Human arrogance may be said to have reached its limit in the papacy. The Pope is practically a God on earth. "Sitting in the temple of God as God, he is showing himself that he is God" (2 Thess. 2, 4). He has been addressed by his followers in terms of the Deity. "When the Pope thinks, it is God thinking," wrote the papal organ of Rome, the Civilta Cattolica, in 1869. He has asserted the right to make laws for Christians, and to dispense with the laws of the Almighty. Although this seemed a superfluous proceeding, he declared himself infallible on July 18, 1870. Under a glowering sky, as if Heaven frowned angrily at the Pope's attempt, Plus IX had entered St. Peter's. As a "second Moses" he mounted the papal throne to read the Constitution "Aeternus Pater," the document in which he made the following claims: Canon III: "If any one says that the Roman Pontiff has only authority to inspect and direct, but not plenary and supreme authority of jurisdiction over the entire Church, not only in matters which relate to faith and morals, but also in matters that belong to the discipline and government of the Church scattered through the whole earth; or that he has only the more eminent part of such authority, but not the full plenitude of this supreme authority; or that this authority of his is not his ordinary authority which he holds from no intermediary, and that it does not extend over all churches and every single one of them, over all pastors and every single one of them, over all the faithful and every single one of them, —let him be accursed!" Canon IV: "With the approval of the Sacred Council we teach and declare it to be a dogma revealed from heaven that the Roman Pontiff, when he speaks ex cathedra, that is, when, in accordance with his supreme apostolic authority, be discharges his office as Pastor and Teacher of all Christians, and defines a doctrine relating to the faith or morals which is to be embraced by the entire Church, he is, by divine assistance promised to him in the blessed Peter, vested with that infallibility with which the divine Redeemer desired His Church to be endowed in defining the doctrine of faith and morals; and that for this reason such definitions of the Roman Pontiff are in their very nature, not, however, by reason of the consent of the Church, unchangeable. If—which God may avert!—any one should presume to contradict this definition of ours,—let him be accursed!" Amid flashes of lightning and peals of thunder this document was read to a council whose membership had shrunk during seven months of deliberation from 767 to 547 attendants,—277 qualified members had never put in an appearance,—and of these all but two had been cowed into abject submission. When one recalls scenes like these, and remembers that Catholic teaching on justification attacks the very heart of Christianity, anything that Luther has said about the Popes appears mild. Such heaven-storming and God-defying arrogance deserves to be dragged through the mire—with apologies to the mire.
21. Luther the Translator of the Bible.
A violent attack upon Luther by Catholic writers is caused by the admiration which Protestants manifest for Luther because he translated the Bible into German. Catholics, of course, cannot deny that Luther did translate the Bible, and that his translation is still a cherished treasure of Protestants; but in order to belittle this achievement of Luther, which inflicted incalculable damage on Rome, they talk about Luther's unfitness for the work of Bible-translation and about the unwarranted liberties Luther took with the Bible.
These writers claim that Luther was, in the first place, morally unfit to undertake the translation of the Bible. To show to what desperate means Luther's Catholic critics will resort in order to make out a case against him, we note that one of the most recent disparagers of Luther informs the public that Luther's original name had been Luder. This name conveys the idea of "carrion," "beast," "low scoundrel." When Luther began to translate the Bible, we are told, he changed his name into "Squire George." Once before this, at the time of his entering the university, Catholics note that he changed his name from Luder to Lueder. But these changes of his name, they say, did not improve his character. We are told that, while Luther was engaged upon the work of rendering the Bible into German, he was consumed with fleshly lust and given to laziness. Luther's own statements in letters to friends are cited to corroborate this assertion. The conclusion which we are to draw from these "facts" is this: Such a corrupt person could not possibly be a proper instrument for the Holy Spirit to employ in so pious an undertaking as the translation of the Word of God.
Catholics should be reminded that they misquote the book of matriculation in which the students at Erfurt signed their names on entering the university. Luther's signature is not "Lueder" but "Ludher." Other forms of the name "Luder" and "Lueder" occur elsewhere. But in any form the name has a more honorable derivation and meaning than Catholic writers are inclined to give it. It is derived from "Luither," which means as much as "People's Man," (= der Leute Herr). Another well-known form of the same name is Lothar, which some, tracing the derivation still further, derive from the old German Chlotachar, which means as much as "loudly hailed among the army" (= hluit, loud, and chari, army). Respectable scholars to-day so explain the name Luther.
At the Wartburg, where Luther was an exile for ten months, his name was changed by the warden of the castle, Count von Berlepsch. This was done the better to conceal his identity from the henchmen of Rome, who by the imperial edict of outlawry had been given liberty to hunt Luther and slay him where they found him.
The sexual condition of Luther during the years before his marriage was the normal condition of any healthy young man at his age. Luther speaks of this matter as a person nowadays would speak about it to his physician or to a close friend. The matter to which he refers is in itself perfectly pure: it is an appeal of nature. Do Luther's Catholic critics mean to infer that Luther was the only monk, then or now, that felt this call which human nature issues by the ordination of the Creator? Rome can inflict celibacy even on priests that look like stall-fed oxen, but she cannot unsex men. Mohammedans are less inhuman to their eunuchs. Moreover, it must be borne in mind that Luther complains of this matter as something that disturbs him. It vexed his pure mind, and he fought against it as not many monks of his day have done, by fasting, prayer, and hard work. Yes, hard work! The remarks of Luther about his physical condition are simply twisted from their true import when Luther is represented as a victim of fleshly lust and a habitual debauchee. Luther's Catholic critics fail to mention that during his brief stay at the Wartburg Luther not only translated the greater part of the New Testament, but also wrote about a dozen treatises, some of them of considerable size, and that of his correspondence during this period about fifty letters are still preserved. Surely, a fairly respectable record for a lazy man!
Catholic writers also declare Luther spiritually unfit for translating the Bible. They say that all the time that Luther spent at the Wartburg he was haunted by the devil. He would hear strange noises and see weird shadows flit before him. He felt that he had come under the sway of the powers of darkness. This, we are assured, was because he had risen in rebellion against the divine power of the papacy. The Holy Father whom he had attacked was being avenged upon Luther by an accusing conscience. Luther was given a foretaste of the terrors that await the reprobate. He had become an incipient demoniac. The inference which we are to draw from this delightful description is this: Could such an abandoned wretch as Luther was during the exile at the Wartburg be favored with the holy calm and composure and the heavenly light which any person must possess who sets out upon the arduous task of telling men in their own tongue what God has said to them in a foreign tongue?
There is hardly a period in Luther's life that is entirely free from spiritual affliction. In this respect Luther shares the common lot of godly men in responsible positions in Church or State during critical times. Moreover, Luther with all Christians believed in a personal and incessantly active devil. Luther's devil was not the denatured metaphysical and scientific devil of modern times, which meets us in the form of the principle of negation, or logical contradiction, or a demoralizing tendency and influence, but an energetic devil, possessed of an intelligence and will of his own, and going about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Luther accepted the teaching of the Bible that this devil is related to men's sinning, that men can be made to do, and are doing, his will, and are led about by the devil like slaves. Luther knew that for His own reasons God permits the devil to afflict His children, as happened to Job and Paul. Add to this the reaction that must have set in after Luther had quitted the stirring scenes and the severe ordeals through which he had passed before the imperial court at Worms. In the silence and solitude of his secluded asylum in the Thuringian Forest the recent events in which he had been a principal actor passed in review before his mind, and he began to spell out many a grave and ominous meaning from them. If it is true that the devil loves to find a lonely man, here was his chance.
And if the devil ever had material interests at stake in attacking a particular person, he made no mistake in assailing this isolated monk, Martin Luther, in his moments of brooding and depression. Lastly, Luther's physical condition at the Wartburg must be taken into consideration. Trained to frugal habits in the cloister and habituated to fasts and mortification of the flesh, Luther found the new mode of living which he was compelled to adopt uncongenial. He was the guest of a prince and was treated like a nobleman. The rich and abundant food that was served him was a disastrous diet for him, even though he did not yield overmuch to his appetite. He complains in his letters to friends during the Wartburg period about his physical distress, chiefly constipation, to which he was constitutionally prone.