History of the Reformation, vol. 3

Chapter 5

Translation of the Bible—Wants of the Church—Principles of the Reformation—Temptations of the Devil—Luther’s Works condemned by the Sorbonne—Melancthon’s Reply—Luther Visits Wittenberg

While Luther was thus struggling against error, as if he were still in the midst of the battle, he was also laboring in his retirement of the Wartburg, as if he had no concern in what was going on in the world. The hour has come in which the Reformation, from being a mere theological question, was to become the life of the people; and yet the great engine by which this progress was to be effected was not yet in being. This powerful and mighty instrument, destined to hurl its thunderbolts from every side against the proud edifice of Rome, throw down its walls, cast off the enormous weight of the papacy under which the Church lay stifled, and communicate an impulse to the whole human race which would not be lost until the end of time,—this instrument was to go forth from the old castle of the Wartburg, and enter the world on the same day that terminated the reformer’s captivity. HRSCV3 319.4

The farther the Church was removed from the time when Jesus, the true Light of the world, was on the earth, the greater was her need of the torch of God’s Word, ordained to transmit the brightness of Jesus Christ to the men of the latter days. But this Divine Word was at that time hidden from the people. Several unsuccessful attempts at translation from the Vulgate had been made in 1477, 1490, and in 1518; they were almost unintelligible, and from their high price beyond the reach of the people. It had even been prohibited to give the German Church the Bible in the vulgar tongue. Besides which, the number of those who were able to read did not become considerable until there existed in the German language a book of lively and universal interest. HRSCV3 319.5

Luther was called to present his nation with the Scriptures of God. That same God who had conducted St. John to Patmos, there to write his revelation, had confined Luther in the Wartburg, there to translate His Word. This great task, which it would have been difficult for him to have undertaken in the midst of the cares and occupations of Wittenberg, was to establish the new building on the primitive rock, and, after the lapse of so many ages, lead Christians back from the subtleties of the schoolmen to the pure foundation-head of redemption and salvation. HRSCV3 319.6

The wants of the Church spoke loudly; they called for this great work; and Luther, by his own inward experience, was to be led to perform it. In truth, he discovered in faith that repose of the souls which his agitated conscience and his monastic ideas had long induced him to seek in his own merits and holiness. The doctrine of the Church, the scholastic theology, knew nothing of the consolations that proceed from faith; but the Scriptures proclaim them with great force, and there it was that he had found them. Faith in the Word of God had made him free. By it he felt emancipated from the dogmatical authority of the Church, from its hierarchy and traditions, from the opinions of the schoolmen, the power of prejudice, and from every human ordinance. Those strong and numerous bonds which for centuries had enchained and stifled Christendom, were snapped asunder, broken in pieces, and scattered round him; and he nobly raised his head freed from all authority except that of the Word. This independence of man, this submission to God, which he had learned in the Holy Scriptures, he desired to impart to the Church. But before he could communicate them, it was necessary to set before it the revelations of God. A powerful hand was wanted to unlock the massive gates of that arsenal of God’s Word from which Luther had taken his arms, and to open to the people against the day of battle those vaults and antique halls which for many ages no foot had ever trod. HRSCV3 319.7

Luther had already translated several fragments of the Holy Scripture; the seven penitential Psalms had been his first task. John the Baptist, Christ himself, and the Reformation had begun alike by calling men to repentance. It is the principle of every regeneration in the individual man, and in the whole human race. These essays had been eagerly received; men longed to have more; and this voice of the people was considered by Luther as the voice of God himself. He resolved to reply to the call. He was a prisoner within those lofty walls; what of that! he will devote his leisure to translating the Word of God into the language of his countrymen. Erelong this Word will be seen descending from the Wartburg with him; circulating among the people of Germany, and putting them in possession of those spiritual treasures hitherto shut up within the hearts of a few pious men. “Would that this one book,” exclaimed Luther, “were in every language, in every hand before the eyes, and in the ears and hearts of all men!” Admirable words, which, after a lapse of three centuries, as illustrious body, translating the Bible into the mother-tongue of every nation upon earth, has undertaken to realize “Scripture without any comment,” said he again, “is the sun whence all teachers receive their light.” HRSCV3 320.1

Such are the principles of Christianity and of the Reformation. According to these venerable words, we should not consult the Fathers to throw light upon Scripture, but Scripture to explain the Fathers. The reformers and the apostles set up the Word of God as the only light, as they exalt the sacrifice of Christ as the only righteousness with this perfect righteousness of Christ, we vitiate both the foundations of Christianity. These are the two fundamental heresies of Rome, and which, although doubtless in a smaller degree, some teachers were desirous of introducing into the bosom of the Reformation. HRSCV3 320.2

Luther opened the Greek originals of the evangelists and apostles, and undertook the difficult task of making these divine teachers speak his mother tongue. Important crisis in the history of the Reformation! from that time the Reformation was no longer in the hands of the reformer. The Bible came forward; Luther withdrew. God appeared, and man disappeared. The reformer placed the Book in the hands of his contemporaries. Each one may now hear the voice of God for himself; as for Luther, henceforth he mingles with the crowd, and takes his station in the ranks of those who come to draw from the common fountain of light and life. HRSCV3 320.3

In translating the Holy Scriptures, Luther found that consolation and strength, of which he stood so much in need. Solitary, in ill health, and saddened by the exertions of his enemies and the extravagances of some of his followers,—seeing his life wearing away in the gloom of that old castle, he had occasionally to endure terrible struggles. In those times, men were inclined to carry into the visible world the conflicts that the soul sustains with its spiritual enemies; Luther’s lively imagination easily embodied the emotions of his heart, and the superstitions of the Middle Ages had still some hold upon his mind, so that we might say of him, as it has been said of Calvin with regard to the punishment inflicted on heretics: there was yet a remnant of popery in him. Satan was not in Luther’s view simply an invisible though real being; he thought that this adversary of God appeared to men as he had appeared to Jesus Christ. Although the authenticity of many of the stories on this subject contained in the Table-talk and elsewhere is more than doubtful, history must still record this failing in the reformer. Never was he more assailed by these gloomy ideas than in the solitude of the Wartburg. In the days of his strength he had braved the devil at Worms; but now all the reformer’s powers seemed broken and his glory tarnished. He was thrown aside; Satan was victorious in his turn, and in the anguish of his soul Luther imagined he saw his giant form standing before him, lifting his finger in threatening attitude, exulting with a bitter and hellish sneer, and gnashing his teeth in fearful rage. One day especially, it is said, as Luther was engaged on his translation of the New Testament, he fancied he beheld Satan, filled with horror at his work, tormenting him, and prowling round him like a lion about to spring upon his prey. Luther, alarmed and incensed, snatched up his inkstand and flung it at the head of his enemy. The figure disappeared, and the missile was dashed in pieces against the wall. HRSCV3 320.4

Luther’s sojourn in the Wartburg began to be insupportable to him. He felt indignant at the timidity of his protectors. Sometimes he would remain a whole day plunged in deep and silent meditation, and awakened from it only to exclaim, “Oh, that I were at Wittenberg!” At length he could hold out no longer; there has been caution enough; he must see his friends again, hear them, and converse with them. True, he runs the risk of falling into the hands of his enemies, but nothing can stop him. About the end of November, he secretly quitted the Wartburg, and set out for Wittenberg. HRSCV3 321.1

A fresh storm had just burst upon him. At last the Sorbonne had spoken out. That celebrated school of Paris, the first authority in the Church after the pope, the ancient and venerable source whence theological teaching had proceeded, had given its verdict against the Reformation. HRSCV3 321.2

The following are some of the propositions condemned by this learned body. Luther had said, “God ever pardons and remits sins gratuitously, and requires nothing of us in return, except that in future we should live according to righteousness.” And he had added, “Of all deadly sins, this is the most deadly, namely, that any one should think he is not guilty of a damnable and deadly sin before God.” He had said in another place, “Burning heretics is contrary to the will of the Holy Ghost.” HRSCV3 321.3

To these three propositions, and to many others besides, which they quoted, the theological faculty of Paris replied, “Heresy!—let him be accursed!” HRSCV3 321.4

But a young man, twenty-four years of age, of short stature, diffident, and plain in appearance, dared take up the gauntlet which the first college in the world had thrown down. They knew pretty well at Wittenberg what should be thought of these pompous censures; they knew that Rome had yielded to the suggestions of the Dominicans, and that the Sorbonne was led away by two or three fanatical doctors who were designated at Paris by satirical nicknames. Accordingly, in his Apology, Melancthon did not confine himself to defending Luther; but, with that boldness which characterizes his writings, he carried the war into the enemy’s camp. “You say he is a Manichean!—he is a Montanist!—let fire and faggot repress his foolishness! And who is Montanist? Luther, who would have us believe in Holy Scripture alone, or you, who would have men believe in the opinions of their fellow-creatures rather than in the Word of God?” HRSCV3 321.5

To ascribe more importance to the word of a man than to the Word of God was in very truth the heresy of Montanus, as it still is that of the pope and of all those who set the hierarchical authority of the Church or the interior inspirations of mysticism far above the positive declarations of the Sacred Writings. Accordingly the youthful masters of arts, who had said, “I would rather lay down my life than my faith,” did not stop there. He accused the Sorbonne of having obscured the Gospel, extinguished faith, and substituted an empty philosophy in the place of Christianity. After this work of Melancthon’s, the position of the dispute was changed; he proved unanswerably that the heresy was at Paris and Rome, and the catholic truth at Wittenberg. HRSCV3 321.6

Meanwhile Luther, caring little for the condemnations of the Sorbonne, was proceeding in his military equipment to the university. He was greatly distressed by various reports which reached him on the road of a spirit of impatience and independence that was showing itself among some of his adherents. At length he arrived at Wittenberg without being recognized, and stopped at Amsdorff’s house. Immediately all his friends were secretly called together; and Melancthon among the first, who had so often said, “I would rather die than lose him.” They came!—What a meeting!—what joy!—The captive of the Wartburg tasted in their society all the sweetness of christian friendship. He learnt the spread of the Reformation, the hopes of his brethren; and, delighted at what he saw and heard, offered up a prayer,—returned thanks to God,—and then with brief delay returned to the Wartburg. HRSCV3 321.7