The volume in which Walch published the letters of Luther known to him was published in 1749, more than 150 years ago. Since then, this epistolary literature has experienced such an increase that it has not been possible to include the newly discovered letters in one volume in addition to the existing ones. There were now two ways open to us, in order to counteract this unfortunate state of affairs:
First. We were able to print in one volume the material offered by Walch, revised of course, and in a second, a supplementary volume, the writings that have become accessible so far; and no one could have complained about the division into two volumes, because, according to the original plan of our edition, it was not intended to increase Walch's, but only to revise it.
Secondly. We were able to insert the newly added material into the already existing material in a suitable place, and thus produce a few, chronologically ordered letters collection, which, however, had to be distributed over two buildings because of its large volume.
The choice could not be difficult for us, and so we have divided the twenty-first volume into two sections, which, however, receive consecutive pagination and consecutive numbers.
The most important collections of Luther's letters, which appeared after Walch, namely those of D. Gottfried Schütze, "Martin Luthers bisher ungedruckte Briefe", 3 volumes, Leipzig 1780 and 1781, 8th, furthermore: Karl Faber, "D. Martin Luthers Briefe an Albrecht, Herzog von Preußen", from the originals in the secret archive at Königsberg. Königsberg 1811, 8th, and the D. Mar- tini Lutheri Epistolae, studio et opera b. edited by Christoph Ranner. G. Th. Strobelii, Past. olim Woehr- densis, collecta. Norimberg. 1814, 8., marked as Strobel-Ranner, have already been used in the work, which has the title: "Dr. Martin Luthers Briefe, Sendschreiben und Bedenken, vollständig aus den verschiedenen Ausgaben seiner Werke und Briefe, aus andern Büchern und noch unbenutzten Handschriften gesammelt, kritisch und historisch bearbeitet von Dr. Wilhelm Martin Leberecht de Wette, Pro-
VIForeword.
fessor of theology at Basel." 5 vols, Berlin 1825 to 1828, 8. To this has been added a sixth volume: "Die in den fünf Theilen [De Wette's] fehlenden Briefe und Bedenken Luthers nebst zwei Registern. Collected, edited, and published using de Wette's estate by Lic. theol. Johann Karl Seidemann, pastor at Eschdorf near Dresden." Berlin 1856, 8.
After De Wette's edition, a reprint of Luther's German letters from De Wette first appeared in the so-called Erlanger Ausgabe der Werke Luthers: "Deutsche Briefe. After the oldest editions critically and historically edited by D. J. K. Irmischer." Frankfurt a. M. and Erlangen, 4 volumes, 1853 and 1854. This collection is a mere reprint, without all self-activity, without all criticism, with retention of all De Wette's errors, for incorrect letters, incorrect readings, incorrect punctuation, incorrect time determinations, incorrect superscriptions, incorrect proofs are retained with the greatest fidelity, while De Wetter's indications of content are omitted; hence it is of no value to us, with the exception of the second supplement to the 56th volume. The first volume of the book is the first volume of the book, but it has already been included by Seidemann in De Wette, vol. VI, and therefore does not provide us with any information.
Since then Seidemann published his Lutherbriefe in 1859, Burkhardt in 1866 "Dr. Martin Luthers Briefwechsel" and Kolde in 1883 the Analecta Luthe
rana, which will be discussed below.
The latest edition of Luther's letters, which is still being published, is: "Dr. Martin Luthers Briefwechsel. Edited and annotated by Dr. th. Ernst Ludwig Enders, pastor at Oberrad near Frankfurt am Main." Vol. 1 to 8, Frankfurt a. M. 1884-1898. This collection forms a part of the Erlangen edition of Luther's complete works. According to the original plan of this edition, to bring only Luther's writings, one would have had to limit oneself to Luther's letters written in Latin, without any further addition, but one has preferred instead, as already Burkhardt and Kolde did, an "exchange of letters". Now it cannot be denied that in many cases Luther's letters can only be understood through the letters addressed to him; therefore, we have also followed this example to some extent by including many foreign letters. The work of D. Enders is thorough, industrious, and worthy of thanks, and we have used it as a basis for the preparation of the greater part of our first section. Enders did not reprint the German letters in the Erlangen edition, but only referred to them and made the necessary improvements.
The letters of Luther, which Walch has assigned to the twenty-first part of Luther's complete writings, are divided by him into three classes. The first includes those that have already been published in
Foreword. . VII
The second contains the letters which, originally written in Latin, were not yet part of any collection of Luther's writings, but were first published by Walch in German translation; the third contains Luther's letters which had never been printed before. Each of these sections is arranged chronologically. The many letters that have already been included in earlier volumes, namely in the catechetical writings, vol. X, and in the reformätion writings, vol. XV to XX, Walch has not reprinted in this volume, but only referred to them. Foreign letters, which are found in large numbers in other volumes, have not been included by Walch in this volume, nor has a record of them been given.
Understandably, we could not follow Walch's arrangement, but, as all recent editions have done, we have included the letters in chronological order, including those that are not by Luther. In the selection of the latter, we have limited ourselves to the more important ones, the most important ones have been given unabridged, of others only a registry, unimportant and uninteresting ones have been omitted. We have referred to those already printed in other volumes.
First of all, we thought to give the dear reader only the largest part of the first section of these letters, as far as they are contained in the Erlangen correspondence, from
The reason for this is that, as already stated in the preface to the 17th volume of our edition, p. VIIb , we are completely dependent on the editions published in Germany for the reproduction of the letters, since we do not have the sources at our disposal here, and also the Erlangen correspondence, which has been in publication since 1884, has only now reached the year 1531 in its eighth volume. But the consideration that about as much time, namely again eighteen years, would pass until the completion of this German edition, and for us about two more years would be necessary to edit and publish this material, has led us to the decision to tackle the rest immediately, and, as well as we are able, to add it to our edition already now, whereby it achieves its completion. We have been encouraged in this by the fact that the edition of Luther's letters by De Wette is, to this day, the best and most complete and a treasure worth owning. Secondly, that many corrections, explanations and additions have been added by Seidemann in the sixth volume of De Wette's edition. From the Corpus Reformatorum we have many additions.
The first part of the book is a collection of letters. Burkhardt's "Dr. Martin Luther's Correspondence with Many Unknown Letters" has given us (besides his many corrections, more precise references
VIII Foreword.
and explanations of De Wette) yielded a rich harvest. Similarly, Kolde, "Analecta Lutherana. Briefe und Actenstücke zur Geschichte Luthers. At the same time a supplement to the previous collections of his correspondence". We were able to take a number of letters from Seidemann's "Lutherbriefe" and Krafft's "Briefe und Documente aus der Zeit der Reformation" (Letters and Documents from the Time of the Reformation) etc. We hope that the thus enriched De Wette'sche edition (which we take as a basis) will be welcome to the purchasers of our edition.
However, we have not only been concerned with enriching Walch's and De Wette's editions, but primarily with correcting both the chronology and the text itself, and we believe that we have succeeded in the former in a few cases, but in the latter in many, even in texts supplied by Burkhardt and Kolde.
In this volume, too, we have translated the originally Latin letters (with very few exceptions) into German. To show how highly necessary this was, we leave here some samples of Walch's translation, to which we could add many more. Walch, Vol. XXI, 521: parce verbis == give me credit for my words. Walch: "und schweiget". - Col. 644: carnem mean quoque valere cupio == I also wish my relatives good welfare. Walch: "I also want my flesh to be healthy." - Col.
646: De autoritate Ecclesiast. super purgatorio nihil scio -- I know nothing about a saying of the preacher Solomon about purgatory. Walch: "What the church is able to say about purgatory, I do not know."-Col. 658: Jejunus est, sensum scripturae magis quam verba retinens == He [the Sermon] is sober, and keeps more the sense than the words of Scripture. Walch: "He is a dry miserable man who" etc. - Col. 672: Ecce Tessaradeca tuam, imo nostram, mi Spalatine. Responsionem meam adversus Stolpensem, tolpensem et talpensem schedulam non mireris animosiorem etc. - See, there you have your, 1) yes, our Tessaradecas, my dear Spalatin. Don't be surprised that my answer to the Stolpian, doltish and foolish note is somewhat vehement and proud. Walch: "Behold your, yes, my Four Tenths, dear Spalatin, namely the answer to the Stolpish, Doltish and Talpish d. i. blind mole note: do not be surprised" rc. Walch has thus identified Luther's delicious consolation for the Elector in fourteen chapters (Tessaradecas consolatoria) (St. Louis edition, vol. X, 1816) with "Luther's answer to the note, which went out under the official's seal at Stolpen" (St. Louis edition, vol. XIX, 462). - Col. 674: ut observatori meo naso vix illudant == that they can hardly fool my observing nose. Walch: "that they can hardly fool my
1) This is what Luther calls this writing because Spalatin was supposed to translate it into German for the Elector.
Foreword. . IX
thin noses may mock."-Col. 719: ut locum tuum non dimittas - that you do not leave your place. Walch: "that he [Satan] find no quiet place with you". - Col. 743: ut etsi non audeant asserere, non tamen possint dissuaderi == that although they dare not assert [my stay at Wartburg], yet they cannot be dissuaded. Walch: "that, though I may not affirm it, yet I may not dissemble or deny (sic) it: so" etc. - Col. 745: a papistis ferior == I have peace before the papists. Walch: "and am beaten by the papists". - Col. 780: Nam et Principis ut christiani fratris, etiam Principis nomine, interest == For it is also to the prince as a Christian brother, also because he is a prince. Walch: "For it is also the prince and the brother Christian, because of the prince's interest." - Col. 921: Miserere mei jam praedestinatus fieri - [the 51st Psalm] "GOtt, sei mir gnädig" is already ordered to be made [into a German chant]. Walch: "Have mercy on me, that I am thus erwählet before." But this may be enough.
We have devoted the same effort and care to the German letters as to the Latin ones. Some of these offer no less a challenge to the editor.
The first part of the book is a book that presents more difficulties than the most difficult Latin ones, which we have set ourselves the task of overcoming.
Where we have departed from De Wette and the Erlangen correspondence in the determination of time, we have given a detailed account of it.
We have often taken notes and explanations from the Erlanger Briefwechsel, without giving credit to it each time. However, we have been very limited in the use of the notes compared to the Erlanger Briefwechsel, because there the notes sometimes take up more space than the text.
It should also be noted that from then on, following De Wette, we no longer use the designation of the Erlangen correspondence for Aurifaber's unprinted collection at the library in Wolfenbüttel: "Wolfenbüttel, Cod. Helmst. 108", but like De Wette: "Aurifaber, Bd. Ill"; likewise, although we know that the Anhalt archive has been moved from Dessau to Zerbst, with De Wetternd Burkhardt, when indicating where the originals are, the designation: "The original is in Dessau."
Now, may the merciful God give His blessing and prosperity also to the course of this volume. Praise, glory and thanks be to Him that He has helped us to this point.
St. Louis, circa Pentecost 1903.