Here you hear that the Scriptures should and must be read in all things. For this reason it is written in letters, and kept in the church by God's special providence (it will remain in the church until the end of the world), so that it may be read, learned, always furthered, spread, and brought to children's children for and 4) for. Now there are always enough disciples or pupils who read and study the Scriptures, and thus increase in them, so that in time they also instruct others from them.
3) This section, except for the last sentence, is found in Aurifaber's Tischreden, Appendix, § 3. In our edition of the Tischreden, it is omitted. In the same version as in the Tischreden, Seidemann has printed this interpretation in De Wette, Vol. VI, p. 474, Note I.
4) So the Erlanger, "für und für" is missing in the Wittenberger and in the Jenaer.
can. But it is most important that the readers of the Scriptures are not only diligent but also faithful. This is what the Lord means when he asks: "How do you read? What do you teach? As if to say, "See to it that you read the Scriptures faithfully and divide the word of truth correctly, that is, that you do not seek anything else in it for your person except me, without whom no one comes to the Father, and teach others from it. For many are those who seek their own interests in the word, namely how they can gain temporal good and honor through it, and have a great reputation in the world, "think (as St. Paul says) that godliness is a trade", 1 Tim. 6, 5. But woe to such 2c.
Luc. 11, 28.
Blessed are those who hear and keep (or retain) God's word.
"Hearing" is a bad thing, "keeping" is a bad thing. For one often hears great lies, and keeps them longer than all God's words, as the pope's and all the world's lies and idolatry have been kept from the beginning. But whoever could believe that it is God's word what he hears from his pastor or preacher (if he is a Christian), and that God humbles Himself so highly, who made heaven and earth from nothing, that He speaks to you and me so graciously and warmly through a human being, would pass the hour with joy. But for this is good the cursed flesh, which thinks when it hears preaching: Oh, that's what the priest preached; now I can read it out of the book and preach it myself, just as he did. Therefore, God's word is taken for man's word, and everyone becomes tired and full of it. So it follows that they neither want to hear it nor keep it. But woe to such clever ones, of whom, alas, there are now only very many.
Blessed are those who hear and keep God's word.
Consider all the calamities on earth, be it pestilence, war, famine, or whatever plague may be, it is nothing compared to the misfortune and wrath that God does not speak to us, nor let His word be heard. But this is still further and unspeakable above, and the last, eternal misfortune, when God speaks with us, and richly
If we hear his word among us, and after that we despise it and become ungrateful, so that we are weary of it, like the Jews of the bread of heaven, then it is over. Therefore it is not only to hear, but also to keep, to remain with it, and not to be forced or torn away from it by love or suffering; this is called blessed.
Blessed are those who hear God's word 2c.
Great grace is it (who has it) to hear God's word. For many are those who will not hear it, nor may hear it, but persecute and condemn it. But this is the greatest grace of all, to keep the word of God. For he that keepeth it heareth it without ceasing in his heart, and it is his delight that he should hear and speak it outwardly. He that keepeth it not, or putteth it out of his heart, and forgetteth it, shall not be able to hear it long with his ears, but shall soon be full and weary of it, as the children of Israel were of the bread of heaven.
So there is a great difference among those who hear the word of God. Those keep it and get better every day; those leave it out and get worse until they fall away and persecute more than those who did not want to hear it in the beginning. Therefore it is in "keeping" it, that one has desire and love for it. This happens when one is certain that it is not the word of men, but the word of God 2c.