First impression, from the year 1531.
1. I will now speak a little about the conjugal life and state, because enough was written about it before; but it is also one of the most necessary things that should be preached in Christianity and that Christians should know. So that the same doctrine
*) Cf. Jen. A. V, 345; Altenb. A. V, 59S; Leipz. A.
Let us now take before us the saying which is written in the epistle to the Hebrews, Cap. 13:4, and which is so little held and preached under the papacy, since all praise and all preaching was directed to chastity and virginity alone, as if all the world were chastity; though they are few in number who are endowed with the gift.
Hebr. 13, 4.
Marriage shall be kept honest among all, and the marriage bed undefiled; but fornicators and adulterers God will judge.
2 So the apostle does not teach the Gentiles here, but the Christians who have been baptized, that they all live in such a way that there is no lewdness among them. But that they keep their state honest, and their bed pure. Therefore, the first thing to be learned from this state, as well as from all other states that God has established, is this: that everyone know and be sure that the marriage state is ordered and established by God. This is almost the highest art in married life, to know that one should regard the state according to the highest honor, namely, that it is God's endowment and has God's word.
(3) The doctors of old preached that the married state was to be praised for its fruit, fidelity and love. But is not also the bodily benefit a delicious thing, that the first virtue of the married state is praised, that a man may rely on his wife, that his body and goods on this earth may comfortably be entrusted to the wife, that they may be as well preserved with her as with him? This fruit would also be one, but we do not want to tell this, we leave this to the rhetors.
4. to speak of it in a Christian and godly way, the highest thing is that God's word is written on your wife and on your husband; if you look at your wife as if there were only one and no one else in this world; and if you look at your husband as if there were only one and no one else in the world; that no king, even the sun, should shine more beautifully and shine in your eyes than your wife or your husband. For here thou holdest the word of God, which promises thee the wife or the husband, gives thee the wife or the husband, says: The husband shall be thine; the wife shall be thine; this pleases me so well, all angels and creatures have joy and delight in it. For there is ever no adornment above God's word, that thou shouldest look upon thy wife as a gift from God. So you can't have a guilty conscience.
5. although it seems that it would be easy to
and who does not know that the marriage state was established and instituted by God, created in paradise, and also confirmed and blessed outside of paradise? as Moses indicates in Genesis 1:2 and 9. Everyone knows this well. I have also learned to repeat the words; but it is such an art that I do not yet know, am still learning it. Reason and the world do not think that marriage is a gift of God, just as the pagans think that it happens by chance that one is granted this or that. For if you look at the attendance and turn your eyes to the outward attendance, there is no difference at all between the conjugal life and the whore life, they are very close to each other and look almost alike, that this one has a wife, that one a whore, therefore that the same person, man and woman, dwell with each other on both sides in the conjugal and whore life.
(6) That is why people have made such a jiggery-pokery of marriage and talked about it so frivolously everywhere. It all flows from the fact that it looks so close and similar to the life of a whore. Therefore, the highest art that belongs to Christians alone, and that Christians want to be, is to know how to distinguish conjugal life from fornication; that a husband is certain and can say, "God has given me this woman, and I shall dwell with her," and that a wife can say, "God has given me this man, and I shall dwell with him in bed and at table. Well, this art is high and necessary to know, let him who can learn it.
(7) Likewise, the sophists looked at this state only from the outside, considered it a lewd life, and made it a vain, useless thing. Above this, they also lived a lewd life of whoredom, a life to which they were well accustomed. Therefore, they could not praise the marriage state more highly, and in addition, they have weighed down and injured the marital conscience by speaking of this state.
as if he were like another common lewd life. I do not want to touch this lament now, but we know very well how they are punished by God, and how such contempt of the marriage state has smelled on them, and they find it enough that the natural love for woman or man, not only for conjugal life, has died out in them. This is what they have to pay for, who wanted to teach and master God.
(8) A Christian should know how to distinguish marriage from illegitimate life. By what? By God's word. For God has attached His word to the marriage state, when He says Genesis 1:27, 28: God created male and female, and gave Eve to Adam, "and blessed them, and said unto them, Be fruitful and multiply" etc. As such blessing is negated again in the 9th chapter. Item Genesis 2:18, 24: "It is not good that a man should be alone; I will make him a helpmeet for him. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and cleave unto his wife, and shall be two in one flesh." Item Matth. 19, 6.: "What God has joined together, let no man put asunder." Without this word the marital state would also be a lewd life and no marriage state. Therefore, the most noble thing in the marriage state is that one can see the word shining in it.
(9) I will give you an example of this, if you can grasp it the better. When I see a robber or a murderer cut off a man's head, the work is the same as when a prince or a judge cuts off a man's neck. That is why they preached in such a way, the unholy drops, that the authorities should not be bloodthirsty, but show mercy; so that they made the secular sword even blunt, so that people were horrified when they had to judge by blood. I myself have seen and known many fine men who, when they were to sit in the chair and pass a sentence of blood, fled from it and went elsewhere so that they would not be there and participate in the atrocious work. This and other errors have all come from the fact that, without God's word, we have judged the estates from the outside.
and after the work, and in the meantime let go of God's word. For if a murderer cuts off a man's head, he does not do right, for he has no command, there is no word of God, yes, he does this against God's word and commandment, which forbids him not to kill. Therefore, it is a murder, a hell, darkness and death. But when the prince or judge kills someone, our Lord's word and command is with him, there you do not wield the sword, but God; there the sword shines as if it were in God's hand, as if an angel wielded it and not a man; therefore God's word is attached to it, which commands to punish the wicked and to protect and defend the pious, Romans 13:13. 13 [And as a robber sins when he murders, to whom it is forbidden: so the judge sins when he does not kill, to whom it is commanded to kill, Rom. 13, 4.]
010 For a thief that stealeth another man's garments, or any other thing, is very like unto this work, as the judge or the public servant goeth about, and taketh a pledge: and yet there is a great difference between them. The judge does it justly, he shall take it, and has holy and God's fists. For the word of God speaks to him: You shall punish injustice, demand and administer justice. But the thief has neither command nor right to take from another what is his; indeed, God has forbidden him: Thou shalt not steal. Therefore, he has vile, damned, cursed fists and fists of sin to grab.
(11) So also that their two, husband and wife, are with each other in the lewd life, which seems to be quite like the married life. For they clothe each other, walk and work with each other, are so like married couples in bed and at table that reason cannot separate them. As it has often been found that two of them have sat together in the field in the bushes, who were thought to be married, and yet have been told otherwise. But in the conjugal life God is with his word, sanctifying the life; saying, When thou dwellest with thy wife, walkest with her.
If you go to bed and to the table, it is not a life like whores and boys come together; but a holy and divine attendance, which is ordered and established by God Himself; just as the other whore life is forbidden by Him. As here in this epistle and in the Ten Commandments, Ex. 20, 14: "Thou shalt not commit adultery"; item v. 17: "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife."
12 Oh, if only God would have everyone walk in such a spirit that he could say from his heart: That I sit and live here with my spouse, I am sure that it is so pleasing to God, that God has thus established and ordered, that God's word calls me such. Such a word, in turn, comforts the spouses and gives them a good conscience. But those who live together out of wedlock cannot have such a good conscience. For they are against the word of God, and are together not in the name of God, but in the name of the devil.
This is the true golden art, which few of them can do; I cannot yet do it either, as I would like to. For by old custom our hearts are not accustomed, in this state as in change, to look only to the word, and not to the work. It is true that our flesh is full of evil desires that tempt us to sin. But the same must not be followed; but if thou holdest up the word of God against it, and lookest to it, that this estate may be blessed and adorned, it shall preserve thee, and again comfort thee, and make thee a holy and spiritual estate. And to him it does violence and injustice that they have called it a worldly estate: it should be called a divine and spiritual estate. But other orders, of the pope, the monks and nuns, must be called spiritual; perhaps because the devil, their god and founder, is also a spirit, by whom they are conceived and made. For where is it written that a monk should wear a black or white cap; lead this order or that rule; eat this or that? etc. But of the marriage state it is written that God created a male and female and gave them together, commanding them to beget children etc.
14 Now because this estate has the Word, and is sanctified by that Word, and is set in the Word as a sanctuary in a monstrance, it is to be held in great honor, and for an order that is pleasing to God; so that every husband or wife may be sure and certain that he is in a right spiritual estate; not apart from marriage, but in marriage, according to God's Word, blessing and order.
(15) This preaching is not only necessary for the sake of conscience, so that you do not feel guilty about lying with your wife or with your husband; for God created and ordained it this way, but it also serves against the devil. For those who are not yet in this state think only that it is a life of pleasure; but those who are in it think much differently. Those who are outside this state in a lewd life do not even recognize such a word, so that this state is adorned and blessed; they only look at it according to the outward appearance, for such a life, in which one only seeks good days and pleasure. But if you want to send yourself in such a way that you see God's word shining over the man's hat and over the woman's veil, that they are God's creature and work, then the devil will find his way to you on both sides. If you seek pleasure in it, it shall pass away from you and be turned to displeasure. For the devil does not like it that the spouses are friendly and one with each other.
(16) That is why God suffers such rutting, which He gave to the bridegroom and the bride, thinking: I must put such a cap on the fool [that they come together*]; for if this were not so, people could never be brought into conjugal life. And where also such ardor and love would always remain, one would devour the other for great love, as it is said in the proverb. Therefore the devil is hostile to the state, as he is to all God's words and deeds, and causes man and woman often to become estranged from each other, to forget love, to become impatient, and yet they must remain with each other. Therefore they will
*) This is how the Jena edition reads. D. Red.
the pleasure turns into displeasure, the joy into anger and sorrow. How then also such experiences daily those, who hold it for God's work and order.
(17) Therefore the Scripture says, Sir. 25:1, 2, that there are three things for which God is well pleased, and which are also praised among men, namely, that brethren be one to one; that neighbors be kind to one another; and that husband and wife be pleasant to one another. Why does the Scripture praise these three things so highly? Because where brothers are at peace and remain one, that is a strange bird; likewise, that neighbors live friendly with one another, that one may trust the other, not being envious or malicious of one another; and that husbands and wives live peaceably with one another. Whoever looks at the marriage state from the outside alone thinks: "Is it such a great art to be friendly to your neighbor? to love your husband? and that brothers are one with each other? Should not brothers be one, who would want to be one? Yes, you can see that when they have to share a bit of shabby property: before one would give anything to the other, he would rather give five to the other. So there is often strife and quarreling among the sisters for the sake of a morsel of bread or for the sake of a drink, for the sake of a little shavings or straw. So it is with the love we should show to our neighbors, that it often lingers on for the sake of an infinite thing, that perhaps one shoos another's chicken etc. So man and woman can always remain at one with other people better than with themselves, and sometimes one can speak a word that is not proper, that would go through the other's heart. The reason is that Satan has no desire to do so where there is peace and unity. If they are not one, what joy and pleasure can there be?
(18) Therefore, one must be prepared against such unpleasantness and vexation. Yes, you say, yet it is God's state, and God has thrown me into it; it should ever be finely peaceful and quiet inside. It is called patientia (patience), brother! The state is therefore not evil nor to be despised, obs wohl nicht
It cannot be as pure as if the doves had chosen it. That's why people say of married couples who get along well with each other, "It's a beautiful marriage. As if to say, "It seldom turns out so well. But that two spouses do not love each other is no wonder, for they do not seek or see how they are conceived and understood in God's word. For if they could see this, how they would be surrounded by a bright light and sunshine, then it would be all the same to them. But now God has mixed it this way, and put mustard with the roast, so that it tastes all the better to them, and so that God may meet them, and they leave that which makes them unwilling and unhappy, and think: Here I have God's word, so that God has adorned and blessed you; this shall be dearer to me than all unhappiness, discord and strife.
19 This is one of the ways the devil tries to cause all unpleasantness and discord in the marriage state, so that one becomes hostile to the other, evil housekeeping, one carries out the back, the other out the front. If the husband breaks the jar, the wife breaks the crock. There then becomes a hell and the devil out of it; that he may well laugh himself. But where husbands and wives live together in friendship, he takes no pleasure in it; but God is well pleased, and laughs and is glad. To this St. Paul says in 1 Cor. 7:15: "If it so happens that married couples are at odds, they should unite and reconcile with one another. Likewise, St. Peter in his first epistle Cap. 3, 7, that the wife, as the weakest instrument, should be spared etc. The dear apostles have seen how the devil sows his seed among married couples, and they want to comfort and uplift the people with the words.
20 But this is how it is: He who is out of wedlock thinks, when he comes in, that he will always laugh and be in good spirits; never speak anything that is annoying to the other. You will leave that alone. You think it is such a thing that happens by chance, that comes from your thoughts. No, it is God's order that he who enters into matrimony enters into matrimony.
to a monastery that is full of temptation. Let her now be the same, how rich, how beautiful, how friendly she is, then you will have enough trouble to keep such love, such friendship. For it is not in your hands, and in addition you have a strong enemy, who is called the devil, who likes to see people purring and grumbling in the house, throwing chairs, benches and tables over each other, sweeping the room with the wife or otherwise giving a mule. That is the devil's game, he laughs in his fist; that is his opinion and that is what he would like to have, that no man should stay with his wife and that none should love her husband. Therefore you must not look at married life from the outside, for there you will see how it is full of temptation and sorrow, but according to the word, so that it may be adorned and restrained. That word will turn the bitter wormwood into honey, and the sorrow into joy.
(21) Then, on the other hand, he will also challenge you with lust. For you will not be so chaste (unless you have a special grace from God), and you will never love your wife so much that you will not grow tired of her or prefer to win another. Likewise, your wife will never love you so much that she will not like another one better. God protect me! Should I not love my wife? Should I be tired of my husband? God protect me, too! Behold, thou thinkest that outwardly thou shalt be regarded as living chastely; but nevertheless thou shalt feel well in thy heart such thoughts as will provoke thee to sin.
22 Therefore, if you are equipped with God's word and clothed with it as with a crown of gold and a purple robe, you are sufficiently adorned. Then the spirit will say to you according to the word of God: "This woman is given to you; you shall have her and no other. So also the woman will say, "The man is mine; I will neither see nor hear him nor any other.
023 But how, if the woman purr and murmur, that thou shalt say, Eh, hath the executioner brought me behind the woman? That she this
and that, all those who have advised and helped me! If only I had taken that one, she is so fine and kind. And will strike with it evil desire, as the poets write, that love rages and rages.
(24) Therefore, let each of you see to it that he remains with his spouse, whom God has given him, and let no other please him better. But you will not be able to do this without God's word, if you have only that before your eyes and reflect yourself in it at all times. Then your bed will become pure gold, your table, your chamber, your house and everything about your wife will become pure solid gold. For thou art in the word that saith unto thee, Thou shalt be a husband; and thou wife shalt cleave unto thy husband. Thus God has decreed. If you consider the marriage state by the word and in the word, and if you have such a high regard for one another, you will not like another man's wife as well as yours. For the word will not please thee, though it seem to thee that another is the most gracious and beautiful in word and deed; yet she is black as coal in thine eyes, and smeared with the devil's dung. For there you do not find this adornment, God's word. Yours, however, is the most beautiful and lovely to you, as God has adorned you with his dear word.
(25) But, as I have said, it is the highest art to look at this state in God's word, which alone makes both the state and the spouses lovely. And if any unwillingness should arise, it must nevertheless sink and disappear as in a deep sea. For the word is powerful and holy, and makes all other things holy where it is recognized and grasped. Although the devil does not like it that they keep conjugal chastity and live chastely in wedlock, for he always seeks cause and means how to tear them apart; so that the wife thinks, "If I had this or that young fellow for my unladylike husband," and again the husband thinks, "If I had this or that pretty strumpet for my ugly wife," etc. And the fool then sees another, without God's word, lets his go, forgets
of the same, since he has God's word with him. How such fools have been found and are still found, who have left their beautiful wives and have attached themselves to naughty, nasty sacks. All this comes from the fact that they consider their status no better than a lewd life.
026 For Satan is an enemy to thee, and the flesh is crafty: so also is iniquity planted in us; it ceaseth not, because we live, except thou cleave unto the word of God. Yes, it may well come to pass that thy maid shall please thee better than thine own wife, and that the wife shall please the servant better than her husband. All this is done by the devil, who blinds people so that you do not consider God's word, which makes this man or this woman for you and assigns them to you, so that you should not consider any other for the word and over the word, to desire her as a spouse. For whoever does this has already broken the marriage, as Christ interprets Matth. 5, 28.
27 The holy apostle also wants to teach this here, as he admonishes the Christians to keep the marriage state dear and valuable and the bed pure and undefiled. For this is what God wants from you. But if you will do better and differently, as the pope has done with his dear clergy, I will not let you go unpunished. As he has proven this honestly and by deed in their case. The pagans and papists know nothing at all about this state; indeed, with them a carnal and worldly state is respected. But their false, fictitious statuses must be called spiritless (ei, spiritual I would have called them), so that they made the spouses evil consciences in their status, when it should be the other way around; as was said before.
28 But that the apostle says here: Marital life should be kept honest, and the bed clean, he sets these two things against the above-mentioned temptations, namely, that our flesh has many harmful pleasures and excesses, and the pride in marriage is great. It follows, then, that avarice drives me there, overindulgence chases me here, and avarice throws me elsewhere. And is this not only to be understood here that the beds
and cloths reij-" be washed; but these uncleanness and stains in the marriage bed are fornication and adultery. These are the right stains that defile, defile, and defile the marriage bed. For those who live a lewd life outside this state, as fornicators, consider this state to be nothing; but both blaspheme and despise God's word and state, however piously they present themselves before the world. But those who are married and do not keep it, but break it against God's commandment and order, they defile and pollute it.
(29) Therefore, all those who regard married life as if it were a state of affairs that happens by chance, disgrace it, for they do not see that the spouses are bound by the word of God. Therefore they do no honor to the married state, but put it to all shame; for they put up with their shamefully lewd life more than the divine and conjugal life. Against this he warns them here, that they may watch and not regard the married state as such a lewd life; but consider it great, glorious, and in all honor, even thus: When you leave the life of a harlot and enter the married life, then, when you have come into it, be careful not to defile the bed, that is, that you wife be devoted to your husband and that you husband be satisfied with your wife; if not, the bed is defiled, the word of God is rejected, the marriage state is abandoned, the bed is ruined, and (he might have said) three things are done.
(30) Therefore, when the devil comes to you with pride and excess, be wise, take hold of God's word, and think: God has made me a man, he has given this one into my arms, she shall be mine etc. If you do this, it will be easier for you to keep your bed clean. For the word shall make thee fear and be afraid, that thou forsake not thy wife. Though she be impatient and obstinate, yet for the word's sake she shall please thee better than another with a veil of gold, and thou shalt be much more honored and adorned than if thou hadst gifts and goods of all kings.
So a delicious veil is around a marriage veil; and such a well-decorated hat around a marriage hat, who can consider it and look at it.
(31) On the other hand, there are some who seek their extractions so that they do not become married and finally drown in fornication; they pretend that there is still much evil in marriage and that there is much sin within it, and so on. No one can believe that it is so pure without sin. But, give me some divine state that goes without sin. In that way I would never have to preach a sermon, serve a servant or a maid, the authorities would not have to use the sword, a nobleman would not have to ride a horse. Not yet, dear Squire! We will never be so pure here in this life that we would do any good work without sin. This article must stand: I believe the forgiveness of sins.
(32) Do you say again that they are angry with each other, and so the husband and wife sin? Ever, God forbid, do you want to reject the married state for that? Dear, don't make me a departure here with this state. Sin this, sin that; if thou wilt put one into sin, put the other in also; but if thou wilt draw one out, draw the other out also. I will never have preached nor done a sermon that I will have preached without sin; I will remain a sinner, and will keep the article, forgiveness of sins, and not deny it. If they are sometimes angry with one another, we confess that they sin in it; but on the other hand, holiness is much more glorious, and forgiveness so much greater, if I remain alone in it and do not step out, and remain in my state, to which God has called me. Even though it is not without sin, it is not without sin.
But God's word is so great that for its sake the state is also pure and holy.
33. Therefore, you hardened and hardened man, may you take a man, or may you take a woman, why do you not take one whom God gives you, and adorns her for you with His word, blesses her and consecrates her for you? Why would you not much rather accept the gift from God that you need (which God grants you, in which you would have a much better treasure than in the sun; indeed, which you would love with a glad heart, with God's good pleasure and all the angels and creatures), than to rob and steal another's wife, who is not due to you and whom God has not given you, since the devil is and since you are cursed? For God has not adorned her with His word, even deprived her of His word. But what is without God's word is an abomination and an abomination in the sight of God. Therefore, because you hurry and pray, it is a sure sign that you are without faith, that you do not believe God's word to be true. For if such a thing burns within thee, thou shalt say, This is another man's wife, it is no concern of mine, it is shameful in mine eyes; I will have another, which God will give me; and shalt not look about thee with thy foolish reason after another man's wife, because God is angry with and all the angels, which hath no continuance, which God will punish severely, as he saith here. So it serves you right. Why do you despise the noble gift that God has offered you out of grace and mercy, blessed and adorned, throwing it to the wind, not asking whether it pleases God or not, which is a sign of unbelief?
Let this be said this time in honor of the wedding and the marriage. Therefore, let us call upon God to grant us His grace to believe and live this way. Amen.