First sermon.*)
Matth. 22, 13-22.
Then the Pharisees went and held a council, as they caught him in his speech; and they sent unto him their disciples, with Herodi's servants, saying: Master, we know that thou art true, and teachest the way of God aright, and askest after no man: for thou regardest not the reputation of men. Therefore tell us, what do you think? Is it right to give interest to Caesar, or not? When Jesus perceived their wickedness, he said, "You hypocrites, why do you tempt me? Give me the interest coin. And they offered him a penny. And he said unto them: What is the image and the superscription? And they said unto him, The emperor. And he said unto them, Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and unto God the things that are God's. When they heard this, they were astonished and left him and went away.
The most important part of this gospel is that our dear Lord Jesus Christ teaches us the difference between the two regimes, which we call the divine and the temporal kingdom, of which you have often heard. The same regiments are to be diligently distinguished, and each is to be let go in its estates and offices, so that neither condemns the other; as the spirits of the wicked have done, and are doing to this day. Some have fought against God's kingdom, which is the greatest and highest.
*) Held publicly in the parish church, 1529.
and has the most adversaries. Some have set themselves against the worldly kingdom. Thus the devil has always had his servants on earth, through whom he has wanted to eradicate these two kingdoms.
(2) But God hath so ordered them, and compassed them, and built such a wall about them, that they are well kept against all devils. But the same wall is that Christ saith in this gospel, "Unto Caesar that which is Caesar's, and unto God that which is God's." This is what all men are told to remember and do. If they do it willingly and gladly, well; if they do it not willingly and
they must do it anyway. If one gives to God what is God's, and to Caesar what is Caesar's, and does it willingly and from the heart, one has thanks; if one does not do it willingly, one must. Because the word "prayer" is attached to every kingdom, it is such a moat, wall and fortification, by which all men are forced to give.
(3) The devil would like to prevent such things, he creates so many factions and sects in the church, so that he prevents God from being given what is God's. But it does not help; the more the devil rages against the kingdom and the dear church, the stronger the church becomes, and the more Christian blood is shed. But it does not help; but the more the devil rages against God's kingdom and the dear church, the stronger the church becomes; and the more Christian blood is shed, the more martyrs are made. So it should and must go. In the worldly kingdom, it should and must also go like this: the more fiercely the devil opposes, the stronger God holds over his order; as the histories testify that he has never left any rebellion unpunished.
(4) First of all, that Christ says: "Pray to Caesar what is Caesar's": thus the temporal kingdom is confirmed and fortified. For if the temporal government were an unjust state and not ordered by God, Christ would not say, "Pray to Caesar the things that are Caesar's." For he is a preacher and teacher of truth, whose mouth cannot lie, but speaks the plain truth. But if we are to give to Caesar, we must take Caesar for a Lord. Now the emperor at that time was a pagan and knew nothing of Christ, and his government was founded on pure human reason, and was also judged and held according to reason; nevertheless, Christ says here that because he is emperor, he should be regarded as such and obeyed. If one does not, one must.
5 Christians accept this word: "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's" with joy and thanksgiving and gladly give to Caesar what is Caesar's from the heart. For they have been instructed and enlightened by God's word, so that they understand what the temporal government means. Therefore they are not ungrateful, like the Anabaptists, who despise the authorities. First of all and most of all, a Christian looks at
the word "pray", and recognizes that he should be obedient to the same word, because Christ himself spoke it. After that he sees that the holy scripture calls the worldly authority God's order, and considers what benefit the worldly government creates on earth. For as long as God preserves it, peace remains on earth, so that the wicked do not all become murderers. This peace is such a great treasure that no one can think about it or understand it except Christians. Further, a Christian looks to duty, and knows that all he has is taken from him and given to the emperor or his lord who sits in the emperor's stead. For in the act of homage, every subject pledges to follow his lord in time of need, body and soul.
(6) So also with this word, "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's," is taken from the subjects, body and goods, and given to Caesar; as 1 Sam. 8 also clearly states what is the right of the king, since Samuel says to the people who demanded a king, v. 11-17: "This will be the right of the king who will rule over you. He will take your sons for his chariots and horsemen to ride before his chariots, and for captains over thousands and over fifties, and for tillers of his field, and for reapers of his harvest, and to make his armor and all that pertains to his chariot. And he will take your daughters to be apothecaries, cooks and bakers. He will take your best fields and vineyards and oil gardens and give them to his servants. He will also take tithes of your crops and vineyards and give them to his stewards and servants. And your menservants and your maidservants, and your finest young men, and your asses shall he take, and do his business with them. Of your herds he shall take tithes, and ye shall be his servants." And to the king of Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar, says the prophet Daniel Cap. 2:37, 38: "You king are a king of kings, to whom God has given from heaven kingdom, power, strength and glory, and has delivered into your hands everything where people live, the animals of the field and the birds of the air.
and has given you authority over everything."
7 Christians know this from the Holy Scriptures, they are enlightened; and so that peace may be and remain on earth, they are satisfied with their authorities, sit in readiness, whatever the emperor commands, whether it affects body or goods, they serve him with it. In this way they earn gratitude and are held dear; as St. Paul says Rom. 13:3: "If you do not fear the authorities, do good and you will receive praise from them." This is the least of the true Christians, who recognize this word: "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's", and thus think: Because God has commanded it this way and wants it this way, so be it. These are the ones by whom the temporal government is maintained. For if the Christians did this with their prayer, there would no longer be a regiment on earth that would preserve worldly peace; so that only the Christians accept this word: "Give to Caesar," and for the sake of their obedience please God and man.
The other great crowd, the mad mob, does not do this. Even though he hears with his ears, he does not believe that worldly authority, empire, principality etc. is from God, does not consider God's word, which teaches that worldly authority is God's order, to be truth; but regards the worldly government as a misery, compulsion and trouble on his neck. A godless man does not look at God's order, commandment and command; but thinks only that he may fill his sack and enjoy the world, God granting that Duke John of Saxony may have peace or strife.
(9) O my beloved, if our Lord God would always let good peace be in the land, and let thee dance and leap, and thou shouldest not thank him for it, nor give anything to Caesar, that would be thy heart's delight. Thou thinkest not that thy goods are the emperor's and thy prince's, but thinkest that they are thine, forgetting in addition that thou hast paid homage to thy authority, to be obedient with body and goods. This is the way of the wicked. As little as he remembers the prayer he owes for his authority, and the peace, how precious a treasure it is: so little does he remember
He also remembers the homage he paid to his authorities. Just as peasants and citizens today curse their authorities for having to pay tribute to the Turks. This is because they do not believe that God has said or commanded anything from the emperor. They think that the property they possess is theirs; yet Christ says here, "Pray to Caesar what is Caesar's." What is the emperor's? Your body and your goods, which you said and swore to him in your homage; yet you set yourself against your lord, as if you yourself were lord, and your lord had sworn to you.
(10) This is the other group of the wicked, who do not understand this word: "Pray to Caesar" etc., 'nor consider how necessary and delicious peace in the flesh is. They are swine who think that everything is theirs. These are the largest group on earth, who would destroy the worldly regime if it were not bounded and restrained by this solid wall of divine word and command. This forces the godless mob to say: If you do not want to obey your authorities, then you must; Master Hans will teach you. If you did not want to obey your authorities, you should not have obeyed them, but should have said the opposite, namely: I will not obey them with body and soul. But now you have obeyed and sworn to be obedient, and yet you will dispute much in the journey whether you will be obedient and give the emperor what is his.
(11) So did the Jews also, as this gospel saith. They had admitted the emperor, paid homage to him and sworn to him; and now they ask Christ first of all whether they should be obedient to him. But the Lord answered them, saying, If the emperor's coin is the interest, and ye have paid homage to the emperor, and have sworn unto him, remember and give him also that which is his. So also I say, Why hast thou accepted thy lord for a lord, if thou wilt not be obedient unto him? Therefore it is said: If you have sworn to your authorities and do not want to obey them, then you must go to Master Hans or, if he is too weak, the Turk will teach you. Now you have good peace, and sit in the thought that body and goods are yours; you do not think that you have such things.
from God and from the emperor. God preaches to you in His Word and says: "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's"; but you open your mouth and say: "I thirst for Caesar"; and you mock God. Therefore, God will send the Turk upon your neck, and he will not let your wife, child, house and property remain with you for long; as happened to the poor peasants outside Vienna the other day, when the Turk destroyed and carried away ninety thousand wives and children in two days. Then our Lord God taught the poor people that neither house nor farm, neither wife nor child is theirs, but the emperor's, through whom God exists.
(12) We Christians should not ask what such wicked people do, but should willingly and gladly give to Caesar what is his. I have nothing, I have only four or six cups. But I will gladly give them, if necessary, and this neck as well. Do what you will, and you will not break down this wall, so that Christ may fortify the emperor here. What you refuse to give to the emperor in God's name, you must give to the Turk or someone else in the devil's name.
013 Many blaspheme us, because we do thus the obedience of the authorities: but we ask nothing of their blasphemies. For he that will be a Christian, let him not think that he is here in paradise, where he will hear good things; but that he is in the midst of Sodom and Gomorrah, where there are such men as neither know nor understand, neither know nor understand, what God hath commanded. For their sake we do not preach these things; for their sake we will not leave them. Whoever does not want to follow, our Lord God will certainly bring him afterward; but we must bear their sin, and do with pleasure and love what God has commanded, and not look at their disobedience, but at God's commandment. For the sake of a pious man, God can hold all the sins of a whole country to account; just as Lot bore all the sins of the land, prayed and corrected so much through his prayer that the cities did not perish. But as soon as he went out of Sodom, in a moment they were in hell. So also, because we are here, let us pray, and do as the obedient, that
God will not impute their sin to the wicked. But if we are no longer there, they will go to hell in the name of all the devils. The rod is already bound, they will not escape it. These things I say unto them that love the gospel: but the rest are not worthy to hear a word of me, or to look upon my face.
14 Therefore it should be known that God commanded to give to Caesar that which is Caesar's. But what is the emperor's? Then ask your homage. You pay homage to your mayor and prince, and the prince in turn pays homage to the emperor with body and soul. When the meeting comes and you are addressed by your authorities, remember your homage. If you do not want to do this, go to your mayor, prince, emperor, and say: "Mr. Mayor, gracious prince, most gracious emperor, I have paid homage to you and sworn to you in the past year, but I do not want to be obedient to you; therefore I come now and recite my homage to you. Then you will hear what your mayor, your prince, your emperor will say. But if thou wilt not recite thy homage, do with pleasure and love that which thou hast promised in the homage, and beware of the great multitude of those who bar and refuse to give what they owe, for it will go out upon their own necks.
15. pious Christians look to the word: "Pray to the emperor" etc., and give to the emperor what is his. Again, pious authorities take what the subjects give: not that they alone may have honor from it, but that the subjects may have peace, sleep securely in their houses, and need the world. One should recognize such benefits and be grateful for them. God will punish those who are grateful in his own time. So teaches Christ, Matt. 21, in the parable of the vinedressers. A householder planted a vineyard, and let it out to the husbandmen, and went over the country. But the husbandmen ate the fruit of the vineyard as if the vineyard were their own; they forgot that the vineyard was given to them, that they should give its fruit in its season. In sum, they nah-
2514 L- 6.190-192. On the twenty-third Sunday after Trinity. W. xm, 2209-2212. 2515
They took the vineyard as their own. And when the father of the house demanded the fruit of his vineyard, they slew not only the servants, but also the son of the father of the house, that they might take his inheritance. "What will the Lord of the vineyard," says Christ, "do to these husbandmen? He will destroy the evil-doers, and give his vineyard to other husbandmen, who will give him the fruit in due season.
(16) Ask thyself, therefore, whether thou couldst suffer such a will of courage in thine house: if thou tarryest abroad, and commandest thy house unto thy servant, he shall swear unto thee that he will do all things for thy good; but because thou art gone, the same servant shall begin and break all that is in the house; what wilt thou do thereto? Truly thou wouldest do unto the servant as the gospel saith, that the householder shall do unto his husbandmen. Why should not our Lord God do the same? Who can blame our Lord God for sending the Turks, or the mayor with the city servants, over the necks of the unthankful and disobedient?
Our Lord God gave you the goods through the emperor, and you paid homage and swore to the emperor; and now you are beginning to revoke your homage, and are acting as if the goods were yours and not the emperor's. Therefore you need such an admonisher, who is called the Turk, who will louse you fools with pistons. So it shall be; whoever will not accept this word, "Pray to Caesar," etc. with kindness, must accept it with unkindness. As happened to the Jews: they had admitted the emperor to be their emperor, as they themselves confess: We have no king but Caesar; yet they would not have Caesar; but they must have him. Titus came and taught them to their destruction, for he destroyed them to the ground.
18) Secondly, when Christ adds, "Pray to God for what is God's," he confirms and strengthens the spiritual rule, which is called God's kingdom. There is not so much need for this kingdom to be confirmed and strengthened as there is for
the worldly kingdom; for all the world has God as its Lord, willingly or unwillingly; and this kingdom endures forever, although there are many who oppose it: but nevertheless, if this kingdom is to be rightly understood, it requires as much explanation as the first and worldly kingdom. For human reason can understand and comprehend the temporal kingdom; but this spiritual government and kingdom of God human reason cannot understand nor comprehend.
19 Therefore, this spiritual kingdom is such a kingdom, in which all people's hearts are gathered and united who trust in God. For the citizens of this kingdom have paid homage to God and sworn in baptism. Just as a citizen and subject pays homage to his authorities and swears before the bank, so all Christians pay homage and pledge in baptism that they will have Christ as their Lord and God. For what is different if we renounce the devil, all his works and all his nature before baptism, and promise to believe in God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, but that we make homage and swear to believe in the one true God and in no other, and in such faith to bring forth good fruits, that we want to be patient with our hearts, gentle, helpful to our neighbor and loving him? Our Lord God also demands such devotion from us, namely, that we cling to Christ alone, hear no other word, and accept no other foreign faith than the gospel of Christ and faith in Him. And this is founded here in the word that Christ speaks, "Pray to God what is God's." What is God? Nothing else, but faith in God and love for one's neighbor.
(20) Against this faith many set themselves. For here it is also mixed that some give to God what is God's; some do not give to God what is God's. Just as there are few obedient subjects in the secular regime, so there are few devout, righteous Christians in the spiritual regime, even though they all bear the name and mingle in the outward company. The small group gladly gives God what is his from the heart. For pious hearts call and
2516 D- 6.192-194. on the twenty-third Sunday after Trinity. W. xm, 2212-2214. 2517
Cry out to God without ceasing that their faith may be strengthened and that they may show themselves with such fruits as faith requires. These are the righteous Christians. For God does not want our money, body and goods; but has given them to Caesar, and to us through Caesar. But the heart, which is the greatest and best in man, he has reserved for himself; the same is to be given to God, that we may believe in him.
But the greatest and most multitude in the world does not give God what is his; indeed, in the same multitude it is all the more a swarm. There are so many sects and cults that it is impossible to tell them all; the devil takes the liberty of making a new and individual faith for each one of them; as is happening today through the enthusiasts, Anabaptists and Sacramentarians, who have torn apart and taken away the holy scriptures again and again according to the Pabst. All of these are rebellious in God's kingdom. Just as those are rebellious in the secular government who think that the property is theirs and do not give to Caesar what is Caesar's: so these are rebellious in the spiritual government; they think that the spiritual good and God's word is their own, which they may direct, bend, and pervert as they please, and they may rape the Christian faith, and corrupt good works as they please; and in sum, they want to be masters over the faith and lords over all the holy scriptures; when they have made obeisance in baptism, and have sworn that they will abide by the Christian faith and by the pure, truthful word.
(22) But the pious Christians, who intend to remain in the right faith and pure doctrine, pray, bear, suffer, and must also bear the sin, and avert God's wrath, so that he does not throw them in from the beginning, until God finally takes them away from this earth, and sets fire to the chaff and burns it with fire, when he has first threshed out the wheat and gathered it into his chaff. If the wicked, with love and lust, do not want to give to God what is his, they must suffer punishment for it. And so God keeps His word and faith, no matter how much the mobs resist,
that he sweeps his threshing floor and burns the chaff. Christians and God-fearers remember such vengeance and punishment, pray for it, and withhold God's wrath as long as they can. For a righteous Christian must be a plumb line on earth; and for the sake of such people the word remains pure and clean. For the sake of others, it does not remain for a few hours; indeed, they do God and his word, as I said, all mischievousness, and help it to perish only soon.
Therefore, it is the Christians alone who maintain these two kingdoms, God's and the emperor's, on earth through their prayers. If they were not praying for these two kingdoms, it would be impossible for them to remain standing for a few hours. In sum, it is the Christians for whose sake God spares the whole world. For he thinks thus: My Christians give to me what is mine, and give to Caesar what is Caesar's; therefore they must also have peace, which I must create and give them. If then God gives peace to the Christians, the same peace also passes over the ungrateful, who enjoy the pious Christians.
(24) Now that the fruits grow and peace is on earth, this does not happen for the sake of the ungodly crowd, but for the sake of the pious Christians. It is true that the ungodly often have more peace than the Christians, for God is a rich, gentle Lord who scatters His goods throughout the world, even among the ungodly; as Christ Himself says, Matth. 5, 45: "The Father in heaven makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. But all this is done for the sake of the pious and thankful, even though the wicked and unthankful also enjoy it, until at last the pious are all gone and the chaff is set on fire and burned. So it happened in Jerusalem: when the apostles and devout Christians were gone, grain, wine, bread and meat went away with them, and pestilence, famine and sword came among the ungodly multitude of the Jews, so that they choked and devoured one another. For there was chaff, and the wheat was gone. So it will finally be the same for you. As long as you devout Christians
you will have peace and abundance of all goods. But when we leave this world, we will take with us all that you have, grain, body and goods, and you will not be able to keep it, just as the Jews could not keep it.
(25) Therefore, let each one remember this difference between the two kingdoms, the kingdom of God and the emperor's kingdom. When he hears the word: "Pray to God what is God's," he should remember the homage and the oath he made to God in baptism, and beware of strange, false faith, and pay attention to God's word, so that he will not be deceived or seduced. When he hears the word: "Pray to Caesar what is Caesar's," he should remember the town hall and the castle, and remember the homage and the oath he has given to his prince and mayor. So that one gives to everyone what one owes; as St. Paul also teaches, Rom. 13, 6. 7. Whoever does this with pleasure and love, God will give him back abundantly, and he will have praise and honor from his authorities. Whoever does not do this will have to hear that someone
Come and say: Give it to me in a thousand devils' names!
26 Solomon, Ecclesiastes 3:1, says: "To every activity there is a season. Hitherto it has been a time of peace; now it is a time of strife. Hitherto it has been a time for laughing and dancing; now it is a time for weeping and lamenting. If God has given us so long a gracious, pleasant time, and a day of salvation, when we might well have heard and learned God's word: so may we now also endure and bear the time of His wrath and fury. If you have gathered until now, you may now also scatter. If you have mocked God and the emperor so far, you may now weep for it in prison. If thou hast bragged and flaunted before in time of peace, now gird thy sword at thy side and go against the Turk. Therefore I ask that you give to God what is God's, and to Caesar what is Caesar's; and do this not for my sake, but for the sake of Him who commanded it. If it is done with thanksgiving, it is well; but if it is not done with thanksgiving, it must be done with ingratitude, and not only with shame and dishonor, but also with loss of body, goods and soul.