I. What are the most serious temptations and diseases?
Where all diseases and plagues come from.
3. various diseases of the people.
4. why diseases come.
5. care causes physical illness.
A verse about man's old age, misery and mortality.
7. healthy body is God's gift.
8. that the sick should be given for strength whatever they desire of drink and food.
9. of D. Luther's Vertigo or Main Web.
10) For what purpose diseases and other plagues are useful to right Christians.
Our suffering is nowhere equal to Christ's suffering.
Ingratitude brings punishment.
13) Do not be too afraid of pestilence and other diseases.
(14) If God visits us with corporal punishment, we human beings remain as we are.
13. D. Luther's illness at Schmalkalden.
16. right remedy in diseases.
Of frailty and mortality, that man is like a glass.
18. how D. Luther has to visit and comfort sick people.
19. how Luther comforted a country servant whom the devil had afflicted with evil.
1. which are the most serious temptations and diseases.
(Cordatus No. 600.)
Sufferings of the head and the heart are the greatest before all other pains, as someone said: Stop here, or I will be gone. Worry and heartache are great evils. I would rather have the plague and the French disease 2c. With the ringing in the ears and similar ills the devil is there and helps freely to it 2c.
Where all diseases and plagues come from.
When young children cry out, they grow well, for through crying the limbs and veins are stretched apart, because otherwise they have no other exercise to move. And he said, Oh, the devil is so mighty and powerful, that all sicknesses, diseases, and plagues come from him. As the poor woman in the Gospel, who was bound by Satan, walked crooked and bent, and who had her blood flow twelve years, and all her goods had been taken with the physicians, 1) Luc. 8, 43. ff. So says St. Peter in Stories of the Apostles, that all sick people are bound by the devil. And if the dear holy angels did not protect us, it would all come to ruin and perish in a moment: he should cut us down with religion and police, both church and worldly regiment, like the trees, if he were granted to cut off some branches.
3. various diseases of people. 1)
Oh, how we humans are subject to so many diseases in this mortal body! We experience and see nothing but vain diseases: as many as there are members in the body, so many are diseases.
4. why diseases come.
(Cordatus No. 1828.)
The real sins are the causes of the diseases, not the original sin. Therefore says
1) to become ahn - to get rid of. Ahn - without.
2) This § will probably only be another version of Cap. 48, ß 38.
[Christ] [Joh. 9, 3.]: The blind man did not sin, but the gout-broken man [Matth. 9, 2.] had earned his evil through his sins. The real punishment of original sin is that one does not know God, that is blasphemy; secondly, that one does not know his neighbor, that is killing; thirdly, that one does not know himself.
(Here a paragraph is omitted because composed of what precedes in this g, Cap. 24, § 53 and ü10.)
5. care causes physical illness.
When Luther was told of a great man's illness, he said, "This is the fruit of sorrow, which is a cause, because when the heart is troubled and sad, the body is also weak. The diseases of the heart are the right diseases, as there are sadness, temptation 2c. I am a true Lazarus, well tried in sickness.
6th verse of man's old age, misery and mortality, narrated by D. Luthern.
Auspicor a lachrymis, in iisdem finio vitam, In lachrymis vita est tota peracta mihi.
2. adolescens.
Dic, venerande Senex, humanum vivere quid sit?
3. senex.
Principium vitae dolor est, dolor exitus ingens
1. the boy.
My life begins with tears, with tears it must also close.
What I can say about it now is nothing but pouring tears.
2. the youth.
Venerable old man, I ask freely. Tell me, what is life?
3. the old man.
My life began with pain, and it ends with pain.
7. healthy body is God's gift.
When M. Luther had red dysentery and was also plagued by the stone, he said, "Alas!
Dear Lord God, what a treasure is a healthy body that can eat, drink, sleep, sleep, urinate, 2c. how little do we thank Him for it? God has put many diseases and plagues on the poor flesh, yet it does not want to recognize itself anywhere. We should see and feel every day who we would be. O blindness upon blindness!
At the same time he said: One should not curse by the butt nor swear or mock at it: in short he wants to have his regiment, 1) not 2) to be ruled, must also be written, Matth. 15, 17. and 1 Cor. 12, 23. There St. Paul speaks: "that the dishonest limbs in the body should be kept most honest." One of the nobility, when his wife asked him, "Do you love her?" he answered, "I love you as much as a good throw. This annoyed her. At one time he led her behind him on horseback for a whole summer's day, not letting her sit down so that she might have done her need; then she said to him, "O dear nobleman, you love me enough, only do not love me better.
8. to give to the sick for strength whatever they desire of food and drink.
Doctor M. Luther said: "It would be very important if a sick person had a heart and desire for a physician. When he lay ill in Schmalkald, there would have been four Medici above him, to whom he would have been very sorry; for there was no man in the world who so unwillingly ate and drank from the pharmacy as he. And he told his example, that he had been lying there for three days and had not been able to eat anything, and the Medici had also forbidden him much food. Then the woman in the house came to him and asked him to tell her what he would like to eat, and she would prepare it for him. He said he would like to eat cold peas and fried herrings; she made them for him and he slept on them.
Item: D. M. Luther gave another example of a nobleman who was also ill and could neither eat, drink, nor drink.
1) Cf. Cap. 73, § 19, near the end.
2) In the issues: not after.
might sleep. Finally, he longed for red wine, which he usually liked to drink in his health. Now he had sent for a glass full, which he drank, then he sent for another glass full, and then he said: All good things must come in threes, and he also drank the third glass. Although the Medici had seriously forbidden wine, he slept well on it. In the morning, the physician came and examined the urine and said, "Yes, if you kept this way, you would be better off.
9. of D. M. Luther's Vertigo or Main Defense.
(Cordatus No. 1301. 1-302.)
No one believes me how much I am annoyed by my dizziness and the ringing and buzzing in my ears. I do not dare. I dare not read for an hour without stopping, nor think anything through sharply, nor look at anything carefully, nor ponder carefully; for immediately the ringing is there, and [I] sink to the length of 3) there.
Scabies cleanses the body, which is purified by it, as by the elimination of excrement and sweat, and serves very well for the health of the head; however, I do not want to condemn my head, because it has faithfully dared to do it with me. He has earned good thanks from me.
10) For what purpose diseases and other plagues are useful to the right Christians.
(Lauterbach, July 27, 1538, p. 102.)
On this day, Luther was suffering greatly from stone and tearing in the bends of his knees, and said: "The devil plagues me everywhere, not in one way, but many times, with many diseases. He is particularly grievous to me. But praise be to God, who has snatched us out of the devil's power and adopted us as His children. Once we were completely under the power of the devil, but now we are freed through Jesus Christ. Even though the godly and the faithful are still subject to the devil in body and goods, diseases and
3) D. i. lengthwise. Rebenstock II, 22 d: 6t 8Ä6xius ack seamnurn rne äeinittere eoZor.
If we are subject to tyranny, it is for our benefit that we learn to trust God in weakness, foolishness, and sin, where God wants to show His power, wisdom, and justice in us. We are indeed under the wrath of God, and God sometimes allows us to be challenged. But at last mercy breaks forth and shows itself gloriously. So he does it with me according to his will.
Our suffering is nowhere equal to Christ's suffering.
When a sick man made his pestilence, sickness and pains great and made them worse, D. M. Luther: "It is true that our sufferings are somewhat great, but what are they compared to Christ, the Son of God, the Crucified? We may all remain silent.
Ingratitude brings punishment.
(Contained in Cap. 9, § 15.)
13) Do not be too afraid of pestilence and other diseases.
(Lauterbach, Dec. 6, 1536, p. 188.)
On December 6, when a contagious plague had come to two houses, Luther was asked by the deacons: How they should behave? Whether an order could be made, because one did not want D. Peter Heß to suffer among the people, because he visited the sick? He answered: "Oh, if God wanted that to be all my concern, I would have no trouble. Mr. Peter should not be forbidden again, for if it is necessary, we will all go and let God take care of us, because God usually protects the servants of His Word, if one does not run after them to the hostel and beds; there is no need for us to hear confessions, because we bring the Word of Life. After this, he marveled at the great fear of the people at the time of the gospel and under the gospel, since they would not have been so afraid before under the papacy. And this is the reason: In the papacy we trusted in the merits of the monks and others, now each one must trust in himself and drive. 1)
1) Cf. cap. 48, § 5.
(14) If God afflicts us with corporal punishment, we humans remain as we are.
Since the calculus and stone plagued D. M. Luthern said: "I am pregnant once again and am in childbearing difficulties; I am scratching at the stone, which is actually the disease of the Germans; as it is said that in England, the nausea is supposed to be very common. So all kinds of diseases rage and rage in our poor bodies; nevertheless, unfortunately, we are proud and hopeful enough to do so, and rarely become more pious afterward, indeed, as they say, "When the sick man recovered, he never got any worse. Alas, it helps little, we remain and do as our kind is. God help us!
The cramp is almost the least disease; however, I think the falling sickness is a. 1) Part of the cramp, as the one in the head: if the cramp in the feet and legs strikes you, it goes away if you move quickly and run. Then he spoke of casting spells, so that people's bodies would also be afflicted.
In Germany, fever is a medicine, because the Germans eat and drink themselves to death if the fever [does not] kill them, which makes them more moderate.
D. M. Luther spoke of the death of D. Sebald and his housewife, whom he had visited and touched and palpated in their illness, and said: They had both died more of sorrow than of pestilence. And when he took their children into his house, some of them gave him a sting, as if he were tempting God. He said, Luther: "I had fine masters who taught me what it means to tempt God.
15. D. Luther's illness at Schmalkalden. 4)
There he lay down on the stone fatally ill, so that he was already struggling with death; for everyone had already despaired of his life, and no man could help him; but God helped him miraculously. For he had heard that they wanted to save him from
2) In the editions instead of "be a": "be".
3) D. i. not resisted.
4) Cf. Mathesius, St. Louis edition, p. 194 s. Cf. also Cap. 48, § 28.
Schmalkald away, so that he would not die and be buried before the Monstro, the Pope's embassy there. Now he was led from Schmalkald to Tambach. When he arrived at the inn and drank a little red wine, his bladder opened again, so that he could pass urine again, which had not happened before in many days. Then he had written on the wall of the inn in Tambach with chalk: Tambach est mea Pha- nuel, ibi apparuit mihi Dominus: Tambach is my Phanuel, there the Lord appeared to me.
If I had died there, it might have been the downfall of the papists; for when I am dead, they will first see whom they have had in me; for other preachers will not be able to keep the same measure, nor meet the ßðéåß÷åéáí that I have kept. And one has already seen and experienced this in Münzer, Carlstadt and Zwinglio and the] Anabaptists at Münster. There will be more of these fellows.
When M. Luther was very ill in Schmalkald in 1537, and D. Ehrhardt Schnepfius visited and comforted him, D. Luther spoke to him. Ehrhardt Schnepfius visited him and comforted him, D. M. Luther said. M. Luther said: Dear God, can it be no other way, so give me great patience and strong faith.
16. right remedy in diseases.
(Lauterbach, Aug. 5, 1538, p. 108 f.)
On this day Luther, in order to recover, rode on a wagon into a grove and through the fields, sang and rejoiced to the glory of God and said: "My songs are very painful to the devil, as he, on the other hand, laughs at our impatience and our pain. He takes pleasure in tormenting us, especially those who confess and preach Christ. Because he is the prince of the world and our enemy, we have to pass through his land, so he truly wants the toll from us and strikes our bodies with various plagues. Doctors see only natural causes in diseases and try to help with their means, and do well. But they do not see that Satan causes the natural cause in the illness, that he immediately and easily cures the causes and illnesses, turns heat into cold and vice versa, good and bad into bad.
into evil. Therefore, there must be a higher remedy, namely faith and prayer, as the 31st Psalm says: "My time is in your hands." I have now learned this passage in this illness and want to correct it. For before I drew it only to the hour of death; but it should mean: In your hands stands my time, i.e. my whole life, all days, hours and moments, as if he wanted to say: My health, sickness, accident, happiness, life, death, joy, mourning is in your hand. This is confirmed by experience. When we think we want to be happy, joyful, pious, healthy, the opposite happens and vice versa.
Of frailty and mortality, that man should be like a gin.
D. M. Luther once sent and gave a beautiful glass to D. Justo Jonä, and next to it he wrote these words: A glass gives a glass to another glass; rath, what is that?
Dat Vitrum Vitro Jonae Vitrum ipse Lutherus, Se similem ut fragili noscat uterque Vitro.
18. as D. M. Luther has to visit and comfort sick nurses.
(Cordatus No. 271 and 271a.)
When he comes to the sick, he talks to them in the most intimate way, and bends down close to them (as far as it is possible) almost with the whole body, and first asks what illness he is suffering from, how long he has been ill, which doctor and which medicine he has used. Then, whether he is also patient against God. When he hears the good will that this weakness is pleasing to them, as imposed by God, or that they are ready to die if God so wills, he praises this will very much and exalts it, since it is certainly from the Holy Spirit, who is there and works this will. It is also something great when someone comes to the knowledge of the Word and of Christ; but when someone is also gifted with such a will and faith that the Word preaches, this goes far beyond everything that is considered delicious. For such a person has God present with him and a gracious God.
GOD 2c. When he leaves, he lays their faith to their hearts that they may persevere in it, and promises to pray for them.
But when they say that they cannot make up for the good deed of his visit, he answers that it is his office and duty, therefore it is not necessary for them to give thanks. He also adds this consolation: they have no reason to be afraid, because it is certain that God, who has given them letter and seal (that is, His Word and Sacrament), will surely give them Himself as well.
19. how M. Luther comforted a lansquenet whom the devil had afflicted with evil.
(Cordatus No. 1020.)
A soldier was with me today, pale with fright, and complained to me that he sees and hears the devil speaking: He wants to lead him away. That is what the devil does. It happens to him as it does to a thief who has the will to steal all goods, but cannot steal them all immediately; and Christ was also led into the wilderness by the devil, but that is why he was not immediately his.