with German interpretation, according to the written sense, to Christ's and God's grace, next to his same true knowledge, thoroughly judged.
[Printed in March or April 1517.]
To all the dear limbs of Christ who read this booklet.
Grace and peace from God! Lest anyone wonder, dear friends of Christ, at the text of these seven Psalms, it is to be known that in some verses, for the sake of clearer understanding
for the sake of the common translation, taken after the translation of St. Jerome, also helped the translation of Doctors Johannis Reuchlin in his Hebrew sep-.
*The first writing, which Luther himself handed over for printing, is the interpretation of the seven penitential psalms in German, not for the scholars and highly educated people, but for the people: Letters to Christoph Scheurl of May 6, 1517, he says (Walch, old ed., vol. XXI, 573): "I am sorry that my little works (Eng ineptias [that is, the interpretation of the seven penitential psalmenft are spread among you by the venerable father f Staupitz). For they were not published for Nurembergers, that is, for feiugebrldete and exceedingly clever people, but for the coarse (as you know) Saxons, to whom the Christian doctrine cannot be sufficiently presented and chewed with however many words." Even earlier, Luther had spent a long time on the Psalms. Luther's very first lecture on biblical writings, soon after his doctorate, was on the Psalter. The glosses and clods relating to it are preserved in Luther's own manuscript, the former in the Wölfenbüttel library, the latter in the library at Dresden. The Wolfenbüttel manuscript was first published by Walch in the ninth volume of his edition in German translation (after a copy that was often faulty).
1656 Erl. 37, 344, Au[1. of the 7 Penitential Psalms. 1517 u. 1525. W. IV, 2288 f. 1657
tene. 1) The gloss and interpretation, however, although it may be considered new or even not written sense containing by some, it has not befitted me, so low.
1) By this expression he understands the following scripture: ,,Septem, psalmi poenitentiales hebraici cum grammaticali tralatione latina" with foeldjer berbunben: ,,Joannis Reuchlin Phorcensis 11. doctoris in septem psalmos poenitentiales hebraicos interpretatio de verbo ad verbum" etc. 2lm Scpluffe: ,,Tubingae apud Thomam Anshelmum Badensem M. D. XII.." (Weim. Ausg.)
To respect the Christians, or to doubt that Christ is so close to them, he will tell them how they should judge all this. But my presumption to interpret the Psalms, especially into German, I command to judge freely in every man's discretion. For not to me nor to you, but to God alone, praise and glory without end, Amen. .
Martinus Luder Augustinian at Wittenberg 1517.
dener first published Seidemann under the title: "Dr. Martin Luther's first and oldest lectures on the Psalms from the years 1513-1516. fJn first edition Dresden I876.] Second fTitel-Z edition Dresden 1880." Complete, both records united into Emem whole, first in the Weimar edition in the third and fourth volumes under the title vietutu sup^r ksultsrium. From the Wolfenbüttel manuscript, Professor C. Aug. Riehm at Halle had the seven penitential psalms printed in 1874 as the Easter program of the University of Halle under the title: luitiurn ttteoloAins Imtlmri s. sxempW settoliornm quibus D. I^utlisrus Psalterium inter^retari eoepit. Luther himself intended to print the very first Psalms lectures, as we can see from two letters to Joh. Lang, dated Dec. 26, 1515 and Oct. 25, 1516, from which it is clear that he was busy with preliminary work for the printing of them. However, the planned printing was postponed further and further and finally did not take place at all. In the Penitential Psalms, Luther did not pay particular attention to his glosses or his lectures, because, as already mentioned, he published them for the people. We recognize the time of their publication from a letter of Luther to Johann Lang of March I, 1517, where he says: "If the Psalms, which I have translated and explained in German, would please no one, they would please me best; but the printer Johannes fGrünenberg] is waiting for you to finish with those which I have sent you." (The meaning of this passage is probably not, as the Weimar edition and also Köstlin, Martin Luther, vol. I, p. 123, assumes, and as also our edition, vol. XVIII, 1974, reads fwo we have taken over the translation of the old edition, "that Luther had his hearty joy in them" fWeim. Ausg., Bd. I, 154], but Luther wants to say: If my learned friends would judge of my work that it would not please them, it would please me best, because I would thereby receive the certainty that it does not fit for the learned, but for the people. fLuther calls it in the letter to Spalatin, spring 1517 (Erl. Br.W. I, 90), a dish that has been chewed two or three times; however, I must get it into print as soon as possible, because the printer wants it and is waiting for the part of the Psalms that is still in your hands). It seems, then, that the printer had already begun work on the Penitential Psalms on March I, 1517, but was now waiting for those that were still in longitudinal hands. They were sent to him (as the Weimar edition says) presumably for his own sake, so that he, as a connoisseur of Hebrew, could check the translation. The printing may therefore have been completed as early as March or April 1517 at the latest, since according to Luther's letters to Scheurl mentioned above, the Penitential Psalms were already in circulation in Nuremberg on May 6, 1517. The first printing was procured by Johannes Grünenberg in Wittenberg and went out under the title: "Die Sieben puszpsalm mit deutscher auszlegung nach dem schrifftlichen synne tzu Christi vnd gottis gnaden, neben seyns selben. Ware erkentniß. gründlich gerichtet." At the end: "Gedruckt tzu Wittenberg! hn der Churfürstlichen stad durch Joannem Grunenbergk Nach Christ geburt Tausent funffhundert vnd jm sibentzen jar. By the Augustinians." "Sales were so brisk that before the printing was completed, the first sheets were already being reissued, and in many cases the manuscript was reprinted in the following years" (Weim. The first edition was printed by Jakob Thanner in Leipzig in 1518, 1519, and 1520; by Johann Knoblouch in Strasbourg in 1519; and by Jörg Nadler in Augsburg (as the marginal borders suggest), but no date is given. Finally, there are two editions from 1524 and 1525, which contain only a short excerpt of Luther's interpretation; the former is printed in Erfurt in the Pergamentergasse zum Färbefaß, the latter, a reprint of the same, is without indication of the printer and place. - After a number of years, namely in 1525, Luther revised the first edition, because in his "first excursion" he "often missed the text's opinion", and "had also progressed since the time", and let the book go out again, "better prepared and based on the right text". The second edition was published under the title we have placed above it in 1525 by Joseph Klug in Wittenberg; likewise, in the same year, a Lower Saxon edition by the same publisher; another edition by Silvanus Ottmar in Augsburg in 1525; finally, an edition in 1526 without indication of place and printer. In the collections, the first edition is found: in the Jenaer (1564), vol. I, p. 19; in the Altenburger, vol. I, p. 25; in the Leipziger, vol. V, p. 369, and in the Weimarschen, vol. I, p. 154. The second arrangement: in the Wittenberg (1553), vol. ill, p. 24d; in the Jena (1556), vol. ill, p. I; in the Altenburg, vol. ill, p. I, and in the Leipzig, vol. V, p. 401. Both editions are combined with each other in such a way that the translation of 1517 precedes each psalm, but the new translation is included in the text of the second edition, and the deviations of the first edition are indicated in notes: in Walch, Vol. IV, 2258, and in the Erlangen edition, vol. 37, p. 340. We reproduce the text in the same way, basing the first edition mainly on the Weimar edition, but the second on the Jena edition, comparing the Wittenberg and Erlangen editions.
sTitle and preface of the second edition of 1525.)