Luther wishes him luck on his appointment to Göttingen and exhorts him to prayer. News.
From the Börner Collection at Leipzig in Schütze, Vol. I, p. 296 and in De Wette, Vol. V, p. 627.
Letters from the year 1544. No. 3093. 3094.
To the respectable Mr. Joachim Mörlin, Doctor of Theology, your faithful, right 1) and fair Bishop of the Church at Göttingen, his in Christ exceedingly dear brother.
We wish you happiness in your profession, my dear Doctor, and we invoke the rich blessing of the Holy Spirit for you and the people of Göttingen, that you may produce much fruit to the glory of God. Go in peace, and the Lord be with you, Amen. If the council of Arnstadt should desire someone from us, they will not find us as they would like, as I have written to a citizen there, Peter Walzdorf. For their ingratitude and wickedness annoys me very much, God will repay them. By the way, may you be especially mindful in your church to urge the people to pray and supplicate for the imperial diets and for the churches, for each individual prince of our confession, and likewise for the emperor, that he be ruled by a good spirit, for Satan is raging terribly, as credible news of him is written to us. The Frenchman has attacked the emperor anew, having taken away a certain good city by fraud. The Pope, the Venetians, and the Turk have joined with him, and they receive Barbarossa, the leader of the Turkish fleet; they pay [for the army] 2) 300,000 gold florins (coronatorum) every month. Then the French gave a certain port to Barbarossa, and a Mahometan temple is built there, with the approval of the pope. This is how the head of the Church and the most Christian king of the Church work for the Church. This is how they use the money for the church, which has been squeezed out of the indulgences, the annals and innumerable revenues of all churches against the Turk in so many years. O over the times! O over Satan! Come, O Lord JEsu, come! It is time for the Lord to intervene, amen. Fare well in the Lord with your own. On Dorothea's Day [6 Feb.] 1544.
Your Martin Luther.
1) Instead of "servo (?)" we have assumed vero. 2) Added from the postscript to the following letter.
No. 3094.
To Anton Lauterbach, pastor in Pirna.
Luther speaks out about the very evil times and reports news.
Manuscript in Aurifaber, vol. III, p. 421 and in Cod. Seidel. at Dresden. Printed from the Ludwig Collection at Halle by Schütze, Vol. I, p. 297 and by De Wette, Vol. V, p. 628. German by Walch, Vol. XXI, 1519.
To the highly esteemed and worthy man, Mr. M. Anton Lauterbach, Bishop of the Church at Pirna, his extremely dear brother in the Lord.
Grace and peace in the Lord! He sits at the right hand of the Father, whom we preach, confess and worship. He will see to it that the counsels and schemes of his enemies are turned aside and brought to nought, as the second Psalm teaches; let us do our part in teaching and praying. We will let them rage and rage against the Lord and his anointed. What in the Mark "Grickel and Jeckel" 3) are cooking, I do not know. May God make them well, amen. The shameful Jews rule in the Mark (ea) with the Margrave for the sake of money. They are also excluded at Prague by Ferdinand for the same reason. This is the fruit of the Centaurs, who, I believe, will be the last enemies of the Church, and at the same time the most pernicious, more avaricious than avarice itself, and more insatiable than hell itself. Christ will satisfy them, who will come next in glory, not with money, but with fire and brimstone of hell and the wrath of God.
I received the spotted fish, or the canned trout. Thank Johann Schulteis in my name. How much bitterness Satan breathes in the poems you have sent! But he will do nothing against the Lord, only that he testifies that he is tormented by one of his worthy hatreds against the Son of God. Fare well in the Lord, who guides and sustains you together with Daniel [Cresser] and the other fellow servants of God, amen. Greetings
3) Johann Agricola and D. Jakob Schenk. The latter was court preacher to the Elector Joachim II of Brandenburg from 1543 (see Seidemann, "Schenk," p. 60).
Letters from the year 1544. No. 3094. 3095. 3096.
you my Käthe and all yours, and says that your care for the Borsdorf apples was not necessary.
There is no news, only that it is said that Latorf was elected bishop of Merseburg, although Julius Pflug (Aratratus == the plowed) had several votes. The bishop of Cologne still insists on the Gospel. Prayers must be made for him to remain firm. The canons do not cease to rage against him. You know that one of us, who was not of us, M. Veit Amerbach, went to Ingolstadt to be Eck's successor in blaspheming our word, perhaps more than the latter did. For there is the dung puddle of all blasphemous people. The Lord is near; we shall not be anxious, amen. February 9, 1544.
M. Luther, D.
I tell you a monstrosity of this new year (the witnesses are extremely reliable): The French, the Pope, the Venetians, the Turk have formed a conspiracy against the Emperor and pay for the army every month three tons [gold], 300,000 gold florins (coronatorum). The Frenchman has granted Barbarossa, who is the commander of the Turkish fleet, a certain seaport, and there he has built a temple of Mahomet. He took away a good town from the emperor. These things you may sing to your followers of the pope. This 1) is the head of the most holy church who wanted to be worshipped, that one is the most Christian king of France. "There is now indulgence money", annals, income, the infinite robbery of all churches, the money, which is collected in so many years, "invested. Praise now to the, Pabst!"
The history of this letter includes the news that after Luther's death Lauterbach gave the original of the letter to his friend Cölestin, and wrote him the following about it:
Esteemed man and respectable doctor, esteemed friend! This letter, which the holy man, Mr. D. M. Luther, wrote to me some years ago with a sincere heart, which contains his complaints against Eisleben, the great hypocrite and false man, the perverse antinomer,2) likewise complains that
1) De Wette has unnecessarily replaced the Hic in the text by Hoc. For Papa results from the preceding Papistis.
2) Here we have added continentes.
the people of our Mark adhere to the Jews, I send to you, who is certainly genuine (bona fide), since you are eager to have your own manuscript (xxxxxxxxxx) of Luther, of blessed memory
niß, to have with you, with which I want to have honored you. But be careful, so that you do not prepare any danger for yourself. For Luther's writings are abhorrent to the devil and his scales, especially to the Agricolanis Eislebiis, whose author, Joh. Agricola, has cunningly and deceitfully angered the Church of God with antinomian ravings and has seriously disturbed the Lutheran community. Would to God that he had seriously repented! Last September 1563.
No. 3095.