Luther & the Pietists

Christian MysticismSchool of Prayer

Presented by David Schütz

Theologia Germanica• Luther’s first published work was Eyn geystlich edles

Buchleynn (1516), a German translation of a handwritten manuscript that came into his possession

• It was an anonymous work, which, Luther wrote in his preface “almost resembles the style of the illumined Doctor Tauler of the Preaching Order”.

• In 1518—following the “Ninety Five Theses” and the outbreak of the dispute over indulgences—he published a fuller version of the same work, having discovered a more complete manuscript in the library of the Erfurt Carthusian monastery.

• This time he called it Eyn Deutsch Theologia, and it has become known by its Latin title: Theologia Germanica.

• The fuller version actually quoted Tauler, and so could not have been authored by him, but was obviously greatly influenced by his mystical theology and came out of the “Friends of God”

Theologia Germanica“This little book warns all those who wish to read and understand its message, especially those of bright intellect and sophisticated reason, that they should not precipitately rush to swift judgement only because it appears awkward in its choice of words or speaks in the way of ordinary preachers and teachers. Indeed, this book does not float on top, like foam on water. It has rather been fetched out of the rock bottom of Jordan by a true Israelite whose name only God knows and whoever is informed about it by God. …Be that as it may, here we have the true solid teaching of Holy Writ. One has to choose between calling it all a folly and becoming a fool, as the Apostle Paul indicates in 1 Cor 1: We preach Christ, a folly to the heathen but to those who are called, the wisdom of God.”

Martin Luther, Preface to Eyn geystlich edles Buchleynn (1516)

Theologia Germanica“This noble little book, poor and unadorned as it is as far as wording an purely human wisdom are concerned, is all the richer and abundantly precious in true knowledge and divine wisdom. And , if I may speak with biblical foolishness: Next to the Bible and Saint Augustine, no other book has come to my attention from which I have learned—and desired to learn—more concerning God, Christ, man, and what all things are.”

Martin Luther, Preface to Eyn Deutsch Theologia (1518)

From the Theologia Germanica• “Even if God would take to himself all humans in the

world and become humanised in them and they would become divinised in him and this did not happen in me, my fall and my apostasy would never be amended. No, it must also occur in me.” Ch. 3

• “But if our inner being would make a leap into the Perfect, one would find and taste that the Perfect is limitlessly, endlessly, insuperably nobler and better than all imperfect and incomplete things. That inner being of ours would also find the Eternal above the transitory and the wellspring and origin underneath everything that flows from it and ever will flow from it.” Ch. 6

• “It should also be pointed out that eternal bliss is rooted in God alone and nothing else. And if man and his soul are to be saved, this one and only God must be in the soul.” Ch. 9

The Traditional ViewHarold J. Grimm, “Introduction” to Preface to the Complete Edition of a

German Theology (1518), in Luther’s Works, American Edition (Fortress Press, 1957)

• “During his formative years, Luther was much impressed by the writings of the late-medieval German mystics, particularly by their emphasis upon the necessity of a spiritual rebirth of despair before one could be united with God….

• “…Like the mystics, Luther was most concerned that the sinner should find a way out of sin and to salvation in communion with God– in other words, that he should annihilate his own personality and substitute God’s.

• “…Yet one looks in vain in Luther's writings for doctrines of the mystics. Unlike these, he never become subjective in his approach, but continue to emphasize at every step the doctrine which had resulted from his own experience and study, namely, justification by faith. …”

Hoffman’s Revolution• Thus the general view was that Luther

abandoned the sapientia experimentalis of the German mystics for a more objective sapientia theologica

• Bengt R. Hoffman Luther and the Mystics (Augsburg, 1976) reissued as Theology of the Heart: The Role of Mysticism in the Theology of Martin Luther. (Kirk House Publishers, 1998)

• Hoffman rejected “the rather common supposition that Luther embraced mystical ideas in his youth, only to abandon all of them for a supposedly more evangelical reliance on outer signs and justification as “imputation” in his mature years.”

Hoffman’s Revolution• Hoffman, Introduction, The Theologia

Germanica of Martin Luther: ‘The Theologia Germanica, like many mystical writings in medieval and modern times, seems to lay little direct stress on Christ’s redemption, the “for you” of salvation. It is more interested in the other side of salvation, the “Christ in you”.’

• Luther maintained a dialectic between the internal and the external, between the experiential and the objective, between “Christ in us” & “Christ for us” that was lost by his later interpreters

• Following Hoffman, Scandinavian (especially Swedish and Finnish) Luther scholars began to emphasise Luther’s “Theology of the Heart”

Luther the Mystic?• Hoffman made use of Nathan Söderblom’s

distinction (1975) between “personality-mysticism” and “infinity-mysticism”.

• Infinity Mysticism = “an experience of the superhuman beyond the vicissitudes of life …an immersion in nature and exercise according to technical patterns …a dissolution of the person into the impersonal Beyond …”

• Personality Mysticism = “an experience of God in the midst of life’s problems …an experience of the human ‘I’ meeting the divine ‘Thou’ …trust and forgiveness in this life… a relationship to a personal God”

• Hoffman equated Eckhart with the former, and Tauler, the author of the TG, and Luther with the latter.

The Fate of the “German Theology”

• 20 editions in Luther’s lifetime• Popular among the radical reformers;

Anabaptists (eg. Schwenkfeldt) and the “Schwärmer” (eg. Carlstadt)

• Rejected by Calvin: “For although there are no outstanding errors in it, it contains frivolities, conceived by Satan’s cunning in order to confuse the whole simplicity of the gospel. And if you look deeper into it you will find that it contains a hidden deadly poison which can poison the church. Therefore, my brethren, shun like the pest all those who try to defile you with such impurities.”

The Fate of the “German Theology”

• Because it was so highly valued by their master, it was accepted by Luther’s 16th Century disciples despite their strong emphasis on objective, external, “Christ for us” justification, and their suspicion of the “Schwärmer”).

• Johan Arndt (a proto-Pietist?) issued new edition by at the beginning of the 17th Century

• Thereafter, Lutheranism was split into two camps:

• Anti-Theologia Germanica: The rationalist, systematic Orthodoxy which systematised Lutheranism

• Pro-Theologia Germanica: The experiential and personal life of faith emphasis of the German Pietist movement

The Fate of the “German Theology”

• Philipp Jakob Spener, the “father of German pietism” spoke warmly of the TG in both his Pia Desiderata and in the foreword to his edition of Tauler’s works.

• Louis Bouyer (“The Spirit and Forms of Protestantism” 1954) : “Authentic Lutheranism is not a theological system. It is wholly a religious movement, single and wide-ranging, which follows not always logically but vitally from a few basic intuitions, or rather from one [intuition] viewed from every possible standpoint, quarried from every angle. Calvinism, on the other hand, is quite clearly a system as compact, perhaps more so, as Thomism before it, or Molinism or Jansenism later.”

Louis Bouyer’s Thesis

• Although Paul V place the Theologia Germanica on the Index, its popularity among some Protestants shows that there is a form of reformation spirituality which shares a commonality with Catholic mystical tradition

• This fits well with a thesis put forward by Louis Bouyer in his 1954 work “The Spirit and Forms of Protestantism”, which predates but supports Hoffman’s thesis:

Louis Bouyer’s Thesis• “It is absolutely certain, as a matter of

history, that the intuition of Luther, which we find to lie at the root of that of Calvin, takes us back directly to the Rhenish school of mysticism originated by Eckhart and Tauler.”

• “If Luther had no hesitation in acknowledging his debt to the Theologia Germanica…if he went so far as to translate it into German to popularise it, that shows that he recognised it as one of the sources of his conception. The God whose very light is a ‘superessential darkness’ is the Deus revelatus, but revelatus as absconditus.”

Louis Bouyer’s Thesis• “Both the Moravians of Zinzendorf, and

even the first pietists (Luther too, for that matter), had recourse to the great medieval mystics, notably of the Rhenish School, as both sources and living examples of the Reformation and the Christianity it ought to produce. It is certain that the entire movement, pietist as well as Weslyan, which we have described, profited by the vast mystical trend apparent from the beginning of Protestantism, sometimes in anarchical forms, but often at the heart of the most conservative movements in thought and action.”

Louis Bouyer’s Thesis• Bouyer goes on to link together the

“succession of German mystics who, in the sixteenth and seventeenth century Protestantism, continued the teaching of Tauler”, incluidng Sebasian Franck, Valentin Weigl, and Jacob Boehme

• In a sweeping vision, he follows the influence of these pietists, mystics and revivalists to the the Low Country Anabaptists, Rembrant, the Quaker George Fox, the Swedish visionary Swedenborg, English Evangelical turned Catholic John Henry Newman, Evangelical Bavarian Pastor Wilhelm Löhe, Danish Pastor Nicolai Frederick Severin Grundtvig, and English Archdeacon Frederick Denison Maurice.

Johann Arndt (1555–1621) • A Lutheran pastor and theologian

• At Wittenberg in 1577 during the “Crypto-Calvinist” controversy (he sided with Melanchthon)

• In Strasbourg studied under a strong anti-Calvinist Lutherans

• In Basel studied under a more moderate teacher who sought to unite Lutherans and Reformed churches

• In Badeborn in 1583 served as a pastor tending more towards Lutheranism than Calvinism

• In 1590 deposed by the Calvinist authorities for retaining pictures in his church and using the baptismal exorcism.

• Worked in Brunswick, Eisleben, and (until his death in 1621) Celle as local “superintendent” (bishop).

Johann Arndt (1555–1621) •Author of mystical and devotional works inspired by St

Bernard, Johannes Tauler and Thomas Kempis, including a new edition of the Theologia Germanica

•Wahres Christentum (True Christianity) 1599 published in many translations, becoming a model of devotion for both Catholics and Protestants.

•In it he “asserts categorically that the true faith which justifies is that which bears fruit in justice and sanctity.” (Bouyer)

•Arndt “stressed in his teaching and preaching the “Christ in us” not to the exclusion of but in a justified reaction against the “Christ for us” theology of orthodox Lutherans. He represented a genuine Lutheran mysticism, orthodox with respect to pure doctrine, yet a proponent of inner “heart theology”.” (Hoffman).

Philip Jakob Spener (1635-1705)•Although Arndt predated the pietistic movement, they

held him in high regard•Spener is generally regarded as ‘Father of German Pietism’

•Bouyer: “Philip Jacob-Spener, president of the seminary of Frankfort on the Maine from 1666,…while maintaining his allegiance to Luther, called Arndt the ‘father of the faithful’, and considered him the real founder of pietism, placing him, for this reason, ‘immediately below Luther’. He declared his conviction that justification by faith in divine grace was the main principle, but he set himself against confusing it with extrinsic justification; on the contrary, he put all the emphasis on its association with practical sanctity, expressly including voluntary effort.”

Count Nicholas-Louis of Zinzendorf (1700-1760)

•Bouyer: “a strange figure, combining pathological traits with very pure flights of mysticism”

•Joined efforts with the “Moravian Brethren” in 1722, giving them property to establish their quasi-monastic commune, the village of “Herrnhut”.

•The “ecclesiolae”, or “small churches”—ancestor of the “small groups” or “base ecclesial communties” of today

•A direct influence on John and Charles Wesley and Methodism

•“Herrnhutter” commune near Penshurst in Western Victoria (Dr. William Metcalf and Betty Huf, "In Search of Utopia - Herrnhut, Australia’s First Commune” (Melbourne University Press)

Luther’s Spiritual Heritage• Luther was an Augustinian Monk. St Augustine

had pride of place in his spiritual formation• In 1508 Luther bought an edition of Tauler’s

sermons which he thoroughly annotated in the margins

• Behind Tauler and the Theologia Germanica was the influence of the “Friends of God” movement.

• The Friends of God was an international network of those working for spiritual and moral renewal in the 14th and 15th centuries. They specifically opposed the radical movement which called itself “the Brothers and Sisters of the Free Spirit”

• He rightly supposed the Theologia Germanica came from this tradition, but wrongly ascribed it to Tauler himself.

Luther and Bernard•Luther, like many of his contemporaries including

Erasmus, was schooled in the studia humanitatis, the via moderna, and the schola Augustiniana moderna

•He was a life-long anti-scholastic, completely rejecting Aristotelianism (“Philosophy”), and embracing a corresponding nominalism

•Thus it is not surprising to find that he was a keen admirer of St Bernard of Clairvaux, the foe of Peter Abelard (the ‘pioneer’ of Scholasticism)

•Franz Posset, “Bernard of Clairvaux as Luther’s Source”, Concordia Theological Quarterly, 1990:“In Bernard’s time a new theology influenced by the ancient pagan philosophy of Aristotle arose in the form of what today is called Scholasticism. It was fostered and inspired by Peter Abelard, Bernard’s foe.”

Luther and Bernard• “We must be selective because Luther’s references

to Bernard amount to more than five hundred, not counting allusions made in his table-talk and in his correspondence.”

• “If one compares Luther’s allusions to the representatives of the so-called “German Mysticism” (such as Meister Eckhart, Johannes Tauler, and the anonymous Frankfurter who wrote the Theologia Germanica), one comes upon some surprising facts: Luther never directly or indirectly quoted or mentioned Meister Eckhart by name; and, compared with Bernard, Lutehr referred relatively rarely to Tauler and to the Frankfurter whose work he had edited. Luther’s often literal quations from, direct references to, and indirect allusions to Bernard outnumber these others by the hundreds.”

Luther and Bernard•Luther said: “I love Bernard as the one who among all writers preached Christ most charmingly. I follow him wherever he preached Christ, and I pray to Christ in the faith in which he prayed to Christ.”

•Posset: “Luther the preacher was most interested in Bernard the preacher, that is, the preacher of the crib and the cross of Christ”, nevertheless, “not only the preaching and teaching Bernard made a great impression on Luther, but also the praying Bernard.”

•Still, Posset asserts that: “the Reformer was interested in Bernard as a biblical theologian & a preacher of the gospel, not as a ‘mystic’ in the sense in which the term is usually understood today… The Reformer alerted his audience primarily to Bernard’s christocentric piety, that is, to meditation on the wounds of Christ, to his incarnational christology, & to his theology of grace alone & faith alone.”

Key themes in Luther’s Spirituality

• The dialectic of Law and Gospel• Sola Gratia, Sola Fide, Sola Scriptura, Solus

Christus• ‘Theologia Crucis’ (vs. ‘Theologia Gloriae’)• Deus Absconditus, Deus Revelatus and especially

the God revealed in hiddenness• The Incarnation: finitum capax infinitum (contra

Calvin who insisted on finitum non capax infinitum, leading later Lutherans to joke about the “extra-Calvinisticum”, the bit of God that didn’t fit into Christ).

• Thus a Christocentricity which focused upon the “crib and cross”, as Posset puts it.

Law and Gospel•Treatise on Christian Liberty (1520) •Grace gives, faith receives. Thus, since all salvation is by grace, all salvation is by faith.

•The “works of the Law” have no part in this.•“In the scriptures, two things are to be distinguished–the commands and the promises. …If you desire to fulfil the law and overcome concupiscence, believe in Jesus Christ, in whom you are offered grace, justice, peace and liberty. By faith, you possess all these; without it, you are a stranger to them all.”

•“A Christian is a perfectly free lord of all, subject to none; a Christian is a perfectly dutiful servant of all, subject to all.”

What is Faith?•Bouyer summarises the doctrine of sola fide as follows:

•“The essential [thing], for salvation, is to realise that God is its author; that it depends, not on one’s own strength, but on God’s. In this realisation, where a radical distrust of self is but the obverse of absolute confidence in God, consists faith; nothing else can possibly replace it.”

•Saving faith is “fiducia” (trust) not just belief (“fides”).•Such faith is an affair of the heart, and not of the mind alone.

•In fact, Luther’s understanding of faith included a large measure of what we would call caritas

•Cf. the explanation to the First Commandment in the Small Catechism: “We are to fear, love and trust in God”

Grace in Luther• Again, Bouyer describes the doctrine of sola

gratia in Luther’s theology as follows:• The “point of departure” for Luther’s whole

conception of grace was “the positive certainty he at last attained that God, not ourselves, is the prime author of our salvation. Consequently, we have no call to be despondent at our powerlessness to save ourselves by our own exertions; for it is just to this powerlessness that the Gospel gives the answer. What we could not do, God, in Christ, has done for us.”

• This is “Christ for us”, but the experience of “positive certainty” points to something internal also, and not simply external.

Interior and Exterior in Luther•The dialectic of the interior and the exterior

justification lies at the heart of Luther’s theology•It is always grace alone that saves us, but •when engaged in controversy, he stressed “extrinsic” justification, without any inward change to our nature

•whereas when speaking pastorally he stressed the inner experience of grace (referring to his own conversion experience) and the presence of Christ in the heart

•Bouyer: “As soon as he speaks as a religious guide or educator, [he becomes] anxious simply to give Christians, learned and unlearned alike, a statement of living Christianity as conceived and realised by himself.”

The “Theology of the Cross”•Heidelberg Disputation (1518) (more significant for

later Lutheranism than the 95 Theses of 1517)•Thesis 20. "The man who perceives the visible rear-ward parts of God [Ex 33:23]as seen in suffering and the cross…[does] deserve to be called a theologian" (Sed qui visibilia et posteriora Dei per passiones et crucem conspecta intellgit).

•“The ‘back’ and visible things of God are placed in opposition to the invisible, namely, his human nature, weakness, foolishness. (1 Cor 1:25) …God wished to be recognized in suffering, …it is not sufficient for anyone, and it does him no good to recognize God in his glory and majesty, unless he recognizes him in the humility and shame of the cross. Thus God destroys the wisdom of the wise, as Isa. [45:15] says, Truly, thou art a God who hidest thyself.”

The “Theology of the Cross”

• Thesis 21: “A theologian of glory calls evil good and good evil. A theologian of the cross calls the thing what it actually is.”

• “This is clear: He who does not know Christ does not know God hidden in suffering. Therefore he prefers works to suffering, glory to the cross, strength to weakness, wisdom to folly, and, in general, good to evil…. God can be found only in suffering and the cross.”

• Thus even when God reveals himself, it is in a hidden way (eg. In the babe in swaddling clothes, on the cross, in the bread and wine of the Eucharist)

Christology of the Crib and Cross•Luther’s Christocentric theology is

distinguished from Calvinism and other forms of Protestantism primarily because it is profoundly Incarnational

•Bouyer: “It should be clear to anyone that the God of Calvin is, primarily, the God of Sinai, the God who makes himself manifest in a splendour and majesty inaccessible to man.”

•Luther’s God, on the other hand, is the God of the manger and of the cross, the God who makes himself accessible to man precisely by hiding himself in humility.

•For Luther, “Finitum capax infinitum”, but for Calvin, Finitum NON capax infinitum.

Luther’s Hymns• “A Mighty Fortress” Verse 2:• With might of ours can naught be done

soon were our fall effected:but for us fights the valiant onewhom God himself elected.Ask ye: Who is this? Christ Jesus it isof Sabaoth Lord, AND THERE’S NONE OTHER GOD.He holds the field for ever.

Luther’s Hymns• “From Heaven above to Earth I come”• These are the tokens ye shall mark:

the swaddling-clothes and manger dark:there shall ye find the young child laid,by whom the heavens and earth were made.”

• Ah, Lord, who hast created all, how weak art thou, how poor and small,that thou dost choose thine infant bedwhere ass and ox but lately fed.

• Ah, dearest Jesus, holy child,make thee a bed, soft, undefiled,within my heart, that it may bea quiet chamber kept for thee.

Luther’s Hymns• “O Jesus Christ, all praise to thee”• He whom the world cannot enclose

doth in Mary’s arms repose:to be an infant small he deignswho all things by his power sustains.Hallelujah.

The Small CatechismI believe in God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth.What does this mean? I believe that God has made me and all creatures; that He has given me my body and soul, eyes, ears, and all my members, my reason and all my senses, and still takes care of them. He also gives me clothing and shoes, food and drink, house and home, wife and children, land, animals, and all I have. He richly and daily provides me with all that I need to support this body and life. He defends me against all danger and guards and protects me from all evil. All this He does only out of fatherly, divine goodness and mercy, without any merit or worthiness in me. For all this it is my duty to thank and praise, serve and obey Him. This is most certainly true.

The Small CatechismI believe in God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth.What does this mean? I believe that God has made me and all creatures; that He has given me my body and soul, eyes, ears, and all my members, my reason and all my senses, and still takes care of them. He also gives me clothing and shoes, food and drink, house and home, wife and children, land, animals, and all I have. He richly and daily provides me with all that I need to support this body and life. He defends me against all danger and guards and protects me from all evil. All this He does only out of fatherly, divine goodness and mercy, without any merit or worthiness in me. For all this it is my duty to thank and praise, serve and obey Him. This is most certainly true.

The Small CatechismAnd in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord, etc. …From thence He will come to judge the living and the dead.What does this mean? I believe that Jesus Christ, true God, begotten of the Father from eternity, and also true man, born of the Virgin Mary, is my Lord, who has redeemed me, a lost and condemned person, purchased and won me from all sins, from death, and from the power of the devil; not with gold or silver, but with His holy, precious blood and with His innocent suffering and death, that I may be His own and live under Him in His kingdom and serve Him in everlasting righteousness, innocence, and blessedness, just as He is risen from the dead, lives and reigns to all eternity. This is most certainly true.

The Small CatechismI believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy Christian church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. Amen.What does this mean?I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to Him; but the Holy Spirit has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith. In the same way He calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies the whole Christian church on earth, and keeps it with Jesus Christ in the one true faith. In this Christian church He daily and richly forgives all my sins and the sins of all believers. On the Last Day He will raise me and all the dead, and give eternal life to me and all believers in Christ. This is most certainly true.

The Small Catechism

Cyril of JerusalemThe Name of God is in its nature holy, whether we say so or not; but since it is sometimes profaned among sinners…we pray that in us God's Name may be hallowed; not that it comes to be holy from not being holy, but because it becomes holy in us, when we are made holy, and do things worthy of holiness.

Hallowed be Thy Name.

Martin LutherGod’s name is certainly holy in itself, but we pray in this petition that it may be kept holy among us also.

AugustineWe ask that His name may be hallowed in us; for holy is it always. …but He is always holy, and His name always holy. It is for ourselves, not for God, that we pray.

The Small Catechism

…How does God’s kingdom come? God’s kingdom comes when our heavenly Father gives us His Holy Spirit, so that by His grace we believe His holy Word and lead godly lives here in time and there in eternity.

Thy Kingdom Come

The Small Catechism•Posset: “[Bernard of Clairvaux] developed the concept of the three comings of Christ…: the first coming is the incarnation…ad homines,…then there is the parousia, usually called the “second coming”, the advent on the day of judgment…contra homines. The third advent is the spiritual birth in the soul—a “mystical” advent, in homines.”

•Luther: “Christ’s face is triple: firstly, in his first advent when he was made incarnate who as Son of God is the face of the Father…; secondly, in the spiritual advent whithout which the first is good for nothing—and so one has to recognise his face through faith; thirdly, in the second and last advent when his face will be fully visible.”

The Small Catechism

…How does God’s kingdom come? God’s kingdom comes when our heavenly Father gives us His Holy Spirit, so that by His grace we believe His holy Word and lead godly lives here in time and there in eternity.

Thy Kingdom Come

“A Simple Way to Pray” (1535)

• The Catechism was the basis for one of Luther’s best known works on prayer “A Simple Way to Pray” (1535)

• Peter Beskendorf, a Wittenberg barber, though a devout Christian, had killed his son-in-law in a drunken rage. By Luther’s intercession he was exiled rather than executed.

• Peter the Barber asked Luther for help in how to pray.

• Luther responded: “I will tell you as best I can what I do personally when I pray. May our dear Lord grant to you and to everybody to do it better than I! Amen.”

“A Simple Way to Pray” (1535)

Some significant and practical pastoral advice:• “when I feel that I have become cool and joyless in

prayer…”• “my room…or where a congregation is assembled…”• “word-for-word the Ten Commandments, the Creed,

…some words of Christ or of Paul. or some psalms”• “just as a child might do.”• “the first business of the morning and the last at

night”• “‘Wait a little while. I will pray in an hour; first I must

attend to this or that.’ …nothing comes of prayer for that day.”

• “St. Jerome “He who works faithfully prays twice.’ Yet we must be careful not to break the habit of true prayer and imagine other works to be necessary which, after all, are nothing of the kind.”

“A Simple Way to Pray” (1535)• Luther then provides a series of model meditations

on the Our Father, the Ten Commandments and the Creed—literally a “prayed catechism”.

• “You should also know that I do not want you to recite all these words in your prayer. …Rather do I want your heart to be stirred and guided concerning the thoughts which ought to be comprehended in the Lord’s Prayer. These thoughts may be expressed, if your heart is rightly warmed and inclined toward prayer, in many different ways and with more words or fewer. …If an abundance of good thoughts comes to us we ought to disregard the other petitions, make room for such thoughts, listen in silence, and under no circumstances obstruct them. The Holy Spirit himself preaches here, and one word of his sermon is far better than a thousand of our prayers.”

“A Simple Way to Pray” (1535)• Priests: “Like the priest who prayed, “Deus in

adjutorium meum intende. Farmhand, did you unhitch the horses? Domine ad adjuvandum me festina. Maid, go out and milk the cow. Gloria patri et filio et spiritui sancto. Hurry up, boy, I wish the ague would take you!””

• Barbers: “So, a good and attentive barber keeps his thoughts. attention, and eyes on the razor and hair and does not forget how far he has gotten with his shaving or cutting. If he wants to engage in too much conversation or let his mind wander or look somewhere else he is likely to cut his customer’s mouth, nose, or even his throat. Thus if anything is to be done well, it requires the full attention of all one’s senses and members….How much more does prayer call for con-centration & singleness of heart if it is to be a good prayer!”

Oratio Meditatio Tentatio (1539)• In the preface to the first edition of Luther’s

works, published in his own life time, Luther points out “a correct way of studying theology” with three steps: Oratio, Meditatio, and Tentatio.

• What he describes is in fact a form of “Lectio Divina”

• This ancient practice, familiar to Luther from his monastic days, also fitted his sola scriptura spirituality

• John Kleinig: “"Everything centres around the practice of meditation, for prayer prepares for it and its results are confirmed in the experience of conflict. For Luther, meditation is the key to the study of theology. No one can become a true theologian unless he learns theology through it [ie. through meditation]."

Oratio Meditatio Tentatio (1539)Oratio:

•“Prayer”, but prayer focused on the Scriptures, “a book which turns the wisdom of all other books into foolishness” (note similar theme in Preface to TG 1516)

•Prayer is the necessary preparation and method for reading the scriptures: “Teach me, Lord, instruct me, lead me, show me…” – the prayer of an open heart

•“Reason and understanding” are useless and presumptuous; “humility and earnestness”, with the gift of the Holy Spirit, are necessary for enlightenment

Oratio Meditatio Tentatio (1539)Meditatio:

• Note the emphasis on meditating “not only in your heart, but also externally”, ie. reading the text aloud (or soto voce)

• Luther was a Hebrew scholar and knew that the word used in Psalm 119 for “meditate” carried the inherent notion of speaking or conversing aloud with someone; if that someone was oneself it meant “to ponder”

• Thus one can “hear” the spoken Word, even when alone

• “For God will not give you his Spirit without the external Word.” This emphasis had grown in reaction to the radical reformers who emphasised interior revelation

• The necessity of repeated reading, hearing and speaking of the word—once or twice is not sufficient

Oratio Meditatio Tentatio (1539)Tentatio:

• But the late-Luther had by no means abandoned the emphasis of the early-Luther and the German mystics on the sapientia experimentalis

• For Luther the sapientia theologica could not be attained through oratio and meditatio without going on to “the touchstone” of tentatio (“Anfechtung”/trial/suffering)

• Only this “experience” was capable of teaching “how right, how true, how sweet, how lovely, how mighty, how comforting God’s Word is, wisdom beyond all wisdom.”

• Here too we can see the constant presence and life-long emphasis in Luther’s spirituality of the “Theology of the Cross” and of the “God who reveals himself in Hiddenness”