Plochmann provides the best information about the origin of the Hauspostille in the preface to the first edition of the Erlangen edition. The historical notes are more clearly arranged than in the preface of Walch's edition. Therefore, we print Plochmann's words here:
Unfortunately, we have the sermons contained in the Hauspostille not from Luther's pen, but from his mouth, through the faithful but often not fortunate diligence of two of his listeners, Veit Dietrich and Georg Rörer. Hence it comes that gradually two editions differed so much from each other.
of the house postilion, which one later tried to unite into one under the name double house postilion. Veit Dietrich spent a long time in Wittenberg with Luther, enjoyed his special confidence, was his table companion, his traveling companion, and carefully copied his lectures and sermons. Later he came as a Lutheran preacher to the church of St. Sebald in Nuremberg, and died there in 1549. Georg Rörer was the first whom Luther ordained as a Lutheran preacher and deacon in Wittenberg in 1525. He was a faithful assistant and co-worker of Luther, took special care of correct editions of Luther's writings, and died in Halle in 1557. Among other things, both of them copied the sermons that Luther had preached in his house in the years 1530 to 1534, and from their manuscripts the two so variously different editions of Luther's house postilion were created.
Dietrich's was first published in Nuremberg in 1544 with a letter of dedication to the mayor and council of the city of Nuremberg, in which the editor says that he had received these sermons with a hurried hand and kept them with him, but now wanted to pass them on to other Christians as a noble treasure, and that the
The book is a good example of a work that can be used by unlearned pastors in the countryside as well as by fathers of the household. Luther wrote a preface to this edition, which is also printed in ours, in which he not only acknowledges the sermons transcribed by Dietrich as his own, but also praises the efforts and enterprise of the editor. In the same year, this edition of Dietrich's sermons was printed in Leipzig, a year later again in Nuremberg and Wittenberg under Luther's eyes, and later in Wittenberg, Frankfurt, Augsburg, Lüneburg and other places, and was translated into Latin as early as 1545 by Michael Roting, professor of Greek and Latin at the Aegidian Gymnasium in Nuremberg, a close friend of Veit Dietrich.
In the letter to the Nuremberg council Veit Dietrich had said among other things: he had added many sermons, which were omitted by him (Luther), especially from the festivals, which are not kept in the Saxon order, so that this work would be perfect for the whole year and therefore all the more useful and useful for everyone. After Luther's death, this statement may have given rise to doubts about the authenticity of Dietrich's house postilion, since it was believed from his own confession that he had added his own sermons to those of Luther; Therefore, in 1559 a new house postilla of Luther appeared, which a certain Andreas Poach, also a student of Luther, who had been Diaconus at Halle, Archidiaconus at Jena, pastor at Nordhausen and professor at Erfurt, and died as pastor at Utenbach in 1585, edited from the manuscript of the late Georg Rörer at Jena. To this the famous Nicolaus von Amsdorf wrote a preface, in which he declared that this new
It was also later reprinted in many places, namely in Jena in 1501 and in Torgau in 1601, and in Leipzig in 1655, 1655 and 1702. It was later reprinted in many places, namely in Jena in 1562 and 1579, in Torgau in 1601, and in Leipzig in 1655, 1679 and 1702, and was translated into Latin by Johann Wanckel, professor of history at Wittenberg, and into Dutch in 1567 (printed in Oberursel).
In the preliminary report to this edition of Luther's Hauspostille, organized in Jena by Andreas Poach, Poach reproaches Dietrich for including his own sermons in Luther's Hauspostille, for often combining two or three sermons that Luther did not preach in one year, and for inserting others, especially on feast days, when there were no sermons by Luther. In contrast, all of this has been avoided in his edition; he has omitted the foreign sermons that were not Luther's work, since Luther preached three years in a row and sometimes several times on a gospel in his house, he has included all of the sermons that he preached, and he has left them in the state in which they were preached by Luther; "whoever therefore likes to have Dr. Luther's sermons alone, is hereby served.
Against these reproaches, which were made to Dietrich's edition of Luther's house postilla, however, a certain Christoph Walther, typesetter in the Luftschen Buchdruckerei in Wittenberg, soon stood up with a writing, titled: Antwort auf die Flacian Lügen und falschen Bericht wider die Hauspostille Doctoris Martini Lutheri, Wittenberg 1559 in 4., in which he not only defended and justified Dietrich's edition, but also cast the most serious doubt on the authenticity of the new Jena house postilla.
To draw sought. "The house postilion Lutheri", he states in this writing, "the dear, learned man M. Vitus Dietrich has taken up from the mouth of the venerable father in Christ D. Martin Lutheri with a hurried hand, and when he became pastor at Nuremberg, he had it printed with the approval and permission of our dear father Lutheri. Luther also had them printed several times in Wittenberg, and ordered the magistrate Georgen Rörer to correct them. Therefore, I, as an old servant in the printing house, who also, along with M. Georg Rörer, often helped to read and correct such house postilions in Wittenberg, must respond to such sacrilegious interrogations of the Flacianists". And now he continues to claim: Veit Dietrich has not added anything of his own work, the passage in the Zueignungsschrift an den Nürnberger Rath, where he says that he has added many sermons, so omitted by Luther, is to be understood in such a way that he has inserted instead of such omitted house sermons some church sermons held by Luther, which he copied from him just like the house sermons. The Poach edition of the house postilion is therefore unauthentic, because Veit Dietrich copied the blessed Luther, since he preached at home, alone, but not also Georg Rörer, because he was at that time still Diaconus at Wittenberg, and had not at all the gift, especially with hurrying hand to copy and to compose. - Be that as it may, it cannot be denied that both such different editions of Luther's Hauspostille have their peculiar merits and shortcomings. While Dietrich's preface has the seal of authentication ahead of Rörer's, it nevertheless suffers from the reproach that several of the sermons contained in it have grown to an unusual length, and necessarily consist of two or more sermons.
The sermons in Rörer's collection, on the other hand, are shorter. In contrast, the sermons in Rörer's collection are shorter, and there are probably two or even three sermons included for each Sunday, which could very well have been given by Luther and collected by Georg Rörer. For according to their content as well as their language, they have absolutely nothing that would contradict this assumption. However, the reason for the different readings, both in individual words as well as in whole sentences and sections, which occur in those sermons that both editions give together, cannot be determined with any certainty.
Only in the two most recently published editions of Luther's complete works, the Leipzig and the Walch editions, has the double Hauspostille been included. In the former it makes up the 15th and 16th, in the latter the 13th part. Dr. Börner, the editor of the Leipzig edition, had each of the two house postils printed separately, Dietrich's in the soldered and Rörer's in the 16th part. Walch, on the other hand, combined both postilles and brought them into one work in such a way that all the sermons that are not in Dietrich's edition were inserted from Rörer's in the appropriate place, and the difference between the sermons found in the two editions was carefully noted. This procedure has something very annoying for those who want to read Luther's sermons for edification, in that they encounter eternal repetitions, often have to read the same thought two or three times on the same page, usually only with highly insignificant deviations, and cannot remain coherent at all. -
So much for Plochmann. We share the last expressed concern about the procedure
Walch's. Therefore, we give the two house postils, the one by Dietrich and the one by Rörer, separately, according to the process and according to the text of the Erlangen edition.
In Dietrich's Postille, the latter was based on the 1547 edition. This was titled: "Hauspostille D. Martin Luthers über die Sonntags- und der fürnehmsten Feste Evangelia, durch das ganze Jahr. With diligence newly corrected and augmented with 13 sermons on the Passion or History of the Passion of Christ. Nuremberg 1547." The deviating readings of the three previous editions are marked with the same letters as the Erlangen edition, namely with a the Nuremberg edition of 1544, with d the Wittenberg edition of 1544, and with c the Nuremberg edition of 1545. Since these are corrections and improvements by Dietrich, not the words of Luther, and since most of the deviations are of very minor importance, we have noted only a few variants.
Dietrich's Postilla appears herewith as a special volume, which is to form the first half of the 13th volume of Luther's works, and
The book is also available as a jubilee edition, commemorating the 400th anniversary of the Reformer's birth.
May Luther's Hauspostille also find its due place in this new guise in the homes of Lutherans, and especially in the home services, as well as in the public reading services! We recall the words of Luther, which he wrote four years before his end, to which Walch also refers in his preface to the Hauspostille (Walch, Hall. Ausg. XXI, 214 *):
"When we are thus clothed with the sacred ornament, whether we be men or women, we come forth publicly, and do right priestly offices, and confess Christ, and preach and teach our children, servants, and journeymen. For this is what St. Augustine says to his citizens: What we are in the church, you are also in your homes, that is, we are bishops or preachers in the church, and you are required to be bishops or preachers in your homes. Therefore look to it, you must care for your household with God's word, as well as we for the whole church."
St. Louis, Pentecost 1883.