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 A. SYMPOSI^C 
 
 ON 
 
 MARTIN LUTHER 
 
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 IN 
 
 ISTE^V^ YOI^K. 
 
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j\. SYMPOSIA^C 
 
 ON 
 
 MARTIN LUTHER 
 
 BY THE 
 
 jjrofessors o{ the |[nion ||ltcological ^emiimr}} 
 
 IN 
 
 NET\^ YOI^K. 
 
 Held in the Chapel of the Seininary ^ Monday Afternoon^ 
 November 19th, 1883. 
 
 Mm %oxh, : 
 
 PRINTING HOUSE OF WM. C. MARTIN, 
 No. Ill John Street. 
 
PREFATORY NOTE. 
 
 The following hrief jpajpers., read hefore the stiidents 
 and, a few friends of the Union Theological Seminary^ 
 ai'e now ptiblished hy the Directon^ of the Seminary., in 
 the hope of reaching a larger audience than the Chapel of 
 the Institution coidd hold. Each of the seven Professors 
 spohe from the stand-point of his ovm. department. The 
 eight rruinutes allowed to each speaker^ though somewhat 
 exceeded in almost evcTy case., nevertheless served a good 
 purpose in suggesti/ng the greatest ptossiMe condensation of 
 material. No man in Modern History better deserves., or bet- 
 ter rewards^ sucli handling than the '■^ many-sided''^ LUTHER. 
 
I. 
 
 MARTIN LUTHEK'S PLACE IN HISTORY. 
 
 Church History, like all other History, has both multiplicity 
 and unity. It is many things ; and it is one thing. Its forces 
 and events, merely chronicled, seem multitudinons, diverse, 
 belligerent, and bewildering. Profoundly apprehended, these 
 forces and events are the working out, straight on, of a single 
 purpose. 
 
 Humanity is, of course, in all these nineteen centuries. 
 Christ also is in them all, partially in each, wholly in none, 
 but making himself felt more and more from age to age. 
 
 It is only four hundred years since Martin Luther was 
 born. It is eighteen hundred and fifty-three years since 
 Christendom began. Many hundreds of years, probably, are 
 yet to come. Christendom is only vestibule as yet. Who 
 can tell us what the edifice will be ? 
 
 Till Luther came, Christendom had been Pelasgic : first 
 Greek, in its emphasis of doctrine ; Roman next, in its 
 emphasis of discipline : both, as I have said, Pelasgic. Greek 
 and Roman, diverse enough in some respects, at bottom are 
 much alike. Form and order are the racial instinct and ideal. 
 Orthodoxy was Greek, defining faith to be the right l)elief. 
 Obedience was Roman. And for fifteen hundred years they 
 divided History between them. The old heathen Pelasgic 
 State conditioned and tutored the new Christian Pelasgic 
 Church. Creed and organism ruled. Individuality was re- 
 volt. I speak of the Pelasgic State, not forgetting that 
 Greece was Democratic, and Rome at last Imperial. But 
 whether many-headed or single -headed. Democracy or Em- 
 pire, the State was intolerant of dissent and opposition. The 
 
penalty was ostracism : hy ballot on one side of the Adriatic, 
 by edict on the other. 
 
 The Pelasgic State was bad enough, if measured l\y our 
 ideal ; but good enough, if judged of by the materials it had 
 to work upon. For the crude Orient, for crude peoples any- 
 where, it was the best thing possible. Mankind outgrew it 
 very slowly. I know nothing in History more impressive 
 than that magnetic name of the " Holy Roman Empire," 
 which, from Charlemagne to Napoleon, flung its gigantic 
 shadow across the map of Europe. 
 
 Tlie Pelasgic Church could no more be final than the 
 Pelasgic State. Everything in this world, from the Sabbath 
 down, was made for man. Individuality is sacred, and must 
 have its rights. Hence the Teutonic stadium in History ; 
 and Martin Luther as the inaugurator of it. Of its cardinal 
 principles you will soon be told. Call it what you will — 
 Revolt, Revolution, or Reformation, it was, and is, the 
 individual believer demanding his rights of the Christian 
 organism. These rights had been withheld : the right to 
 interpret Scripture ; and the right of way directly to Christ. 
 And the retribution, in deteriorated character, had been 
 tremendous. There is no disputing the facts. Europe cer- 
 tainly was far enough above its old Heathen level ; but also 
 shamefully below its proper Christian level. 
 
 All through the flfteenth century, organic Reformation 
 was agitated, and failed. Pisa, Constance, and Basle were 
 Pelasgic. Expulsion followed; not mere exodus, but expul- 
 sion. And the organism gave its tinal answer at Trent. But 
 Luther was already dead, dying on the battletield as really 
 at Eisleben, as Zwingle died literally at Cappel. And it was 
 a long time before Protestantism understood itself, if it does 
 even yet. Its manifold beneflcent achievements are indis- 
 putal)le. Its historic cojitributions of religious and civil 
 liberty, of advanced intelligence and morality, of eager in- 
 dustry, thrift, and accumulating wealth, are like the jeonian 
 geological deposits. Some foolish people call it a failure. 
 
Other foolish people call it a hnality. It is neither failure 
 nor finality ; but a good long stride onward in the resounding 
 march of these Christian centuries. Even the old Pelasgic 
 organism has responded to its quickening touch. All Chris- 
 tendom has moved. Should the Day of Judgment dawn 
 to-morrow, Protestantism would go to the right. 
 
 It is childish to denounce the Protestant sects. They 
 were inevitable. Sectarianism is the real iniirmity ; and, 
 along with that, our Protestant scholasticism. We are not 
 yet rid of the heresy of an interpreting organism. Our 
 creeds are still Pelasgic. There are many Popes besides the 
 one chosen by Roman Cardinals. The sooner we are con- 
 sistent, the better it will be for us. 
 
 What next ? More Protestantism, not less of it ; but 
 Protestantism on its better, positive, productive, and progres- 
 sive side. Till now it has been too negative. Sect impeaches 
 and weakens sect ; connnunion, communion ; scholar, scholar. 
 Even congregation rivals congregation. This Teutonic dis- 
 integration is intolerable. Unity we must have at last ; 
 though, for the present, we may be content with intelligent, 
 cordial, steady movement towards it, in our simplified Con- 
 fessions. Creed-subscription is one of the burning questions 
 of the hour. There are two kinds of subscrij^tion : subscrip- 
 tion to the letter, and subscription to the spirit, of our creeds. 
 The latter must eventually carry the day. It is both more 
 Scriptural and more ratioual. " The letter killeth." Strict 
 literal subscription to statements of Christian doctrine not 
 Divinely inspired, should never be required of any one. 
 Only Scripture is imperative and iinal. 
 
 Lift up your eyes, and you may see another stadium 
 advancing. Its aim will be to realize the Christianity of 
 Christ himself, which is about to renew its youth by taking 
 to heart the Sermon on the Mount. He that sitteth on the 
 throne is saying : " Behold I make all things new." This 
 earth is yet to be redeemed, soul and body, with all its 
 peoples, occupations, and interests. The Iinal goal of History 
 
is not merely the Day of Judgment, rolling its thunders from 
 star to star ; but a sweet and blessed Christian civilization, nay, 
 a true Christian socialism, which shall answer in the affirmative 
 that insolent and cruel question of the first godless Political 
 Economist : "• Am I my brother's keeper V 
 
 Inspired great men like Wiclif and Luther, sent, at wide 
 intervals, to make epochs in History, are equally the l^ene- 
 diction, and the reproach, of the blinded and sluggish masses 
 requiring such guidance. Let us hope that the time is com- 
 ing when the masses themselves shall be inspired. 
 
 ROSWELL D. HITCHCOCK. 
 
II. 
 
 LUTHER A8 PROFESSOR OF THEOLOGY. 
 
 In the lirovideiice of God, the light of divine tnitli hurst 
 fortli from the university of Wittenherg, at tlie beginning of 
 the sixteenth century. The master of the Reformation was a 
 professor of theology, who was training his students in the 
 exegesis of the Psalter and the Pauline Epistles. He first gave 
 the word from God to his own pupils ere he gave it to the 
 German nation and the world. 
 
 The university of Wittenberg was founded by Frederick 
 the Wise of Saxony, in 1.502, under the advice of Staupitz, 
 chief of the Augustinian order in Germany, who became its 
 first dean. 
 
 Luther was born in the heart of Germany, at Eisleben, of 
 sturdy peasant stock. He was trained at the Latin school of 
 Eisenach, by the help of Conrad and Ursula Kotta. His father's 
 improved circumstances enabled him to study in the faculty 
 of law at the university of Erfurt, the best German university 
 of the time. Called of God, he entered the Augustinian order 
 and came under the influence of Staupitz. Staupitz taught 
 him that Christ was the centre of the Bible and of theology. 
 Staupitz became his spiritual father, and induced him to enter 
 the priesthood in iSOT, to become j)rofessor of philosophy in 
 the university of Wittenberg in 1508, and doctor of theology 
 in 1512. Li 1513 he began to lecture on the Psalter, and in 
 1515 on the Epistle to the Romans. Luther combined in his 
 experience and faith David and Paul, but the Davidic element 
 predominated in his life and character. The Psalms and the 
 Epistle to the Romans .thus expounded in the lecture-room 
 at Wittenberg, became the pillars of the Reformation. 
 
 If the Reformation was born at noontide, Oct. 8 J, 1517 
 
10 
 
 when Luther posted the ninety-live theses on the doors of the 
 Castle chnrch at Wittenberg and called the world to repen- 
 tance, it was conceived in the lecture-room of the university 
 when he expounded the penitential psalms to his classes, and 
 its birth was heralded when his expositions issued from the 
 press in the spring of the year. 
 
 Luther, as a professor of theology, devoted himself to the 
 exposition of Scripture, and entirely reformed theological 
 instruction by new principles and new methods. 
 
 (1.) The scholastic formula was "A theologian who is not 
 logical is a monstrous heretic." Luther confronted it with 
 '' That is monstrous and heretical language." The scholastic 
 logic with its infinite hair-splittings and never-ending questions 
 of casuistry had become supreme in the universities. It was 
 a master-stroke when Luther smote it with its own audacious 
 pretensions. The scholastics sought the truth by analytic 
 logic. These surgeons of learning were ever dissecting and 
 reconstructing. They took the concrete to pieces ; they 
 defaced its beauty ; they destroyed its symmetry ; they 
 wounded it and took away its life ; they were rewarded with 
 shapeless and bleeding fragments, and bones. The bones they 
 reconstructed into skeleton systems ; but the life, the glowing 
 forrn, the beautiful face of truth had departed. 
 
 From these lecture-halls of dissection and death, Luther 
 led his pupils into lecture-halls of reality and life. God gave 
 him wondrous insight into trutii, and marvellous powers of 
 delineation. The concrete was substituted for the abstract — 
 the intuitive method for the analytical ; and enthusiastic love 
 of the truth assumed the place of the cold, mechanical, cruel 
 handling of it. The words of Luther became words of life 
 and burning light. They kindled his pupils ; they fired the 
 German nation ; they set the world ablaze with a new era. 
 The university of Wittenl)erg became the centre of Europe, 
 and its professors the doctors of the world. 
 
 (2.) The mediaeval exegesis had covered over the Bil)le 
 with the glosses of the manifold sense, and encased it in the 
 
11 
 
 decisions of the councils and the doctrines of the fathers. 
 The Bible was hidden in the mass of tradition. Luther 
 bravely attacked this evil. In his exposition of the Lord's 
 Prayer on the first Sunday of 151Y, he declared that the 
 scholastic doctors were silly dreamers in fooling with the 
 fourfold sense. They understood neither the spirit nor the 
 letter of Scrij)ture ; they had made it a nose of wax. 
 
 It is not true that the Bible was inaccessible to the people 
 in the fifteenth century. It was then, as now, the most 
 accessible of books. There were immense numbers of MSS. 
 of the Bible in the libraries of the universities and monas- 
 teries and in private hands. The Bible was the earliest 
 printed book, and numerous editions of the Bible in many 
 different languages poured from the presses. There were 
 several German versions of the Bible before Luther. The 
 ninth German Bible was published in the year of Luther's 
 birth. The Bible was not shut off by any physical barriers. 
 It was not chained by fetters of iron. But the Bible was left 
 on the shelves, as an honored relic of ancient times. It was 
 regarded as an antiquated text-book. Its juice was boiled 
 down in the Creeds ; its teachings were represented in better 
 forms in the fathers. The free intrepretation of the Bible 
 was the source of every heresy. The Bible was a dangerous book. 
 The Fathers and creeds were safer. Why go to the Bible and 
 run the risk of heresy, when you may have the substance of 
 the Bible in the creeds and the fathers and be sure of your 
 orthodoxy ? It was a dreadful risk that Luther ran when he 
 went back of the fathers to the Bible, and through the Bible 
 to God. Ecclesiastics were not surprised that he rejected the 
 authority of the Church and became a heretic. When in the 
 university of Wittenberg, he taught the Bible in place of 
 Peter Lombard and Thomas Aquinas, the masters of the sen- 
 tences, heretics multiplied like rats, and they ran all over 
 Germany and infested all Europe, and threatened the entire 
 structure of the papacy. • But blessed l)e God, that Avliich the 
 papists called heresy has proved a reformation from God. 
 
12 
 
 Luther followed the apostles and prophets in preference to the 
 fathers and the schoolmen. When Jesus Christ became his 
 master he rejected the pope. He discarded the manifold sense 
 because he had found the divine sense. He rejected the deci- 
 sions of the councils because he bowed before the decisions of 
 God. He went back of the fathers to the Father of all fathers. 
 The study of the Bible became the chief study in the univer- 
 sity at Wittenberg. A new theology was born, a theology of 
 truth and life, of converting grace, and of sanctifying power. 
 
 (3.) The chief merit of Luther as a professor was in his 
 unflinclving fidelity to truth. He was not so great a scholar 
 as Melancthon ; but Melancthon would have given aw^ay the 
 reform by his compromising j)olicy, if Luther had not held 
 him fast to the truth. Luther was not so keen a critic as 
 Carlstadt or Agricola ; but these became narrow and one- 
 sided, conceited and fanatical, and Luther could not restrain 
 them from mischief-making. He was not a politician as 
 Avere Zwingli and Calvin. He did not seize the civil or the 
 ecclesiastical sword to battle for the reform or to purge the 
 church. Zwingli took the sword to perish by the sword. 
 Calvin purged Geneva so heroically that he made hypocrites 
 and pious exiles. Luther wielded the sword of the spirit. He 
 grasped the truth with all his strength, and made it a part of 
 his own being. The truth of God swayed him with irresistible 
 power. He was not controlled by half-truths and force of 
 circumstances. Essential and '^rltal truths and the great 
 unities made him their spokesman. He held these up as 
 the truth of God, to guide and save the nations. He im- 
 pressed them so deeply upon the Germanic world, that they 
 characterize the modern age, and will never be effaced. 
 
 When truth became supreme in the university of Witten- 
 berg, in the lecture - room of Luther, the Pope and the 
 monastic orders, the empire and the allied kings, had to 
 contend — not with Luther and his students — but with a 
 divine force, the Eternal Logos, the living God. 
 
 CHARLES A. BlilGGS. 
 
III. 
 
 LUTHER AS AN EXEGETE. 
 
 In October, 1512, Luther became Licentiate and Doctor of 
 Divinity at Wittenberg. He annonnced the Scripture as the 
 subject of his University lectures, and in 1513 began them by 
 a course on the Psahns. November 17th, 1545, he iinished a 
 series of lectures on Genesis — the last fresh University work 
 he did. Three months later he was dead. For thirty-two or 
 thirty-three years he M^as thus publicly engaged in the inter- 
 pretation of the Bible. His public life as exegete was longer 
 than his life as a pronounced reformer. 
 
 But, indeed, he initiated a reform in exegetical methods 
 as noteworthy as his reform in Christian doctrine and practice. 
 For nearly ten centuries before him — since the death of the 
 last great patristic expositors — exegesis had made almost no 
 advance. Many of the theologians of the middle age did not 
 study the Bible very much. Their theology was wrought out 
 by the a priori methods of logic, instead of being an outgrow^th 
 of freshly apprehended Scriptural truth. If it would not be 
 true to say that the Bible was rejected, it was certainly given 
 a subordinate place. Men went to it either to find arguments 
 for dogmas already held, or to get edifying thoughts for the 
 promotion of spiritual life. The more numerous the proofs 
 of a cherished doctrine, the more particular and varied the 
 spiritual suggestions that could be found in it, the better. 
 The idea of an objective revelation preserved in writing, and 
 of exegesis as the science whose prime object it is to simply 
 understand that revelation, and make it understood, hardly 
 existed at all. Still less was there a general belief in the 
 indwelling, vitalizing power of God's Spirit, constantly ])resent 
 
14 
 
 in His Word. Hence the Bible became of remote interest, 
 and wlien it was studied at all the allegorical sense was made 
 to overshadow the literal ; and the mystical, the historical. 
 There had been, indeed, some movements toward better things, 
 particularly since Nicolas of Lyra (d. 1340), but a new era 
 began with Luther. Luther found only faint and feeble begin- 
 nings of a true exegetical science ; he left an exegetical science, 
 still imperfect, as was natural, but avowedly based on evangel- 
 ical and critical principles. He pointed out the path which 
 the student of the Bible ought to follow, and took long steps 
 in it himself. 
 
 His equipment in technical knowledge would now be called 
 very slender, and its limitations cramped him a good deal. 
 He had l)egun to pick up Hebrew at Erfurt, and possessed 
 a Hebrew lexicon of some sort there. But he expounded the 
 Psalms in 1513 from the Vulgate version, with only occasional 
 references to the original ; for most of these he was indebted 
 to Reuchlin. Li Greek he would seem to have been even 
 worse off at tirst. We have no knowledge that he studied it 
 in Erfurt, and he shunned the society of those who might 
 have taught it to him there — the Humanists. It was quite 
 natural that his lack of Greek should increase his difficulty in 
 understanding the Pauline doctrine of justification. The 
 Vulgate translation obscured the truth. Even after he began 
 to study Greek earnestly, it was some time before he was at all 
 at home in it. He owed much to his friend and brother-monk, 
 Joliann Lange, who was a line Greek scholar, but as late as 
 1518 he wrote to him — addressing him as " Lange, the Greek," 
 — with a question about avd&rjixa and avd&eixa — saying 
 that he himself could not draw the Greek letters. In this 
 same year, however, Melancthon began to lecture on Homer in 
 the university, and this gave Luther a new impetus and oppor- 
 tunity, and later, under the pressure of his greatest scholarly 
 undertaking, the translation of the Bible — first the New 
 Testament and then the Old — with the opportunities afforded 
 by the repeated denmnds for new editions, he succeeded in 
 
15 
 
 making of himself, according to the standard of the time, a 
 tolerable scholar in the original languages of Scripture, so that 
 although he sometimes spoke slightingly of these attainments 
 he was able, as he once said, "■ to meet fairly well a Hebrew 
 or a Greek." The tremendous energy with which he thus 
 fitted himself for his exegetical work while he was doing the 
 work itself, is one of the many remarkable things in his life. 
 
 It was only by degrees that Luther broke away from the 
 traditional methods of exegesis. He was still under their 
 influence when he began to lecture on the Psalms, in 1513. 
 Indeed, he seems for a time to have been growing more- and 
 more allegorical and mystical in his interpretations. But this 
 really indicated a deepening of his spiritual experiences, which 
 he was trying to match out of that part of Scripture which 
 was just then under his hand, l^one the less, the method 
 was a false one. He even warned his students against the 
 historical interpretation of the Psalms, and went so far in his 
 allegorizing as to find in some Psalms a sixfold sense. " He 
 was still in the swaddling-clothes of the allegorizing method." 
 He said of the Ne\y Testament that a literal interpretation of 
 it was like a literal interpretation of the (ceremonial) demands 
 of the Old Testament. Believing that the Old Testament 
 ritual must in some sense be still binding, but not able to think 
 that it could be literally so, he interpreted it spiritually, and 
 this spiritualizing method he carried even into those parts of 
 Scripture whose literal meaning is spiritual. And yet amid all 
 the fancifulness of these interpretations we catch glimpses of 
 the future reformer. Thus, "His dwelling is darkness" 
 means that God is hidden in the Church, which is dark to the 
 world, hut revealed to God. In Ps. Ixxviii, 16—" He brought 
 streams also out of the rock, and caused waters to run down 
 like rivers " — he interpreted the rock of Christ and the Holy 
 Scripture, the waters of the believing peojtles and the Churches. 
 He found references to Christ everywhere, even when the 
 literal sense was made the foundation. Thus he says of 
 Ps. viii, Y (A. v., v. 6), that it literally refers to the creation of 
 
man, but tliat because of the word " all " (" thou hast put all 
 things under his feet ") which l)elongs properly only to God, 
 the apostle {i. e. author of Ilehrews) explains the passage of 
 Christ, and Luther adds : "Wherefore, since this Psalm appears 
 less applicable to Chi'ist than many others, the apostle shows 
 me that I am to understand almost all of the same Lord." It 
 was perhaps this supposed encouragement from the New 
 Testament whicli led him to say of Ps. vi, T (A.V., v. 6) — 
 " All the night make I my bed to swim :" — " This Psalm is to 
 be believed as teaching that the Lord wept very often, especially 
 in the night, although this is not written in the Gospel." 
 
 These illustrations are enough to show that Luther did not 
 adopt the truer exegetical methods which are commonly 
 associated w^th his name from any natural aversion to the 
 scholastic and mystical exegesis, but as the result of a genuine 
 growth out of the old into the new. Indications of this 
 growth appear (piite early. He was himself soon dissatisfied 
 with his first attempt at exegesis, and said no later than the 
 winter of L516, that they were "child's play, fit only for the 
 sponge." Excesses of Christological interpretation began to 
 be pared down. Even in the Psalter of 1513 where he made 
 marginal notes for his lectures, his own hand modified a 
 Christological interpretation of Ps. cxl, and erased one of Ps, 
 cxxxix. Some of these earliest notes, compared with the expo- 
 sition of the seven penitential Psalms, printed in 1517 — ^liis 
 first published exegetical work — and with the revised edition 
 of the same, which appeared in 1525, enable us to measure 
 with some fairness the advance of these years : e. ^., Ps. 
 vi is said, in Luther's MSS. notes of 1513, to be uttered by 
 Christ ; in the publication of 1517, to be spoken by a sinner, 
 or by Christ in the person of sinners. The edition of 1525 
 strikes out the words, " by Christ." Ps. xxxviii is called, in the 
 MSS. notes, and so in the exposition of 1517, "A prayer of 
 Christ in his suft'ering and penitence which he had for our 
 sins." T]ie edition of 1525 gives up the reference to Christ. 
 Ps. cii is interpreted, in 1513 and 1517, as a longing for 
 
Christ; in 1825, as a longing for grace. Such examples might 
 be greatly multiplied. 
 
 The exegetical principles which Luther finally reached 
 were based, of course, on his great doctrines of the supreme 
 autliority of Scripture, and the right of private interpretation. 
 These two fundamental positions limited and supplemented 
 each other. Thus he made use of the Christian freedom 
 whicli he claimed, not only to pass — somewhat hastily, indeed, 
 and on too narrow grounds — upon the canonicity of different 
 books, looking rather askance, for example, upon the Epistle 
 to the Hebrews, that of James, and the Apocalypse, but 
 also in considering questions of date and authorship, or 
 editorship — e. g., of the Pentateuch, of Samuel, of Isaiah, 
 Jeremiah, Hosea, Ecclesiastes, Ezra, etc. On the other hand, 
 he insisted on the need of the Holy Spirit's aid, of a sense 
 of awe, of humility and of earnest prayer, in addition to a 
 sound knowledge of Hebrew and Greek. It was on the 
 double foundation of these two doctrines that his exegetical 
 principles rested. The most important of these principles 
 were the following : 
 
 1. The Scripture must be looked at ohjeoti'vely. The great 
 desire must be to learn exactly what the Scripture says — 
 simply to understand. 
 
 The observance of a principle like this — even the attempt 
 to observe it — was an immense step in advance. The endeavor 
 — not to find that the Bible means what we have been think- 
 ing, and would therefore like to have it mean, but to know 
 precisely what it does mean — honestly to receive God's mes- 
 sage to us out of it ; it is a far-reaching principle. To have 
 recognized the absolute necessity of it is one of Luther's chief 
 claims to our respect, in his exegetical work. We need not 
 be surprised that he did not always practise it. Perfect 
 consistency here has not even yet been attained by all persons 
 who study the Bible. 
 
 2. The simple, literal sense has the prime value. '' The 
 single, right, chief -meaning, which the letters give," Luther 
 
18 
 
 called it. He did not wholly renounce the allegorical method, 
 but he assigned it a quite subordinate place. When any 
 doctrine was at stake lie was close and literal — sometimes 
 even too literal, as in the sacramental controversy. Elsewhere, 
 and es]3ecially for jDractical purposes, he admitted the allegory 
 as an ornament, or an enforcement, not as an essential part of 
 his exegesis. "Allegories," he said, "may be used to teach 
 the ignorant common people, who need to have the same 
 thing impressed in various forms." This he illusti*ated by aji 
 interjjretation of Is. vi, in which he made the serajjhim repre- 
 sent apostles and preachers, the wings mean the ministry of 
 the word, flying, the proclamation of the Gospel, the cover- 
 ing of the feet, a sign that preachers must not be boastful. 
 But he kept such allegorizing almost always within the limits 
 he himself assigned. 
 
 3. Closely allied with the preceding was his insistence on 
 the historical sense. He tried, in many cases, to determine 
 and to portray the liistorical background of the particular 
 Scripture in hand. Thus he would have his reader to make 
 sure " whether the words are addressed to thee or to some one 
 else." It is true that he still found too many New Testament 
 doctrines in the Old Testament, and particularly that the mys- 
 tical interpretation, which found Christ everywhere, had still 
 too much influence over him. He even said : " The prophets, 
 too — because they announced the Gospel, and spoke of Clirist, 
 their teaching, in the places w^here they speak of Christ, is no 
 other than the true, pure, genuine gospel, as if Luke or 
 Matthew had written it." Still, it was true of him, on the 
 whole, that he strove after tlie historical sense, and in this, 
 also, he was the forerunner of the better exegesis of to-day. 
 
 4. Scrijiture is to l)e interpreted by Scripture. Texts are 
 not to be explained in isolation, but in the light of the w^iole. 
 This is a most valuable principle if rightly applied, l)ut it is 
 subject to peculiar dangers. In Luther's case it sometimes 
 encouraged his tendency to find his favorite truths in all parts 
 of the Bible. It remained, indeed, to the end, a defect in his 
 
19 
 
 exegetical jjroeesses that lie constantly nsed exegesis to set forth 
 doctrine argumentatively. So far, he never ceased to follow the 
 scholastic method, but always with the fundamental difference 
 that the doctrines themselves, to which he clung with the inten- 
 sest belief, were derived from a candid study of the Scrijsture. 
 Thus there were two sets of passages where his exegesis was 
 at its best, {a) those which really contained these doctrines, and 
 (b) those which manifestly had nothing to do with these doc- 
 trines. It could not, however, be otherwise. He would 
 probably have lost in effective power if it had been otherwise. 
 
 His great exegetical works illustrate the points above men- 
 tioned. His second course of theological lectures at Witten- 
 berg was on Romans — when he expounded the difference 
 between the righteousness of works and the righteousness 
 that comes by faith. His third course (in 1516) was on Gala- 
 tians, and the contrast between Law and Gospel. This was 
 revised and published in 1519, and republished, after a new 
 revision and delivery, in 1535. A sound exegesis lies at the 
 core of this famous book, and yet it is, in the main, a powerful 
 dogmatic treatise. It was largely this characteristic of it which 
 gave it so direct an influence as an evangelizing force, not only 
 in Germany, but, since 1575, in many editions, in an English 
 dress, and among English-speaking people. John Bunyan was 
 among the many who have been under the deepest obligations 
 to this book, in which, whatever an ideal exegesis might stamp 
 as imperfections of detail, the heart of men was brought into 
 close contact with the living truth of God. 
 
 In this and many other published commentaries, in count- 
 less sermons and letters, by the force of Luther's example and 
 through the adoption of his methods elsewhere, the influence 
 of the new exegesis made itself felt. But the translation of 
 the Bible was Luther's greatest exegetical work — and an 
 exegetical work it emphatically was ; the one in which his 
 faults are least apparent, and his splendid qualities as an exe- 
 gete most prominent. It was a marvel of conscientious, per- 
 sistent toil. To understand and to make understood were 
 
20 
 
 his steady aims. For da3's and even weeks he would la])or over 
 a single word. But there was no pedantry in this. He took 
 infinite pains to iind the exact words which would best conve}' 
 the meaning to the people. Having learned Hebrew and 
 Greek, he set himself not merely to learn but to create the 
 German language. He took as the best basis, within his reach, 
 a form of diplomatic German, which was cold and meagre 
 enough, but which he warmed and enriched. On the one hand, 
 he borrowed a spiritual vocabulary from the Mystics of a former 
 age. On the other, he elevated and adapted to a sacred use 
 the vulgar speech which he heard around him. He listened 
 to children at their play, and common people at their work. 
 As he travelled he was on the lookout for the peculiarities 
 of dialects. He made a butcher slaughter a sheep for him, 
 and name to him all the internal organs, that he might have 
 the correct expressions in translating the laws of sacrifice. 
 With this prodigious and patient industry, under the guidance 
 of his rij^ening principles of exegesis, it is no wonder that the 
 result was a masterpiece. 
 
 A single word in closing : 
 
 It ought never to be forgotten that the two great reform- 
 ers, Luther and Calvin, were both great exegetes. They were 
 alike humble students of God's word — alike fearless and free 
 in their attitude toward the traditional interpretations — 
 neither was wholly without dogmatic bias. Calvin was the 
 more learned, the more calm, the more consistent ; Luther, the 
 more practical, the more enthusiastic . 
 
 Luther was the man to fire a people with unquenchable 
 zeal for the study of the Scripture ; Calvin the man to build 
 his exegetical methods and results into the life of coming 
 generations. 
 
 FRANCIS BROWN. 
 
ly. 
 
 LUTHER AS A KEFOEMEK. 
 
 Two years ago the New Testament was republished in a 
 revised version to tlie English-speaking world, and read by 
 more millions than in whole centuries before the Reformation. 
 This year the principles of evangelical Protestantism are re- 
 published in innumerable addresses and sermons not only in 
 Eisleben, Eisenach, Erfurt and Wittenberg, but tliroughout 
 Christendom, in languages unknown to Luther, in countries 
 which at the time of his birth were not yet discovered, and in 
 nations which then were not yet born. No man has been so 
 much honored, no man — save the apostles — deserves so much 
 to be held in grateful remembrance as Martin Luther, remark- 
 able alike as a man, as a Christian, as a husband and father, as 
 a theologian, as a Bible translator, catechist and hymnist, as 
 the bold champion of the freedom of conscience, as the founder 
 of the Lutheran Church, and as the chief leader of that Refor- 
 mation which carried Christendom back to lirst principles and 
 urged it forward to new conquests. Such a man belongs not 
 to a sect, but to the whole church of Christ ; and even those 
 who dissent from some of his favorite opinions, must say : 
 Luther, with all thy faults I love thee still. Zwingli gave 
 expression to this feeling when, in the heat of the eucharistic 
 controversy, and with tears in his eyes, he offered him the 
 hand of brotherhood at Marburg. 
 
 The principles of the Reformation for which Luther lived 
 and was ready to die at any moment, are the propelling forces 
 of modern church history. They have stood the test of more 
 than three hundred years, against persecution from without 
 and corruption from within, and are still as vital as ever. 
 
95 
 
 They carry in themselves the possibility and guarantee of 
 further reformation on the same immovable foundation of 
 God's holy word, which, in the language of St. Augustine, 
 has haustos prhnos, haustos secundos^ haiistos tertios, haustos 
 injhiitos. Christianity itself is perfect, but there is a pro- 
 gressive understanding and application of it in the history of 
 the church. 
 
 Freedom in Christ is the ultimate root of evangelical Pro- 
 testantism ; while freedom from Christ is the essence of 
 rationalistic pseudo-Protestantism, and bondage in the law is 
 tlie essence of Romanism. From that root sprung three 
 branches, which we may call the three principles of Protes- 
 tantism : the supremacy of the Bihle^ the supremacy of faith, 
 the sup)remacy of the people. These principles constitute a 
 trinity in unity and a unity in trinity. The first is the objective 
 principle, and relates to the source and rule of faith ; the 
 second is subjective, and belongs to the sphere of practical 
 experience, or the religion of the heart; the third is social, 
 and relates to the life and organization of the church. 
 
 1. The first principle is expressed in the statement: The 
 Word of God as contained in the canonical Scriptures of the 
 Old and Xew Testaments is the only infallible source and 
 rule of the Christian faith and duty. It alone can bind the 
 conscience, and every one has the right and duty to read, 
 explain, and obey it to the best of his ability, and in full 
 view of his personal responsibility to the Lord of conscience. 
 This principle is opposed to the principle of traditionalism, 
 which so overloads the Word of God with human traditions 
 as to hide it from the people and to make it of no effect. 
 " The Bible, the whole Bible, and nothing but the Bible, is 
 the religion of Protestants." Yet the Bible must be interpreted 
 by the mind of the church as well as by the individual. No 
 sound Protestant despises the lessons of history, the value of 
 doctrinal standards, the common teaching and experience of 
 Christendom, but he subordinates them all to the oracles of 
 the living God, who is wiser than all the wisdom of men. We 
 
23 
 
 honor the fathers, but still more the grandfathers. We follow 
 the river up to the fountain. Amicus Augustinus, sed ftiagis 
 amicus Paulus^ et maxime amicus Ghristus. 
 
 With the Bible in his hand, head, and heart, Luther went 
 forth to fight his battles against the pope and the devil, 
 being assured that " one little word " of the Almighty can 
 slay them. On this immovable rock the humble monk 
 took his stand at the diet of Worms, U7ius versus Qnundum, 
 strong in the sense of his weakness, independent in the sense 
 of his dependence, free in his obedience to God and the voice 
 of Lis conscience. And he conquered notwithstanding the 
 pope's bull and the emperor's ban. 
 
 " With our own strength we nothing can, 
 Full soon we were down-ridden ; 
 But for us fights the proper man 
 Whom Grod himself has bidden. 
 Ask ye, who is the same r" 
 Christ Jesus is his name, 
 The Lord God Sabaoth : 
 He, and no other god. 
 Shall conquer in the battle." 
 
 2. The second principle is justification by faith in dis- 
 tinction from justification by works. Faith is the pioneer of 
 all great thoughts and deeds. It is the bond of confidence 
 between man and man, between man and God. "The just 
 shall live by faith," is the theme of the Epistle to the 
 Romans. By faith Abraham stands out as the father of a 
 generation as innumerable as the stars in heaven ; by faith 
 Moses became the lawgiver of Israel ; faith inspired the 
 Psalms of David, and prophecies of Isaiah ; by faith the 
 fishermen of Galilee were made fishers of men and pillars of 
 the church. "Thy faith hath saved thee," we hear again and 
 again from the lips of Christ in the Gospels, but never : " Thy 
 works have saved thee ;" or " Charity has saved thee." "Who- 
 soever believeth in me hath eternal life." Faith, simple, child- 
 like, boundless trust in Christ, as our all-sufiicient Lord and 
 Saviour, is the soul of true piety. This faith alone justifies. 
 
24 
 
 because it apprehends, appropria^ies, and assimilates the grace 
 of God in Christ, which is the only ground and cause of 
 justification. But faitli, or rather the grace of God through 
 faith, is also the root of sanctification ; it overcomes the workl 
 and abounds in fruits of righteousness. In receiving Christ, 
 faith receives a new life and a power of holiness which must 
 at once manifest itself. Good works are necessary, not as 
 conditions, it is true, but as evidences of justification, and a 
 faitli which shows no works is dead, and no faith at all in the 
 sense of PauL The reformers insisted as strongly on a holy 
 life as their opponents, and the moral condition of Protestant 
 countries contrasts favorably with Roman Catholic. Luther 
 indeed, in the heat of polemics, depreciated the Epistle of James, 
 and could not reconcile him with his favorite Paul, who yet 
 furnishes the key for the reconciliation in his pregnant phrase : 
 " Faith working through love " (Tiiazcz ot ayd-r^Q iuspyou/jiiuTj). 
 But in his best and final utterances, Luther did full justice 
 to the working power of faith, which made him a reformer. 
 '' Faith," he says, in his Preface to the Epistle to the 
 Romans, " faith is a living, busy, active, mighty thing, and 
 it is impossible that it should not do good without ceas- 
 ing. Faith does not ask whetlier good works are to be done, 
 but before the question is put, it has done them already, and 
 is always engaged in doing them. You may as well separate 
 burning and shining from tire, as works from faith." 
 
 3. Tlie third principle is the general priesthood of be- 
 lievers in opposition to an exclusive hierarchy or priest-cast, 
 which claims to be the indispensable mediator between God 
 and man ; thus setting aside the eternal priesthood of Christ, 
 and assigning to the laity the degrading position of passive 
 obedience. Let me again quote from Luther, who always hit 
 the nail on the head, and could say the deepest things in the 
 plainest language. " It is faith," says he, " that makes men 
 priests, faith that unites them to Christ, and gives them 
 the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, whereby they become tilled 
 with all holy grace and heavenly power. This inward an- 
 
25 
 
 nointing — this oil, better than any that ever came from the 
 liorn of bishop or pope — gives them not the name only, but the 
 nature, the purity, the power of priests ; and this annointing 
 have all they received who are believers in Christ." The gene- 
 ral priesthood implies the right and duty of every believer to 
 read the Word of God in his vernacular tongue, to go directly 
 to the throne of grace, and to take an active part in all the 
 affairs of the church according to his peculiar gift and calling. 
 It makes the whole congregation an active, working, evangeliz- 
 ing power, and utilizes every member for the general good. 
 
 Schleiermacher reduced the whole difference between 
 Romanism and Protestantism to the formula : " Romanism 
 makes the relation of the individual to Clirist depend on his 
 relation to the church, Protestantism, vice versa^ makes the 
 relation of the individual to the church depend on his relation 
 to Christ." In other words. Protestantism puts Christ before 
 the church, the Christian before the churchman, and measures 
 man's piety by his Christliness rather than his churchliness. 
 But the best Christians are also or ought to be the most active 
 and useful church members. 
 
 The principle of the general priesthood of the Christian 
 people is the true source of religious and civil freedom. It 
 has never yet been fully realized in Europe, but has its widest 
 prospects in the virgin soil of this vast republic under the 
 sunshine of liberty. What else is universal suffrage but the 
 application of that principle to the political and civil sphere? 
 The true Christian is not only a priest, but also a king. As a 
 king he has a share in the government of the people, by the 
 people, and for the people. But let us not forget that, as the 
 general priesthood is based on faith in Christ, our only high- 
 priest, so the general kingship is based on the moral power 
 of self-government. Only he is truly free whom the truth has 
 made free. That freedom alone can stand the test of time, 
 and be a blessing to the people. A republic without the Bible, 
 without the Lord's Day, without the Lord's Church, is an 
 empty shell and will be broken to pieces. 
 
26 
 
 Tliese three great principles were in Luther not mere notions 
 or scholastic formulas, but vital truths. Thej were the ripe 
 fruits of his profound study of the Scriptures, and his severe 
 ascetic self-discipline in the convent at Erfurt. He passed 
 through that intense moral struggle described by St. Paul in 
 the seventh chapter of the Romans. Those truths were his 
 very life, his strength, his comfort, his joy. The Bible was 
 his daily food, faith was the element in which he moved, and 
 prayer was the breath of his soul. 
 
 Let us then, my fellow-students, learn this practical lesson 
 from the Luther celebration. Let us vitalize and individualize 
 those great principles of which he stands out as a typical 
 representative. Let us imitate him as far as he imitated Paul, 
 and as Paul imitated Christ. Let us be theologians after 
 God's own heart, mighty in the Scriptures, full of faith and 
 good works, and fervent in prayer. Let us, as true priests, 
 live in dail}^ communion with God and consecrate our persons 
 to His service which is perfect freedom. 
 
 Thus you will become a blessing to your generation, and 
 help to prepare the way for that grander reformation and 
 reunion of divided Christendom which the Lord of the Church 
 will surely bring about in His own good time. 
 
 PHILIP SCHAFF. 
 
V. 
 
 LUTHEK A8 A THEOLOGIAN. 
 
 " The student of theology," says Lutlier, in liis Table-Talk, 
 " has now far greater advantages than students ever had. 
 First, lie has the Bible, which I have translated so clearly into 
 German that any one may readily comprehend it. Next, he 
 has Melancthon's Common Places, which he should read over 
 and over again, until he has it by heart. Once master of these 
 two volumes, he may be regarded as a theologian whom 
 neither devil nor heretic can overcome ; for he has all divinity 
 at his fingers' ends, and may read understandingly wliatsoever 
 else he pleases. Afterwards, he may study Melancthon's 
 Commentary on Romans, and mine on Deuteronomy and 
 Galatians, and practise eloquence. Melancthon is a better 
 logician than myself ; he argues better. My superiority lies 
 rather in the rhetorical way." 
 
 Luther's estimate of himself is modest and moderate. Yet 
 on the whole a correct one. His power as a theologian did 
 not lie in systematizing, but rather in penetrating and deep 
 views of particular truths. He was inferior to Melancthon, 
 and still more to Calvin, in the ability to combine doctrines 
 into a scientific whole. 
 
 The same is true of him in regard to the political side of 
 the Reformation. He could do single things well and power- 
 fully. He could quell by his mighty preaching the fanati- 
 cism of Carlstadt and Miinzer, and keep his followers from 
 excesses in doctrine and practice. But others must organize 
 the Reformation, and manage its interests as related to the 
 Swiss, Dutch, and French peoples. 
 
 But in reference to some single doctrines, Luther had very 
 
28 
 
 great insight, acuteness, and logical strength. The doctrine of 
 justitication bj faith only, will immediately suggest itself. 
 The jjrecision and carefulness with which Lutliei* distinguished 
 between justitication and sanctiiication saved Protestantism 
 from lapsing back into the Romish view of good works. 
 And whenever in Protestantism this distinction is obliterated, 
 Protestantism slides down into legalism and sacramentarianism. 
 Luther opposed the doctrine of justitication by works, in both 
 the coarse and the refined form of it. Justification by works 
 may mean, that sin is pardoned because of an external work — 
 like penance, or pilgrimage, or the payment of money in the 
 purchase of absolution. Or it may mean that sin is pardoned 
 because of an internal work — such as the exercise of faith, 
 hope, and charity. The crude statement is : Money will buy 
 the remission of sin. The refined statement is : Goodness of 
 heart and upright moral character will merit it. The two 
 forms are one in princiiDle. In both cases alike, the reason 
 why sin is forgiven is found in the work and agency of man, 
 and not in the work of Christ. The ground of pardon and 
 justification is a human one, in both instances. Luther saw 
 with a clear eye, not only the error in the coarse legalism of 
 Tetzel, but in the subtle legalism of the more spiritual of the 
 Papal theologians — a legalism that was subsequently formu- 
 lated in the half-truth of the canons of Trent. 
 
 For Luther, as for Paul, justification means only that side 
 of redemption which concerns the forgiveness of sin. The 
 other side, which concerns the sanctiiication of the heart, he 
 insisted upon as strongly as any one. But he refused to make 
 tlie latter the reason and ground of the formei" — to mix the 
 two things and spoil ])oth. For a justification that rests upon 
 good works, either internal or external, as its meritorious and 
 procuring cause, is neither gracious nor gratuitous ; and good 
 works that are connected with this spurious justification are 
 not spontaneous and hearty, but servile and forced. 
 
 ] I once Luther refused to say that justification depends 
 ii|)()ii \v(ti"ks in any sliape or form. It does not depend upon 
 
29 
 
 faith and works togetlicr ; and still less upon works alone. 
 With St. Paul he said : " A man is justified by faith without 
 the deeds of the law. To him that worketh not, but believeth 
 on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for 
 righteousness," It is not the godly man, but the ungodly, 
 who is forgiven and pronounced just for Christ's sake alone. 
 
 This doctrine of Luther is objected to by some Protestants. 
 Canon Mozley, for example, complains that Luther's statement 
 of justification " requires us to beliet-e that that which makes 
 a man pleasing to God, or justifies him, has nothing to do 
 with morality or goodness " (Essays, I, 431). This is the old 
 Romish error of supposing that justification means making 
 just — that "to justify a sinner," and " to make a sinner pleasing 
 to God," are one and the same thing. But in Luther's view, 
 as in St. Paul's, they were wdiolly distinct things, though 
 inseparable from each other. God never justified a sinner 
 whom he did not sanctify, or in Mozley's pln-ase "make 
 pleasing " to himself. But, in the order, he justified him be- 
 fore he sanctified him. He first forgave his sin solely because 
 Christ died for sin, and then he made him a good man. 
 Pardon is first in the order, and sanctification is second. 
 "Whom he justified them he also glorified." The two things, 
 though thus inseparable, rest upon different bases. Justifica- 
 tion is founded upon the satisfaction of Christ, solely and 
 only; sanctification results from the operation of the Holy 
 Spirit in the heart. Because the two things are inseparable, 
 it does not follow that they are one and the same thing ; or 
 that one is the procuring cause of the other. Drinking and 
 eating are inseparable, and both alike necessary to life ; but 
 this does not prove that drinking is the same thing as eating, 
 or that it is the food which a man eats that quenches his 
 thirst. To say that a man is justified by being inwardly 
 sanctified, or, in Mozley's phrase, by " being made pleasing to 
 God," is precisely like saying that thirst is slaked by eating 
 bread. 
 
 Again, the doctrine of original sin was settled by Luther 
 
30 
 
 with clearness and profundity. The bondage of the af>ostate 
 will very early became a disputed point. Eck contended with 
 Carlstadt — the former asserting synergism, the latter mon- 
 ergism. Eck seemed to have the better of the argument. 
 Luther then entered the lists, and carried the day for the 
 Augustinian view of sin. His treatise on Free Will, though 
 highly polemic against Erasmus and objectionable in jihrases, 
 yet presents substantially the same view of the sinner's 
 impotence to which Oalvin subsequently gave celebrity. 
 Luther's doctrine of the bondage of the will has been charged 
 with fatalism, as his doctrine of justification has been with 
 antinomianism — but unjustly. His phraseology, occasionally, 
 if taken by itself, and aj^art from the qualifying connection, 
 is indeed liable to the charge ; but never when taken with 
 the context, and mitigated by it. 
 
 In brief, then, we may say that Luther as a theologian had 
 a penetrating rather than a constructive mind. He was a 
 close and accurate reasoner upon the important truths con- 
 nected with sin, and justification from sin. On other subjects 
 he was not so powerful, and in some cases not so accm'ate. 
 He does not appear to have devoted nmch study to the 
 doctrine of the trinity. He expended much thought upon 
 the doctrine of the sacraments, but did not succeed in entirely 
 clearing himself from the Romish errors. He did not attempt, 
 like Melancthon and Calvin, to bring his views into a system. 
 His followers endeavored to do this ; but did not succeed 
 in constructing a well-rounded and symmetrical theology. 
 Lutheran ism has never been so clearly defined and self- 
 consistent a scheme as Calvinism; nor have the churches 
 founded upon it been marked by the solidarity of the Calvin- 
 istic bodies. And the reason lay in the fact, that there were 
 some heterogeneous elements in Luther's views that were in- 
 compatible with a thoroughly harmonious body of 'livinity. 
 
 WILLIAM G. T. SHEDD. 
 
 
VI. 
 
 LUTHER WITH THE CHILDREN. 
 
 One of the most striking traits of Lutlier's character was 
 his sympathy with childhood. In the quality and power of 
 this sympathy he stood alone among all the Reformers. And 
 herein, no doubt, lay one secret of his niighty influence over 
 the common people of Germany. They loved and trusted 
 him because he showed such deep interest in their children. 
 Luther's work as a Reformer was very rough work and 
 required nerves of iron ; for he " wrestled not against flesh 
 and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against 
 the rulers of the darkness of this w^orld, against spiritual 
 wickedness in high places." The tendency of such a struggle 
 was to repress, if not deaden, the finer sensibilities of our nature. 
 You w^ould scarce expect that one in the very stress of a battle, 
 on whose issue he believed the fate of Christendom to hang, 
 would stop to seek aid and comfort from a child. Yet this is 
 what Luther did. " I have often need, in my tribulations, to 
 talk even with a child, in order to expel such thoughts, as the 
 devil possesses me with. I need one at times to help me, who, 
 in his whole body, has not so much divinity as I have in one 
 finger." 
 
 In recent discussions of his life and work, it has been often 
 pointed out, that Luther's immense infiuence was rooted in 
 his Christian manhood. It is equally true that a vital 
 element of his extraordinary personal power and magnetism 
 was the child-like spirit that was in him. His heart was like 
 the heart of a little girl for artless simplicity, tenderness and 
 a certain irrepressible gaiety. This is the more notewoi-thy in 
 view of the somewhat stern home-discipline, the hardships at 
 
32 
 
 school and other trials, which marked his early years. These 
 sharp experiences, that would have soured for life a nature less 
 sweet and generous, served rather in his case to train him for 
 the beautiful office of the children's friend. 
 
 There are three ways in which Luther's wonderful sym- 
 pathy with childhood especially showed itself; namely — in 
 his catechism, in his theology, and in his home. 
 
 (1.) In his Catechism. This, it is true, was not intended 
 exclusively for the young, but for all ages and all classes. It 
 is, however, more than any other product of the early Refor- 
 mation, the children's book. "God assembles unto Himself 
 a Christian church out of little children " said Luther; and his 
 catechism aimed to make them conscious of their privileges. 
 If none but a learned man of God, full of faith and of the 
 Holy Ghost, could have written it, neither could it have been 
 written by one, who had not become as a little child. Theo- 
 logically and practically, it has been a great force in history. 
 " It may be bought for a sixpence, but six thousand worlds 
 would not pay for it," said Luther's old friend, Dr. Justus Jonas. 
 And in our own day the venerable historian Ranke has said : 
 " It is as childlike as it is profound, as comprehensible as it is 
 unfathomable, simple, and sublime." Almost the whole of it 
 may be used as a prayer, so charged is it with the devotional 
 element. Luther himself, in his old age, was in the habit of 
 praying it. This indicates its character. Our Shorter Cate- 
 chism is unsurpassed in its kind ; it contains admirable state- 
 ments of Christian doctrine ; and some of its answers, like 
 that to the question. What is the chief end of man ? may 
 serve as keys to the whole divine system. But with all its 
 excellencies you could not easily ^ray the Shorter Catechism ; 
 it is didactic rather than devotional. Luther's Catechism, 
 then, is a noble monument of his deep sympathy with child- 
 hood no less than of his reforming genius. By it he overthrew 
 the confessional and put in its place faithful instruction, both 
 parental and pastoral, in the saving truths of the Gospel ; by 
 it he laid the foundations of a new and consecrated family 
 
33 
 
 life ; by it he has helped to irradiate ten thousand German 
 homes with the blessed sunshine of heaven. And not German 
 homes alone, but ten thousand English and American homes 
 as well ; for to Luther far more, it seems to me, than to any 
 other man, we owe that reconstruction of domestic life and 
 nurture in the spirit of the New Testament, which is one of 
 the brightest glories of evangelical Protestantism. He set the 
 example and all the other Reformers followed in his steps. 
 
 (2.) In his Theology. To some it may sound strange to 
 hear it said that Luther's sympathy with childhood modified 
 his theology. Nevertheless, I believe it was even so. Pectus 
 theologum facit. A wise, loving heart, sanctified by the word 
 of God and by prayer, is the best interpreter of Scripture. 
 What did more than aught else, perhaps, to make Calvin 
 the great theologian of the sixteenth century, was his profound 
 spiritual insight and sagacity ; in other words, the depth of 
 his Christian experience. Luther's Christian experience, while 
 equally deep, was still more varied, rich, and complete ; it 
 touched whole spheres of humanity where Calvin was not at 
 home ; above all, the sphere of childhood. I doubt if, since 
 the days of the apostles, there has been anything quite like 
 it. Run over in thought the names of the mighty heroes of 
 faith, who from age to age have fought the battles of truth, 
 and tell me which of them in this respect can we place beside 
 Luther's ? 
 
 But how did his sympathy with childhood modify his 
 theology ? By the sweet Christological tone which was thus 
 infused into it ; or, perhaps, I should rather say, by the posi- 
 tion assigned in it to the infant Redeemer. Luther grasped 
 the central truth of the incarnation with astonishing energy of 
 conviction ; his whole faith rested upon it ; and more than 
 any other theologian of the Reformation, he recognized and 
 adored God incarnate in the Babe of Bethlehem, as really as 
 in the crucified and risen Jesus. He was both impelled and 
 enabled to do this by the fine mystic quality of his piety, 
 which helped to keep him alike untrammeled by the abstract 
 
34 
 
 formulas of sacred doctrine, and undisturbed by contradictions 
 of the mere intellect. His conception of the word made flesh 
 for us men and for our salvation embraced not only the whole 
 Christ in His entire incarnate life and work, from the cradle to 
 the cross, and from the cross to the throne in glory ; but Christ 
 also as the same yesterday, to-day and forever. I will give a 
 single illustration of my meaning by quoting a part of Luther's 
 letter to his wife, ''doctoress and self-tormentor at Wittenberg," 
 as he calls her, written from Eislebeu on the Tth of February, 
 1546, eleven days before his death. Having wished her grace 
 and peace in the Lord, and exhorted her to read the Gospel of 
 John and the Smaller Catechism, he playfully takes her to task 
 for being so anxious about him. "For thou must needs take 
 the care of thy God upon thee, just as though He were not 
 almighty, and could not create ten Doctor Martins, if the one 
 old Doctor Martin were drowned in the Saale. Leave me in 
 peace with thy cares ; I have a better guardian than thou and 
 all the angels. He lies in the ma/ngeT and hangs on the hreast 
 of a virgin^ but sits none the less at the right hand of God 
 the Father Almighty. Therefore be at peace. Amen." I might 
 quote a score of similar passages, all showing how deeply 
 Luther felt the truth of his own teaching, that if we would 
 climb up to God, find Him, and know Him as our forgiving 
 Father, we must begin at the cradle in Bethlehem. 
 
 (3.) In his Home. A volume might be written on this 
 point ; a few words must suffice. Luther had six children ; 
 three sons and three daughters. His familiar letters, his table- 
 talk, the reports of friends and many passages in his writings 
 throw so clear alight upon his domestic life that we seem almost 
 to have seen it with our own eyes. And contrasted with the 
 fierce confiict that then shook the world, and of which the great 
 Reformer himself was the central figure, it presents a picture 
 of household peace and love that is inexj^ressibly attractive. 
 The halo of the Holy Child Jesus encircles it. I do not sup- 
 pose there was a sweeter Christian home in all the German 
 fatherland than that of Dr. Martin Luther. Within its charmed 
 
35 
 
 enclosure the voice of this son of thunder, whose echoes were 
 resounding through all Europe, was gentle as a woman's ; here 
 the rough hand of this dauntless assailant of pope and devil, 
 became as soft in touch as that of a young maiden. 
 
 When Elizabeth, his second child, died in infancy, he said : 
 " My little daughter is dead. I am surprised how sick at 
 heart she has left me ; a woman's heart, so shaken am I. I 
 could not Iiave believed that a father's soul would have been 
 so tender towards his child." And when his lovely daughter, 
 Madeleine, sickened and died in the 14th year of her age, the 
 frame of the strong man shook like an aspen leaf. He would 
 approach her bed, and taking hold of her small, thin hands, 
 press them again and again to his lips. " My dearest child, 
 my own sweet and good Madeleine, I know you would gladly 
 stay with your father here ; but in heaven there is a better 
 Father waiting for you." " Oh, yes ; I have loved this dear 
 child too much," he exclaimed, as he walked the room, over- 
 come with emotion. When the last agony came on, he threw 
 himself on his knees by her bedside, and weeping bitterly, 
 entreated God to spare her. He held her in his arms as she 
 breathed her last, and then softly laying her head upon the 
 pillow, cried out again and again : " Poor child ! thou hast 
 found a Father in heaven. Oh, my God ! let thy will be 
 done !" 
 
 In Konig's illustrated life of the German Reformer there 
 is a picture which gives us a glimpse of his home on Christmas- 
 eve. The Christmas tree is blazing, laden with all sorts of 
 fruit, horses, trumpets, cakes and dolls. Luther sits in the 
 midst and on his lap kneels his youngest child, clasping him 
 around the neck. On his shoulders, her hands joined to his, 
 leans his Kiithe, " meine heilige, tiefgelehrte, gnadige Haus- 
 frau," as he called her in one of his last letters from Eisleben. 
 The oldest boy, Hans, is aiming at an apple on the tree with 
 a crossbow, Philip Melancthon directing him how to do it. 
 In another part of the room " cousin Lehne " is showing a 
 picture-book to the second boy ; while the third boy presses 
 
36 
 
 his father's knee with one hand and with the other holds up in 
 triumph a hobby-horse. Madeleine clasps in rapture the 
 little angel that belongs of right to her as the angel of the 
 household. The picture, even if somewhat fanciful, is, no 
 doubt, a faithful representation of the spirit which inspired 
 that happy Wittenberg home. 
 
 In his catechism, then, in his theology, and in his home, 
 Luther's sympathy with childhood vividly appears. Since the 
 days of the apostles, I repeat, no great theologian or reformer, 
 it seems to me, has equalled him in the power of this sympathy ; 
 and what adds immeasurably to its strength and beauty is 
 the manner in which it blossoms forth out of his adoring love 
 to the Infant Redeemer. On this account, also, the Protestant 
 churches owe him a debt of gratitude that can never be fully 
 paid. By example and precept alike he taught them to fall 
 down and worship the divine Babe in the manger. How he 
 delighted in the gospel of the holy Nativity ! " We cannot vex 
 the devil more than by teaching, preaching, singing and talking 
 of Jesus. Therefore I like it well, when with sounding voice 
 we sing in the church : Et homo f actus est / et verbum caro 
 factum est. The devil cannot endure these words, and flies 
 away, for he well feels what is contained therein. Oh, how 
 happy a thing were it, did we find as much joy in these 
 words as the devil is affrighted at them !" 
 
 GEORGE L. PRENTISS. 
 
VII. 
 
 LUTHER AS A PREACHER. 
 
 In studying Luther as a preacher, the first thing that 
 strikes one is thehinnility with which he shrank from the work 
 of the pulpit. He said to liis Superior who was urging him 
 to preach : " No, no ; it is no slight thing to speak before men 
 in the place of God." Yielding reluctantly at last, he said to 
 Staupitz : "Ah ! doctor, by doing this you deprive me of 
 life. I shall not be able to hold out three months." It was 
 only the natural shrinking of a great soul from a great 
 responsibility. The modest men are the mighty men. 
 
 He began to preach in an old wooden chapel, 30 feet by 
 20. For a beginning it was large enough for a large man ; it 
 was too small for a small man. The new preacher ''could 
 not be hid." The full man had a full church. After this 
 hesitant beginning, almost every day for weeks together Luther 
 was in the pulpit. During Lent he often preached twice, and 
 sometimes thrice a day, besides keeping up his daily academi- 
 cal lectures. He condemned a certain minister as luxurious 
 and lazy, because on a salary of about $200 a year he preached 
 only twice a week. 
 
 Luther's physical qualifications for preaching were excep- 
 tional. He had an iron constitution ; strength, force and 
 grace. He had a clear, ringing, flexible voice, which could 
 be stirring as a bugle, or soothing as a lute. He had such 
 eyes as magnetize and master men. He could look through 
 his eyes and with them ; they were deep beyond fathoming ; 
 they were quick, sharp, piercing ; they could flame with pas- 
 sionate fierceness, flash with lofty inspiration, or flow with 
 tenderest tears. 
 
38 
 
 Luther's intellectual qualifications for preaching were 
 remarkable for their symmetry and comprehensiveness. It 
 would not be difiicult to name one and another preacher who 
 excelled him in one and another respect ; but it would be 
 impossible to name one who in all respects was his equal. 
 Comparing him with other preachers, Melancthon bears this 
 testimony — " One is an interpreter, one a logician, another an 
 orator, affluent and beautiful in speech, but Luther is all in 
 all." If you distrust Melancthon's enthusiasm for his friend, 
 hear the later and calmer verdict of Mr. Froude, who says 
 of Luther : " In mother wit, in elasticity, in force and imag- 
 inative power, he was as able a man as ever lived." Like all 
 great preachers Luther was mighty in the Scriptures. He 
 found in the Bible his food and his drink ; his life and his 
 light ; his tools and his weapons. He was always a student, 
 but always with his eye upon duty as well as upon truth, 
 upon man as well as upon God. 
 
 Of Luther's spiritual qualifications for preaching it 
 would be difficult to say enough. He was greatly affected 
 by the spirituality and fervor of the sermons of Tauler. 
 His religious experiences were extraordinary in depth and 
 in vividness. He lived under the spell of the infinities 
 and the eternities ; he heard the inaudible ; he saw the 
 invisible ; he handled the intangible ; and so, according 
 to the old proverb, "he turned men's ears into eyes." ^Vhen 
 charged with harshness and severity he said : " I can easily 
 cut a willow or a hazel wand with my trencher-knife, but for 
 a hard oak a man must use the axe." He was master of 
 different metliods ; he knew how to fence and how to strike 
 hard blows ; he could wield either a Damascus blade, or a 
 battle-axe. Heine says : "• He was not only the tongue, but 
 the sword of his time. Sometimes he was wild as the storm 
 that uproots the oak, and then again he was gentle as the 
 zephyr that dallies with the violet." He knew his times. He 
 did not preach classical sermons, mediaeval sermons, or lt)tli 
 century sermons; but such as were precisely suited to his own 
 
39 
 
 day. With keen, longing eyes he looked into tlie present, 
 and aimed his sermons, not at graves, nor at clonds, but at 
 living men. Behind and in every sermon was the man, full 
 of faith, full of power, full of tenderness and sympathy ; and 
 his great true heart pulsed in every word he uttered. He 
 knew well how to choose his language. He could utter words 
 that would toll on and on, and thrill the world with their 
 music like a new evangel. He could speak words that went 
 like bullets swift and straight to their mark ; or such as burst 
 like shells amid his foes. Hot, hissing words he had for those 
 who merited his scorn ; or gentle, drawing, sootliing words 
 for those who needed persuading or comforting. 
 
 In this great preacher, as in all who fill the pulpit and 
 lift the people, self was subordinated and Christ was supreme. 
 He said : " My true disciples do not believe in Luther but in 
 Jesus Christ." At the gates of Wittenberg, starting on foot 
 on his perilous journey to Augsburg, when the crowd of his 
 friends (assembled to bid him farewell) shouted: "Luther 
 forever," he replied: "Christ forever!" Again he said: 
 " Those are my best friends who think the worst of me. 
 I cannot allow myself to be praised either by you or by any 
 man, for all praise of man is vain, and only that which comes 
 from God is true." In his preaching he was to the last degree 
 simple. He said : " I want the common people and children 
 and servants to understand me." And again he said : 
 " Cursed are all preachers that in church aim at high or hard 
 things." He was as diligent as he was versatile. The pro- 
 digious task of translating the Scriptures he accomplished 
 mainly by economizing fragments of time. To a friend, who 
 wondered how he had achieved so great a work, his explana- 
 tion was this paraphrase of Apelles' familiar motto : '"''Nulla 
 dies sine versu /" He knew that religion must sing as well 
 as work its way among men, and so he gave to the nation 
 that had been silent and songless in its worship for centuries, 
 hymns and tunes which were seized with avidity, and which 
 are still full of life and power. 
 
40 
 
 It need hardly be said that Luther was a bold, brave 
 preacher. He was afraid of neither man nor devil. "When 
 the gallant Ulrich Yon Hiitten offered military aid for his 
 protection, Luther replied : " By the Word the world has been 
 conquered ; by the Word the Church has been saved ; by the 
 Word, too, she will be restored. I do not despise your offers ; 
 but I will not lean upon any one but Christ." Pope, cardinal 
 and emperor were to him only men. He would smite hypocrisy 
 squarely in the face, whether crowned or uncrowned. Well 
 miglit Carlyle say of him : " His was the bravest heart then 
 living." 
 
 I conclude with Luther's favorite homiletical rule : " Open 
 
 the mouth boldly ; open the mouth widely ; have done 
 
 quickly y 
 
 THOMAS S. HASTINGS. 
 
Date Due 
 
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 ^ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 
 
 m 
 
 PRINTED 
 
 IN U. S. A. 
 
 
PAMPHLET BINDER 
 
 ■■ Syracuse, N. Y. 
 Stockton, Calif. 
 
'* 
 
 BW2222.U58 
 
 A symposiac on Martin Luther 
 
 Princeton Theological Semmary-Speer Library 
 
 1 1012 00030 7084