To the venerable Lord, Friedrichen, Abbot of St. Ilgen, 1) at Nuremberg, my favorable lord and patron.
Grace and peace in Christ our Lord and Savior - Venerable, dear Lord and Patron! I would gladly show my gratitude to your love and favor shown to me, but I am, according to the world, a poor beggar. And even though I have much, your nature is such that I would not like to show you anything special with it. So I have turned to my wealth, which I consider my treasure, and have taken my dear psalm before me, the beautiful Confitemini, and have put my thoughts on paper about it, because I am sitting here in the desert so idle, and yet must rest and celebrate at times, to spare the main, with the greater work of fully translating the prophets; which I also hope to complete soon.
2 I wanted to write and give you such my thoughts. I have nothing better. Although it may be considered by some to be a great, perhaps even a useless piece of drivel, I still know that there is nothing evil or unchristian in it. For it is my Psalm, which I love. Although the entire Psalter and the holy scriptures are also dear to me, as they are my only consolation and life, I have fallen especially in love with this psalm, so that it must be called and be mine, because it has earned itself so often for me, and has helped me out of many great troubles, where otherwise neither emperors, kings, wise men, wise men, nor saints could have helped me, and is dearer to me than the pope's, the Turk's, the emperor's, and all the world's honor, goods, and power.
1) "St. Ilgen" is, as we see from other Latin letters of Luther, St. Aegidii.
reluctant to interpret this psalm with them all together.
(3) But if any man shall think me strange to boast of this psalm as mine, which is common to all the world, let him know that the psalm is not taken from any man, that it is mine. Christ is also mine, yet remains the same Christ to all the saints. I do not want to be jealous, but a joyful sharer. And if God wanted all the world to address the psalm as his own, as I do; that would become the friendliest quarrel, to which hardly any harmony and love could be compared. Unfortunately, there are few of them, even among those who should do it before others, who would speak to the holy scripture or to some psalm from the heart for the rest of their lives: You are my dear book, you shall be my own little psalm.
(4) And it is indeed one of the greatest plagues on earth that the Scriptures are so despised, even by those who are endowed with them. All other things, art and books, are practiced day and night, and there is no end to labor and toil; but the holy Scriptures are left lying around, as if they were not allowed. And those who do it so much honor, since they read it once, can do it all in no time, and no art or book has ever come on earth that everyone has learned so soon as the holy scripture. And after all, they are not reading words, as they think, but genuine living words, which are not set down for speculation and high poetry, but for life and action. But our complaints do not help, they do not respect them. May Christ our Lord, through His Spirit, help us to love and honor His holy Word with earnestness, amen. Command me hereby in your prayer. Ex Eremo, prima Julii [from the desert, July 1] 1530. Martin Luther.