\ '. Cltnurnrbiu m4tuingual AtntlJlg Continuing LEHRE UND WEHRE MAGAZIN FUER Ev.-LuTH. HOMILETIK THEOLOGICAL Q UARTERLy-THEOLOGICAL MONTHLY Vol. XID February, 1942 No. 2 CONTENTS Pqe Through Justification unto Salvation. Theo. Hoyer _._........_______ 81 Luther: A Blessiug to the English. oW. Dallmann _._. _____.____._________ III The Progressive Revelation of the Antiehrist. P . E. Kretzmann _______ 120 Outlines on the Wuerttemberg Epistle Selections ______..____..__..________ 137 Theolotieal Observer. - Kirehlieh-Zeitgesehiehtliehes ____________ 145 Book Review. - Literatur ---_____._________._________._________________ 154 Ein Predlger mUll DIehl alleln wei Ell 1st Jrein Ding, das die Leute deB. al80 dais er die Scbate unter mehr bet cler K1rche behaelt denn wei8e, wle sle rechte Chrfslen lOllen die gute Predlgt. - Apologie. Art. !4 seln, sondern auch claneben den Woel fen wehretl, dais ale die Schafe DIehl ancrelfm und mit falscher Lehre ver If the trumpet give an uncertain fuebren und Irrtum einfuehren. sound, who shall prepare htmself to LutheT the battle? - 1 Cor. 14:8 PabUshed for the Ev. Luth. Synod of Missouri, Ohio, and Other States •CONCORDIA PUBUSBING BOUSE, St. Louis, Me: Luther: A Blessing to the English 111 that, when they hear the Gospel, they fall to .. and make for themselves, by their own powers, an idea in their hearts which says, 'I believe.' This they hold for true faith. But it is a human imagination and idea that never reaches the depth of the heart, and so nothing comes of it and no betterment follows it. Faith, however, is a divine work in us. It changes us and makes us to be born anew of God (John 1); it kills the Old Adam and makes altogether different men in heart and spirit and mind and powers, and it brings with it the Holy Ghost. Oh, it is a living, busy, active, mighty thing, this faith; and so it is impossible for it not to do good works incessantly. It does not ask whether there are good works to do, but before the question rises, it has already done them and is always at the doing of them. He who does not these works is a faithless man. He gropes and looks about after faith and good works, and knows neither what faith is nor what good works are though he talks and talks with many words about faith and good works. Faith is a living, daring confidence in God's grace, so sure and certain that a man would stake his life on it a thousand times. This confidence in God's grace and knowl- edge of it makes men glad and bold and happy in dealing with God . and with all His creatures; and this is the work of the Holy Ghost in faith. Hence a man is ready and glad, without com- pulsion, to do good to everyone, to serve everyone, to suffer every- thing, in love and praise of God, who has shown him this grace; and thus it is impossible to separate works from faith, quite as impossible as to separate heat and light from fire." Through justification unto sanctification. - When the Lord today asks us, "Will ye also go away?" may He give us grace to answer with Peter, "Lord, whither shall we go? Thou hast words of eternal life." THEo. HOYER ••• Luther: A Blessing to the English I. "The Lutheran Invasion" In the eighth century the English monk Winfrid came over to preach his Gospel to the Thuringians, was martyred for his pains, and became known to fame as St. Boniface, the Apostle of the Germans. Eight hundred years later a German monk of that same Thuringia had a special love for the English for their work and made a return gift of his Gospel. The Catholic Joseph Clayton, an Oxford man, writes: "Luther, by his writings and through his dis- ciples, brought the Protestant teaching to Great Britain, and from England and Scotland this Protestant teaching spread to North 112 Luther: A Blessing to the English America and to all British colonies and dominions. . .. Whatever the varieties of Protestant teaching, they all derive from Luther." Should it not interest all, especially all Protestants, more espe- cially all English-speaking people, and most especially all English- speaking Lutherans, to know how Lutheranism came t o the En - glish? The following pages will try to give the answer . Luther posted his Ninety-five Theses on Indulgences on Oc- tober 31, 1517. In November Cardinal Wolsey received Pope Leo's bull relating to the building of St. Peter's Church and the appointment of a banker for the money received by preaching the indulgence offered. King Henry demanded a rake- off of the plunder. The Pope offered a quarter ; the king's agent, the bishop of Worcester, demanded a third. The Pope also r equested from the clergy a subsidy for the Holy See. A Pope said, "Truly, England is our storehouse of delights: a very inexhaustible well ; and where so much abounds, much can be extorted from many." Chancellor Bishop Fisher of Cambridge had Pope Leo's proc- lamation of indulgences affixed to the gate of the common schools. In the following night a student wrote above it, "Blessed is the man that maketh the Lord his trust and respecteth not the proud nor such as turn to lies." P s. 40 : 4. Old Thomas F uller says : "Inquiry was made about the party, but no discovery was made. Whereupon Bishop F isher solemnly proceeded to excommunication, which he is said to perform with tears and great gravity." The heretic was a Norman student by the name of Peter de Valence. The Rt. Rev. Mons. Patrick O'Hare finds Luther's theses "er- roneous, inconsistent, satirical, merely puerile." He simply does not recognize dynamite. Prof. Peter Guilday of the Catholic Uni- versity of America at Washington knows they "set Europe ablaze," and he speaks of "the militant figure of the man who centered Europe, political and religious, around himself at the Diet of W orITis, three years afterwards." Erasmus, the peerless leader of the literary lights, also saw Luther had something there and as early as March 1, 1518, sent the live wire to Dean John Colet of St. Paul's with the comment: "The court of Rome clearly has lost all sense of shame; for what could be more shameless than those continued indulgences? . .. The princes conspire with the Pope and perhaps with the Turk against the happiness of the people." On the 5th he sent them to Bishop John Fisher of Rochester, a learned and saintly man, with the remark: "The shamelessness of the Roman curia has reached its climax." Luther: A Blessing to the English 113 On the same day he sent a number of Luther's tracts to his "Democritus," Sir Thomas More, whom Anthony Wood rates "the greatest prodigy of wit England has hitherto produced." A little later he wrote Cardinal Wolsey, the personal represen- tative of Leo X, "God on earth," and himself "seven times more powerful than the Pope": "The man's life is approved by the unanimous consent of all, and the fact that his character is so upright that even enemies find nothing to slander must considerably prejudice us in his favor." As early as June 24 Secretary Richard Pace writes Wolsey the king was pleased with the praise given his book by the cardinal and all other great learned men - repeated four days later. Prof. J. S. Brewer of King's College, London, the editor of Letters and Papers, holds this the draft of Henry's book against Luther of 1521. Bernard Andre, the poet, is credited with getting the king into this theological fight. As early as 1518 John Higges was accused of favoring the teaching DE Luther, openly pronouncing that Luther had more learning in his little finger than all the doctors in England in their whole bodies, and that all the priests were blind and had led the people the wrong way. Fox, Acts and Monuments, IV, 179 (quoted by Charles Hob in his Manual of EngLish Church History, 1910) . Wolfgang Capito gather ed Luther's writ ings, and J ohn Froben of Basel pirated them in 1518, reprinted them the same year and the next. On February 14, 1519, Froben wrote Luther: "Blasius Sal- monius, a printer of Leipzig, gave me some of your books, which he had bought at the last Frankfurt Fair, which, as they were ap- proved by all the learned, I at once reprinted. We have sent six hundred copies to France and Spain; they are sold at Paris and are even read and approved by the doctors of the Sorbonne, as certain of our friends have assured us; for some of the most learned say that they have hitherto missed among those who treat Scrip- ture the same freedom that you show. Francis Calvus, also a bookseller of Pavia, a most learned man, one devoted to the Muses, has taken a good part of your books to Italy to distribute them among all the cities. Nor does he do it so much for gain as to aid piety. He has promised to send epigrams written in your honor by all the learned in Italy, so much does he like your con- stancy and skill. . . . We have exported your books to Brabant and England. . . We have sold out all your books except ten copies and never r emember to have sold any more quickly." Erasmus wrote Luther on May 30, 1519: "Dearest brother in Christ, I cannot tell you what commotion your books are raising 8 114 Luther: A Blessing to the English here [at Louvain]. In England there are men who think well of your writings, and they the very greatest." One of Luther's works bears the coat of arms of the Duchess of Suffolk - most likely the fourth wife of the . duke, a brother- in - law of the king. "The effect of Luther's writings in England this year was the bringing some unhappy people to the stake at Coventry," says Glocester Ridley in his Nicholas Ridley, the martyr. In December the Pope permitted Wolsey to punish disorderly cloisters and "such as have lapsed into Lutheranism" - as early as 1519! On February 28, 1520, Sir Thomas More wrote Edward Lee, the king's chaplain: "Should Leo withdraw his approval of Erasmus's New Testament, Luther's attack on the Holy See were piety itself compared with such a deed." On March 3, G. Cowper wrote his father at London : "As for newes ther ys none, but of late ther was herytykes here which did take Luters opinyons." Looking over the day-book of John Dome for 1520, we see that Dutchman at Oxford sold the following books of Luther at the prices noted : S d 1 opera luteri ligata _________________________________________ ______ 3 10 1 opera luteri ligata ___________ _______________________ __________ _________ ___ 4 1 condemnatio luter i ____________ _________ _______________ _______ ___ 4 [three editions in 1520] 1 disputatio lupsie luteri _____________ __________________________________ 4 1 luter ad gallatas ___ ____________________________________________ _______ 1 4 1 luter de potestate pape _____________________________________________ 3 1 luter de potestate pape ___________________________________________ 3 1 luter de potestate pape ------------------------------------1 1 resolutio luteri ligata ______________________________________ ~ 1 1 resolutio luteri ------------------------------------------------J 3 parvi libri luteri de potestate cum aliis ________________ 6 It may be of interest to know a pound of beef cost a half penny. Though he had a wealthy father, Sir Thomas More as a student at Oxford had to live on a penny a day. In May Erasmus wrote Melanchthon: "It was decided t o burn Luther's books in England, but I stopped this by writing letters to Cardinal Wolsey." He wrote the same to Oecolampadius. On the 24th he wrote Archbishop William Warham of Canter- bury, regretting Luther's violent language. On the 28th Bishop Silvester de Giglis of Worcester wrote Wolsey from Rome: "Some months ago the works of Friar Martin arrived. Much of their contents is disapproved of by great theo- logians by reason of the scandals to which they might give rise, and part is condemned as heretical. After long debates it has been Luther: A Blessing to the English 115 decreed by the cardinals to declare M. a heretic, and a bull is in preparation on the subject, of which I will send a copy." It was published on July 15, 1520. Wolsey at once forbade the circulation of Luther's books. When King Henry and King Francis met on the most magnifi- cent Field of Cloth of Gold in June, 1520, Henry spoke to Erasmus about "writing against Luther." The king of scholars begged off, not able to do so. On January 1, 1521, Nicholas Wilson alludes to the rapid spread of Lutheranism, the activity and pertinacity of its sup- porters, - the confusion and dissensions occasioned by it. Unequal to the task alone, Luther surrounded himself with shrewd men, who were at the same time excellent scholars, but more studious of popularity than truth. His influence over them is such that when once they have adopted his teaching, they despise all others, consider themselves the exclusive possessors of sacred learning, and wrest the Scriptures to their will. "When Luther has once rendered them invincible, he teaches them to simulate constancy, frugality, labor, humility, the greatest order and zeal for propagating the glory of Christ, and equal grief and indignation against any who oppose (what they call) sound doctrine; - in short, every virtue which pertains to probity or holiness of life." Luther is a very learned man, and one who would have been the greatest ornament to the Church of Christ if his innocence had equaled his learning. But he has now become so insanely arrogant as to claim for himself the exclusive interpretation of Scripture; taxing the fathers of the Church with blindness, inconsistency, and error. He alone is on Christ's side, and all who contradict him are heretics. On January 21, 1521, Ambassador Cuthbert Tunstad at the Reichstag of Worms writes Wolsey: "The Germans are so addicted to Luther that, rather than he should be oppressed by the Pope's authority, who had already condemned his opinions, they were re- solved to spend a hundred thousand of their lives in his defense. They have informed the emperor that he is a good and virtuous man, besides his learning. He offereth to make his defense and revoke those opinions which he cannot defend by Holy Scripture . . . . His declaration [for burning the Pope's bull and decretals] he put in print in the Dutch tongue and sent it all about the country; which declaration by some idle fellow hath been trans - lated into Latin, which I send your Grace herein enclosed, to the intent that you may see it and burn it when ye have done, and also that Your Grace may call before you the printers and book- sellers, and give them strait charge that they bring none of his books into England, nor translate them into English, &c. 116 Luther: A Blessing to the English "He hath written a book since his condemnation, De Cap- ti'vitate Babylonica Ecclesiae. . . . They say there is much strange opinion in it near to the opinions of Boheme; I pray God keep that book out of England. At the exequy of the Cardinal of Croy, in the presence of the electors, the emperor, the Pope's ambas- sador, and the cardinals, a friar preacher made a sermon, and in the beginning said the Pope was Vicarius Christi in spiritualibus and the cardinals and the bishops were Apostoli, &c. But how his tongue turned in his head I cannot tell; but after he concluded that the emperor, when they do amiss, should reform their abuses, even to deposition; whereupon the Pope's Nuncius, having commission against Luther, called him, laying the premises to his charge; which said nuncius hath been openly threatened by many gentle- men not to intermeddle with him. In his said sermon he exhorted the emperor and all the princes to go into Italy, which is of the empire, and to reform such abuses as be there; whereunto I understand many of the princes be inclined, because every man thinketh to gain thereby. The said friar preacher is since ordained to preach here all Lent, by whom I know not. "Luther offereth, if the emperor will go to Rome to reform the Church, to bring him 100,000 men, whereunto the emperor, as a virtuous prince, will not hearken . The said Luther hath many great clerks that hold with him save in some points, which the said Luther hath put forth more than he can or will justify, to the intent that on the residue he might be heard and a council called for reformation, whereof the Pope will not hear, but standeth to his sentence." The preacher was John Faber, court preacher to Kaisers Max and Karl. What he advised had been advised by Luther in the Address to the Christian Nobility of the German Nation in 1520. On February 2, 1521, Sir Thomas Spinelly from the Reichstag at Worms wrote Wolsey: "As to Lutero, he - a certain governor - esteemed that matter of great importance, and very difficile to be remedied and extincted." Some one wrote to some one: "The diet will take notice of the books made by frier Martine Lutero a schismatic against the courte of Rome. Some one caused the seid bookes to be brynned. . . . The whiche £rier Martine of the elector of Saxson and other princes of this contre is favored." The Pope's curse was disregarded, and Luther's works were devoured with greater avidity than before. Writings and seals "set up at the abbey of Boxley against the ill opinions of Martin Luther" were pulled down by Priest Adam Bradshawe in June, for which he went to prison. On July 12 Jerome Ghinucci begs Wolsey to have the books of Luther he sent from Rome looked at by learned men, as the Luther: A Blessing to the English 117 Pope wishes to know if they are satisfactory, and likewise to have the replies made by Cardinal S. Sixtus to certain doubts moved by some learned men, and to arrange that Luther's books be not publicly sold. When the papal nuncio, Jerome Aleander, told the printers Luther's books were forbidden throughout the empire, they said: "We will send them to England"; and they did. Polydore Vergil, the Italian bishop of Bath, says in his History of England, a great number of Lutheran books were in the hands of the people in 1521. The "vicious and dissolute" Bishop Richard Nix of Norwich complained about the spread of heresy in his diocese; but Wolsey said he had no power from Rome to burn books of Lutheran pravity, and so show the devotion which England has always had to the Holy See. Cardinal Giulio de Medici, cousin of Pope Leo and his right hand, answered the Pope thinks Wolsey has power enough. Has ordered the original bull to be sent, requesting him to have it published and condemn the works of Lu ther. Sends him a copy of a book put out by that damnable heretic, for which not the book but he should be condemned to the flames. He desires nothing more than the suppression of Lutheranism and wishes the king to send an ambassador to the Emperor to u rge him in this good cause. The P ope thinks a general bonfire would be more satisfactory than the prohibition of the importation. On March 16 Pope Leo thanks Wolsey for his zeal against Luther and for forbidding the introduction of his books into England. On the 29th Silvester de Giglis sends Richard Pace, the king's chief secretary, a pamphlet just written by a learned man against Martin Luther. On April 17 Pope Leo permitted "the great God and Cardinal Wolsey" to read and refute Luther's books, which should be burned. On October 20 the king ordered all to help his confessor, Bishop John Longland of Lincoln, to root out the "no small number of heretics" for which Lincoln was notorious. Above five hundred were forced to recant. Some had recited the Ten Com- mandments in English in their own homes, and others had spread Matthew and Mark in English. Six were burned. John Scrivener's daughter had to burn her own father; the same in the case of one Tylesworthy. On the 10th John Clerk wrote Wolsey the Pope said, in con- demning the errors of Luther, the Gallican Church had sanctioned as many errors against the Roman Church. In 1521 More's daughter Margaret was married to William Roper, who was converted by Luther's Christian Liberty and Babylonian Captivity and became "a violent advocate of justifi- 118 Luther: A Blessing to the English cation by faith, and arguments and danger of punishment failed to move him." He was "a marvelous zealous Protestant and so fervent and withal so properly liked of himself and his divine learning that . . . neither was he contented to whisper it in hugger-mugger, but thirsted very sore to publish his new doctrine and divulge it, and thought himself very able to do so and it were even at Paul's Cross." More asked Roper with a smile if it were not enough that his friends should know him to be a fool, but that he would have his folly proclaimed to the world. He was "convented of heresy" before Cardinal Wolsey, "but for love borne by the cardinal to Sir Thomas More, his father-in- law, was, with a friendly warning, discharged." More said to his daughter, "Meg, I have borne a long time with thy husband, I have reasoned and argued with him in those points of religion and still given him my poor fatherly counsel, but I per- ceive none of all this can call him home again. And therefore, Meg, I will no longer argue or dispute with him, but will clean give him over and get me another while to God and pray for him." Later Roper "turned him again to the Catholic faith." More commended the happy state of the realm: "Truth it is indeed, son Roper, and yet I pray God that some of us, as high as we seem to sit upon the mountains treading heretics under our feet like ants, live not the day that we gladly would wish to be at league and composition with them, t o let them have their churches quietly to themselves, so that they would be contented to let us have ours quietly to ourselves." More's brother-in-law, John Rastell, a lawyer and printer, also became a Lutheran. On March 8, 1521, Archbishop Warham wrote Cardinal Wolsey: "I am enformyd that diverse of that Universitie [Oxford] be in- fectyd with the heresyes of Luther and of others of that sorte, havyng emong theym a grete nomber of books of the saide per- verse doctrine which were forboden. . . . "It is a sorrowful thing to see howe gredyly inconstaunt men, and specyally inexpert youthe, fallith to newe doctrynes, be they never so pestilent. . . . I wold I hadd suffered grete payne, in condition this hadd not fortuned ther, wher I was brought up in lernying . .. . "Pytie yt wer that through the lewdnes of on or two cankerd members, whiche as I understand have enducyd no small nombre of yong and incircumspect foles to give ere unto thaym, the hole Universitie shuld run in thinfamy of soo haynouse a cryme, the heryng wherof shuld be right delectable and plesant to the open Lutheranes beyond the See, and secrete behyther , wherof they Luther: A Blessing to the English 119 wold take harte and confydence that theyr pestilent doctrynes shuld encrese and multiply, seyng bothe the Universities of Inglande enfectid therewith, wherof the on hathe many yeeres been voyd of all heyrsyes, and the oth er hathe afore nowe taken apon hyr the prayse that she was never defyled; and nevertheles nowe is thought to be the origin all occasion and cause of the fall in Oxford. "By thes my writing I intende in nowise to move, but that the capitaynes of the said erroneus doctrynes be punishede to the ferefull example of all other. But if all the hole nombyr of yong scolers syspectyd in this cause (which as the Universitie writeth to me be marvelouse sory and repentaunt that they ever had any such books or redde or herde any of Luther's opynyons) shuld be caUyd up to London, yt shuld engendre grete obloquy and sclandre to the Universitie, bothe behyther the See and beyonde, to the sorrow of all good men, and the pleasure of heretyks, desyering to have many folowers of thayr mischef; and (as it is thought) the lesse brute the better, ffor thavoyding wherof the said University hathe desyred me to move your Grace to be so good and gracyouse unto thaym, to gyve in commission to some sadd father which was brought up in the Universitie of Oxford to syt ther , and examyne, not the heads . . . but the novicyes which be not yet throughly cankerd in the said errors, and to put thaym to suche correction as the qualitie of thair transgression shall require. . . . "Item, the said Universitie hathe desierd me to move your good Grace to . .. my lorde of Rochestre or my lorde of London to note out besyde ... werks of Luther condemnyd alredy, the names of all other suche names of writers, Luthers adherents and fautors, as they preceyve to be erroneous and repugnant to Catholique fey the. . . . For I undrestand ther be many of thos newe writers as yll as Luther. And therfor it needeth this gret provision to be made for stopping of thaym, as of Luthers." On April 3 the Archbishop tells the Cardinal of his intention of reading certain most damnable works of Luther sent by Wolsey's chaplain, Dr. Sampson. He will return in ten days to Lambeth and then confer with Wolsey upon them. Bishop John Longland of Lincoln wrote Wolsey in April: "Ther is a monche of Saint Edmundsbury called Doctor Rowham whiche preched the fourth Sunday of Quadragesimae att St. Peters in Oxon. the mooste seditious Sermone ye have herd of, in raylyng agenste your Grace and Byshopes for this sequestration of evyll prechers, maynteynyng certayn opynyons of Luther, comfortyng erronyous persones in ther opynyons, saying, 'Fear not them who kill the body,' whiche I feare me hath and will doo moche hurte." He urges Wolsey to have a notable clerk at Paul's Cr oss to preach afore you a sermon against Luther, the Lutherans, their 120 The Progressive Revelation of the Antichrist favorers, against their works and books, and against those bringing them into the kingdom. The guilty ought to be burned. The King thinks Bishop Fisher of Rochester to be the most meet to make that sermon. Wood's Annals tells us of 1521: "While these things were in doing, certain persons of Martin Luther 's faction (as they wer e now called) were busy in Oxford in dispersing his doctrine and books. So far, it seems, were they spread in a short time through several parts of the Nation, that the Cardinal wrote to the Universitie to appoint certain men from among them to go up to London, to examine and search his opinions that were predominent against the articles of Holy Faith. Whereupon, after consultation had, they appointed Thomas Brinknell, John Kynton, John Roper, and John de Coloribus, doctors of divinity, who, meeting at that place divers learned men and bishops in a solemn Convocation in the Cardinal's House, and finding his doctrine to be for the most part repugnant to the present used in England, solemnly condemned it , a testimony of which was afterwards sent to Oxford, and fastened on the dial of St. Mary's Churchyard by Nicholas Kratzer, the maker and contriver thereof and his books also burnt both here and at Cambridge." Kratzer was born at Muenchen, became a Bachelor of Arts at Wittenberg, a fellow of Corpus Chr isti College at Oxford on July 4, 1517, and in 1520 the king's "Estronomyer," at hundred shillings the quarter. "He made the old dial in Corpus Christi College garden; and that standing on a pillar in St. Mary's south churchyard, in High Street of the city of Oxon." Thus the Reformation, made in Germany, came to England. Cardinal Gasquet correctly calls it "the Lutheran invasion." Oak Park, Ill. (To be continued) W. DALLMANN The Progressive Revelation of the Antichrist That there have been many antichristian forces, many "anti- christs" in the world since the days of our blessed Savior, that, in fact, they had their origin in apostolic times, is clearly stated in Holy Scripture, as in 1 J ohn 2: 18; 4:3; 2 John 7. Our knowledge of this fact, therefore, and our belief in this truth, is based upon a teaching, a doctrine, of the Bible. That, in addition, there would come one great Antichrist, one whose antecedents would go back to the days of the apostles, is just as clearly and emphatically stated in H oly Scr ipture. Cpo 1 J ohn 4: 3; 2 Thess. 2: 3-12 (also the pertinent passages in Daniel and in the Book of Revelation) . The Biblical basis for the doctrine of the Antichrist, as held by the Lutheran Church and by many others,