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Luther,

on Protest - ant - ism

J H Merle D’Aubigne DHR

THE PAPAL BULL--1520.

BOOK 6 CHAPTER 10 page 0207 paragraphs 3-9

On the 17th November [1520], a notary and five witnesses, among whom was Cruciger, met at ten o'clock in the morning in one of the halls of the Augustine convent where Luther resided. There, the public officer (Sarctor of Eisleben) immediately proceeding to draw up the minute of his protest, the reformer in presence of these witnesses said with a solemn tone of voice:--

"Considering that a general council of the Christian Church is above the pope, especially in matters of faith;

"Considering that the power of the pope is not above but inferior to Scripture; and that he has no right to slaughter the sheep of Christ's flock, and throw them into the jaws of the wolf;

"I, Martin Luther, an Augustine friar, doctor of the Holy Scriptures at Wittenberg, appeal by these presents, in behalf of myself and of those who are or who shall be with me, from the most holy pope Leo to a future general and christian council.

"I appeal from the said pope [Leo X],

first, as an unjust, rash, and tyrannical judge, who condemns me without a hearing, and without giving any reasons for his judgment;

secondly, as a heretic and an apostate, misled, hardened, and condemned by the Holy Scriptures, who commands me to deny that christian faith is necessary in the use of the sacraments;

thirdly, as an enemy, an antichrist, an adversary, an oppressor of Holy Scripture, who dares set his own words in opposition to the Word of God;

fourthly, as a despiser, a calumniator, a blasphemer of the holy Christian Church, and of a free council, who maintains that a council is nothing of itself.

"For this reason, with all humility, I entreat the most serene, most illustrious, excellent, generous, noble, strong, wise, and prudent lords, namely, Charles emperor of Rome, the electors, princes, counts, barons, knights, gentlemen, councilors, cities and communities of the whole German nation, to adhere to my protest, and to resist with me the antichristian conduct of the pope, for the glory of God, the defense of the Church and of the christian doctrine, and for the maintenance of the free councils of Christendom; and Christ, our Lord, will reward them bountifully by his everlasting grace.

But if there be any who scorn my prayer, and continue to obey that impious man the pope, rather than God, I reject by these presents all responsibility, having faithfully warned their consciences, and I abandon them to the supreme judgment of God, with the pope and his adherents."

Such is Luther's bill of divorce; such is his reply to the pontiff's bull. A great seriousness pervades the whole of this declaration. The charges he brings against the pope are of the gravest description, and it is not heedlessly that he makes them. This protest was circulated through Germany, and sent to most of the courts of Christendom.

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My note:

A few weeks later, after making a public show of burning the Canon Law, the Decretals, The Clementines, the papal Extravgants, some writings by Eck and Emser, and the pope’s bull, Martin Luther gave a lecture.

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J H Merle D’Aubigne DHR

THE PAPAL BULL--1520.

BOOK 6 CHAPTER 10 page 0208 paragraphs 3-7

Luther had re-entered Wittenberg. On the morrow, the lecture-room was more crowded than usual. All minds were in a state of excitement; a solemn feeling pervaded the assembly; they waited expecting an address from the doctor. He lectured on the Psalms,--a course that he had commenced in the month of March in the preceding year. Having finished his explanations, he remained silent a few minutes, and then continued energetically:

"Be on your guard against the laws and statutes of the pope. I have burnt his Decretals, but this is merely child's play. It is time, and more than time, that the pope were burnt; that is (explaining himself immediately), the see of Rome, with all its doctrines and abominations."

Then assuming a more solemn tone, he added:

"If you do not contend with your whole heart against the impious government of the pope, you cannot be saved. Whoever takes delight in the religion and worship of popery, will be eternally lost in the world to come."

"If you reject it, [the religion of popery]" continued he, "you must expect to incur every kind of danger, and even to lose your lives. But it is far better to be exposed to such perils in this world than to keep silence! so long as I live, I will denounce to my brethren the sore and the plague of Babylon, for fear that many who are with us should fall back like the rest into the bottomless pit."

We can scarcely imagine the effect produced on the assembly by this discourse, the energy of which surprises us. "Not one among us," adds the candid student who has handed it down, "unless he be a senseless log of wood (as all the papists are, he says parenthetically), doubts that this is truth pure and undefiled. It is evident to all believers that Dr. Luther is an angel of the living God, called to feed Christ's wandering sheep with the Word of God."

This discourse and the act by which it was crowned mark an important epoch in the Reformation. The dispute at Leipsic had inwardly detached Luther from the pope. But the moment in which he burnt the bull, was that in which he declared in the most formal manner his entire separation from the Bishop of Rome and his church, and his attachment to the universal Church, such as it had been founded by the apostles of Jesus Christ. At the eastern gate of the city he lit up a fire that has been burning for three centuries.

"The pope," said he, "has three crowns; and for this reason:

the first is against God, for he condemns religion;

the second against the emperor, for he condemns the secular power;

the third is against society, for he condemns marriage."

When he was reproached with inveighing too severely against popery:

"Alas!" replied he, "would that I could speak against it with a voice of thunder, and that each of my words was a thunderbolt!"

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