concerning the elevation of the Holy Communion.*)
June 26, 1542.
To the Serene, Highborn Prince and Lord, Mr. Georgen, Cathedral Provost of Magdeburg, Prince of Anhalt, Count of Ascanien, Lord of Bernburg, my gracious Lord.
Grace and love in the Lord. Sublime, highborn prince, gracious lord! My dear Lord and friend, D. Augustin, has indicated to me how His Grace should be moved to refrain from the Sacrament here 2c. Although I did not do it for myself, but D. Pommer, I did not want to argue about it, and up to now it has been the same to me, whether one abolishes it, as with us, or leaves it, as in Magdeburg and almost in all Saxony. To the fact that I saw it, how with displeasure our Diaconi lifted it, not about the mouth. For this reason, D. Pommer has also long since avoided it, and has not recently fallen for it. So may E. F. G. console himself that I console myself that the ceremonies are not articles of faith, and yet more and greater things are always done in the church, contrary to the Word and the Sacraments, and the rabble easily falls into it, an eternal 1) thing.
1) The original should offer "free" here instead of "eternal" which we put after the old editions. If
to make of it. Therefore I do nothing else in this, except where the ceremonies stand, I stand with them (where they are not ungodly); where they fall, I fall with them. For even without this, if the host or wine is consecrated too little, and [one] must consecrate more, that we do not annul the same the second time, as was also held in the papacy, in case one had to consecrate otherwise, and especially the particles, which were consecrated for the people, were not annulled, and yet were the same sacrament. And if someone wanted to cancel them even now, I would not ask anything about it. It neither takes away from nor gives anything to the sacrament; and if perhaps the time comes when the causes are to be abolished, we are free to do so again. For the ceremonies are subject to us, and not we to the ceremonies, without which the love to which we are subject demands it. E. F. G. will mean this and other things much better than I can write. Hiemit dem lieben GOtte befohlen. Monday after S. John 1542.
E. F. G.
willing Martinus Luther, D.
Lindner did not read out the word, it can be assumed that there was a spelling mistake by Luther.
*) This letter is found, but very corrupted, in the editions. In Aurifaber, vol. Ill, col. 292; in the Altenburg edition, vol. VIII, p. 1000; in the Leipzig edition, vol. XXI, p. 429; in the Erlangen edition 56, 29: in De Wette, vol. V, p. 478. Recently, however, the original was found in Dessau and printed by Lindner in his "Mittheilungen", vol. II, p. 78, no. 53. After that in the Erlanger, vol. 56, p. 235. Seidemann in De Wette, vol. VI, p. 459 has also given the corrections. We share the text according to the Erlanger edition. On the combination of this letter with the one of May 25, 1541, compare the first note to No. 152 of this volume.