Theology of Luther

Department of Theology
Tyndale Seminary
Winter 2006
Thursday at 1:00 p.m.
Instructor: V. Shepherd
Office Hours as posted
Tel. 416 226 6380 ext. 6726 (office)
905 821 0587 (home)
email: victor.shepherd@sympatico.ca 

Objective:
This course is meant to assist students in probing Luther’s theology both extensively and intensively

Aims: The aims of the course are
[1] to familiarize students with the vocabulary and logic of the Magisterial Reformation’s first major thinker;
[2] to understand Luther’s against its immediate philosophical, theological and humanistic background;
[3] to situate Luther’s singular theological expression amidst those of other Reformers and Roman Catholics;
[4] to investigate Luther’s oneness with and departure from the Renaissance;
[5] to appreciate the Magisterial Reformation as part of a movement that included Radical, Elizabethan, Catholic and Counter Reformations;
[6] to appreciate the significance of Luther’s theology for contemporary ecumenism.

Prerequisites:
THEO 05331 and THEO 0532 or THEO 0530

Text:
Timothy Lull, ed., Martin Luther’s Basic Theological Writings

Assignments:
Essay: Each student is to submit one 3000-word essay on a topic selected from the appended list of essay topics, or on any topic approved by the instructor.  The deadline is not negotiable.  An extension will not be granted (apart from medically documented illness or family emergencies such as death.) The penalty assigned for late submission will be one-third of a grade for each day late.
Examination: each student is to sit the in-class examination at the conclusion of the semester.

Evaluation:
The essay and the examination are each worth 50%.

Schedule:

Essay Topics

What aspects of Renaissance Humanism most immediately affected the Reformation?

Was Erasmus a Christian? How did his work assist or contradict the Reformation?

What did mediaeval scholasticism mean by “justification”?

How does Luther understand the eucharist?

What would any two (or three) of the following have said to each other concerning the Lord’s Supper: Luther, Zwingli, Calvin, the Anabaptists, Rome?

What is Melanchthon’s theological contribution to the Lutheran Reformation?

Compare Melanchthon and Luther on the Law of God.

Write a “Review Article” on the debate between Erasmus and Luther on the bondage of the will.

What does Luther mean by the “Righteousness of God”?

Expound Luther’s understanding of freedom. Contrast it with popular contemporary notions.

How do Luther and Calvin understand the relation of law to gospel?

What is Luther’s Ecclesiology?

What does Luther mean by “Two Kingdoms”?

Discuss the theology of Luther and Eck at the Diet of Worms.

What significance is attached to the following cities during Luther’s lifetime: Worms, Eisenach (the Wartburg), Leipzig, Augsburg, Marburg?

What is the image of the Jew in the late mediaeval and early Reformation eras, and how did this image affect the treatment accorded Jewish people?

How does Luther understand faith? (fides qua creditur)

What is God’s mandate for the state, and how does Luther’s understanding here influence his advice during and subsequent to the peasant revolt?

(any topic approved by the instructor)

 

 

LUTHER BIBLIOGRAPHY

 

Althaus, P.; The Ethics of Martin Luther

The Theology of Martin Luther

Atkinson, J.; The Great Light: Luther and the Reformation

Martin Luther and the Birth of Protestantism

Martin Luther: A Prophet to the Church Catholic

Rome and Reformation: How Luther Speaks to the New Situation

d’Aubgine, J.; The Life and Times of Martin Luther

Bainton, R.; Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther

Blackman, H.; Luther, Translator of Paul: Studies in Romans and Galatians

Bornkamm, H.; Luther and the Old Testament

Luther in Mid-Career: 1521-1530

Luther’s World of Thought

Boyle, M.; Rhetoric and Reform: Erasmus’ Civil Dispute with Luther

Bratten, C.E., and Jenson, R.W.; Union with Christ: The New Finnish Interpretation of Luther

Brecht, M.; Martin Luther: His Road to Reformation, 1483-1521

Martin Luther: Shaping and Defining the Reformation,1521-1532

Martin Luther: The Preservation of the Church, 1532-1546

Brendler, G.; Martin Luther: Theology and Revolution

Crossley, R.; Luther and the Peasants’ War

Dickens, A.; The German Nation and Martin Luther

Martin Luther and the Reformation

Ebeling, G.; Luther: And Introduction to his Thought

Edwards, M.; Luther’s Last Battles: Politics and Polemics

Green, L.; How Melanchthon Helped Luther Discover the Gospel

Green, V.; Luther and the Reformation

Grisar, H.; Martin Luther: His Life and Work

Gritsch, E.; Martin Luther — God’s Court Jester

Gritsch, E., and Jenson, R.W.; Lutheranism: The Theological Movement and its Confessional Writings

Haendler, G.; Luther on Ministerial Office and Congregational Function

Haile, H.; Luther, An Experiment in Biography

Harran, H.; Luther on Conversion: The Early Years

Headley, J.; Luther’s View of Church History

Hendrix, S.; Luther and the Papacy: Stages in a Reformation Conflict

Hoffman, B.; Der Franckforter: The Theologica Germanica of Martin Luther

                    Luther and the Mystics

Hordern, W.; Experience and Faith: The Significance of Luther

For Understanding Today’s Experiential Religion

Jensen, D.; Confrontation at Worms: Martin Luther and the Diet of Worms

Jungel, E.; The Freedom of A Christian: Luther’s Significance for Contemporary Theology

Kittelson, J.; Luther the Reformer: The Study of the Man and his Career

Koeningsberger, H. (ed); Luther: A Profile

Kooiman, W.; Luther and the Bible

Leaver, R.; Luther on Justification

Lienhard, M.; Luther, Witness to Jesus Christ: Stages and Themes of the Reformer’s Christology

Lindsay, T.; Luther and the German Reformation

Loewen, H.; Luther and the Radicals

Loewenich, W.; Luther’s Theology of the Cross

Martin Luther: The Man and his Work

Lohse, B.; Martin Luther: And Introduction to his Life and Work

Mackinnon, J.; Luther and the Reformation

Marius, R.; Luther

McDonough, T.; The Law and the Gospel in Luther

McGoldrick, J.; Luther’s English Connection: The Religious Thought of Robert Barnes and William Tyndale

McGrath, A.; Luther’s Theology of the Cross: The Intellectual Origins of the European Reformation

McSorley, H.; Luther: Right or Wrong?

Oberman, H.; The Dawn of the Reformation

The Impact of the Reformation

Martin Luther: Man Between God and the Devil

The Reformation: Roots and Ramifications

Olin, J., Smart, J., McNally, R.; Luther, Erasmus and the Reformation

Olivier, D.; The Trial of Luther

Pascal, R.; The Social Basis of the German Reformation

Pelikan, J.; Spirit Versus Structure: Luther and the Institutions of the Church

Pinomaa, L.; Faith Victorious: An Introduction to Luther’s Theology

Ritter, G.; Luther: His Life and Work

Rupp, E.; Luther’s Progress to the Diet of Worms

The Righteousness of God

Russell, W.R.; The Schmalkald Articles: Luther’s TheologicalTestament

Sasse, H.; This is My Body

Sessions, K. (ed); Reformation and Authority:

The Meaning of the Peasants’ Revolt

Sider, R. (ed); Karlstadt’s Battle with Luther

Siemen-Netto, U.; The Fabricated Luther: The Rise and Fall of the Shirer Myth.

Steinmetz, D.; Luther and Staupitz: An Essay in the Intellectual Origins of the Protestant Reformation

Luther in Context

Swihart, A.; Luther and the Lutheran Church

Tavard, G.; Justification: An Intellectual Study

Todd, J.; Luther, A Life

Martin Luther, A Biographical Study

Volkmar, L.; Luther’s Response to Violence

Watson, P.; Let God Be God!

Wood, A.; Captive to the Word

Zachman, R.; The Assurance of Faith

Background to the Reformation

I

Did Luther tear apart a united Christendom?
Were the Reformers impatient? immoderate? unfaithful? simply wrong?

There were many tensions and crises on many fronts:
princes akin to warlords;
towns in tension with rural dwellers;
the Holy Roman Emperor in tension with kings and princes;
tension within the church between
(1) conciliarists and papalists,
(2) scholastics and humanists,
(3) those who sought greater spiritual depth and those contented with
e.g., masses for the dead and indulgences.
     a shift from agricultural economy to an urban entrepreneurial economy.

II

Features of the turbulence:
[A] Religious upheaval:
Hussite movement
Waldensians
Late mediaevalists who sought simpler expression of the Christian faith
devoid of pomp and perversity

[B] Objections to Papal Power:
Erastianism
The question of Rome’s primacy
The precedent of France and England
Germany’s objection despite its political fragmentation

[C] Renaissance Humanism (see next week)

[D] Ecclesiastical corruption and public perception of it

 

III

The nature of the clergy
a: higher clergy
b: lower clergy
c: public perception

 

IV

The religious life of the common people
a: the prevalence of fear
b: the propensity for “revelations”
c: the place and proliferation of relics
d: the traffic in indulgences
e: the primacy of Jesus the Judge
f: the godliness of, e.g., the Brethren of the Common Life
g: mysticism
h: the nature of, e.g., the Devotio Moderna

 

V

The religious consequences of urbanization

VI

The influence of Occam
The authority of the church
The Council of Constance

 

 

 

VII

Other Forces:
[A] economic
[B] social unrest
[C] printing press
a: theological tomes
b: tracts and treatises, “occasional” writings
c: pamphlets
[D] new universities

 

Reverend V. Shepherd

 

A Note on Humanism

I

The Renaissance was a transition from the mediaeval to the modern world, and this transition entailed a startlingly new “world-view.”

E.g., the rise of modern science as the “old science” was freed from the restrictions of philosophy that had attempted to deduce what had to happen in the naturalworld instead of having observers draw conclusions from what did.

E.g, the era of geographic exploration, presupposing a mindset of risk-taking, cutting loose from the safe/conventional, eagerness to be rid of what one regarded as inhibiting (i.e., the exploration and self-insertion into what was thought to entail greater human significance.)

E.g., a new impetus w.r.t. trade and commerce, entailing cultural and intellectual cross-fertilization.

E.g., the appreciation of and rewarding of individual effort as the guild system (a collectivity of sorts) dissolved. (Collectivism never produces outstanding culture; culture atrophied under Stalin and Hitler.)

II

The Renaissance involved political concentration. Even though in Germany and Italy the pope and emperor were strong enough to prevent a melding of nation-states (there were 300 fiefdoms in Germany alone, each governed by a prince), national forces were rising everywhere in Europe. Everywhere princes, newly confident, were attempting to free themselves from papal control, one consequence of which was the jettisoning of an ecclesiastical mindset. Underlying this was the “right” of the individual to revolt against tyranny or against anything that suppressed the full flowering of one’s humanity.

III

The Renaissance was enormously abetted by paper and printing. The massive emphasis on the literature of antiquity, not to mention the production of vernacular scriptures, as well as the huge tomes of the Reformers was possible only with paper and press. (Erasmus handled a book reverently.)

IV

The Renaissance, recovering antiquity, provided new raw materials for thought and new vistas and visions for self-making. What it meant to be a human being was to be forged in light of what was now regarded as the human good. Here the move was away from heteronomy and towards autonomy.

Religion was a part of this movement: a shift from submission to an extraneous authority that cramped self-enrichment, a shift towards a more autonomous, classically informed human self-expression and self-projection.

 

V

Ancient learning and art were crucial here. Latin had never perished during the middle ages (it was the language of every educated person), nor had all familiarity with Greek literature. Now, however, there was a new zeal for the language and literature of antiquity. Whereas, for instance, Latin had always been the language of the church, government (diplomacy) and law, Latin was now recognized to facilitate an authentically human wealth. (Knowledge of a language — any language — always admits the knower to a world.) A study of the classics was deemed necessary not merely to gain access to content but also to appreciate (and reproduce) the beauty of literary form.

It was felt that classical thought was both more rational (i.e., freed from mediaeval superstition and thought-forms) and more life-affirming. Greater scope was admitted for intellect (i.e., beyond philosophy and theology), affect, aesthetics, as well as an affirmation of sensuousness: the sheer exuberance of impassioned living. At first the church saw nothing inimical here, looking upon early humanism as a fresh appreciation of the manifold riches of the creation. Soon, however, an attempt was made to reconcile Christian thought with ancient philosophy. (Since humanism was chiefly a literary rather than a phil’l movement, it didn’t develop its own phil’l thought.) The “partner” with whom reconciliation was effected was Platonism. The Xn Platonists (whose greatest representative was likely Pico della Mirandola) shaped the Xn outlook in the direction of Platonism’s intellectual presuppositions, ethics, and human self-exaltation. These Xn Platonists insisted that not only is Israel the progenitor of Christ, so is Hellenism. (NB humanism’s undervaluation of the OT and its wicked antisemitism.)

 

VI

At first the papacy supported the humanist resurgence. The biggest ecclesiastical boost came from Pope Nicholas V (1447-55). A great lover of books, he founded the Vatican library and gathered around himself both scholars and artisans. (Humanists were always concerned with beauty.) Julius II (1503-13) stated that the head of the church was also to demonstrate leadership in intellectual and cultural developments. He instructed Michelangelo to represent him as Moses: Julius II saw himself as the leader who brings the church out of intellectual/cultural oppression, through a wilderness, and into a promised land. This was not a concern with mereaesthetics; aesthetics were regarded as facilitating union with God, enjoyment of God.

As humanism spread north from Italy, its birthplace, it found the German universities resistant: the scholasticism not of Aquinas but of Occam and Biel had a firm hold. The ghost of Aristotle remained, however, and it was deemed necessary to rid the university of Aristotle if humanist learning was to thrive. Anyone assisting the overthrow was deemed an ally –like Luther. (Soon the humanists saw that Luther was setting aside Ar., as well as Occam and Biel, for a very different reason. At this point the Renaissance and the Reformation parted.)

When the new learning did penetrate Germany it did so chiefly through people who had been trained in the schools of the Brethren of the Common Life. They regarded the new learning not so much as cultural enhancement to be appropriated immediately (as happened outside Germany) but rather as a tool of educational reform, and thence a tool to reform the church and improve social life. (Later humanists didn’t care about reforming the church.)

 

VII

At the same time humanism was spreading among the middle class people of the cities, especially Strassburg, Augsburg and Nuernburg. (NB how largely the first two will figure in the Reformation.) Among these urban humanists were German poets and teachers who didn’t magnify ancient paganism but rather insisted that all of life could be elevated and be found to have profounder significance as the mediaeval distinction between sacred and profane was collapsed.

Erfurt was the centre of German university humanism. Rufus Mutianus was its most prominent representative. Note his convictions, and note how they differed from the use that people from the BCL schools had wanted to make of humanism:
-Xy began a long time before the advent of Christ.
-the true Christ is not the God-man but the discarnate wisdom of God. (The true Christ can’t be seized by human hands.) this discarnate wisdom is the true son of God, and it alights equally on Jews, Greeks and Germans.
-the natural law is written on our hearts and makes us partakers of heaven.
-scripture is “fabulous”=full of fables (like Aesop), and teaches moral truths.
-“There is but one god and goddess; but there are man forms and many names: Jupiter, Sol, Apollo, Moses, Luna, Proserpina, Mary.” Humanists are aware of this; the ill-educated aren’t, and therefore should continue to be told the fables.
-Mutianus denounced the veneration of relics, fasts, auricular confession, masses for the dead.
-he wanted to be rid of intellectual strait-jackets, but didn’t want to break decisively with the church (like Erasmus); he (like most humanists) had no interest in the question that preoccupied the Reformers, righteousness=right-relatedness to God.

 

VIII

Ulrich von Hutten, intellectually precocious, wanted above all a united Germany under a “reformed” emperor. While he didn’t specify what such a person was to exemplify, no doubt it would be something other than what Luther had in mind. Hutten would support anyone who curbed the power of the papacy and ended papal siphoning of money out of Germany. Regarding himself Luther’s ally after the Leipzig debate, in fact he was poles removed from L’s theological and spiritual depth. Finally he could only express amazement at L’s passion for the gospel, which gospel L. knew to be qualitatively distinct from anything the humanists offered.

A most glorious exception to the above was Philip Melanchthon. He was a superbly trained humanist as well as the first systematic theologian of the Reformation. (After the death of Erasmus [1531] P.M. was the finest Greek scholar in all of Europe.)

 

IX

In each of the major countries of the north there were three generations of humanists.
[1] “pioneers” — they acquired classical learning and absorbed a classical mindset.
[2] “consolidators” — they integrated and developed the rich materials the pioneers unearthed, creating the high point of humanist learning
[3] “doers” — they were a younger generation who cherished humanism not so much for its intellectual excellence as for its providing tools for social change.

Between 1510 and 1520 many of these third generation humanists gathered around L., eager to do something about abuses in church and society. These people were the “runners” who disseminated L’s Ninety-Five Theses throughout Germany.

Luther profited from a humanist environment but was not especially humanist trained (despite having attended Erfurt U.) and was never interested in humanism as such. Yet there were discernible affinities between Luther and the humanists.

[1] rejection of scholasticism:
H: scholastic theology is unnecessarily complex, obscure, unintelligible; a more elegant theological formulation is needed.
L: scholastic theology is intelligible — and therefore should be recognized readily as anti-gospel.

[2] desire to return to patristics:
H: Patristics is a simple, understandable statement of Christian faith, devoid of fruitless speculation and incomprehensible scholastic Latin.
L: Patristics is closer to the NT era than is the mediaeval period, less distorted, less warped by a non-biblical logic.
Note: since the humanists esteemed antiquity, no one father was to be elevated (exception: Erasmus and Jerome.) For the Wittenberg theologians, Augustine was pre-eminent.

[3] desire to return to scripture:
H: sola scriptura = “not without scripture”
L: sola scriptura = “scripture as unnormed norm” (singularly used by the Spirit to acquaint us with the living Lord Jesus Christ.)

[4] interest in rhetoric:
H: an interest in eloquence as a cultural excellence.
L: an interest in preaching the gospel.

 

X

After 1520 the Reformation stood out in starker contrast with humanism. Humanists finally realized that their purposes and the Reformation’s were not the same.

But note: non-humanistically trained pastors were the foot soldiers of the Reformation, dutiful church functionaries. Yet they never provided intellectual or organizational leadership for the Reformation. Subsequently they became the most rigidly scholastic Protestants, re-introducing an utterly scholastic mindset only with a Protestant vocabulary.

Humanist education remains important in the formation of Christians and clergy!

 

Reverend V. Shepherd

 

GABRIEL BIEL

? – 1495

was born at Speyer during the 1^st quarter of the 15^th century.

– is little-known w.r.t. his childhood, youth, or early adulthood.

was ordained to the priesthood in 1432 and entered Heidelberg University.

distinguished himself academically and became an instructor in the faculty of arts.

did further study in 1442-1443 at the U. of Erfurt (where Luther was later to study. Erfurt was the centre of German Humanism, and both Biel and Luther absorbed little of it.)

enrolled in 1453 in the faculty of theology at U. of Cologne (21 years after his ordination.)

immersed himself (Cologne) in the Nominalist thought of Occam (as contrasted with the “older” thought of Thomas Aquinas and Duns Scotus.)

was engaged in mid-life chiefly in day-to-day matters of church life.

was cathedral preacher in Mainz, and at this time associated himself with and thereafter remained a member of the Brethren of the Common Life (BCL: a group that pursued devotional depth — what today we call “spirituality” — and ethical rigour in a communal setting, but found nothing at all disagreeable about the church’s theology.)

was appointed in 1484 (Luther was born in 1483) professor of theology at the U. of Tuebingen.

was appointed in 1489 rector of U. of Tueb. (Likely he was 75 years old now.)

died in 1495, having spent his last years exclusively among the BCL.

Note: one of his theological “grandsons”, Johann Eck, was Luther’s principal opponent and formidable opponent in disputations at Leipzig (1519), Worms (1521) and Augsburg (1530.)

 

BIEL ON JUSTIFICATION

 

Presuppositions: (i) the Nominalist understanding of God: chiefly in terms of will or power.

(ii) the Nominalist understanding of grace: God is able to do anything that is not simply contradictory; e.g., God cannot make a square circle. (This is not “something” that God can’t do; rather, it is by definition a “no-thing”, nonsense. In the same way God cannot annihilate himself, since God exists necessarily.)

Note: (i) the Nom’t und’g of grace begins with philosophical speculation.

(ii) the ” ” of grace is characterized by power.

The Prot. Reformers will have much to say on both points.

 

God is the source of all power, concerning which there are two kinds:

potentia absoluta: metaphysical freedom to do anything at all that isn’t self-conradictory.

potentia ordinata: a limited capacity, power, or freedom which God has because of God’s

self-limitation.

By PA God has willed to create. (He was under no necessity to create.) But once he has created a finite world, then God is bound (PO) by his self-imposed order. If he were to violate this order he would be inconsistent.

E.g., God has willed that pain follow injury (PO). There is no metaphysical reason for this; of his own unconstrained will he has willed it. God could have (PA) created the world in any way he wanted, but in fact has created it as we have it. (Note here the Nominalist stress on the “freedom” of God.)

By PO God has imposed upon himself a way or pattern of dealing with us his finite creatures, and (more tellingly) with us his sinful creatures. Therefore it is of utmost importance that we recognize his way of dealing with us and conform ourselves to it.

A question that theology has always asked is, “How do sinners get right with the all-holy God?” I.e., how do people who are wrongly related to God come to be rightly related? How are sinners “justified”, set in the right with God?

 

An Overview of Biel’s Understanding of Justification

Biel casts his answer in terms of the respective roles that God and humans play in justification and final glorification.

Our role has to do chiefly with the nature of the human act.

Any human act can be evaluated w.r.t. its bonitas or goodness. (Here “goodness” is a moral category not a theological category. The Reformers will dispute this and insist that “goodness” is the good, the Kingdom of God.)

Upon such an act of bonitas God freely, gratuitously confers dignitas or reward.

God doesn’t have to (PA), but he has willed himself (PO) to reward bonitas.

The good act, now elevated to dignitas by grace (of Christ), gives the human agent a claim on salvation.

In other words, a morally good act merits grace by “congruent merit” (PO), an instance of God’s mercy. Bonitas, now elevated to dignitas by grace, merits eternal salvation by “condign merit” (PA), an instance of metaphysical necessity.

As already noted, the elevation of bonitas is not strict justice on God’s part, but is rather an instance of God’s generosity.

Once bonitas has been graced and therein elevated to dignitas, however, strict justice applies: God must grant eternal salvation to dignitas (PA) or God contradicts himself, God denies himself — and this is inherently impossible.

 

The Presuppositions of Biel’s Understanding

 

In a state of nature (i.e., outside the state of grace) humans, trying their utmost, can love God more than anything else. In other words, people can will themselves to love God above all else.

In a state of nature humans have the capacity to choose both good and evil, without which capacity we should cease to be human.

The will (will is this capacity for choice together with the act of choosing) is blind and has to be guided by reason.

Reason is not impaired in the way that will is.

Reason presents the will alternatives for moral action: reason informs the will and advises the will. The will, acting on this information and advice, produces spontaneously (i.e., the will is not moved by anything else) a morally good act (bonitas.)

Yet bonitas, however good, is never good enough to meet the requirements of the holy God.

God gratuitously (PO) infuses the act by grace. Grace doesn’t infuse any act, only the morally good act; i.e., grace as seed has to be planted in fertile rather than stony ground. Bonitas alone is such fertile ground.

Plainly, for Biel sin has not made it impossible for humans to act “rightly” without the aid of grace; i.e., the will is not devastated in this regard.

When we fail to act rightly, we fail because of improper cognition (i.e., ignorance): reason did not bring forward the proper object of the will’s willing.

The defect lies not in the will but in reason. Conversely, not the good will but reason (knowledge) is the foundation and root of all virtues. * Therefore the primary task of the church is not to be the herald and “custodian” of God’s grace (God will always add grace to bonitas), but rather to provide people with the proper information about God and the human good, information that assists people in moral improvement. I.e., this information apprises people as to which acts genuinely are bonitas.

How is such information acquired?

partly by a natural knowledge of God and his will;

partly by a revealed knowledge of God and his will, accepted on the authority of the church or on the authority of a particular preacher.

These two kinds of knowledge together constitute “acquired faith”, acquired faith being the source of all virtue.

Still, as mentioned earlier, these virtues do not meet the requirements of God. For this reason there is always needed grace, the middle term that elevates bon. todign., at which point the requirements of God are met.

Iustitia (“justice”) is the metaphysical necessity of God’s granting eternal salvation to dignitas. (PA)

It should be noted in Biel’s scheme that God graces not only the morally good act but also all aspirations; anyone who tries to be “God’s friend” (a mediaeval term) will find God gracing that effort.

For this notion Biel adduces the following scriptural support:

Zechariah 1:3 — “Return to me, says the Lord of hosts, and I will return to you.”

James 4:8: — “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you.”

Revelation 3:20 — “Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears my voice and opens

the door, I will come in to him and eat with him and he with me.”

(Biel reads all such texts as supporting human initiative w.r.t. our salvation.)

For Biel, the essence of biblical Christianity is the congruent elevation of moral act or aspiration. God elevates such not from any constraint grounded in his being but from his overflowing kindness (i.e., his will.)

“Doing one’s best” (even if that “best” is highly deficient or defective) is at the same a “begging for mercy”; such importunity the gracious, merciful God never spurns.

Then for Biel justification is [A] by grace alone, since God alone supplies that grace which elevates bonitas to dignitas; [B] by works alone, since we must “do our best.”

The emphasis, of course, always falls on [B]. [A] is the rational, outer structure whose inner content is [B].

The church preaches and teaches [B], leaving God to supply [A]

Humankind’s motivation for moral act/aspiration is twofold: (i) fear of judgement

(ii) hope of salvation.

 

Biel explicitly rejects justification sola fide (by faith alone) as “an error of carnal and idle men.” To believe that we can be saved sola gratia (by grace alone)is to “scorn God’s justice.” Since genuine love for God is within everyone’s reach even after the fall and in the wake of the fall’s damage to us, it is our responsibility toinitiate the process of justification by making that effort which God will then honour and render worthy (meritum de condigno) of eternal salvation.

Despite Biel’s reference to grace, grace merely forms the outer structure whose inner content is human achievement; i.e., grace lends our achievement/aspiration salvific force. Put differently, grace makes it possible for us to save ourselves.

Plainly Biel’s notion of justification is essentially Pelagian.

 

The 16^th Century Reformers’ Disagreements

 

1] Outside the state of grace humankind cannot love God at all (never mind love God above all.)

Humans can certainly be religious, but religiosity as such is simply idolatry, a barrier

behind which people flee God in the guise of seeking God.

In the wake of the fall our will is in se curvatus. We are afflicted with “concupiscence”,

rendering ourselves the centre of ourselves and the measure of everyone (-thing) else.

2] Instead of reason guiding the will, the will (the human “heart”) warps reason.

With respect to God, reason is perverted and largely of the order of rationalization.

We can never reason our way to God’s truth or God’s way with us: the cross.

3] While morally good act/aspiration is always possible (even actual), it is neither a sign of grace nor a step toward grace.

Morality is not the vestibule to the kingdom. The harlots and the tax-collectors enter the

kingdom ahead of the morally upright.

In the light of the kingdom (grace), morality has the same significance as religion: an

abomination to God.

4] The entire discussion of condign versus congruent merit contradicts the logic of scripture.

The only “merit” is that of Jesus Christ. His obedience to his Father is imputed to

(reckoned to) those who cling to him in faith.

5] We do not fail to act rightly merely because of improper information/cognition.

The root human problem is not ignorance but perverseness. Humankind wills to

make itself its own lord.

God’s giving us what we want (this is also his curse) — “You shall be as gods, knowing good

and evil” (Genesis 3:5) — means that we extend ourselves into areas of life that God has

marked “off limits”, and so marked for our blessing. No amount of information can overturn

the human predicament. (This is not to denigrate the informational content of the gospel. It is,

however, to deny that even the gospel as information can rectify us.)

People ultimately need not information but deliverance.

Our root problem is not that we are deprived (lacking something) but rather depraved

(perverse.)

 

6] The primary task of the church is NOT to provide people with proper moral information about
God and goodness (so as left-handedly to foster concupiscence) but

to attest Jesus Christ in the totality of his reality as attested by prophet and apostle,

to embody his truth and reality amidst the world’s life.

Plainly there is a truth-claim to the gospel and therefore a truth-content as well. However, in

articulating the truth of the gospel the Reformers do not provide that vehicle in terms of which

we achieve something meritorious before God. The truth/reality of the gospel isn’t naturally

intelligible, and therefore not the information on the basis of which we initiate the process

of salvation.

7] The grace of Jesus Christ does not pertain (only) to bonitas, thereby elevating it, while the grace of God is that which fashions the overall scheme of salvation.

There is no distinction between the grace of Christ and the grace of God and God himself;

i.e., grace is God himself in his presence and efficacy. Put differently, grace is the effectual

presence of God.

8] Iustitia (justice) is NOT (i) that by which we are measured, an abstract standard or code,

(ii) the metaphysical necessity of God’s rewarding dignitas.

Justice is the same as justification: God’s putting us in the right with himself, and thereby

vindicating himself and his people, relieving the oppressed, clearing the slander of

opprobrium heaped on those deemed “beyond the pale.” (I.e., all that HITZDIQ — the

hiphel of ZADAQ — and DIKAIOUN entail in Isaiah, the psalms, and the NT)

9] “Doing one’s best” is not synonymous with begging for mercy, but is rather disdaining and spurning the mercy that God has wrought in the Son (the cross) and visits upon his people through the Spirit.

The greater the sincerity in moral effort, the stronger the bastion that our pride has built

and to which we point in defiance of Jesus Christ.

10] Fallen humankind does not (because cannot) “unlock the door” to God. Any unlocking is possible only by grace.

The Reformed tradition will invoke here a doctrine of election.

The Wesleyan tradition will invoke here a doctrine of prevenient (pre=before;

venire=to come) grace.

11] In the wake of the fall no one seeks God. We flee God. When we think we are seeking him we are in fact fleeing him. God is “sought” in faith, not in unbelief.

The gospel is the declaration that the God (who never was lost or difficult to locate) has of his

mercy found us. God seeks a rebellious race; that race does not seek him.

12] There is no natural knowledge of God. We pervert the “revelation” found in the creation (e.g., Romans 1) as fast as it is “beamed” upon us. The apprehension of God available through the creation serves only to condemn us.

13] There is no natural knowledge of sin. Since knowledge of sin is a predicate of knowledge of God, and since God is known only in Jesus Christ (this is bedrock for the Reformers), the existence and nature of sin have to be revealed to us.

Only in the presence of Jesus Christ (the cure for sin) is the ailment seen for what it is.

When the psalmist cries, “Against Thee only have I sinned” (Ps. 51:4) he isn’t denying

that sin violates others besides God. He is acknowledging, however, that sin is defined

to be such by reference to God and revealed to be such by God’s self-disclosure in Jesus Christ.

In other words, the revelation of God entails revelation of the nature and disgrace of

humankind. Until we know God (where such knowledge is always participation — by faith — in God’s own life), we can’t know the fact or nature of a defective relationship with God.

For the Reformers, knowledge of sin is always a predicate of grace (knowledge of Christ.)

Where this fact is not recognized, sin will always be misunderstood as immorality or vice

or the violation of taboo. Jesus dies for the ungodly, not for the immoral.

14] “Acquired Faith”, a compend of natural knowledge and revealed knowledge, is wholly wide of the mark.

faith is not knowledge in the sense of information (see #5), even as there is always a cognitive content to faith.

faith, rather, is fellowship with Jesus Christ. He embraces us by grace, and in the power of his embrace we find ourselves both able to embrace him and eager to embrace him. Faith is always the grace-facilitated response to the action of the person of Christ.

faith is never acquired in any case but is rather always a gift (exercised.)

15] To affirm that salvation is sola fide is not to scorn God’s justice (i.e., his judgement), but rather to submit to that judgement and receive/affirm the provision of righteousness that the judging/rightwising God has made.

God’s justifying us always includes his judging us. God’s judgement is the converse of his mercy (he bothers to judge us only because he longs to save us) and aims at our restoration. God’s justifying us presupposes his judging us. Then sola fide, an acknowledgement that we can only receive what God has fashioned for us in our need, endorses God’s judgement rather than scorning it.

16] The will is not free to choose but rather is bound.

It isn’t denied that we can choose among creaturely goods; e.g., to eat hotdogs rather than hamburgers, or to study rather than watch TV. But as fallen creatures we can’t “choose” Jesus Christ; i.e., we can’t will ourselves into the righteousness of God. What we most sorely need has to be wrought for us and pressed upon us; it isn’t something that we can choose to effect in ourselves. We can choose (“embrace”) JC only as a result of his having “embraced” us.

17] The distinction between an outer structure of grace and an inner content of (meritorious) work is unbiblical and therefore impermissible.

18] To embrace Jesus Christ in faith and therein become a beneficiary of his righteousness is at the same time to be the beneficiary of God’s; i.e., JUSTIFICATION IN THE PRESENT FORMS THE STABLE BASIS AND NOT THE UNCERTAIN GOAL OF THE CHRISTIAN LIFE.

Rev. Victor Shepherd

 

The Nominalism of Gabriel Biel

Aquinas is a “realist”, preoccupied with being (being itself), following Aristotle.

God is understood chiefly in terms of being or existence: that which is (necessarily),

the one whose essence is his existence.

 

Occam is a “nominalist”, preoccupied with willing or power. Less concerned than Aquinas

with metaphysics, he is less concerned with reasoning towards God. Therefore faith isn’t

built on what reason “demonstrates” to be a metaphysical foundation, but rather on what

God has willed.

Result: the scholastic method of relating theology to philosophy (grace perfects nature), is
undercut. Natural theology is devalued.

God’s will determines our faith, not God’s being or our reason.

The command of God is grounded only in the will of God, not in the nature of God

 

 

 

Luther will agree with nominalism’s

denial of natural theology

denial of the scholastic method of theology

affirmation of a God whom philosophy can’t control.

Luther will disagree with nominalism’s

(i) insistence that God is to be understood chiefly in terms of power

(ii) insistence that God’s command is rooted only in God’s will.

(The latter notion inevitably causes God(‘s will) to appear arbitrary. Unless God’s will is God’s nature, God’s will has nothing to do with his being; God’s will is the capricious exertion of sheer power.)

 

 

Reverend V. Shepherd

 

Luther and “Mystical” Experience

I

In his note on Rom. 5 Luther wrote, “Once I was carried away to the third heaven.”

Yet L. never based his theological authority on special revelations or mystical experiences.

Still, he knew that the doctrine of the Holy Spirit meant that God draws us into God’s own life, thus giving rise to our experience.

L. distanced himself from the mediaeval mystics with their “ladder:” purgatio, illuminatio, unio.

L. insists we encounter God but are never absorbed into God so as to blur the distinction between creature and Creator.

 

 

 

II

Three kinds of mysticism have been identified:

Dionysian. It sidesteps the incarnation and speculates about God.

Latin. It emphasizes the earthly Christ and mysticism as experience rather than as doctrine. However it sidesteps spiritual Anfechtung and deploys an erotic vocabulary while upholding an ecstatic union with the uncreated world.

German. It maintains that the true purgatory is self-despair, and such despair is an experience, a genuine foretaste, of hell.

Luther: (a) Dionysian mysticism is rejected.

(b) Latin mysticism is accepted with qualifications: its emphasis on the earthly Christ, plus

its recognition that Christ is known ultimately in experience rather than merely as

doctrine.

Its denial of the place of Anfechtung, its erotic vocabulary/conceptuality, and its

ecstatic union with the uncreated world are all rejected.

(c) German mysticism is accepted without qualification. (A proper understanding of the

Law drives us to self-despair.)

Luther repudiates all speculation, insisting that it belongs inherently to a theology of glory rather than to a theology of the cross.

At the same time Luther never denies the validity of an experience of God so deep and vivid that no words can do justice to it. Just as Paul, in 2^nd Cor. 12, speaks of his ecstatic experience (plainly it’s important to him) yet never proclaims it instead of the “Word of the cross”, so Luther insists that “proper theology should precede mystical theology.”

L.’s point is that accessus has priority over raptus; i.e., we are granted access to God through justifying faith-clinging grasp of the crucified; only Christ-crucified (and faith’s seizing him) gives us access to God, not mystical rapture. I.e., faith is our accessus to the raptus.

L. always repudiated the notion that our love for God (or Jesus Christ) is the bond that unites us to him. Those mystics who said it is also spoke of Christ’s “sweet” embrace and of the delights of all this. L. insists that Christ’s embrace isn’t merely sweet but also deadly: to be embraced by Christ is to be embraced by one who knows most profoundly God-forsakenness, the feeling of which (but not, of course, the actuality) will torment the Christian many times over in his or her life. The Christian, identified with the crucified, is henceforth immersed in the turbulent, treacherous world and never flees it for “sweetness.”

L. disagrees with the radical reformers on the grounds that they aren’t radical enough: they separate faith in the heart from Christ in heaven, when these can never be separated. The believer’s identification with Christ is “not an imagined but a real matter,” never a metaphorical but a real way of speaking.

 

 

 

III

For L. the venue of our profoundest experience of God is conflict, tribulation, Anfechtung. (Shepherd: The risen one is the crucified one: Jesus is raised wounded. The resurrection is the triumph and efficacy of the still-bleeding Christ, not the transcending of his crucifiedness.)

Just as Christ moves history towards its fulfillment by means of the cross, so he moves Christians toward theirs by means of their suffering.

The “groaning” as in Rom. 8 describes the complete identification with Christ. Then just as simul (totus) iustus et peccator describes the Christian, so does simul gemitus et raptus.

 

Reverend Victor Shepherd

 

Martin Luther
1483 – 1546
(Married Katarina von Bora, 1525: six children)

I: Introduction

II: Background and youth

elementary schooling at Breslau, Magdeburg and Eisenach.

began university studies at Erfurt, 1501.

III: The Monk

joined Augustinian (Reformed) order, 1505.

ordained to priesthood, 1507.

lectured at Wittenberg, 1508.

visited Rome, 1510.

IV: The Professor

appointed to chair of theology, 1510.

lectured on Psalms, 1513-15.

lectured on Romans, 1515-16.

lectured on Galatians, 1516-17 9 (and again in 1541.)

lectured on Hebrews, 1517-18.

V: The Indulgence Controversy

the Ninety-Five Theses, 1517.

VI: The Disputant

disputed with Johann Eck at Leipzig, 1519.

wrote three great tracts, 1520.

An Address to the Nobility of the German Nation for the Improvement of the

Christian Estate

On the Babylonian Captivity of the Church

On the Freedom of the Christian

disputed with Johann Eck at Worms, 1521. (From this moment until he died there was a

price on Luther’s head.)

completed translation of NT into German, 1522.

 

VII: The Social Conservative

supported the peasants’ grief but not their methods in the Peasant War, 1524.

VIII: The Victor

Diet of Speyer, 1526

Second Diet of Speyer, 1529

The Colloquy of Marburg, 1529. (Does est mean “is” or “signifies”?)

Diet of Augsburg, 1530. (Luther remained nearby in Cobourg. The Lutheran cause was

represented by Philip Melanchthon, since the emperor feared Luther’s physical presence

would provoke a riot.)

IX: The Shamed?

Luther and the Jewish people.

 

THE FREEDOM OF A CHRISTIAN

1520

Luther: “To make the way smoother for the unlearned — for only them do I serve — I shall set down

the following two propositions concerning the freedom and bondage of the spirit:

A Christian is a perfectly free lord of all, subject to none.

A Christian is a perfectly dutiful servant of all, subject to all.”

 

 

 

The first power of faith:

The Word (=Jesus Christ in the power of the Spirit) confers righteousness upon believers

as the “happy exchange” (2 Cor. 5) occurs:

my shame for his glory,

my condemnation for his acceptance with the Father,

my sin for his righteousness.

 

The second power of faith:

Believers honour God by vesting all their trust in God. To honour God and trust him in this

way is to obey him. God can be obeyed only in faith.

Note Luther’s understanding here of the kind of obedience the Decalogue enjoins: not conformity to a moral code but rather eager, glad, grateful self-abandonment to the “character” God wills for me. My gratitude is born of the fact that God has redeemed me at measureless cost to himself.

E.g., the commandment, “Thou shalt not steal” is violated if I merely refrain from stealing.

God wants not external conformity from me but rather a living relationship (faith) with him wherein I cheerfully embrace the shape he ordains for my life. He ordains this shape for my good

(i.e., as blessing.) I gladly endorse it out of gratitude for what he has already done for me and

promises yet to do for me. My not-stealing is my faith-quickened abandonment of my selfist self

as I “put on” the “new man (woman)” he wills for my good.

In other words, the Decalogue never encourages moralism but always faith and the Christ-shaped

“new creature” that faith glories in.

 

The third power of faith:

We are united with Christ. (Actually the third is logically prior to and the ground of the first

two.)

 

Since faith “puts on” Christ, believers are free from sin, death, the world and the devil as Christ was free from the domination of sin, death, world and devil.

Since faith “puts on” Christ, believers are bound to the needy as Christ bound himself to them.

When Luther’s opponents told him that his elevation of faith underserved the neighbour, Luther replied that faith always serves the neighbour in love. Such love is love only if it disregards the neighbour’s ingratitude and one’s own loss.

Finally Luther insists that faith is the (only) cure for anxiety. Anxiety is a form of self-preoccupation. The Christian doesn’t live in herself but in another: in Christ through faith, in the neighbour through love.

Paradoxically, she finds herself, discovers her identity, to the extent that she doesn’t seek it but rather forgets herself through her immersion in Christ (faith) and neighbour (love.)

“Word of God” in the Thought of Martin Luther

Its Sevenfold Sense

1] the essential content of the gospel, where “gospel” is “the promise of God fulfilled in our midst (i.e., in Jesus Christ.)

L’s five-word summary: “Christus Gottesohn ist unser Heiland. (Cf. the early church’s acrostic, Iesous Christos Theou Huios Soter.)

“Promise” for L always implies “fulfilled in Christ.” E.g., “The promise is the content of the Lord’s Supper” or “We cling to the promise in dark moments.”

 

 

 

2] the medium or vehicle of revelation: Christ’s redeeming work benefits us only as it is communicated to us. E.g., “The Word conveys, pours out, proffers and gives to me the forgiveness won on the cross.” The Word “administers” what Christ has wrought for us.

 

 

 

3] that which makes past and present contemporaneous Here L has in mind the force of “remember” in Hebrew. The Word renders a past event the determinant of my existence now.

 

 

 

4] that alone which can be received by faith, even as faith is that which the Word, in its intrinsic militancy and efficacy, forges in cold and stony hearts.

 

 

 

5] that which quickens a faith which is inherently personal and individual yet also necessarily social The scope of the word is not merely a renewed heart but also a renewed cosmos.

1519 — L’s first published sermon on the sacrament contains “brotherhood” in the title

1521 — L writes on the cancellation of private masses

1526 — L speaks of the Lord’s Supper as rendering fellow-believers ein Kuechen , a cake whose ingredients interpenetrate each other

In short, the Word fosters that faith which anticipates the Messianic banquet.

 

 

 

 

 

6] that which witnesses to the “absurdity” of Christian truth, pre-eminently in L’s theologia crucis.

The truth is neither a species of rationalism nor philosophical speculation nor a superstructure added to an Aristotelian foundation.

What besides absurdity is a crucified Messiah? a dying conqueror of death? The Word never dovetails with human categories but rather forges the categories in terms of which alone the Word can be understood. Luther relished all the paradoxes and seeming contradictions of the gospel. These paradoxes paradoxically bring us the reality, blessing, miracle, solidity and efficacy of our redemption and renewal in Christ, while non-absurd rationalism brings nihilitudo, a neo-logism L coined to express rationalism’s ultimate nothingness.

 

 

7] Scripture (L never wrote a treatise on the authority of Scripture.)

 

Note the contrast between Luther and later Lutheran Orthodoxy:

L the canon of Scripture is to be found within Scripture.

LLO the canon is equated with the text.

 

L the authority of Scripture derives from the authority of the gospel (i.e., of Christ.)

LLO the authority of Scripture derives from its having been “verbally

dictated.”

 

L Scripture is revelatory in that it is the unique, normative witness to

him who is the revelation of God, Jesus Christ.

LLO Scripture itself is revealed. There is no distinction between “Word

of God” and “Scripture.”

For L there is a distinction but never separation or confusion.

 

 

 

Note Luther’s insistence: Since the gospel is the sword of the Spirit (Eph. 6:17), “We will not long preserve the gospel without the languages [i.e., Hebrew and Greek]. The languages are the sheath in which this sword of the Spirit is contained.”

 

 

Reverend Victor Shepherd

Luther (1483 – 1546), Calvin (1509 – 1564) and Zwingli (1484 – 1531) and Anabaptists

On The Lord’s Supper

LUTHER

The conceptual “tools” in his toolbox were those of mediaeval Aristotelianism: substance and accident.

Substance: a thing’s definition, its “whatness”; e.g., that which renders bread bread.

Accident: a thing’s appearance; e.g, bread’s colour, taste, smell, texture.

Luther objected to Rome’s notion of transubstantiation (promulgated at the Fourth Lateran Council, 1215). It presupposed

priestly powers vested in a man by virtue of ordination at the hands of an institution defined by its hierarchical order of priest, bishop, cardinal, pope;

the sacrifice of the mass.

Luther maintained

the mass is not a sacrifice;

ordination (by church of Rome) does not confer power to effect transubstantiation.

the clergy do not constitute the church;

all Christians are “priests”, ordained through baptism;

there is no distinction before God between clergy and laity; therefore the cup should be given to the laity (and clergy should be allowed to marry);

Christ is “really” present in the sacrament. “Before I drink mere wine with the Swiss I shall drink blood with the pope”;

the manner of Christ’s presence is consubstantiation, since the substance of Christ’s body and bloody (i.e, Christ himself) is present with the substance of bread and wine;

while Christ’s ubiquity means he is present everywhere, he is received “sacramentally” on account of the promise attending the institution;

Since Christ is “in” the elements, all communicants receive him; believers to their blessing, unbelievers to their destruction.

CALVIN

Superbly trained as a humanist (like Zwingli) Calvin’s toolbox contained the tools of Renaissance humanism rather than mediaeval philosophy. (The Renaissance wrote much literature, very little philosophy.)

Calvin objected to Luther’s consubstantiation, finding it no improvement on transubstantiation, and regarding it as cannibalism in any case.

Calvin maintained

Jesus Christ is not ubiquitous throughout the universe but rather is “located” in heaven;

by the strength, power (vis, vires [plural], Latin) of the Holy Spirit, believers are drawn up to heaven whereby they receive Christ to their blessing; (this position, following the Latin, is sometimes called “virtualism”. However, “virtualism” has nothing to do with modern notions of “virtual”, “as if”);

faith alone receives Christ (everywhere in Calvin, because everywhere in scripture); unbelievers do not receive him, since the Saviour cannot be received to anyone’s destruction;

communicants receive Christ in the totality of his reality: body and blood; i.e., they do not receive something “spiritual” in the sense of a disembodied spectre. At the same time, they do not “chew his flesh” (Luther). Concerning this viewpoint Calvin said, “Every time Luther mentions the Lord’s Supper he has in mind something that a butcher handles”;

the primary purpose of the sacrament is to strengthen weak faith (i.e., strengthen in Christ those who remain sinners in themselves); the secondary purpose is to pledge publicly our loyalty to our Lord.

 

ZWINGLI

Zwingli, following the Latin meaning of sacramentum (the oath whereby a Roman soldier pledged his loyalty to his commanding officer), puts first what Calvin put second.

Zwingli is everywhere falsely accused of “bare memorialism”– e.g., “For Calvin the elements exhibit a Saviour who is present; for Zwingli they recall one who is absent.”

Zwingli, the most woodenly literal of the Reformers in his reading of scripture, yet the least literal on the Lord’s Supper, maintained

in Hoc est meum corpus the word est means not “is” but “signifies” (as in “I am the door” — i.e., Jesus isn’t telling us he is rectangular and made of wood);

in the Supper believers do receive Christ, but they don’t eat him; i.e., Jesus is the diner but not the dinner. (Three months before his death Z. wrote, “Jesus Christ is received in conjunction with the elements”);

Calvin was wrong in accusing him of proffering an empty sacrament (“naked and empty signs”);

Calvin was correct in points (i) through (v) above;

Calvin was deficient in not recognizing the sacrament to bind believers to one another in the congregation as well as to their Lord. {NB}

ANABAPTISTS

There were many Anabaptist spokespersons, the best-known of whom is Menno Simons. In general they maintained

a “thing-holiness” is indefensible ; holiness does not pertain to things (books, bread, wine, vestments, candles, bells) but rather to relationships. Here the Magisterial Reformers are no better than Rome — both are wrong — in discussing the Lord’s Supper in terms of a holiness that attends elements. (Shepherd: I think it can be asked fairly if the Magisterial Reformers ever upheld what the Anabaptists imputed to them.)

they are unjustly accused of promoting “bare memorialism”; Christ is “really” present not to inert elements but rather to the congregation. In other words, the fellowship of believers rather than the elements is the vehicle of Christ’s continual self-bestowal. (I.e., they too do not believe in the “real absence”);

the church consists of Christians who are sinless by definition [here the Magisterial Reformers disagree totally: sinless people would have no need of the supper]; the supper maintains them in their sinlessness;

the supper pledges believers in the Anabaptist congregation/community to give up their lives for each other as Christ gave up his for them. {NB}

 

 

Note: Everything said above with respect to the Lord’s Supper could be said of preaching; namely, how is a creaturely item (a sermon delivered by a human being and a sinner as well) become the vehicle of Christ’s self-utterance and self-bestowal?

(It is assumed that no one will admit to believing in the transubstantiation of the sermon, the unqualified identification of the words of the preacher with the self-utterance of God.)

 

An Overview of Luther’s Understanding
Of
The Bondage of the Will

Systemic Sinnership (not merely actual sins committed) is the primal predicament of humankind before God. ThisSin is unbelief. Unbelief isn’t cerebral agnosticism but rather the ungrateful, contemptuous denial of God’s goodness and repudiation of his command (gift). “Unbelief is not one of the grosser passions, but sits and holds sway at the summit — the citadel of the will and reason, just like its opposite, faith.” (214)

The human predicament is universal: there are no exceptions to it or modifications of it or alternatives to it.

While the structure of reason survives the Fall (otherwise fallen humans would no longer be human), the integrity of reason does not (otherwise fallen humans could reason themselves out of their predicament.)

To assert “free choice” (i.e., the freedom or non-bondage of the will) is insist that we can will ourselves out of our predicament, and therefore to affirm self-justification.

Perforce the righteousness we need but cannot furnish for ourselves has to be gift.

The gift of righteousness isn’t the gift of something but is rather the self-bestowal of Jesus Christ, the Righteous One himself.

This gift has to be revealed to us, since humankind cannot anticipate the nature of its depravity or the nature of righteousness or the means by which it is wrought for us (the cross) or the nature of our coming to possess it. I.e., because Sin not only corrupts us but also blinds us we cannot foresee the nature of our predicament, the nature of its cure, or the nature of the application of the cure.

Since the gift is gift, it can only be owned in faith, faith being, amidst much else, the admission that “Nothing in our hands we bring.”

Since we live in sin, and therein come to apprehend that sin lives in us, we can live in Christ (and live out of Christ, live from Christ) only as Christ lives in us.

To say we contribute, however slightly, to our justification is to claim a residual capacity, however slight, for reason or will with respect to our “rightwising” before God.

In sum, the affirmation of “free choice” eliminates every aspect of the gospel: “the purpose of grace, the promise of God, the meaning of the law, original sin, divine election.” (203)

 

 

 

Reverend V. Shepherd

Outline of Lecture on

Luther and Marriage

Reformation conviction supported justification by faith, communion in both kinds, and clerical marriage.

 

The Protestant understanding of marriage contradicted late mediaeval estimations:

marriage is an unhappy estate

marriage is vitiated by the depravity of women.

Luther was the 16^th century’s chief critic of Aristotle concerning marriage

women are botched males

if copulation and conception were error-free, a male would result every time.(Aristotle regarded a woman as halfway between an animal and a man.)

 

 

L faulted the church having written nothing good about marriage (e.g., Jerome, Cyprian, Augustine, Gregory.)

A 1494 vernacular catechism maintained that laity “sin in the marital duty” (i.e., commit the 3^rd deadly sin) by [1] unnatural positions for intercourse (any position that maximizes pleasure while

minimizing the likelihood of conception), contraception or masturbation,

[2] fantasizing about a non-spouse while performing with spouse,

[3] fantasizing about a non-spouse while not performing with spouse,

[4] withholding sex for no acceptable reason, thus precipitating one’s spouse to

adultery,

[5] having sex during forbidden seasons (any season of Penance), menstruation, final

weeks of pregnancy, while one’s wife was lactating,

[6] by continuing to have sex with one’s spouse when (s)he was known to be

adulterous,

[7] having sex for sheer pleasure of it.

 

L transferred the mediaeval praise of monastic life to marriage. (Contrast Jerome’s scale [0-100]: 100 for virginity, 60 for widowhood, 30 for marriage.)

 

Modern feminists criticize the Reformers for regarding women chiefly in their roles as wife and mother. Feminists argue that women had far more autonomy in the cloister and the bordello. Still, the Reformers implicitly recognized women as persons in insisting that there was no self-respect for women in a bordello, and many women had been placed in cloisters against their will, and could there be easily bullied by superiors.

 

L encouraged families to removed daughters from convents and encouraged the publication of testimonies of escaped nuns.

L opposed the “dishonest” arrangements that the mediaeval church had encouraged:

e.g., secret marriages,

e.g., forbidding marriage for exaggerated rules of consanguinity and “spiritual affinity”

(between candidate for marriage and siblings of godparents)

e.g., forbidding marriage for defective eyesight or speech

e.g., forbidding marriage between Christian and non-Christian.

Note: marriage is a “creation mandate”, an order of

creation and a commandment of God. It is not a sacrament,

since (i) it doesn’t have dominical institution, (ii) a

means of grace shouldn’t be accessible to married people

only.

 

L preferred that parental permission be secured, but didn’t require it.

L extolled marriage, and endlessly praised his wife, Katarina von Bora.

L broke new ground in “estate planning” by willing everything to his wife.

L insisted that physical attraction might initiate a relationship, but it would never bet he ground of it. The “cement” in marriage is the persistent willingness to make sacrifices.

“It’s when the spouse is sick that one learns the meaning of marriage.”

 

L permitted the re-marriage of divorced people, and permitted secret bigamy to divorce/re-marriage in cases involving impotence.

 

L opposed harsh penalties for adultery lest the estranged couple be driven further apart.

 

L loved his six children (Hans, Elizabeth, Magdalene, Marta, Paul, Margaretha), and was disconsolate at the deaths of Elizabeth (18 months) and Magdalene (13 years.)