[28] Gregory the Great, pope 590-604. The passage is found in Migne, LXXVI, 203; LXXVII, 34.
[29] Antichrist, the incarnation of all that is hostile to Christ and His Kingdom. His appearance is prophesied in 2 Thess. 2:3-10 (the "man of sin, sitting in the temple of God"); 1 John 2:18, 22; 4:3, and Rev. 13. In the early Church the Fathers sometimes thought the prophecies fulfilled in the person of some especially pestilent heretic. Wyclif applied the term to the pope,—"the pope would seem to be not the vicar of Christ, but the vicar of Antichrist" (see Loos, Dogmengeschichte, 4th ed., p. 649). On Dec. 11, 1518, Luther wrote to Link: "You can see whether my suspicion is correct that at the Roman court the true Antichrist rules of whom St. Paul speaks"; and March 13, 1519, he wrote to Spalatin: "I am not sure but that the pope is Antichrist or his apostle." It was the worldly pretensions of the papacy which suggested the idea both to Wyclif and to Luther. By the year 1520 Luther had come to the definite conclusion that the pope was the "man of sin, sitting in the temple of God," and this opinion he never surrendered.
[30] See above, p. 65.
[31] According to academic usage, the holder of a Master's degree was authorised to expound the subject named in the degree.
[32] The doctrine of papal infallibility was never officially sanctioned in the Middle Ages, but the claim of infallibility was repeatedly made by the champions of the more extreme view of papal power, e. g., Augustinus Triumphus (died 1328) in his Summa de potestate Papae. In his attack upon the XCV Theses (Dialogus de potestate Papae, Dec, 1517) Prierias had asserted, "The supreme pontiff (i. e., the pope) cannot err when giving a decision as pontiff, i. e., speaking officially (ex officio), and doing what in him lies to learn the truth"; and again, "Whoever does not rest upon the teaching of the Roman Church and the supreme pontiff as an infallible rule of faith, from which even Holy Scripture draws its vigor and authority, is a heretic" (Erl. Ed., op. var. arg., I, 348). In the Epitome he had said: "Even though the pope as an individual (singularis persona) can do wrong and hold a wrong faith, nevertheless as pope he cannot give a wrong decision" (Weimar Ed., VI, 337).
[33] Most recently in Prierias's Epitome. See preceding note.
[34] Luther had discussed the whole subject of the power of the keys in a Latin treatise, Resolutio super propositione xiii. de potestate papae, of 1519 (Weimar Ed., II, pp. 185 ff.), and in the German treatise The Papacy at Rome (Vol. I, pp. 337-394).
[35] Pp. 66 ff.
[36] Another contention of Prierias. In 1518 (Nov. 25th) Luther had appealed his cause from the decision of the pope, which he foresaw would be adverse, to the decision of a council to be held at some future time. In the Epitome Prierias discusses this appeal, asserting, among other things, that "when there is one undisputed pontiff, it belongs to him alone to call a council," and that "the decrees of councils neither bind nor hold (nullum ligant vel astringunt) unless they are confirmed by authority of the Roman pontiff" (Weimar Ed., VI, 335).
[37] i. e., A mere gathering of people.
[38] The Council of Nicæa, the first of the great councils of the Church, assembled in 325 for the settlement of the Arian controversy. Luther's statement that it was called by the Emperor Constantine, and that its decisions did not derive their validity from any papal confirmation, is historically correct. On Luther's statements about this council, see _Schäffer, Luther als Kirchenhistoriker, pp. 291 ff.; Kohler, Luther und die Kg., pp. 148 ff.
[39] Luther is here referring to the earlier so-called "ecumenical" councils.
[40] i. e., A council which will not be subject to the pope. Cf. Erl. Ed., xxvi, 112.
[41] i. e., They belong to the "spiritual estate"; see above, p. 69.
[42] Der Haufe, i. e. Christians considered en masse, without regard to official position in the Church.
[43] The papal crown dates from the XI Century; the triple crown, or tiara, from the beginning of the XIV. It was intended to signify that very superiority of the pope to the rulers of this world, of which Luther here complains. See Realencyk., X, 532, and literature there cited.
[44] A statement made by Augustinus Triumphus. See above, p. 73, note 5; and below, p. 246.
[45] The Cardinal della Rovere, afterwards Pope Julius II, held at one time the archbishopric of Avignon, the bishoprics of Bologna, Lausanne, Coutances, Viviers, Mende, Ostia and Velletri, and the abbacies of Nonantola and Grottaferrata. This is but one illustration of the scandalous pluralism practised by the cardinals. Cf. Lea, in Cambridge Mod. Hist., I, pp. 650 f.
[46] The complaint that the cardinals were provided with incomes by appointment to German benefices goes back to the Council of Constance (1415). C. Benrath, p. 87, note 17.
[47] The creation of new cardinals was a lucrative proceeding for the popes. On July 31, 1517, Leo X created thirty-one cardinals, and is said to have received from the new appointees about 300,000 ducats. Needless to say, the cardinals expected to make up the fees out of the income of their livings. See Weimar Ed., VI, 417, note I, and Pastor, Gesch. der Papste IV, I, 137. C. Hutten's Vadiscus (Bocking IV, 188).
[48] The famous Benedictine monastery just outside the city of Bamberg.
[49] The proposal made at Constance (see above, p. 82, note 2) was more generous. It suggested a salary of three to four thousand gulden.
[50] As early as the XIV Century both England and France had enacted laws prohibiting the very practices of which Luther here complains. It should be noted, however, that these laws were enforced only occasionally, and never very strictly.
[51] The papal court or curia consisted of all the officials of various sorts who were employed in the transaction of papal business, including those who were in immediate attendance upon the person of the pope, the so-called "papal family." On the number of such officials in the XVI Century, see Benrath, p. 88, note 18, where reference is made to 949 offices, exclusive of those which had to do with the administration of the city of Rome and of the States of the Church, and not including the members of the pope's "family." The Gravamina of 1521 complain that the increase of these offices in recent years has added greatly to the financial burdens of the German Church (Wrede, Deutsche Reichstagsakten unter Kaiser Karl V, II, 675).
[52] On the annates, see Vol. I, p. 383, note 1. Early in their history, which dates from the beginning of the XIV. Century, the annates (fructus medii temporis) had become a fixed tax on all Church offices which fell vacant, and the complaint of extortion in their appraisement and collection was frequently raised. The Council of Constance restricted the obligation to bishoprics and abbacies, and such other benefices as had a yearly income of more than 24 gulden. The Council of Basel (1430) resolved to abolish them entirely, but the resolution of the Council was inoperative, and in the Concordat of Vienna (1448) the German nation agreed to abide by the decision of Constance. On the use of the term "annates" to include other payments to the curia, especially the servitia, see Catholic Encyclopedia, I, pp. 537 f.
Luther here alleges that the annates are not applied to their ostensible purpose, viz., the Crusade. This charge is repeated in the Gravamina of the German Nation presented to the Diet of Worms (1521), with the additional allegation that the amount demanded in the way of annates has materially increased (A. Wrede, Deutsche Reichstagsakten unter Kaiser Karl V., II, pp. 675 f.). Similar complaints had been made at the Diet of Augsburg (1518), and were repeated at the Diet of Nürnberg (Wrede, op. cit., III, 660). Hutten calls the annates "a good at robbery" (Ed. Böcking, IV, 207). In England the annates were abolished by Act of Parliament (April 10, 1532)
[53] On the crusading-indulgences, see Vol. I, p. 18.
[54] i. e., As was done by the Council of Basel. See above, p. 84, note i.
[55] The canons are the clergy attached to a cathedral church who constituted the "chapter" of that cathedral, and to whom the right to elect the bishop normally belonged.
[56] This whole section deals with the abuse of the "right of reservation," i. e., the alleged right of the pope to appoint directly to vacant church positions. According to papal theory the right of appointment belonged absolutely to the pope, who graciously yielded the right to others under certain circumstances, reserving it to himself in other cases. The practice of reserving the appointments seems to date from the XII Century, and was originally an arbitrary exercise of papal authority. The rules which came to govern the reservation of appointments were regarded as limitations upon the authority of the pope, The rule of the "papal months," as it obtained in Germany in Luther's time, is found in the Concordat of Vienna of 1448 (Mirbt, Quellen, 2d ed., No. 261, pp. 167 f.). It provides that livings, with the exception of the higher dignities in the cathedrals and the chief posts in the monasteries, which all vacant in the months of February, April, June, August, October and December, shall be filled by the ordinary method—election, presentation, appointment by the bishop, etc.—but that vacancies occurring in the other months shall be filled by appointment of the pope.
[57] i. e., Church offices which carried with them certain rights of jurisdiction and gave their possessors a certain honorary precedence over other officials of the Church. See Meyer in Realencyk., IV, 658.
[58] Charles V, though elected emperor, was not crowned until October 22d.
[59] i. e., A living which has not hitherto been filled by papal appointment.
[60] This rule, like that of the "papal months," is found in the Concordat of Vienna. Luther's complaint is reiterated in the Gravamina of 1521. (Wrede, Deutsche Reichstagsakten, etc., II, 673.)
[61] Des Papstes und der Cardinale Gesinde, i. e., all those who were counted members of the "family" or "household" (called Dienstverwandte in the Gravamina of 1521) of the pope or of any of the cardinals. The term included those who were in immediate attendance upon the pope or the cardinals, and all those to whom, by virtue of any special connection with the curia, the name "papal servant" could be made to apply. These are the "courtesans" to whom Luther afterwards refers.
[62] In 1513 Albrecht of Brandenburg was made Archbishop of Magdeburg and later in the same year Administrator of Halberstadt; in 1514 he became Archbishop of Mainz as well. In 1518 he was made cardinal.
[63] This rule, like the others mentioned above, is contained in the Concordat of Vienna.
[64] Cf. The Gravamina of 1521, No. 20, Von anfechtung der cordissanen (see above, p. 88, note 3), where the name cordissei is applied to the practice of attacking titles to benefices. (Wrede, op. cit., II, pp. 677 f.)
[65] The pallium is a woolen shoulder-cape which is the emblem of the archbishop's office, and which must be secured from Rome. The bestowal of the pallium by the pope is a very ancient custom. Gregory I (590-604) mentions it as prisca consuetudo (Dist., C.c. 3). The canon law prescribes (Dist. C. c. I) that the archbishop-elect must secure the pallium from Rome within three months of his election; otherwise he is forbidden to discharge any of the duties of his office. It is regarded as the necessary complement of his election and consecration, conferring the "plenitude of the pontifical office," and the name of archbishop. Luther's charge that it had to be purchased "with a great sum of money" is substantiated by similar complaints from the XII Century on, though the language of the canon law makes it evident that Luther's other contention is also correct, viz., that the pallium was originally bestowed gratis. The sum required from the different archbishops varied with the wealth of their sees, and was a fixed sum in each case. The Gravamina of 1521 complain that the price has been raised: "Although according to ancient ordinance the bishoprics of Mainz, Cologne, Salzburg, etc., were bound to pay or the pallium about 10,000 gulden and no more, they can now scarcely get a pallium from Rome for 20 or 24 thousand gulden." (Wrede, op. cit., II, 675.)
[66] The oath of allegiance to the pope was required before the pallium could be bestowed (Dist. C, c. I). The canon law describes this oath as one "of allegiance, obedience and unity" (X, I, 6, c. 4).
[67] See above, p. 86, note 2.
[68] cf. Luther to Spalatin, June 25, 1520 (Enders, II, 424; Smith, No. 271).
[69] i. e., The benefices are treated as though they were vacant.
[70] In the case of certain endowed benefices the right to nominate the incumbent was vested in individuals, usually of the nobility, and was hereditary in their family, This is the so-called jus patronum, or "right of patronage." The complaint that this right is disregarded is frequent in the Gravamina of 1521.
[71] Commendation was one of the practices by which the pope evaded the provision of the canon law which prescribed that the same man should not hold two livings with the cure of souls. The man who received an office in commendam was not required to fulfil the duties attached to the position and when a living or an abbacy was granted in this way during the incumbency of another, the recipient received its entire income during a subsequent vacancy. The practice was most common in the case of abbacies. At the Diet of Worms (1521), Duke George of Saxony, an outspoken opponent of Luther, was as emphatic in his protest against this practice as Luther himself (Wrede, op. cit., II, 665); his protest was incorporated in the Gravamina (ibid., 672), and reappears in the Appendix (ibid., 708).
[72] A monk who deserted his monastery was known as an "apostate."
[73] i. e., Offices which cannot be united in the hands of one man. See e. g., note 3, p. 91.
[74] A gloss is a note explanatory of a word or passage of doubtful meaning. The glosses are the earliest form of commentary on the Bible. The glosses of the canon law are the more or less authoritative comments of the teachers, and date from the time when the study of the canon law became a part of the theological curriculum. Their aim is chiefly to show how the law applies to practical cases which may arise. The so-called glossa ordinaria had in Luther's time an authority almost equal to that of the corpus juris itself. Cf. Cath. Encyc., VI, pp. 588 f.
[75] The thing which was bought was, of course, the dispensation, or permission to avail oneself of the gloss.
[76] Dataria is the name for that department of the curia which had to deal with the granting of dispensations and the disposal of benefices. Datarius is the title of the official who presided over this department.
[77] See above, p. 88, note 2. For a catalogue of papal appointments bestowed upon two "courtesans," Johannes Zink und Johannes Ingenwinkel, see Schulte, Die Fugger in Rom, I, pp. 282, 291 ff. Between 1513 and 1521, Zink received 56 appointments, and Ingenwinkel received, between 1496 and 1521, no fewer than 106.
[78] See above, p. 87, note 1.
[79] So Albrecht of Mainz bore the title of "administrator" of Halberstadt.
[80] The name of this practice was "regression" (regressus).
[81] The complaint was made at Worms (1521) that it was impossible for a German to secure a clear title to a benefice at Rome unless he applied for it in the name of an Italian, to whom he was obliged to pay a percentage of the income, a yearly pension, for a fixed sum of money for the use of his name (Wrede, op. cit., II, 712).
[82] Simony—the sin of Simon Magus (Acts 8:18-20)—the sin committed by the sale or the purchase of an office or position which is normally conferred by a ritual act of the Church. In the ancient and earlier mediæval Church the use of money to secure preferment was held to invalidate the title of the guilty party to the position thus secured, and the acceptance of money for such a purpose was an offence punishable by deposition and degradation. The "heresy of Simon" was conceived to be the greatest of all heresies. The traffic in Church offices, which became a flagrant abuse from the time of John XXII (1316-1334), would have been regarded in earlier days as the most atrocious simony.
[83] The reservatio mentalis or in pectore is the natural consequence of the papal theory that the right of appointment to all Church offices of every grade belongs to the pope (see above, p. 86, note 3). According to the theory of the canonists (Lancelotti, Institutiones juris canonici. Lib. I, Tit. XXVII) this right is exercised either per petitionem alterius, i. e., by confirmation of the election, appointment, etc., of others, or proprio motu, i. e., "on his own motion." In ordinary cases the exercise of the appointing power was limited by rules, which though bitterly complained of (see above, pp. 86 ff, and notes), were generally understood, but the theory allowed any given case to be made an exception to the rules. Of such a case it was said that it was "reserved in the heart of the Pope," and the appointment was then made "on his own motion." Hutten says of this reservatio in pectore that "it is an easy, agile and slippery thing, and bears no comparison to any other form of cheating" (Ed. Booking, IV, 215).
[84] For a similar instance quoted at Worms (1521), see Wrede, op. cit., II, 710.
[85] The three chief centers of foreign commerce in the XV and the early XVI Century. The annual fairs (Jahrmarkt), held at stated times in various cities, brought great numbers of merchants together from widely distant points, and were the times when the greater part of the wholesale business for the year was done.;
[86] Built by Innocent VIII (1454-1490).
[87] See above, p. 93, note 2.
[88] The Church law forbade the taking of interest on loans of money.
[89] During the Middle Ages all questions touching marriage and divorce, including, therefore, the question of the legitimacy of children, were governed by the laws of the Church, on the theory that marriage was a sacrament.
[90] i. e., By buying dispensations.
[91] The sums paid or special dispensations were so called.
[92] The toll which the "robber-barons" of the Rhine levied upon merchants passing through their domains.
[93] Ja wend das blat umb szo indistu es—The translators have adopted the interpretation of O. Clemen, L's. Werke, I, 383.
[94] The Fuggers of Augsburg were the greatest of the German capitalists in the XVI Century. They were international bankers, "the Rothschilds of the XVI Century." Their control of large capital enabled them to advance large sums of money to the territorial rulers, who were in a chronic state of need. In return for these favors they received monopolistic concessions by which their capital was further increased. The spiritual, as well as the temporal lords, availed themselves regularly of the services of this accommodating firm. They were the pope's financial representatives in Germany. On their connection with the indulgence against which Luther protested, see Vol. I, p. 21; on their relations with the papacy, see Schulte, Die Fugger in Rom, 2 Vols., Leipzig, 1904.
[95] Certificates entitling the holder to choose his own confessor and authorizing the confessor to absolve him from certain classes of "reserved" sins; referred to in the XCV Theses as confessionalia. Cf. Vol. I, p. 22.
[96] Certificates granting their possessor permission to eat milk, eggs, butter and cheese on fast days.
[97] The word is used here in the broad sense, and means dispensations of all sorts, including those just mentioned, relating to penance.
[98] Equivalent to "carrying coals to Newcastle."
[99] The Campo di Fiore, a Roman market-place, restored and adorned at great expense by Eugenius IV (1431-1447), and his successors.
[100] A part of the Vatican palace notorious as the banqueting-hall of Alexander VI (1402-1503), turned by Julius II (1503-1513) into a museum for the housing of his wonderful and expensive collection of ancient works of art. Luther is hinting that the indulgence money has been spent on these objects rather than on the maintenance of the Church. Cf. Clemen, I, 384, note 15.
[101] i. e., The offices and positions in Rome which were for sale. See Benrath, p. 88, note 18; p. 95, note 36.
[102] See above, p. 84, note 1.
[103] The passage is chapter 31, Filiis vel nepotibus. It provides that in case the income of endowments bequeathed to the Church is misused, and appeals to the bishop and archbishop fail to correct the misuse, the heirs of the testator may appeal to the royal courts. Luther wishes this principle applied to the annates.
[104] See above, pp. 91 f.
[105] See above, p. 91.
[106] See above, p. 94.
[107] i. e.. Promises to bestow on certain persons livings not yet vacant. Complaint of the evils arising out of the practice was continually heard from the year 1416. For the complaints made at Worms (1521), see Wrede, op. cit., II, 710.
[108] See above, pp. 86 f.
[109] See above, pp. 92 f.
[110] See above, p. 93.
[111] See above, p. 89.
[112] Rules for the transaction of papal business, including such matters as appointments and the like. At Worms (1521) the Estates complain that these rules are made to the advantage of the "courtesans" and the disadvantage of the Germans. (Wrede, op. cit., II, pp. 675 f.)
[113] The local Church authorities, here equivalent to "the bishops." On use of term see Realencyk., XIV, 424.
[114] The sign of the episcopal office; as regards archbishops, the pallium; see above, p. 8q, and note.
[115] See above, p. 87, note 1.
[116] The first of the ecumenical councils (A. D. 325). The decree to which Luther here refers is canon IV of that Council. Cf. Köhler, L. und die Kg., pp. 139 ff.
[117] The primate is the ranking archbishop of a country.
[118] "Exemption" was the practice by which monastic houses were withdrawn from the jurisdiction of the bishops and made directly subject to the pope. The practice seems to have originated in the X Century with the famous monastery of Cluny (918), but it was almost universal in the case of the houses of the mendicant orders. The bishops made it a constant subject of complaint, and the Lateran Council (Dec. 19, 1516) passed a decree abolishing all monastic exemptions, though the decree does not seem to have been effective. See Creighton, History of the Papacy, V, 266.
[119] i. e., Antichrist. See above, p. 73, note 2.
[120] The papal interference in the conduct of the local Church courts was as flagrant as in the appointments, of which Luther has heretofore spoken. At Worms (1521) it was complained that cases were cited to Rome as a court of first instance, and the demand was made that a regular course of appeals should be re-established. Wrede, op. cit., II, 672, 718.
[121] The reference is Canon V of the Council of Sardica (A. D. 343), incorporated in the canon law as a canon of Nicaea (Pt. II, qu. 6, c. 5). See Köhler, L. und die Kg., 151.
[122] i. e., Appealed to Rome for decision. This is the subject of the first of the 102 Gravamina of 1521 (Wrede, op. cit., II, 672).
[123] The judges in the bishops' courts. The complaint is that they interfere with the administration of justice by citing into their courts cases which properly belong in the lay courts, and enforce their verdicts (usually fines) by means of ecclesiastical censures. The charges against these courts are specified in the Gravamina of 1521, Nos. 73-100 (Wrede, op. cit., II, 694-703).
[124] The signatura gratiae and the signatura justitiae were the bureaus through which the pope regulated those matters of administration which belonged to his own special prerogative.
[125] See above, pp. 88 f.
[126] See above, p. 88, note 3.
[127] See above, p. 94.
[128] i. e., The cases in which a priest was forbidden to give absolution. The reference here is to cases in which only the pope could absolve. Cf. The XCV Theses, Vol. I, p. 30.
[129] A papal bull published annually at Rome on Holy Thursday. It was directed against heretics, but to the condemnation of the heretics and their heresies was added a list of offences which could receive absolution only from the pope, or by his authorisation. In 1522 Luther translated this bull into German as a New Year present for the pope (Weimar Ed., VIII, 691). On Luther's earlier utterances concerning it, see Kohler, L. u. die Kg., pp. 59 2.
[130] The breve is a papal decree, of equal authority with the bull, but differing from it in form, and usually dealing with matters of smaller importance.
[131] Cf. Luther's earlier statement to the same effect in A Discussion of Confession, Vol. I, pp. 96 f.
[132] See above, p. 99.
[133] The Fifth Lateran Council (1512-17).
[134] See above, p. 90, note 1.
[135] In the canon law, Decretal. Greg. lib. i, tit. 6, cap. 4. The decretal forbids the bestowing of the pallium (see above, p. 89, note 3) on an archbishop elect, until he shall first have sworn allegiance to the Holy See.
[136] The induction of Church officials into office. The term was used particularly of the greater offices—those of bishop and abbot. These offices carried with them the enjoyment of certain incomes, and the possession of certain temporal powers. For this reason the right of investiture was a bone of contention between popes and emperors during the Middle Ages.
[137] Especially in the time of the Emperors Henry IV and V (1056-1125).
[138] The German Empire was regarded during the Middle Ages as a continuation of the Roman Empire. (See below, p. 153.) The right to crown an emperor was held to be the prerogative of the pope; until the pope bestowed the imperial crown, the emperor bore the title, "King of the Romans."
[139] In the canon law, Decretal. Greg. lib. i, tit. 33, cap. 6.
[140] In the treatise, Resolutio Lutheriana super propositione XIII, de potestate papae (1520). Weimar Ed., II, pp. 217 ff.; Erl. Ed., op. var. arg., Ill, pp. 293 ff.
[141] See p. 70.
[142] cf. The Papacy at Rome, Vol. I, pp. 357 f.
[143] A decree of Pope Clement V of 1313, incorporated subsequently in the canon law, Clement, lib. ii, tit. 11, cap. 2.
[144] A forged document of the VIII Century, professing to come from the hand of the Emperor Constantine (306-337). The Donation conveyed to the pope title to the city of Rome (the capital had been removed to Constantinople), certain lands in Italy and "the islands of the sea." It was used by the popes of the Middle Ages to support their claims to worldly power, and its genuineness was not disputed. In 1440, however, Laurentius Valla, an Italian humanist, published a work in which he proved that the Donation was a forgery. This work was republished in Germany by Ulrich von Hutten in 1517, and seems to have come to Luther's attention in the early part of 1520, just before the composition of the present treatise (C. Enders II, 332). Luther subsequently (1537) issued an annotated translation of the text of the Donation (Erl. Ed., XXV, pp. 176 ff.).
[145] The papal claim to temporal sovereignty over this little kingdom, which comprised the island of Sicily and certain territories in Southern Italy, goes back to the XI Century, and was steadily asserted during the whole of the later Middle Ages. It was one of the questions at issue in the conflict between the Emperor Frederick II (1200-1260) and the popes, and played an important part in the history of the stormy times which followed the all of the Hohenstaufen. The popes claimed the right to award the kingdom to a ruler who would swear allegiance to the Holy See. The right to the kingdom was at this time contested between the royal houses of France and of Spain, of which latter house the Emperor Charles V was the head.
[146] The popes claimed temporal sovereignty over a strip of territory in Italy, beginning at Rome and stretching in a northeasterly direction across the peninsula to a point on the Adriatic south of Venice, including the cities and lands which Luther mentions. This formed the so-called "States of the Church." The attempt to consolidate the States and make the papal sovereignty effective involved Popes Alexander VI (1492-1503) and Julius II (1503-1513) in war and entangled them in political alliances with the European powers and petty Italian states. It resulted at last in actual war between Pope Clement VII and the Emperor Charles V (1526-1527). See Cambridge Modern History, I, 104-143; 219-252, and literature cited pp. 706-713; 727 f.
[147] A free translation of the Vulgate, Nemo militans Deo.
[148] The kissing of the pope's feet was a part of the "adoration" which he claimed as his right. See above, p. 108.
[149] The three paragraphs enclosed in brackets were added by Luther to the 2d edition; see Introduction, p. 59.
[150] The holy places of Rome had long been favorite objects of pilgrimage, and the practice had been zealously fostered by the popes through the institution of the "golden" or "jubilee years." Cf. Vol. I, p. 18, and below, p. 114.
[151] Cf. the Italian proverb, "God is everywhere except at Rome; there He has a vicar."
[152] Cf. Hutten's saying in Vadiscus: "Three things there are which those who go to Rome usually bring home with them, a bad conscience, a ruined stomach and an empty purse." (Ed. Böcking, IV, p. 169.)
[153] The "golden" or "jubilee years" were the years when special rewards were attached to worship at the shrines of Rome. The custom was instituted by Boniface VIII in 1300, and it was the intention to make every hundredth year a jubilee. In 1343 the interval between jubilees was fixed at fifty, in 1389 at thirty-three, in 1473 at twenty-five years. Cf. Vol. I, p. 18.
[154] Cf. the statements in the Treatise on Baptism and the Discussion of Confession, Vol. I, pp. 68 ff., 98.
[155] The houses, or monasteries, of the mendicant or "begging" orders—the "friars." The members of these orders were sworn to support themselves on the alms of the faithful.
[156] The three leading mendicant orders were the Franciscan (the Minorites, or "little brothers"), founded by St. Francis of Assisi (died 1226), the Dominican (the "preaching brothers"), founded by St. Dominic (died 1221), and the Augustinian Hermits, to which Luther himself belonged, and which claimed foundation by St. Augustine (died 430).
[157] The interference of the friars in the duties of the parish clergy was a continual subject of complaint through this period.
[158] By the middle of the XV Century there were eight distinct sects within the Franciscan order alone (See Realencyk., VI, pp. 212 ff.), and Luther had himself taken part in a vigorous dispute between two parties in the Augustinian order.
[159] St. Agnes the Martyr, put to death in the beginning of the IV Century, one of the favorite saints of the Middle Ages. See Schäfer, L. als Kirchenhistoriker, p. 235.
[160] One of the most famous of the German convents, founded in 936.
[161] The celebrated Church Father (died 420). The passages referred to are in Migne, XXII, 656, and XXVI, 562.
[162] Or "community" (Gemeine). Cf. The Papacy at Rome, Vol. I. p. 345, note 4. See also Dass eine christl. Gemeine Recht und Macht habe, etc. Weimar Ed. XI, pp. 408 ff.
[163] Or "congregation." See note 2.
[164] i. e.. At a time later than that of the Apostles.
[165] The first absolute prohibition of marriage to the clergy is contained in a decree of Pope Siricius and dated 385. See H. C. Lea, History of Sacerdotal Celibacy, 3d ed. (1907), I, pp. 59 ff.
[166] The priests of the Greek Church are required to marry, and the controversy over celibacy was involved in the division between the Greek and Roman Churches.
[167] Cf. Hutten's Vadiscus (Böcking, IV, 199).
[168] i. e., Lie in Roman appointment.
[169] i. e., The ministry in the congregation. See above, p. 119.
[170] Quantum ragilitas humana permittit. A qualification of the vow.
[171] i. e., Celibacy. Non promitto castitatem.
[172] Fragilitas humana non permittit caste vivere.
[173] Angelica fortitudo at coelestis virtus.
[174] The court-jester was allowed unusual freedom of speech. See Prefatory Letter above, p. 62.
[175] The laws governing marriage were entirely the laws of the Church. The canon law prohibited marriage of blood-relatives as far as the seventh degree of consanguinity. In 1204 the prohibition was restricted to the first our degrees; lawful marriage within these degrees was possible only by dispensation, which was not all too difficult to secure, especially by those who were willing to pay for it (see above, p. 96). The relation of god-parents to god-children was also held to establish a "spiritual consanguinity" which might serve as a bar to lawful marriage. See Benrath, p. 103, note 74, and in the Babylonian Captivity, below, p. 265.
[176] This Luther actually did. When he burned the papal bull of excommunication (Dec. 10, 1520) a copy of the canon law was also given to the flames.
[177] i. e., The marriage of the clergy.
[178] On this sort of reserved cases see Discussion of Confession, Vol. I, pp. 96 ff.
[179] "Irregularity" is the condition of any member of a monastic order who has violated the prescriptions of the order and been deprived, in consequence, of the benefits enjoyed by those who live under the regula, viz., the rule of the order.
[180] The three kinds of masses are really but one thing, viz., masses for the dead, celebrated on certain fixed days in each year, in consideration of the enjoyment of certain incomes, received either out of bequeathed endowments or from the heirs of the supposed beneficiaries.
[181] i. e., Even when the mass is decently said.
[182] See above, p. 72, note 1.
[183] See above, p. 104.
[184] Das geistliche Unrecht.
[185] The Treatise concerning the Ban, above, pp. 33 ff.
[186] i. e., To those who teach and enforce the canon law.
[187] Luther means the saint's-days and minor religious holidays. See also the Discourse on Good Works, Vol. I, pp. 240 f.
[188] Or "congregation."
[189] i. e., City-council.
[190] Kirchweihen, i. e., the anniversary celebration of the consecration of a church. These days had become feast days for the parish, and were observed in anything but a spiritual fashion.
[191] i. e., Occasions for drunkenness, gain and gambling.
[192] See above, pp. 96 f.
[193] See above, p. 98, note 2.
[194] Letters entitling their holder to the benefits of the masses founded by the sodalities or confraternities. See Benrath, p. 103.
[195] See above, p. 98, and Vol. I, p. 22.
[196] The pun is untranslatable,—Netz, Gesetz solt ich sagen.
[197] What the pope sold was release from the "snares" and "nets," viz., dispensation.
[198] i. e., Even into the law of the church.
[199] Die wilden Kapellen und Feldkirchen, i. e., churches which are built in the country, where there are no congregations.
[200] A little town in East Prussia, where was displayed a sacramental wafer, said to have been miraculously preserved from a fire which destroyed the church in 1383. It was alleged that at certain times this wafer exuded drops of blood, reverenced as the blood of Christ, and many miracles were said to have been performed by it. Wilsnack early became a favorite resort for pilgrims. In 1412 the archbishop of Prague, at the instigation of John Hus, forbade the Bohemians to go there. Despite the protests of the Universities of Leipzig and Erfurt, Pope Eugenius IV in 1446 granted special indulgences for this pilgrimage, and the popularity of the shrine was undiminished until the time of the Reformation. Cf. Realencyk, xxi, pp. 347 ff.
[201] In Mecklenburg, where another relic of "the Holy Blood" was displayed after 1491. C. Benrath, pp. 104 f.
[202] The "Holy Coat of Trier" was believed by the credulous to be the seamless coat of Christ, which the soldiers did not rend. It was first exhibited in 1512, but was said to have been presented to the cathedral church of Trier by the Empress Helena, mother of Constantine the Great.
[203] Pilgrimage to the Grimmenthal in Meiningen began in 1499. An image of the Virgin, declared to have been miraculously created, was displayed there, and was alleged to work wonderful cures, especially of syphilis.
[204] The "Fair Virgin (die schöne Maria) of Regensburg" was an image of the Virgin similar to that exhibited in the Grimmenthal. The shrine was opened March 25, 1519, and within a month 50,000 pilgrims are said to have worshipped there. (Weimar Ed., VI, 447, note 1). For another explanation see Benrath, p. 105.
[205] The pilgrimages were a source of large revenue, derived from the sale of medals which were worn as amulets, the fees for masses at the shrines, and the free-will offerings of the pilgrims. A large part of this revenue accrued to the bishop of the diocese, though the popes never overlooked the profits which the sale of indulgences or worship at these shrines could produce. In the Gravamina of 1521 complaint is made that the bishops demand at least 25 to 33 per cent, of the offerings made at shrines of pilgrimage (Wrede, op. cit., II, 687).
[206] i. e., Every bishop.
[207] The possession of a saint gave a church a certain reputation and distinction, which was sufficiently coveted to make local Church authorities willing to pay roundly for the canonisation of a departed bishop or other local dignitary. Cf. Hutten's Vadiscus (Böcking, IV, 232).
[208] Archbishop of Florence (died 1450). He was canonised, May 31, 1523, by Pope Hadrian VI. When Luther wrote this the process of canonisation had already begun.
[209] Indulta, i. e., grants of special privilege.
[210] "Lead," the leaden seal attached to the bull; "hide", the parchment on which it is written; "the string," the ribbon or silken cord from which the seals depend; "wax," the seal holding the cord to the parchment.
[211] Franciscans, Dominicans, Augustinians, Carmelites and Servites.
[212] Botschaten, interpreted by Benrath (p. 105), Clemen (I, 406, note) and Weimar Ed. (VI, 406, note 1) as a reference to the stationarii. They were wandering beggars who, for an alms, would enroll the contributor in the list of beneficiaries of their patron saint, an alleged insurance against disease, accident, etc. They were classified according to the names of their patron saints, St. Anthony, St. Hubert, St. Valentine, etc. Protests against their operations were raised at the Diets of Worms (1521) and Nürnberg (1523). Included in these protests are the terminarii, i.e., the collectors of alms sent out by the mendicant orders. See Wrede, op. cit., II, 678, 688, III, 651, and Benrath, loc. cit.
[213] Wallbrüder, the professional pilgrims who spent their lives in wandering from one place of pilgrimage to another and subsisted on the alms of the faithful.
[214] i. e., If the plan above proposed were adopted.
[215] See above, p. 129, note 1.
[216] See Treatise on the New Testament, Vol. I, pp. 308 ff.
[217] In the Babylonian Captivity (below, pp. 291 f.) Luther definitely excludes penance from the number of sacraments, but see also p. 177.
[218] The sodalities ("fraternities," "confraternities"), still an important institution in the Roman Church, flourished especially in the XVI Century. They are associations for devotional purposes. The members of the sodalities are obligated to the recitation of certain prayers and the attendance upon certain masses at stipulated times. By virtue of membership in the association each member is believed to participate in the benefits accruing from these "good works" of all the members. In the case of most of the sodalities membership entitled the member to the enjoyment of certain indulgences. In 1520 Wittenberg boasted of 20 such fraternities, Cologne of 80, Hamburg of more than 100 (Realencyk., Ill, 437). In 1519 Degenhard Peffinger, of Wittenberg, was a member of 8 such fraternities in his home city, and of 27 in other places. For Luther's view of the sodalities see above, pp. 8, 26 ff. On the whole subject see Benrath, pp. 106 f.; Kolde in Realencyk., III, pp. 434 ff.; Lea, Hist. of Conf. and Indulg, III, pp. 470 ff.
[219] See above, p. 98, note 2.
[220] See above, p. 128, note 5.
[221] The excesses committed at the feasts of the religious societies were often a public scandal. See Lea, Hist, of Conf. and Indulg, III, pp. 437 ff.
[222] "Faculties" were extraordinary powers, usually for the granting of indulgences and of absolution in "reserved cases" (see above, p. 105, note 3). They were bestowed by the pope and could be revoked by him at any time. Sometimes they were given to local Church officials, but were usually held by the legates or commissaries sent from Rome. Complaints were made at the Diets of Worms (1520) and Nürnberg (1523) that the papal commissaries and legates interfered with the ordinary methods of ecclesiastical jurisdiction and appointment. See Weede, op. cit., II, 673, III, 653.
[223] Wladislav I forced the Sultan to sue for peace in 1443. At the instigation of the papal legate, Cardinal Caesarini, who represented that the treaty had not been approved by the pope, and absolved the king from the fulfilment of its conditions, he renewed the war in 1444. At the battle of Varna, Nov. 10th, 1444, the Hungarians were decisively defeated, and Wladislav and Caesarini both killed. See Creighton, Hist. of the Papacy, III, 67.
[224] John Hus and Jerome of Prague were convicted of heresy by the Council of Constance and burned at the stake, the former July 6th, 1415, the latter May 30th, 1416. Hus had come to Constance under the safe-conduct of the Emperor Sigismund. Luther is in error when he assumes that Jerome had a similar safe-conduct. In September, 1415, the Council passed a decree which asserted that "neither by natural, divine or human law was any promise to be observed to the prejudice of the catholic faith." On the whole matter of the safe-conduct and its violation see Lea, Hist. of the Inquisition in the M.A., II, pp. 453 ff.
[225] The League of Cambray, negotiated in 1508 for war against Venice. In 1510 Venice made terms with the pope and detached him from the alliance, and the result was war between the pope and the King of France. See Cambridge Modern History, I, pp. 130 ii., and literature there cited.
[226] i. e. The Hussites. After the martyrdom of Hus his followers maintained for a time a strong organisation in Bohemia, and resisted with arms all attempts to force them into conformity with the Roman Church. The Council of Basel succeeded (1434) in reconciling the more moderate party among the Bohemians (the Calixtines) by allowing the administration of the cup to the laity. The more extreme party, however, refused to subscribe the Compactata of Basel. Though they soon ceased to be a actor in the political situation, they remained outside the Church and perpetuated the teachings of Hus in sectarian organisations. The most important of these, the so-called Bohemian Brethren, had extended into Poland and Prussia before Luther's time. See Realencyk., Ill, 465-467.
[227] See above, p. 140, note 1.
[228] See Kohler, L. und die Kirchengesch., 139, 151.
[229] The Archbishop of Prague was primate of the Church in Bohemia.
[230] The dioceses of these bishops were contiguous to that of the Archbishop of Prague.
[231] Bishop of Carthage, 240-258 A. D.
[232] Lass man ihn ein gut jar ha ben, literally, "Bid him good-day."
[233] One of the chief points of controversy between the Roman Church and the Hussites. The Roman Church administered to the laity only the bread, the Hussites used both elements. See below, pp. 178 f.
[234] Luther had not yet reached the conviction that the administration of the cup to the laity was a necessity, but see the argument in the Babylonian Captivity, below, pp. 178 ff.
[235] The Bohemian Brethren, who are here distinguished from the Hussites, Cf. Realencyk., Ill, 452, 49.
[236] St. Thomas Aquinas, the great Dominican theologian of the XIII. Century (1225-74), whose influence is still dominant in Roman theology.
[237] The view of the sacramental presence adopted by William of Occam. For Luther's own view at this time, see below, pp. 187 ff.
[238] i. e., If they did not believe in the real presence of the body and blood of Christ in the Lord's Supper.
[239] Places for training youths in Greek glory.
[240] The philosophy of Aristotle dominated the mediæval universities. It not only provided the forms in which theological and religious truth came to expression, but it was the basis of all scientific study in every department. The man who did not know Aristotle was an ignoramus.
[241] Or, "I have read him." Luther's lesen allows of either interpretation.
[242] Duns Scotus, died 1308. In the XV and XVI Centuries he was regarded as the rival of Thomas Aquinas for first place among the theological teachers of the Church.
[243] i. e., In the universities.
[244] See above, pp. 94 f.
[245] i. e., "The chamber of his heart." Boniface VIII (1294-1303) had decreed, Romanus pontiex jura omnia in scrinio pectoris sui censetur habere, "the Roman pontiff has all laws in the chamber of his heart." This decree was received into the canon law (c. I, de const. In VIto (I, 2)).
[246] Doctores decretorum, "Doctor of Decrees," an academic degree occasionally given to professors of Canon Law; doctor scrinii papalis, "Doctor of the Papal Heart."
[247] The introduction of Roman law into Germany, as the accepted law of the empire, had begun in the XII Century. With the decay of the feudal system and the increasing desire of the rulers to provide their government with some effective legal system, its application became more widespread, until by the end of the XV Century it was the accepted system of the empire. The attempt to apply this ancient law to conditions utterly different from those of the time when it was formulated, and the continual conflict between the Roman law, the feudal customs and the remnants of Germanic legal ideas, naturally gave rise to a state of affairs which Luther could justly speak of as "a wilderness."
[248] "Sentences" (Sententiae, libri sententiarum) was the title of the text-books in theology. Theological instruction was largely by way of comment on the most famous book of Sentences, that of Peter Lombard.
[249] Cf. Vol. I, p. 7.
[250] i. e., Doctors.
[251] The head-dress of the doctors.
[252] See above, p. 118, note 2.
[253] i. e., The monasteries and nunneries.
[254] i. e.. The name of Christian.
[255] This section did not appear in the first edition; see Introduction, p. 59.
[256] Charles the Great, King of the Franks, was crowned Roman Emperor by Pope Leo III in the year 800 A. D. He was a German, but regarded himself successor to the line of emperors who had ruled at Rome. The fiction was fostered by the popes, and the German kings, after receiving the papal coronation, were called Roman Emperors. From this came the name of the German Empire of the Middle Ages, "the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation." The popes of the later Middle Ages claimed that the bestowal of the imperial dignity lay in the power of the pope, and Pope Clement V (1313) even claimed that in the event of a vacancy the pope was the possessor of the imperial power (cf. above, p. 109). On the whole subject see Bryce, Holy Roman Empire, 2d ed. (1904), and literature there cited.
[257] The city of Rome was sacked by the Visigoths in 410.
[258] Luther is characteristically careless about his chronology. By the "Turkish Empire" he means the Mohammedan power.
[259] So sol man die Deutschen teuschen und mit teuschen teuschenn, i.e., made Germans (Deutsche) by cheating (teuschen) them.
[260] See Cambridge Mediæval History, I (1911), pp. 244 f.
[261] Such a law as Luther here suggests was proposed to the Diet of Worms (1521). Text in Wrede, Reischstagsakten, II, 335-341.
[262] Cf. Luther's Sermon von Kaubandlung und Wucher, of 1524. (Weim. Ed. XV, pp. 293)
[263] Spices were one of the chief articles of foreign commerce in the XVI Century. The discovery of the cape-route to India had given the Portuguese a practical monopoly of this trade. A comparative statement of the cost of spices for a period of years was reported to the Diet of Nürnberg (1523). See Wrede, op. cit., III, 576.
[264] The Zinskauf or Rentenkauf was a means or evading the prohibition of usury. The buyer purchased an annuity, but the purchase price was not regarded as a loan, or it could not be recalled, and the annual payments could not therefore be called interest.
[265] The practice was legalised by the Lateran Council, 1512.
[266] The XVI Century was the hey-day of the great trading-companies, among which the Fuggers of Augsburg (see above, p. 97, note 5) easily took first place. The effort of these companies was directed toward securing monopolies in the staple articles of commerce, and their ability to finance large enterprises made it possible for them to gain practical control of the home markets. The sharp rise in the cost of living which took place on the first half of the XVI Century was laid at their door. The Diet of Cologne (1512) had passed a stringent law against monopolies which had, however, failed to suppress them. The Diet of Worms (1521) debated the subject (Wrede, Reichstagsakten II, pp. 355 iff.) "in somewhat heated language" (ibid., 842), but failed to agree upon methods of suppression. The subject was discussed again at the Diet of Nürnberg (1523) and various remedies were proposed (ibid., Ill, 556-599).
[267] The profits of the trading-companies were enormous. The 9 per cent, annually of the Welser (Ehrenberg, Zeitalter der Fugger, I, 195), pales into insignificance beside the 1634 per cent, by which the fortune of the Fuggers grew in twenty-one years (Schulte, Die Fugger in Rom, I, 3). In 1511 a certain Bartholomew Rem invested 900 gulden in the Hochstetter company of Augsburg; by 1517 he claimed 33,000 gulden profit. The company was willing to settle at 26,000, and the resulting litigation caused the figures to become public (Wrede, op. cit., II, 842, note 4; III, pp. 574 ff.). On Luther's view of capitalism see Eck, Introduction to the Sermon von Kaushandlungund Wucher, in Berl. Ed., VII, 494-513.
[268] The Diets of Augsburg (1500) and Cologne (1512) had passed edicts against drunkenness. A committee of the Diet of Worms (1521) recommended that these earlier edicts be reaffirmed (Wrede, op. cit., II, pp. 343 f.), but the Diet adjourned without acting on the recommendation (ibid., 737)
[269] Sie wollen ausbuben, so sich's vielmehr hineinbubt.
[270] Cf. Müller, Luther's theol. Quellen, 1912, ch. I.
[271] In the Confitendi Ratio Luther had set the age for men at eighteen to twenty, or women at fifteen to sixteen years. See Vol. I, p. 100.
[272] Translated in this edition, Vol. I, pp. 184 ff; see especially pp. 266 ff.
[273] These sentences did not appear in the first edition.
[274] See Letter to Staupitz, Vol. I, p. 43.
[275] This "little song" is the Prelude on the Babylonian Captivity of the Church. See below, pp. 170 ff.
A PRELUDE ON THE BABYLONIAN CAPTIVITY OF THE CHURCH
1520
INTRODUCTION
In the Open Letter to the Christian Nobility Luther overthrew the three walls behind which Rome sat entrenched in her spiritual-temporal power; in the Babylonian Captivity of the Church he enters and takes her central stronghold and sanctuary—the sacramental system by which she accompanied and controlled her members from the cradle to the grave; only then could he set forth, in language of almost lyrical rapture, the Liberty of a Christian Man.
The first of these three great reformatory treatises of the year 1520, as they have been called, closed with the words: "I know another little song about Rome, and if their ears itch to hear it I will sing it for them, and pitch it in a high key. Dost thou take my meaning, beloved Rome?" (See above, p. 164.) That some ears were itching to hear his little song was brought home to Luther especially by two writings, the one appearing in the summer of 1520, the other published in the previous autumn, but not reaching Wittenberg until some months later.
The former came from the pen of Augustin Alveld, that "celebrated Romanist of Leipzig," against whom Luther had culminated in The Papacy at Rome, promising further disclosures if Alveld "came again." (See Vol. I, p. 393.) He came again, this time with a Tractatus de communione sub utraque specie,—date of dedication, June 23, 1520. "The Leipzig ass has set up a fresh braying against me, full of blasphemies"; thus Luther describes it in a letter to Spalatin, July 22, 1520. (Enders, Luther's Briewechsel, II, no. 328.)
The other work was the anonymous tract of a "certain Italian friar of Cremona," who has only recently been identified as Isidore Isolani, a Dominican hailing from Milan, who taught theology in various Italian cities, wrote a number of controversial works and died in 1528. (See Fr. Lauchert, Die italienischen literarischen Gegner Luthers, Freiburg, 1912.) The title of his tract is, Revocatio Martini Lutheri Augustiniani ad sanctam Sedem; its date, Cremona, November 20, 1520, according to Enders, which is a mistake for November 22,1519. Its beginning and close, which have epistolary character, are printed in Enders, II, no. 366, and one paragraph from each is translated in Smith, Luther's Correspondence, I, no. 199.
These two treatises may be regarded as the immediate occasion for the writing of the Babylonian Captivity, which is, however, in no sense a direct reply to either of them. "I will not reply to Alveld," Luther writes on August 5 to Spalatin, "but he will be the occasion of my publishing something by which the vipers will be more irritated than ever." (Enders, II, no. 335; Smith, I, no. 283.) Indeed, he had promised some such work more than half a year before, in a letter to Spalatin of December 18, 1519: "There is no reason why you or any one else should expect from me a treatise on the other sacraments [besides baptism, the Lord's supper, and penance] until I am taught by what text I can prove that they are sacraments. I regard none of the others as a sacrament, for there is no sacrament save where there is a direct divine promise, exercising our faith. We can have no intercourse with God except by the word of Him promising, and by the faith of man receiving the promise. At another time you shall hear more about their fables of the seven sacraments." (Enders, II, no. 254; Smith, I, no. 206.)
Thus the Prelude grows under his hand and assumes the form of an elaborate examination of the whole sacramental system of the Church. He makes short work of his two opponents, and after a few pages of delicious irony, of which Erasmus was suspected in some quarters of being the author, he turns his back on them and addresses himself to a positive and constructive treatment of his larger theme, lenient toward all non-essentials, but inexorable with respect to everything truly essential, that is, scriptural. The Captivity thus represents the culmination of Luther's reformatory thinking on the theological side, as the Nobility does on the national, and the Liberty on the religious side. It sums up and carries forward all of his previous writings on the sacraments, just as, nine years later, the Catechisms gathered up and moulded into classic form his writings on catechetical subjects. Passage after passage, often whole pages, from the Resolutiones disp., the Treatise on Baptism, the Conitendi Ratio, the Treatise on the New Testament, the Treatise on the Blessed Sacrament, are transferred bodily to this new and definitive work, and find in it the goal toward which they had been consciously or unconsciously tending. The reader is referred to a fine comparative study in Köstlin's Theology of Luther (English trans.), I, 388-409. The title is a reminiscence from the Resolutiones super prop, xiii., of 1519,—"absit ista plus quam babylonica captivitas!" The sense in which the work is called a "prelude" is explained on page 176; the theologian in Luther could not deny the musician, he goes into battle singing and comes back with the stanza of a hymn upon his lips.
The Captivity marks Luther's final and irreparable break with the Church of Rome, and it is not without a peculiar significance that in the same letter to Spalatin, of October 3d, in which he mentions the arrival in Leipzig of Eck armed with the papal bull, he announces the publication of his book on the Babylonian Captivity of the Church for the following Saturday—October 6th. (Enders, II, no. 350; Smith, I, no. 303.)
While the Nobility, addressed to the German nation as such, was written in the language of the people, the Captivity, as becomes a theological treatise, is composed in Latin, just as later the Liberty, affecting the religious life of the individual, whether layman or theologian, is sent out in both German and Latin.
A translation into German appeared in the following year—the work of the Franciscan, Thomas Murner (on whom see Theod. v. Liebenau, Der Franziskaner Thomas Murner, Freiburg, 1913). Luther calls the Franciscan his "venomous foe" and accuses him of making the translation in order to bring him into disrepute. This charge Luther makes in his answer to Henry VIII's Assertio septem sacramentorum adversus Mart. Lutherum (1521), the royal theologian's reply to the Babylonian Captivity, for which he won from the pope the proud title of "Defender of the Faith."
The translation which follows is based on the Latin text as given in Clemen's "student-edition"—Luthers Werke in Auswahl (Bonn, 1912-3), I, 426-512, which reproduces, though by no means slavishly, the text of the Weimar Edition (Vol. VI), which, together with the Erlangen Edition (opera var. arg., V), has been compared. The German St. Louis Edition (Vol. XIX) has been consulted, and especially the admirable German rendering of Kawerau in the Berlin Edition (Vol. II) as well as the careful literal translation of Lemme, Die drei grossen Reormationsschriten Luthers vom Jahre 1520, 2. ed. (Gotha, 1884). Like the last mentioned, Wace and Buchheim's English translation (London, 1896) is incomplete, and besides is not always accurate; the Captivity is not contained in Cole's Select Works. The catalogue of the British Museum notes no early English translation. Köstlin-Kawerau's (1903) and Berger's (1895) lives should be consulted; the former for the historical setting and full analysis, the latter for a fine appreciation of this as of the other two reformatory treatises of this year. For the theological development, beside Köstlin's work mentioned above, and Tschackert, Entstehung der luth. und re. Kirchenlehre (1910), compare the exhaustive article Sakramente, by Kattenbusch, in Prot. Realencyklopadie, 3. ed., XVII, 349-81. The treatise is here Englished in its entirety, including those portions of the section on marriage which are frequently omitted. The homeless paragraph on page 260, whose proper location is not found even in the Weimar Edition nor in Clemen, we have placed in a foot-note, following the example of Kawerau.
ALBERT T. W. STEINHAEUSER.
Allentown. PA.
THE BABYLONIAN CAPTIVITY OF THE CHURCH
1520
JESUS
Martin Luther, Augustinian,
to his friend,
Herman Tulich[1],
Greeting
Willy nilly, I am compelled to become every day more learned, with so many and such able masters vying with one another to improve my mind. Some two years ago I wrote a little book on indulgences[2], which I now deeply regret having published; for at the time I was still sunk in a mighty superstitious veneration for the Roman tyranny and held that indulgences should not be altogether rejected, seeing they were approved by the common consent of men. Nor was this to be wondered at, for I was then engaged single-handed in my Sisyphean task. Since then, however, through the kindness of Sylvester and the friars[3], who so strenuously defended indulgences, I have come to see that they are nothing but an imposture of the Roman sycophants by which they play havoc with men's faith and fortunes. Would to God I might prevail upon the book-sellers and upon all my readers to burn up the whole of my writings on indulgences and to substitute for them this proposition: INDULGENCES ARE A KNAVISH TRICK OF THE ROMAN SYCOPHANTS.
Next, Eck and Emser, with their fellows, undertook to instruct me concerning the primacy of the pope. Here too, not to prove ungrateful to such learned folk, I acknowledge how greatly I have profited by their labors. For, while denying the divine authority of the papacy, I had yet admitted its human authority[4]. But after hearing and reading the subtle subtleties of these coxcombs with which they adroitly prop their idol—for in these matters my mind is not altogether unteachable—I now know of a certainty that the papacy is the kingdom of Babylon[5] and the power of Nimrod the mighty hunter[6]. Once more, therefore, that all may all out to my friends' advantage, I beg both booksellers and readers to burn what I have published on that subject and to hold to this proposition: THE PAPACY IS THE MIGHTY HUNTING OF THE ROMAN BISHOP. This follows from the arguments of Eck, Emser and the Leipzig lecturer[7] on the Holy Scriptures.
Now they are putting me to school again and teaching me about communion in both kinds and other weighty subjects. And I must all to with might and main, so as not to hear these my pedagogues without profit. A certain Italian friar of Cremona[8] has written a "Revocation of Martin Luther to the Holy See"—that is, a revocation in which not I revoke anything (as the words declare) but he revokes me. That is the kind of Latin the Italians are now beginning to write[9]. Another friar, a German of Leipzig, that same lecturer, you know, on the whole canon of the Scriptures, has written a book against me concerning the sacrament in both kinds, and is planning, I understand, still greater and more marvelous things. The Italian was canny enough not to set down his name, fearing perhaps the fate of Cajetan and Sylvester[10]. But the Leipzig man, as becomes a fierce and valiant German, boasts on his ample title-page of his name, his career, his saintliness, his scholarship, his office, glory, honor, ay, almost of his very clogs[11]. Here I shall doubtless gain no little information, since indeed his dedicatory epistle is addressed to the Son of God Himself. On so familiar a footing are these saints with Christ Who reigns in heaven! Moreover, methinks I hear three magpies chattering in this book; the first in good Latin, the second in better Greek, the third in purest Hebrew[12]. What think you, my Herman, is there for me to do but to prick up my ears? The thing emanates from Leipzig, from the Observance of the Holy Cross[13].
Fool that I was, I had hitherto thought it would be well if a general council decided that the sacrament be administered to the laity in both kinds[14]. The more than learned friar would set me right, and declares that neither Christ nor the apostles commanded or commended the administration of both kinds to the laity; it was, therefore, left to the judgment of the Church what to do or not to do in this matter, and the Church must be obeyed. These are his words.
You will perhaps ask, what madness has entered into the man, or against whom he is writing, since I have not condemned the use of one kind, but have left the decision about the use of both kinds to the judgment of the Church—the very thing he attempts to assert and which he turns against me. My answer is, that this sort of argument is common to all those who write against Luther; they assert the very things they assail, for they set up a man of straw whom they may attack. Thus Sylvester and Eck and Emser, thus the theologians of Cologne and Louvain[15]; and if this friar had not been of the same kidney he would never have written against Luther.
Yet in one respect this man has been happier than his fellows. For in undertaking to prove that the use of both kinds is neither commanded nor commended, but left to the will of the Church, he brings forward passages of Scripture to prove that by the command of Christ one kind only was appointed for the laity. So that it is true, according to this new interpreter of the Scriptures, that one kind was not commanded, and at the same time was commanded, by Christ! This novel sort of argument is, as you know, the particular forte of the Leipzig dialecticians. Did not Emser in his earlier book[16] profess to write of me in a friendly spirit, and then, after I had convicted him of filthy envy and foul lying, did he not openly acknowledge in his later book[17], written to refute my arguments, that he had written in both a friendly and an unfriendly spirit? A sweet fellow, forsooth, as you know.