Historical Introductions to the Symbolical Books of the Evangelical Lutheran Church

256. Apology on God's Mysterious Judgments and Ways

Concerning the mysterious judgments and ways of God the Apology says: "At the same time we do not deny that God does not work alike in all men, enlightening all, – for neither does He give His Word to all, – and that nevertheless He is and remains both just and merciful, and that nobody can justly accuse Him of any unfaithfulness, envy, or tyranny, although He does not, as said, give His Word to all and enlighten them. But we add that, when arriving at this mystery, one should put his finger on his lips and not dispute or brood over it [gruebeln– from the facts conceded infer doctrines subversive of God's universal serious grace], but say with the apostle: 'How unsearchable are His judgments, and His ways past finding out!' Much less should one rashly say, as our opponents do, that of His free will, and irrespective of sin, God has ordained that some should be damned. For as to what God holds and has decreed in His secret, hidden counsel, nothing certain can be said. Nor should one discuss this deeply hidden mystery, but reserve it for yonder life, and meanwhile adhere to the revealed Word of God by which we are called to repentance, and by which salvation is faithfully offered us. And this Word, or revealed will, of God concerning the giving rest to all those that labor and are heavy laden, is certain, infallible, unwavering, and not at all opposed to the secret counsel of God, with which alone our opponents are occupied. Accordingly nothing that conflicts with the will revealed in the Word of God should be inferred from it, even as God Himself in His Word has not directed us to it. Because of the fact, therefore, that not all accept this call, we must not declare that from His free purpose and will, without regard to sin, God in His secret counsel, has ordained those who do not repent to damnation, so that they cannot be converted and saved (for this has not been revealed to us in the Word), but adhere to this, that God's judgments in these cases are unsearchable and incomprehensible."

"It is impossible that the doctrine of the opponents concerning this article should not produce in the hearers either despair or Epicurean security, when in this doctrine it is taught that God, from His mere counsel and purpose and irrespective of sin, has ordained some to damnation so that they cannot be converted. For as soon as a heart hears this, it cannot but despair of its salvation, or fall into these Epicurean thoughts: If you are among the reprobate whom, from His free purpose and without regard to sin, God has ordained to damnation, then you cannot be saved, do what you will. But if you are among those who shall be saved, then you cannot fail; do what you will, you must nevertheless be saved, etc. We do not in the least intend to join our opponents in giving occasion for such things. God also shall protect us from it." (209.)

Again: "They [the opponents] also say that we stress the universal promises of grace, but fail to add that these belong and pertain to believers. But herein they wrong us. For we urge both, viz., that the promises of grace are universal, and that, nevertheless, only believers, who labor and are heavy laden, Matt. 11, become partakers of them. But their [our opponents'] object is to have us join them in saying that some are ordained to damnation from the free purpose of God, also without regard to sin, whom He does not want to be saved, even though He calls them through the Word and offers His grace and salvation to them, – which, however, we shall never do. For our heart is filled with horror against such a Stoic and Manichean doctrine." (209 b.)

XXII. Article XII of the Formula of Concord: Of Other Heretics and Sects

257. Purpose of Article XII

The purpose of the first eleven articles of the Formula of Concord was not only to establish peace within the Lutheran Church and to ward off future controversies, but also to meet the ridicule and obloquy of the Papists and to brand before the whole world as slander, pure and simple, their assertions that the Lutherans were hopelessly disagreed and had abandoned the Augsburg Confession, and that the Reformation was bound to end in utter confusion and dissolution. The Formula of Concord was to leave no doubt regarding the fact that the Lutheran Church offers a united front in every direction: against the Romanists, the Calvinists, the errorists that had arisen in their own midst, and self-evidently also against the sects and fanatics, old and modern, with whom the Romanists slanderously identified them.

Summarizing the errors which Lutherans repudiate, the Formula of Concord declares: "First, we reject and condemn all heresies and errors which were rejected and condemned in the primitive, ancient, orthodox Church, upon the true, firm ground of the holy divine Scriptures. Secondly, we reject and condemn all sects and heresies which are rejected in the writings, just mentioned, of the comprehensive summary of the confession of our churches [the Lutheran symbols, preceding the Formula of Concord]. Thirdly, we reject also all those errors which caused dissension within the Lutheran Church, and which are dealt with and refuted in the first eleven articles of the Formula of Concord." (857, 17ff.) Among the errors rejected in the Augsburg Confession and the subsequent Lutheran symbols were those also of the Anabaptists, Antitrinitarians, and others. (CONC. TRIGL. 42, 6; 44, 4; 46, 3; 48, 7; 50, 3. 4; 138, 66; 244, 52; 310, 13; 356, 43; 436, 49; 744, 55; 746, 58.) And this is the class of errorists which Article XII of the Formula of Concord makes it a special point to characterize summarily and reject by name. Before this the Book of Confutation, composed 1559 by the theologians of Duke John Frederick, had enumerated and rejected the doctrines of such errorists as Servetus, Schwenckfeld, and the Anabaptists.

From the very beginning of the Reformation, and especially at Augsburg, 1530, Eck and other Romanists had either identified the Lutherans with the Anabaptists and other sects, or had, at least, held them responsible for their origin and growth. Both charges are denied by the Formula of Concord. For here we read: "However, lest there be silently ascribed to us the condemned errors of the above enumerated factions and sects (which, as is the nature of such spirits, for the most part, secretly stole in at localities, and especially at a time when no place or room was given to the pure word of the holy Gospel, but all its sincere teachers and confessors were persecuted, and the deep darkness of the Papacy still prevailed and poor simple men who could not help but feel the manifest idolatry and false faith of the Papacy, in their simplicity, alas! embraced whatever was called Gospel, and was not papistic), we could not forbear testifying also against them publicly, before all Christendom, that we have neither part nor fellowship with their errors, be they many or few, but reject and condemn them, one and all, as wrong and heretical, and contrary to the Scriptures of the prophets and apostles, and to our Christian Augsburg Confession, well grounded in God's Word." (1097, 7f.)

258. The Anabaptists

The Anabaptistic movement originated in Zurich. Their leaders were Conrad Grebel, Felix Manz, and the monk George of Chur (also called Blaurock, Bluecoat), who was the first to introduce anabaptism. In rapid succession Anabaptistic congregations sprang up in Swabia, Tyrol, Austria, Moravia, etc. Because of their attitude toward the civil government the Anabaptists were regarded as rebels and treated accordingly. As early as January, 1527, some of them were executed in Zurich. Persecution increased after the council held by Anabaptists in the autumn of 1527 at Augsburg, which then harbored a congregation of more than 1,100 "Apostolic Brethren," as the Anabaptists there called themselves. In Germany the imperial mandate of September 23, 1529, authorized the governments to punish Anabaptists, men and women of every age, by fire or sword "without previous inquisition by spiritual judges." They suffered most in Catholic territories. By 1531 about 1,000 (according to Sebastian Franck 2,000) had been executed in Tyrol and Goerz.

The most prominent of the early Anabaptistic leaders and protagonists were Hubmaier, Denk, Dachser, and Hans Hutt. Besides these we mention: Ludwig Haetzer, published a translation of the prophets from the Hebrew, 1527, for which he was praised by Luther, was executed as adulterer February 4, 1529, at Constance; Eitelhans Langenmantel, a former soldier and son of the Augsburg burgomaster, expelled from the city October 14, 1527, impassionate in his writings against the "old and new Papists," i. e., Luther and others who adhered to the real presence of Christ in the Lord's Supper, decapitated May 12, 1528, at Weissenburg; Christian Entfelder, 1527 leader of the Brethren at Eisenschuetz Moravia, and later on counselor of Duke Albrecht of Prussia; Hans Schlaffer, a former priest, active as Anabaptistic preacher and author, executed 1528; Joerg Haug, pastor in Bibra; Wolfgang Vogel, pastor near Nuernberg, executed 1527; Siegmund Salminger, imprisoned 1527 in Augsburg; Leonard Schiemer, former Franciscan, bishop of the Brethren in Austria, an Antitrinitarian, executed 1528; Ulrich Hugwald, professor in Basel; Melchior Rinck, pastor in Hesse; Pilgram Marbeck; Jacob Buenderlin; Jacob Kautz, preacher and author in Worms; Clemens Ziegler; Peter Riedemann, an Anabaptistic author and preacher, who was frequently imprisoned and died 1556; Melchior Hofmann, an Anabaptistic lay-preacher and prolific author, who died in prison at Strassburg, 1543. (Tschackert, 148ff.; Schlottenloher, Philipp Ulhart, ein Augsburger Winkeldrucker und Helfershelfer der "Schwaermer" und "Wiedertaeufer," 1523 – 1529, p. 59ff.)

The various errors of the Anabaptists are enumerated in the Twelfth Article of the Formula of Concord. The Epitome remarks: "The Anabaptists are divided among themselves into many factions, as one contends for more, another for less errors; however they all in common propound such doctrine as is to be tolerated or allowed neither in the church, nor in the commonwealth and secular government, nor in domestic life." (839, 2.) Urbanus Regius said in his book Against the New Baptistic Order: "Not all [of the Anabaptists] know of all of these errors [enumerated in his book]; it is therefore not our intention to do an injustice to any one; we mean such public deceivers in the Baptistic Order as John Denk and Balthasar Friedberger," Hubmaier. (Schlottenloher, 80.)

While some of the Anabaptists, as Hubmaier, were more conservative, others (Denk, Schiemer) went so far as to deny even the doctrine of the Trinity. They all were agreed, however, in their opposition to infant baptism, and to the Lutheran doctrines of justification, of the means of grace, of the Sacraments, etc. What their preachers stressed was not faith in the atonement made by Christ, but medieval mysticism, sensation-faith (Gefuehlsglaube), and the law of love as exemplified by Christ. Tschackert quotes from one of their sermons: "Whoever follows the voice which constantly speaks in his heart always finds in himself the true testimony to sin no more, and an admonition to resist the evil." (153.) In his introduction to a publication of hymns of Breuning, Salminger said: "Whoever speaks in truth to what his own heart testifies will be received by God." Schlottenloher remarks: "It was medieval mysticism from which they [the Anabaptists] derived their consuming desire for the complete union of the soul with God and the Spirit." (83.)

259. Balthasar Hubmaier

Hubmaier (Hubmoer, Friedberger, Pacimontanus) was born at Friedberg, near Augsburg, and studied under Eck. In 1512 he became Doctor and professor of theology at Ingolstadt; 1516 preacher in Regensburg; 1522 pastor in Waldshut on the Rhine. Before he came to Waldshut, he had read the books of Luther. He joined Zwingli in his opposition to Romanism. In January, 1525, however, he wrote to Oecolampadius that now "he proclaimed publicly what before he had kept to himself," referring in particular to his views on infant baptism. On Easter Day of the same year he was rebaptized together with 60 other persons, after which he continued to baptize more than 300. In July of 1525 he published his book Concerning Christian Baptism of Believers, which was directed against Zwingli, whose name, however, was not mentioned. At Zurich, whither he had fled from Waldshut after the defeat of the peasants in their rebellion of 1525, he was compelled to hold a public disputation with Zwingli on infant baptism. This led to his imprisonment from which he was released only after a public recantation, 1526. He escaped to Nicolsburg, Moravia, where, under the protection of a powerful nobleman, he developed a feverish activity and rebaptized about 12,000 persons. When the persecutions of the Anabaptists began, Hubmaier was arrested, and after sulphur and powder had been well rubbed into his long beard, he was burned at the stake in Vienna, March 10, 1528. Three days after, his wife, with a stone about her neck, was thrust from the bridge into the Danube.

Hubmaier denounced infant baptism as "an abominable idolatry." He taught: Children are incapable of making the public confession required by Baptism; there is no Scriptural reason for infant baptism; it robs us of the true baptism, since people believe that children are baptized while in reality they are nothing less than baptized. He says: "Since the alleged infant baptism is no baptism, those who now receive water-baptism according to the institution of Christ cannot be charged with anabaptism."

Concerning the Lord's Supper, Hubmaier taught: "Here it is apparent that the bread is not the body of Christ, but only a reminder of it. Likewise the wine is not the blood of Christ, but also a mere memorial that He has shed and given His blood to wash all believers from their sins." "In the Lord's Supper the body and blood of Christ are received spiritually and by faith only." In the Supper of Christ "bread is bread and wine is wine and not Christ. For He has ascended to heaven and sits at the right hand of God, His Father."

Hubmaier did not regard the Word as a means of grace nor Baptism and the Lord's Supper as gracious acts of God, but as mere works of man. "In believers," he says, "God works both to will and to do, by the inward anointing of His Holy Spirit." Concerning church discipline he taught: Where the Christian ban is not established and used according to the command of Christ, there sin, shame, and vice control everything. A person who is expelled must be denied all communion until he repents. In connection with his deliverances on the ban, Hubmaier, after the fashion of the Papists, made the Gospel of Christian liberty as preached by Luther responsible for the carnal way in which many abused it. The socialistic trend of Anabaptism, however, was not developed by Hubmaier. (Tschackert 132. 172. 234.)

260. Dachser and Hutt

Jacob Dachser was one of the most zealous members and leaders of the large Anabaptistic congregation in Augsburg, where he was also imprisoned, 1527. He, not Langenmantel, is the author of the "Offenbarung von den wahrhaftigen Wiedertaeufern. Revelation of the True Anabaptists," secretly published by the Anabaptistic printer Philip Ulhart in Augsburg and accepted as a sort of confession by the council held by the Anabaptists in the fall of 1527 at Augsburg. The book of Urban Regius: "Wider den neuen Tauforden notwendige Warnung an alle Christenglaeubigen– Against the new Baptistic Order, a Necessary Warning to All Christians," was directed against Dachser's Revelation. In 1529 Dachser published his Form and Order of Spiritual Songs, the first hymn-book of the Anabaptists, containing hymns of Luther, Speratus, Muenzer, Hutt, Pollio, and Dachser.

In his Revelation Dachser said: "The entire world is against each other; we don't know any more where the truth is. While all are convinced that the Pope has erred and deceived us, the new preachers, by reviling and maligning each other, betray that they, too, are not sent by God." "In their pulpits the false teachers [Lutherans, etc.] themselves confess that the longer they preach, the less good is done. But since they do not forsake a place where they see no fruits of their doctrine, they thereby reveal that they are not sent by God." "God draws us to Himself through the power which is in us, and warns us against wickedness and through the Teacher Christ, who in His Word has taught us the will of God." "Christ sent His disciples to preach the Gospel to all creatures and to baptize such as believe. And such as obey this command are called 'Anabaptists'!" "By our evil will original purity has been defiled; from this uncleanness we must purge our heart. Who does not find this uncleanness in himself, neither without nor within, is a true child of God, obedient to the Word of God. Who, in accordance with the command of Christ, preaches and baptizes such as believe, is not an Anabaptist, but a cobaptist [Mittaeufer] of Christ and the Apostles." "All such as preach, teach, and baptize otherwise than Christ commanded, are the real Anabaptists [opponents of Baptism], acting contrary to the Son of God, by first baptizing, instead of first teaching and awaiting faith, as Christ commanded." "We need but strive with Christ to do the will of the Father then we receive from God through the Holy Ghost the power to fulfil the divine command." (Schlottenloher, 72ff.)

Hans Hutt (Hut), a restless bookbinder in Franconia, attended the Anabaptistic council in Augsburg, where he was opposed by Regius and incarcerated. He died 1527 in an attempt to escape from prison. As a punishment his body was burned. Hutt must not be confounded with Jacob Huter or Hueter, an Anabaptist in Tyrol. The followers of Hans Hutt in the city of Steyr developed the socialistic tendencies of Anabaptism. They taught: Private ownership is sinful; all things are to be held in common; Judgment Day is imminent; then the Anabaptists will reign with Christ on earth. Some also taught that finally the devil and all the damned would be saved; others held that there is neither a devil nor a hell, because Christ had destroyed them. (Tschackert 134ff. 141. 153.) Article XVII of the Augsburg Confession condemns "the Anabaptists, who think that there will be an end to the punishments of condemned men and devils…; also others, who are now spreading certain Jewish opinions, that before the resurrection of the dead the godly shall take possession of the kingdom of the world, the ungodly being everywhere suppressed." (CONC. TRIGL., 51)

261. John Denk

Denk, who was called the "Archbaptist," the "Bishop," "Pope," and "Apollo" of the Anabaptists, was born in Bavaria and trained in Basel. In 1523 he became Rector of St. Sebald in Nuernberg where he was opposed by Osiander. Banished in the following year, he escaped to St. Gallen. Expelled again, he fled to Augsburg. Here he was rebaptized by immersion and became an active member of the Anabaptistic "Apostolic Brethren," who at that time numbered about 1,100 persons. Denk was the leader of the council held by the Anabaptists in 1527 in Augsburg. Expelled from the city, Denk died during his flight, 1527, at Basel. His "Retraction, Widerruf" (a title probably chosen by the printer), published 1527 after his death, does not contain a retraction, but a summary of his teaching. (Schlottenloher, 84.) The mystic mind of Denk runs a good deal in the channels of the author of the "German Theology, Deutsche Theologie," and of his pantheistic contemporary, Sebastian Franck.

Denk taught: God is one, and the source of unity. To return from all divisions to this unity must be our constant aim. The only way is entire surrender to God and submission in tranquillity. He says: "Nothing is necessary for this salvation [reunion with God] but to obey Him who is in us, and to be tranquil and wait for Him in the true real Sabbath and tranquillity, losing ourselves and all that is ours, so that God may both work and suffer in us. He who is in us is ready every hour and moment to follow, if we are but willing. His hour is always, but ours is not. He calls and stretches forth His arms the entire day, always ready; nobody answers Him, nobody admits Him or suffers Him to enter. Do but seek the Lord, then you will find Him; yea, He is already seeking you; only suffer yourselves to be found. Indeed He has already found you, and even now is knocking. Do but open unto Him and let Him in. Apprehend and know the Lord, even as you are apprehended and known of Him."

Denk held that the source of religious and moral knowledge is not the Scriptures, but the voice of God in the heart of man, or Christ Himself, who speaks and writes the divine Law into the hearts of those who are His. [Before Denk, Thomas Muenzer had said: "Was Bibel! Bibel, Bubel, Babel!"] Whoever has this divine Law in his heart lacks nothing that is needed to fulfil the will of God. According to Denk a man may be saved without the preaching of the Word, without the Scriptures, and without any knowledge of the historical Christ and His work. Nor can the Scriptures be understood without heeding the revelation of God in our own bosom. The Scriptures must indeed be regarded as higher than "all human treasures, but not as high as God's Word" [in our own bosom]. Baptism is a mere outward sign that one has joined the number of believers; hence it can be administered to such only as are conscious of their faith. Ceremonies in themselves are not sin, says Denk, "but whoever imagines to obtain grace through them, either by Baptism or by the Breaking of Bread, is given to superstition." (Tschackert, 143; Meusel, Handl. 2, 142.)

262. The Schwenckfeldians

Caspar Schwenckfeldt, of Ossig in Liegnitz a descendent of a noble family in Silesia, was born 1490 and studied in Cologne. In 1524 he helped to introduce the Reformation in Liegnitz. He was twice in Wittenberg; 1522, when he met Carlstadt and Thomas Muenzer and 1525, when he visited Luther. He endeavored to interest Luther in the formation of conventicles, and particularly in his mystical theory concerning the Lord's Supper, which he considered the correct middle ground on which Lutherans and Zwinglians might compromise. But Luther had no confidence in the enthusiast, whom he characterized as a "mad fool," "possessed by the devil." He said: "In Silesia Schwenckfeldt has kindled a fire which as yet has not been quenched and will burn on him eternally."

Because of the troubles and dissensions created in Liegnitz, Schwenckfeldt, in 1529, was compelled to leave. Having removed to Strassburg he was zealous in propagating his enthusiasm in Southern Germany by establishing conventicles of "Lovers of the Glory of Christ," as the adherents of Schwenckfeldt called themselves. At a colloquy in Tuebingen, 1535, he promised not to disquiet the Church. In 1539 he published his Summary of Several Arguments that Christ according to His Humanity Is To-day No Creature, but Entirely Our God and Lord. He called it the doctrine of the "Deification of the Flesh of Christ." When this teaching was rejected as Eutychianism, Schwenckfeldt published his Large Confession, 1540. At the convention of Smalcald, also 1540, his views were condemned and his books prohibited and burned. Compelled to leave Strassburg, he spent the remainder of his life in Augsburg, in Speier and in Ulm (where he died, December 10, 1561). Schwenckfeldt exchanged controversial writings with many contemporary theologians, whom he kept in constant excitement. In Liegnitz he was supported by the ministers Valentin Krautwald, Fabian Eckel, Sigismund Werner, and Valerius Rosenheyn. His adherents were called "Neutrals," because they declined to affiliate with any of the existing churches.

263. Schwenckfeldt's Doctrine

In 1526 Schwenckfeldt wrote to Paul Speratus: Since by the preaching of the Gospel as set forth by Luther so few people amended their lives, the thought had occurred to him that "something must still be lacking, whatever that may be." Endeavoring to supply this defect, Schwenckfeldt taught: Grace cannot be imparted by any creature, bodily word, writing, or sacrament, but only by the omnipotent, eternal Word proceeding from the mouth of God. Whatever is external is a mere symbol and image of God, able neither to bring God into the soul nor to produce faith or an inward experience of divine life. "Mark well" says he, "God is not in need of external things and means for His internal grace and spiritual action. For even Christ, according to the flesh, was a hindrance to grace and [the Spirit] of God, and had to be translated into the heavenly mode of being that the grace of the Holy Spirit might come to us… Whoever endeavors to come from without and through external means into the inner [the heart] does not understand the course of grace. God works without all means and pictures… Man must forget and drop everything, and be free and tranquil for the inbreathing [Einsprechen, inspiration], and be drawn away from all creatures, giving himself up to God altogether."