Luther declares himself against the baptism of children not yet fully born.
Handwritten in Cod. Gud. 214 Bibl. Guelph; in the
Cod. chart. 402. f. Goth. and in Aurifaber, vol. III, p. 181. Printed from the Börnersche Sammlung in Leipzig in Schütze, vol. II, p. 311; from the Litt. Wochenblatt II, 308 in Strobel-Ranner, p. 231, and in De Wette, vol. IV, p. 505.
Grace and peace! What else could I answer you, my dear Leonhard, than what we teach here and do publicly in this case about which you are inquiring? For this has happened to us not only once. We do not allow women to baptize a member that has come out of the womb, or the head that appears in the natural door, but exhort them to recommend in prayer to God this fruit, which is not yet in our hands, but in his, as well as the fruit that is alive in the womb for so many months (like John the Baptist) before birth. We can also baptize the fruit, if we want to avoid the danger, by pouring water on the belly (umbilicum) of the mother, as it were on a cloth in which the baptized child is wrapped! Therefore, thele fruit that is not yet born must be commanded GOtte. For it is nothing that we have learned from Aristotle and afterwards from St. Augustine: The soul is whole in every part, since Augustine also did not make use of this philosophy iu holy things. We must follow the words of God. For he shall be born again who is born, lest we become like those who worshipped St. Emerentiana, the mother of St. Anne, in reverse (retro), and begin to baptize the womb of a bride or a virgin in the hope of future fruit that will be sown in that womb. This I have said in many words. You provide that this child, which was neither born nor baptized, be baptized publicly. It would be different if it had already been born and then baptized. For then it would have been brought to the priest in the church alone.
No. 2037.