Luther sends the letter of responsibility against Eck's letter to the Elector; complains that Eck is interfering in a hostile manner in Luther's dispute with the Franciscans at Jüterbock and that the Bishop of Brandenburg is spreading his writing. About the ceremonies to be used at the Passion celebration.
4) Compare Eck's letter to Hoogstraten, No. 395 in this volume.
The original of this letter is in the Anhaltisches GesammtArchiv. Printed by Aurifaber, Vol. I, p. 206b; in Löscher's Ref.-Acta, Vol. Ill, p. 980; by De Wette, Vol. I, p. 323 and in Erlanger Briefwechsel, Vol. ll, p. 129. The last piece of this letter (§ 4) is once again in Walch as a special letter in the old edition, Vol. XXI, 5; also in the supplement to the Leipzig edition, p. 29.
Your esteemed husband Georg Spalatin, priest of the princely court, his most sincere friend in the Lord.
JEsus.
Hail! Behold, my dear Spalatin, we are sending the letter to the most noble prince 1) and our most gracious patron, who is answering Eck's slander. If the most illustrious prince should deign to send the same to Eck, it will be dear to us; but if not, then let it be done as GOtte pleases. For the venerable father Vicarius has made it doubtful to us whether the prince wanted Eck to be answered in this way as well, or only by the Latin explanations of the theses, with which we are now occupied; therefore we provide both. If the letter is to be sent, then we wish that either according to the prince's or according to your opinion everything be changed that seems to be good to be changed in it. I have searched for Eck's letter among my papers, but have not yet found it; I will search more carefully.
2) By the way, Eck (whom we can now judge and accuse without sin) behaves everywhere neither as a good nor as a noble thinking man: he has handed over articles to the bishop of Brandenburg, which are provided by him with interpretations, which the brothers of Jüterbock have brought together against me in a lying way. 2) He is an impudent man and has a shameless forehead, ready to assert everything possible and to let the same thing go again, depending on whether there is a glimpse of fame for him. He has only one thing in mind, whether he cannot harm Wittenberg with right and wrong. This is what
1) Luther's and Carlstadt's letter of responsibility against Eck, No. 416 in this volume. Eck's letter, against which it is directed, No. 413.
2) Compare St. Louis Edition, Vol. XVIII, Introduction, p. 43 b f. and No. 380 m this volume, towards the end.
I now oppose and will drag this intriguer with his lies before the public, God willing.
Meanwhile, the bishop of Brandenburg, without having heard the other part, spreads Eck's lies and helps them, to my name's disgrace, to many people's reputation through his name, by which he shows quite nicely what attitude he has harbored against me so far. I fear that I can hardly avoid implicating him at the same time and displaying his ignorance and sacrilege, which is closely related to that of Eck. The Minorite Brothers of the Observance help him quite extraordinarily; we only lack a printing press so that we can publish counter-writings more quickly. 3)
I have begun, according to your wish, to direct my attention to the public celebration of the passion of Christ, and the more I think about it, the less I find something that could please me, because there are already more than enough ceremonies in the church, so that almost all serious things of Christian godliness run into superstition, as [the people] are inclined to trust in the outward appearance of the works and in the meantime to leave the spiritual things safely in the queue. And for this reason I am not yet fully prepared how to present it, so that what is established may at the same time have a beautiful outward appearance and be inwardly fruitful. It is difficult for both to happen at the same time, since the Gospel has placed the most reliable godliness in brotherly love and mutual goodwill. Another time more. Farewell and commend us to our patron, the prince. Wittenberg, 1519, on the day of St. Agapetus [August 18].
Martin Luther, Augustinian.
3) Therefore, Luther's "Vertheidigung wider das böswillige Urtheil des Johann Eck" 2c. (St. Louis edition, vol. XVIII, 1362) was printed by Melchior Lotther in Leipzig and not finished until September.
4) publies we have resolved by publioas, because it belongs to mkäitutioui. For what the old translator offers: "I have thought publicly" (eoepi publieo iutouäkrtz), does not seem possible to us.
5) Added by us, since we assume that Luther had a preceding vulxus in mind when he wrote "xroeliv".
No. 55.
Luther to Spalatin.
Of the author of the Canonici inäooti; of the burning of the writings of Luther and others, intended but thwarted by Eck; of Eck's writing against Carlstadt, and of Duke George's request to the people of Erfurt to give their verdict on the Leipzig disputation. His sermons on Matthew, his work on the Postille, and his answer to the ban of the Bishop of Meissen.
The original is in the Anhaltisches Gesammt-Archiv. Printed in Aurifaber, Vol. I, p. 241; in De Wette, Vol. I, p. 404 and in Erlanger Briefwechsel, Vol. II, p. 318.
To the learned and honest man, Georg Spalatin, princely Saxon court preacher and secretary, his superior in Christ.
JEsus.
1st Hail! Bernhard Adelmann has written that he has seen to it that the Eck is answered; this much I have about the author of the unlearned very learned canons. The style fits, in our opinion, both Oekolampad and Conrad Adelmann, the brother of Bernhard, who seems to me to be stronger and more important than Bernhard.
Our Wenceslaus wrote that Eck had ordered the nobles [of the university in Ingolstadt] that my books should be burned on the public market, "the unlearned canons" and the German "Schutzrede"; 1) and since a container had been prepared there so that they would be burned the following day, certain more sensible doctors at Ingolstadt would have consulted Johann Reuchlin, and he would have answered: They should be careful that they do not attach a stain to themselves and the whole university by this matter. Therefore the execution was omitted. When Eck came to the place the next day, he left angrily, without having accomplished anything. One would think that man had become a raging bacchante. That is how we do theology nowadays! By the way, I didn't want you to read what he spat out against Carlstadt, but you will read it, because he
1) Des Lazarus Spengler Schrift: "Schutzrede und christliche Antwort" 2c.
so sullied that I have not seen nor heard of a more impudent and impure book. 2) He is a desperate man, the wretched sophist, when he sees that his undertaking is either postponed or prevented. Duke George has written anew to the Erfurt people with great arrogance (so our Lang writes) that they should answer which of us has the better opinion about the faith. A good prince, but one who is driven and ruled by the sophists. Carlstadt is working on a rebuttal against Eck. 3) See the fruit of the Leipzig disputation!
2 I have not even managed a word of my sermons on Matthew, my dear Spalatin, although I hardly wanted anything else so much, but I lacked time. Furthermore, I have not yet completed the interpretations that began with Advent up to Lent, and have not begun anything from Lent. You want to know briefly the reason for this. It is impossible for me to do it, there is no lack of desire. By God's grace, there is enough strength, but I hardly do enough for the Psalter? 4) Enough. You would not believe how much even a single verse troubles me at times. You want to tell the prince that I will gladly continue the matter as I have gladly begun it; but you create two or three days for me for each one, and that will hardly be enough. Sometimes my time is taken away by my willingness to serve strangers, brothers and near ones. Yesterday I also lost half a day by responding to the Meissen ban. 5) I certainly have a quick hand and a vivid (promptae) memory, from which
2) This is the book that Eck dedicated to his compatriot Gervasius Vaim from Memmingen, professor of theology in Paris, on December 3, 1519, which has the title: "Wider den dummen Verfechter Martin Luthers, Andreas Rodolphi Bodenstein, Carlstadt" 2c. See Wiedemann, "Eck," p. 512 ff.
3) Carlstadt had intended the title for it: 6outra drutissiruuru asiuum st asssrtum vostorsulum sts, but on Spalatin's advice (prompted by Luther), he changed it and gave it the title: Eontutatio acivsrsus äsksusivaru spiktolam loaunis Lskii sts. Cf. De Wette, Vol. I, p. 406.
4) St. Louis edition, vol. IV, 198 ff.
5) St. Louis edition, vol. XIX, 462.
I wonder how it might be with others who are slower than I. But you know that our intention is that after Lotther's printing press is properly set up, all interpretations should be printed at the same time. You know, however, that our intention is that, after Lotther's printing press 1) has been properly set up, all interpretations should be printed at the same time, and that is our intention that we also begin, as soon as possible, the severe punitive speeches about the teachers of the sentences 2). Farewell and commend me to the prince. February 8, 1520.
Martin Luther, Augustinian.