On the fact that faith gives us strength against all Satanic influences Luther insists frequently and in the strongest terms.
He tries to find here a wholesome remedy against the fear that presses on him. He describes his own attempts to lay hold on it and to fill himself with Christ boldly and trustfully. Even in his last days such words of confidence occasionally pierce the mists of his depression. “We see well,” he says, “that when the devil attacks a [true] Christian he is put to shame, for where there is faith and confidence he has nothing to gain.” This he said in 1542 when relating the story of an old-time hermit who rudely accosted the devil as follows, when the latter sought to disturb him at his prayers: “Ah, devil, this serves you right! You were meant to be an angel and you have become a swine.”[1216]
“We must muster all our courage so as not to dread the devil.”[1217] We must “clasp the faith to our very bosom” and “cheerfully fling to the winds the apparitions of the spirits”; “they seek in vain to affright men.”[1218] Contempt of the devil and awakening of faith are, according to Luther, the best remedies against all assaults of the devil.[1219] A man who really has the faith may even set an example that others cannot imitate.[1220] Luther knows, for instance, of a doctor of medicine who with boundless faith stood up to Satan when the latter, horns and all, appeared to him; the brave man even succeeded in breaking off the horns; but, in a similar case, when another tried to do the same in a spirit of boasting, he was killed by Satan.[1221] Hence let us have faith, but let our faith be humble!
But, provided we have faith and rely on Christ, we may well show the devil our contempt for him, vex him and mock at his power and cunning. He himself, as he says, was given to breaking out into music and song, the better to show the devil that he despised him, for “our hymns are very galling to him”; on the contrary, he rejoices and has a laugh when we are upset and cry out “alas and alack!”[1222] To remain alone is not good. “This is what I do”; rather than be alone “I go to my swine-herd Johann or to see the pigs.”[1223]
In this connection Luther can tell some very coarse and vulgar jokes, both at his own and others’ expense, in illustration of the contempt which the devil deserves; they cannot here be passed over in silence.
Thus, on April 15, 1538, he relates the story of a woman of Magdeburg whom Satan vexed by running over her bed at night “like rats and mice. As he would not cease the woman put her a—— over the bedside, presented him with a f—— (if such language be permissible) and said: ‘There, devil, there’s a staff, take it in your hand and go pilgriming with it to Rome to the Pope your idol.’” Ever after the devil left her in peace, for “he is a proud spirit and cannot endure to be treated contemptuously.”[1224] According to Lauterbach, who gives the story in somewhat briefer form, Luther sapiently remarked: “Such examples do not always hold good, and are dangerous.”[1225]
He himself was nevertheless fond of expressing his contempt for the devil after a similar way when the latter assailed him with remorse of conscience.
“I can drive away the devil with a single f——.”[1226] “To shame him we may tell him: Kiss my a——”,[1227] or “Ease yourself into your shirt and tie it round your neck,” etc.[1228] On May 7, 1532, when troubled in mind and afraid lest “the thunder should strike him, he said: ‘Lick my a——, I want to sleep, not to hold a disputation.’”[1229] On another occasion he exclaims: “The devil shall lick my a—— even though I should have sinned.”[1230] When the devil teased him at night, “suggesting all sorts of strange thoughts to him,” he at last said to him: “Kiss me on the seat! God is not angry as you would have it.” Of course, seeing that the devil “‘fouls’ the knowledge of God,” he must expect to be “fouled” in his turn. Luther frequently said, so the Table-Talk relates, that he would end by sending “into his a—— where they belonged” those “twin devils” who were in the habit of prying on him and tormenting him mentally and bodily; for “they had brought him to such a pass that he was fit for nothing.”[1231] The Pope had once played him (Luther) the same trick: “He has stuck me into the devil’s behind”;[1232] “for I snap at the Pope’s ban and am his devil, therefore does he hate and persecute me.”[1233]
He relates, in May, 1532, according to Schlaginhaufen’s Notes, his method of dismissing the devil by the use of stronger and stronger hints: When the devil came to him at night in order to plague him, he first of all told him to let him sleep, because he must work during the day and needed all the rest he could get. Then, if Satan continued to upbraid him with his sins, he would answer mockingly that he had been guilty of a lot more sins which the devil had forgotten to mention, for instance, he had, etc. (there follows the choice simile of the shirt as given above); thirdly, “if he still goes on accusing me of sins I say to him contemptuously: ‘Sancte Satanas ora pro me; you have never done a wrong and you alone are holy; be off to God and get grace for yourself.’”[1234]