Yes, it applies only to the love which has flesh and blood, for only this can absolve from the sins which flesh and blood commit. A merely moral being cannot forgive what is contrary to the law of morality. That which denies the law is denied by the law. The moral judge, who does not infuse human blood into his judgment judges the sinner relentlessly, inexorably. Since, then, God is regarded as a sin-pardoning being, he is posited, not indeed as an unmoral, but as more than a moral being—in a word, as a human being. The negation or annulling of sin is the negation of abstract moral rectitude,—the positing of love, mercy, sensuous life. Not abstract beings—no! only sensuous, living beings are merciful. Mercy is the justice of sensuous life.[7] Hence God does not forgive the sins of men as the abstract God of the understanding, but as man, as the God made flesh, the visible God. God as man sins not, it is true, but he knows, he takes on himself, the sufferings, the wants, the needs of sensuous beings. The blood of Christ cleanses us from our sins in the eyes of God; it is only his human blood that makes God merciful, allays his anger; that is, our sins are forgiven us because we are no abstract beings, but creatures of flesh and blood.[8]
[1] In religion, the representation or expression of the nothingness of man before God is the anger of God; for as the love of God is the affirmation, his anger is the negation of man. But even this anger is not taken in earnest. “God ... is not really angry. He is not thoroughly in earnest even when we think that he is angry, and punishes.”—Luther (Th. viii. p. 208). [↑]
[2] Luther, Concordienbuch, Art. 8, Erklär. [↑]
[3] Luther, Sämmtliche Schriften und Werke, Leipzig, 1729, fol. Th. iii. p. 589. It is according to this edition that references are given throughout the present work. [↑]
[4] Predigten etzlicher Lehrer vor und zu Tauleri Zeiten, Hamburg, 1621, p. 81. [↑]
[5] “That which, in our own judgment, derogates from our self-conceit, humiliates us. Thus the moral law inevitably humiliates every man when he compares with it the sensual tendency of his nature.”—Kant, Kritik der prakt. Vernunft, 4th edition, p. 132. [↑]
[6] “Omnes peccavimus.... Parricide cum lega cæperunt et illis facinus pœna monstravit.”—Seneca. “The law destroys us.”—Luther (Th. xvi. s. 320). [↑]
[7] “Das Rechtsgefühl der Sinnlichkeit.” [↑]
[8] “This, my God and Lord, has taken upon him my nature, flesh and blood such as I have, and has been tempted and has suffered in all things like me, but without sin; therefore he can have pity on my weakness.—[Hebrews v.] Luther (Th. xvi. s. 533). “The deeper we can bring Christ into the flesh the better.”—(Ibid. s. 565.) “God himself, when he is dealt with out of Christ, is a terrible God, for no consolation is found in him, but pure anger and disfavour.”—(Th. xv. s. 298.) [↑]