Martin Luther's Legacy: Reforming Reformation Theology for the 21st Century

75 Although the general consensus of scholars is that Luther was focused on Christ and Justifcation, he was very concerned about the doctrine of God. His theology, he says, was about giving God the glory, letting God be God.1 And it is his judgment that this can only happen by focusing on grace, for it “takes away all glory, wisdom, righteousness, etc., from men and gives it solely to the Creator,” for it is “far safer to ascribe too much to God than to men.”2 We see this commitments refect when Luther speaks of God while exploring the mystery of Christ’s Presence in the Lord’s Supper as “an inexpressible being, above and beyond all that can be imagined.”3 He is said to be the highest good and the source of all good.4 He is that which is higher than all and helps all.5 We have already noted that in polemical contexts Luther says that God in His essence is altogether unknowable.6 Also in polemical contexts Luther calls the faithful to wonder at God’s Majesty.7 We should let God be God.8 But in the context of expounding the logic of faith Luther affrms, in a manner consistent with his Theology of the Cross, that it is best to begin refecting on the doctrine of God where Christ did—in the Virgin’s womb.9 This leads the Reformer to claim even in non-polemical contexts that God only manifests Himself through His works and Word.10 The Word is His covering.11 Luther observes that the Word is “a being Who is able to deliver us from every evil.”12 He is said to be “that One to Whom the frightened run to seek help in time of desperate need.”13 CHAPTER 3 God and Trinity © The Author(s) 2017 M. Ellingsen, Martin Luther’s Legacy, DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-58758-9_3

76 M. Ellingsen We believe in God Who is an almighty Creator Who makes everything out of nothing, Who makes out of evil good, out of the hopeless and last redemption and salvation.14 The Reformer is concerned to refer to God’s kindness, which leads to repentance.15 When articulating faith, he speaks of the great and overfowing goodness of God, a sublime patience Who does not stop inciting faith.16 This reference to what God does in giving faith is consistent with the realistic ontology borrowed from the Nominalists that we have noted previously in Luther. He claims that to know God’s works is to know Him; God is what He does.17 This God is always loving, according to Luther in non-polemical circumstances or when not addressing sloth and sin. As the Reformer once put it in such a context: God Himself is love, and His Being is nothing but pure love. Therefore if anyone wanted to paint a picture of God in a telling way, he would have to paint a picture that showed nothing but love, as though the divine nature were nothing but an intense fre and fervor of a love that has flled heaven and earth.18 In general with non-polemical exhortative contexts in view Luther repeatedly claims that the nature of God is love.19 He also refers to God’s “indescribable mercy” when teaching Justifcation by Grace.20 This is what it is to be god; not to take good things but to give, that is, to return good for evil.21 In the same vein the Reformer writes that God’s love gladly wastes kindness on the ungrateful.22 In another context he writes: This is a description or defnition of God that is full of comfort: that in His true form God is a God Who loves the afficted, has mercy upon the humbled, forgives the fallen, and revives the drooping. How can any more pleasant picture be painted of God?23

3 GOD AND TRINITY 77 In one sermon he refers to God as philanthropic.24 The vision of His compassion does not render God any less awesome. Writing about our sin and its forgiveness the Reformer observes, In secular matters, when we speak of a king or a prince, we make it a custom to do so with some nice gesture, reverence, and genufection. Much more should we bow the knee of our heart when we speak about God, and we should mention the Name of God with gratitude and the greatest reverence.25 In fact, in a sermon dialoguing with legalism, Luther notes, apart from Christ, God is terrible, only wrath.26 When offering comfort, Luther notes that there is no other God than the One Who talks to us and treats us as Christ does.27 But as Christians we are only to expect good things from Him. To this Luther adds that German derives the word “God” from the term “good.” “He is an Eternal Fountain which gushes forth nothing but the good from fows all that is good.”28 When explaining the faith, Luther claims, after noting that “God does not appear to any, but those who fear Him and humble themselves,” that “God is the God of none but the lowly.”29 And in The Large Catechism the Reformer says that God is “like an eternal, inexhaustible fountain, which, the more it gushes forth and overfows, the more it continues to give.”30 He is a glowing oven, full of love.31 With God, love fows from a Fatherly heart; He is the fountain of all good.32 God is said to be love, when articulating the logic of faith or comforting.33 The Father’s love is just as strong as the Son’s.34 As Luther once put it over table: Our Lord God must be a devout Man to be able to love knaves. I can’t do it, although I myself am a knave.35 The Reformer refers to a German proverb that says that “God has more than He has ever given.”36 Earlier in his career he had written The love of God which lives in man loves sinners, evil persons, fools and weaklings in order to make them righteous, good, wise, and strong. Rather than seeking its own good, the love of God fows for and bestows good.37

78 M. Ellingsen Late in his life while offering comfort Luther noted that God, the King of the Universe, gently lifts us out of our doldrums and insecurities and gently puts us in His lap.38 Elsewhere He calls Him a gracious Father.39 He does not want us to hate ourselves any more, Luther noted, but loves us like beloved daughters.40 Elsewhere he added, For the Holy Spirit does not wish us to fear in such a way that we are overwhelmed by fear and despair … But He wills that you should fear and so escape pride and presumption, and you should rejoice and so escape despair … [Then you will] fear God not as a tyrant but as children fear parents with respect.41 Luther once observed that God’s Name El Shaddai means that he has breasts to nurture the Hebrews.42 When explaining the faith or offering comfort, Luther calls God or Christ Mother on a number of occasions.43 God’s love is compared to a mother’s love.44 He is said to hold us in His arms.45 When consoling us, Luther extols God’s boundless compassion: His compassion is boundless and without measure after it begins to shine again. Therefore His compassion is more abundant because it is part of God’s nature, since wrath is truly God’s alien work, in which He engages contrary to His nature, because He is forced into it by the wickedness of man.46 In 1535 he wrote, This is the indescribable and infnite mercy of God which Paul would like to spread abroad with an enthusiastic and generous fow of words; but the human heart is too limited to comprehend, much less to describe, the great depths and burning passion of divine love towards us.47 Even early in his career when lecturing to overcome righteousness of the fesh Luther claimed that God does not change from our merits, we are assured, even if we have changed.48 Insofar as Luther seems here to assert God’s faithfulness to His Promises, this point has implications, as we shall note, for making a case for the continuing accuracy of Luther’s interpretation of the righteousness of God in relation to Justifcation.

3 GOD AND TRINITY 79 The love of God does not fnd, but creates that which is pleasing to it. The love of man comes into being through that which is pleasing to it.49 In line with this thinking and the Theology of the Cross Luther claims that God is a God of the oppressed: For God is a God of the humble, the miserable, the afficted, the oppressed, the desperate, and of those who have been brought down to nothing at all. And it is the nature of God to exalt the humble, to feed the hungry, to enlighten the blind, to comfort the miserable and afficted, to justify sinners, to give life to the dead, and to save those who are desperate and damned. For He is the almighty Creator Who makes everything out of nothing.50 He loves the afficted (a point made while comforting).51 He wants to have patience with our weakness.52 Explaining the faith Luther notes that God deals with us in the friendliest manner.53 He contends that God is always talking with us—is a verbal God.54 The Reformer also advises that God is best understood not in Himself as substance, but in terms of relationship.55 Indeed it is said to be God’s nature to create something out of nothing.56 These commitments follow from the Reformer’s belief, articulated when preaching, that the Father’s true essence is revealed in Christ.57 When offering comfort or proclaiming the Gospel Luther claims that Christ (and so love) reveals the Majesty of God.58 He is said to be fully known in the Word: Therefore the world knows that nothing represents the condition of the heart so perfectly and so positively as the words of the mouth, just as though the heart were in the word … Thus it is also with God. His Word is so much like Himself, that the Godhead is wholly in it, and he who has the Word has the whole Godhead.59 In one sermon offering comfort from despair, Luther claims that references to God’s love may not necessarily apply to trinitarian issues or doctrine but have a “practical application” teaching us to know “what our attitude over against God and Christ must be to fnd the Father and know His will.” There is “no other God than the One God Who is called Jesus Christ.” 60

80 M. Ellingsen In similar contexts, Luther portrays God with His wrath is subordinated to grace.61 In a polemical context he writes, “It is God’s nature frst to destroy and to bring to nothing whatever is in us before He gives us of his own.”62 When comforting, he says that things said about God do not entail that He does evil or is wrathful Himself. Much in the fashion of Liberal theology, Luther claims that wrath in God is just the result of our misperception of His goodness.63 When dealing with the Christian life with a concern to critique those caught up in works-righteousness, on at least one occasion Luther seems to take another position much like modern liberal theology, positing a loving God Who reacts toward His creatures as they act towards Him.64 Or he claims that God remains loving; we just misperceive His mercy.65 In a related manner, much as we noted previously when the Reformer was seeking to point out our despairing circumstances or exhort Christian life Luther once claimed that “Just as I think about God, so it is with me.”66 When comforting despair, the Reformer commented that God’s compassion is more abundant than His wrath, which is His alien work forced on Him by our wickedness.67 In one of his Lectures while seeking to encourage or comfort Luther claims that damnation is solely the result of our misuse of God’s benevolent activity.68 Other times in these contexts, as we will note in more detail when describing Luther’s treatment of the doctrine of Providence, he claims that evil is the fault of evil instruments.69 Luther’s concern here seems to be that he is consoling the weak that God’s wrath is not construed as His active judgment.70 Elsewhere in the Lectures on Romans Luther insists that to say that God gives man what he wants does not entail that God does not will that thing.71 It was not atypical in late medieval thought to posit like the Nominalists did that God’s mutability must be correlated with His never changing.72 Thus while dealing with the meaning of the Right Hand of God while engaged in polemics, the Reformer contended that the power of God is so great that it cannot be measured.73 God is said to rule constantly, but not manifest to us. He sees us, but we do not see Him. The context for these remarks is preaching the holiness of God.74 Yes, God is loving for Luther (especially when he was expounding the logic of faith and comforting others), but that is not the whole story.

3 GOD AND TRINITY 81 A God of Wrath In other contexts God’s justice is said to be too absolute to be satisfed by works of attrition.75 Because God is righteous and just, sin must offend Him.76 Defending faith against Epicurean tendencies, Luther asserts the immensity of divine wrath.77 As he put in in a sermon, “The consciousness that God is angry and that He is an irate judge of sin is innate in the human heart … In such circumstances it is impossible for man to be happy.”78 Such an awareness of God’s enormous wrath was the root of the Anfechtungen (despair) that plagued Luther.79 A God Who is in control of all creatures but is against us entails that all creation is against us, that every and any natural event might be our enemy.80 Apart from Christ we stand under this wrath.81 Or in such contexts Luther refers to God’s holiness.82 Such a portrayal of God undercuts pride.83 In The Bondage of the Will, combating Erasmus’s brand of Pelagianism, Luther insists that appreciating the wrath of God is essential for faith.84 The opposition of God’s wrath and love emerges as Luther seeks to defend faith or condemn sin. He posits then an opposition of wrath and love in God, so that (in the spirit of the Theology of the Cross) we must believe against this picture of God.85 In such contexts, in line with his Theology of the Cross, Luther distinguishes between God’s alien work (opus alienum) and His proper work (opus proprium). God’s strange work, and so His wrath, is said to be alien to His Nature.86 Luther’s construal of God’s hidden, alien work as the hardening and abandoning of some, a fully omnipotent God, accords with the absolute will of God posited by the Nominalists. He rejects the Scholastic distinction between the absolute Will of God and His ordained Will posited by the Scholastics.87 God plays an active role in judgment, Luther also claims, in contexts in which pride or smugness must be curtailed.88 In contexts like these Luther may speak of a hidden God not revealed in Christ (related to the teaching of double predestination): Hence in order that there may be room for faith, it is necessary that everything which is believed should be hidden … Thus God hides His eternal goodness and mercy under eternal wrath, His righteousness under iniquity. This is the highest degree of faith, to believe Him merciful when He saves so few and damns so many …89

82 M. Ellingsen When dealing with questions about what the Christian life looks like, Luther was inclined to portray God as more demanding.90 Also in dialogue with legalistic tendencies, Luther says that God is “a negative essence and goodness and wisdom and righteousness.” In short, God is hidden.91 In contexts when the polemics are mixed with exhortation to faith, Luther softens his teaching of God’s wrath, by speaking of a confict between God and tyrants.92 However, these texts from the Romans lectures are balanced by claims when he seeks to defend the sola fde that God uses the devil to do evil.93 In such contexts God’s love is hidden under wrath.94 When offering comfort, Luther speaks of God’s wrath directed towards the enemies of the faithful, and so subordinates wrath to love.95 Also when comforting, Luther claims that God’s Nature is that after He has afficted His own He shows Himself benevolent.96 In some contexts requiring the comfort of despair (along with a critique of liberation), Luther needed to acknowledge his teaching of double predestination, and in those contexts he affrmed both it and the God of love: If you believe in the revealed God and accept His Word, He will gradually also reveal the hidden God; for “He who sees Me also sees the Father,” as John 14:9 says. He who rejects the Son of God also loses the unrevealed God along with the revealed. But if you cling to the revealed God with a frm faith, so that your heart will not lose Christ even if you are deprived of everything, then you are most assuredly predestined, and you will understand the hidden God.97 When just addressing despair the Reformer even more radically subordinated the hidden God to the revealed God, construing His hiddenness as passive, a mere function of our sinful misperceptions (after the fashion of liberal theology): But these things must be borne, and we must conclude that God is the One Who is hidden, and yet He is not hidden, for the fesh prevents us from being able to look at Him … So it seems that God is completely forsaking us and casting us away, because He is hidden to us and we are hidden along with Him. But in faith, in the Word, in the Word and in the Sacraments He is revealed and seen.98 In a similar fashion when exhorting Christian living he claims that as you think about God so He is.99 We see a similar commitment in Luther’s

3 GOD AND TRINITY 83 claims while offering comfort and critiquing philosophy that rather than assigning to God emotions of a human being like repentance and wrath, it seems to me that there is a less complicated explanation, namely that Holy Scripture is describing the thinking of those men who are in the ministry. When Moses says that God sees and repents, these actions really occur in the hearts of men …100 When teaching repentance God’s wrath is minimized more.101 And when dealing with God’s demands of service (Christian life) Luther puts it this way: For the Holy Spirit does not wish us to fear in such a way that we are overwhelmed by fear and despair … but He wills that you should fear and so escape pride or presumption, and you should rejoice and so escape despair … [Then you will] fear God not as a tyrant, but as children fear their parents with respect.102 In a sermon exhorting faith, in much the same spirit, Luther claims, “The consciousness that God is angry and that He is an irate Judge of sin is innate in the human heart.”103 But when articulating or exhorting the faith he writes, “To think of God as wrathful is to believe in no God.” 104 Luther adds: Finally, He pours Himself out for me altogether.105 Anyone who regards Him [God] as angry has not seen Him correctly, but has pulled down a curtain and cover, or even more, a dark cloud over His face.106 And yet Luther still assures us when comforting despair and exhorting faith that God comforts us in our trials with an awareness that God sets trials before us in order to rely on His Promises and to cleanse us.107 For God exalts the lowly, Luther adds while expositing the faith108 He “is the God of none but the lowly, the oppressed, and the sighing.”109 Where Is God? Luther breaks with the above–beneath the earth cosmologies for gaining answers to this question. Instead he makes some very timely claims. He speaks of God taking the faithful to hell before He brings them back and comforts them. Presumably God is both in heaven and hell.110 We

84 M. Ellingsen cannot measure God’s Power. He is said to be Present everywhere, in every single creature.111 He [God] is Present everywhere in death, in hell, in the midst of our foes, yes, also … governs them, and they must all do as He wills.112 He is said to be “a vast immense being that flls the world, pervades it and towers over it: He [God] is a supernatural, inscrutable being Who exists at the same time in every little seed, whole and entire, and yet also in all above and outside all created things.113 “Nothing can be more truly present and within all creatures than God Himself and His Power,” Luther claims.114 God is said to be in all and above all and outside all created things. “Nothing is so small but God is still smaller, nothing so large but God is still larger.”115 He is a vast, immense Being that flls the world, is inexpressible and beyond all that can be described.116 The Reformer depicts Him as “in a manure bug or even in the cesspool … no less than in heaven.”117 He is closer to me than I am to myself, Luther adds.118 While explicating Law and Gospel Luther claims that the Word of God is impossible to escape, for it is above and yet in all things.119 He is always acting.120 Luther says something similar about the Lordship of Christ, as he claims that His Lordship is “active, energetic,” and continuous …”121 Christ is completely present to us. Nothing is nearer than He is.122 Luther also notes that God acts continuously in that He exists at the same time in every little seed, whole and entire, and yet also in all things.123 What happens to the Son happens to the Father, since the entire Trinity is in Christ, he adds.124 This has implications for God being totally involved not just in Jesus’ fate, but in His human nature. In comments most suggestive of something like the Eastern idea of deifcation, Luther once claimed, For in Christ a part of our fesh and blood, that is, our human nature sits in heaven above at the right hand of God … It is an unspeakably great glory and honor for humankind to have been raised so high by Him, not merely to heaven among the holy angels and archangels … but to the level of direct equality with God Himself.125

3 GOD AND TRINITY 85 A Triune God Regarding the Trinity doctrine, Luther once justifed the Trinity late in his life by noting that reference to God as Elohim in Gen.1:1 is plural.126 Also when explaining the logic of faith, the Reformer identifes God as Three Who has given Himself wholly and completely with all that He is and has.127 In another treatise Luther stressed the unity of the Persons of the Trinity. Father, Son, and Spirit are not at all different in nature, he claimed. Drawing on The Nicene Credal formulation he claims that their distinctness is only a function of the fact that “He [Christ] does not have the Godhead from Himself, nor from anyone else but the Father, since He was born of the Father from eternity.” And the “Holy Spirit “does not have the Godhead from Himself nor from anyone else but from the Father and the Son.”128 Obviously the Filioque is affrmed here (and elsewhere).129 Citing Augustine Martin Luther describes the Trinity: “The Father is the Mind; the Son, the intellect; and the Holy Spirit the Will.”130 He also uses Augustine’s idea of God as the triune connection of mind, intellect, and will.131 Luther spoke of the relation of Father and Son as akin to the relation between the sun and its rays.132 He also describes the distinction between Father and Son as like difference between speaker and Word.133 Formulating an image unique to Luther he speaks of the Trinity in terms of an internal conversation in God – Father as Speaker, Son as he Word, and Spirit the Listener.134 Elsewhere he speaks of the Triune God as Preacher [Father], Sermon [Son], and hearer [Spirit].135 The Reformer contends that the Three Persons give themselves wholly to us, Luther claims. The Father gives Himself with heaven and earth and all creatures. The Son subsequently gave Himself, all his work, sufferings, and righteousness in order that we might have the Father. But this grace would beneft no one if it remained hidden. The Holy Spirit comes and gives Himself to us wholly and completely, teaching us to understand the deed of Christ, helping us receive and preserve it.136 Father and Son are said to be bound so closely together that “we should learn to think of God only as Christ.” Thus this is a God in Whose lap we may cuddle like children in their mother’s arms.137 This image not only refects a Christocentrism. It also communicates an affrmation of God’s maternity. For Luther the Persons of the Trinity have an intimacy surpassing any earthly unity. The human body and soul are not so completely One as

86 M. Ellingsen the Triune God he claims.138 Luther indeed offers us a vision of God Who is intimate with us when exhorting faith or comforting), but Whose Majesty and awesomeness confounds us (when we are compromising the primacy of grace). Little wonder that this awesome God seems to be so unlike Himself in different contexts. Notes 1. Pred. (1525), WA17I :232, 34/ LW12:187; cf. Wein., WA10I/1:616f., 1ff./ LW52:199; Unter. Art., WA2:69, 18. Other intpreters making this point regarding the importane of the doctrine of God for Luther include Philip Watson, Let God Be God (Philadelphia: Muhlenberg Press. 1948); Paul Althaus, The Theology of Martin Luther, trans. Robert Schultz (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1966), p. 105. Also see for this emphasis Stuf., WA40III:356, 18; Ibid., WA40III:358, 1; Ps., WA31I : 244, 26/ LW14:26. 2. Gal. (1535), WA40I 131f., 25f. / LW26:66: “Et verrum est doctrinam Evangelii adimere hominibus omnem gloriam, sapientaim, iustitiam etc. et ista tribuere soli Creatori qui ex nihilo ominia facit. Multo autem tutius est tribuere nimium Deo, quam hominibus.” 3. Ab.Chr., WA26:340, 1/ LW37:228: “Ists ein unausprechlich wesen uber und ausser allen, das man nennen odder dencken kan.” Cf. Hab., WA19:426, 7/ LW19:228. 4. Gut.Werk., WA6:227, 28/ LW44:52; Dtsch.Kat., WA30I :135, 17/ BC: 388–389. 5. Rom., WA56:177, 1/ LW25:157. 6. Gen., WA42:293, 5ff./ LW2:45; Ibid., WA42:635, 17/ LW3:122. 7. Serv.arb., WA18:631f., 37ff./ LW33:60. 8. See note 1, for references. 9. Gal. (1535), WA40I :77, 11/ LW26:28–29. 10. Gen., W42:9, 32/ LW1:11. 11. Ibid., WA42:11, 19/ LW1:13. 12. Jon., WA19:206, 12/ LW19:54. 13. Dtsch. Kat., I.1, WA30I :133, 1/ BC:386.2: “Ein Gott heisset das, dazu man sich versehe sol alles guten und zufucht haben ynn allen nöten.” 14. Gen., WA44:607, 33/ LW8:39: “Quia credimus in illum Deum, qui est creator onmipotens, producens ex nihilo omnia, ex malis optima, ex desperatis et preditis salute.” Cf. Magn., WA7:547, 1/ LW21:299. 15. Rom., WA56:19, 14/ LW 25:17. 16. Jes. (1528–11530), WA31II:58, 13/ LW16:83. 17. Magn., WA7:577, 26/ LW21:331.

3 GOD AND TRINITY 87 18. 1 Joh., WA36:424, 16: “Gott is selbs die Liebe, und sein wesen ist eitel lauter liebe, Das wenn jmand wolte Gott malen und treffen, so müst er ein solch bild treffen, das eitel hebe were, als sey die Göttliche natur nichts den ein feur offen und brunst solcher liebe, die himmel und erden füllet …” 19. 1 Joh., WA36:424,9; Ps.51, WA40II:462,27/LW12:406; Gen., WA42:646, 9/ LW3:137–138; Gal. (1535), WA40I :488, 15/ LW26:314; Ibid., WA40I : 387,27/ LW26:245–246; Ibid., WA40I :522, 27/ LW26:339; Ibid., WA40I : 298, 19/ LW26:178; Ibid., WA40I :455, 15/ LW26:292. 20. Gal. (1535), WA40I :97, 15/ LW26:41. 21. Dict.Ps., WA4:269, 25/ LW11:403: “Sed hoc est deum non accipere bona, sed dare, ergo pro malis bona retribuere.” 22. Ps., WA31I :182, 19/ LW14:106. 23. Ps.51, WA40II:462,27/LW12:406: Plenissima igitur consolationis est haec Dei seu description seu defnitio, quod Deus in sua propria forma sit talis Deus, qui amet affictos, qui misereatur humliatorum qui ignoscat lapsis et foveat languidos. Num enim potest ulla suavior Dei imago describi?” 24. KirchPost. (1522), WA10I/1:95–128. 25. Gal. (1535), WA40I :100, 12:LW26:43: “Sie in Politia, quando Regum aut Principum nomina appellamus, id honesto quodam gestu, reverentia et genut fexione facere solemus. Multo magis, cum de Deo loquimur, genu cordis fectere et momen Dei cum gratitudine et summa revernetia naominare debemus.” 26. Hspost. (1544/1532), WA52:308, 17 / CS6:148. 27. Ev.Joh, 14–16, WA45:517, 10/ LW24:62; cf. Ps., WA31I :63, 21. 28. Dtsch.Kat., I.1, WA30I :135f., 34/ BC:389.25: “Daher auch achte ich, wir Deutschen Gott eben mit dem namen von alters her nenne (seiner und artiger den sein andere sprache) nach wortlin ‘gut,’ als der ein ewiger quellbrun ist, der sich mit eitel güte ubergeusset und von dem alles was gut ist und heisset ausfeust.” See Ibid., WA30I :135, 18ff./ BC388f.18ff. 29. Jes. (1528–1530), WA31II:72, 7/ LW16:102: “Deus enim est non nisi humilium, oppressorum, gemencium suspivancium.” 30. Dtsch. Kat., WA30I :201, 5/ BC:447.56. 31. Pred. (1532), WA36:424, 2. 32. Kirchpost.G., W211:1098.13/ CS2/1:354. 33. Gal. (1535), WA40I :494, 14ff./ LW26:318–319; Ibid., WA40I :488, 15ff./ LW26:314; Ibid., WA40I :298, 19/ LW26:178; cf. Gen., WA42:621f., 40ff./ LW3:103–104; Send.Rech., WA10II:323f./ LW43:53.

88 M. Ellingsen 34. Ev.Joh.3–4, WA47:80, 30/ LW22:355. 35. TR (1532), WATR1:100, 23/LW54:32: “Unser herrgott mus enin frommer man sein, das er die buben kan lieb haben. Ich kan es nit thus, und bin doch selb ein bub.” 36. Gen., WA44:605, 17/ LW8:35: “Gott hat noch mehr, den er je vergab.” 37. Disp. Heid, WA1:365, 8/ LW31:57: “Prima pars patet, quia amer Deo in homine vivens dilgit peccatores, malos, stultos, infrmos, ut faciat iustos, bonos, sapientes, robostos et sic effuit potius et bonnum tribuit.” 38. Gen., WA42:647, 7/ LW3:139; cf. Gal. (1535), WA40I :408, 14/ LW26: 260. 39. Matt.5–7, WA32:329, 1/LW21:37; Vor. 1.Joh., WA20:696, 32/ LW30: 266. 40. Kl.Proph., WA13:506, 16/ LW18:359. 41. Ps.2, WA40II:288f., 26ff./ LW12:75: “Non enim vult Spiritussantus nos sic timere, ut in timore absorpti desperemus … Hoc autem vult, ut et timeas atque ita effugias superbiam seu praesumptionem, et exultes, ut effugias desperationem... hi sunt vere flii Dei, qui Deum timent, non ut tyrannum sed, sicut liber parentem, cum reverentia...” 42. Gen., WA 42:607, 17ff./ LW3:82–83. 43. Ev. Jn.6–8, W33:522, 12/ LW23:325; Jes. (1527–1530), WA31II:370, 30/ LW17:139; Ibid., WA31II:272, 11/ LW17:16; Jes. (1527–1530), WA31II:42, 21/ LW16:60; Gen., WA42:364, 10/ LW2:145. 44. TR (1533), WATR1:189,21/LW54:70; Ecl.Leb., WA10II:298, 29/LW45:43; Kl. Proph., WA13:508,16/ LW18:362–363; Gen., WA42:364, 10/LW2:145. 45. Promodisp.Pall., WA39I :204, 6. 46. Gen., WA42:356, 20/ LW2:134: “… sicut Die ira, cum ceperit exaestuare, est intolerabilis, Ita misericordia quoque, postquam relucere incipit, infnita et sine modo est. Est autem ideo misericordia exuberantior, quia haec est de natura Dei, Cum ira vere sit alienum Dei opus, quod contra naturam suam suscipit cogente ita malicia hominum.” 47. Gal. (1535), WA40I :455,15/LW26:292): “Haec est ineffabilis et infnita illa misericordia Dei quam Paulus libenter exuberanti et largissima quadam copia verborum effundere vellet. sed illam abyssum profundissimam et Zelum ardentissimum divinae charitatis erga nos non potest angustia cordis humani comprehendere, multo minus eloqui. Quinetiam ipsa magnitudo divinae misercordiae non solum diffcultatem credenda, sed et incredulitatem parit.” 48. Rom., WA56:440,2/LW25:432; cf. Disp.Verb., WA39II:20, 1/ LW38:253. 49. Disp. Heid, WA1:354, 35/ LW31:41: “Amor Dei non invenit sed ereat suum diligible. Amor hominis ft a suo diligibili.”

3 GOD AND TRINITY 89 50. Gal. (1535), WA40I :488, 15/ LW26:314: “Nam Deus est Deus humilium, miserorum, affictorrum, oppressorum, desperatorum, et eorum qui prorsus in nihilum redacti sunt; Estque Dei natura exaltare humiles, cibare esurientes, illuminare caecos, mieros et affictos consolari peccatores iustifcare, mortuous vivifcare, desperator et damnatos salvare etc.” 51. Ps.51, WA40II:462, 27/ LW12:406. 52. Gen., WA43:446, 11/ LW5:25. 53. 1 Pet., WA12:266, 21/ LW30:10; Som.Post. (Cruc.), WA22:260, 28/ CS3/1:53. 54. Promodisp.Schmed., WA39II:199,3/LW34:316; cf. Reih.Gen., WA24: 38, 9. 55. Gen., WA42:634f., 20ff./ LW3:122; Pred. (1538), WA46:337, 4ff. 56. Stuf., WA40III:154, 11/ LW21:299; Gen., WA42:572, 21/LW3:33; cf. Antinom. (2), WA39I :470, 1. 57. Ev.Joh.14–15, WA45:589, 1/ LW24:140–141. 58. Gen., 43:460, 23/ LW5:46; Ibid., WA43:461,23/ LW5:48; Ev.Joh.1–2, WA46:672, 14/ LW22:156–157. 59. Kirchpost.G., W211:160, 15ff./ CS1/1:179: “Also gar bekennt alle Welt, dass sein Bild dem Herzen so eben gleich und gewiss ist, als die Rede des Mundes gleich also wäre das Herz, wesentlich im Wort … Also ists im Gott auch, da ist sein Wort ihm eben so gleich, das die Gottheit ganz darin ist, und wer das Wort hat, der hat die ganze Gottheit.” 60. Ev.Joh.14–15, WA45:588f., 35ff./ LW24:140: “Nu wollen wir hie nicht scharff disputiren (wie der alten Peter etliche gethan haben uber diesem text) wider die Arianer, wie beide, der Vater inn Christo und Christus im Vater ist nach dem einigen, unzerteilten Gottlichen wesen, Sondern reden ist allein von dem brauch oder nutz des selben Artikels, wie wir uns gegen Gott und Christo sollen schicken, das wir den Vater treffen und seinen willen erkennen, Das ein Christen (wie wir allzeit gehört haben) lerne also sagen: Ich weis von seienem Gott on allein von dem einigen, der da heisst Ihesus Christus.” 61. Dict.Ps., WA3:330, 26/ LW10:273; Ev.Joh.3–4, WA47:106f., 28ff./ LW22:384– 385; Rom., WA56:304, 20/ LW25:291; Gal. (1535), WA40I :591, 23/ LW26:388; Ibid., WA56:380, 23/ LW25:370; Ps.51, WA40II:342,37/ L12:322; Ibid., WA56:387f.,27ff./LW25:378; Ps., WA31I :156ff.,35ff./LW14:88–90; Ibid., WA56:434,25ff./ LW25:426; Gen., WA44:280, 17/ LW6:374; Ibid., WA56:450,13/ LW25:442–443. 62. Rom., WA56:375,18/ LW25:365: “Quad totum ideo facit, Quia Natura Dei est, prius deftruere et annihilare, quicquid in nobis est, antquam sua donet …”

90 M. Ellingsen 63. Dict. Ps., WA3:35, 7/ LW10:40: “Item singulariter nontandum pro regula, quod multa dicuntru de deo in Scriptura, que ipse tamen non facit. Sed quia facit ea alios facere ideo Scriptua reducens intellectum nostrum in deum et docens gratiarum actionem et onmia fumina revocans in mare unde fuunt, attribuit ei, que faciunt creature. Ut illud: ‘Tunc loquetur ad eos in ira sua’ i.e. loqui faciet Christum et alios sanctus in ira sua: quia et ira seu vindicta, quam faciunt creature, sunt dei. Non enim ira sic est sua, quia in ipso sit. Sed quia creatura, in qua est ira, est eius et ipsius nutu et imperio affigit impios, ipse autem in se manens quietissimus et tranquillus, immo summe bonus et non turbatus. Nam tam est bonus deus, et quicquid ipse immediate agit, not sit nisi summum gaudium et delectatio et non affigit, sed magis refcit.” Cf. Gen., WA44:112, 1/ LW6:150; Paul Tillich, Systematic Theology, Vol.1 (3 vols. in one; Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1967/ pp. 282–283; Ibid., Vol.2, pp. 76–77; Friedrich Schleiermacher, The Christian Faith, Vol.1, eds. H. R. MacKintosh and J. S. Stewart New York and Evanston, IL: Harper & Row, 1963), pp. 350–352. 64. Rom., WA56:234, 2/ LW25:219: “Deus Est mutalbilis quam maxime. Partet, Quia Iustifcatur et Iudicatur, psalm 17: ‘Cum electo electus eris et cum peruerso peruerteris.’ Qualis est enim vnusquisque [sic “unusquisque] in seipso, talis est ei Deus, in obiecto. Si Iustus, Iustus; Si mundus, mundus; Si iniquu, iniquus etc’.” 65. Gen., WA42:553, 7ff./ LW3:7. 66. Ps.51, WA40II:343, 2: “Sicut de [d]eo cogito, ita ft mihi.” 67. Gen., WA42:356, 19/ LW2:134. 68. Gal. (1535), WA40I :522, 14/ LW26:339. 69. Serv.arb., WA18:709f., 31ff./ LW33L176; Ibid., WA18:711, 2ff./ LW33:178–179. 70. Ibid., WA18:714, 6/ LW33:183. 71. Rom., WA56:108, 9/ LW25:97. 72. See for example Gabriel Biel, Collectorium circa quattuor libros Sententiarum, V,Dist.M,qu.1,c.3,art.3,dub.1 (Tűbingen: J.C.B. Mohr, 1973), Vol.1, p. 418: “Et omnibus his modus ft mutation. Non autem propter hoc oportet ponere aliquam formam Deum necessitantem. Nec oportet ponere obiectim aliquod distinctum a Deo immutabile et aeternum ad salvandum immutabilitatem actus divini; sicut patet de creation. Deus non vult nunc creare et non prius seu prius non voluit, sine mutatione actus in Deo.” 73. Wort., WA23:133f., 18ff./ LW37:57–58. 74. Gen., WA42:665f., 22ff./ LW3:164–165; Ibid., WA43:619, 5ff./ LW5:276–277. 75. Stuf., WA40III:344, 23; 2.Ps., WA5:201, 5. 76. 2.Ps., WA5:50, 5ff./ LW14:316; Tess.Con., WA6:127, 5.

3 GOD AND TRINITY 91 77. 90.Ps., WA40III:567, 22/ LW13:125–126; cf. Ibid., WA40III:485f., 9ff./ LW13:76–78; Ibid., WA40III:513, 1/ LW13:93; Promodisp.Heg., WA39II:366, 18. 78. Ev.Joh.3–4, WA47:98, 17/LW22:375: “Nun sticktt das in aller menschen hertzen, das Gott zurne und ein zorniger Richter sej uber Sunde … So kan der mensch nicht frolic sein, sonder mus sich imerdar furchten, das Gott mit der feulen hinder ihme stehe und zuschlagen wille.” 79. See p.155, n.148, for references. 80. Pred.1.Mos., (1523/1527), WA14:101, 24; Gen., WA44:546, 9/ LW7:332. 81. Matth.11–15, WA28:17, 7ff. 82. 1 Pet., WA12:287, 25/ LW30:32. 83. 1 Pet., WA12:289, 3/ LW30:33–34; Latom., WA8:67, 2ff./ LW32:172. 84. Serv.arb., WA18:633, 7ff./LW33:62–63:” Altera est, quod fdes est rerum non apparentium. Ut ergo fdei locus sit, opus est, ut omnia quae creduntur, abscondantur … Hic est fdei summus gradus, credere illum esse elementem, qui tam multos damnat … Si igitur possem ulla ratione comprehendre, quomodo is Deus sit misericors et iustum, qui tantam iram et iniquitatem ostendit, non esset opus fde. Nunc cum id comprehendi non potest, ft locus exercendae fdei, dum talia praedicantur et invulgantur, non aliter, quam dum Deus occidit, fdes vitae in morte exercetur.” Cf. Wein., WA10I/1:472f, 1ff./ CS3/2:285ff., on the importance of appreciating our sin. 85. Gal. (1535), WA40I :576, 27/ LW26:378. 86. Gal.(1535), WA40I :488, 15ff./ LW26:314; cf. Gen., WA42:356, 19/ LW2:134; Jes. (1527–1530), WA31II:168, 8/LW16:233; Gen., WA43:458, 31/ LW5:42–44; Serm.S.Thom., WA1:112f., 24/ LW51:19–20. For other references to this distinction, though without specifc reference to the nature of God as love, see Rom., WA56:374f., 21ff./ LW25:365; Disp.Heid., WA1:361, 4/LW31:51; Ps.90, WA40III:584, 24ff./ LW13:135–136; Op.Ps. (1519–1521), WA5:63f., 33ff./ LW14:335; Jes. (1527–1530), WA31II:168, 8/ LW16:233–234. 87. Serv.arb., WA18:719, 12/ LW33:190. And yet there may be a connection between this distinction and Luther’s opus alienum/opus proprium (thogh for Scholastics God’s omnipotence is cerely potentiality). See Theodor Dieter, “Luther As Late Medieval Theologian: His Positive and Negative Use of Nominalism and Realism,” in Robert Kolb, Irene Dingel, L’Ubamic Batka, eds., The Oxford Handbook of Martin Luher’s Theology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 20014). p. 41.

92 M. Ellingsen 88. Gen., WA44:503, 24/ LW7:275: “Quia lex intus in corde est, quae terret et est lex Dei, Ideo omnis consternatio et pavor conscientiae ft cooperante Deo. Non igitur potes excutere legem, sed ipsa excutit tibi cor. Quia est Dei iudicium aeternum et immutabile, cuius accusastionem et impetum haud facile sustinebis.” 90.Ps., WA40III:513, 13/ LW13:93: “Ergo ex descriptione hae Dei, quod sit aeternus et omnipotens, immensus et infnitus, Sequitur utrumque, quod et habitaculum eius seu securos favor super timentes eum sit infnitus, et quod furor seu ira eius super etiam sit immensus. Et infnitus. Nam effectus semper sequitur magnitudinem causae effcientis.” For surveys of the tendency to overlook wrath in Luther, see Lennart Pinomaa, Der Zorn Gottes in der Theologie Luthers (Helsinki: DruckereiA.G. Der Dinnischen Literaturgesellschaft, 1938), pp. 7–11. 89. Serv. Arb., WA18:633, 7ff./ LW33:62–63: “Ut ergo fdei locus sit, opus est, ut omnia quae creduntur, absconduntur … Sic aeternam suam clemntiam et misericordiam abscondit sub aeterna ira, Iustitiam sub iniquitate. Hic est fdei summus gradus, credere illum esse clementem, qui tam paucos salvat, tam multos damnat …” Cf. Serv.arb., WA18:685, 14ff./LW33:139–140; Ibid., WA18:689f.,18ff./ LW33:145–146; Gen., WA43:458, 31/ LW543–44; Serv. Arb., WA18:633,7ff./ LW33:62–63. 90. Serm.hoc.Sak., WA2:746f., 38/ LW35:56; Serm.Tauf., WA2;730f., 35/ LW35:34. 91. Rom., WA56:292f., 32ff./ LW25:383: “Et universaliter omnis nostra affrmatio boni cuiuscunque sub negatione eiusdem, Vt [sic “Ut”] fdes habeat in Deo, Qui Est Negatiua Essentia et bonitos et Sapientia et Iustitia Nec potest possideri aut attingi nisi negates omnibus affrmatiuis nostras.” Cf. Ibid., WA56:375, 6/ LW25:365; Ibid., WA56:380, 33/ LW25:370; Ibid., WA56:392, 28/ LW25:382–383. 92. Rom., WA56:180, 14/ LW25:161; Ibid., WA56:402, 13/ LW25:392. 93. Ibid., WA56:402, 16/ LW25:392: “Immo sepius et precipue nostro tempore suscitat diabolum Vt [sic “Ut”] suos electos in horrenda peccatat prosternat et dominetur in eis diu, Vel saltem vt [sic “ut”] eorum bona proposita semper Impediat et contraria facient quam volunt, vt [sic “ut”] sicetiam palpare possint, Quia ipsi non sunt, qui bene velint aut currant.” Cf. Ibid., WA56:179, 27/ LW25:160; 90.Ps., WA40III :516f., 13ff./ LW13:96–97; Ibid., WA40III :584., 24/ LW13:135. 94. Rom., WA56:381, 2/ LW25:370. 95. Tess.Con., WA6:128, 5/ LW42:156–157.

3 GOD AND TRINITY 93 96. Gen., WA42:561, 1/ LW3:17. 97. Ibid., WA43:460, 26/ LW5:46: “Si credus in Deum revelatum, et recipis verbum eius, paulatim etiam absconditum Deum revelabit. Quia, ‘qui me videt, videt et partem.’ Ioannis 14, capite. Qui flium reiicit, amittit cum revelato DEO etiam non revelatum. Si autem frma fde revelato Deo adhaeseris, ita ut cor tuum sic sentiat te non amissurum Christum, etiamsi omnibus spoliatus fueris: tum certissime praedestinatus es, et absconditum Deum intelliges: imo iam de present intelligis.” 98. Ibid., WA44:110, 23/ LW6:148: “Sed ferenda ista sunt, et sic statuendum est: Deus est, qui absconditus est. Hoc est eius proprium. Revera est absconditus, et tamen non est absconditus. Caro enim obstat, quo minus eum intueri possimus … Ideo videtur Deus nos prorsus deserere et abiicere. Quia est absconditus nobis, et nos una cum ipso abscondimur. In fde autem, in verbo, in Sacramentis revelatur et conspicitur.” 99. Pred. (1533–1534), WA37:589, 20ff.; cf. Ps.68, WA8:8, 9/ LW13:6–7; Ps.51, WA40II: 342f., 37ff./ LW12:322f.; Fast. (1525), WA17II:66, 18/ CS1/2:63. 100. Gen., WA42:293, 6/ LW2:44: “ … Sed mihi simplicius esse videtur, quod scilicet Scriptura sancta loquitur secundum cogitationem eorum hominum, qui sunt in minsterio. Quod igitur Moses dicit Deumvidere et poenitere, haec vere funt in cordibus eorum qui ministerium, verbi habent.” 101. Gal. (1535), WA40II: 317, 34/ LW12:305; Ibid., WA40II: 342, 16/ LW12:322. 102. 2Ps., WA40II:288f., 26ff./ LW12:75: “Non enim vult Spiritssanctus nos sic timere, ut in timore absorpti desperemus … Hoc autem vult, ut et timeas atque ita effugias superbiam seu presimptionem, et exultes, ut effugias desperationem … qui Deum timent, non ut tyrannum sed, sicut liberi parentem, eum reverential …” 103. Ev.Joh.3–4, WA47:98, 17/ LW22:375: “Nun stictt das in aller menschen hertzen, das Gott zorne und ein zorniger Richter sey uber die Sunde, wie wir den seinen zorn in die welt sehen …” Cf. Jon., WA19:210, 5/ LW19:210; Gen., WA44:546, 30/ LW7: 332–333. 104. Jes. (1527–1530), WA312:279, 6/ LW17:24: “Nam iratum opinai deum est nullum deum credere.” 105. Ibid., WA312:282, 10 / LW17:28: “Deique totum se mihi effundet …” 106. Matt.5–7, WA32:328f., 37/ LW21:37: “Denn wer in fur zornig ansihet, der sihet in nicht recht, sondern nur ein furhang und decke ja ein fnster wolcke fur sein angesich gezogen.”

94 M. Ellingsen Cf. Ps.51, WA40II:417, 18/ LW12:374; Ps., WA31I :147f., 14ff./ LW14: 84f. 107. Gen., WA43:200f.,25ff./ LW4:91–95; Fast.(1525), WA17II:13, 14/ CS4:17; Ps.68, WA8:7,13/LW13:7; Ps., WA31I :169f., 32ff./ LW14:94; Jes. (1527– 1530), WA31II:118, 7/ LW16:167. 108. Magn., WA7:546f., 32ff. / LW21:299. 109. Gal. (1535), WA40I : 488, 15ff./ LW26:314. 110. Kl.Proph., W13:101, 18/ LW18:98; cf. Krichpost.G., W211:477, 39/ CS1/2:69; Gen., WA42:561, 1/ LW3:17. 111. Wort., WA23:133, 8/ LW37:57–58; cf. Gen., WA42:40, 32/ LW1: 53–54. 112. Jon., WA19:219, 31/ LW19:68: “Er ist allenthalben gegen wertig ym tod, ynn der hellen, mitten unter den feinden, ya auch ynn yhrem hertzen. Denn er hats alles gemacht und regieret es auch alles, das es mus thun was er wil.” Cf. Ibid., WA19:197, 18/ LW19:44; Serv.arb., WA18:623, 14/ LW33:47. 113. Ab.Chr., WA26:339, 34/ LW37:228: “ … sondern ein ubernatürlich unerforschlich wesen, das zu gleich, ynn eym iglichen fornlin gantz und gar und dennoch ynn allen und uber allen und ausser allen Creaturen sey …” Cf. Wort., WA23:133, 26/ LW37:57–58. 114. Wort., WA23:135, 5/ LW37:58: “ … das nichts gegenwertigers noch ynnerlichers sein kan ynn allen creaturn, den Gott selbs mit seiner gewallt …” 115. Ab.Chr., WA26:339, 39/ LW37:228. 116. Ibid., WA26:339, 25/ LW37:227–228. 117. Serv.arb., WA18:621, 16/ LW33:45: “Iam videamus tationes consilii tui, Deum, esse secundum naturam in antro scarabei vel etiam cloaca (quod tu veris dicere et aarguins Sophistas ita garrire) non minus quam in coelo …” 118. Wort., WA23:137, 33/ LW37:60. 119. Heb., WA57III:162, 2/ LW29:165. 120. Magn., WA7:574,10/ LW21:328; Serv.arb., WA18:18:712,19/ LW33:180. 121. Kirchpost.G., W211:940, 10/ CS2/1:190; cf. Serv.arb., WA18:718, 28/ LW33:189; Magn., WA7:574, 27/ LW21:328. 122. Gal. (1535), WA40I :545, 26/ LW26:356. 123. Jon., WA19:197, 18/ LW19:44; cf. Ibid., WA19:219, 31/ LW19:68; Ab.Chr., WA26:329, 27/ LW37:216. 124. Ev.Joh.3–4, WA47:72,22/LW22:346; Wein.,WA10I/1:188, 6/ LW52:46. 125. Ps.110, WA41:98f., 31/ LW13:243: “ … das eben dises unsers feisches und bluts (das ist: der menschlichen natur) ein stücke droben im himel Zur rechten Gottes … Denn das ist die unausprechlich grosse herrligkeit

3 GOD AND TRINITY 95 und ehre des menschlichen geschlechts, das es so hoch erhaben wird, nicht schlecht gen himel unter die heiligen Engel oder Ertzengel, welches doch treffich grosse Fürsten und Herren sind, sondern schlecht Gotte selbs gleich gestzt …” 126. Gen., WA42:10, 11/ LW1:11–12. 127. Ab.Chr., WA26:505, 38/ LW37:366. 128. Letz.Wort., WA54:58, 19ff./ LW15:303: “Der Son ein unterschiedliche Persone ist vom Vater in derselben einigen Vaterlichen Gottheit, Sein unterscheid ist, das er Son ist, und die Gottheit nicht von sich selbs, noch von jemand, sondern allein vom Vater hat, als ewighlich vom Vater geborn. Der Heilige geist … die Gottheit nicht von sich selbes noch von jemand hat, sondern beide vom Vater und Sone zu gleich und das alles von ewigkeit in ewigkeit.” 129. Ab.Chr., WA26:505,29/LW37:365f.; Letz.Wort., WA54:64,3/ LW15: 309–310. 130. Gen., WA42:38, 2/ LW1:50. 131. Ibid., WA42:43, 19/ LW1:60. 132. Dr. Sym., WA50:275f., 38/ LW34:219. 133. Kirchpost.G., W21:156f., 6/ CS1/1:175–176. 134. Ev.Jn.16, WA46:59, 31/LW24:364–365; Ev.Joh., 1–2, WA46:543f., 6ff./ LW22:8–9. 135. Krichpost.G., W211:1098.14/ CS2/1:354–355. 136. Ab.Chr., WA26:505f., 29ff./ LW37:366. 137. Ev.Jn.14–15, WA45:519, 30/ LW24:64. 138. Kirchpost.E., W212:648.6/ CS4/2.

97 Luther was clearly a Christocentric theologian. In fact, when dealing with Christian life issues or addressing allegations of sloth against Lutherans and challenges to their catholicity, Luther sometimes spoke of Christology or the Work of Christ, not Justifcation, as the heart of Christian faith. In a sermon he wrote, Therefore, this Gospel deals with the great article about Christ, that we should receive Him, kiss and embrace Him, cling to Him, never allow ourselves to be from Him nor Him from us. This is the chief article of Christian doctrine, and on it rests our salvation.1 In a context about Christian living Luther claims that the chief article of faith is the Resurrection of Christ.2 The article of faith that Christ is our Lord is said to be what makes us Christian.3 He is the righteousness of God and the righteousness of faith.4 Luther refers to Christ as like a mother-hen, giving her chicks all she has.5 He is said to deal with us in a fatherly way.6 According to the Reformer, He is closer than a closest friend.7 Luther also speaks of the profound love Christ has for us.8 He is also portrayed as gentle.9 Christ is said to draw all in a kindly manner.10 Luther adds, Therefore, if you believe in Christ, you must not fee from Him or be frightened; for here you perceive and that His whole heart, mind, or CHAPTER 4 Christology © The Author(s) 2017 M. Ellingsen, Martin Luther’s Legacy, DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-58758-9_4

98 M. Ellingsen thinking are intent only rescuing you from all that assails and oppresses you and on placing you with Christ over everything.11 Behold, if we could portray His [Christ’s] heart and press it into our own heart, that He has such a gushing desire, anxiety, and longing for us, then we could not dread or fear Him, but would joyfully run up to Him and abide in Him alone …12 He further elaborates on the love our Lord has for us: The frst thing you see in this person Christ is that He does not look at anyone with a sour face, treat anyone in an unfriendly manner, or frighten and drive anyone away from Him; He invites and draws all to Him in the kindliest manner, both with His words and with His bearing.13 He is found everywhere, Luther contends, no matter our mood. “For He holds in His hands everything.” Therefore, so long as He dwells in my heart, I have courage where I go, I cannot be lost. I dwell where Christ my Lord dwells.14 While seeking to offer consolation, Luther notes that Christ is a Priest more than a Judge.15 He warns against making Him a lawgiver who teaches us how to live, a point most relevant in light of the role Christ plays as an Example for Luther at a number of points.16 He is no lawgiver, not a judge.17 But to have Christ is no longer to be under the Law, Luther contends.18 Christ does not want to teach us how to lead a good life, but to live and rule in us.19 He does not want to be known as a miracle worker. The Reformer does speak of Christ as an Example when exhorting the Christian life.20 He says that Christ is both Gift and Example, but that the latter should only be taught in times of rejoicing, but without temptation (see chapter on Sanctifcation for further elaboration of this point).21 To be sure, the Reformer in turn adds that Christ’s role as Example was “the least important aspect of Christ.”22 We are frst to accept Him as Gift.23 Likewise to regard Christ as Teacher apprehended through reason is of no avail, the Reformer claims, as He could not make us alive.24 The Reformer compellingly describes the awesomeness of the Incarnation:

4 CHRISTOLOGY 99 Reason stumbles at this article when it tries to measure and comprehend it with its wisdom … Here one must believe, not see, measure, or comprehend.25 Luther reminds us that Christ is like us in every way, but without Original Sin.26 He also provides a helpful way of understanding the importance of Christ’s humanity: That is why we should learn our lesson well and earnestly ponder the great honor that has been bestowed on us by Christ’s becoming a human being. For it is such a great honor, that even if one were an angel, you would do well to wish that you were a human being, so that you could boast. My own fesh and blood is greater than all the angels.27 As he puts it in one of his letters: Whoever wishes to think about or to meditate on God in a way which will lead to salvation must subordinate everything else to the humanity of Christ.28 Human though He be, the Majesty of God is still revealed in Christ.29 Indeed, the entire divinity is within the Word.30 The essence of God is given in His Word.31 We can think of God only in Christ.32 With reference to Christ Luther notes, while explicating the logic of faith in dialogue with Zwingli, that “apart from this Man there is no God.”33 In line with His Theology of the Cross, the Reformer notes while preaching that God cannot be found except in Christ.34 Though Christ the hidden, God becomes revealed.35 In Him all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden.36 His human nature is said to bring entrance to God’s idly paternal heart.37 Christ is correspondingly identifed as “the mirror of God’s fatherly heart.”38 God’s essence is said to be fully in the Son.39 He is totally revealed in Christ.40 The whole fullness of God dwells in Christ.41 Thus in Christ we peer into the depths of God’s Fatherly heart and inexhaustible goodness.42 Luther’s own words are instructive at this point: It is because of His [Christ’s] humanity and His Incarnation that Christ becomes sweet to us, and through Him God becomes sweet to us. Let us therefore begin to ascent step by step from Christ’s crying in His

100 M. Ellingsen swaddling clothes up to His Passion. Then we shall easily know God. I am saying this [extolling Christ’s humanity] so that you do not begin to contemplate God from the top. But start with the weak elements.43 Yes, but what the Lord God has in mind is this; Man, you ought to accept Christ just as God sends Him, not as you want Him to be.44 The Son is said to reveal God’s Face.45 God’s face is His graciousness as our Father.46 Luther connects the Will of Christ with the Will of the Father.47 Only through Christ, he adds, do we know God hidden in suffering.48 This overcomes all our despair (Anfechtung).49 Christ gives courage: The faithful dwell where Christ dwells.50 He is a “poison against the Law, sin, and death, and simultaneously a remedy to regain liberty, righteousness, and eternal life.”51 He is a helper and rescuer from death.52 He changes the heart and reason, without breaking down anything in outward affairs.53 Christ cleanses our hearts, putting away our impurity and making us pure.54 The Church and the faithful rest on Christ’s shoulders. All our sins lie there.55 Christ’s Two Natures In line with his Credal commitments and fdelity to Tradition Luther affrms the doctrine of Christ’s Two Natures. He speaks of the Creator becoming a creature.56 We need to assert this, Luther claims, for if God is not involved and does not add His weight to the scale, or weight sinks the balance of the ground.57 If God is not involved in Christ’s Work we will not be saved. The Reformer speaks of Christ emptying Himself in Jesus. He speaks of it in the sense that a prince might empty himself of his power and concern himself with his subjects’ needs.58 He provides a helpful image for portraying the union of the Two Natures in Christ: For humanity and divinity are not one natural single being; but in this one indivisible Person they are so unifed that one cannot be separated from the other; just as sugar water is still water, but the sugar is blended with the water that the two cannot be separated even though they are distinct constituents … Just as you fnd real sugar in sugar water, so the divinity and humanity of Christ form one cake.59

4 CHRISTOLOGY 101 Christ’s divinity and His humanity are so united more intimately than body and soul.60 Luther also spoke of the union of the Two Natures as akin to a glowing iron.61 The Reformer provides us, as he did in the case of the Trinity, with some helpful images for making sense of Christology as a mystery of the faith. The Influence of Ancient Africa As we shall observe throughout the book, Luther was infuenced by several theological commitments of ancient North Africa. This is readily apparent in his endorsement of the communicatio idiomatuum, typical of the Alexandrian School of theology in the ancient world. This commitment entails that the idioms of Christ (the characteristics of each Nature) can be attributed to the other. Whatever you say of Jesus humanity you can say of His divinity.62 Thus it follows that Luther teaches that what Christ died and suffers, essentially God does too.63 Luther also describes Christ’s humanity as the “tool and house of the deity.”64 His human nature is said to share the properties of the divine nature—omnipresence.65 And Mary is said to be Mother of God.66 More on Mariology Regarding Mariology, Luther was open to the Perpetual Virginity of Mary.67 He clearly affrms this even in later sermons.68 He even did not deny the Immaculate Conception with Christian life issues at stake.69 But he contended that this is not in Scripture.70 Luther once claimed when merely explicating texts that Mary was born in sin.71 We will have more to say about Mary’s and the role of the saints in prayer later in Chap. 10. Luther rejects the Assumption of Mary, saying it is papist.72 In another case, he says that we do not know how Mary got to heaven.73 An Inconsistent Alexandrian At one point in his career Luther seems to have denied the communion of idioms, while still endorsing the ubiquity of Christ’s Body. But this occurs in his Notes on Peter Lombard’s Sentences, as he observes that the Magisterium has not understood that its sanction authorizes this position.74 However, even if this denial of the Alexandrian position in

102 M. Ellingsen its context as a mere observation of what seems unwittingly entailed by Church teaching is accurate, we must still observe that when speaking of examples of faith or engaging in polemics with unbridled reason, Luther seems to have embraced the alternative Antiochene Christology in claiming that Christ’s divine nature did not die.75 God does not suffer, he asserted in such contexts.76 Something like an Antiochene Christology appears when Luther teaches that the Spirit of God did not move Christ equally every time.77 The indwelling of the Logos becomes more perfect in the course of ethical development, Luther contended.78 Once when dialoguing with critics of the strangeness Christ, contending that only Christians know Jesus, Luther also asserted that the Father did not suffer.79 On the other hand, while explicating faith or critiquing Zwingli he contended that God suffered and died in Christ’s death.80 As Christ suffered, God suffered and died, the frst Reformer contended.81 God is said to be afficted when we are afficted.82 Likewise Christ is said to bring our human nature “to the level of direct equality with God,” bringing it into the Godhead.83 Why It Matters Luther nicely summarizes an answer to the question posed in this section. Christ became our sin, the Reformer asserts, so that His righteousness might be ours.84 Christ is also said to be the greatest of all sinners (a point that links with the Reformer’s discussion of Christian life as brave sinning): And all the proponents saw this, that Christ was to become the greatest thief, murderer, adulterer, robber, desecrator, blasphemer, etc. there has ever been anywhere in the world.85 Christ does not want to be known as a miracle worker, Luther notes.86 In His glorifcation we have a continuous reality, where He now exercises dominion, not limited as it was when He dwelt on earth in visible form. Now He can be in touch with and reign over all. Luther speaks of this Lordship as active and energetic.87 In this connection, as already noted, Luther asserts that in Christ, our human nature sits in heaven with God, almost to the level of direct

4 CHRISTOLOGY 103 equality with God Himself.88 Deifcation is suggested here, as Luther deals with how we are to believe—a Christian life concern. In his fnal sermon, the Reformer nicely has Christ Himself express why He makes things better for the faithful: If things go badly, I will give you the courage even to laugh about it; and if even though you walk on fery coals, the torment shall nevertheless … not be so bad, and you will rather feel that you are walking on roses. I will give you the heart to laugh …89 Luther writes elsewhere: … He [Christ] does not come with a great voice, with storm and commotion, but very orderly; not changing nor breaking anything in the outward affairs of human life … but He illumines and changes for the better his heart and reason.90 Luther profoundly summarizes Christ’s signifcance for us: But, as Christ said earlier, it all depends on whether you feel and fnd that you love this man [Jesus]. For if you truly believe this, then love will be there, and your heart will be moved … Should I not thank, praise, honor and serve Him with my life and my goods? If not, I should be ashamed that I am a human being. Therefore Christ declares, “Sincere love for me is part of a true Christian.”91 Notes 1. Hspost., W213II:1420f.14/ CS5:82: “Also handelt dies Euangelium den hohen Artikel von Christo, dass wir annehmen sollen ihn füssen und herzen, uns an ihn hängen, uns von ihm nicht reissen, noch ihn uns nehmen lassen. Das ist das Hauptstück christlicher Lehre und darauf steht der Grund unserer Seligkeit.” Cf. Schmal.Art., I.II, WA50:198f., 23ff./ BC301.1ff. (not surprisingly includes reference to the doctrine of Justifcation since there is a concern in this text with the logic of faith as well as concern for practice of the Christian life); Magn., WA7:599f., 32ff./ LW21:354; Gal. (1535), WA40I :33,7/ LW27: 145; Dr. Sym., WA50:226, 22/ LW34:207; Rom., WA56:371, 17/ LW25: 361; 1 Pet., WA12:259, 8/ LW30:3; TR (1532), WATR2:242, 1; Men., WA10II:73, 15/ LW35:132; Pred. (1538), WA46:414, 14.

104 M. Ellingsen 2. 1 Pet., WA12:268, 17/ LW30:12. 3. Ev.Joh.3–4, WA47:61, 10/ LW22:334. 4. Dict.Ps., WA3:457f., 38ff./ LW 10:401–402; Gal. (1535), WA40I :229, 31/ LW26:130. 5. Wein., WA10I/1:284, 9/ CS1/1:234–235; Ev.Joh.6–8, WA33:522, 11/ LW23:325. 6. Hspost., W213II:1994.16/ CS6:58–59. 7. Ev.Joh.6–8, WA33:235, 2/ LW23:150; TR(1532), WATR2:67, 32/ LW54:143. 8. Hspost., W213II:1813f.24/ CS5:427. 9. Jes. (1527–1530), WA31II:310f., 32ff./ LW17:64; Fest., WA17II:396, 15/ LW51:131. 10. Ev.Joh, 6–8, WA33:87, 20/ LW23:59. 11. Pred. (1532), WA36:590, 20/ LW28:139–140: “Darumb darfftu ja nicht fur ym fiehan noch erschrecken, so du an Christum gleubt, Denn hie hörest und fhestu, das er kein ander hertz und sinn odder gedancken hat, denn dich dich aus allem, so dich anfchtet und drucket, zu retten und mit Christo uber alles zu setzen …”. 12. Kirchpost.G., W211:1261.44/ CS2/2:86–87: “Siehe, wenn wir könnten also sein Herz malen und in unser Herz drücken, das ser solche ausgeschüttete Begiende, Angst und Verlangen nach uns hat; so könnten wir uns ja nicht vor ihm entsetzen noch fürchten, sondern würden fröhlich zu ihm lauten und bei ihm allein bleiben ….”. 13. Ev.Joh.14–15, WA45:515f., 37ff./ lW24:60: “Denn and dieser person Christ siheftu erstlich, das er niemand faur ansihet noch un frendlich handelt, oder schrecket und von sich jagt, Sondern jderman beide, mit worten und geberden auffs freundlichkeit zu sich locket und reitzet.” 14. Kirchpost.E., W212:887.46/ CS4/2:279: “Darum wenn er in meinem Herzen wohnt, so bleibt der Muth stehen; wo ich hinkomme und fahre, kann ich nicht verloren werden. Denn wo Christus, mein Herr bleibt, da bleibe ich auch.” 15. Heb., WA57III:165, 9/ LW29:167. 16. Antinom.(3), WA39I :535, 7. 17. Gal. (1535) WA40I : 298, 19/ LW26:178; Kl.Ant., WA38;148, 12; Pred. (1535/1536), WA41:653, 41; Ev.Joh.14–15, WA45:482, 16/ LW24:24; Matt.18–24, WA47:590, 1. 18. Hspost., W213II:2631.14/ CS7:251. 19. Gal.(1535), WA40I :562f., 26ff./ LW26:368; Ibid., WA40I :568f., 25ff./ LW26:372f. Also see n.16, above. 20. Serm.Beriet., WA2:691f., 23ff./ LW42:107–108; Rom., WA56:136, 12/ LW25:119; Ibid., WA56:137, 19/ LW25:120; Tess.Con., WA6:114, 16/ LW42:135–136; Disp.just., WA2:148, 32/ LW31:302.

4 CHRISTOLOGY 105 21. Gal. (1535), WA40II:42,29/LW27:34; Kl.unt., WA10I/1:11,1/ LW35: 119; cf. Kl.unt., WA10I/1:11, 12/ LW35:119. 22. Br.Schwar., WA15:396, 16: “ … wie Christus eyn exempel sey, wilchs das geringst stuck an Christo ist …” Cf. Kl.unt., WA10I/1:8f, 18ff./ LW35:117. 23. Kl.unt., WA10I/1:11, 12/ LW35:119. 24. Ev.Joh.6–8, WA33:259, 21/ LW23:165. 25. Pred. (1540/1545), WA49:248f, 31ff.: “Die Vernunfft stosset sich an diesem Artikel, wenn sie in messen und fassen wil mit yrer fugheit … es heisset gegleubet, nicht gesehen, gemessen oder gegriffen …”. 26. Hspost., W213II:2659.8/ CS7:277. 27. Ibid., WA213II:1483.12/ CS5:137: “Darum sollen wir wohl lernen und mit Ernst bedenken, erstlich zu was Ehren wir sind gekommen in dem, dass Christus ist Mensch geworden. Denn es ist ein solche Ehre, dass wenn einer ein Engel ware, wünschen möchte rühmen: Mein Fleisch und Blut ftzt über alle Engel …”. 28. Br (1519), WABR1:329, 50: “ …quicunque velit salubriter de Deo cogitare aut speculari, prorsus omnia postponat praeter humanitatem Christi.” Cf. Ev.Joh.6–8, WA33:154f., 37ff./ LW23:102. 29. Ev.Joh.6–8, WA47:210,9/LW22:504; Heb., WA57III:99f.,1ff./ LW29:111. 30. Wein., WA10I/1:188,7f./LW52:46; Ibid., WA10I/1:186,15f./ LW52:46/ LW52:45. 31. Kirchpost. (1522), WA10I/1:188, 61/ LW52:42. 32. Ev.Joh.14–15, WA45:517, 4/ LW24:61–62; Ev.Joh.6–8, WA33:189, 27/ LW23:123. 33. Ab.Chr., WA26:332, 19/ LW37:218; “ … und ausser diesem menschen kein Gott ist …” Cf. Ps., WA31I :63, 21. 34. Ev.Joh.6–8, WA33:179f., 40ff./ LW23:117; Hspost., W213II:2586.3/ CS7:210. 35. Gen., WA43:460, 29/ LW5:46. 36. Gal. (1535), WA40I :79, 3/ LW26:30. 37. Leid.Christ., WA2:140f.,35ff./LW42:13; Ev.Joh.1–2, WA46:674, 2/ LW22:158; BR (1519), WABR1:329,50ff. Cf. Ev.Joh.14–15, WA45:589, 31/ LW24:141; Kl.Kat., II.2. WA30I :295, 14/ BC 355.4. 38. Dtsch.Kat., II.3, WA30I :192,3/BC:439f.65; cf. Ev.Joh.14–15, WA45:514,17/ LW24:59; Pred. (1526), WA20:228,9; Fast., WA17II:244, 27; Serm.heil. Leid., WA2:140, 30/ LW42:13. 39. Heb., WA57III:99f., 12ff./ LW29:111. 40. Wein., 10I/1:188, 6/ LW52:46. 41. Gen., WA43:583, 7/ LW5:224; Heb., WA57III:99, 3/ LW29:111; Gal. (1535), WA40I :79, 3/LW26:30.

106 M. Ellingsen 42. Pred.(1526), WA20:228, 12. 43. Jes. (1527–1530), WA31II: 516, 24/ LW17:331: “Nam ex humanitate Christi et eius incarnacione duleescit nobis Christus et per hunc deus nobis duleescit. Ita incipiamus ascendere gradatim ex vagitu Christi in incunabulis usque ad passionem. Deinde facile deum agnoscemus. Haec ideo loquor, ne in summo incipiatis deum considerare, sed ab infrmis incipite.” Cf. BR (1519), WABR1:329, 50; Ev.Joh.6–8, WA33:157, 3/ LW23:103. 44. Hspost., W213II:1419.11/ CS5:81: “Ja, da hat unser Herr Gott Lust zu: hinter sich, meine ich. Es heist: Lieber Mensch, du sollst Christum also annehmen, wie ihn Gott sendet, nicht, wie du ihn haben willst.” 45. Ev.Joh.1–2, WA46:673, 8/ LW22:157. 46. Matt.5–7, WA43:329, 1/ LW21:37. 47. Joh., 6–8, WA23:90f.,41ff./ LW23:61; Ev.Joh.14–15, WA45:589, 31/ LW24: 141. 48. Disp. Heid., WA1:362, 23/ LW31:53. 49. Kirchpost.G., W211:728.9/ CS1/2:357; Pred. (1525), WA17I :42, 24ff./ LW51:128. 50. Kirchpost.E., W212:887.46/ CS4/2:279. 51. Gal. (1535, WA40I :278, 28/ LW26:163: “ Sic Christus simul est venenum contra legem peccatum et morten et remedium pro libertate, iustitia et vita aeterna.” 52. Hspost., W213II:2540.1/ CS7:177. 53. Kirchpost.G., W211:752f.13/ CS1/2:384. 54. Kirchpost.E., W212:120.42/ CS3/2:135. 55. Hspost., W213II:2591f.16/ CS7:226–227. 56. Pred. (1533/1534), WA37:43f., 39ff. 57. Konz., WA50:590, 1/ LW41:103–104; cf. Pred. (1522), WA10III:74, 1; Fast., WA17II:236, 12. 58. Wellt. Uber., WA11:273, 14/ LW45:120. 59. Ev.Joh.6–8., WA33:232, 4/ LW23:148–149: “Denn die Menscheit und Gottheit ist wol nicht ein näturlich einigs wesen, dennoch sind sie in der einigen und unzertreulichen Person, das man sie nicht von einander scheiden kan. Gleich wie Zuckerwasser ist wasser, aber also vermenget mit dem Zucker, das niemand isst kan Zucker und wasser voneinander scheiden, obs wol fur sich zweierley naturen sind … gleich wie im Zuckerwassert du den waren Zucker befndet, also wird aus der Gottheit und Menscheit des Herr Iesus auck in ein Kucher.” 60. Ab.Chr., WA26:340, 22/ LW37:229; Ibid., WA26:333, 11/ LW37:219; Disp.Christ., WA39II: 114,14; Ev.Joh.14–15, WA45:558,14/ LW24:106–107; Ev.Joh.3–4, WA47:56, 10/ LW22:328.

4 CHRISTOLOGY 107 61. Ev.Joh.6–8, WA33:191, 4/ LW23:123–124; Aus.Joh., WA49:250; Gal. (1535), WA40I :417, 17/ LW26:266. 62. Ev.Joh.3–4, WA47:72,24/ LW22:346; Konz., WA50:589,21/ LW41:103; Ev.Joh.14–15, WA45:557,7/ LW24:105–106; Ibid., WA45:556,3/ LW24:1 04;1Tim., WA26:38,18/ LW28:265; Promodisp. Fab., WA39II:280,16; Disp. Christ., WA39II:93, 4; Ev.Joh.3–4, WA47:76f., 33ff./ LW22:351; Ess.53, WA40III: 704, 5; Pred. (1537), WA45:300, 37ff.; Letz.Wort., WA54:92, 17/ LW15:343. There is an obvious indebtedness to the ancient Alexandrian School of Christology, though nowhere did I fnd Luther to invoke Cyril of Alexandria. The Reformer’s dependence on Athanasian Christology has been argued by Wilhelm Maurer, “Die Einheit der Theologie Luthers,” Kirche und Geschichte. Gesammelte Aufsatze (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1970), 1:11–21. For references to the comunicatio idiomatum in the writings of ancient African theology, see Athanasius, Four Discourses Against the Arians (ca.359), III.XXVI.33; Cyril of Alexandria, Epistola XVII (430). 63. Ep. 1.Joh., WA20:605, 21/ LW30:223; Ev.Joh.16–20, WA28:486, 24; Pred. (1533–1536), WA41:481, 3; Wein., WA10I/1:150, 22. 64. Wein, WA10I/1:447, 12: “ …gewissen eyn handgetzeug und hawss der gottheit …”. 65. Wort., WA23:137f.,8ff./LW37:59ff.; Ab.Chr., WA26:321,19/ LW37:210. 66. Magn., WA7:555,33/ LW21:308; Ibid., WA7:558,10/ LW21:311; Ibid., WA7:568f.,2ff./ LW21:322f.; Ibid., WA7:573f.,19ff./ LW21:326f.; Jud., WA11:314, 2/ LW45:199. 67. Jud., WA11:319f., 32ff./ LW45:205–206. 68. Pred. (1540/1545), WA49:174, 49; Ibid., WA49:182, 6. 69. Magn., WA7:573, 4/ LW21:327; Fast., WA17II:288, 5 (here he insists that Mary was not born in sin). 70. Fast. (1525), WA17II:280, 19. 71. Pred (1540/1545), WA49:173, 9. 72. Haus., WA52:681, 6. 73. Pred. (1527), WA10III:269, 18. 74. Hndb.Sent., WA9:88, 28ff. 75. Wein., WA10I/1:416, 14/ CS1/1:284. 76. Pred. (1525), WA17I :72, 12. 77. Wein., WA10I/1:446f., 7ff./ CS1/1:303–304. 78. Ibid., WA10I/1:447, 11/ CS1/1:306. 79. Ev.Joh.14–15,WA45:550, 36/ LW24:99. 80. Ab.Chr., WA26:319, 33/ LW37:209–210; Letz. Wort., WA54:92, 13/ LW15:343; 2.Ps., WA5:50, 9/ LW14:316; Konz., WA50: 589, 26/ LW41:103; Ess.53, WA40III:721, 5.

108 M. Ellingsen 81. Ab.Chr., WA26:321, 19/ LW37:310; Promodisp.Fab., WA39II:280, 18; Disp.Christ., WA39II:121, 8. 82. Jes. (1527–1530), WA31II:538, 17/ LW17:358. 83. Ps.101, WA41:98f., 34ff./ LW13:243: “Denn das ist die unasuprechlich grosse herrligkeit und ehre des menschichen geschlechts, das es so hoch erhaben wird nicht schlecht gen himel under die heiligen Engel oder Ertzengel, welches doch treffich grosse Fürsten und Herren sind, sondern schlecht Gotte selbs gleich gesetz.” 84. 2.Ps., WA5:607, 32; Ibid., WA5:605, 11; cf. Gal.(1519), WA2:534, 34/ LW27:288. 85. Gal. (1535), WA40I :433f., 26ff./ LW26:277: “Et hoc viderunt omnes Prophetae, quod Christus futurus esset omnium maximus latro homicida, adulter, fur, sacrilegus, blasphemus, etc., quo nullus maior unquam in mundo fuerit …”. 86. TR (1533), WATR1:294f., 24ff./ LW54:111–112. 87. Kirchpost.G., W2:11:940.23/ CS2/1:190–191; Kirchpost.E., W2:12:886.46/ CS4/2:279. 88. Ps.101, WA51:98f.,34ff./ LW13:243; cf. Serm.heil.Leid, WA2:140f., 27ff./ LW42:13. 89. Pred. (1546), WA51:194, 12/ LW51:392: “Gehets euch ubel, so wil ich euch den mut geben, das ir noch dazu lachen solt, und sol euch die warter nicht so gros sein, der Teufel nicht so böse, wenn ir auch auff fewrigen Nolen gienget, so sols euch düncken, als gienget ir auff Rosen, Ich wil euch das hertz geben das ir lachen solt …”. 90. Kirchpost.G., W2:11:752f.13/ CS1/2:384: “ … da kommt er nicht mit Beche und Boltern, Stürmen und Rumoren; sondern sein säuberlich und gemach fährt verrückt, bricht und zerstört nichts in äusserlichem und menschlichem Leben … sondern das Herz und Verstand erleuchtet und bessert.” 91. Ev. Joh.14–15, WA45:594f., 29ff./ LW24:146: “Es ligt aber alles daran ob du solchs bey dir fülest und fndest (wie er droben auch gesagt hat), das du diesen man lieb habest, Denn wo ir solchs warhafftig gleubet, so wird auch die Liebe da sein, und werdet fülen ewer hertz also gesinnet … Solt ich dem in nicht widerumb lieben dancken und loben, dienen und ehren mit leib und gut? Wolt ich doch ehe wüindschen, das ich kein mensch geboren were. Darumb (sagt er) gehoret zum rechtschaffen Christen, das er Mich von hertzen lieb habe …”.

109 Contrary to popular consensus Luther posited a strong doctrine of the Holy Spirit. He makes a distinction between the Spirit as Person (the Spirit in His divine Nature) and the Spirit as He is given to us (His actions). We focus frst on the Spirit’s actions.1 To be sure, Luther was very critical of the Enthusiasts/Spiritualists of his day (Karlstadt, and Zwickau Prophets, and Thomas Muntzer). What concerned him was that they compromised the primacy of God’s Word and grace. Luther insisted that the Spirit claimed by these Reformers needed to be tested by the Word. As he put it, they had devoured the Holy Spirit, feathers and all, even introducing new laws purportedly given by the Spirit.2 They seem not to know suffering and cross, but only glory and triumph.3 The Reformer claimed their desire for extraordinary religious experience clings to all because of sin.4 Luther criticized these leaders’ stress on the Holy Spirit for inverting the order which prioritized God’s outward action on us (the Word) over our subjective experience of it (see Chap. 2). He wrote: Now when God sends forth His holy Gospel he deals with us in a twofold manner, frst outwardly, then inwardly. Outwardly he deals with us through the oral word of the Gospel and through material signs, that is Baptism and the Sacrament of the Altar. Inwardly he deals with us through the Holy Spirit, faith, and other gifts. But whatever their measure or order the outward factors should and must precede. The inward experience follows and is effected by the outward … His [Karlstadt’s] insolence leads him to set up CHAPTER 5 The Holy Spirit © The Author(s) 2017 M. Ellingsen, Martin Luther’s Legacy, DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-58758-9_5

110 M. Ellingsen a contrary order and, as we have said, seeks to subordinate God’s outward order to an inner spiritual one … he wants to get the Spirit frst.5 God is to be found in the Word, for the Holy Spirit is given in the Gospel; it is there we lay hold of Him in the right way, the Reformer noted.6 And then he adds another interesting insight to critique the Enthusiasts (like the Zwickau Prophets and others) encountering him: “Because of sin we must not act arrogantly like the Fanatics who imagine themselves perfect.”7 Luther believed that these Enthusiasts seemed to think they had achieved perfection because they claimed authority merely on the basis of their experience, with no need for verifcation by externals like Scripture or church institutions.8 He criticized those claiming to have the Spirit apart from the Word.9 For him, Word and Sacrament are the veils through which the Spirit works.10 The Spirit, Luther observes, is only a Schoolmaster, teaching the Word. The Word precedes the Spirit’s Work, not the Spirit working without the Word.11 The Spirit, the Reformer notes, puts God’s Word in our hearts.12 He adds: “God wants to give the Holy Spirit through the Word, and without the Word He does not want to do it.”13 Second, it is shown that this Word precedes, or must be spoken beforehand, and that afterwards the Holy Spirit works through the Word. One must not reverse the order and dream of a Holy Spirit Who works without the Word and before the Word, but One Who comes with and through the Word and goes no farther than the Word goes.14 As we have noted, for Luther external elements of faith must come before internal elements.15 In other words, God is to be found in the Word; it is there we lay hold of Him in the right way.16 Who the Spirit Is What He Does The distinction between as the Spirit as Person and as given to us is a bit like the Reformer’s claim that God in His Nature is our enemy in threatening us with the Law, but when uniting Himself to us He is a friend.17 We have already noted Luther’s description of the Spirit in Himself as Listener to the divine conversation between Father and Son. As given to us, Luther identifes the Spirit as Sanctifer “the One Who still makes us holy” (Who sanctifes us). His Work is said to involve the beginning.18

5 THE HOLY SPIRIT 111 Elsewhere this sanctifying work by the Spirit is seen through the purging and mortifcation of sin.19 In His role as Sanctifer, the Spirit is said daily to increase holiness (comments signifcantly made in the Catechisms, concerned to teach Christian life).20 When exhorting comfort Luther notes that only the Spirit brings about the right Knowledge of Christ.21 No one can understand God unless receiving it immediately from the Holy Spirit.22 Nor can we correctly understand Scripture without the Spirit, Luther adds.23 In a 1527 sermon he writes: … the Holy Spirit, the real teacher, comes and gives power to the Word so that it takes hold.24 Without the Holy Spirit we are ungodly.25 We hate God.26 Luther proceeds to note that it is the Spirit’s Work in making possible the distinction between Law and Gospel.27 The Spirit also gives the Church the power to distinguish letter and spirit.28 And we are reminded by the Reformer that we get nowhere in faith without the Spirit: Flesh and blood are too weak to obtain this glorious confdence [that we are servants of Christ]: the Holy Spirit is essential.29 We need the Holy Spirit in order to know what has been given to us.30 Without the Spirit we would know nothing of Christ.31 The Spirit makes possible the language game of faith distinct from philosophy, as was discussed in the frst chapter.32 As noted, Luther believes that the Spirit only comes from preaching of Scripture, while outlining his testimony to faith.33 Thus the Spirit only comes through material and physical things like Sacramental elements and the Word.34 The Spirit is nowhere more alive than in the holy letters themselves.35 We cannot come to Christ and believe in Him without the Spirit.36 The Spirit is necessary in order to understand Scripture.37 Luther notes that wherever Christ’s Name is, there is the Spirit.38 The Spirit is said to bring Christ into our hearts and so gains control over believers leading them to feel compelled to admit it is true and right.39 And so (most importantly) faith is a work of the Spirit!40 The Spirit makes our faith sure, removing all doubts.41 When exhorting Christian life or comforting despair, Luther broke with the Theology of the Cross’ claim that faith and feeling are in tension claiming that no one can

112 M. Ellingsen receive he Word without “feeling it,” without “feeling Christ.”42 Even the preparation we do for hearing God’s Word is a Work of the Spirit, Luther adds when undercutting pride.43 The Spirit comforts the afficted and the despairing.44 He gives courage, brings us into the Church’s lap, and creates new hearts.45 The Reformer observes that when God [through the Spirit] draws us, it is not like a hangman dragging us, but done in a friendly fashion.46 The lowliness of Christ can only be perceived through the Spirit.47 When discussing Justifcation Luther affrms this point and almost everything that follows, but he seems open to placing more emphasis on this when he claims that the Spirit also inscribes biblical insights into our hearts by faith.48 He does this and makes creatures who love and willingly obey God.49 In other comments made while preaching or explicating the logic of faith, Luther claims that the Spirit makes alive: As a hen broods her eggs, keeping them warm in order to hatch her chicks, and, as it were, to bring them to life through her, so Scripture says that the Holy Spirit brooded, as it were, on the waters to bring life to those substances which were quickened and adorned. For it is the offce of the Holy Spirit to make alive.50 The Spirit is also said to be the agent of making us born again and so loving.51 Not one of us can preach the Word adequately, Luther says; the Spirit must do it.52 He is the Divine Pilot of the ship of faith.53 Christians are flled with the Spirit, Who begins new obedience in us.54 But while Luther connects the Work of the Spirit in these cases with a Third Use of the Law (obedience) in texts devoted to exhorting Christian living (against Antinomians), in a different pastoral context more concerned with exhorting faith or comfort Luther refers to the spontaneity of the good works, that we become drunk with the Spirit, with the richest knowledge of God.55 We cannot separate love from the Holy Spirit, Luther says.56 The Spirit sets our hearts on fre.57 He creates new hearts.58 Creates the new creation and must mortify our deeds.59 The Spirit can defy the world.60 He is generous and kind in bearing with sins.61 As previously noted, the Holy Spirit must make us holy and sustain us. Without the Spirit there is no grace.62 He creates a new man, completely changing us.63 The Spirit makes us bold and happy.64 Without the Spirit we could not bear the devil and the world.65 Through the

5 THE HOLY SPIRIT 113 Spirit we cheerfully and gladly do all we should do.66 Again we observe here Luther positing the spontaneity of good works. The Reformer calls the Spirit a Comforter.67 He consoles and strengthens.68 The Spirit “kindles a new fame of fre in us, namely, love and desire to do God’s Commandments.” (He makes these comments about obeying the Law in the context of a sermon exhorting the faithful to Christian living.69) Elsewhere in another sermon, as we previously noted, Luther claims that we can only do good works when done from the heart out of love, and this cannot happen unless born again through the Holy Spirit.70 The Spirit is said to be the source of every good thought.71 His Presence creates the ability and necessity to pray.72 In another sermon Luther notes that the Spirit comes (and so takes us) when and where He will.73 He is superior to the Law.74 In this sense, for this reason, the Holy Spirit and our sin should be mingled. We are like sick men in the hands of a physician. No one should think that because he has the Spirit he must be altogether strong.75 Indeed, Luther notes, it is the Spirit Who makes the Law properly function to contribute to Justifcation by terrifying and bruising us.76 In view of his awareness of the realities of our remaining sin, even after receiving the Holy Spirit, Luther speaks of the Spirit and grace as a “medicine …”77 He stands by to keep us from falling into error.78 Without the Holy Spirit, hearts are either hardened in sin or in despair.79 As Author of the Law it is only by the Spirit’s work that the Law condemns sin.80 In addition, the Spirit is the One Who consoles and strengthens until His Work is fully accomplished.81 Explaining the Creed for preaching and learning, Luther speaks of the Spirit continuing God’s Work when “creation is now behind us” and “redemption has also taken place.”82 Luther also says the Spirit creates, calls, and gathers the Church. As creator of faith, new hearts, and good works He truly is Spiritus Creator for Luther.83 Notes 1. Antinom. (1), WA39I :370, 12 / Lohse:233. 2. Br.auf.geyst., WA15:213, 11ff./ LW40:52; Himm.Proph., WA18:66, 17/ LW40:83; Ibid., WA18:73, 14ff./ LW40:90. 3. BR (1522), WABR2:423, 61/ LW48:364. 4. Schmal.Art., III.8, WA50:246, 20ff./ BC:323.9ff.

114 M. Ellingsen 5. WA18:136, 9ff./ LW40:146, 147: “So nu Gott seyn heyliges Euangelioun hat auslaffen gehen, handelt er mit uns auff zweyerley weyse. Syn mal eusserlich, das ander mal ynnerlich. Eusserlich handelt er mit uns durchs mündliche wort des Euangelii und durch leypliche zeychen, alls do ist Taufe und Sacrament. Ynnerlich handelt er mit uns durch den heyligen geyst und glauben sampt andern gaben. Aber das alles der massen und der ordenung, das die eusserlichen stucke sollen und müssen vorgehen … das er diesen orden umblere und eynen widdersynnischen auffrichte aus eygenem frevel und füret die sache der wassen: Erstlich, was Gott eusserlich ordenet zum geyst ynnerlich, wie gesagt ist … er das ynn wind und will zuvor hyneyn ynn den geyst.” Cf. Ev.Joh.1–2, WA46:582, 17/ LW22:54; Schmal.Art., III.8, WA50: 245f., 1ff./ BC322–323. 6. Serm. Sak., WA19:492, 22/ LW36:342; Gal. (1535), WA40I :336, 34/ LW26:208. 7. Kirchpost. E., W212:624.14/ CS4/1:334–335: “Darum sage ich, dass man hier klug sein muss, und darauf sehen, dass man von dem Heiligen Geist nicht so trotze und fruendig poche, wie etlich hoffährtige, vermessene Schwarmgeister thun, auf dass nicht jemand zu sicher fahre und sich dünken lasse, dass er allenthalben vollkommen sei.” 8. BR (1522), WABR2:424f., 9ff./ LW48:366; Rad., WA15:42,15ff./ LW45: 365, 366; Himm.Proph., WA18:213, 23ff./ LW40:222. 9. Schmal.Art., III.8, WA50:245, 1/ BC:322.3. 10. Promodisp.Pall., WA39I :244, 19. 11. Kirchpopst.G., W211:1073.74/ CS2/1:329. 12. Pred. (1522), WA10III:260, 21. 13. Pred. 2. Mos., WA16:270, 18: “ … den Gott wil den heiligen Geist, geben durch das wort, one wort wil est nicht thun.” 14. Kirchpost.G., W211:1073.75/ CS2/1:329: “Zum andern, ist auch das hierin angezeigt, das solch Wort muss vorher gehen oder zuvor geredet werden, und darnach der Heilige Geist dadurch wirken; also dass mans nicht umkehre, und eineneHeiligen Geist träune, der ohne Wort und vor dem Wort wirke, sondern mit und durch das Wort komme, und nicht weiter gehe, den soweil solch Wort gehet.” 15. Himm.Proph., WA18:136, 9/ LW40:146. 16. Serm. Sak., WA19:492, 22/ LW36:342. 17. Antinom. (1), WA39I :370, 13. 18. Dtsch.Kat.,II.3,WA30I :188,21/BC:436.40ff; Kl.Kat.,II.III, WA30I :297, 28/ BC: 355.6 – the Spirit is said to sanctify us. Antinom.(1), WA39I :370f., 18ff. WA39I :391, 19. Konz., WA50:624, 28/ LW41:143–144. 20. Dtsch.Kat., II.3, WA30I :191, 8/ BC:439.59. 21. Kirchpost.G., W211:627.11/ CS1/2 :243.

5 THE HOLY SPIRIT 115 22. Magn., WA7:546, 26/ LW21:299. 23. Hspost., W213II:1987.4/CS6:20; Ibid.,W213II:1989.9/CS6:22– 23;KirchpostG., W2 11:758.26/ CS1/2:390. 24. Fest., WA17II:460, 5: “ … so kompt der heylige geyst, der rechte schülmeyster und gibt dem wort krafft, das es befeybet.” 25. Gen., WA42:291, 30/ LW2:42. 26. Ibid., WA42:292, 27/ LW2:43. 27. TR (1531), WATR2:3f., 20ff./ LW54:127; Pred. (132), WA36:13, 22. 28. Dict.Ps., WA3:12, 2/ LW10:4. 29. Kirchpost.E., W212:824.35/ CS4/2:210: “So sind wir ohne das zu schwach nach Fleisch und Blut, solchen Ruhm zu erhalten, darum gehört der Heilige Geist hiezu …” Cf. Vor.N.T., WADB7:11, 17/ LW35:371. For numerous references to the Spirit working faith, see pp. 202–203, nn.111–112. 30. Tit., WA25:73, 20/ LW29:98. 31. Dtsch.Kat., II.3, WA30I :192, 6/ BC:439f.65; cf. Ibid., WA30I :188, 31/ BC:436.44. 32. Disp.Christ., WA39II:104, 18. 33. Schmal. Art.III.8, WA50:245, 1/ BC322.3. 34. Wort., WA23:193, 31/ LW37:95. 35. Assert.art., WA7:97, 2: “ … spiritus nusquam praesentius et vivacius quam in ipsis sascris suis, quas scripsit, literas inveniri potest.” 36. Kl.Kat., II.3, WA30I :297, 25/BC:355.6; Thes. Wel., WA39I : 44, 4/ LW34: 109. 37. Serv.arb., WA18:609, 5/ LW33:28. 38. Serm.dr.gut., WA7:801, 16/ LW44:241. 39. Wein., WA10I/1:130, 14/ LW52:33. 40. Magn., WA7:546,24/ LW21:299; Pred. (1538),WA46:422,1; Ev.Joh.1– 2,WA46:582,17/ LW22:54; Vor. N.T., WADB7:10,6/ LW35:370–371; Ev.Joh. 14–15,WA45:579,30/ LW24:130; Ibid., WA45:729,5/ LW24:294; Ibid., WA45:654, 15/ LW24:212; Magn., WA7:546, 24/ LW21:299; Jes. (1527–1530),WA31II:439, 37/ LW17:230; Hspost., W213II: 2069.12/ CS6:171; Ibid., W213II:2125.12/ CS6:220; Kl.Kat., II.3, WA30I :297f., 25ff./ BC:355.6; Himm.Proph., WA18:139,13/ LW40:149; Fest., WA17II:459f., 35ff.; Jon., WA19:206, 28/LW19:54. Sometimes Luther just calls faith a work of God; see Pred. (1523), WA12:422ff., 32ff. 41. Ev.Joh.14–15, WA45:729, 5/ LW24:294. 42. Magn., WA7:546, 24/ LW21:299; Beid.Ges., WA10II:23, 6/ LW36:248. 43. Pred. (1523), WA12:497, 3. 44. Gal. (1535), WA40 :58, 20/ LW26:383.

116 M. Ellingsen 45. Hspost., W213II:2059.26/ CS6:163; Ibid., W213II:2058.22/ CS6:161; Dtsch.Kat.,II.3,WA30I :187f.,37ff./ BC:435f.37;Kirchpost.E., W212:621f.7f./ CS4/1:332. 46. Ev.Joh.6–8, WA33:130ff., 39ff./ LW23:86. 47. Jes. (1527–1530), WA31II:500, 12/ LW17:311. 48. Letz.Wort., WA54:36, 35/ LW15:277. 49. Kirchpost.E., W 12:621.5/ CS4/1:331. 50. Gen., WA42:8,25/ LW1:9: “His Spiritus sanctus incubat; sicut eninm gallina incubat ovis, ut pullos excludat ova calefaciens et calore quasi animans: It scriptura dicit Spiritum sanctum quasi incubasse aquis, ut ista corpora, quae animanda et aranda erant, vivifcaret. Nam Spiritus sancti offcium est vivifcare.” 51. Kirchpost.G., W211:1696.26/ CS3/1:180; Ibid. W211:1707.11/ CS3/1:188. 52. Pred. (1522), WA10III:347, 18/ LW51:111. 53. TR (n.d.), WATR5:346, 26. 54. Antinom.(2),WA39I :435,18; Antinom.(1), WA39I :383,10; Ibid., WA39I :388, 15; Antinom.(2), WA39I :483, 1. 55. Gen., WA44:774, 19/ LW8:266. 56. Sent.Lom., WA9:42, 35. 57. Kirchpost.E., W212:937.4/ CS4/2:331. 58. Ibid., W212:621.6/ CS4/1:332; Kirchpost.G., W211:1179.41/ CS2/1:439; Ev.Joh.14–15, WA45:654,15/ LW24:212. 59. Gal. (1535), WA40II:178,21/ LW27:140; Konz., WA50:625,66/ LW41:144. 60. Kirchpost.G., W211:1038.10/ CS2/1:292. 61. Gal. (1535), WA40II:140, 14/ LW27:110. 62. Butz., WA18:504, 26/ LW14:172. 63. 1 Pet., WA12:299, 3/ LW30:44. 64. Vor.N.T., WADB7:10, 16/ LW35:370; Ev.Joh.14–15, WA45:729,16/ LW24:294. 65. Ev.Joh.14–15, WA45:727, 2/ LW24:291. 66. Fest., WA17II:397, 9/ LW51:132. 67. Ev.Joh.14–15, WA45:565, 17/ LW24:114–115; Ibid., WA45:579, 30/ LW24:130; Ibid., WA45:561, 17/ LW24:110. 68. Kirchpost.G., W212:309.51/ CS3/2:333–334. 69. Ibid., W211:1704.11/ CS3/1:188: “Darnach verheisst er auch den Heiligen Geist geben damit das Herz anfange, Gott zu lieben und sein Gebot zu halten … und durch den Heiligen Geist entzünde unde treibe, dass es beginne ihn wieder zu lieben vor Tage zu Tage mehr und mehr.” 70. Ibid., W211:1696.26/ CS3/1:180. 71. Ev.Joh.14–15, WA45:579, 30/ LW24:130.

5 THE HOLY SPIRIT 117 72. Ibid., WA45:541, 27/ LW24:89. 73. Ev.Joh.3–4, WA47:32, 2/ LW22:302–303. 74. Kirchpost.G., W211:1025.17/ CS2/1:280. 75. Ibid., W211:1027.23/ CS2/1:281. 76. Gal.(1535), WA40I :489f., 31ff./ LW26:315. 77. Trost.An., WA7:789ff., 22ff./ LW42:186. 78. Ev.Joh.6–8, WA33:124f., 42/ LW23:83. 79. TR (n.d.), WATR5:346, 24. 80. Antinom. (1) WA39I :391, 18; Ibid., WA39I :370, 9. 81. Kirchpost.E., W212:624.13/ CS4/1:334. 82. Dtsch.Kat., II.3, WA30I :191, 18/ BC:439.61: “Denn die schepffung haben wir nu hinweg …”. 83. Ibid., II.3, WA30I :188, 13/ BC:436.38f.; Ibid., II.3, WA30I :191.18/ BC:429.61. The idea of Spiritus Creator owes to Regin Prenter, Spiritus Creator, (Kobenhavn: Samerlens forlag 1944).

119 Martin Luther has been accused of weakness in his doctrine of Creation, allegedly so accused due to his over-emphasis on salvation. In fact, while articulating the faith for training in how to live as Christians (in his Large Catechism) Luther actually teaches that the purpose of Creation was in order that we might be saved and sanctifed.1 True enough, but this is not the whole story. Other comments by Luther about Creation, when merely expositing the logic of Christian faith, lead him to make comments most suggestive of cutting-edge Scientifc insights. Likewise the Reformer is contextual in his approach to Providence. While merely expositing the logic of faith, Luther posits an ongoing creation. As he puts it, “creating and preserving are on end the same” for God.2 Creation, he says, is not a moment of origin but a continuing new beginning.3 Every day He is creating.4 God is said not to be like a carpenter who builds a house and goes away.5 On the other hand, when explaining faith with an eye towards instructing how to live the Christian life (in his Catechism), Luther also claims that Creation is a past event.6 When engaged in polemics, defending biblical authority against allegory, Luther even posits a 6-days creation to protect the Bible’s literal sense.7 With similar concerns in view he insisted on the historicity of Adam and Eve.8 CHAPTER 6 Creation and Providence © The Author(s) 2017 M. Ellingsen, Martin Luther’s Legacy, DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-58758-9_6

120 M. Ellingsen How God Created and What He Did: Dialogue with Medieval and Modern Science The Reformer taught that God created all things by speaking them into existence.9 But in accord with late medieval consensus, Luther rejected Copernicus, insisting that the sun revolves around the earth.10 God holds all of Creation together by His Word, Luther commented: Therefore the heaven, which cannot stand frm by means of its bounds … stands frm through the Word of God …11 In creation, God has given Himself to us.12 We have already noted that for Luther God is in every creature and through them creates. On this point the Reformer is in line with modern Quantum Physics which posits the existence of some reality (often called the God-Particle) which is in all matter and brings the various subatomic particles together (a point made above by Luther in claiming that His Word holds all Creation together).13 To these points, Luther adds, it is the nature of God to create all things out of nothing, to make something of nothing.14 Regarding the creation of all living things, Luther claims that not much is said in the Bible about angels.15 But he did believe that angels are with us.16 Luther defnes angels as … a spiritual creature, a personal being without a body, appointed for the service of the heavenly church.17 About animals, Luther said that they put us to shame. Birds, he claimed, are more pious than we are, for they are happy and sing, whether they have food or not.18 Concerning the works of God, the Reformer claims in one sermon that “The beginning is nothing, the end is everything …”19 With reference to God’s love and acceptance, Luther is recorded as saying (in a manner most consistent with his emphasis on Justifcation by Grace): In the same all men are not acceptable and pleasing to God on account of their worthiness, but only by the grace of God.20 Earlier he observed that “The love of God does not fnd, but creates that which is pleasing to it.”21

6 CREATION AND PROVIDENCE 121 As we noted when discussing the Theology of the Cross, Luther contends that God works in hidden surprising ways. In polemical circumstances like The Heidelberg Disputation he writes: 4. Although the works of God are always unattractive and appear evil, they are nevertheless really eternal merits.22 Even when just interpreting texts Luther claims that we can only understand creation clearly from an eschatological point of view.23 Yet other times he contends that creation reveals something about God’s Power.24 This creates a sense of wonder.25 It can strengthen faith.26 Providence In view of God’s permeation of all creation, His role in growing crops, Luther advocated reading the Gospel to crops in order to clean the air of devils to help crops better grow.27 Luther notes that despite all that God has to put up with from us He continues to send the sunshine and other blessings to those of us who do not deserve it.28 In these ways the Reformer relates Creation and Providence to the teaching of grace alone. When comforting despair Luther subordinated Creation to Redemption, claiming that Creation is intended to serve the divine purpose of Redemption.29 At least he closely relates them when not engaged in polemics.30 An Omnipotent God, Totally in Control God’s Will and foreknowledge are said to be immutable, Luther says in his controversy over free will.31 He speaks, though, of a necessity of immutability, the recognition that events occur necessarily.32 In that way an element of voluntariness is retained.33 This language of necessity has Nominalist roots.34 It was in face of Erasmian legalism that Luther asserted that God is in control of all things.35 The Will of God cannot be hindered.36 All that comes into being is necessary, Luther contends in these contexts.37 All things happen by necessity, he claims when addressing legalism.38 He adds when stressing that the Word works all, God is construed as causing everything, even the movement of our hands and the weather.39

122 M. Ellingsen When Luther addresses compromises of grace and affrms God’s total control of the cosmos, he does refer to the foreknowledge of God. But in those cases he insists that such foreknowledge does not entail that events are contingent.40 In fact, what happens transpires necessarily, he asserts when addressing challenges to grace.41 In these contexts, Luther speaks of the “necessity of immutability.”42 But this is not a mere determinism.43 Luther warns at this point about the insuffciencies of language when describing God’s “necessitating” events and also when teaching God’s hidden will in double predestination.44 Seeking to respond to Erasmus’s examples of our exercise of free will, God is said to work through us, and in that sense we cooperate with Him.45 The Reformer makes this point even more strongly when dealing with issues related to living the Christian life. He insists that “God wills that man should work … and without work He will give him nothing.” But, he adds, God gives nothing because of this labor, “but solely out of His goodness and blessing.”46 Thus in Polemical contexts the Reformer seeks to distinguish divine coercion from the necessity of immutability in making these points regarding our cooperating with His Providential actions.47 Such points are related to Scholastic distinctions.48 Another matter to keep in mind as we consider Luther’s claim that all that happens is of necessity is his stated purpose in making these claims, that his discussion has nothing to do with “what we can do with God’s working, but [only pertains to] what we can do of ourselves.”49 We are just His masks.50 Luther makes this point in one context grappling with doubt in order to make the point that what happens in the world is hidden.51 The masks help create all manner of things.)52 (Luther also identifes the Word and Sacraments as God’s masks.53) In a sermon the Reformer also says that we are God’s fngers.54 Creatures are said to be the hands of God.55 He also speaks of creatures as the means or medium through which God works.56 Likewise, angels are said to be used by God; they do not act on their own.57 Luther adds that God works miracles in that He is in the creatures which work.58 He speaks of all creation (including human creatures) as the hands of God.59 Ultimately God is the only causal agent, in Luther’s view. He is the frst cause of all things; all others are only secondary or instrumental causes.60 Apparently ordinary natural events are really miracles.61 Christians are said to be the “legs” which carry the world. Whatever God gives the world He gives for the sake of Christians.62 God is the poet, and we are the verse, he said.63

6 CREATION AND PROVIDENCE 123 God is said to do everything.64 As Luther puts it: Fight and let Him give the victory. Preach and let Him win hearts … In all our doings He is to work through us, and He alone shall have the glory from it … Don’t be lazy or idle, but don’t rely on your own work and doings. Get busy and work, and yet expect everything from God alone.65 Nothing takes place but as [God] wills it.66 God wills all in all.67 Regarding God’s Work, we note again how Luther asserted that the beginning is nothing, but the end is everything.68 Our earlier discussion of the Theology of the Cross reminds us that, especially when exhorting faith or when engaged in polemics, Luther endorsed the paradoxical character of God’s revelation construing God as hiding good in His work.69 Since God is in control of the past and future, Luther assures us that there is no need to worry.70 He writes: Therefore such a believer is so flled with joy and happiness that he does not allow himself to be terrifed by a creature and is the master of all things; he is afraid only of God, his Lord, Who is in heaven – otherwise he is afraid of nothing that might happen to him.71 In other sermons Luther makes similar points: … we must come to rely on God, trust in Him in every need, and learn to be content with what He daily provides. This insight, Luther notes, entails that God will see to it that the poor not starve. Indeed, in death the rich have no more than the average Christian.72 We should, therefore, learn contentment and not become impatient and angry with God because we are not wealthy. Were we rich we might well become meaner and more sinful.73 These commitments are most pertinent to the progressive Social Ethic on economics that we will observe in Luther. The Reformer wanted to ensure in polemical contexts and when refecting on temptations (like in the quote that follows) that the Will of God was understood as effectual and could not be hindered.74He [God] is Present

124 M. Ellingsen everywhere, even in death, in hell, in the midst of our foes, yes also in their hearts. For He has created all things, and He also governs them, and they must all do as He wills.75 Even though we fall away from ourselves we cannot fall out of God’s hands. We just run into His lap.76 Focusing less on polemics, Luther observes that there is joy and happiness in knowing that all is up to God and so there is nothing to fear.77 When the context was less focused on polemics and more on suffering, God is said to permit things to break apart, to kill in order to give life.78 Addressing despair, Luther also notes that because God loves us He “plays” with His saints sometimes.79 When concerned to comfort and exhort works, Luther claims that God lays crosses on us to compel us to believe and help others.80 He is even said to use the devil to work evil (a claim made with polemics in view).81 Luther also claims that God uses the devil to punish sin (affrming divine omnipotence).82 As he puts it in a similar context, the God Who is hidden works death and life.83 Similarly he writes while dialoguing with a belief that works save: In short, God cannot be God unless He frst becomes a devil. We cannot go to heaven unless we frst go to hell.84 God’s yes is hidden in a no.85 The devil has no power not given by God, the Reformer claims, a point made when polemicizing with works-righteousness or when exhorting Christian life (when as we have seen Luther teaches a God of wrath).86 This entails that God is even the author of evil.87 Luther also makes this claim when dealing with the Christian life and distress (along with some polemics).88 But he adds that in so doing, when God rules the devil, He does not do evil. God withdraws and simply permits Satan to do evil.89 Looking back on how things turned out positively Luther spoke of God causing his constipation.90 When warning against papal error, the Reformer tells his mother that her sickness is God’s fatherly chastisement.91 When exhorting Christian living the plague is said to be God’s judgment.92 Likewise the Turkish plague.93

6 CREATION AND PROVIDENCE 125 Compromises of God’s Full Control When comforting those tempted by despair the Reformer claimed that God does send temptations, but only that we might rely on the promises of God.94 And also when comforting despair along with polemics in The Bondage of the Will Luther claims that we are caught between God and the devil regarding who rides us. We will observe this vision of God’s Providence, limits to His Power, in other texts not so concerned with polemics (see later in the chapter), but rarely in this treatise without a lot of interpretation to reassert a strong affrmation of divine omnipotence.95 For example, there are other texts in The Bondage of the Will which refer to the confict between God and Satan, but in these cases the concern to address despair is not as strong. Perhaps in these instances the confict with Satan is subordinated to claims that God uses Satan.96 Satan is even depicted on one occasion by Luther as a fallen angel.97 Luther also notes on at least one occasion that God uses witchcraft and sorcery to work evil—an indication that such practices were continuing in late medieval Germany.98 The struggle against Satan was an important dimension of Luther’s daily life, for Satan was regarded as at work in unhappiness sickness, and death, even seeking to do away with the doctrine of Justifcation.99 When God’s working evil was raised as an issue of concern (His hardening of the heart), the Reformer suggested that God works with how He fnds us, simply does not hinder evil.100 Elsewhere while “humoring reason” (offering apologetics), Luther reiterates that God is not acting evilly, but only using evil instruments that cannot escape the sway of His omnipotence. Evil, he claims, is the fault of the instruments.101 In another text he claims that God does not do evil, but uses instrumental means, like the Law and Satan, to rob us of pride.102 In this spirit he writes: Hence it comes about that the ungodly man cannot but continually err and sin, because he is caught up in the movement of divine power and not allowed to be idle, but wills, desires, and acts according to the kind of person he is.103 He also overlooks things, so His wisdom and goodness are known in our weakness.104

126 M. Ellingsen When addressing despair Luther says that God allows the righteous to be attacked and troubled by evils so that they might be conformed to their king.105 In such contexts God’s wrath is directed to the enemies of the faithful.106 When noting how to address the hard-hearted Luther claims that God takes some to hell.107 But when merely explicating faith with some concern for Christian life in view Luther contends that God tempts no one.108 Once while addressing despair engendered by the concept of the hardening of the heart the Reformer speculated that God may have permitted the Fall in order to reveal His glory.109 While preaching he claims that “since God is good, He can do nothing except what is good.”110 In another context as Luther addresses hard-heartedness, Luther claims that with these insights we can sleep in our little nests and sing in the morning like the birds.111 In a comment most suggestive of the modern Theory of Relativity, Luther claims that time is in God, in the sense that all time is but an instant to Him; He grasps all in a single moment.112 This has implications for the issues of God’s complicity in evil, for it entails that God’s decision to act is concurrent with our own actions on earth. Expounding on this subject of what we can do through God’s working (Christian life), Luther claims that God does not work without us.113 It seems that even when refuting Pelagianism, the Reformer Luther claims that God works on the kind of people we are (working through us).114 A God Who Struggles with Evil When just expositing Scripture he claims that humans retain freedom in areas of life that do not relate directly to God.115 Not all that happens in everyday life is God’s doing. Indeed, when comforting, Luther notes that much is said in Scripture about God that He does not do. His creatures do the wrath: Furthermore, we must pay special attention to the rule that many things are said in Scripture about God, which He, however, does not do Himself … He will cause Christ and other saints [presumably the devil] to speak in their wrath, because also the wrath and vengeance which creatures express are God’s. Not that the wrath is His because it is in Him, but because the creature, in whom the wrath is, is His, and the creature’s nod and command He afficts the ungodly, though He in Himself remains most quiet and calm, yes