, denying the Lord that bought them, and in covetousness defrauding you of money with fancied words." This they also do finely; for all goods and interest have come to the clergy for their own sake.
They do this because of their false, unchristian spiritual life, which they lift up with false words.
Therefore, all those who are advised to leave plates and caps, monasteries and convents, and to stop keeping their vows, or to begin anew to vow such a life in Christian faith or opinion. For the vow made in the unchristian opinion is no longer valid before God, for so much: Behold, God, I vow to you not to be a Christian man all my life, revoke the vow of my baptism, and will now make and keep a better vow to you apart from Christ, in my own being and works. Isn't that a terrible, horrible vow? Now this is no different, as has been thoroughly enough explained from the foregoing; but these are the ones who become spiritual in the best way than one would think.
For the great multitude who become priests and monks for the sake of their bellies, that they may be provided for in time, of which there are several now, are not worthy to be dealt with, much less that their vows should count for anything: they may become worldly if they wish, but they have never become or been spiritual. And it would be necessary for them to stop mocking God with their monkey play, to give up their prebendaries, fiefdoms, parishes, and monasticism and nunnery. O Lord God, how surely blind is the world! how perverse is it! The world is now spiritual, the clergy are the world. How strong is the regiment of the end of Christ.
266 On the other, let us now dispute and put: Although someone of Christian opinion has become righteously spiritual, whether he does not have the power, if the cause demands it, to become worldly again? Here I request that only pious, honest minds listen, who are not quick to judge, but are eager to learn the reason. For there is nothing to be said to the mad papists and Herodists, no one can argue with them; they can do no more than cover their ears, clench their teeth and shout: Heretic, heretic, heretic! Fire, fire, fire! Let us leave them as nonsensical and talk to those who want to have their own and other people's consciences taught.
267. It is ever irrefutable that a Christian's opinion of becoming spiritual, as stated above, is that it does not become spiritual because the state is useful and necessary to eradicate sin, to acquire grace, to become pious, to serve God especially, and to become blessed; For these are qualities of the common Christian faith alone, which nowhere but in Christ waits for such goods, but, free and free of such unchristian delusion, thinks only of accepting a good exercise of the body in this life. It is also irrefutable that God does not accept vows or spiritual status, unless in such a Christian opinion; for St. Paul stands strong here and says Rom. 14, 23: "Everything that is not done by faith is sin." "But God may not accept sin", Ps. 5, 5. and Hab. 1, 13. Since God does not accept such vows and status other than as free and unnecessary for salvation, and Christian opinion does not begin or vow anything else, I would like to hear him who could thoroughly and with honest reason deny that a clergyman may again become worldly without harm to his soul, with a good conscience before God, especially if he has cause to do so.
268 Because it is often said that it is not customary, that holy fathers have also done and written otherwise, everyone can see that nothing concludes. We do not ask here what custom does, or what the writings of the fathers will; but what is pleasing and right in the sight of God. Who can assure us that custom is not wrong and that the fathers did not err? For Christ proclaims in Matt. 24:24 that even the elect will be deceived by false Christians, as the spiritual ones are. Say what you will, for it cannot be added up that something should be freely and unnecessarily begun or vowed before God and conscience for the salvation of souls, and yet not be abandoned, but must be kept until death in case of loss of salvation. The two are strictly against each other; think for yourself.
A Christian vow to become spiritual must be like this before God: See,
Dear God, I vow to you to keep this life, which is free by nature and without need for bliss. Shouldn't God answer here: "Well, what do you vow to me and what do you keep? Do you not have enough necessary things to keep? You promise me nothing, except that you may keep it and leave it again. Well, I will let that happen. And so the vow naturally excludes before God that spiritual life remains free to keep and to leave; just as if your servant vowed to you and said: Lord, I vow to you this remaining day a free service, which I may do and leave, the other days I am obligated to you because of necessity etc. Here I mean that if the servant did or did not do as he pleased, he would have done enough for his vow.
(270) I cannot understand otherwise than that all spiritual vows are like this, for the reason that faith makes all things free, and it is impossible that anything should be necessary or made necessary for salvation, either by ourselves, angels, or all creatures, except faith alone. And this is the freedom that Christ has purchased for us; of which St. Paul teaches to the Galatians Cap. 5, 1. and says against all human doctrine: "Stand fast in freedom, so that Christ may redeem us." Therefore, all spiritual vows must naturally retain in themselves the freedom to let go of the same life, and thus read: I vow to God and to you chastity, poverty, obedience, according to the rule of St. Augustine, to keep and leave freely until death.
Here, perhaps, someone should start laughing and say: This would be a foolish, ridiculous vow, and a pure jugglery and spookiness. I answer: Don't be surprised if people do ridiculous and foolish things, if they follow their own way out of God's order, and do what they think is good, not what God's word teaches. Such a vow is ridiculous, foolish and void; but with it, God's wrath is nevertheless fulfilled and countless souls are deceived, so that hardly any of the elect escape it.
272. people have such vows and
*) Starn, that is, Staar, blindness. D. Red.
For in former times, when the youth was taken up to be taught and brought up in the Christian way, as should now be done in the schools, they were allowed to remain free for a time in discipline; then some remained in it willingly all their lives and got into the habit that a few ran away from the collection, but generally all remained in it to the end; so in the end monasteries and convents grew out of it. Since the masters became lazy and the youth unruly, they invented these ropes and chains of vows, caught the consciences with them, got rid of the worry and fuss, so that each one had to urge himself to be and remain chaste and pious for the sake of the bond of his vow; just as in the high schools also the cursed way reigns, with oaths and vows to ward off and execute all things, entangling the poor youth so shamefully without any trouble.
Thus the free Christian schools have become stables of misery and monasteries, and faith has been converted into works, and freedom has been destroyed and imprisoned by vows; therefore it is no wonder that when Christian freedom shines forth again, human vows are regarded as ridiculous and foolish. Christian freedom can now never exist with fearful vows of outward works. The two one must give way, that is in vain. Faith makes all outward things free; vows bind them: how then can they both remain at the same time? Thus faith is divine, vows are human; therefore it is not possible that God should abandon faith and look to our vows. Therefore it is also not possible that he who sins against God or breaks his vows remains a priest, monk or nun as long as he wants, and becomes worldly when he wants.
274 We still want to discuss this to comfort the wretched prisoners of conscience, who have been crushed under this herod and end-Christ. I assume that the vows are made in a Christian manner, and that they are necessary to keep; what will one say to that, if one would find it impossible to keep them? I take before me that which is most apparent, namely, the vow of the
Chastity, which one sees before one's eyes, as it is impossible for the more part to keep; even where there is not special grace, nature is much too small to keep.
Moses wrote much about the natural flow of man and woman, both awake and asleep, of which no one is now allowed to speak publicly; so much purer have our ears become than the mouth of the Holy Spirit: shame on us when there is nothing to be ashamed of, and shame on us when there is something to be ashamed of; surely it would be necessary for everyone to know and be taught about this, especially the youth. Where there is no heavenly, high grace, nature must flow after its own kind; if man and woman do not come together, it goes its own way and is unruly; that it would be better if male and female were together than God has created and nature gives. Many teachings and books have been written about this; if God would help, everything would be well written.
276 So I ask: How shall one advise such a one, to whom it is impossible to keep? If you say that one should defend oneself with prohibitions, then one of the three will follow, because there is no great mercy: male and female will run together where they like, as now happens among the priests; or nature will solve itself; or where none happens, there will be an eternal burning and secret suffering. Then you have made a devil's torture, and it happens that the man would take the ugliest woman on earth, woman would take the unfunniest man on earth, because of the raging evil lust of the flesh.
Forgive me, and chaste ears shall forgive me; I must reach into the sickness of the soul, as a physician into the dunghill and secret place, if I should advise otherwise. Now God does not like and does not want forced, unwilling chastity, nor is chastity before Him, unless it is willing, as all other services must be willing, or He does not respect it. What do you do, then, that you keep this poor man in unchaste chastity all his life? that he sins with his heart against his vows without ceasing, and perhaps it would be better if the little man had
sometimes a damsel and the damsel a boy with him.
Here, some teach that it is enough for someone to willingly begin chastity and vow that this will help, even if he becomes unwilling, so that in the power of the willing beginning, no harm will come. O deceivers and blind leaders, that you judge God's service by the work and not by the spirit. It is in vain all that is done unwillingly would be better left alone. For it may happen that when male and female are together, they have lesser flames and desires than when male and female are together: but the greater the desires, the greater is the sin of unchastity. So these three kinds of people may not find a council; the pope lets them flow, burn and torture as they can; that I respect, they are the children who were sacrificed and burned to the fiery idol Moloch in the people of Israel.
Thus you say: How shall I do otherwise to him? It is not fitting to marry them because of the vow, since the Scripture says, Vovete et reddite: vow and keep. I wanted to have this answer. Now you answer me again, "It is not proper for them to marry," you say; "Why then is it proper for them to marry, to flow and to burn? Is not the vow here more grievously broken than if they were wedded? How fine this helps the vow, that you refuse the marriage, and see that you can't refuse the bastards, and the flowing, and the burning. I mean, that is to leave the beam in the eye and to pull out the stick.
280 Yes, you say, the man may finally leave the woman and live chastely, which he may not do in marriage. Dear, give me some examples of this. It happens sooner that married people abstain and willingly, than such people; but let that pass until another time. Here answer me: St. Augustine sets in his rule that his brothers shall not go alone, but two and two; this I have vowed unto death; well then, I am caught and forced to be alone, tell me, where is my vow? If I am to keep my vow here, I must let myself be killed before I suffer to be alone. But how, if they
not want to kill and keep by force alone, my vow must ever be broken, or must have resolved in itself at all times this addition: I vow to keep the rule in this and this piece as much as I can.
281 Further: I vow to pray, wear clothes and other such things as a rule. Well, I get sick, have to lie in bed and cannot keep any; where is the commandment here: Vovete et reddite: Vow and keep? It does not help me that I am sick; for God's commandment is to be kept unchanged, whether dying, living, sick or well. What do you want to say to this? It is not a matter of making loose, lazy, unfounded excuses; we are dealing with serious matters, in which the salvation of souls is at stake, since one should respond honestly, correctly and thoroughly. Therefore, if you want to say: If I am trapped and forced to be alone, and if I am sick that I cannot keep the other parts, it is enough that I have the will to keep and do against the rule with unwillingness, God looks at the will, where the deed may not follow. Dear, this does not help; my vow is made to the deed, and does not understand the will alone, but the work described in the rule.
Therefore, if the work does not follow, the vow is broken, or the vow excludes the case of inability. Otherwise I would also take a wife and say: I would like to keep chastity with will, and do it unwillingly; but it is impossible for me, my nature forces, catches and wins me. Who is there in all the world who would not rather live chastely and without a wife, where he could as well as he would? You must speak differently about this.
Now, if in other things the impossibility (as no one can deny) is reserved in spiritual vows, and no one sins if he never fulfills the vow all his life because of the impossibility, I would like to hear the reason honestly why chastity alone must be kept, whether it is possible or impossible, and not also in the vow the addition should be reserved: I vow chastity as much as it is possible for me.
If we want to speak without foul faces, we must say that either the impossible chastity, like the other impossible pieces, is never vowed; or no monk on earth has ever come. For there has never been one who has not once fallen ill, or otherwise been prevented from having to leave some parts of his rule, which is nevertheless contrary to his vow.
284 Above all this, it is the unanimous custom of all of them that they generally leave such things free in the power of the ruler, so that the latter may dispense with his subordinates and charge them to keep in whatever way he pleases; not only for reasons of impossibility, but also for convenience, and as it seems good to him; which is, after all, contrary to the vows, where the vows are to be understood without any addition. For what you vow to God to keep, of course, no creature will take from you. Now you vow the whole rule, and your prelate exalts you in whatever part he wants or you need; that without doubt all monks' vows can be regarded as if this were their content: I vow to keep the rule as far as is possible for me and pleasing to my prelate. If this is not the content and opinion of the vow, then all orders and monasteries are false and damned; or no monk has ever been on earth. For no one has ever believed and respected this point otherwise. Why then should not a prelate have power to give a brother leave to become worldly and conjugal, seeing the fiery and troubled temptation of the flesh torment him? If he cannot let up the vow of chastity, how does he let up all the others? But if he can forbear the others, why not also chastity, if it has more cause than the others?
That is why they divided the vows into substantialia and accidentalia, that is, some vows are movable, some immovable. Of the immovable ones they made three, poverty, chastity and obedience. The other ones, all with the whole rule and order, they call movable.
How is the devil such a wicked rogue and full of a thousandfold cunning? If we ask them here, for what reason they have such subterfuge?
and who gave them the authority to do so; they may say nothing else, but that they do it by their own authority, without any reason or cause. For when they saw that it was impossible for them to vow an order or rule, and that it would not be kept, they thought, "Well, what shall we do now, since all this is vowed and not kept? If they are all to be condemned, then no monk is in the state of blessedness, and all orders and rules would be nothing else but vain, impossibly foolish things. We want to do this to him, we want to exclude three pieces, which shall be called immovable, and whoever does not keep the same, that he is damned; the others shall be called movable and immovable: and so it happened, so they also keep, use and teach all of them. But hold your peace, dear sirs, we have something to talk to you about.
If it is true that you have power to make mobile and immobile, you also have power to condemn and to save people. But tell me, how can I be sure that such a division of yours is right and pleases God? Who will satisfy and assure my conscience when it is urged by these commandments? Commandment: Vovete et reddite? Do you think that it will be enough for me that you divide in this way, or that you show how it should not be done? No, your dividing and not keeping will not be enough for me against this storm: Vovete et reddite. I have not vowed the immovable alone, but the whole rule with movable and immovable. The supreme judge will not suffer me to change his word and say: Omnia vovete, aliqua reddite (Vow all, keep some); but he will say: Quodcunque voveris, redde. Et iterum: Redde vota tua (What you vow, keep. And again: Pay your vow).
Therefore, this exclusion of the three vows is certainly an erroneous and seductive thing, invented out of human discretion, or all vows must be equally flexible; for they are equally vowed, required by the same commandment, and must also be kept or not kept in the same way. What may you say to this, dear sirs? You will say: It is impossible and vain thing, where it is thus
is done for spiritual life. This is also true: we are fools; we vow, do not know what we vow, want to help ourselves, and make possible, impossible, to keep, to leave, movable, immovable, what we think. But the Supreme will not allow us to do this; he will not let his commandment weave to and fro according to our will.
You have learned this from the pope, who also takes this commandment of God: Vovete et reddite, and pulls it as far as he wants. He wants to take all vows, without chastity and devotion, to Nom, to St. Jacob and Jerusalem, and shall now gain such understanding of God's commandment: Vow to keep chastity and chastity at St. Jacob's at Nome and Jerusalem; otherwise you must not keep your vows. Behold, thus shall God's commandment be in His power, what to keep or not to keep. O accursed abominatio (abomination), how insolent, how sacrilegious is thy pride against thy God. But what reason and cause has he for this? None other than that chastity and pilgrimage are great things, but the other things are small. Behold, the senseless fool and blasphemer, who dissolves God's commandment when it commands a small thing, and teaches to keep it when it commands a great thing: the same stiff-necked, straight against Christ, Matt. 5:19: "He that dissolves one of the least commandments, and teacheth men so, shall be the least in heaven." As the pope, what is small thing, thou shalt not keep, and we resolve on the commandment, Vovete et reddite, in all small things: so do the ministers, his children, as their father teaches them, say: Vovete et reddite (Vow and keep) the three immovable vows; but, Vovete et non reddite (Vow and keep not) the movable vows. Then see if the spiritual state is not the devil's own rule and nature, founded on vain lies and blasphemy.
Not so, dear man, be it small or great, what is comprehended in God's commandments should and must be kept. Here one must judge not by the works, but by the commandment: you must not see whether the work is great, small, kept or unkept; but only whether it is commanded. If it is commanded, then there is no more slackness, unless
as it may be. For Christ says: Not one jot or tittle shall pass from the law; all must be done. But the pope with his disciples does not take only iota and tittle from this commandment: Vovete et reddite, but letter, text, sense and everything together.
291 The clergy may not deny that they vow all movable vows and are understood under the word vovete; for they call them vota, vows, although they make movable ones of them. So they can never deny that they are obliged to keep them, and must also remain under the word reddite. Otherwise you might be hostile to your neighbor in your heart and say that you are not obliged to love him, but that it is enough that you do not kill him, and so keep the great part of the fifth commandment and leave out the smallest. So from now on we would like to divide all of God's commandments into great and small, or into movable and immovable works, and say that we do not owe to keep the small or movable ones. Let God be foremost, even though the pope holds and teaches this with the high schools, which, unfortunately, is followed by the clergy.
What do we want to do here? Shall the clergy hold all their vows and rules to be immovable, which of them will be saved? Do you want to condemn and reject them all? I would not like to condemn any of them; I would much rather that they all ran away from the monasteries again or became spiritual in another way. In that way they must certainly all be condemned, if they tear and stretch God's word according to their will. That is why I have disputed all this, so that I irrefutably enforce that either all vows must be movable, or all must be immovable, and quite the same, one as the other. And if one of them may be relinquished with a good conscience for cause, then chastity and all the others may and shall be relinquished where necessity and cause demand it. I hope that I have thus shut the mouths of all the adversaries, so that they will be stunned and will not know how to answer.
293 Because we now see publicly,
That the impossible ones be remitted, even by the holy people, and God does not require them of them, I have decided that no vow before God shall be accepted otherwise, nor may be done otherwise, except with the reservation and opinion: if it is possible and pleases the prelates; so that we may give wives and husbands to all young monks and nuns and make them worldly again, where it is necessary for them, and cannot keep them with a good conscience and divine favor and will; so that we may bring the monasteries back to their old, first, original reformation and nature, that they may be Christian schools, where boys and maidens are taught discipline, honor and the faith, after which they may remain free until death, or as long as they wish; and God has never looked at them differently, nor willed them otherwise.
294 Let's have another meeting with them, so that we can see how completely confused, bottomless the spiritual being is. I assume that their dream is true about the three immovable vows, which are poverty, chastity and obedience. Poverty is of two kinds, spiritual and corporal. Of the spiritual, Christ says Matt. 5:3, "Blessed are the poor in spirit," which is that a man is left alone and willing to do without all goods, and has a separate desire for them in his heart, whether he has much good and reigns, as Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and all devout Christians. This poverty is common to all Christians, vowed in baptism, and is not vowed by the clergy; for their vow requires that Christian, evangelical, common poverty be there first.
295. physical is not to possess or have any good externally. This is not possible, nor did Christ command it or keep it; for man cannot live without temporal food and clothing. Therefore they have interpreted it to mean that physical poverty is having nothing of one's own. This poverty was described by Lucas Apost. 4, 34 in the apostles. Christ also held it; for his bag, which Judas carried, was common to all the apostles. John Cap. 12, 6. does not say that Judas carried Christ's bag, but rather: "He had the bag, and what was given, that he carried.
He": these words prove that the bag was common to all. Otherwise he would have said that he had Christ's bag and carried what was given to Christ.
Now look, St. Bonaventure became a cardinal; Eugenius, the pope, was St. Bernard's disciple; and many clergymen have become bishops and popes. Tell me, where is the vow of their poverty? They are ever holy. And if the vow had not been flexible and free before God, they would certainly have been condemned, as those who have not kept their vow until death. Now, popes, cardinals, bishops have their own goods and do with them what they want; which is strictly against the vow of poverty. Thus, the papal, cardinal, and bishop's office is considered by everyone as worldly in comparison with the monks' office.
297 Do you mean to say that they have followed obedience and have risen to a more perfect state, and have not their own goods but the goods of the churches among them? Dear, see, what you say, are these not vain words? But do you mean to smear my mouth with them? Not so, dear brother! First of all, obedience to one side, obedience to the other; keeping vows is God's commandment and God's obedience, from which even an angel is not to be obeyed; as St. Paul says Gal. 1, 8. and Peter Apost. 5, 29: "One must be more obedient to God than to men." Now if they have gone out of God's obedience for the sake of Pabst's obedience, they have gone out of heaven into hell. No, you do not have to throw God's commandment and obedience to me like that. For so I would also say, that thou mightest step out of the vow of chastity for the sake of the Pabst, and transgress all the commandments of God. If you transgress one commandment of God for the sake of man, you may transgress them all.
Secondly: Even if the rank of cardinal, pope, and bishop were a perfect rank, it is not to be stepped out of God's commandment. For apart from God's commandment there is no state, let alone a perfect state, but only error and seduction. Perfection is not contrary to God's commandment, yes, it goes alone in God's commandments, and breaks none, but keeps them all together. See,
With what great lies and falsehoods do the people go about that they do not know what and what they are talking about, making perfection apart from God's commandment and wanting to cancel God's commandment with it. But since the papal, cardinal, and bishop's dignity is a purely lordly dignity, the most imperfect, we will not receive these saints, for we confess that all vows before God last only for a time and are free to change, as we see this vow of poverty changed here. Why then should chastity not also change out of necessity and cause, if it is not vowed higher than poverty? But let it be that such saints have entered into a perfect state from the vow of poverty, then you must admit to me that the marital state is perfect against the state of unchastity or against impossible chastity, as St. Paul 1 Cor. 7, 9. says: "It is better to be free than to burn." It is ever better to lie with a legitimate wife than with an illegitimate one, or to flow, or to burn. Well then, let all who keep an unchaste chastity and an imperfect, unwilling state of chastity enter into this perfect state of marriage; or if you do not want to do so, your excuse of the perfect state is not valid either.
299 Thirdly: How can you be so bold as to say that the vow of poverty is not broken because they do not trade their own goods but those of the church? If this were so, what would they be better than a secular house servant or magistrate? Why do you not consider them to be spiritual because they do not govern their own goods? They are vain, lazy theidings. But it is not true, the bishops have goods as their own, and their nature, considered against the clergy, is a thousand miles unequal, because of poverty. Therefore, nothing can be raised here; one must confess that poverty is vowed no further, for as far as the prelate wills or demands cause, we want to preserve the saints otherwise.
And what needs much circumlocution? It is obvious that a spiritual man pledges only the childish, servile poverty that lies in the fact that he has no goods in his hands, but is a subject and takes what is given to him.
But as soon as he comes into the regency, that he presides over others and distributes goods, he is no longer in the vow of poverty, until he is deposed and becomes a subject again. For what is the difference between such a regent and a secular head of household or bailiff, as far as the goods are concerned, to have, to use, to govern, to divide? They are only fictitious words, as St. Peter says, whatever else is said about them, basically it is a completely secular office, work and status. Therefore, we see how God does not take the vows other than freely and flexibly; otherwise no monastery would have to have a prelate: that necessity forces the monasteries to keep schools and exercises for young people.
Similarly, obedience cannot and may not be understood in any other way than filial and servile obedience, for the words of the vow clearly express obedience to the abbot or prior. When one becomes a bishop or prelate, where is the vow of obedience? One must now be obedient to him and he is not obedient.
But if you want to make your lazy excuse here, that such a one enters into a higher obedience, or keeps the heart willing to become obedient again, all this is already misplaced; for it is said: Vovete et reddite: against the words there is no gloss, God does not want His commandment to be torn apart, neither for high, middle nor low obedience. So it is obvious that clergymen do not vow heart submission, but bodily submission; for heart submission is common to all Christians toward everyone, as St. Paul Rom. 12, 10: "You should respect one another, so that each may be the superior of the other. Now, however, the monasteries must not have prelates, nor must they be able to give bishops, or the vowed submissiveness ends with the vow. Therefore, see how finely these two vows are called immovable, how they deal with fables and invented words. God also lets his saints vow and live in this way, tolerating their foolishness: but he does not take the immovable vows, as you see from all this dispute; for they are contrary to Christian liberty and all good order, only that the
So the evil spirit should and must have its way with the unbelievers and work its foolish work in them, as St. Paul teaches.
So there remains the one vow of chastity, which alone must remain immovable, unshakeable, which should be the most free and most flexible. In all others one says: Vovete et non reddite (Vow and do not keep it); here alone it is iron and steel; Vovete et reddite (Vow and keep). Is it not an abominable perversion? But the evil spirit did it so that he would keep the souls the stronger in unchastity, and fast there, where they are weakest and good to keep; seeing well that all other vows might be kept more easily. Therefore he did not insist on them, but he insisted on this impossible thing alone, so that he would be sure of his tyranny. Oh Lord God, what a spook and monkey game he plays with the spiritual state.
So in the whole spiritual nature we find nothing solid, certain and stable; everything still wavers and moves without Scripture and reason, so that it would be sufficient to leave everything and run away, the only cause being that there is no Scriptural foundation, and that there is such manifold error and lies in the main things. 24, by Paul 2 Tim. 3, by Petro 2 Ep. 2. so severely condemned and cursed, that if you had made ten vows, because you see that it is done in the devil's doing and against God, you would be guilty of resigning, or ever vowing in a new free way, as is said above.
They have one thing that they raise: They were holy fathers in the spiritual state. But against this they should be afraid that Christ says: The elect may be deceived by them; as here the Magi were deceived by Herod, and the examples much more. The three men, Hananiah, Azariah, Mishael, remained in the furnace of Babylon. Naaman of Syria remained pious in the temple of the idol alone. Joseph remained devout in Egypt. What shall I say? St. Agnes remained chaste in the common women's house and the martyrs remained holy in dungeons, and still daily Christians remain pious in the flesh, in the world, in the midst of devils;
Should he not have been able to keep Franciscus, Bernard and their like in the midst of error, and if they had sometimes erred, lead them out again?
He has allowed almost no great saint to live without error. Moses and Aaron, Miriam, David, Solomon, Hezekiah, and many more, he has caused to stumble, so that no one should ever rely on the mere examples of the saints and works without scripture. But we plump for what we only see and hear of saints, then we fall on it, and generally meet that which they as men have infirmly erred. Then error must be a thorough truth to us, and so we build on the crooked wall, of which Psalm 62:4, 5: "How do you fall down on the man, you will kill yourselves; just as on a sloping wall, and on crumbling walls; but they have thought to show him up, only seek how they lie: with the mouth they praise, but with the heart they malign" etc.
But if all other things were good in the spiritual state, the abuse of the mass would be enough to make one flee from it where one hears it called. I consider that such abuse of the high sacrament is reserved for this state, as the worst, most pernicious and most abominable that has come on earth, and will be the greatest and last among the evil ones. Then they make of the mass a sacrifice and good work, which they sell to the people and endow all interest on it. Oh, the terrible perversion! What wrath should it not deserve? If God wanted that all the private and angular mestas were removed, then there would be a hope that God would be a little more merciful to us. But now we are blinded, we think we are doing great sin if we let the masses fall; and presuming to propitiate and serve God with such abominable abuse, there is no end to wrath, and all our prayer becomes vain sin, as Psalm 109:7 proclaimed. There should be only one mass a day and it should be treated as a common sacrament; indeed, only one mass a week would be even better. But the thing is not to be advised, it is too deeply settled.
308 I want to have done this run-out
I do not care if the clergy will be angry and cry out against me. I would rather they were angry than Christ. I know myself guilty of advising and helping the wretched consciences and souls, of sharing with everyone what God has given me; I will not leave the guilt on me. Whoever does not receive it, I will not answer for him: he looks to himself, he has my faithful service and advice there; if I could do more, I would do more for him. Become and remain spiritual, whoever will; but whoever wants to be saved, let him see to it that he becomes Christian, and let clergymen be clergymen.
Perhaps here the chaste hearts and holy priests of God, who like nothing without what they themselves speak and write, will open their mouths and say: Oh, how the monk is oppressed by his habit, how he would like to have a wife. But let them only blaspheme and have their courage, the chaste hearts and great saints; let them be iron and stone, as they cast themselves up: only do not deny that you are a man who has flesh and blood; let God then judge between the angelic strong heroes and you sick despised sinner. I hope that I have come so far that I can remain as I am by God's grace, although I am not yet over the mountain and do not dare to compare myself to the chaste hearts; I would also be sorry and God would graciously protect me from this. For if you knew who they are, who pretend to be so chaste and show discipline, and what St. Paul says in Eph. 5:12: "What they do secretly is also shameful to say": you would not consider their highly praised chastity worthy of a bride to wipe her shoes on. Here, too, the reversal goes, that the chaste are the unchaste, and all that glitters is deceptive.
Dear boy, do not be ashamed that you desire a maiden, and that the maiden desires a boy; only let it come to marriage, not to fornication, and it will be no more a disgrace to you than eating and drinking is a disgrace. Chastity shall be a virtue, which therefore goeth forth in the wondrous works of God; as, if a man eat not, neither shall he eat.
drink. It is above the healthy nature, let alone the sinful depraved nature. God did not let many virgins live long, but hastened with them fresh from the world, as, Cecilia, Agnes, Lucia, Agatha and their like; he knows well how noble the treasure is and can hardly be preserved long. If in any city there were five boys and five maidens, twenty years old, completely pure, who had felt nothing full of natural flux, I could say that Christianity would be better than in the times of the apostles and martyrs.
O Lord God, I fear that by no other means could unchastity have broken down more and more horribly than by such commandments and vows of chastity. What a Sodom and Gomorrah the devil has created by such commandments and vows, and has made the strange chastity so completely common to unfortunate misery. Neither common women's houses, nor no irritation is so harmful, as these commandments and vows, invented by the devil himself.
312 Now here I say, what boys and maidens have become spiritual before they have felt what flesh and blood is, as there are of fifteen, sixteen, twenty years, they should only be torn out quickly if they desire it; for their vow is nothing at all, as if a child had vowed it. Here is not to be seen the carnival consecration, whether he has priest, deacon, or otherwise a holy order. It is a jugglery with the consecration and counts for nothing before God. That's enough of that, now come back to our things, since we have left it.
When the Magi came from Herod and returned to Bethlehem, the star appeared to them again, and they were very happy. This always happens when the heart, after the error and deception of human doctrine, returns to the knowledge of the truth and the gospel; it immediately gets rid of Herod, and sees how certain and light the way of truth is in contrast to the pretense that the Herodists put forward; then the heart also becomes glad. For the gospel is a comforting teaching that leads us out of human presumption into the confidence of God's pure grace, as Ps. 4:7, 8.
says: "Lord, let the light of your countenance shine upon us; with it you give joy to my heart."
Again, all who walk in the doctrines of men and in their own ability lead a hard and fearful life, and yet are of no use. What heart should not rejoice when it sees how the Pabst's rule is a vain trouble and burden to consciences, and deceives all the world with its appearance. The divine light and truth has the nature to align the consciences, to comfort the hearts and to make the spirit free; just as the teachings of men naturally depress the consciences, torture the hearts and extinguish the spirit.
315) Above this, the star goes before them, does not leave them until it brings them to Christ, and does not go further, but remains above, where the child is. So does the light of the holy gospel, which is like a bright lucerna in the darknesses, as St. Peter calls it 2 Petr. 1, 19, and goes before us, leading us, if only we cling to it with firm faith, not leaving us until it brings us to Christ and the truth; neither does it go further, for apart from Christ it teaches nothing.
316) So in this star is signified the manner and works of this gospel, and by the magic of all believers: that as the star led them bodily to Christ, and they followed him bodily, so the gospel leads men's hearts spiritually in this world, and believing hearts see it, and follow it gladly, until they come to Christ. Thus St. Paul boasts in 1 Cor. 2, 2: "I made myself believe that I knew nothing when I was with you, except Jesus Christ alone, and Him crucified. And Col. 2, 8. he forbids us to follow any teaching that does not teach Christ. What is this but that this star alone teaches Christ and nothing else? Thus, in this figure, all the doctrines of men are condemned, and no more should be preached to Christians than the pure, clear, single light of the gospel, and we are to follow the same star alone. Therefore also here pope, bishop, priests, monks with all their regiment and doctrine are condemned as Herod's tyranny to be avoided.
317 Also, the papists and heroes are given the
They have shut their mouths and punished their lies honestly, because they teach with wanton outrage: one should wait for the Christian church and the faith with them; and whoever does not hear them should be considered as not hearing the Christian church. They want to be the sign and the star that leads to Christ and the truth; but it is false and untruthful. If you want to know where Christ and the truth are, learn from this history. Do not look at the pope, not at the bishops, not at the high schools and monasteries; do not be deceived that they preach much, pray, sing and say mass; do not ask that they sit in the place of the apostles and hold spiritual office: all this may deceive and deceive without ceasing; they err and teach error. There is no more than one certain sign, whereby thou mayest know where Christ and his church are, which is this sterile thing, the holy gospel; all else is false and erroneous.
But where the Gospel is preached, there this star shines, there Christ is certainly, there you will certainly find the Church, be it in Turkey, Russia, Bohemia, or wherever. It is not possible that God's word should be, and God, Christ and the Holy Spirit should not be there. Again, it is not possible that God, Christ, the Holy Spirit, the Church, or something blessed should be there, since God's word does not read it, even if they would do all miracles; but there must be vain Herodists and devils' regiments. Now everyone sees how the pope and the clergy deal only with human doctrines without God's word.
They went into the house and found the child with Mary, his mother, and fell down and worshipped him.
This house is the Christian church, the assembly of all believers on earth, in which alone you find Christ and his mother; for in the Christian church alone are they who, pregnant and fruitful by the Holy Spirit, give birth to Christianity and lead a Christian life. Everything that is outside this house, however beautiful it may be, however reasonable it may be, neither Christ nor his mother is there, that is, there is no Christian life there.
ches may not be without faith and the Holy Spirit.
Therefore, if the pope, bishop, or whoever it is, asks you to look at them, if you want to see the church, remember this gospel and look for the star; be sure, where the star is not above, there is certainly not the house where Christ and his mother are found, that is, where the gospel does not hover and shine, there is certainly not the Christian church. You will not miss this star; you will never really find it without it. It leads to this house and remains above it: thus the gospel brings you into the church and also remains above the church, stands firm, cannot be driven away by any persecution; it shines freely and publicly, so that all its enemies are put off; as we see all this fulfilled in the apostles, martyrs, all saints, and still daily where it is preached.
And they have handed over their treasures and offered him gold, frankincense and myrrh.
All physical sacrifices in the Law of Moses, and where they occurred, signify the spiritual sacrifice, of which Heb. 13:15 says: "Let us offer through Him always the sacrifice of praise to God," that is, the fruit of the mouth that confesses His name. And Hos. 14:2, 3: "Return, O Israel, to God your Lord; for you have fallen in your sins. Take words with you, and turn to God, and say unto him, Take away from us all sin, and lay hold on good:" that is, let go the evil which thou hast brought upon us by thine hand, and take good in thine hand, which thou hast given us: "Then will we offer unto thee the calves of our mouth," that is, praise and thanksgiving. These are the right calves to offer unto thee; of which also Ps. 51:20, 21: "O Lord, do good by thy grace, O Zion, that the walls of Jerusalem may be built up. Then you will receive the sacrifices; then they will offer calves on your altar"; item Ps. 50, 7-15: "Listen, Israel: I am your God, I do not have to punish you because of your sacrifice. What will you sacrifice to me? Shall I eat veal and drink goat's blood? If I were hungry, I would not say much to you. But the world is mine, all the birds
of the air and all the animals of the earth, all that you can sacrifice to me is already before me. Offer to your God the sacrifice of praise, and keep to him what you have vowed to him. The sacrifice of praise honors me rightly, and that is the way to blessedness." From these sayings it is clear that the sacrifice, if it is to be pleasing in the sight of God, should be praise and thanksgiving, or ever not without praise and thanksgiving. And where it is without praise and thanksgiving, He does not want and does not like it, as He also says Isa. 1, 11: "What is your sacrifice to Me: I do not want your smoking."
We can give nothing else to God, for everything is already His and we have everything from Him: only praise, thanks and honor can we give Him. This is also what Ps. 116:12, 13 means: "What shall I pay God for all the good things He has given me? I will take the healing cup and call upon God's name. Thou hast broken my bands; therefore will I offer unto Thee the sacrifice of praise." Now praise is nothing else than confessing the good deed received from God, and not ascribing it to us, but to Him alone, and carrying it home again. And this same praising and confessing is done in two ways: once before God alone, the other time before men; and is actually a work and fruit of faith; of which St. Paul teaches Rom. 10:9, 10: "With the heart one believes, and thereby is justified; but with the mouth one confesses, and thereby is saved. For if thou shalt confess with thy mouth that Jesus is the Lord, and shalt believe with thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved." As if St. Paul were to say: "This is not the right faith, that you would secretly believe in Christ in your heart and praise Him in the corner; you must freely confess Him with your mouth before everyone, just as you believe in your heart. This will soon be the end of your neck. For such confession the devil and man cannot hear, and the cross is bound to such confession; as you see that even now pope, bishop, priests, monks cannot hear Christ's word nor suffer, that the prophet says: "I will take the cup that can be healed and call upon God's name. As if he should say: "If I praise and confess God, they will drink me with the cup of Mary".
I will accept it in God's name, and will not be silent in praising God: it will not harm me, but will heal me and help me to salvation; this is also the intention of Christ Marc. 8, 38: "Whoever is ashamed of me and my words before this sinful and adulterous generation, the Son of Man will also be ashamed of them when he comes in the glory of his Father with his holy angels.
323 Many have interpreted these three sacrifices, one in a different way, the other in a different way, but they all generally stick to the fact that they are three different confessions. Therefore, let us take what seems to us to be the best of all. The gold offering, they say, means that they confess Christ to be king; the incense, that he is a priest; the myrrh, that he died and was buried. All three pieces are supposed to rhyme with Christ according to mankind, so that he is God and for the sake of the Godhead such things have happened to mankind.
First, the Christian faith confesses and praises that Christ is King and Lord over all things, according to the saying Ps. 8:7: "You have made Him Lord over the works of your hands, and have put all things under His feet," and Ps. 110:1: "God has said to my Lord, sit at My right hand, until I put Your enemies at Your footstool. This confession in the right faith is a high, mighty defiance and arrogance of all believers in Christ against everything that is against them, be it, as Saint Paul says Rom. 8, 35: sword, famine, frost and all creatures. Who will harm or frighten a Christian if he offers this gold, believes and confesses that his Lord Christ is also Lord of death, hell, devils and all creatures, and that everything is in his hands, even under his feet?
(325) He that hath a gracious prince feareth not any thing that is under the same prince, and defieth, and glorieth, and confesseth the grace and power of his Lord. How much more does a Christian man defy and boast against torment, death, hell, the devil, and say comfortingly to him, "What may you do to me? Art thou not under the feet of my Lord? Defy and devour me without his will. Behold, such a free heart makes this golden sacrifice. O how strange is
which has now been done; therefore it is very comforting, if anything frightens or harms you, that you go out verbally and confess Christ, saying, Omnia subjecisti sub pedibus ejus: All things are under his feet, who then will be against me?
326 Secondly: Incense is used for worship according to the Law of Moses, to burn incense in the temple, which is part of the priestly office. Therefore, offering incense is nothing other than confessing Christ as a priest who mediates between God and us, as St. Paul says in Romans 8:34, that he speaks for us and mediates before God, which is most necessary for us. For by his kingdom and dominion he shields us from all evil in all things; but by his priesthood he shields us from all sins and God's wrath, intercedes for us, and sacrifices himself to propitiate God, that through him we may have confidence in God, and that our conscience may not be dismayed or afraid of his wrath and judgment; as St. Paul says Rom. 5:2: "Through him we have peace with God, and access to his grace through faith."
327 Now this is much greater, that he makes us secure against God and satisfies our conscience that not God and ourselves are against us, than that he makes the creatures harmless to us. For it is much greater. Guilt than pain, sin than death. Since sin brings death, and without sin death would not be, or ever would not be harmful. Now as Christ is Lord over sin and death, and in his power to give grace and life to all who believe in him, so offering gold and incense, confessing the two offices and works of him, and giving thanks to him, as St. Paul does 1 Cor. 15:55, 56: "Where is death your spear? The spear of death is sin, but the law is the power of sin. But praise and thanks be to God, who has given us the victory over death and sin, through Jesus Christ our Lord."
This is a high defiance, that a man, against his sin, against his evil conscience, against God's terrible wrath and judgment, can set this priest, with firm faith, to say and confess: Tu es Sacerdos in aeternum: "You are an eternal priest."
But if you are a priest, you represent all the sin that confesses you such a priest. How little then God's judgment, wrath, sin and evil conscience may condemn and terrify you, so little does it condemn and terrify me, for whom you are such a priest. Behold, this is rightly called burning incense, being undaunted against all sin and God's wrath through Christ in faith.
Third, myrrh is needed to anoint dead bodies so that they do not decay in the grave. Therefore Christ's death and resurrection is recorded in this; for he alone is he who died, was buried, and did not decay; but was raised again from the dead, as Ps. 16:10 says: "Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt thou suffer thy Holy One to see corruption." And his incorruption is signified by all who are kept and preserved by bodily myrrh. So to offer myrrh is as much as to confess that Christ died and yet remained incorrupt, that is, that he overcame death in life, and that he never died according to the Godhead and raised mankind from death again.
This confession is the most necessary of the three, although they must all be necessary and undivided. For that he has become a king and priest to you and has given you such great good, you must not think that it has happened in vain, or that it has cost little, or that it comes to you through your merit. Sin and death have been overcome in him and through him, grace and life have been given to you; but he has been soured, he has suffered much, he has purchased with his own blood, body and life in the most holy way. For God's wrath, judgment, conscience, hell, death, and the laying down of all evil things, and the acquiring of all good things, may not have happened; divine justice had to be satisfied, sin paid for, death rightly overcome. Therefore, St. Paul has the custom that where he preaches God's grace in Christ, he usually touches his suffering and blood next to it, so that he may show how all goods are given to us through Christ, not without his unspeakable merit and cost; thus he says Rom. 3, 25: "God has seated him on the throne of grace in faith, through his blood"; and
1 Cor. 2, 2: "I have not presumed among you to know but Christ and Him crucified" etc. Therefore, confessing the myrrh offering is the great cost and effort it took for Christ to become our priest and king.
Behold, these are the three things wherein we are to praise and confess Christ, his three works, which he hath shewed us, and sheweth us daily until the last day. And the order is also fine; but the evangelist begins at gold, the highest. For that he should be king over all things to us to good, would not be possible, if he had first reconciled us to God, and assured our conscience, that he might reign and work in us with quietness and peace, as in his own kingdom; wherefore also he must be priest for us. But should he be a priest and reconcile us to God according to the priestly: If he was to be a priest and reconcile us to God according to the priestly office, he had to do God's justice enough for us. But there was no other sufficiency, he had to give himself up, die and thus overcome sin with death in himself. Thus he came to the priesthood by dying, to the kingdom by the priesthood, and received the myrrh before the frankincense and the frankincense before the gold. But the Scripture always tells of the kingdom, then the priesthood, then his death, as Ps. 110, 1. 4. 7. also does, which first describes his kingdom thus: "God has said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand, until I put your enemies at your footstool." Then follows of his priesthood thus: "God has sworn, and will never repent. You are a priest forever after the manner of Melchizedek." Finally, he concludes about his torture: "He will drink from the river of water in his journey, therefore he will lift up his head. So one would also like to say here: He will taste the myrrh, therefore he will become priest; and is priest, therefore he will also be king: that one follows from the other, one is the cause of the other and drives on each other.
I will leave it at this simple, bad interpretation and leave the high considerations to the more idle. Here it is most important for us to pay attention to this threefold
Confessions do not separate any, but sacrifice together. And although Isaiah Cap. 60, 6, in the epistle, says of gold and incense alone, myrrh is silent, perhaps this is why Christ's kingdom and priesthood has always been from the beginning of the world, as St. Paul says Hebr. 13, 8.Christ yesterday and today and forever, for all the saints have been redeemed from death and sin through Him and His faith; yet at that time the third part, His suffering, the myrrh, had not yet been accomplished, which the evangelist had a right to report after the fulfillment that had taken place.
The Herodists and Papists, however, have not only dissected these three sacrifices, but have also destroyed them with unspeakable abomination, yet they retain the names, and confess in words that Christ is a king, a priest, and died for us; but in other words, with their heart and whole being, they deny all this and condemn it in the most outrageous manner. And that we, noticing this, begin with myrrh, because they teach that man, without God's grace, may of himself, by the natural ability of his reason and free will, make himself worthy and capable of divine mercy: what else is this, but that without Christ's blood and suffering, even by his own doing, he may do enough for divine justice, appease his wrath and judgment, make peace to his conscience? This is ever to nullify Christ's blood and all His suffering, yes, His whole humanity with all its doings, to consider it useless and trample it underfoot; of which St. Paul Heb. 6:4, 5, 6 says: "It is impossible that those who have fallen should have a renewal of repentance, since they crucify again the Son of God in themselves, and make a mockery of Him." For apart from Christ there is neither grace nor repentance, but only wrath; nor do the papists seek and find grace apart from him. Thus the myrrh offering is abolished altogether.
334 Thus the incense offering must be nothing beforehand. For how shall Christ be their priest and mediator, if they are so good and pure that they do not need his blood and means; but by themselves means and for themselves come before God to obtain grace and life by natural ability? Since
If they ever confess and teach that natural wealth is pure and good, then Christ must not be a priest. Who would ever have believed that Christians would come to teach or hear such things, which are terrible to think?
Now we see that all the high schools, together with the pope and the clergy, do not teach or hold otherwise, and it is said to be heresy whoever teaches otherwise. How Peter 2 Petr. 2, 1. has just struck them, when he says: "There will be false teachers among you, who will deny the Lord who bought them." He does not say, "They will deny Christ," but "the Lord who bought them," as if to say, "They will confess Christ with words, but they will not hold that he bought them with his blood; but without his blood they will redeem themselves, wanting to obtain God's grace by their own natural power, which Christ alone bought for us all with his blood. This is because they think that it costs or confesses nothing to acquire God's grace; therefore they fall, wanting to acquire it themselves and not suffer Christ's purchase.
Where Christ is not recognized as a priest, he may much less be recognized as a king; for they are not subject to him in any way, they are their own masters, that is, the devil's own servants; because they do not want him to reign over them and work in them alone, he remains a king, priest and redeemer without their thanks over all creatures. Behold, you see that now is the time when St. Peter denies Christ three times; God would have them hear the cock's cry, come to themselves again, recognize their fall, mean bitterly, and go out of the house of Caipha, that is, out of the infernal assembly of the pope, where the fire of worldly love is kindled, and the pope's servants stand around and warm themselves; for divine love has grown cold in them altogether. Let that be enough of the spiritual sacrifices. Follows:
And they received an answer in their sleep, that they should not come again to Herod: and they returned by another way unto their own country.
This is the final decision, that we should avoid the doctrine of men, and not fall into it again, once we have been delivered from it; just as magi, once freed from Herod, do not come to him again. So I also say that we should avoid the law and doctrine of the pope and all papists for the sake of God's displeasure and the salvation of our souls, since we have recognized the true evangelical truth. For they teach us only to come from God, that we follow our own reason and work; thus God's work is hindered, who after all should and will work and give all things in us, will also have waited for such things from us in Him.
But the doctrines of men make us to do all our works first, to be the first to seek God, and afterwards he shall come and see us for what we have begun. That I may set you an example: Those who now seem to teach the youth best of all, tell them that they should pray gladly and go to church, that they should live chastely and be pious, but do not say where they should begin and seek this; just as if it were enough that they had taught them to be pious. Item, if they are to become married or spiritual after that, they think it is enough that they begin it themselves, do not look to God that they greet Him for it; after that, when they have begun it, God shall then come and see what they have done, let the thing please Himself and make it good.
Yes, the young people are so drawn that a maiden is ashamed to ask God for a boy, and a boy for a maiden, thinking it is a foolish thing to ask God for it, they themselves must plump. Hence it is that marriage so seldom goes well. Should not a maiden thus be taught with all seriousness, that she may come before God and say with all confidence: Behold, dear God, I have now come to my years, that I may be married; be thou my father and let me be thy child, give me a pious boy and help me with grace to the marital state, or, if it pleases thee, give me a spirit to remain chaste. So also a boy should ask for a maiden, and not begin all his things himself, but ask God for it.
To begin with, to lay the first stone; these would be true children of God, who would not begin anything, but would greet God first, however small it might be. Thus Christ would remain our King, and all our works would be His works and well done. But the doctrines of men do not suffer this, they are clumsy, as if there were no God, and they must do what is well done. Behold, learn from the example how all the doctrines of men are so seductive and contrary to God.
(340) Now there are three ways to avoid the doctrines of men: first, that they be avoided in conscience alone, and not in deed. For example, if I confess, pray, or fast according to the pope's law, I do not think that I must do it, or that it is a sin if I do not, but that I do it willingly of my own accord, without need, and would not do it if I wanted to. Here the work of human doctrine is going on, but the conscience is free, and respects the doing as well as the letting go; it is no sin to it if it lets go, no good if it does; for it does not obey, but does its own good pleasure in it; these are probably the best.
341 So the Magi are still in Herod's country, they also move under his rule; but they respect his nothing, they do not come to him, they do not obey him. Now whoever is also under the pope and works that he does not keep his law out of obedience but out of his own free will, *) how, when, where and how long he wants, they do not harm him. But this is a high intellect, which few people have, and like this Magis in sleep and secretly, only by God's spirit in the heart recognized, which one can admittedly no one with words from the outside, where it does not feel the heart itself from heaven.
342 The other way is to avoid both with conscience and with works; as those who trample them underfoot do only the contradiction with a cheerfully secure conscience. And this way is the most necessary and best for the sake of the weak consciences, that they may well be brought out, and made equal to the first strongest, perfect and free; which is to be done with words and conscience.
*) holds, unless it is Against God's Word, as etc.
If they do not like it, they should take hold of it and show them the contradiction with examples, just as Christ did and did not let his disciples wash their hands against the Pharisees' law. Therefore, it would be good for those who would now keep the commanded confession, prayer, and fasting for a certain period of time, so that they would be shown by example how the Pope's laws were folly and deceit, if they would do all this voluntarily for another period of time.
343 The third way is to avoid with the deed alone and not with the conscience, as those do who let it stand brazenly, and yet believe they do wrong that they do not keep it. And such a conscience is, unfortunately, in the common man all over the world. For this reason, St. Paul calls this time a dangerous time in 2 Timothy 3:1. For such consciences sin without ceasing, they keep or do not keep, and the pope is their soul killer and cause of such danger and sin with his commandment. If they keep, they do it against faith, which should be free from all teachings of men; if they do not keep, they do it against their conscience, which believes it must keep them. It is necessary for them to be instructed in the free Christian faith and to put away their false conscience; or if they are not able to do this, to bear their weakness for a time, as St. Paul teaches in Romans 15:1, and let them follow and keep such a conscience in addition to faith, until they also become great and strong.
344 Behold, this is the other way home to
Do not come back to Herod. For all beginnings of godliness are generally through the teachings of men and outward holiness; but one must come out into the pure faith, and then not fall again into works out of faith. So we come right into our fatherland, where we originated, that is, to God, from whom we were created; and the end comes together again with the origin, like a golden ring. May God help us, through Christ our King and Priest, to enter eternity. *)