In Luther's remarks about sinning to spite the devil we have always heard an echo from his life at the cloister. One's judgment about the monastic life is somewhat mitigated when one hears how Dr. Staupitz and the brethren in the convent at Erfurt would occasionally speak to Luther about the latter's sins. Staupitz called them "Puppensuenden." It is not easy to render this term by a short and apt English term; "peccadillo" would come near the meaning. A child playing with a doll will treat it as if it were a human being, will dress it, talk to it, and pretend to receive answers from it, etc. That is the way, good Catholics were telling Luther, he was treating his sins. His sins were no real sins, or he had magnified their sinfulness out of all proportion. This same advice Luther hands on to another who was becoming a hypochondriac as he had been. When the mind is in a morbid state it imagines faults, errors, sins, where there are none. The melancholy person in his self-scrutiny becomes an intolerant tyrant to himself. He will flay his poor soul for trifles as if they were the blackest crimes: In such moments the devil is very busy about the victim of gloom and despair. Luther has diagnosed the case of Weller with the skill of a nervous specialist. He counsels Weller not to judge himself according to the devil's prompting, and, in order to break Satan's thrall over him, to wrench himself free from his false notions of what is sinful. In offering this advice, Luther uses such expressions as: "Sin, commit sin," but the whole context shows that he advises Weller to do that which is in itself not sinful, but looks like sin to Weller in his present condition. When Luther declares he would like to commit a real brave sin himself as a taunt to the devil, he adds: "Would that I could!" That means, that, as a matter of fact, he could not do it and did not do it, because it was wrong. What bold immoral act did Weller commit in consequence of Luther's advice? What immoralities are there in Luther's own life? Luther's letters did not convey the meaning to his morbid young friend that Catholic writers think and claim they did.
Luther's advice to Melanchthon which is so revolting to Catholics that they have made it the slogan in their campaign against Luther refers to a state of affairs that is identical with what we noted in our review of the correspondence with Weller. It is contained in a letter which Luther wrote August 1, 1521, while he was an exile in the Wartburg. He says to his despondent friend and colleague at the University of Wittenberg: "If you are a preacher of grace, do not preach a fictitious, but the true grace. If grace is of the true sort, you will also have to bear true, not fictitious, sins. God does not save those who only acknowledge themselves sinners in a feigned manner. Be a sinner, then, and sin bravely, but believe more bravely still and rejoice in Christ, who is the Victor over sin, death, and the world. We must sin as long as we are in this world; the present life is not an abode of righteousness; however, we look for new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness, says Peter (2. Ep. 3, 13). We are satisfied, by the richness of God's glory, to have come to the knowledge of the Lamb that taketh away the sins of the world. No sin shall wrest us from Him, were we even in one day to commit fornication and manslaughter a thousand times. Do you think the price paltry and the payment small that has been made for us by this great Lamb?" (15, 2589.)
"Be a sinner, and sin bravely, but believe more bravely still"—this is the chef d'oeuvre of the muck-rakers in Luther's life. The reader has the entire passage which contains the outrageous statement of Luther before him, and will be able to judge the connection in which the words occur. What caused Luther to write those words? Did Melanchthon contemplate some crime which he was too timid to perpetrate? According to the horrified expressions of Catholics that must have been the situation. Luther, in their view, says to Melanchthon: Philip, you are a simpleton. Why scruple about a sin? You are still confined in the trammels of very narrow-minded moral views. You must get rid of them. Have the courage to be wicked, Make a hero of yourself by executing some bold piece of iniquity. Be an "Uebermensch." Sin with brazen unconcern; be a fornicator, a murderer, a liar, a thief, defy every moral statute, —only do not forget to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. His grace is intended, not for hesitating, craven sinners, but for audacious, spirited, high-minded criminals.
This, we are asked to believe, is the sentiment of the same Luther who in his correspondence with Weller declares that he could not if he would commit a brave sin to spite the devil. Can the reader induce himself to believe that Luther advised Melanchthon to do what he himself knew was a moral impossibility to himself because of his relation to God? And again we put the question which we put in connection with the Weller letters: What brave sin did Melanchthon actually commit upon being thus advised by Luther?
One glance at the context, a calm reflection upon the tenor of this entire passage in the letter to Melanchthon, suffices to convince every unbiased reader that Luther is concerned about Melanchthon as he was about Weller: he fears his young colleague is becoming a prey to morbid self-incrimination. It is again a case of "Puppensuenden" being expanded till they seem ethical monstrosities. But, as the opening words of the paragraph show, Luther had another purpose in writing to Melanchthon as he did. Melanchthon was a public preacher and expounder of the doctrine of evangelical grace. He must not preach that doctrine mincingly, haltingly. Is that possible? Indeed, it is. Just as there are preachers afraid to preach the divine Law and to tell men that they are under the curse of God and merit damnation, so there are preachers afraid, actually afraid, to preach the full Gospel, without any limiting clauses and provisos. Just as there are teachers of Christianity who promptly put on the soft pedal when they reach the critical point in their public deliverances where they must reprove sin, and who hate intensive preaching of the Ten Commandments, so there are evangelical teachers who dole out Gospel grace in dribbles and homeopathic doses, as if it were the most virulent poison, of which the sinner must not be given too much. Luther tells Melanchthon: If you are afraid to draw every stop in the organ when you play the tune of Love Divine, All Love Excelling, you had better quit the organ. There are some sinners in this world that will not understand your faint evangelical whispers; they need to have the truth that Christ forgives their sins, all their sins,—their worst sins, blown into them with all the trumpets that made the walls of Jericho fall. If Melanchthon did not require a strong faith in the forgiving grace of God for himself, he needed it as a teacher of that grace to others; he must, therefore, familiarize himself with the immensity and power of that grace.
In conclusion, it should be noted that the Catholic writers who express their extreme disgust at the immoral principles of Luther belong to a Church whose theologians have made very questionable distinctions between venial sins and others. Papal dispensations and decisions of Catholic casuists, especially in the order of the Jesuits, have startled the world by their moral perverseness. Yea, the very principles of probabilism and mental reservation which the Jesuits have espoused are antiethical. In accordance with the principle last named, "when important interests are at stake, a negative or modifying clause may remain unuttered which would completely reverse the statement actually made. This principle justified unlimited lying when one's interest or convenience seemed to require it. Where the same word or phrase has more than one sense, it may be employed in an unusual sense with the expectation that it will be understood in the usual. [This is called "amphibology" by them.] Such evasions may be used under oath in a civil court. Equally destructive of good morals was the teaching of many Jesuit casuists that moral obligation may be evaded by directing the intention when committing an immoral act to an end worthy in itself; as in murder, to the vindication of one's honor; in theft, to the supplying of one's needs or those of the poor; in fornication or adultery, to the maintenance of one's health or comfort. Nothing did more to bring upon the society the fear and distrust of the nations and of individuals than the justification and recommendation by several of their writers of the assassination of tyrants, the term 'tyrant' being made to include all persons in authority who oppose the work of the papal church or order. The question has been much discussed, Jesuits always taking the negative side, whether the Jesuits have taught that 'the end justifies the means.' It may not be possible to find this maxim in these precise words in Jesuit writings; but that they have always taught that for the 'greater glory of God,' identified by them with the extension of Roman Catholic (Jesuit) influence, the principles of ordinary morality may be set aside, seems certain. The doctrine of philosophical sin, in accordance with which actual attention to the sinfulness of an act when it is being committed is requisite to its sinfulness for the person committing it, was widely advocated by members of the society. The repudiation of some of the most scandalous maxims of Jesuit writers by later writers, or the placing of books containing scandalous maxims on the Index, does not relieve the society or the Roman Catholic Church from responsibility, as such books must have received authoritative approval before publication, and the censuring of them does not necessarily involve an adverse attitude toward the teaching itself, but way be a more measure of expediency." (A. H. Newman, in New Schaff-Herzog Encycl., 6, 146.)
18. Luther, Repudiates the Ten Commandments?
In Luther's correspondence with Weller there occurs a remark to the effect that Weller must put the Decalog out of his mind. Similar statements occur in great number throughout Luther's writings. In some of these statements Luther speaks in terms of deep scorn and contempt of the Law, and considers it the greatest affront that can be offered Christians to place them under the Law of Moses. He declares that Moses must be regarded by Christians as if he were a heretic, excommunicated by the Church, and assigns him to the gallows. Some of the strongest invectives of this kind are found in his exposition of the Epistle to the Galatians. These stern utterances of Luther against the Law serve the Catholics as the basis for their charge that Luther is the most destructive spirit that has arisen within the Church. He is said to have destroyed the only perfect norm of right and wrong by his violent onslaughts on Moses. Once the commandments of God are abrogated, the feeling of duty and responsibility, they argue, is plucked from the hearts of men, and license and vice rush in upon the world with the force of a springtide.
The reader will remember what has been said in a previous chapter about Luther's labors to expound and apply the divine Law, also about the intimate and loving relation which he maintained to the Ten Commandments to the end of his life. Luther has spoken of Moses as a teacher of true holiness in terms of unbounded admiration and praise. Ho declares the writings of Moses the principal part of our Bible, because all the prophets and apostles have drawn their teaching from Moses and have expanded the teaching of Moses. Christ Himself has appealed to Moses as an authority in matters of religion. The greatest distinction of Moses in Luther's view is that he has prophesied concerning Christ, and by revealing the people's sin through the teaching of the Law has made them see and feel the necessity of a redemption through the Mediator. However, also the laws of Moses are exceedingly fine, Luther thinks. The Ten Commandments are essentially the natural moral law implanted in the hearts of man. But also his forensic laws, his civil statutes, his ecclesiastical ordinances, his regulations regarding the hygiene, and the public order that must be maintained in a great commonwealth, are wise and salutary. The Catholics are forced to admit that alongside of the open contempt which Luther occasionally voices for Moses and the Mosaic righteousness inculcated by the Law there runs a cordial esteem of the great prophet. Luther regards the Law of Moses as divine; it is to him just as much the Word of God as any other portion of the Scriptures. To save their faces in a debate they must concede this point, but they charge Luther with being a most disorderly reasoner, driven about in his public utterances by momentary impulses: He will set up a rule to-day which he knocks down to-morrow. He will cite the same Principle for or against a matter. He is so erratic that he can be adduced as authority by both sides to a controversy. The Catholic may succeed with certain people in getting rid of Luther on the claim that his is a confused mind, and that in weighty affairs he adopts the policy of the opportunist. Most men will demand a better explanation of the seeming self-contradiction in Luther's attitude toward the divine Law.
There is only one connection in which Luther speaks disparagingly of the Law, and we shall show that what he says is no real disparagement, but the correct Scriptural valuation of the Law. Luther holds that the Ten Commandments do not save any person nor contribute the least part to his salvation. They must be entirely left out of account when such questions are to be answered as these: How do I obtain a gracious God? How is my sin to be forgiven? How do I obtain a good conscience? How can I come to I live righteously? How can I hope to die calmly, in the confidence that I am going to heaven? On such occasions Luther says: Turn your eyes away from Moses and his Law; he cannot help you; you apply at the wrong office when you come to him for rest for your soul here and hereafter. He gives you no comfort, and he cannot, because it is not his function to do so. It is Another's business to do that. Him you grossly dishonor and traduce when you refuse to come to Him for what He alone can give, and when you go to some one who does not give you what you need, though you pretend that you get it from this other. A proper relation to God is established for us only by Jesus Christ. He is the exclusive Mediator appointed by God for His dealing with man and for man in his dealings with God. There is salvation in none other; nor can our hope of heaven be placed on any other foundation than that which God laid when He appointed Christ our Redeemer (Acts 4, 12; 1 Cor. 3, 11).