Gal. 3, 23-29.
But before faith came, we were kept under the law, and shut up unto the faith that should be revealed. So the law was our disciplinarian unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under the disciplinarian. For you are all children of God through faith in Christ. For as many of you as have been baptized have put on Christ. Here is neither Jew nor Greek, here is neither bond nor free, here is neither male nor female; for ye are all one in Christ Jesus. But if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise.
This is also a true Pauline epistle, written about faith against works, and is now easily understood from the next epistle. What is said there about the servant is also to be understood here by the disciple. For St. Paul uses the two parables to teach us what the law does and what it is good for. For this reason we must also speak of the law and its works, namely, that the works are of two kinds: some compelled by punishment, or exhausted by enjoyment and reward; some done freely, cheerfully, in vain, without fear of punishment or desire for enjoyment, but out of pure favor and desire for good. The first are the work of servants and pupils; the others are the work of children and free heirs.
2 For a boy who is under his disciplinarian does not do what he wants, but must do what his disciplinarian wants for fear of the rod, and one cannot know what is behind him because his disciplinarian is above him. But if he were free, one would see what was behind him, then he would show his nature and do his own works. Therefore, the works that he must do, thus imprisoned and kept, are not really his works, but rather the works of the disciplinarian, who forces them from him. For if the disciplinarian were not over him, he would do none of them, but the contrary.
3 In this rough, fine example, St. Paul makes the law and free will, or nature's business with each other so clear that nothing clearer could be presented, and anyone could easily deduce from it the law and the nature.
The first is that he is preserved from many evils that he would otherwise do, by the fear and restraint of his disciplinarian. For in this boy we see two things: the first, that he is protected by such fear and restraint of his disciplinarian from much evil, which he would otherwise do, and would give himself up to a freely evil life and even become wild; the other, that he becomes the more hostile in heart to the disciplinarian who forbids him his will. And so it is with him: the harder evil is forbidden him outwardly, the more unwilling he becomes in heart about the forbidder. And if his nature stands on such a scale that sin, as much as it decreases outwardly, as much as it increases inwardly, one bowl of the wagon goes up, the other goes down. We see this also in the experience that the boys who are pulled the hardest, where they get loose, they get much worse, because those who are not pulled so hard. Nature cannot be helped at all with commandments and punishments; one must do more.
4 So also every man, while he is still in nature, apart from grace, does not do what he wills, but must do what the law, his disciplinarian, wills. And everyone must confess that if it were not for hell and the punishment of the law, no one would do good. Therefore, since such works are not of his free spirit, they are not his, but of the compelling and driving law, that the apostle calls such works not our works, but works of the law. For what we do not do of our own free will, we do not do, but he by whom we are compelled.
5. so, if someone takes my hand with them
If I were to use my power to kill someone or give alms to a poor person, the work would not be mine, even if it was done by my hand, but by the one who forced it to be done; therefore, the work does neither harm nor help me. So also the works of the law make no one righteous, even though they are done by us. For our will does them only out of fear and punishment of the law, would much rather do otherwise, where the compelling and threatening law does not hold sway over us: therefore they are not our works. Now every man must be saved by his own works.
006 Again, if a man do not do such works through fear, as he may seem, yet he doeth them for the promise and enticement of the law. This is as wicked and false, or worse, than that, as if heaven were not promised, and if they knew that they should do all things in vain, they would not do them. Therefore works are once more not our own, but the law's and its enticement or enticement by promise of goods and reward. And these works are more dangerous and difficult to detect than those which are much more subtle and most similar to the free, pleasurable, righteous works.
7 But in the cross they are recognized, when they are rejected and demanded to be done in vain, without request of reward, only for the honor of God and the benefit of the neighbor: there nature lies and can do nothing, is found to do no good work of its own, but only strange and lawful works; just as an unreasonable animal runs and works by beating or for the sake of its food. How much do you think that now devout people, who are of an honorable nature, would remain, if shame, punishment, hell or heaven were not before their eyes? No man would remain pious: everything is kept with fear or pleasure in the good nature; therefore everything is false and vain lies, as the Scripture says: "All men are liars and vain," Ps. 39:6, 116:11.
(8) So we see these two things also in all men. The first, that they are kept by the disciplinarian, the law, from a shameful, insolent, wild nature, are kept in the discipline of such works.
of the law, in an honorable being outwardly. The other, that inwardly they become truly hostile in their hearts to the law and its punishment, and so much more subtly, so much more severely does the punishment penetrate. Who is not hostile to death and hell? But what is this but to be hostile to the law, which inflicts such punishment? But what is being hostile to the law but being hostile to justice? But what is being hostile to justice but being hostile to God Himself? Is it not decided here that we are not only unrighteous, but also hate righteousness, love sin and are hostile to God with all our heart, no matter how beautiful and honorable the outward appearance of our works may shine?
(9) Now God wants to be loved with all your heart, as the commandment reads Deut. 6:5: "You shall love God your Lord with all your heart," etc., and wants all our good works to be our own, and not of the disciplinarian, the law, death, or hell, or heaven; that is, that we do them not out of pure fear of death or hell, nor out of enjoyment of heaven, but out of free spirit, desire, and love of righteousness. For he who does a good work out of fear of death or hell does it not in honor of God, but of death and hell, and is a work of death and hell; for they have taken it from him, and for their sake alone do it, and would not have done it otherwise. Therefore he also remains a servant of death and hell with all such works; but if he remains a servant of death and hell, then he must also die and be damned; and it happens to him according to the saying: He who is afraid of hell leads into it; item: Trembling does not help for death.
10 Thus you speak: What will come of this? Who then can be saved? Who is without such fear and trembling of death and hell? Who does his works or leads his good life without such fear? I answer: Who then loves God, who carries such fear and hatred of His law and His righteousness with him? Where is nature now? Where is free will? Wilt thou not believe how needful is the grace of God; wilt thou not believe the nature of all men?
Let sin be false and mendacious; surely you cannot be persuaded that works do not make one pious!
(11) Here you see for what purpose the law is necessary and good, and what God seeks in it, namely, the two things: the first, that He may keep us in discipline and drive us into an honorable way outwardly, so that we may live among ourselves and not eat one another; as would happen if there were no law, no fear, no punishment; as happened in the past among some Gentiles. For the same reason God did not want to abolish the secular sword in the New Testament, even though he did not want to use it and his own did not need it, but that the insolent, wild nature might be resisted, and people might live in peace among themselves, feed and multiply; otherwise all countries would be desolate, full of murderers and robbers, no woman, no child would remain unharmed; but by the sword and its law they are preserved and driven into a quiet, calm, honorable nature. Nevertheless, they do not become pious by it, the heart becomes nothing better. It is only the hand that is forced and bound, and works or righteousness are not their own, but of the sword that forces such out of them and works in them by its punishment and fear.
12 Thus also, God's law urges and compels us to forsake much evil for fear of death and hells, and keeps us like a disciplinarian in an outwardly honorable life. But with this, no one is pious before God; the heart still remains hostile to such a disciplinarian, hates his punishment, would rather be free.
13. The other is that a man should recognize through the law how wrong and unjust his heart is, how far he still is from God, how nature is nothing, that he despises his honorable life and recognizes how it is nothing compared to that which belongs to the fulfillment of the law, and is thus humbled, crawling to the cross, sighing for Christ and longing for his grace, despairing of himself, putting all his comfort in Christ, who then gives him another spirit that changes his heart, so that he never fears death and hell, never seeks life and heaven, becomes free and free of the law, and lives there.
with a good conscience in death and life, be equal to him in hell and heaven and all things. For thus saith the epistle Heb. 2:15, that Christ hath redeemed us, who through the fear of death were all our lifetime bound in bondage. So that he testifies clearly enough that we must be without the fear of death, and all who live in the fear of death are slaves and will never be saved. Now neither nature nor law can ever deliver us from fear; indeed, they both increase fear; Christ alone has delivered us from it. And if we believe in him, he gives us a free, fearless spirit that fears neither death nor hell, loves neither life nor heaven, but serves God freely and blessedly.
(14) From this we see, first of all, how dangerous are the teachings that drive men by commandment and law to the opinion that they shall become pious thereby. For in doing so, they only tear him further away from God, from Christ, yes, even from the law and all righteousness, do no more, for the longer the more they make a fearful, stupid, despondent, miserable conscience, always learning to fear only death and hell, until they drive vain despair into the hearts, so that man must be the devil's martyr here and there.
(15) Secondly, that there are three customs of the law, or that men have three ways of applying it. The first are those who completely destroy it and brazenly go against it in a free life; to them it is just as if it were not a law. The others, who thereby abstain from such desolate life and are kept in an honorable life, thus walk in discipline outwardly, but inwardly they are hostile to the disciplinarian, all their doing goes out of fear of death and hell. And so they keep the law only outwardly, yes, the law keeps them outwardly; inwardly they do not keep and are not kept. The third, the keeping by heart and inwardly; these are the tablets of Moses, written by heart and inwardly by the finger of God Himself.
(16) Now as the first are neither pious in heart nor in heart, so the others are only pious in heart and not in heart. But these are through and through
good. St. Paul says in 1 Tim. 1, 8. 9.: "We know that the law is good for those who need its law. How does one need his law? Answer: He who knows that no law is given to the righteous, but to the unrighteous. What is this saying? Nothing else, for whoever wants to preach the law rightly must make these three distinctions, so that he does not preach the law to the third, as if they were to become righteous through it, for that would be deception. But to the first it must be preached, for it is appointed that they leave their naughty life and let themselves be kept under the disciplinarian. But it is not enough for them to be kept and to keep the law; they must also learn to keep the law. Then one must preach more and above the law also the gospel, in which Christ's grace is given to keep the law. So it is quite a different thing to keep or keep the law, and to be kept or kept by the law. The first neither keep nor are kept; the second are kept; the third are kept.
17 These three wise men at the custom of the law are signified by Moses. First, when he broke the tablets, 2 Mos. 32, 19. when the Jews worshiped the calf. That the tablets were broken and did not come to the people, means the first who do not receive the law at all and break it all. On the other hand, when he brought the other tables, they came to the people, Ex 34:30, 33, but his face was so clear that Aaron and the people of Israel did not like to see the brightness and glory of his face. He had to put a curtain over his face if he wanted to talk to them. This means the others who receive the law, but only keep it outwardly; inwardly it is too bright for them, and they are afraid of it.
(18) For this reason, as St. Paul interprets 2 Cor. 3:13, 14, 15, which is the presumptuousness of their works and outward holiness, they make a veil for themselves, not wanting to see the law rightly under their eyes and see how such righteousness is nothing. So the veil remains over their hearts to this day, says St. Paul. So also Moses does not lead the people further
He only killed two kings, Sihon and Og, and divided the land among the third and a half generations of Israel. So that all is the half, yes, the small piece of the outward righteousness. And here Moses dies in the desert of Moab. The law cannot help any further.
19 Then Joshua comes and leads all the people through the dry Jordan into all the land; there is no Moses, no law, but Joshua, Christ, who leads by faith, fulfilling all that was commanded by Moses. These are the ones to whom no law was given, as St. Paul says, who do not become righteous by works but by grace, that is, who do not do good by compulsion of the law. There is no Moses. From all this, I think, St. Paul should be easy to understand in this epistle; let us now see it.
Before faith came, we were kept under the law, closed to the faith that was to be revealed.
020 He saith not, Before faith came, we were righteous, and kept the law; but again, the law kept us, and we were shut up and kept under it, that we should not go forth, bold and free to do our wickedness; and yet were not righteous in skin. But the shutting up and keeping away was not so that we should remain so; but it was directed to the future faith, that the same should make us free and loosed: not to do evil, for which the law shut us up; but free to do good, since the law compelled. Of the same faith we should desire to learn by such shutting up, and to know our evil inclined nature; for this redemption is spiritual, and redeems only that which is evil.
21 So if a master had imprisoned you in a dungeon, and you were extremely unwilling to be in it, he would release you from it in two ways. First, bodily, that the Lord break the dungeon and set you free bodily, let you go where you will. Secondly, if he would do you so much good in the dungeon, make it cheerful, light, wide and richly adorned,
that no royal chamber and kingdom would be so delicious, and would break and change your courage so that you would not be out of the dungeon for all the world's good, but would ask that the dungeon remain and that you be inside, which would no longer be a dungeon for you, but a paradise. Tell me, which salvation would be the best here? Isn't it true that this spiritual one is the best? For in the first you would remain a poor beggar, as before; but here you would have free will and everything you wanted.
(22) Behold, Christ also hath spiritually redeemed us from the law; not having broken the law, and taken it away, but having so changed our heart, which before was unwillingly under it, and hath done it so much good, and hath made the law so sweet, that it hath no greater pleasure nor joy than in the law, not willing that any title should fall away. Just as he who is in prison makes the prison tight and heavy for himself with his displeasure, so we too are enemies of the law, and are displeased because we are shut up in displeasure from evil and forced to do good.
23 Thus the apostle has understood both the fruit and the profit of the law in these words. For if I asked, "What is the law good for?" he answers, "It does not make us righteous, but increases sin and irritates nature with its commandments and prohibitions; yet it bears two fruits: the first, it shuts us up and prevents us from flaming out freely and putting ourselves in the way of a public shameful life; as those do who want to be unconstrained and untruthful under it: that for this reason it is much better that it be law than no law; who would otherwise remain before the other? St. Paul also says in Romans 13:4 that the secular sword is set for fear, not of the pious, but of evildoers.
(24) The other fruit, that such closure is directed to the future faith, so that man thereby recognizes his wickedness and unwillingness to do good, comes to himself, and humbly confesses and denounces his evil nature, and desires God's mercy, which does not take away from him the law, which he well sees to be right, good, and holy,
but to make another heart that loves this right, good and holy law. Behold, this is the right understanding and best usage of the law; wherefore it is well needful that the law should be to bring man hither, that he may thus know himself, and groan after the grace of God.
(25) But here the quarrel between the right and the wrong saints arises. The false saints do not want to use the law any further than in the first way; they presume to be already pious through such closure and preservation, do not want to learn to recognize their evil nature from it, pretend that nature is good in itself and may well love the law naturally. The right saints say no to this and it is also not true. The experience of each one says otherwise and agrees with God's scripture. And whoever does not want to deny nor pretend, must confess that he naturally dislikes God's commandment, much less the punishment of sin, death and hell, brought forward by laws. They excuse and cover such great, deep and horrible disgrace of their hearts with the fig leaves of their works in the law; just as Adam and Eve covered their disgrace, but nothing better came of it by covering. So also by working and self-justification in the law no one becomes better, but worse. Because of this disgrace, Christ rejected the synagogue and cast it out.
26 Therefore it is clear to whom Paul speaks these words, namely to the saints of works, who want to become godly through the law and its works and respect the first custom of the law enough for godliness. For just as Absalom hung between heaven and earth on an oak tree with his own head, 2 Sam. 18:9, so these also hang between heaven and earth. For by shutting up the law they do not touch the earth, that is, they do not do what evil nature would like; again, because the law does not make nature better, but only tugs and irritates it so that it becomes hostile to the law, they are not pious and do not touch heaven.
27) Just as Zechariah Cap. 5, 9. saw two women leading a barrel between
Heaven and earth up to Babylon, and a woman sat in the barrel, which was called Impietas, unbelief or godlessness. This barrel is the people of such holiness, hovering between public wickedness and right holiness; therefore Impietas, unbelief, sits in it. The two women who led it between heaven and earth are fear and desire of reward; for all their works they do from fear of punishment, or from desire of reward; these two pieces lift, carry, and hold them in their holiness: wherefore also he says, the two women had wings like a vulture or harrier. Wings in the Scripture mean oral preaching, so that the speech flies and goes fast. Now all these saints' preaching is only of fear and reward; they only want to make people devout by frightening and enticing them, and only make it worse, so that they become more hostile to the law because of its fright, and because of its enticement they only prefer to win themselves and their request than before. Therefore, it is only vulture wings that eat the chicks and only kill the souls.
028 But the true saints abide not in the mean between heaven and earth. They also hear the terrors and enticements of the law, but they know themselves to respect the terrors and enticements more than the law; and therefore, seeing that they are not pure nor righteous in reason, they fall down, confess themselves, and cry out: Grace, grace, Lord God; then Christ comes and brings them right freedom through his Spirit, so that they become completely heavenly.
(29) Behold, that is, "kept under the law, and determined unto the faith to come. Thus not only the Jews, but also still and always those who practice piety before faith by works, law, distrust, fear, merit, and such like causes, have been determined. Which, if it is not directed to faith, or if faith does not finally come and be known to them, it must only become trouble with them and finally fall into despair or hardened presumption, so that they can never be helped. So it is dangerous who does not use the law properly to come to faith through it.
Therefore the law has been our disciplinarian unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith.
(30) Behold, as it is said: No one is justified by the law and its works. For if we would be justified by the law, then faith would not be necessary, and would also be false, which St. Paul says here: By faith we are justified. They are, however, mutually exclusive, faith and works, above justification. If you give justification to faith, you must take it away from works, law and nature. If you give it to works, you must take it from faith. One must be true and the other false, may not be true at the same time. Therefore the law must have no other power or ability than to make sinners or to keep sinners. That which does not make righteous certainly makes sinners or causes sinners to remain. Further, because the law ever has to do with sins and sinners, it must do something more with them than badly let sinners remain. What kind of business would that be, if it let remain what it finds?
(31) Now what can it accomplish, if it neither justifies nor corrects, nor leaves as it finds? It must be a miraculous business, not making righteous, nor leaving as it is; therefore it follows that it must make sin greater, as St. Paul says, Rom. 5:20: "The law came in beside, that sin might have the upper hand. This is as it has been said: in that it closes and resists the hand and public evil life, it only awakens greater hatred and aversion of the heart against itself. Just as a boy becomes so much more unwilling to his disciplinarian, so much more severely he is punished by him or his will is forbidden; which hatred and unwillingness is nothing else but an increase of the evil will that is forbidden to him; and would never have risen up, if the same will had not been resisted.
So, before the law man sins and evil nature par excellence for itself, does not think of the law. But when the law comes, and forbids and threatens, then nature becomes first of all evil and unwilling to the law, catches
not only to love sin, but also to hate righteousness. Behold, this is the law's business to sin and sinners. This is what St. Paul calls sin being increased by the law, let alone anyone being justified by it. But blessed is he who understands and recognizes this; for the works saints do not understand it at all, do not give to nature such malice nor hatred of the law, find much good in it; therefore they also do not understand a letter in St. Paul, which never speaks differently of the law. And if we want to say right, we also find it in our heart.
(33) He saith also, To Christ, or until Christ, let the law be our tutor; that no man put on any other faith than that of Christ. The law presses on Abraham's seed, Christ, in whom all the saints have believed from the beginning, as stated in the previous epistle.
(34) Therefore it does not help the Jews and the Turks that they believe in God, who created heaven and earth: he who does not believe in Christ does not believe in God. And even if it were true that Christ is not God (which is impossible), still they do not believe in God who do not believe in Christ; for God promised His grace in Abraham's seed. Now, the same seed is Christ, as the Jews, Turks and all the world confesses: therefore, he who does not believe in Christ does not believe in God's promises; therefore, he does not believe in the God who created heaven and earth. Because no other God made the promise to Abraham, and in no seed of Abraham's name did the blessing and faith go out and be preached, but only this Christ, in all the world.
35 Therefore apart from Christ there is no redemption or justification, not only of the law, but also of all other faiths. God will keep his promise made to Abraham, to whom he promised the blessing of all the world in his seed, and in no one else's seed; therefore he will not confirm to any man his new and different faith, nor leave his promise, nor revoke it. Therefore, Christ's faith makes righteous, as Rom. 10:4. pau
lus says, "Christ is the end of the law, for righteousness to everyone who believes in him." What is this? Nothing else, for all who believe in Christ are justified by faith and receive his Spirit and grace, so that the law is ended, so that he is never under the law, which is also the end of the law, as follows:
But now that faith has come, we are no longer under the disciplinarian.
(36) Though from the foregoing it is sufficiently and easily understood what it means to be under the law, or to be a disciplinarian, yet because such doctrine and word come from the way, it cannot be spoken of enough. "To be under the disciplinarian or law" is lately to be a gleaner, to do many good works and yet not be pious, to lead a good life and never become righteous, always teaching and preaching and never learning nor understanding anything. Cause that all who are of this kind do no good of their own free will and with love, nor without fear or desire of reward. Therefore they are servants, driven by the law, and the law always remains their master and driver; so they always remain its debtors and subjects. For the law demands a free, cheerful, and merry will: which they have not and cannot have of themselves; the faith of Christ alone gives it. Where this is, the law ceases to demand, and has had its fill; enough has been done for it, and it is fulfilled. The disciple can now do what he should be able to do, and what the disciplinarian requires him to know; therefore he now leaves him, demands nothing more of him, and is no longer his disciplinarian, but his good friend and companion.
(37) So faith does not redeem us bodily from the law, so that we go here, and the law goes there, and so we come from one another that we are never under it; but that enough of its demand has been done through us: we can and now have what it wanted to know and have from us, namely, the Holy Spirit, who makes us love it. For it did not want to be worked, nor was it content with works: it wanted to be loved and to be filled with love. Without
It would not let us go, nor would it be paid for, and so we had to remain loveless under it with all our works, and our conscience had no peace before it, always punishing us as sinners and transgressors, and threatening us with death and hell, until Christ came and gave us his Spirit and love through faith, preached in the Gospel: Then we were loosed from the law, that it never requires, never punishes, never rests the conscience, never terrifies with death and hell, and has become our favorable friend and companion.
38) Just as the disciplinarian does not leave the child to die or go elsewhere, but spiritually, so that the child has become different and can have what the father wanted through the disciplinarian, so the law does not leave us to cease to be or to be removed, but spiritually, so that we have become different and have what God wanted us to have through his law.
39 Therefore I have said that this image of the boy and the disciplinarian is a pretty light sign to rightly understand the law and grace in us. For it is the first custom of the law, that it closes and makes outwardly pious, so deeply ingrained and driven by all teachers and books, and almost even to human nature, that it becomes sour and difficult to understand also this other custom, that it makes sin greater inwardly; therefore I may well compare it to a scale, where one bowl is empty and the other weighed down. Thus the law, if it makes pious outwardly, increases sin inwardly, and puts on inwardly so much through hatred and displeasure, as much as it puts off outwardly in works, and much more; that St. Paul calls it Rom. 7:13: Ultra modum peccans peccatum per legem: That through the law sin becomes exceedingly wicked, and sins too much etc. All of which every man's experience must also confess.
For you are all children of God through faith in Christ.
40. that which is under the law, and works unmerciful, is all servile, as in the former
But what works in faith and joy is all children, for they have obtained God's Spirit through Christ. The apostle, however, draws on Christ, and interprets such a faith, which believes and abides in Jesus Christ, that otherwise no faith is sufficient and right, he believes in God as he wills.
41 There are some, previously among the new high school teachers, who say that the forgiveness of sins and justification of graces lie entirely in the divine imputatio, that is, in God's imputation, that it is enough to whom God imputes sin or does not impute sin, that he is justified or not justified from his sins, as the 32nd Psalm v. 2 and Romans 4:7, 8 read. Psalm v. 2. and Rom. 4, 7. 8. seem to read, since it says: "Blessed is the man, to whom God does not impute his sin." If this were true, then the whole New Testament would be nothing and in vain, and Christ would have worked foolishly and uselessly in suffering for sin; God Himself would also have been playing with mirrors and jugglery without any need; because without Christ's suffering he might have forgiven and not imputed sin, and so another faith than in Christ might make one righteous and blessed, namely, one who relied on such gracious mercy of God that his sins would not be imputed to him.
Against this horrible, terrible mind and error, the holy apostle has the custom that he always draws the faith to Jesus Christ, and so often calls him Jesus Christ that it is a wonder who is not aware of such a necessary cause. Is nevertheless about the other word, as one says, and vain Jesus Christ in St. Paul's Epistles. And the pagan masters have so unjustly destroyed him and made him strange to us with their horrible and infernal dreams of such seduction.
That is why our scholars in the high schools no longer know what Christ is, or what he is necessary and useful for, and what the Gospel and the New Testament are. They think that Christ is only a Moses, that is, a teacher who gives laws and commandments on how to be pious and live well.
should be. After that, they continue with free will and natural works, and want to prepare themselves for grace and make themselves skillful, so that they can storm heaven.
44 Because God gives His grace to those who work and prepare by their own diligence, Christ must remain a hempen. What may they be, if they may obtain grace in their own name and deed? As they not only teach publicly, but also defend with Pabst's bulls and all power, and condemn false doctrine as the highest and worst heresy. Therefore I have warned and still warn everyone that he may know how the pope with the high schools has rejected Christ and the whole New Testament from the world further than the Jews or Turks have ever done. Therefore, the pope is the real antichrist and the high schools of the devil are their own tabernacles and whorehouses. What shall I have Christ for, if I can obtain God's grace through my own natural willingness? Or what do I want to have more, if I have the grace?
Therefore let us beware of such hellish poison, and not lose Christ, the comforting Savior. Christ must be here above all things. It is true that as the 32nd Psalm v. 2 and Paul Rom. 4, 8 say, he is blessed to whom God does not impute his sin. But St. Paul leads us to the conclusion that only the believer in Christ is opposed to such divine reckoning, not to free will or nature for the sake of their works. For he introduces Abraham, how his faith was reckoned to him for justification, since he believed the divine promise of his seed. Even though our sin is not imputed to us by God's grace, He still did not want to do this, so that His law and His righteousness would be fulfilled beforehand in all things and superfluously enough. Such a gracious imputation had to be bought and obtained for us beforehand. Therefore, because this was impossible for us, he appointed one for us in our place, who would take upon himself all the punishment we deserved, and fulfill the law for us, and thus turn away divine judgment from us and atone for his wrath. So we will
grace is given in vain, that it costs us nothing; but it has nevertheless cost another much for us, and is acquired with innumerable, infinite treasure, namely, through God's Son Himself. Therefore it is necessary that we have the same before all things, who has done these things for us; and it is also impossible to obtain grace except through the same.
46 Behold, therefore from Adam unto Abraham no man was saved, save by faith in the seed of the woman, which should bruise the head of the serpent; and after Abraham no man, save by faith in the seed of Abraham. So no one can be saved yet, except by faith in the same seed of Abraham, which is now come. Oh, it would not do for you to come to God by yourself without this mediator, by doing your diligence, as the Jews, Turks and Papists teach. Who will reconcile you to God first? He says John 14:6: "No one comes to the Father except through Me." The Egyptians in those troubled times also wanted to come to Pharaoh, the king himself, and complain; but he turned them away and said, "Go to Joseph, and whatever he tells you do," Gen. 41:55. So God hears no one, nor does he help anyone to salvation, but we must all come to Christ: He is set up as Lord over all things, and with Him is the throne of grace, He has purchased it for us; therefore it is lost that we seek it elsewhere. Yes, if we were without sin, as Adam was before the fall, we would not be able to come before God through Christ, but through ourselves. But in this precious time, after the fall, we must have a Joseph who is without sin, and yet receive us sinners and the needy who come to him and desire him.
It follows that the Papists do not speak and believe differently about nature, except as if it were still unchanged, as it was before the fall in Adam, do not believe that it is completely corrupted in sins and is God's enemy. For God is hostile to sin; so sin is hostile to God, as Paul teaches in Romans 5 and 8: so they certainly do not believe what Moses writes of Adam's fall in Genesis 3, or
consider the same case as a disgrace (joke), which has not worked anything in nature, and has not made them sinful and subjected to God's wrath. Because they do not believe Mosi, do not need Christ, and thus reject the New and Old Testament, condemn the living whole Scripture, it has again been done to them by God that they have become disciples of the dead and condemned pagan Aristotle, and the devil's secret chamber, who, through Pabst's laws and the doctrines of men, is slandering them so much that it is overflowing and the world is stagnant and slimy, yet they remain always in darkness, that they penetrate to God without such faith of Christ with their praying, fasting, mass-keeping, studying and preaching.
48. And even though they call and confess Christ, their mind is no different than if God had abundantly made them such a lord that they should be obedient to God in it and have him for a lord; otherwise, without such lordship of Christ, free will might well attain the grace of God through natural diligence; that Christ's kingdom is an unnecessary thing for them, and a pure will of God to have him as Lord, like another kingdom to which one is subject, not that it is necessary for salvation, since without such a kingdom one may be saved, but that God's will and commandment is to be obedient to the same king. So Christ is not a savior in the depths of their hearts, but rather a tyrant and master of the rod, whose nature needs nothing to obtain grace, but is only more burdened by him, as they must have not only God, as before, but also Christ as their Lord and his commandments.
(49) Many people have proclaimed in the past that in the time of the Antichrist all heretics should come together in one heap and destroy the whole world; this is now going on under the Pope and the Turks. For if Christ is rejected and condemned with the whole Scripture, that no more than the name remains, one can easily prove how all heresy, all error, all darkness reigns now, which have ever been from the beginning of the world, that I often feel ill at ease.
sorget, all men are now condemned, without whom die in the cradle; and no one recognizes the cruel wrath of God upon us, nor weeps nor laments.
(50) Behold, this is the cause and necessity why St. Paul always drives the faith so to Christ, that he has well provided himself for such poisonous teaching in the future, which without Christ presumes to deal with God, as if God and our nature were good friends with each other, as if righteousness would love sin, and hear what sin would. Therefore, dear friends, let us be wise and know Christ rightly, namely, that we must first of all hear the gospel and believe in Christ, not only for his sake, as if he were the Lord, but also that he is the man who took the place of our sinful nature, incurred and overcame all the wrath of God, which we deserved with all our works: not keeping all these things for himself, but giving them to us for his own, so that all who believe these things in him and from him may surely be delivered through him from the same wrath of God and be received into grace. From this we learn how great need and benefit Christ is to us, and that it is a lie and a devil's own invention that a man may do so much out of natural powers that the grace of God is given to him. For if nature can obtain grace, Christ is not needed as a representative and mediator. But if he is necessary, nature must obtain nothing but grace; they do not stand together, being themselves mediators, and having Christ for a mediator.
For all of you who have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ.
51) The apostle keeps such a fine order: "Now that faith has come, we are no longer under the disciplinarian. Why, "For ye are all the children of God through faith in Jesus Christ. But how is it that we become children of God? "All ye that are baptized in Christ have put on Christ." Christ is God's child: therefore, he who clothes himself in God's child must also be God's child; for he goes clothed with divine filiation, which must surely be
make him a child. If then he be a child, he is no more under the law, being vain servants. And if a child be under him, as the child under the disciplinarian, yet is he like a servant, as long as he is under him, as the text follows in St. Paul, and is heard in the former epistle.
But what does "put on Christ" mean? The unbelievers quickly answered that it means to follow Christ and to become like his example. But I would also like to put on St. Peter, Paul and all the saints, and nothing special would be said about Christ. Therefore we let the faith speak here, which St. Paul describes sweetly with this word "put on". It is evident that those who are baptized have never followed Christ before, but begin to follow Christ in baptism; therefore Christ must be put on before one follows him. And it must be a very different thing to put on Christ than to follow Christ's example. It is a spiritual dressing in the conscience, and proceeds in this way, that the soul accepts Christ and all his righteousness as its own good, defies it, relies on it, as if it had done and deserved such itself; just as a man is wont to accept his garment. Such acceptance is spiritual dressing: that is the nature and kind of faith.
Surely Christ is given to us in such a way that all his righteousness, and all that he has and is, stands before us as if he were our own. And whoever believes this, it also happens to him; as St. Paul Rom. 8, 32. says: "He gave his own Son for us, how should he not have given all things with him to us?" item 1 Cor. 1, 30.: "Christ was made for us by God for righteousness, wisdom, holiness and redemption." Behold, therefore, he that believeth on Christ putteth on Him. Therefore faith is so great a thing, that it makes a man blessed and righteous; for it brings him all the goods of Christ, on which the conscience comforts and relies; from which then it must rejoice in Christ, and be glad to do all good, and avoid all evil, never fearing death, nor hell, nor all evil, for it is abundantly clothed in Christ. This then is called the law
enough, and never be under him; for there is the Holy Spirit with the garment in the soul, and is quite another man there; there she goes clothed in the filiation of God, therefore she must be a child.
Behold, in this way no saint can be attracted before God. For it is necessary for every man for himself that he also put on Christ. Christ, and has not that he may give to others to put on. After this clothing and dressing follows the example and following; then man again does to his neighbor as Christ did to him, gives and does to him all the good that he has and is able to do, lets himself also be clothed, and clothes his neighbor with what he has. But the garment, since he himself is clothed in Christ, he cannot give him; for no one can put his faith on another or give him the same faith. He may pray for him, that he also may be clothed with Christ; but every man must believe for himself, and Christ alone clothe us all with himself.
(55) He who does not have this faith, that Christ is his with all good things, does not yet truly believe, nor is he a Christian, nor does his heart become joyful or glad; for this faith alone makes Christians joyful, glad, secure, blessed, and God's child, where the Holy Spirit must dwell. Oh, what a beautiful, colorful, and delicious garment it is, with such exuberant adornment, jewelry, and jewels hanging on all virtue, grace, wisdom, truth, righteousness, and all that is in Christ; so that St. Paul says, "I thank God for His unspeakable gift." And St. Peter, 2 Pet. 1, 4., says: "Through Christ great and delicious goods are given to us." This is Joseph's coat of many colors, which his father Jacob made for him before other children, Gen. 37:3; for Christ alone is full of grace and truth. Item, this is the delicious garment of the chief priest Aaron, in which he served God, of which much could be said. For Paul also points us to the same stories with this word.
(56) Again, as we put on Christ and receive him, so he puts on us and receives us, and all things that are not ours are ours.
ser is as if it were "his" own. Now he finds nothing good in us, but only sin; he takes care of them and expels them from us, as from his glorious garment; in addition he prays for us and carries them before God, so that they will not be punished eternally, as Paul says Rom. 8, 34: "Christ who mediates for us with God." And Ps. 41, 5. he says: "I have said: Lord God, have mercy on me, heal my soul, for I have sinned against you"; and Psalm 69, 6.: "Lord God, you know my foolishness, and my sins are not hidden from you." Such things are all said in our person, as St. Paul interprets Rom. 15, 3. from the same 69th Psalm v. 10. and says, how Christ bore our sin, and despised not us, nor thought good of his holiness toward us; but as it is written, "The blasphemies of them that blasphemed thee are fallen upon me."
(57) Now that he is our garment, and that he ministered for us as his garment, we gladly hear; but if he will cleanse his garment, that we suffer not at all. If we want to be his garment, we must truly suffer that he may cleanse it: he neither likes nor wants to go in unclean garments. In the time of his torture, when he had put on the robe anew, he swept it clean through death and all kinds of suffering. 3:3, and melted the children of Levi, and was as a fuller that purifieth the garments. Therefore it is a good sign, where he maketh much suffering: neither let him abate, where his garment is; he purifieth it with all manner of suffering: but if he do not, his garment is not there.
There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female, you are all one in Christ JEsu.
(58) It is evident enough that this is not what St. Paul means, that there is no Jew, no Greek, no man, no woman in nature and in the person of the body, but in what he speaks. But of what does he speak? Not of the body or nature, but of faith, of justification, of Christ, how we become children of God in him through faith; all of which takes place in the soul and conscience, not by flesh and blood, not by hand or foot, but by the body.
through the word and gospel. There is no distinction of any person in this nature and trade; everything is the same, whether you are a Jew, a Gentile, a servant, a free man, a man or a woman. In the sight of men and in the flesh, the Jew has a different law and way of life than the Greek, the servant a different one than the free man, the man a different one than the woman. The Jew is circumcised, the Gentile uncircumcised; the man wears his hair openly, the woman wears a veil; in addition, each has its own way of serving God, and goes, as it is said: "Many a country, many a custom. Such ways, however, and everything that is outward and not faith, do not make one righteous or devout before God, nor do they hinder justification; for faith may remain the same in and among all these ways, persons, customs and differences, without any distinction.
59. But where the accident strikes, that man falls in such a way and clings to it, as to that by which he wants and should become pious and righteous, wants to help his soul with it, to put away sin and acquire salvation: Then everything is wrong, Christ denied, God lost, faith and gospel gone; then works and the law reign again, the conscience is already deceived into thinking that if it did not keep such ways it would already be eternally lost; but if it keeps them, it may thereby be saved. This is the most harmful error on earth; against it the apostle argues so hard. For with such a delusion or conscience it is not possible for Christian faith to remain, for it does not want to and cannot be justified and saved by any thing in heaven or earth, but only in Christ. He needs all other ways, law, work, customs, person only for the exercise of the body on earth and for the service of his neighbor.
(60) What then is lacking in the Jews, that they are not saved? Answer St. Paul Rom. 9, 32: They want to go up by works and not by faith. They want to be considered as Jews in heaven: God wants to be considered as Christians, whether they are Jews or Gentiles, male or female. They think that if they keep the law, they will be saved, if not, they will be condemned: again, God means that whoever believes in Christ will be saved.
He who does not believe will be condemned, Marc. 16, 16.; in addition, without faith no one should keep the law, as stated above, and St. Paul also testifies Gal. 6, 13, when he writes: Those who circumcise themselves do not keep any part of the law. Why? There is no willing observance of it, but only terror and enticement of the law. Because they then think they must be Jews, and not otherwise than as Jews in the law drive, cling therefore, with the conscience caught, to the Jews and laws: they must perish eternally; for it is decided, there is no Jew, no Gentile, as St. Paul says, but only Christ and Christians.
61 If they believed in Christ before, then remained Jews as they wished, circumcised themselves, or did not circumcise themselves, and kept their laws as they wished, so far that they did not fail to become pious and blessed by it, but only by the grace of Christ, as all their fathers and patriarchs did, as St. Peter says in Acts 15:11. 15, 11. says: so it would be without any danger for them. But they do not do this, they cling too firmly to the works, terrors and enticements of the law, that they immediately condemn and persecute all who tell them otherwise and preach the faith. For the same reason their ancestors persecuted and killed all the prophets, saying that they had destroyed the seducers of the people and the blasphemers of the law and worship for the sake of God and his law, as Moses had commanded them.
62 But let us also look at our Jews, they do it much more roughly and clumsily. Those Jews keep up an honest pretense that God's law bound them: our Jews, the pope with his papists, drive us on to nothing but human laws and their own little fiefdoms, which God has forbidden; and almost cry out about the noble virtue of obedience, that without it no one may be saved and through it everyone may be saved; but they do not point this same obedience to God's commandment, but to their little laws and little fiefdoms. Look at their nature, and you will certainly find that they are not Christians by faith, but by their works and laws as Carthusians, preachers, Barefooters, Augustinians, Benedictines, canons, vicars etc.
They intend to become pious and blessed. They also confess themselves, as they accept such orders and statuses as the right ways to become pious and blessed, that it is evident how their conscience hangs on the works and not on the grace of Christ. And even though they read St. Paul's words that there is neither Jew nor Greek, they say: If there is neither Jew nor Greek, then there is a Carthusian, a Barefoot, a Preacher, a Benedictine, an Augustinian, this one and that one.
63 But if one speaks of the faith of Christ, they say: We know that we must believe in Christ, but that through him alone they shall be saved and saved, they do not believe, saying, "What good are good works? In that way such orders and stands would be in vain. You want to destroy good works and worship. Out, out with the cursed heretic! Fire, fire, fire! Heretic, heretic, heretic! Should St. Franciscus, Dominic, Benedictus, Augustine, Bernard, Antonius have erred in this way? What do you think you are doing? Where do you come from with the belief in the devil? Behold, is it not true that our saints and Jews go thus? What shall we do with them? We must do as St. Paul did to the Galatians, crying out twice, "If an angel from heaven, or we ourselves, preach any other doctrine unto you than that which ye have heard, let it be accursed," Gal. 1:8, 9.
(64) So also we say, Our preaching and the ground of faith is this, that by faith alone, without law and works, there is justification and salvation. If therefore the world be vain Carthusians, and teach otherwise, let it be accursed. If the whole world were all barefooted, preachers, Augustinians, Benedictines, and taught otherwise, let it be accursed. Say further: If one world were like St. Augustine, the other like St. Francis, the third like St. Dominic, the fourth like St. Benedict, the fifth like St. Anthony, the sixth like St. Paul, the seventh like the angel Gabriel; what would it be then? if they taught otherwise, let it be accursed. Nevertheless, God's word must stand and Christ alone must remain. What more do you want?
65 Christ said of these sects Matth. 24, 24: "Many false Christians and false
There shall arise prophets, which shall say, Behold here, behold Christ: believe them not. They will do signs, so that they will lead even the elect into error (if it were possible). For a long time, two causes prevented me from understanding this saying about these sects and orders. The first is that there are so many of them and the whole world is full of them. If they had been few, I would not have let myself endure. I thought God would not let so many people err, and did not see that the text clearly said: "They shall be many, that even the elect, whose number is few, may err with them. The other thing, that holy people have been in it, as Benedictus, Bernard, Augustine, Franciscus, Dominic, and many of their successors. Then I thought it could not be in error, and did not see that Christ said, "The elect shall fall into this, and shall be challenged with error; but yet shall not abide in it.
(66) Gideon, Judg. 8:27, was also a great man in the faith, by which he also did great things; yet he was deceived, that he set up an ephod, that is, a special worship and manner; whereupon much mourning happened, and his family was destroyed, as the Scripture there says. What wonder should there be if St. Benedictus, Franciscus, Dominicus had erred? Who can assure us that they did not err in this?
It is possible that in this, as commonly happens in all the legends of the saints, people abandon the best nature and the right way of the dear saints, and fall only because they have stumbled as men. Then their frailty is thrown up for their strength and their strength is suppressed; for everyone is inclined to follow the weakest and the least, the worst, and not the best.
(68) But if they were to freely lead their ranks and orders, not thinking to become pious and blessed thereby, but solely for the exercise of their bodies and the service of their neighbor, in honor of God, and to leave the becoming pious and blessed to faith alone, then it would be all to suffer and harmless to them;
However, it is not unpleasant for the simple-minded crowd that learns from this that it thinks such a nature is the right way, and if its faith takes a great blow, it does not fall down completely. For faith is a tender, noble thing, and is easily misjudged beforehand with such seeming, glittering works and offerings.
Now there is no doubt that the holy fathers with their disciples have led such ranks in freedom and integrity, yes, with increase of faith; otherwise they would truly not be holy. But this blind mob goes after them and follows them, and leaves the core, keeps the shells, does their works and forgets their faith; and still wants to boast and let itself be seen, it holds the holy fathers' stand, order and example, if it has no more than the shadow of it, and is a real monkey's pile, who imitates everything it sees, and yet remains a monkey, and does nothing in such Christian freedom. This they prove by saying: Should I not become pious and blessed by my rank, order and works? If it were only based on the faith that everyone has, what would I be looking for in the monastery? Why did I become a monk? Why am I a priest? What do my masses and prayers that I say matter? so much more would I have remained a layman. Here you see from these words of theirs that they are unbelievers and not Christians, and do not want to be one thing with all Christians, as St. Paul says here that all the baptized have put on Christ and are all one in Christ; but they seek their own special ways before all Christians, and Christ is neither good, full, nor enough for them to put on and be justified and saved in him.
70 So they turn back this saying of Paul and say: All baptized are not one in Christ; but there is not only Jew and Greek, but also Carthusian, barefoot, preacher, priest and such like classes, which are right ways to salvation. So they seek first of all the blessedness and piety by their nature, which they should have before from baptism in faith, as they have other Christians; forget their Christian nature and name, take a human nature and name for it; are called no longer Christians, but Carthusians, Benedictines, Barefooters etc.
St. Paul says here of servants and freemen, according to the old custom (which is not common now, before in German lands), since the servants were their own people, who sold their masters, and might do with them as with other cattle. Those who were not their own people are called freemen; and now they might well be called such servants and their own people, the cloistered people who make themselves their own among men. And God willing, they thought of themselves as such, and let their spiritual being be a willing prison, in which they did not become pious and blessed, but practiced their piety and blessedness, attained by faith, in it.
(72) Now, as little as it helps or hinders you to be a man or a woman, so little does it help or hinder you to be a Christian or a priest, or to lead outwardly all kinds of creatures, works, orders, and ranks. That thou art a woman doth not make thee pious nor wicked, though thou doest all the works of the womanish nature; but the faith of Christ, above and apart from thy womanhood and womanish nature or work. Thus, being a nun does not make you spiritual, pious, or happy, even if you do all the rules, laws, and works of the nunnery order by a hair, or even if you alone fulfill all nuns' works and nature: but the faith of Christ does; who knows not of nuns, nor of monks, nor of laymen, nor of priests, nor of cobblers, nor of tailors, nor of fasting, nor of prayer, as little as he knows of Jews and Greeks, of male and female, of free and proper; but is in all, and above all, without distinction of any kind, of station, of order, of person, of vows, of works, of garments, of food, of days, of place, of workmen; in short, in none is godliness and blessedness.
But again, they may well cling to godliness and blessedness, that is, they may well believe in Christ and become all of one thing in him, however diverse their outward nature may be; as St. Paul says, "You are all one in Christ. Of this the 68th Psalm v. 7. sings: "God makes the one minded to dwell," or they are of one thing in the house, and the
Psalm 1: "How joyful and sweet it is that brothers dwell in the house of one thing. For faith is one in all, and makes one pious as another. Sects and orders do not do this, but each takes its own way; therefore they are wooden paths. And where there are not prelates in monasteries who teach such things, it would be much better that no stick nor stone should stand in the same monasteries, for they are vain gates of hell; it would also be better to run out and learn the faith elsewhere than to stay inside for an hour; one can still keep chastity. O of the innumerable ropes and aversions! How many noble souls must strangle and suffocate so miserably here, who could be helped so easily! Woe, woe, woe to popes, bishops and all those who are commanded to provide such a lot. Here the word of Christ may sound Matth. 24, 19: "Woe to the suckers and nurturers in the days".
He also says, "You are one," as if he were speaking of a man. He speaks this to the crowd in this way: You are not many, but one. And though outwardly ye are many and various, not all of one estate nor of one work, since godliness and blessedness are not in you; yet inwardly, since blessedness and godliness are, ye are one. Therefore, before men, a layman is different from a priest, a monk is different from a nun, a man is different from a woman; but before God, neither layman nor priest, nun nor monk, man nor woman, is one like the other in faith. This is the scriptural saying: Non est prosopolepsia, which the apostles commonly use, and reads in German: Es ist kein Ansehen der Person.
75) There is fulfilled the figure of Exodus 16:18, when the children of Israel gathered the bread of heaven, one more, the other less; and afterward, when they measured it by the measure of Gomor, that is, as much as a man might eat in a day, they all received alike, every man his Gomor; and as the text saith, "They that had gathered much received no more; and they that had gathered little received no less." This should also not be the case now alone in the
faith, since we all received the same Christ in one Gomor of faith, whether one hears the gospel more than the other; but also in love, so that the body and goods of all Christians would be common, as this figure is interpreted by the apostles in 2 Cor. 8:15, so that whoever had left would help him who had little or nothing, and whoever had too little would recover from him who had much, and so the same burdens would be borne as the apostles did in the beginning.
For as it is done for us by Christ in faith, when he sheweth his love, and poureth out his goodness upon us, and maketh us all like unto him, and he maketh himself like unto us: so must we also go with our good to our neighbor, if we would be Christians. And where faith is right, there it is undoubtedly done willingly from the heart; for all things are one thing and all Christians one man; then the law is fulfilled. But if it is not, then there is neither faith nor Christianity. Therefore it is easy to see how now in all the world faith lies and there are no more Christians; and yet all corners are full of masses and worship, that is, vain idolatry.
(77) Thus sayest thou: With this manner you disturb all monasteries and convents, and give cause for everyone to run out and leave his station; I answer: These words and teachings are not mine, as you see; talk to St. Paul, yes, to Christ and God, about why they disturb such foundations and beings. In the Israelite people there were also special people, who were called Baal's and Moloch's people, until all countries and cities became full of such own and special worship, that Jeremiah Cap. 2, 28. says, and Hosea Cap. 10, 1.: They erected as many altars and gods as they had cities, yet all wanted to serve God with them; therefore God had the land disturbed. And the holy king Josiah rumbled under it, 2 Kings 23:5, tore apart and broke all such services, yet he did not fear the pope's banishment, or that they would say of him that he had violated services; as Rabshakeh reproached the holy king Hezekiah about the same thing, 2 Kings 18:22. But such teaching does not disturb the monasteries and foundations, but teaches them to walk rightly and Christianly in them.
78) Behold the words of St. Paul, how he fighteth and meetteth on both sides, that he may keep us in the right middle way: he saith, There is neither Jew nor Gentile etc. If a Jew were to say from these words, "The status of a Jew is not valid in the sight of God; well then, I will let him go and become a Greek and accept this object," St. Paul meets him on the other side: No, he says, neither is a Greek. If then the Greek says, Let me leave the Greek status and become a Jew: No, says St. Paul, neither is a Jew. If the woman or servant says, If I were a man or free, because woman and servant are not valid, St. Paul replies, No, neither is man nor woman valid. What is valid then? Not to the side, but over against, Jews, Greeks, bond, free, male, female, in faith and in Christ. These are earthly ways, this is a heavenly way. So he also says 1 Cor. 7:18: "If any man be called in the Jewish circumcision, let him not bring on the uncircumcision; if any man be called uncircumcision, let him not bring on the circumcision." What is this, but so much that the Jew should not say, Because my circumcision is not valid, then let uncircumcision be valid, and in this I will now become pious. Again, the Gentile should not say, "Because my uncircumcision is not valid, I would like to be blessed, so I will circumcise myself. No, says St. Paul, who is none, and thus concludes: Circumcision is nothing, uncircumcision also nothing; but keeping God's commandment. This is what is said: Believe in Christ first, in which God's commandments are kept, and be pious and blessed first, circumcise afterwards or do not circumcise, be Jew or Gentile, man or woman, servant or free, do what you want, everything is then the same.
79 So here, too, the nun, the priest, the monk should not ask, "If my nature is not valid, then I will leave it and become a layman. No, says St. Paul, it does not count as a layman either. Again, if the layman were to say, "Oh, if I were a priest, a monk, or a nun, for my layman's state is a worldly, unholy state," he would say, "No," says St. Paul, "a monk, a nun, a priest's state does not apply either; it is just as worldly and unholy as your layman's state. What is valid
because? About you, about laymen, about monks, about nuns, about spiritual, about worldly. Faith in Christ, and doing to your neighbor as you believe Christ did to you, that is the only right way to become pious and blessed, and is no other.
If a young boy were learning a cobbler's trade, and such a fool or rogue came to a master, who taught him how the trade was a way to become pious and blessed, and the boy believed him, and practiced the cobbler's trade, thinking that he should thereby become blessed, and would not become blessed without such shoemaking, abandoning all other ways, faith and love: what would you do here? Should you not have mercy on the boy? Should you not be hostile to the master and wish all misfortune? Well, how will you help the boy? Do you want to say: Dear son, shoemaking does not work; it is not shoemaking in heaven, you must become a tailor? Then you will lead him from one hell to another, and you will be just as pious as that master; just as they do who advise a priest to become a monk, or a monk to enter another hard order, and so throw souls and consciences out of one frying pan into another. But so you must help him: Dear son, there is neither cobbler nor tailor here; but you must believe in Christ, and then do to your neighbor as you believe Christ did to you: then remain a cobbler, or become a tailor, as you wish. Behold, thou hast redeemed the soul, and his conscience is glad and satisfied, thanking God and thee. And yet he must not abandon his trade, indeed, he may now do it more cheerfully and freely than before. For Christ redeems not the hand from the work, not the person from the order, not the body from the status, but the soul from the false delusion and the conscience from the false faith. He is a redeemer of consciences and a bishop of souls, as St. Peter says in 1 Peter 2:25, so that the hand remains in the work, the person in the order, the body in the state.
Do the same, priest, monk, nun. Do not believe the teachers who
teach that your position is a way to become pious and blessed; they are vain blind guides, messengers of the devil and murderers of souls: but first learn that believing in Christ and serving your neighbor in turn is the right way; then stay where you are.
82 And so you say, "Yes, but I have become spiritual of the opinion that I wanted to become pious and blessed in this state, otherwise I would not have considered it; and make sure that there is not one among thousands who becomes spiritual of a different opinion. And if the people knew that no one would become spiritual, all monasteries and convents should perish from themselves within thirty years, so that no one could destroy them. Here I answer: Do you also think that Christ was drunk or a fool when he says Matth. 24, 24. that such false Christians would deceive everyone, even the elect? and St. Peter says 2. Ep. 2, 2. that many will follow the same damned sects. Is it any wonder that Christ says it is true? Do you want to believe your own imagination more than his words?
Therefore you see, where such a spiritual state does not work in this way, in faith and love, as has been said, I would not only that this teaching of mine should be the cause of destroying monasteries and convents, but I would that they were already lying in a heap in the ashes. If you can redeem your conscience and soul by this teaching and live in the spiritual state in such a way that you do not think of becoming pious and blessed by it, but only want to exercise your faith in it over your body and serve your neighbor, then stay in it and do not run away. But if you cannot, and your conscience wants to remain imprisoned, then it is better for you to tear off your caps and plates, abandon mass and prayer forever, and become a swineherd, for example, and you will not get any better. For to redeem the soul and conscience, no thing in heaven and earth should be kept.
If you are called an apostate, an apostate, an apostate monk, suffer, and remember the word of Christ, Matt. 7:3, that he who had a beam in his eye, punished him who had a mote in his eye. You are a man apostate, they are God's-
Apostates; you run from men that you may come to God, so they run from God that they may come to themselves and to men.
But see thou let not the rogue look, and let not such a state for a right cause. For the old Adam loves to adorn himself, and takes a cubit where he is allowed a finger's breadth. You may deceive men, but you will not deceive God. If you leave your status alone, so that you may live freely and get rid of the order, and not seek salvation of conscience alone, you have not followed me, nor have I advised you, you should know that. You may well remain in the order and keep your conscience free according to this teaching. Consider the parable of the cobbler's boy that I gave you. But if you are ever so weak and cannot keep your conscience free, it is better to be far from the state.
Summa Summarum, both of them: You must give up the opinion, or you must leave the state; faith does not suffer the opinion that you want to become pious and blessed through spiritual life or state. But because faith may suffer the estate, it is better to cast off the opinion than the estate; otherwise it might happen that afterwards the conscience would torment so hard for the sake of the abandoned estate (where the opinion is not dead), that it would be just as much if he had remained in the estate. It is only a matter of the serpent's head, of the opinion: if this were dead, so that a man did not think he would and might become pious and blessed by works and position, then all travel and care would be gone.
(87) But the serpent has such great diligence on his head that Christ also teaches us to be diligent on our heads, saying Matt. 10:16: "Be wise as serpents, and simple as doves. This serpent sets all his body and all that he has on keeping his head, and there is his life. So we should take care of our main thing, faith, and put everything else into it, and let it come and go as it leads; for therein is our life, which the evil spirit also seeks to trample underfoot with such seeming ordinances and stands. Again, if we follow the serpent
If the Pharisees crush their heads, that is, the opinion, which is a false faith in works, then the whole being is harmless. Therefore Christ calls the Pharisees serpent-breeders, because they are hard on works and such an opinion. But if we also guarded our heads like serpents, and were as wise in our nature as the children of the world are in their nature, then the simplicity of the deaf would follow from itself, that we would not take on any outward work, status or nature.
(88) But the greatest fault here is not Pilate, but Caipha, who delivers Christ into Pilate's hands, that is, the pope, bishops and doctors in the high schools, who should prevent such things, as shepherds do, so they themselves devour the sheep like wolves. They should preserve the faith; so they exterminate it, and not only let such orders and estates arise in the world, but establish them, confirm them, and praise them, and lay the serpent's head on silken pillows, giving it milk enough to eat and drink. They have brought two speeches into the world, and driven them so deeply into all hearts that it has not been possible that the Christian faith should remain. One is that the spiritual state is a state of perfection; with this they have made such a distinction between themselves and the common Christian man that they are almost alone regarded as Christians, the others as the unfit, rejected Cinderellas. In this way they have opened their mouths and noses to everyone, everyone has run to them and wanted to be perfect, and they have despised the commoner as nothing, until they have come to the point where they think that no one can be pious or blessed unless he is spiritual.
Behold, faith has fallen to the ground, and works and orders have arisen, as if not only piety and salvation were in their essence, but also perfection, since it all depends on faith alone, both to be pious and perfect. O what a banner the infernal Satan has thrown up! Since the spell has come and gone, he has undoubtedly climbed the main castle in Christendom. So the blind one goes.
The people are always talking about perfection, and they don't know what being pious, let alone perfect, means; they think it's all about works and status.
90. Yet about this they have made a great hole for themselves: saying that perfection and the state of perfection are two different things. A man may be in the state of perfection, and yet not be perfect, that is, he may be a spiritual person, and yet not holy; as they are commonly all in the state of perfection, and none in perfection. They also have St. Thomas Aquinas, who teaches: It is not necessary to be perfect, but it is enough that they are in the state of perfection and intend to become perfect. So now their custom is that one may be in the state of perfection and yet not perfect; neither be necessary, but only strive for it. Blind, blind, blind, mad, mad, mad, foolish, foolish, foolish and senseless is the people. Who does not know that a monk may wear a cap and plate and still be a rogue in the skin? The same is in the state of perfection and yet is not perfect. For the state of perfection is called a monk, cap and plate. Let them go, the blind, says Christ, they are blind and blind leaders. If St. Thomas (Aquinas) is more holy than I doubt, he has certainly become more miraculously holy than any other saint, for the sake of his harmful poisonous teaching.
The other is that they divided the gospel into two parts, consilia and praecepta, commandments and counsels. Christ gave only one counsel in the whole Gospel, namely, chastity, which may be kept even in the laity who have grace. But they have made twelve counsels in it, and deal with the Gospel as they please. In this way they have divided and separated the world, placing their life in the counsels and the laymen in the commandments, pretending that their life is higher than God's commandments. Because of this, the life and faith of the common Christians became like rotten sour beer; everyone opened their eyes, despised the commandments and ran after the rulers.
And when they have almost run, they have finally found man's law in clothes, food, singing, reading, plates etc., and over it God's commandment has followed the faith, both exterminated and forgotten, that now henceforth to be perfect and live in the wheels means to put on a black, white, gray or colored cap, to blare in church, to shear plates, not to eat eggs, not meat, not butter, and yet to eat and drink the best, to have lazy good days.
Behold, this is what Satan wanted by these two sayings. The first one destroys the faith and the whole New Testament with Christ; the other one chases after the commandments and the whole Old Testament with Moses. This is the people that all Scripture says should reign at the end of the world under the final Christ. More harmful, more poisonous two sayings have not come on earth, which so powerfully and quickly expel the whole of God's Scripture from the world, that now one does not know what is commandment or gospel. The gospel does not give commandments, but shows how impossible the commandments are, and teaches the faith of Christ, by which they are kept. But I wish that all monasteries were provided with true preachers of the faith, or were in ashes. Such a being has no means as the laity have; for the laity do not add to their laic works the opinion of becoming pious and blessed by it. But this people cannot live nor exist without such an opinion; there must be right or wrong faith in their works, there is no means. Well, that is enough about the sects. It is, unfortunately, so deeply muddied that it costs a lot of words; nevertheless, I don't know if it helps that we understand the clear, bright words of Paul again.
If then you are Christ's, you are Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise.
(94) How does it follow that all who put on Christ and are his are Abraham's seed and heirs, since we are not of the Jewish stock? That all who put on Christ through baptism and faith are his, and that he in turn is also theirs, is evident enough from the above text and interpretation; also that they are all one in Christ.
and one with him, yet spiritually, not bodily, they must also be and have all that Christ is and has. But Christ is Abraham's seed; so through him they must also be Abraham's spiritual seed. Just as they have Christ, so they are also seed. But they have him not bodily in flesh and blood, but spiritually in faith: therefore they are not his seed bodily, but spiritually.
95 But here it is to be noted that the apostle gives Abraham three kinds of seed. First, those who are only his children in the flesh, who only bring flesh and blood from him: this is a mere natural consequence, with whom God has no more to do than with other Gentiles; as he proved in Ishmael, who was Abraham's flesh and blood, first son, yet not counted among Abraham's seed and children in Scripture. Item, so also Esau was naturally Isaac's son and Abraham's flesh and blood. Item, after that many of Israel, who were all Abraham's children, flesh and blood, and yet were slain in the wilderness; and after that there have always been many who are damned, and still the several portion of Jews are damned now.
The other seed is those who are Abraham's children, both physically and spiritually, who bring with them not only flesh and blood, but also the spirit and faith of Abraham, as Isaac, Jacob, the patriarchs, prophets and all the blessed among the people of Israel are. This is the right seed that God has to deal with; He helped the seed out of Egypt, led it into the land of Canaan and showed it innumerable benefits, as the Scriptures indicate. For the sake of the seed he also tolerated the pure fleshly seed among them and let them enjoy the same benefits for a time. Just as Abraham was their spiritual father through the faith of Christ, so they were all his spiritual children, above the natural kinship. Among this seed Christ is the chief, of whom Abraham himself and all Abraham's seed, his brethren and joint heirs, are blessed. Now this is the text, since it says of this seed Gen. 12, 3. and Cap. 22, 18. says: "In your seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed." The
is fulfilled in Christ; for they are all with Christ and in Christ, and Christ with them and in them One Seed. Christ is blessed by God: his fellow seed is blessed through Christ: the Gentiles through the apostles, and the Jews in Christ, who are also his fellow seed.
97 The third seed, who do not bring flesh and blood from Abraham in the flesh, but have the spiritual result, that is, the faith of Abraham in Christ, his seed. Now these are we and all the Gentiles who are Christians in the true faith. For just as unbelief is so strong that it separates even natural children, flesh and blood, from Abraham's clan, so that they are not called Abraham's seed and God's children in Scripture, so again faith is so powerful that it also makes those who are not his flesh and blood into Abraham's true seed, but bring faith with them only from the spiritual result of Abraham. Of this Paul says Rom. 4, 13. and Rom. 9, 8. item Gal. 3. This seed is touched in the promise, since God says to Abraham: "All nations on earth shall be blessed in your seed."
98. if the blessing is to come to the nations, they must become like Abraham's seed; for Abraham and his seed have nothing but the same blessing. If the inheritance, the chief possession, the blessing is common and one, of Abraham, his seed, and all the nations of the earth, then they must all be counted as Abraham's heirs, seed, and children, having flesh or not flesh of him. So that it is decided that Abraham has no seed except the one who believes, for these are counted as seed to him in the Scriptures. This is where the promise of God comes in, that Abraham's seed should be blessed and bless others. Everything must be blessed that is to be Abraham's seed and inheritance; as the words of the promise compel. Now no one is blessed unless he believes. He who does not believe remains under a curse; so that St. Paul Rom. 4, 13. 9, 8. and here calls such Abraham's seed the seed of promise, which is not the seed of the flesh, but of faith, which are declared in the promise; as he says
Rom. 9, 8: "Not the children that are the seed of the flesh shall be the children of God, but they that are the children of the promise shall be counted for seed. Therefore John 1:13 is also true: "Not of the seed, nor of the will of the flesh, but born unto God."
Now you see what the apostle means when he says: "If you are Christ's seed, you are Abraham's seed, heirs according to the promise. As if he should say: You are not the natural seed of Abraham, nothing would help you any more, as it helps no one else; but you are his promised seed, since the power also lies with him. For Abraham has no other than the promised blessed seed, let God be his flesh and blood or not. Abraham's seed must be understood according to the Scriptures, not according to nature. Now the Scripture does not respect nature, taking at the same time nature and not nature, all who are blessed and believe. Although God had provided that children of blessing would certainly come from Abraham's natural seed, not because of nature, but because of election, by grace.
100 Now you must understand the word "Abraham's seed and inheritance", as it is said in the previous epistle against the works of the Lord.
that righteousness is not obtained by works, but must first be and do all works. For whatsoever is heir does not work for the inheritance, or for the reward of the inheritance, but already possesses the inheritance, and exercises the same by his works; therefore he that believeth is already pious and righteous, blessed also, without any works, thus gifted by grace; after which what he doeth are only works of exercise in this inheritance.
Further, if you believe, you must feel the inheritance and consider yourself to be God's child and not doubt it. If you doubt it, you are neither a child nor an heir and certainly do not believe correctly. But you must not doubt it, in this life and in death. But what is a Christian being but a beginning of eternal life? But if you pretend to be God's child and confess such faith, Caiphas will tear his garment before great worship and cry out over you: Blasphemavit (He has blasphemed God) and the others all with him: Reus est mortis (He is guilty of death); "We have a law, and according to the law he shall die; for he has made himself God's child"; crucify him, crucify him, he is a heretic and deceiver etc., Joh. 19, 7. 15. Let this be told to you, and judge yourself on it, it must be so.