5. The Aftermath (1527-53)
The Flood of Catechisms (1525-27)
The struggle to define the relation of law and poenitentia played itself out on another front besides commentaries, namely, the evangelical catechisms produced in Wittenberg from 1525 to 1527. Without a discussion of this explosion of catechisms, one would be hard-pressed to understand why a simple set of instructions to local pastors, the Visitation Articles published in 1527, could have created such a furor in the first place. Moreover, one would have to posit that Melanchthon and Agricola were studying one another's exegetical writings with the same intensity afforded to them by twentieth-century historians. By examining the catechisms of the time, we discover, first, that questions about poenitentia and law concerned others beyond simply Melanchthon and Agricola, and, second, that another important source for Agricola's thought, to which Melanchthon probably had access, appeared shortly before the publication of the Scholia on Colossians. Eisleben's catechisms could easily have precipitated Melanchthon's criticism of those who preach the gospel without true poenitentia.
The Impetus for the Wave of Catechisms
Almost without exception, previous studies of the early catechisms have rested upon the encyclopedic work of Ferdinand Cohrs, who at the turn of the twentieth century published four volumes of evangelical catechisms appearing before Luther's.1 Thirty years later, Johannes Meyer used Cohrs's work as the basis of his own careful analysis of Luther's catechisms.2 Even John Michael Reu, who was mainly interested in cat echisms produced after 1529, owed a tremendous debt to Cohrs's work.'
Cohrs examined all catechisms, regardless of their provenance. We will focus more narrowly on what Wittenberg's own presses produced and in the process examine several oversights in Cohrs's work, which point to the possibility that several of Wittenberg's catechisms were in direct theological, to say nothing of-from the printer's perspectiveeconomic, competition.' Yet even this small glimpse into an otherwise extremely complicated story rests upon Cohrs's formative work.
Two events caused the wave of catechisms in Wittenberg. The first was the publication of a book that was not thought of as a catechism at all. In 1522 Martin Luther and his eager assistants at Griinenberg's print shop published his "BetbUchlein."5 In its original form it was not a catechism, but stood instead in a long line of medieval prayer-books designed to assist especially the laity in their devotional life. Luther's preface placed the book squarely within the tradition of these "paradise" books and "gardens of the soul." While Luther was unsure whether to ban such books altogether or to reform them, he claimed his book was merely a beginning, a simple Christian form to pray the Lord's Prayer and the Ten Commandments.'
The book itself was made up of excerpts from Luther's previous sermons and translation work. Its forty leaves contained material already published separately in 1520 in "Eine kurze Form" of the Commandments, the Creed, and the Lord's Prayer,7 additions from 1522 on ways to pray and the Ave Maria, as well as a selection of psalms and a translation of Titus, which only in later editions conformed to the September Testament. Ten separate printings in 1522 alone, according to the Weimar edition of Luther's works, bespeak its popularity.
These early printings show the printers' concern to make additions to the work.8 A major change in the form took place only one year later at the hands of Nicholas Schirlentz. With the appearance of the September Testament, this Wittenberg publisher, perhaps under Luther's supervision, turned the "Prayer Booklet" into a 156-page New Testament reader, adding Romans, 1-2 Timothy, 1-2 Peter, and Jude.9 The book had now taken on the form of a lay Bible. Still, we cannot call this work a catechism.
While the "Prayer Booklet" provided an important model, it was a second event or, rather, series of events that broke the dam.10 In 1523, Nicholas Hausmann, pastor in Zwickau and comrade-in-arms with the Wittenberg theologians, sent to the court of the elector a request that a visitation of the churches in Saxony be instituted. Elector Frederick delayed. At the end of 1524, Hausmann turned to Wittenberg itself and in a now-lost letter to Luther reiterated the need for a visitation. In this connection he must have asked that Luther also address the problem of instructing the young. To this second matter Luther replied on 2 February 1525 that Justus Jonas and John Agricola had been asked to write a catechism." A little more than a month later, on 26 March, Luther told Hausmann that a catechism had been demanded from them.12 Hausmann sent a second request to the court, this one dated 2 May 1525, the time of Elector Frederick's death, and again asking "what kind of lessons should be held for the unlettered small children."13 In the same month Agricola was making preparations to move to Eisleben to become rector of the Latin school. That, coupled with the death of the Elector Frederick and the Peasants' War, had placed Hausmann's request on the back burner for many in Wittenberg and at the court. Thus, on 23 August 1525 Hausmann wrote to Stephen Roth, then an assistant at the Wittenberg city church: "On account of the departure of [John Agricola of] Eisleben, to whom the catechism had been committed, I am ignorant [of the situation]. 0 that it would be supplied and quickly published by [Justus] Jonas; from him I expect great progress."" At nearly the same time he must have written to Luther, whose response on 27 September 1525 indicated that Luther himself intended to write a catechism.15
Hausmann also sought a revision of the worship service and its translation into the vernacular. In order to secure a copy by Christmas 1525, he even sent his own messenger to Wittenberg.16 Whether he succeeded or not is unclear. Certainly the new order of the "Deutsche Messe" was used in Wittenberg on Christmas 1525. Whether it was also used in Zwickau on that date is unknown. On 4 January 1526, Luther wrote as if he had not yet finished the editing of the work, but by 2 February 1526 he seemed surprised that no copies had yet reached Erfurt.
In his preface to the "Deutsche Messe," written during this period, Luther also discussed the need for a simple, straightforward catechism on the three chief parts, that is, a book in question-and-answer format covering the Ten Commandments, Creed, and Lord's Prayer.17 He added, "One could take such questions out of our Betbtichlein, where the three parts are briefly explained, or could write another himself."" Two things are clear. First, Luther offered his own "Prayer Booklet" as a source for catechization. Second, he invited others to write their own. Luther then speculated about what such a catechism might contain, using the well-known picture of two little purses (faith and love), each with two pockets (sin and salvation, and love for others and the cross for ourselves, respectively). Into these purses Luther suggested placing Bible verses, golden ones for faith and silver ones for love.
At the same time, Luther described the fuller religious life of the city churches, where there were more than simply Sunday services. Here he suggested that early on Mondays and Tuesdays a service of readings be held in German covering the Ten Commandments, the Creed, the Lord's Prayer, baptism, and the sacrament (of the altar). These days were to be set aside for inculcating the catechism "in its proper understanding-"19 For the first time, the five chief parts of the catechism were mentioned in connection with the word catechism itself. Luther proposed a second level of catechetical instruction based upon this broader subject matter.
We have seen several causes for the publication of catechisms. Catechisms arose from the need for new prayer books and personal edification. Their production was stimulated by a lone pastor's single-minded effort to institute evangelical congregational life in Zwickau. They met the evangelical demand for material with which to instruct both children and those unfamiliar with the Christian faith. Their form arose out of the Reformer's call for instruction in faith and love and out of the church's three traditional teaching sources, now expanded to include the sacraments.
The Onslaught of Catechetical Literature
This multifaceted demand for catechesis resulted in a storm of publications, all intended to instruct the common folk in the faith .20 From 1522 to 1529, sixty-two printings of thirteen different instructional booklets were produced in Wittenberg.21 We begin our survey with Luther's "Prayer Booklet," which in 1525 was produced in its third Wittenberg edition, this time at the hands of Hans Lufft.22 In this edition the Scripture completely disappeared, except for the material from the Psalms and the newly added Prayer of Manasseh. Also included were portions of Luther's sermons on prayer, the cross, baptism, the Lord's Supper, penance, and death.23 The 40 leaves of 1522 had grown to 164, larger than the lay Bible published by Schirlentz only two years before. The stuff for a catechism was here; the book had a clear pedagogical intent, but it also maintained its edificatory tone.
Luther's "Prayer Booklet" was not alone. Already in 1524 a German translation of the questions and answers of the Bohemian Brethren had been published in Wittenberg, perhaps by Grunenberg. It was followed in 1525 by a Niederdeutsch edition printed by Hans Barth and Hans Bossow.24 Luther could actually have been referring to this kind of book when he called for the use of questions and answers in catechetical instruction.
From John Toltz, a schoolmaster in Plauen, we have "Eyn kurtz handbuchlyn fur iunge Christen souiel yhn zu wissen von n6ten."25 He sent the booklet to the University of Wittenberg for its approval. The rector, Herman Tulich, who was about to depart with Agricola for Eisleben, gave it to Johann Bugenhagen, who wrote his approval on 18 December 1525: "And [I] say that in my estimation I know nothing else than that this booklet is godly and useful."26 The sixteen-leaf booklet was published by George Rhau in 1526.27
In 1527 Christopher Hegendorfer wrote an explanation of the three chief parts of the catechism, "Die zehen gepot/ der glaub/ vnd das Vater vnser/ fur die kinder/ ktirtzlich ausgelegt"; it was published once in Wittenberg by George Rhau.28 Two years later its Latin translation, first published in Haguenau by John Setzer and perhaps edited by George Rorer, appeared as an appendix to a Latin version of Luther's "Prayer Booklet."
George Rauth from Tresen published a small booklet in Wittenberg that claimed to cover in seventeen articles everything in the entire Scriptures that the Christian needed for comfort. Stephen Roth, perhaps in part spurred on by Nicholas Hausmann's requests, served as editor for some of the editions, which were published in Augsburg, Leipzig, and Wittenberg (two times).29 Such books very clearly filled the need for books of edification, connecting the Scriptures to the comfort of the gospel.
Two similar sets of articles, which had their origin outside of Wittenberg, also stimulated new publications. Benedict Gretzinger, probably from Augsburg, published in 1523 a short work of important Scripture texts with an explanation of how to use them in case of persecution 30 In 1525 Stephen Roth published a new edition of this work for Wittenberg. At the same time (the title page bears the date 9 March 1525), Urbanus Rhegius published a new edition of his explanation of the Creed and the chief articles of the faith.31 These two works would not fall within our purview were it not for the appearance in 1525 of a booklet that was based upon them. Published by the end of 1525, it was entitled "A Comforting Disputation Put in Question-and-Answer Form between Two Artisans, and Touching on Faith and Love and Other Christian Doctrines; Also the Form of How One Person Should Instruct Another in a Christian Fashion, Very Useful for the Articles of Doctor Urbanus Rhegius and Gretzinger."32 Between 1525 and 1528 this work, ostensibly a dialogue between two artisans, appeared at least eighteen times in at least three different editions and in a Niederdeutsch translation; it was published in Wittenberg (eight times), Leipzig (five times), Augsburg (once), and Nuremberg (four times). While it was advertised as a supplement to the works of Rhegius and Gretzinger and is often found bound with one or both of those books, it was in fact an independent catechetical tract in the very question-and-answer form Luther had called for in the preface to the "Deutsche Messe."
Given Stephen Roth's reworking of Gretzinger's text, it is possible that he had something to do with the Wittenberg revisions of the "Disputation between Two Artisans" as well. In fact, when Agricola left his post as catechist at the Wittenberg city church, it seems that Roth may have filled those duties until he left for Zwickau in 1527.33 We have already seen that he edited two catechetical pieces. Furthermore, once Agricola had left for Eisleben, Hausmann appealed to the native from Zwickau regarding the proposed catechetical work of Jonas and Agricola. Indeed, we find yet another 1525 booklet that could very well have been the work of either Jonas or Roth or both. (Certainly in its later editions, Roth played a special role.) That is "Eyn buchlin fur die leyen vnd kinder."
"Eyn buchlin fur die leyen vnd kinder"
In his work on the evangelical catechisms before Luther's, Cohrs argues that "Eyn buchlin" was first published in Niederdeutsch, probably by Johannes Bugenhagen of Pomerania, the new pastor of the city church of Wittenberg.34 This theory is fraught with difficulties. It does not explain why all Niederdeutsch editions contain a separate booklet of titles that is not found in any Hochdeutsch version. Nor does it clarify why the second edition of the catechism appeared only in Hochdeutsch. Moreover, it sheds no light on why in 1527 printers in Strasbourg and Basel reprinted a Hochdeutsch version of what Cohrs presumed was the Niederdeutsch first edition-a version, however, that followed word for word the renderings of the Hochdeutsch second edition.
The complicated history of publication began with Schirlentz's printing of the book, probably in September or October 1525. The alphabet was followed by a "Lay Bible," the chief parts of the catechism, including (in order) the Ten Commandments, the Apostles' Creed, the Lord's Prayer, a proof text from Mark 16 for baptism, and the Words of Institution. The booklet then presented an excerpt from Luther's sermon "Eine kurze Form der zehn Gebote, etc." (WA 7:204, 214-20), which it called "Eyn unterweysung." There followed a series of prayers, including a morning order of blessing, the Benedicite and Gratias for meals, and a blessing from Psalm 63 for bedtime. After an excerpt from Luther's 1519 "Auslegung deutsch des Vaterunsers fur die einfaltigen Laien" (WA 2:128-30), the booklet concluded with a short discussion of Bu/3e, for which no parallel exists in Luther's works.
Shortly after this first printing appeared, a Niederdeutsch edition, to which had been added the booklet of titles, rolled off the presses of Hans WeiF.36 All other portions followed the Schirlentz edition. Be fore the end of the year, a Latin version appeared from the presses of George Rhau.37 This printing included a table of contents, a conclusion to the Ten Commandments (WA 7:207), passages from 1 Corinthians 11 and Psalm 67, a new explanation of the Lord's Prayer (WA 7:220-29/WA 6:11-19) in place of the original (WA 2:128-30), and an explanation of poenitentia to which had been added material from Luther's sermon on the subject (WA 15:482.15-483.26), a reference to Melanchthon's Loci, and a discussion of auricular confession. Several passages from the Bible were appended at the end, including Matthew 6 (as found in Melanchthon's "Enchiridion"),38 and Psalms 127, 122, and 128. The work concluded with a list of roman and arabic numbers.
Probably around the same time a short excerpt for young children appeared from some press in Wittenberg; it was reprinted by Jobst Gutknecht in Nuremberg and bore the title "Eyn Buchlyn daraus man die iungen knaben lernet lesen."39 It contained the ABCs, the Lord's Prayer, the Ave Maria, and an explanation of the Creed.
Around the New Year, 1526, George Rhau published a second Hochdeutsch edition.40 It contained from the Latin version the conclusion to the Ten Commandments, the added material on Bu/e, and a portion of Matthew 6. The words of institution now conformed to the version in the "Deutsche Messe." These three editions-Niederdeutsch, Latin, and second edition Hochdeutsch-were printed several times from 1526 through 1528.41 In 1527 a new twist was added by the Strasbourg printer Hans Preussen. He took Schirlentz's original edition and added to it a German translation of Melanchthon's "Enchiridion." This was reprinted in Basel and Strasbourg in the same year. 2
A completely new edition of "Eyn buchlin" appeared in 1528, this time from Zwickau itself, from the presses of Gabriel Kantz 43 Cohrs surmises that this is the work of Nicholas Hausmann himself, but one cannot help thinking that Stephen Roth, the newly hired Stadtschreiber, might also have had his hand in this revision.44 It began with letters, names, and common words; continued with the "Unterweysung" (WA 7:204), the five chief parts of the catechism, and the Ave Maria; and added biblical texts for baptism and infant baptism. After quoting John 13:34, it gave an expanded list of prayers and Luther's "Vermanung and kurtze Deutung" (WA 19:95.22-96.19) of the Lord's Prayer. It concluded with biblical material used in the liturgy (Magnificat, Nunc dimittis, Benedictus), and a collection of Luther's hymns, including some hymns from the "Deutsche Messe." There was no mention of confession in this work at all.
Just before this Zwickau catechism was to come off the presses, George Rhau wrote to his brother-in-law, Roth, about his plans for this very book. On 7 November 1527 he reported, "My prayer booklet, which you have prepared for me, I want-God willing-to start printing."45 Three months later, on 10 February 1528, Rhau wrote: "You should also know that Dr. Martin has permitted me to print my prayer booklet (the one you put in order). And when I otherwise have nothing more to print, then I will typeset it. Already now I am having the illustrations prepared."46 This letter proves that, at least at this stage, Stephen Roth served as editor, that George Rhau viewed the book as his, and that Martin Luther had approved its printing. Rhau did not publish just one version in 1529, but three: one in Hochdeutsch with an entire series of woodcuts, one in Niederdeutsch, and one in Latin.47 Besides the new woodcuts, the new Hochdeutsch edition contained an expanded set of prayers and the "Kurtze deuttung" of the Lord's Prayer that is found in the Zwickau edition (WA 19:95.22-96.19). It also added a section entitled "Eine christliche weise zu beichten" and Melanchthon's "Etliche Spriiche."
As direct competition to Rhau's book, Hans Lufft reprinted Luther's "Prayer Booklet" of 1525, now including a calendar and a "Passional" with fifty woodcuts.48 In the same year he also published a Latin version, including Melanchthon's paraphrase of the Lord's Prayer, a Latin version of Luther's Small Catechism, and an expanded version of the table of duties.49
Both editions from Rhau and Lufft in 1529 straddled the border between prayer book and catechism. With the addition of woodcuts and prayers, these books now defined much more clearly their edificatory purpose without giving up their pedagogical one. Edification and pedagogy were also intended in 1547 when near the end of his life George Rhau once again published a prayer book, called "Hortulus Animae," with a wealth of woodcuts, including one of the new evangelical saint, Martin Luther. In a poignant preface to his five daughters, Rhau described his duty as an evangelical father: "Now I have brought you to Christ and through others allowed you to be brought in that you received baptism and almost all of you memorized your catechism, as our dear lord and father Dr. Martin composed the same with a short explanation in question-and-answer form."50 Rhau still retained Luther's paraphrase of the Creed from the original text of "Eyn buchlin."51 He viewed this prayer book as fostering a second stage of evangelical piety to begin after baptism and the memorization of Luther's Small Catechism.
We have spent much time on "Eyn buchlin" because, as Cohrs himself asserts, it "is the most important publication of the catechism literature from the same period. It contains for the first time the five evangelical chief parts, which from now on are more and more generally accepted and through Luther's `Enchiridion' are sanctioned. In this the booklet forms a milestone in the history of the oldest evangelical cate- chisms."52 Also included were prayers for mealtimes and a discussion of penance, which also form a portion of Luther's Small Catechism. The text, most likely prepared by a student and catechist from Wittenberg, interwoven with Luther's own words, and laced with Melanchthon's catechetical material in later editions (for which Melanchthon himself may have been asked to write new material), demands attention because it depicted a very different understanding of poenitentia and law from Agricola's. If "Eyn buchlin" represented one attempt at catechetical writing, stemming perhaps from half the team originally asked to write such a book, Agricola's work offered an opposing view.
The Catechetical Contributions of Melanchthon and Agricola
Within this crush of catechisms Melanchthon's and Agricola's contributions took their places. Melanchthon's early attempts were really quite insignificant compared to the enormous success enjoyed by the works of his friend from Eisleben. In 1523, at the same time Setzer began printing Melanchthon's Annotationes in Johannem, a small booklet appeared from the same press, "In caput Exodi XX Philipi Melanchth. Scholia."53 This kind of material may well have originated not in formal lectures at the University of Wittenberg, but rather in lectures before Melanchthon's schola privata. From the same source we have his paraphrases of the Lord's Prayer that were used by Christopher Hegendorfer in 1526 and in the Latin version of Luther's "Prayer Booklet" in 1529.
In late 1523 Melanchthon published another catechetical work, again meant for young Latin students and perhaps coming from his schola privata, and more than likely published without his permission. An undated version appears with the title "Enchiridion elementorum puerilium. Vuittemberge."54 This was almost immediately translated and, under the auspices of Jobst Gutknecht in Nuremberg, appeared with the title "Philipps Melanchthons Handtbuchlein, wie man die kinder zuo der geschrifft vnd Jere halten sol. Wittenberg."55 The printer's preface bore the date 26 December 1523. In January 1524, Simprecht Ruff, the Augsburg printer, combined the Latin version with a tract of Ulrich Zwingli.56
A third kind of material, which may also have arisen out of Melanchthon's attempts to catechize young students, was printed in 1527 under the title "Some Passages in Which the Entire Christian Life Is Contained, in All Ways Beneficial to Keep in View and to Consider."57 Cohrs fixes its publication date as late 1527 and sees it as a response to Agricola's open attack in August and October of the same year.58 However, a Niederdeutsch translation by Ludwig Dietz from Rostock or Lubeck that bore the date 1527 on the frontispiece and the words "Printed by Ludwig Dietz on 14 February" in the colophon makes this late dating impossible.59 Cohrs was right, as we shall see, to interpret this work as Melanchthon's response to Agricola's understanding of poenitentia and law, but it was issued six months before the public dispute, not while it was going on!60
While Melanchthon had entered the lists three times between 1523 and 1528,61 Agricola was also busy with some entries of his own. Having earlier received from Luther the task to produce a catechism for Wittenberg, Agricola now set about completing the project as the newly installed rector of the Latin school in Eisleben.62 The first result came with a Latin piece entitled "Elementa pietatis congesta," first published by Jo seph Klug in 1527.63 At the same time a slightly expanded German version was also published by George Rhau under the title "Eine Christliche kinder zucht, ynn Gottes wort vnd Jere, Aus der Schule zu Eisleben."64 The prefatory letter to this version was dated 11 November 1526 65 We know that it appeared very early in 1527 because on 17 February 1527 the preacher George Buchholzer (or as he put it, the "elected bishop" in Schonau) wrote a letter asking Stephen Roth to send him the `kinder czucht I&lebij deusch (the `Kinderzucht' of [John Agricola of] Eisleben in German)."66 This book was an immediate success. In 1527 and 1528 we find it reprinted in Zwickau, Augsburg, and Nuremberg.67 In Erfurt a small section of the work was published by Wolfgang Sturmer61
Agricola, or perhaps his wife Else, who was possibly a teacher at the girls' school, quickly discovered that the "Kinderzucht" was too complicated for the capacities of beginning students. To remedy this problem, and also (it turned out) to attack directly Melanchthon's understanding of poenitentia and the law, Agricola reworked the piece into a questionand-answer form entitled "Hundert vnd Dreissig gemeyner Frage stticke/ fur die iungen kinder/ ynn der Deudschen Meydlin Schule zu Eyssleben (130 Common Questions for the Young Children in the German Girls' School in Eisleben)." The preface, dated 18 November 1527, was written at the very height of the controversy with Melanchthon. The book first appeared early in 1528, published by George Rhau.69 Its immediate success can be judged by the number of reprints: three in Hochdeutsch in 1528 and one in Niederdeutsch; two in an expanded edition in 1528; three in the same second edition in 1529.70 Ten printings in two years! However, except for a Latin translation appearing in Berlin, Agricola's new home, in 1541, it was never printed after 1529, because a far more successful set of catechisms authored by Martin Luther himself began rolling off Wittenberg's presses at that very time.
Poenitentia in Wittenberg's Catechisms
With Luther's attack on the sacrament of penance already in "The Babylonian Captivity of the Church" (1520) and in his tract on private confession in the same year, the question of the positive role of this sacrament and its parts was up for grabs. In his Loci communes of 1521 Melanchthon still maintained the threefold division of the sacrament, but was careful to place it under baptism and to connect it with Christian freedom.71 In 1524 a new phase of the discussion started with Luther's Palm Sunday sermon on the subject, which was immediately printed.72 It was then quickly included in the Lenten portion of the Kirchenpostille, first published in 1525.73 At the same time, the entire sermon found a place in Luther's "Prayer Booklet" of 1525, and a portion of it ended up in the second edition of "Eyn buchlin." Thus Luther's position affected the catechetical tradition from the start.
Luther's "Betbi chlein"
To begin with, in the sermon on poenitentia found in the "Prayer Booklet," Luther made the point that confession ought not be forced with threats, as the devil did under the papacy. He distinguished three kinds of confession. The first occurs before God, as David prays in Psalm 32, and involves the admission of our sinfulness. This kind of confession is of the highest necessity and marks the entire life of the Christian. The second kind occurs before one's neighbor and arises from love, in the way the first arises from faith. This second kind is described in James 5:16: we confess to our neighbor to whom we have done harm. Like the previous kind of confession, this, too, is commanded and thus is a necessary fruit of faith.
The third kind is auricular confession, on which Luther concentrated his remarks. It is not commanded by God; the pope, however, had made it mandatory and thus martyred many consciences. This kind of confession has to occur freely, because God wants people to come to him of their own free will. Moreover, although one cannot be forced to come, this kind of confession is good, because it contains in it the absolution of the gospel. Whenever a preacher opens his mouth, out comes the gospel promising forgiveness to those who believe. This comment introduced Luther's practical advice: when going to the priest, do not be as concerned about confessing as about hearing the absolution.
Confession, like the Lord's Supper, holds this advantage over preaching the gospel: it is completely personal. We would go to the ends of the earth to hear an angel, and yet the Scriptures prove that God himself speaks the absolution through the priest. Moreover, even if confession did not involve the word of God, it would still afford the opportunity to seek counsel and support from a Christian brother. While Luther refused to make it mandatory that a Christian go to confession before the Lord's Supper, still he urged his listeners that they receive God's word as often as possible.
Luther's conclusion stressed the centrality of the absolution and contrasted evangelical confession to that of the past, where a person was forced to perform works of satisfaction. A closing paragraph gave practical advice concerning how one should confess. Whereas confession in the past had been characterized by references to the seven deadly sins or the Ten Commandments in an effort to discover one's sins and by related pressure to remember all one's sins, Luther countered with the simple advice to confess only those sins that bother the conscience.
All in all, Luther's view of auricular confession was very positive. He sought to tread a fine line between the freedom of confession and the importance of the gospel. He did not emphasize the law as a means of discovering one's sins or of forcing confession. On the other hand, he also did not exclude sorrow over sin-especially from the first and second kinds of confession. He turned private confession into an opportunity for receiving a personal gospel, even more direct than a sermon. A crucial point for the later debate is that Luther saw faith as the origin of the first kind of confession, love as the origin of the second, and the gospel as the origin of the third. Faith in Christ, sorrow over sin, law and gospel all have their place in this sermon as reproduced in the "Prayer Booklet."
"Eyn buchlin fur die leyen vnd kinder"
On the question of poenitentia and confession, "Eyn buchlin" presented two different views. In the only part of the first edition without a parallel in Luther's extant writings, the author placed the discussion of confession at the very end of the work.74 He spoke of two different kinds of confession. The one, which is demanded by God and without which we cannot become holy, flows from faith. We confess that we are eternally lost, that our works mean nothing to God, and that only through pure grace and mercy can we become righteous. There followed a series of proof texts, including Psalm 32:5b and a sizable portion of the parable of the tax collector and Pharisee (Luke 18), which concluded that Christ absolved the one and damned the other. This kind of confession must occur without hypocrisy or self-made thoughts, and from the "bottom of one's heart." Where this occurs, God's grace is surely present. This kind of confession is performed every time we recite the Lord's Prayer. So far this edition of "Eyn buchlin" matched Luther's discussion of the first type of poenitentia.
The second kind of poenitentia is to one's neighbor. However, what the author had in mind was not Luther's second kind of confession, but the third, except that it was not understood as a sacrament. This kind, unlike the first, is not necessary, but is useful and comforting, since the neighbor has God's word and can impart the gospel to the one confessing. There is no better way to plague the devil and bring peace to the conscience than through this kind of confession. Here the author cited Matthew 18 as proof that as Christians and coheirs of Christ we have authority to forgive one another.
In the first edition of "Eyn buchlin" the author presented a view of poenitentia completely severed from the sacramental life of the church. One is to go to a neighbor who has God's word. It is significant that the closing remarks omitted any reference to the role of the priest and instead viewed confession in terms of the priesthood of all believers.
In the Latin edition of "Eyn buchlin," published shortly before the end of 1525, the editor left out the section on the two kinds of confession. At the beginning of 1526 it was also omitted from the second Hochdeutsch edition. Instead, a small portion of Luther's sermon on confession, drawn from his "Prayer Booklet" and dealing with the three kinds of confession, was inserted, both in the opening paragraph and as a replacement for the section on the two kinds of confession. At the end of the Hochdeutsch edition, the editor added, "Read more about this in the Prayer Booklet of D. Martin Luther."75 In the Latin, the reference is even more instructive: "Read the remaining things in either the Loci communes of Philip or in the booklet of Dr. Martin concerning confes- sion."76 So in later editions of "Eyn buchlin" the compiler placed himself squarely on Melanchthon's side.
However, the actual editing had a different effect. From the first edition both the section that discussed the origin of confession (it arises out of a faith that admits to being eternally lost save for God's mercy) and the reference to Jesus' parable were retained. But the editor cut Luther's discussion of the kinds of confession short, including practically everything on the first two kinds,77 and leaving next to nothing on the third. He mentioned the fact that auricular confession was commanded by the pope, not by God, and that thereby many souls had been martyred. All of the positive things Luther had to say about auricular confession completely disappeared into a footnote sending the reader to other books. The asacramental position in the first edition now bordered on the antisacramental. This differed sharply even from the Latin edition, which contrasted the practice of confession under the pope ("conscientiarum carnificina") to the anguished conscience' need to seek spiritual counsel and the consolation of the word of God.78 Whether the omission of Luther's positive assessment of auricular confession was intentional cannot be shown from the text. The various editions of this text did demonstrate, however, that the understanding of poenitentia and confession was very fluid in Wittenberg, and could include positions that downplayed or omitted the sacrament altogether.
Other Catechetical Material
Other instructional material produced in Wittenberg before Agricola's Elementa pietatis generally expressed very positive assessments of poenitentia. Question 67 of the "Kinderfragen" asked whether confession might still be practiced. The author answered quite confidently, "Yes, confession may be practiced," but then reminded the children that only the passion of Christ, not confession, rosaries, psalms, and other works, frees from sins.79 Proper confession has a different basis, namely the conscience that, being filled with fear before the judgment of God, comes to trust in Jesus Christ.80 This is what Paul meant by cleansing out the old leaven and bringing in the new creature. Having been cleansed of sins by God's grace, we then turn from evil desires to good ones, presenting our bodies as living sacrifices (Rom. 12) and forgiving our neighbors. Here this positive assessment stopped short of a discussion of the sacrament itself. The author discussed instead what Luther described under the first two kinds of confession: the penitent moves from fear of God's judgment to faith in Christ's forgiveness.
John Toltz's catechism reflected Luther's assessment of confession quite clearly. He wrote that in the Scriptures God commands two kinds of confession from the believer. The one occurs in God's presence and involves admission of one's sins and the request for God's mercy. The other occurs when one confesses to a neighbor whom one has injured. The third form of confession, in use for a long time, has not been commanded by God but by human beings. Toltz went on to counsel that this form of confession is not unfruitful, since one can use it freely to seek counsel and admit one's sinfulness.81 Despite the generally positive view of this third kind of confession, the centrality of the gospel, so crucial to Luther's argument, is completely lacking in Toltz's explication. He even neglects to mention the importance of Christ's death and God's mercy in the first two kinds of confession.
The "Comforting Disputation between Two Artisans" expresses the most favorable understanding of confession. When the work was reedited for Wittenberg's presses, the section on confession, which fell near the back of the Nuremberg edition, was brought to the front to conclude a discussion of good works. The initial question in this part of the dialogue tried to clear up a misconception about the evangelical position on confession. One artisan observes, "They say I should not go to confession."82 The answer begins by criticizing the mandatory nature of auricular confession. The author continues, "First, however, I want to tell you about contrition (Reu), then about confession, and finally about Bufle."83 This very traditional threefold division, where Bu/(e is understood as penitential satisfaction, would in 1527 spark Agricola's dissatisfaction with the Visitation Articles.
The author of the "Artisans' Disputation" placed his discussion of contrition within a dialogue about how God makes a righteous person out of a sinner. Because we are joined with Christ who died and rose, we, too, must undergo death and resurrection. "First God terrifies the person with the law, so that the person has an anxious conscience in the face of the knowledge of one's sin." Then God comes "and sweetly comforts the person by means of the gospel."84 This effects such a fundamental change in penitents that they come to abhor their previous life and through the Spirit willingly put to death all carnality out of love for righteousness. Such mortification of the flesh and renewal of the spirit is called contrition (Reu) and comes not from human powers but as a gift of God.
The discussion of contrition leads directly to the question of confession itself. Here auricular confession is the presumed context, and receiving the gospel the purpose. "In confession this divine word is spoken: Your sins are forgiven you."85 The point is not the recitation of sins and one's past life, but the future life. God has set up three kinds of confession in the Scriptures. The first occurs before God alone, when a person confesses one's sins. Without this confession sins cannot be forgiven. "Christ is not Christ for you unless you confess that you are sick."86 The second form of confession is to one's neighbor and is called "bruderliche beicht."87 "The third kind of confession occurs when one accuses oneself not only before God but also before other people, because for a true Christian, auricular confession is not difficult but good."88 Two things should motivate a Christian to this form of confession: "the holy cross, that is, shame and disgrace, and second, the comforting promise of God."89
After practical examples of how to frame confession to a priest, there followed a discussion of Bu$e, here understood as satisfaction. Nowhere in the Scriptures is satisfaction demanded of us for sin. Only the precious holy death of Christ makes satisfaction. Accordingly, Christ did not demand satisfaction of the woman taken in adultery; "it was enough not to do the thing again."90
Here we have encountered the most positive assessment of confession. Although the author recognized the abuse of forced auricular confession, he clearly derived all three kinds of confession from the Scripture. He used the medieval division of poenitentia into contrition, confession, and satisfaction, criticizing only the third part and replacing it with the satisfaction made by Christ on the cross. He retained the movement from death to resurrection in contrition and forgiveness, and connected it both with Christ's death and resurrection and with law and gospel. He also connected the phrase "nymmer thue" with "pul3," not as a way of defining poenitentia as a whole, but as a way of eliminating medieval understandings of satisfaction.
The Law in Wittenberg's Catechisms
Luther's "Betbuchlein"
From its first appearance in 1522, Luther's "Prayer Booklet" contained "Eine kurze Form der zehn Gebote, Eine kurze Form des Glaubens, Eine kurze Form des Vater unsers" from 1520.91 Three things a person needs to know to become holy: first, what to do and what to avoid (Ten Commandments); second, where to turn for help upon realizing that one cannot through one's own power do and avoid what is commanded (Creed); third, how one then ought to search for and obtain such help (Lord's Prayer). Luther compared these three parts of Christian knowledge to a sick man's need to know what the sickness is, then what the remedy is, and finally where the remedy is to be found. "The commandments teach people to recognize their sin, so that they see and sense what they can and cannot do or refrain from doing, and so that they recognize themselves to be sinners and evil human beings."92 We begin with the commandments, Luther continued, for this reason: "to teach and recognize our sin and evil (that is, spiritual sickness), through which we do not do or refrain from doing as we ought."93
Luther then worked through each commandment, showing first how they are broken and then how they are fulfilled. He concluded that the commandments, as Augustine had already said, forbid self-love and are fulfilled only through love of God and neighbor. What we learn from the commands, Luther summarized, is that human beings do not live well. In the Creed we discover where we can get that which we need to live well and fulfill the commandments.94
Here we discover a very positive approach to the law. Without any second thoughts Luther saw the commandments as providing human beings crucial knowledge about themselves and their positions, and as revealing the depth of the illness so that they can seek help from God's mercy. He did not foreshorten the law's work. The law is not made irrelevant by the gospel, nor does it cause resentment against or increased dread of God and his judgment.
"Eyn buchlin fur die leyen vnd kinder"
A portion of the section on the commandments found its way from Luther's "Prayer Booklet" into "Eyn buchlin." In three short sentences the editor rephrased Luther's opening remarks regarding the three things needed for salvation. On the commandments the editor wrote simply, "First, the Ten Commandments teach so that individuals know what they should do or refrain from doing. Second, when they now see that they cannot from their own powers do or refrain from doing these very things ...."95 Despite the fact that this is the only statement in "Eyn buchlin" about the law, the main point of Luther's exposition remained intact. The commandments tell us what we are to do and what we are to avoid. When we see that we can neither do what we ought nor avoid sin by our own powers, God provides the Creed and Lord's Prayer.
The Works of Gretzinger and Rhegius
Rhegius also dealt with the meaning of law. Law is a judgment, so that "one commands the good and forbids the evil."97 This law is spiritual and seeks out the desires of the heart. It can be fulfilled only by the Spirit. As a result, "with the law people come no further than into terror and recognition of their sin and damnation."98 Under his discussion of the gospel, Rhegius returned to the law, describing how it frightens human beings and shows their misdeeds. Contrariwise, "the gospel comforts the individual and shows one the physician."99 Under the rubric "Christian Freedom," Rhegius returned again to the question of the law, this time indirectly, warning that Christian freedom is such that not the law but human beings are changed.'°° To say that one has faith is no excuse for not doing good: "This is not right. One ought not make a cover for villainy. " 10 1
Rhegius, unlike the catechisms we have examined so far, stressed the law's effect on us. He also tried to prevent an interpretation of Christian freedom that would lead to license. He alluded to the Augustinian metaphor of sickness used by Luther, but made the gospel the place where we discover not the cure, but the physician.
"The Disputation between Artisans"
The discussion of law in the "Artisans' Disputation" echoed the works of Gretzinger and Rhegius. In his discussion of contrition, the author described how God terrifies the human being with the law. He tied the work of the law to mortification, something that comes not from our powers, but from the Holy Spirit.
Curiously, several sections of the Nuremberg second edition were left out of the Wittenberg editions, including a more thorough discussion of mortification and its links to baptism and the preaching of the law. This included Rhegius's claim that the law is spiritual, but we are carnal; the description of the new birth in baptism as taking place through law and gospel; and the entire discussion introduced by "Dear brother, tell me how the death of the old creature and the life of the new occur."102 This section had described how the law terrifies us and according to Galatians 3 is our "disciplinarian to Christ (Zuchtmeister zu Christo)." Whatever the reasons for these omissions may have been, the end result abbreviated discussion of law and curtailed its function. Nevertheless, what remained still linked the law to mortification and, like Rhegius, stressed its terrifying nature.
Other Wittenberg Catechisms
George Rauth, silent about confession, described the law as a clear mirror which serves human beings in that it enables them to recognize their sins. When the law comes with its eternal curse and one cannot fulfill the least of it, "what can otherwise follow from that except that I have to despair of my own powers?" The law does all this through its strict righteousness "as its own work prior to the coming of grace."' 01 Rauth went on to contrast the light burden of Christ with the heavy and bitter one of Moses. The work of the law in our hearts comes from God alone and is a matter of killing and making alive, which is then "the proper Bu/3e for sin" preached by John the Baptist and given alone by God.104 Rauth then described the good preacher who terrifies the people through preaching the law, so that "the whole world becomes too small for them,"105 after which the gospel must be preached. As he expounded on the movement from law to gospel and on the terrifying nature of the law, Rauth linked the law directly to Bu/e and preaching.
Toltz explained the issue in much the same way. He defined the law in terms of recognizing both sin and God's judgment. He followed with a discussion of the gospel.106 Hegendorfer, on the contrary, gave a completely moralistic view of the Ten Commandments. Children are to learn what they owe God and their neighbor. The notion of the law's revealing sin, terrifying sinners, or driving to Christ was not discussed at all. 107
Agricola and Melanchthon on Poenitentia and the Law
Given this background, we can better understand the contributions of Agricola and Melanchthon in the mid-1520s and their developing disagreement on poenitentia and the law. We can discern, in at least one instance, Melanchthon's moralizing approach to the law. More importantly, we discover Agricola's distinctly different approach to both topics. When Melanchthon in his own catechetical contributions began to counter this new theological option, the stage was set for controversy.
In 1525 Melanchthon's scholia to Exodus 20, first published in Latin by Setzer in 1523, was translated and published in Wittenberg. His approach to the law mirrored his earlier comments in the Loci. Speaking of the power of the law, Melanchthon raised the stakes above anything heretofore noted in other similar works. The knowledge of the law is absolutely necessary because we cannot discover nor experience the gospel in our hearts without it! The law must first, like the thunder at Sinai, "frighten and terrify" the consciences. 108 In his summary Melanchthon noted that in Exodus 20 we have first the recitation of the law, then the revelation of its power, and finally instruction that the law is not fulfilled through our "diligence, effort, work, or thought, and that we should not trust in our works."109
The structure of the "Enchiridion" also set a moralizing tone. It used the traditional medieval division of the catechism, beginning with the Lord's Prayer, moving to the Creed, and ending with, not just the Ten Commandments, but also the Sermon on the Mount, Romans 12, and John 13. After a collection of wise, moralistic sayings, the "Enchiridion" concluded with a variety of prayers for schoolchildren to use as they perform their various tasks. If Cohrs is right, the "Enchiridion" reflects daily life in Melanchthon's own schola privata.
Certainly we find nothing in these small contributions of Melanchthon that could, in the context of the other catechetical materials under investigation, be called provocative. In Agricola's "Elementa," however, we encounter just such a work. In his introduction to the Ten Commandments, Agricola took an approach already encountered in other contemporary catechisms. He too spoke about the thunder, and he maintained that the law shows us our sins for the purpose of driving every soul that recognizes the greatness of its sins to give up on itself and its own counsels.' 11 But then Agricola added this characteristic twist: "[Human] nature, flesh and blood, nevertheless searches for and loves that which does it good and, again, is hostile to and hates all that does it harm and opposes it. Thus, the law is, as the Germans say, `a cudgel by the dog,' so that it does not become too excited but rather, against its own ideas, remains a little tame." 112
In Agricola's discussion of the Creed we do not find, as in the other catechisms, that the law drives to faith. Instead, he begins by discussing in nearly ontological terms the exclusion of knowledge from matters of faith: "The word faith [in the Creed] proves that these articles are all foreign to nature, strange, and impossible to understand. For what must be believed is above all sense, human reason, knowledge, and understanding. One sees nothing, grasps nothing; one only believes it."114 This division between knowledge and faith, coupled with Agricola's negative assessment of the law, left him next to no room to move from law to gospel. Whereas Luther and most other catechists took for granted that the Ten Commandments, Creed, and Lord's Prayer impart some knowledge, Agricola began with the total impossibility of knowing matters of faith. For him faith preceded knowledge of sin.
This bifurcation makes the next move in Agricola's catechism completely understandable. In the context of the Creed he discussed the forgiveness of sins, a central category in his thought, describing it as the "military drums with which one calls the faithful to arms and defense, to the holy community."115 In the description of the way one comes to experience forgiveness, Agricola excluded the law completely. "In matters pertaining to our Lord God, whether large or small, one must pay attention to two things: the word and faith."' 16 But by the term word Agricola meant exclusively the gospel. Thus he continued, "Therefore, when one speaks in the gospel about the forgiveness of sins ... let yourself be content with the words and believe them."117
This de facto exclusion of the law before the gospel did not mean that Agricola did not try to structure the life of the believer. He began a lengthy discussion of marriage by calling upon a distinction in Ephesians 1:8 between wisdom (weisheit, sapientia) and prudence (klugheit, prudentia). The word wisdom has to do with faith and doctrine, the word prudence with the "external way of life of those who among the people on earth are believers." 118 Just as a good soul wants a beautiful body, so the one who has the Holy Spirit (wisdom) must relate to others in a Christian and friendly manner (prudence). Agricola then divided his comments on marriage between wisdom (marriage is a blessing from God, a "hospice and house of service [Spital vnd dienst- haus]," a secret depiction of the church and Christ) and prudence (here he described the relations between men and women in terms of Eph. 5).
Agricola concluded his catechism with a discussion of poenitentia. Even more than in the discussion of the law, we discover here how different his approach was from that found in contemporaneous catechisms. There is no discussion of confession or contrition, to say nothing of the law. Instead, we have here a simplified version of the ideas expounded in his exegetical works (see ch. 1):
On Bulle
1. The person who is sorry for something is already free of sin. Bu/3e is a new heart and a different way of thinking, as when the person who previously desired to be unchaste now hates it. Ephesians 5 [4:28]: "Let the one who previously stole steal no longer." In sum, "the highest Bu/3e is never to do it again."
Agricola completely severed poenitentia from the sacramental system of the church. He described only an inner transformation of the mind in which the believer has exchanged old desires for new thoughts. The goal of the Christian life, the highest poenitentia, becomes the exclusion of bad behavior. Unlike the "Artisans' Disputation," which understood "Nymmer thun" (Christ's words to the woman taken in adultery) as excluding works of satisfaction, Agricola construed Ephesians 4:28 to eliminate the entire sacramental movement from contrition to absolution to works. Moreover, he eliminated works of satisfaction not so much because Christ had satisfied the just demands of the law for our sins,120 but because the Holy Spirit transforms our minds and does these works.121
Agricola's understanding of law and poenitentia had moved beyond obscure references in his commentaries and sermons into booklets intended for both the young people of Saxony and Thuringia and their teachers. For those who had presented a more positive assessment of law and especially of poenitentia, this pair of catechisms in Latin and German could well have come as something of a surprise. As we shall soon discover, their appearance in January 1527, along with Agricola's sermons on Colossians and his new translation of Melanchthon's commentary on Romans and 1-2 Corinthians, sparked Melanchthon's twopronged response. The exegetical response is to be found in Melanchthon's Scholia. The catechetical response is found in Melanchthon's "Etliche Spriiche" and especially in the Visitation Articles. As in his contemporaneous attack on Erasmus's position on free will, Melanchthon's offensive took place under cover of darkness: no names were named, and every conceivable indirect method was utilized. When, with the appearance of the Visitation Articles, Agricola found himself outflanked, he went public and created the most important early challenge from a student of Luther to Melanchthon's theology and mode of operating at Wittenberg.
Melanchthon's First Attacks on Agricola
(1527)
Melanchthon's understanding of poenitentia and law constituted a crucial part of his approach to justification by faith. Thus it should come as no surprise that he began to correct and argue against the law-free system being developed at the same time by his friend in Eisleben. However, Melanchthon did not take the role of a teacher correcting a student, nor an opponent disproving an enemy. Rather, he was simply expressing his informed opinion in what we saw in the previous chapter to be an extremely fluid situation. There was no supreme court for pure doctrine in Wittenberg in 1527, neither in Luther's garden nor in Melanchthon's house. The debate in which Melanchthon and Agricola became involved could have happened only where issues had not been decided and various interpretations were still being experimented with. Nevertheless, Melanchthon clearly rejected the position argued by Agricola and, given the opportunity to regulate doctrine on the point, excluded it expressly from the teaching and preaching in electoral Saxony.
"Etliche Spriiche"
Melanchthon's third contribution to catechetical instruction appeared early in 1527 at the very time Agricola's catechism was rolling off Wittenberg's presses. The "Etliche Spruche" presented biblical texts with brief introductions as reading material for the young. It represented a deliberate effort by an expert in the loci method to realize Luther's call to divide the Scripture into the topics of faith (with its subdivisions of Bufle and forgiveness) and love (with its subdivisions of love for neighbor and the cross). Melanchthon specifically dealt with the topics of poenitentia, faith, and the cross.
Melanchthon's discussion of poenitentia delineated the split that was opening between Agricola and himself. The title of the section onpoenitentia is itself illuminating: "On Bu$e and Fear of the Terrifying Wrath of God and the Beginning of the Christian Life."' Over these very words Melanchthon and Agricola debated. Melanchthon's introduction to the Bible verses on the subject sounds like a response to Agricola's "Elementa": "The beginning of the Christian life is hearty and earnest terror of God's wrath for our sins. For this reason Christ began his sermon on this topic. Therefore we should always keep in mind how severely God threatens the despisers of his wrath and how he takes pleasure in fear."2
As in his 1523 comments on the Ten Commandments, Melanchthon began his discussion of faith by declaring: "Where there is no fear, there can be no faith. For faith should comfort the terrified heart, so that it firmly holds that God has forgiven sin for the sake of Christ."4 What followed touched directly on the brewing controversy. Melanchthon went out of his way to define faith not as fleshly security and despising of the wrath of God, "but instead a true comfort in such anxiety as arises from a knowledge of sins."5 He attacked as only a "pretend faith (gemalter glaub)" that other kind of faith which imagines that we can live a wild life without fear of God. At the same time, Melanchthon showed the connection between the fear of judgment and faith: the frightened heart recognizes that all our merit is too small to reconcile us to God, and thus it must trust Christ for forgiveness.6
With this brief catechetical instruction, Melanchthon set the stage for conflict with any opinion that downplayed poenitentia, excluded contrition over sin out of fear of God's wrath, or insisted that the law has no direct, positive role in the justification of the sinner. But the tension here was hardly greater than that between Agricola and the other Wittenberg catechisms. It would take two more important challenges before Agricola was willing to pick up the gauntlet and strike back publicly.
Melanchthon's Scholia of 1527
Our discussion of Agricola's theology and Wittenberg's catechisms demonstrated that important differences in the understanding of poenitentia and law existed between him and Melanchthon. These differences first became matters of explicit debate in Melanchthon's commentary on Colossians. There are three external pieces of information in the Scholia of 1527 that support this contention. First, Melanchthon addressed the dedicatory epistle to one of Agricola's supporters and relatives by marriage, Alexander Drachstedt. Second, he referred in that letter to other commentaries on Colossians, most likely Agricola's sermons, that could have kept him from publishing his own. Third, he made a passing reference in the preface to "many" who teach forgiveness and faith without poenitentia. Directly echoing his recently completed catechism, he added, "But faith without poenitentia is nothing except a foolish dream." 7 With this remark Melanchthon set the stage for his careful correction of what he perceived to be a false view of poenitentia.
Before we consider the specifics of the debate, however, we must examine whether and to what extent Agricola's sermons on Colossians served as a source for the Scholia. This question has no easy answer. For one thing, we encounter immediately the problem of timing. Agricola preached on Colossians during August of 1526, and Melanchthon lectured on the same epistle in 1526 and 1527. The chances of Melanchthon's having obtained a copy of Agricola's sermons for his own lectures appear slim. Nevertheless, we know that the printer boasted on the title page that these sermons had been gone over by Luther himself, which at least increases the possibility that Melanchthon could have seen them at some point before he completed his own commentary.
A second problem in comparing the two commentaries is that their authors studied at the same institution under the same teacher, used similar methods, and employed some of the same sources. Thus, paral lel exegetical results do not necessarily mean dependence, and an attack by Melanchthon on a particular position held by Agricola may signify only that he disagreed with one of the sources for Agricola's thought, such as Erasmus.
Comments on Colossians 1:15-20 serve as a good example. Both exegetes recognized Paul's statement here as a digression from his main argument. Agricola stated, "Here St. Paul takes some time and makes an excursus."8 Melanchthon said, "However, a description of the person of Christ is inserted in passing."9 This view of these verses, not found in the broader exegetical tradition, falls far short of demonstrating dependence, in this particular case because two years earlier another Wittenberg exegete, Johann Bugenhagen, had made a similar observation: "At this point he digresses with an amplification."10 It is far more likely that at least Agricola, but possibly Melanchthon too, used the insights of their colleague to describe the verses in question. Certainly their acquaintance with rhetoric would have suggested to all three exegetes the excursive nature of the passage.
Comments on Colossians 2:8, on the other hand, demonstrate that a close relation existed between the work of Melanchthon and Agricola. Agricola interpreted this verse along much the same lines as did Melanchthon, or rather the other way around.11 Like Melanchthon, Agricola defined philosophy in this text as "everything that comes from human reason: namely, good order and government, rule and construction of castles, cities, territories, the establishment of civil discipline, the education of the youth in all honesty and discipline, the search for peace and unity, and whatever else may be good on earth. 1112 He then tied all this to the temporal sword, ordained by God to keep peace in the world. As long as philosophy remains in external "do's and don'ts (gebot vnd verbot)," and the conscience is not trapped, philosophy does not stand against God and in fact pleases him.
As an example of God's gift of order, Agricola cited Pliny the Elder's description of the behavior of bees:
The virtues of the bees was an ancient topos that doubtless appeared in collections of sayings and stories from that period.15 That two exegetes should independently of one another bring the same example to bear on the same text, and that they should make the same distinction between civil and Christian righteousness, is most unlikely. Here is what may have happened.16
In the winter semester of 1526, officially starting on 18 October, Melanchthon began his lectures on Colossians.'7 He completed them by 1 May 1527, which gave him some time to edit the manuscript before John Setzer's departure on 20 May. Given the time frame, Melanchthon would probably have reached Colossians 2:8 sometime in late December or January, perhaps even February.18 If we assume the earliest possible printing date for Agricola's sermons-his translation of Melanchthon's Pauline lectures was out by 5 January' 9-Melanchthon, who undoubtedly would have read the work of his friend, was lecturing on this text at almost exactly the time the sermons appeared.
This possibility has important ramifications for our understanding of Melanchthon's developing theology. Various scholars have argued that the distinction between the two righteousnesses (civil and Christian) became a more and more important hallmark of Melanchthon's theology during this time.20 Yet here we have a distinction that came not simply from Melanchthon himself, but also from another within the Wittenberg circle. Add to that Luther's frequent expositions of the same distinction,21 and it becomes clear that many changes one may wish to attribute to Melanchthon at this point in his career had a much wider currency among Wittenberg's theologians. Against the twin attacks by people like Francois Lambert and Andreas Karlstadt on the left (who advocated abandoning the arts) and Desiderius Erasmus on the right (who accused Wittenberg's theologians of the same), both Agricola and Melanchthon appropriated this distinction from Luther's theology.
There were other important differences. Agricola turned a portion of his sermon into an appeal to the authorities at Speyer to support good schools. For philosophy is not against the Scripture or the gospel:
Agricola made two important points here. First, the gospel improves "burgerliche zucht," and God improves "naturalia" by using them for his own purposes. Second, children should learn both profane history and the gospel, according to the letter. In this connection he mentioned the importance of learning languages and of the printing press for the spread of the gospel. He concluded with a plea to the princes to support the schools, reminding his listeners what happened to education when it was in the hands of the priests and monks.
Melanchthon's comments on Colossians 2:8 were both dependent upon and independent of Agricola's sermon. First, in an excerpt published in 1527 just before the Scholia came out, he did not mention languages. However, in the Scholia of 1527 he did.25 Moreover, not until the second edition of 1528 did he make any reference to the printing press and the extraordinary nature of the times. More importantly, Melanchthon did not speak of God's or the gospel's enhancing philosophy's effectiveness. God uses law, reason, and philosophy in the world quite apart from the gospel, although God can also use them for the benefit of the gospel. For Melanchthon, no one use was better than the others. Moreover, when Melanchthon talked about philosophy in the service of the gospel, he did not limit it to grammar and languages, as Agricola seemed to do, but moved immediately to rhetoric and dialectic. Finally, he made no direct call for the establishment of schools.
When Agricola turned to the areas where philosophy has no place, other differences appeared. From philosophy we cannot learn about God, faith, and hope, but only an external civic virtue, which will not make a person righteous, he wrote. Melanchthon agreed, and pointed to the linking of civil righteousness and justification as one example of philosophy's errors. Agricola, however, took the discussion in a different direction. Imitating Luther's arguments in 'Ton welltlicher uberkeytt," Agricola contended that Colossians 2:8 means that when princes attack the conscience, they must be told that they have no jurisdiction.
Agricola then discussed the meaning of the term "Welt satzung (human tradition)" in the text. The use of Plato in earlier times and of Aristotle in Agricola's day had ruined the interpretation of Scripture. To this were added the decrees, decretals, "extravagantes," and "extravaga- torum extravagantes."26 The only thing that saved the church was the coming of the gospel. Agricola even mentioned Jean Gerson's complaint that many people committed suicide because they could not receive good counsel for their consciences. The only sure ground we have comes not from philosophy, but from God's Word alone. Agricola then traced the loss of the gospel through the Scholastic theologians and ended with an attack on that "lying spirit" that departs from the clear meaning of the words "This is my body," and then divides itself "over the `tuto,' over the `this,' over `body,' and does not know where to get out-that is how crazy philosophy makes people."27
Melanchthon offered an entirely different set of arguments. He said nothing about the limits of civil authority. Moreover, his worry about the mixture of Plato or Aristotle in theology was not connected directly to the interpretation of the Scripture. His attack on the Scholastics was much more muted in this section of his commentary. He merely provided examples of incorrect metaphysical and theological speculation by the philosophers. In 1528 he would attack not the Scholastic exegetes' use of Aristotle in interpreting the Scripture, but their inept use of the rhetorical and dialectical tools that Aristotle provided.
Most importantly, Melanchthon targeted not the sacramentarians, but Erasmus and the debate over free will 28 If one assumes that Agricola's attack on linking civic virtue and justification lay before Melanchthon in 1527 as he was preparing his lectures, then it becomes even more impressive that the two areas Melanchthon added to the discussion (God's gubernatio and sanctificatio) directly supported his attack on free will. It was as if he wanted to say that not only in matters directly related to justification, but also in the defense of free will philosophy errs.
There remains one more point at which Agricola's interpretation of Colossians 2:8 diverged sharply from Melanchthon's, and that is on the question of the role of the law and good works in the life of a Christian. For Agricola philosophy had no place in the interpretation of the Bible. He divided his comments on this subject into two major sections. First, he argued that the importation of first Plato and then Aristotle into the interpretation of Scripture had resulted in uncertainty and the multiplication of commentaries on commentaries; although Augustine had tried to bring people back to the Scripture, later theologians simply wrote commentaries first on Augustine and later on Thomas and others.
Second, Agricola described several instances where the importation of philosophy had occurred. Much more important for Agricola than the Lord's Supper controversy described briefly above was the failure to understand 1 Timothy 1:8-9: the law was not given for the just. That is, only apart from philosophy do Christians know that their holiness comes from Christ alone, that it has nothing to do with their works:
If they sin, they run to Christ and shake their sins on him. If they do something good, then it is not theirs but his. They need no law. 1 Timothy 1[:8- 9]: "No law is given to the righteous." They take the middle road and are free from good and evil works in this way: that no sin harms their salvation, and no good work makes them righteous. Grace, grace it is that does not pay attention to sin nor regard good works.29
How serious was Agricola about the exclusion of the demand for good works from the Christian life? He pitted Christian freedom against all statutes and ceremonies. They are all excluded. No one rules the Word of God except God's Son:
With one sweeping statement Agricola had eliminated all rules from the gospel. Moreover, in very pointed terms he criticized even the holiest of people who imagine that rules and regulation will help when people live disorderly lives. He included in his attack Francis, Dominic, Basil, Bernard, "and all of the Fathers who made rules, all councils in which something was decreed concerning the external life, as in all of them, even the Council of Nicea."3 ' He compared those who try enforcing ceremonies to the Jews who asked Jesus for a sign. We must have patience with the simple and must simply respect the truth.
Agricola categorically denied any role for works, good or bad, in the life of the believer. He excluded any common ordering of the Christian life. Christians live by grace alone:
When we spend an entire day with good thoughts, service to the neighbor, preaching, working, writing, reading, we are pleased with ourselves and say, "Ach, if only I did this every day, it would be really fine and would please God." Contrariwise, when we spend a day evilly, we are so fright ened and cry and complain, "Wrong has been done; we will only be damned." Both of these things mock Christ and his grace.32
In his summary of Colossians 2:8 Agricola focused exclusively on his final arguments. Philosophy says that when we do good works, we can be sure that we please God. But God's Word says that if we do good works, we should fear (furchte), because we become righteous by faith and are only unworthy servants. Philosophy says that when we sin, we are damned and should be afraid. God's Word says, "If you sin, be happy; it should have no consequence."34 Here Agricola substituted the effect of human philosophy for the effect of the law that the other catechetical interpretations of Wittenberg's theology described. Fear and judgment connected with the revelation of sin were totally excluded from Agricola's understanding of the Christian life. Rather, he said that we should fear when we do good works; on the other hand, "when you sin, then be happy." Statements like these were on a collision course with Melanchthon's theology.
Did Melanchthon respond in his Scholia? Without a doubt, but not in his discussion of Colossians 2:8. There the chief opponent remained Erasmus. Instead, he returned to Agricola's theology in comments on Colossians 2:23, where he discussed human traditions.35 His first point established what might be called the first use of the law within the churches. Traditions that do not conflict with the divine command have been created not to justify us or to placate God, but to prevent confusion in the churches. As proof he cited 1 Corinthians 14:40, a text to which Luther also often referred in this context. Examples of traditions that prevented confusion included the setting of rules for singing, Sunday services, and fasting. Melanchthon's summary took on Agricola's blanket rejection of human regulations in the church: "And exactly in this manner and for this reason the old ordinances were made, which were preserved not as necessary for justification but for the sake of peace and to avoid confusion."36
Having positively defined the role of ordinances in the church, Melanchthon then took on those who would abolish them. Attacking such people as individuals who "gravely damage charity,"37 he linked them to Jesus' strictures in Matthew 18:6 against those who scandalize the "weak (pusilli)." And who are the "pusilli"? Those "who when old ordinances are changed take opportunity for license and become worse."38 Melanchthon feared that changing human ordinances led to license, not to evangelical freedom. Moreover, some people, seeing that scandal arose from the changing of unnecessary practices, came to hate the gospel itself. He included the example of the prohibition of eating food once sacrificed to idols (1 Cor. 8) and Paul's command to avoid offense. Melanchthon added two examples from the history of the church, including a positive interpretation of the canons of Nicea: "The Council of Nicea set things up this way, that when there were deliberations concerning church ordinances, the council did not want to hand down some new form for all churches, but instead commanded that in each and every place the old customs be preserved."39 Not only did Melanchthon praise the council in general, but he specifically mentioned the decree that allowed churches to regulate themselves.
After an examination of other kinds of human ordinances in the church (including those that are harmful because they are thought to lead to salvation), Melanchthon concluded with a summary. First, he issued an explicit admonition: "I wanted to add these things at the end, so that I might urge the preservation of old ordinances, as far as it can be done without sin."40 Melanchthon condemned people who had eliminated some old rites only to institute their own; guilty of instituting a new form of circumcision in the church (Gal. 5:2), such people are "authors of the greatest scandals, namely of dissension in the churches and license among the common folk."41 Then, in some of the strongest lan guage in the Scholia, he added that this was the work of the devil. While earlier the devil had sent pseudoapostles in the form of "teachers of human traditions (doctores traditionum humanarum)," now people needed to fear "lest the devil deceive us somewhere with a false teaching of liberty."42 Peter predicted as much (2 Peter 2:19), and Paul admonished people not to use freedom as an opportunity for the flesh (Gal. 5:13).
The battle lines were clearly drawn. When in the Visitation Articles Melanchthon attempted to preserve a tradition of the old church, namely the threefold division of poenitentia, criticism would inevitably come from John Agricola, who portrayed Christian life as free from such burdens and who criticized those well-intentioned people who reintroduced them for the sake of order.
Melanchthon's and Agricola's introductions to the Book of Colossians foreshadowed other disagreements between these two interpreters of Paul. We have already mentioned Melanchthon's warning in the preface against those who preach forgiveness without poenitentia. In his sermon on Colossians 1:3-8, Agricola spent a great deal of time proving that the connection between works of love and hope did not indicate that we merit eternal life.45 Melanchthon said simply, "Concerning this text I know that others have debated many things subtly, but I think that this kind of question does not benefit the common folk."46 In one sentence Melanchthon dismissed over twenty pages of Agricola's argument as being unfit for the common folk. In the edition of 1528 Melanchthon rewrote his comment to read, "Concerning this text I know it is usual that it be debated subtly. But we will explain it as best we can, most crudely."47
In 1527 Melanchthon cited Paul's advice that the common people need to be fed with milk; that way they can understand "what it means to serve God freely with no thought of reward."48 But even more pointedly he added, "Indeed it is useful to incite them to godliness by mention of rewards and punishments, just as by preaching of the law."49 This final comment revealed the gulf between Melanchthon and Agricola over the preaching of the law. For Agricola, the law had no place in the life of the Christian. Thus pages of his sermon on Colossians 1:3-8 had to be spent explaining away Paul's apparent reference to reward. Melanchthon pointed out that punishments and rewards can move a person to do good rather than ill, because the former are witnesses to the divine will and the latter are signs of divine favor. The saints at Colossae were moved to do good by the magnitude of the reward, not that their doing good increased the reward, but that, having been accepted by God, they wished to show him their gratitude. This shows that hope and the expectation of heavenly blessings do not rest on our merit but on the divine promise.50 With talk like this, it is no wonder that Agricola could accuse Melanchthon of reverting to papal practices. Merit, reward, punishment, preaching the law-the very things Agricola's gospel excluded-Melanchthon's commentary welcomed.
Before examining the arguments concerning poenitentia in the Scholia, we must look at Melanchthon's interpretation of Galatians 3:24. This became one of the points of contention between the two exegetes at the Torgau conference in November 1527. Whereas Luther had in Agricola's opinion consistently applied this verse to the second use of the law-the law is the disciplinarian (Zuchtmeister) that drives to Christ-Melanchthon in the commentary on Colossians applied it to the first use of the law-an exegetical move Agricola rejected. As part of his discussion of free will in comments on Colossians 1:15, Melanchthon stated that the law "not only teaches those who do not yet have the Holy Spirit, but also drives them away from manifest and shameful acts or from transgressions; as [Paul] says, `the law is given on account of the transgression,' that is, for coercing the flesh .1151 So while allowing this verse to apply to those who do not yet but will have the Holy Spirit, Melanchthon insisted that it also implies the coercion of sinners.
Melanchthon expressed himself even more clearly in comments on Colossians 2:17 ("These [regulations concerning food, drink, festivals, etc.] are only a shadow of what is to come").52 He wanted to expand this text beyond simply a typological interpretation of the law. He did this by defining two uses for the law. For the first use ("to coerce the carnal human creature"-the second use is to drive us to Christ) he adduced two texts, Galatians 3:24 and 1 Timothy 1:9. Not only is Israel coerced, but God wants all people to be coerced by the law, which is why he also gives magistrates and laws to the Gentiles. Agricola had used 1 Timothy 1:9 to exclude the law from the gospel and had argued that Galatians 3:24 applied only to believers waiting for salvation; Melanchthon assigned the coercive function of the law to all peoples and all laws.
These opposing views of the law had direct consequences in two areas: poenitentia and Christian freedom. Both topics underwent some sharpening and changes by Melanchthon for the Scholia of 1528, but even in their earliest form they showed an understanding completely different from Agricola's. Melanchthon discussed poenitentia in his introduction to comments on Colossians 2:11f.53 He pointed out that starting with Colossians 2:454 Paul had introduced a "collatio" between human and divine righteousness, which he finished in 2:1 if. by teach ing that within Christian righteousness itself there are two parts: mortificatio and vivificatio. This is what Christ himself teaches in Luke 24:47. But whereas this verse was one of Agricola's favorites to prove that poenitentia arises from faith in the gospel, Melanchthon argued that it proves that poenitentia precedes faith and forgiveness.
"Mortification" or poenitentia Melanchthon defined as "to know sin and to be truly terrified by God's judgment.... Nor can faith exist without such fear and terror."55 In his application of this definition to the verses in question Melanchthon emphasized again and again the necessity of our fearing divine judgment ("you may be truly terrified by fear of divine judgment"; "as David ... was terrified"; "this terror is poenitentia itself").56 This terror prepares one for true confession, in which the heart not only acknowledges its sin and condemns itself, but sees the impending judgment. Other words for this mortificatio in Paul's vocabulary include circumcision, burial, baptism, and even the hiddenness of our life in Christ.
Faith and consolation first appeared in Melanchthon's discussion of vivificatio, which he defined as the consummation of Christian righteousness, "to comprehend consolation through faith."57 Such faith acknowledges and trusts that satisfaction is made to God not through our merits but through Christ's death. In this way Melanchthon drew the line between his understanding of poenitentia and Agricola's. The battle continued a year later when Melanchthon reworked the material into a much more careful rebuttal of Agricola's position.58
In his comments on Colossians 3:11 Melanchthon discussed Christian freedom.59 He defined Christian freedom in several different ways. Most importantly, through forgiveness and the gift of the Holy Spirit God frees Christians from sin and the devil's power. Another kind of freedom involves freedom from the political and ceremonial law of Moses. Here Melanchthon rejected calls to reintroduce Mosaic laws, supporting instead the local laws and customs as well as the daily human activities they regulate.
A final level of freedom comes from the understanding that human traditions neither save nor damn us. Although Melanchthon referred his readers to his earlier discussion of this issue,60 he nevertheless took this opportunity to investigate what Paul meant by saying that the law had been abrogated. Harking back to a medieval definition discussed in the Loci communes theologici of 1521, Melanchthon divided the law into ceremonial, judicial, and moral. Since neither ceremonies nor legal judgments justify before God, the first two kinds of law have been suspended. There follows one of the Scholia's most important statements in relation to the coming controversy: "However, because the gospel, as we said above, contains the preaching of poenitentia, it is necessary that the part of the law that teaches righteousness be retained. This is the Decalog. It condemns us and calls us to poenitentia."61
The moral law is written not only on Moses' tablets, but also on human hearts as natural law. It is taught for two reasons: to coerce the flesh by the fear of punishment, and to humble and fill sinners with fear by the preaching of poenitentia. "For remission of sins cannot be taught without the preaching of poenitentia."63 Here Melanchthon echoed the preface of the Scholia.
With the Scholia Melanchthon's disagreements with Agricola reached a new stage. The Scholia indicates that Melanchthon was familiar with Agricola's sermons on Colossians. This means that in all probability the differences between their interpretations were not simply random divergences but, as we saw in Agricola's translation of Melanchthon's annotations on Romans and 1-2 Corinthians, wellthought-out rebuttals of the other's theology. Melanchthon rejected the subtleties of Agricola's interpretation of Colossians 1:5-8. His comments on Colossians 2:8 expanded the positive role of philosophy. He corrected statements that would eliminate all human traditions from the church. He dismissed any definition of poenitentia that excluded the law and its terrors. Having clearly spelled out his positions, Melanchthon now brought them to bear in the Visitation Articles, the third front from which he initiated the earliest intra-Lutheran battle.
The Visitation Articles
In the middle of the controversy with Agricola, Melanchthon wrote a note to his friend in Nuremberg, Joachim Camerarius, in which he complained about the attacks. Speaking of the Visitation Articles he said, "They contain nothing except some children's catechesis, as I call it, of the Christian religion."64 He concluded with the same description: "And in that catechesis itself, what else did I strive for except that the necessary things be taught in the churches while omitting many controversies?"65 Thus Melanchthon viewed the Visitation Articles as a children's catechism intended for the simple pastors whom he had encountered in his work as a visitor in the churches of electoral Saxony. What Melanchthon wrote in that piece, however, served as the last crucial salvo in his ever sharper correction of and controversy with Agricola's theology. Here he wrote not only as exegete or catechist, but as visitor and, if one takes seriously the definition of the episcopal office in Luther's preface to the German version of the Articles, bishop 66
Pressure for a visitation of the churches came originally from several sides. As we have already seen, Nicholas Hausmann of Zwickau was one of the first to call for and then to execute a visitation in his immediate area. Luther also joined in the chorus, especially once the reform of the University of Wittenberg was well in hand. After an exchange of legal opinions between him and the court, the university elected two representatives to serve on the visitation team. (The elector also named two representatives from the court.) On 6 December 1526 the faculty chose Jerome Schurff from the law faculty and Melanchthon to represent the theologians.67 Although others had nominated Benedict Pauli the rector, Johann Bugenhagen the pastor, and Justus Jonas the provost, Luther's insistence on Melanchthon carried the day.68
On 16 June 1527 the elector sent the visitors his instructions defining their responsibilities.69 They were given carte blanche by the elector, who wanted to insure that within the existing church structures, especially the financial ones, the gospel would be preached.70 While the elector's instructions concerned themselves with the external problems of the churches and their pastors and with the relation of the elector to the visitation, it seems that Melanchthon, as the sole theologian among the visitors, was then designated to come up with a proposal that would serve as the theological basis of instruction for the pastors and their people. From the beginning this proposal was intended to be worked over by the entire theological faculty at Wittenberg and, if the elector agreed, published.
During the summer, sometime after 1 July, the visitors worked their way through the region of the Saale. We have their reports from Neu- stadt (Orla), Kahla, Eisenberg, and, later, Altenburg.71 Among the towns visited was Saalfeld, where the visitors reported that the pastor, John Plack, and the preacher, Caspar Aquila, were capable but unpaid. By 15 August 1527 Melanchthon had come to Jena, where the university had moved because of the plague in Wittenberg.72 Sometime before this Melanchthon must have begun work on a Latin version of the Visitation Articles, which in translation became the subject of discussion between the court and the theologians, who because of the plague were residing in both Wittenberg and Jena.73 On 26-27 September a conference over the visitation and its articles took place at the Torgau with Melanchthon, Schurff, Luther, and Bugenhagen in attendance.74
By mid-October, much to Melanchthon's dismay, the original Latin version of the articles was published by Nicholas Schirlentz in Witten- berg.75 By that time the debate over catechesis between Agricola and Melanchthon had broken out into the open. Before we investigate this controversy, we need both to understand how these articles contributed to that dispute and to show the intimate connection between the Latin articles and the works of Melanchthon we have already discussed.
As Erasmus commented wryly in a letter to Melanchthon in 1528, the opening table of contents did not match what was in the book 76 In fact, it was not a table of contents at all but, as stated in Schirlentz's edition, a list of twenty articles on which the curates had to be examined. Next to that list, which may not even have come from Melanchthon, was a description of some, though not all of the articles, placed in a completely different order. Where the list began with the Decalog and moved to faith and then the sacraments, the Articles themselves began with an untitled section on poenitentia and forgiveness of sins, saving a discussion of the law until the end and omitting altogether such topics as schools, foundations, sacristans, and the punishment of adulterers. 77
Following this attack Melanchthon stepped back and gave positive instruction. Poenitentia must be taught to exhort the hearers to contrition, which is the principal part ofpoenitentia and which is called in the Scripture mortificatio. Here he quoted Ezekiel and Joel 2:13.79 The preaching of the law-the first question of the visitors to the local clergy-was to be understood in this context: "The preaching of the law rouses [a person] to poenitentia."80 But this preaching was to be more than simply a recitation of the commandments; it had to include the penalty for breaking them, both temporal and eternal. Melanchthon offered examples from Genesis 18 and Exodus, reminding the reader that, as Paul says, such punishments were written for our sakes, "that we may learn the fear of God."81 Moreover, the preacher ought to explain the state of a person abandoned by God. In addition to Paul's description in Romans 1, the examples of Saul, Cain, Absalom, and Ahab are cited. Melanchthon then added a comment possibly directed at the preaching of Caspar Aquila: "It is much better to inculcate these things into the multitudes, than to go on and on about monks, eating of meat, and similar things, which the common people can scarcely understand properly."82
Even when Melanchthon spoke of faith, he kept coming back to the importance of poenitentia. Faith, or the remission of sins, can be understood only when people have heard beforehand the teaching of fear or poenitentia, "because faith cannot be conceived except in a contrite heart."83 Melanchthon expanded the notion of faith to include not only forgiveness, but also God's continual rule by the Holy Spirit who sanctifies us. This forgiveness is obtained not by our merit, but on account of Christ. According to Luke 17:10, "You say, `We are unworthy servants"'; our merit and works do not avail.84
Here for the first time Melanchthon mentioned that the doctors of the church divided poenitentia into three parts, contrition, confession, and satisfaction. In this context he was concerned to point out only that satisfaction is not a matter of our works but of Christ's propitiation for our sins. But as soon as Melanchthon concluded this discussion, he returned to the fact that there is no faith without fear of God and a contrite heart. The one follows the other as the sunrise follows the dawn. Salvation follows a specific process: "When God is about to have mercy, the heart is frightened and filled with fear of his judgment; that is poenitentia or contrition. If it then hears the gospel, that is, if it hears that its sins are forgiven on account of Christ, it also believes it is certainly forgiven."85 This then is true, not simulated, faith, which is conceived by the Spirit and bears fruit.
Melanchthon returned to the importance of contrition in the next section, entitled "De cruce."86 The human being is justified by faith, not by human merits or works, "but there is no faith except in the heart that is contrite, or mortified, or doing poenitentia."87 It seems as if Melanchthon could not repeat it often enough. He divided the discussion of the cross into four parts. First, people must be taught that all afflictions come from God. Second, they must learn that the reason for this affliction is, as part of the law and its penalty, to call us topoenitentia, not to crush us. Third, affliction should teach us patience and, fourth, lead us to prayer.88
A few sections later Melanchthon again returned to this theme under the topic "De timore Dei."89 He again emphasized that faith cannot exist without fear of God and insisted that this faith "must be very diligently inculcated" because Christ has warned that even when Satan is expelled from someone, he comes back with seven other demons. The gospel exposes the powers of darkness, as is clear from John 16:8-11, a text Melanchthon used to structure his comments. The Holy Spirit accuses the world of sin, which encompasses not only external things, but also hidden things in the heart, among which Melanchthon included "to lack fear of the judgment of God."90 He distinguished two kinds of fear. Some, like Satan, believe the story of the gospel but not their own forgiveness. This is servile fear. The other, called filial fear, is akin to trust, where the heart is terrified and faith is aroused to believe that one is forgiven and God is placated: "In this way fear and faith are felt and exercise themselves. Nor are the thoughts of the soul lazy, but it is necessary for souls truly to shudder with fear and afterwards truly to receive again consolation and joy through faith."91
In his discussion of the sacraments Melanchthon returned to this theme. Baptism is a sign of poenitentia, the death of the old being.92 The effect of baptism continues throughout one's life. When Melanchthon turned to the sacrament of penance itself, he argued that it is not a sacrament distinct from either baptism or the Lord's Supper, but that it signifies both. Here again he discussed the three traditional parts of poenitentia. He defined contrition as sorrow over sin or fear of punishment, the feeling "that we are condemned to eternal death."93 While contrition varies from person to person, God must be sought in order that it be "verissima." Melanchthon added, in words that soon became the subject of debate, "people must always be exhorted to contrition."94
Melanchthon then turned to the second part of poenitentia, confession to God that we are worthy of punishment. The other type of confession, to a priest, ought not be a matter of reciting all one's sins, for that is impossible. Nevertheless, no one ought to be admitted to the Eucharist without confession. Moreover, one ought not be asked just what one thinks of the Eucharist, but also whether one is sorry for one's sins and believes that remission of sin will follow. Individuals who are particularly anguished must be encouraged and have explained to them that God gives the keys of the kingdom to the church, so that it may take his place and they may believe the absolution. The only satisfaction that must be taught is that of Christ. This ought both to show God's hatred of sin and to increase faith. Melanchthon closed this section with a summary: "The conscience, touched by the horror of judgment, feels that it is not enough to please God. But faith is to feel certain that on account of Christ our sins are forgiven and that God now wants to rule and defend the one received in grace."95 Horror of judgment, faith in Christ's sacrifice for sin and in God's will to rule and defend us: these sum up the Christian life. Melanchthon saw in them the move from law to gospel, from mortificatio to vivificatio.
The section on traditions led directly into Melanchthon's discussion of Christian freedom. Here we discover another section that matches mate rial in the Scholia, this time down to individual phrases.97 The first level of Christian freedom is forgiveness of sins and freedom from the devil's power.98 This level of freedom Melanchthon viewed as a great consolation for human hearts. The second level of freedom is freedom from the law of Moses. Again Melanchthon divided this law into three parts, arguing that the ceremonial and judicial laws are no longer binding on Christians. Instead, as Gentiles we have our own civil law. What remains in effect is the Decalog, written in our hearts and repeated in the gospel; this moral law is not abolished. Melanchthon contrasted this view of Christian freedom to what was preached during the Peasants' War of 1525. The' least important level of Christian freedom concerns human traditions that do not justify us before God. As in the previous section, Melanchthon warned about straining at gnats and swallowing camels.
As if all this were not enough, in a section called "De lege" Melanchthon returned one last time to the question of the relation between law and poenitentia. Here he brought into focus the great differences between Agricola's theology and his own. To begin with, Melanchthon argued: "Law must be taught for two reasons, for it has two effects: to coerce the flesh and to terrify the conscience."99 This meant, first, that the law must be taught to coerce "rudes homines." As proof Melanchthon offered two texts: "The law was given on account of transgressions" (Gal. 3:19) and "the law is given for the unjust" (1 Tim. 1:9). Here Melanchthon explicitly censured those who, when they hear that we are not justified by our own powers or deeds, live the most impure lives. "They will incur great punishment from God."100
Second, the law must be taught to terrify consciences, for, according to Romans 3:20, "through the law comes knowledge of sin." Melanchthon glossed this text, "that is, so that people may be called topoenitentia, and through poenitentia to faith and Christian righteousness."101 Then, as if making a final plea to those who might oppose him, Melanchthon concluded the same way he began the Articles:
Over the course of a year, with the appearance of various writings by Agricola, Melanchthon had become more and more convinced of a glaring weakness in his friend's theology. When in the course of the visitation he discovered that some preachers were attacking human traditions and that the common people were flouting the law while claiming they had faith, he used his considerable authority to attack the problem directly. Of course, he did not name names and tried instead simply to refute Agricola's arguments through his own catechetical proposal. In this one small booklet Melanchthon confronted the theological aberration he most feared (lawlessness and a faith that substituted security for trust in God's forgiveness through Christ's sacrifice). His presentation of a theological program most incompatible with that of Agricola, who feared above all a return to the rules and regulations of Rome, resulted in public dispute.
Tempest in the Torgau (August-November 1527)
The public dispute between Philip Melanchthon and John Agricola over the Visitation Articles lasted scarcely more than three months. Reaction to Melanchthon's Visitation Articles was quick in coming. Discussions between Luther and the elector had begun by the middle of August. By the end of August, both Melanchthon and Luther were defending the approach to poenitentia found in the Articles. After the conference at the Torgau Castle near the end of September, a second storm of protest began, sparked by the unauthorized publication of a Latin version of the Articles and the arrival in Wittenberg of Melanchthon's Scholia on Colossians. This resulted in a second, more widely attended conference at the Torgau near the end of November, after which peace-or at least a lasting truce-was established. On the basis of the disagreements and the resulting concord, both Melanchthon and Agricola changed their exegetical and catechetical work in the following year.
Round One: The Parts of Poenitentia and Creeping Back to Rome
On 29 July 1527, the visitors for electoral Saxony, Hans von der Planitz, Asmus von Haubitz, and Philip Melanchthon, sent an interim report to the elector describing their work to date.' Among other things, they reported having visited Saalfeld on 21 July, where the pastor, John Plack, and the preacher, Caspar Aquila, were capable enough, but unpaid, in part because of a major fire in the city. Both an accompanying letter of the visitors and the response of the elector complained that problems had arisen due to attempts by Count Albert of Mansfeld to prevent the visitation in Saalfeld.'
Aquila's now lost response to the young visitor must have been quite harsh, for it evoked a spirited defense from Melanchthon. Though Melanchthon's reply has been dated to the middle of October 1527,5 there are several reasons for redating it to the end of August or the beginning of September 1527. First, in parallel with Melanchthon's initial letter, it dealt with the harsh preaching of Aquila. It referred directly to Melanchthon's visitation activities ("in hoc itinere"). The Visitation Ar tides, which Melanchthon would later refer to as a "libellus," are here called a "scriptum," perhaps indicating that they had not yet been printed. In addition, the letter referred to attacks by nonevangelical preachers and to the immediate troubles in Saalfeld, with which Melanchthon had just become acquainted. Another consideration is that the letter's rehearsal of Aquila's objections to the manuscript version of the Visitation Articles made no mention of Agricola's later challenges to Melanchthon, but only of the narrow question of dividing poenitentia into the three traditional parts. This reflected a simultaneous early challenge by Agricola, to which Luther responded on 31 August 1527.6 Finally, the editors of Melanchthon's correspondence dated his letter of defense to mid-October because in a letter dated 27 October 1527 Luther mentioned Melanchthon's complaint that some (quidam) had attacked his understanding of poenitentia; Luther added that Agricola had also made an attack. Although the editors construed the "quidam" as referring to Aquila, Melanchthon was more likely referring indirectly to Agricola's renewed attack against him.7 This interpretation squares with two other letters, dated in early November, in which Melanchthon informed Aquila of renewed attacks and mentioned Agricola by name.8
What was the nature of Aquila's attack? Melanchthon's letter gave a running account of the challenges. First, Aquila complained about Melanchthon's failure to deal with the "quorundam sacrificulorum importunitas."9 Saalfeld's clergy was by no means completely evangelical, and these priests, probably encouraged by the count of Mansfeld, must have been attacking Aquila and the evangelicals. While admitting that these priests were the "semina discordiae," Melanchthon contrasted his own efforts to establish "concordia." Both during the visitation and in his earlier letter Melanchthon had urged moderation on those who preach the gospel.10 Given this goal of moderation, Melanchthon continued, he had approved some teachings of the former age, in this case the threefold division of poenitentia, since, as long as satisfaction is attributed to Christ, this division is useful for teaching."
With this positive assessment of his work plainly stated, Melanchthon took up Aquila's second charge, that Melanchthon himself had now become a papist and a patron for the monks.12 Melanchthon's first response was irony bordering on sarcasm, a characteristic which we will encounter time and time again in this dispute and which actually serves as one of the hallmarks of his intra-Lutheran polemic. He had once believed that the Saale River could more quickly return to its source than that Aquila's opinion of him could change so rapidly. Turning again to the major point at issue, he referred Aquila to "scriptum meum" which Aquila had at his house, a writing showing how Melanchthon divided poenitentia. This indicates that Aquila must have been familiar with some writing of Melanchthon describing the division of poenitentia, most likely an early copy of the Visitation Articles themselves.
Melanchthon then explained the reasons for this division. Everyone defined poenitentia as mortification of the flesh, self-denial, or knowledge of sin, but no one, neither the common people nor the doctors whom Melanchthon had heard on his recent visit, knew what that meant.13 Thus, Melanchthon preferred to call the beginning of poenitentia contrition. The other parts, confession and satisfaction, were clear and caused no sane person any occasion to complain.
Aquila had a different idea about poenitentia. He would have liked to see it laughed off the stage.14 Melanchthon's reply dripped with contempt. What do I hear? What reason is there for it to be laughed off the stage when in fact it is useful for teaching if rightly understood? This, of course, returned to his initial argument that the reason for using the threefold division, or any such division, was its usefulness in teaching. Melanchthon then added an attack against those who, in their great hatred of the pope, condemned both good and bad. From this behavior, however, came only scandal. Contrary to such behavior, Melanchthon argued for tolerance and leniency, referring Aquila to Romans 14:13 where Paul urges Entciicrta. Melanchthon, turning the tables on Aquila, demanded the same virtue of Aquila himself, who had argued so sharply against this division.15 He reminded Aquila that some (was he thinking of Karlstadt, Muntzer, or Zwingli?) had acted not to sup port concord in the church, but to rule it. They thought they were wise if they totally condemned the teachings of the old church. Aquila knew this to be the case for many, but Melanchthon, true to the complimentary style of his age, added that he expected better of him. "I have always loved your modesty,"16 he wrote, adding that he hoped others would not wrest it from Aquila. The flattery put Aquila in the awkward position of having to contradict both Paul's admonition and Philip's expectation.
Aquila had also feared that using the traditional terminology would mean that his opponents could now boast that they had carried the day.t" Melanchthon repeated his arguments. The only aim of such people was to rule. Aquila, contrariwise, was to keep calm and remain patient.
In closing, Melanchthon reflected upon the state of the church he had encountered in the visitation. First, he insisted that many things were better taught now, thank God, than ever. Second, other things were taught better in the past than by some unlearned "Lutherani" now. Third, Aquila's task was to heal the souls both of the adversaries and of the common folk and to refuse to feed the hatred of these factions. Fourth, some papists actually had reason to rebuke the behavior of some evangelicals. In his final prayer Melanchthon revealed again his modus operandi. He asked for concord, convinced that Aquila could conquer his adversaries with patience. He closed by asking Aquila to respond.
Before examining Aquila's response, we need to examine a letter that Luther wrote to John Agricola at precisely the same time. Agricola, in Eisleben at the court of Count Albert of Mansfeld, had doubtless heard of the problems in Saalfeld. Aquila may even have turned to Agricola for support. (Three years later Agricola dedicated his commentary on Titus to Aquila, whom he addressed as catechist.)19 From Luther's letter we can discern two questions that Agricola had raised. First, he had asked about Christian liberty, which was, as we have seen, a bone of contention between himself and Melanchthon as well as a subject emphasized in the Visitation Articles. Luther responded in general terms about the necessity of caring for the weak.20 Second, Agricola must have complained about the Articles themselves. Luther counseled restraint and patience. For Luther would himself go over the Articles upon Melanchthon's return and before publication by the elector; in the meantime any disputes should be curtailed, lest the visitation itself be impeded 21 What we learn about from Luther's letter is an early challenge from Agricola regarding Christian freedom and Luther's insistence on patience. Agricola's concern seemed to match Aquila's, and Luther's answer mirrored Melanchthon's.
A second reply to Aquila reflected a satisfactory resolution to his first challenge.22 This letter, too, should be dated differently. For if the assigned date of the end of December is correct, Melanchthon accepted Aquila's apology for the later controversy twice.23 However, at this point the issue was not, as in the later controversy, the basis and cause of true poenitentia, but Aquila's preaching against the monks, Melanchthon's division of poenitentia into three parts, and the greed of some citizens who wanted to get their hands on the monks' property-all concerns in Melanchthon's defense against Aquila's early attack (MBW 604). A reference to Jerome Schurff's imminent departure suggests a date for this second reply of around 10 September 1527 24
Aquila's letter must have been quite an exercise in humility. Melanchthon was quick to proclaim himself satisfied with the response and of one mind with Aquila. But he immediately added the request that Aquila teach moderately and concentrate on those things that edify his hearers.25 He again urged that Aquila not be provoked to attack by the curses of the monks or the calumnies of others. In a moment of honesty, Melanchthon admitted that he knew his division of poenitentia would offend some, but, as he was encouraging Aquila to do, he himself was not going to be affected by the attacks.26 This was as close as Melanchthon came to admitting openly that the Visitation Articles were conceived as an attack against the likes of Agricola. He called his attackers "leves et frivolae sycophantes" who have nothing more to do with good men than with the peoples of India or Arabia. 7
We have in these two replies, along with Luther's to Agricola, the outline of the earliest attacks against the Visitation Articles. The primary target of the attacks was the continued use of teachings and ceremonies from the old church, namely the threefold division of poenitentia and the relation between Christian freedom and certain human traditions. The objections seemed to include the rumor that the evangelicals' adversaries would view the Visitation Articles as a return to Rome. Aquila approached Melanchthon directly; and Agricola, as was his wont, approached Melanchthon indirectly through Luther. The replies to these challenges showed no sense of panic nor any hint that these matters had been reported formally to the court. Both Melanchthon and Luther argued in similar ways about the need for patience and moderation. By the middle of September Melanchthon was writing Aquila on the friendliest terms, answering his questions about the pastoral problems of engagements and drunkenness.28
Another piece of correspondence from September revealed how both the court and Wittenberg's theologians handled the objections. On 13 September 1527 Luther wrote to George Spalatin that the adversaries' boast that the Visitation Articles signaled a return to Rome would not endure. He was more than pleased with the ordinances. 9 In any case, the visitors were going to have a hard time pleasing everyone. As in earlier letters,30 Luther saw the problem primarily in terms of Roman adversaries. Having seen the Articles by this time, he had no reason to question their usefulness or orthodoxy.
At this point, apparently according to a prearranged plan, the visitors met at the Torgau with Spalatin and theologians from Wittenberg. Having finished their swing through Altenburg in less time than expected, the visitors even asked the electoral counselors for permission to meet earlier than 26 September.31 But from the account books for the Torgau we learn that the meeting took place as planned. On the morning of 26 September a runner was sent from the Torgau to fetch Luther and Johann Bugenhagen, who arrived on the same day and stayed overnight .3 1
The order of the day was not so much Aquila and Agricola as Zwingli and the Visitation Articles themselves. As is typical for documents of this kind, they were worked over thoroughly, giving Hans the stenographer plenty to do.33 Melanchthon's report to Justus Jonas shortly after the meeting showed that the participants discussed the Visitation Articles and the Lord's Supper controversy, but it mentioned nothing about Aquila or Agricola.34 In fact, the correspondence before mid-October showed no hint of an open conflict. To be sure, however, the challenge from their adversaries that had so exercised Aquila (namely, that the Reformers were creeping back to Rome) must have been a topic for discussion. In this context Melanchthon probably learned from Luther of Agricola's similar challenge.
The results of this meeting were preserved in a letter from the elector to Martin Luther. By 30 September the elector had seen the work of the counselors and the theologians and now was sending the Articles back to Luther and Bugenhagen for further editing. He gave them a free hand to change anything in order to prepare the document for publication. The elector then issued a challenge similar to those already made by Aquila and Agricola:
Elector John worried about the papists and their glee at watching the Reformers fall back into the old Roman position. At issue was the continued use of the threefold division of poenitentia. The counselor Gregory Bruck, who doubtless understood the dispute more fully, had in an original draft made the elector's point even clearer:
Luther's response to the elector defined very clearly his position in the entire dispute.38 First, he refused to give in to Elector John's pres sure. He gave the assurance that he and Bugenhagen had read the Articles and found little to change. Second, like Melanchthon he kept the intended audience in view-the simple folk who need instructions they can understand: "For everything pleases us very much, because it is set out for the masses in the simplest way."39 Third, Luther refused to change anything because of gainsayers. They would be silenced, he argued; their objections were only a sign that when one does a godly work, one has to put up with the devil's talking and lying. 0 Fourth, perhaps with a view to Aquila's behavior, Luther insisted that "our people" be prevented from using force against those preachers unwilling to change. He reminded the elector that not everything could be accomplished at once and that one had to live with a church composed of weeds and wheat. "For establishing an order and holding to an established order are two completely different things."41 He advised the elector, according to Ecclesiastes 11:6, to do what he could and leave the rest to God, even in the area of worldly government.
This oft-overlooked letter not only clarifies Luther's position in this first phase of the controversy over the Articles, it also illumines his overall position on the visitation and church reform. His major concern here and later in his catechisms was the common people. He did not believe that polemic and new vocabulary served the purposes of the gospel. Nor did he imagine that church reform would occur by princely command. He was willing to leave old and new practices side by side, so convinced was he of the eventual triumph of the gospel, and so sure was he that force would not accomplish anything. In this irenic approach he agreed fully with Melanchthon's advice to Aquila. Luther also placed the rumors within an eschatological framework. When godly things happen, the devil cannot keep his mouth shut. That had been Luther's experience all along, and he expected nothing different in this particular case.
At the same time Luther was advising the elector, Melanchthon wrote a letter to his friend John Agricola.42 He complained about Agricola's failure to write now that they were even closer to one another (Melanchthon was still in Jena), and he promised to continue to write even if he had nothing worth writing about. He then reported his meeting at the Torgau with Luther and Bugenhagen. There he had discovered that Agricola had falsely accused him of renewing old practices as he inspected the churches.43 At this juncture Melanchthon made no mention of the basis and cause of true poenitentia or the use of the law, but only the same accusations reflected in Melanchthon's earlier letters to Aquila and Luther's to Agricola as well as in the exchanges between Luther and the court. Melanchthon then referred Agricola to his explanation "in that booklet" (that is, the Visitation Articles), which he had reason to believe Agricola had seen.44 It had satisfied Luther and many others.41 Melanchthon then changed the topic to his dedication of his Colossians commentary to Alexander Drachstedt. Although he had recently seen a copy at a friend's, he did not as yet have any of his own, but promised to send copies to Drachstedt and Agricola as soon as he received some.
For those researchers who have not noticed the two distinct phases to the dispute, this letter seems misplaced, written almost as if Melanchthon did not realize the seriousness of Agricola's charges. In fact, in Melanchthon's mind there were no serious charges at this point. Clearly miffed that he had to hear about his friend's accusations from a third party and that the charges were false in any case, Melanchthon, in an uncharacteristic burst of forthrightness, brought the case very bluntly to Agricola's attention. That Melanchthon referred to the Visitation Articles in his defense showed that the battle had not yet turned to the theological content of that book itself. The reference to the Scholia and Drachstedt was Melanchthon's attempt to demonstrate his friendship. By referring to the commentary in this connection Melanchthon indicated that he associated his explanations in the Visitation Articles with the broader discussions in the Scholia. In this letter he also discussed Erasmus's Hyperaspistes, the other major opponent in the Scholia.
With this letter the first phase of the controversy came to an end. The charge was a return to Rome. At issue were the division of poenitentia into three parts and the retention of old traditions in the church. The overarching concern was what Roman opponents, still active in churches and monasteries throughout the region, might say. Both Luther and Melanchthon responded by counseling patience, a renewed focus on the needs of the common people, and the necessity of avoiding confrontation and the use of force. Neither of them imagined that the theological content of the Articles was under suspicion. Despite challenges from Aquila and Agricola as well as a plea from the elector, the Visitation Articles remained virtually unchanged.
Round Two: The Basis and Cause of True Poenitentia
Sometime in September 1527 Nicholas Schirlentz came into possession of a copy of a Latin version of the Visitation Articles. Knowing a best-seller when he saw one, he immediately printed it. In a letter to Agricola from the end of October'46 Melanchthon denied having had anything to do with its publication. He said the same in letters to Joachim Camerarius and Lazarus Spengler. It was also clear from these two letters that Spengler had just heard of the Articles, another indication that they had just been printed.47 Melanchthon differentiated between the German version in the hands of the court and the Latin version, published without his permission.
The news of a second attack on Melanchthon took some time to sink in. For example, in a letter to Aquila shortly after mid-October, we find no mention of the problem at all.48 In fact, the reference to the Torgau conference spoke only of a discussion on the Lord's Supper. The same silence echoed in letters to Spalatin on 15 and 19 October. 9 Sometime after that, in another letter to Spalatin, Melanchthon wondered in a postscript where Spalatin had come by his information about Agricola's complaints. Here we learn for the first time something about the nature of those complaints: "He censures some things in my booklet concerning poenitentia, because I do not begin to treat it from the love of righteousness."50 The issue was no longer the threefold division of poenitentia or the rumors of returning to old church practices. It was clearly a serious theological matter. It was also an objection the gravity of which Melanchthon did not seem to appreciate: "I do not see that this has a great enough cause for his slanderous writing."51 He closed by promising to stoop down in order to bear it, "although it continues to be irksome for me."52
Melanchthon's response showed how he used the appearance of passivity to fight his battles: "But I will make the attempt to settle these things between us, and I will defeat his vehemence with my moderation and humanity."54 Far from being either a virtue or a weakness, Melanchthon used moderation for a weapon, just as he had already counseled Aquila to do. In this instance his approach to the problem would triumph. In the same vein Melanchthon concluded the letter with a prayer that he would do nothing to increase discord. He summarized his "catechism" as a simple and pious attempt to teach the bare necessities in the church without controversy. By so doing he had hoped to cut short the "seeds of dissension."55
Previous research by Joachim Rogge and Gustav Kawerau hypothesized that Agricola's "censura" was an identifiable, quasi-legal document now lost. More likely Melanchthon was referring to the one document Agricola did produce at this time: the "130 Fragestucke."56 Here Agricola answered Melanchthon's "catechism" with an even sharper catechism of his own, rejecting Melanchthon's definitions of poenitentia and the law and calling for the elimination of the law from Christian teaching. (No wonder that at precisely this time Spalatin pleaded with Melanchthon to write a new catechism.)57
In the same letter to Camerarius, Melanchthon also outlined the charges, as he had heard them from friends. First, he had not taught that poenitentia stems from love of righteousness. Second, he had urged the preaching of the law to excess. Third, somewhere (in the Scholia it turned out) he distorted the Scripture. Fourth, in some places (probably in both the Visitation Articles and the Scholia) he hurt Christian liberty. He concluded, "[Agricola] makes me a double papist." Despite Luther's moderating letter, Agricola had not budged from his previous accusations against Melanchthon. Indeed, he had now added new ones.
At nearly the same time Melanchthon must have written a now lost letter explaining to Luther the new wave of attacks but not mentioning their source. Luther's response on 27 October not only gives us more information about the building controversy, but also reveals his own position in the fray.58 He described Melanchthon's letter as having mentioned that someone (quidam) was castigating him for deriving poenitentia from the fear of God.59 Luther mentioned that Agricola had made such a complaint about Melanchthon to him. Then, in words that have often been misconstrued, Luther called the whole thing a "war of words," important only to the common folk. Rogge and others have taken this to mean that Luther did not understand the seriousness (i.e., the antinomianism) of Agricola's challenge. Quite to the contrary. In terms of the sixteenth century's understanding, the phrase "a war of words" immediately put the challenger in a dispute at a distinct disadvantage. We already know from Melanchthon's letter to Camerarius that he did not want to contribute to the dissension, but wanted to win through moderation. Luther's letter meant that Melanchthon already was well on his way to victory. The burden of proof, as far as Luther was concerned, was not on the accused, Melanchthon, but on the accuser, Agricola, who now had to prove that his challenge was more serious than simply words.
With one phrase Luther had reduced the argument of Agricola to words, thereby refusing to acknowledge even the possibility of building a theology on Agricola's principles. This is clear from what follows: "How the fear of punishment and fear of God differ is said more easily with syllables and letters than is known in reality and feeling."60 The ungodly, who fear hell and punishment, at the same time fear God, who is in those things. In this life, Luther went on to say, it is impossible not to have the two mixed, just as there is no spirit without flesh. He added that fear of punishment without fear of God would be useless. Then, in a rather complicated comparison, he balanced the two opinions against one another: "Therefore what is done to the teaching about the fear of God [Melanchthon's position], I believe, is the same as is done to the teaching about the freedom of the Spirit [Agricola's position]. As some pervert the latter into the security of the flesh [Melanchthon's worry], so others pervert the former into desperation or fear of punishment [Agricola's worry]."61
Luther saw to the heart of the problem. It lay with the hearers of the message and what they did with the proclamation of either the fear of God or the freedom of the Spirit. There were inevitable distortions on both sides. What Luther argued was that they belong together. In some ways, this was also Melanchthon's point. He wished to move from law to gospel. His definition of freedom in the Visitation Articles had to do with forgiveness of sins. Whatever nomism can be found here was only in the eyes of his opponents, whom he perceived as distorting the gospel.
At the same time Melanchthon received the letter from Luther, he also finally heard from Agricola, who in a now lost letter (most probably written in response to Melanchthon's own complaint [MBW 598]) outlined his newest challenge to Melanchthon. From Melanchthon's response we can reconstruct the gist of Agricola's arguments.63 They agreed with and expanded the rumors about himself that Melanchthon had passed on to Camerarius. The general charges focused on an error that Melanchthon sarcastically labeled a capital crime and sin. He had injured Christian liberty, contaminated the purity of evangelical doctrine, and defiled the purity of the Scriptures.
More specifically, Agricola charged first that on the question of poenitentia Melanchthon had mistakenly taught that the terrors of conscience over sin arise from a fear of divine judgment and eternal punishment. (One is reminded here of Agricola's description of Judas.) On the contrary, such movements of the heart must arise from the love of righteousness, which converts a person to God. God must be feared on account of himself, not on account of punishment. Second, Melanchthon had distorted a text of Paul in order to stress the law, and had done so in opposition to Luther himself. Third, he had not strongly enough repressed (in his capacity as visitor?) the sermons of some people. This corresponded to the earlier difficulties with Aquila.
Melanchthon's response to this letter highlighted both the method he used to defend himself and some aspects of the theological debate between the two men.65 He began with the kind of humanist prose that could hide as much as it exposed. He was glad that Agricola had finally written-to Melanchthon himself, the discerning reader would add. He quoted Aristophanes about the need both to teach and be taughta quote aimed both at himself in humility and at Agricola as a challenge. And he expressed his willingness to confess an error, if he had committed any-implying, as the letter showed, that he thought he had not.
Melanchthon commenced his investigation of Agricola's charges by putting Agricola on the defensive. The Articles were not intended to be published, but to indicate to those for whom they had been intended the principal topics of Christian doctrine. Was Melanchthon perhaps suggesting here that the Articles were not any of Agricola's business? He also put the Articles into a quite different light when he characterized them as the "principal loci of Christian doctrine."66 Of course, such a grandiose description served to conceal his motives: he had so focused the meaning of the Articles as to attack Agricola's position. More importantly, Melanchthon challenged Agricola's behavior, noting that he wrote "under a foreign character (sub aliena persona)," a sure sign of unfriendly and un-Christian behavior.
Having taken the moral high ground, Melanchthon attacked with stinging irony: "Since I see plainly that I have been charged with capital accusations, I will respond to them briefly," hoping that Agricola would judge the case most equitably.67 He dismissed the general charges of Agricola out of hand. He had neither said nor written anything to damage Christian liberty; he had not knowingly even wanted to write anything to contaminate the purity of evangelical doctrine. In this controversy Agricola's hyperbole would put himself at a distinct disadvantage. Melanchthon would have none of it.
Turning first to the question of poenitentia, Melanchthon set up the argument in such a way that Agricola's challenge collapsed: "Concerning poenitentia I imagine you will agree with me that before vivification or consolation fright and terrors and confusion of conscience ought to exist in people's hearts."68 Given Agricola's comparison of Peter and Judas, with which Melanchthon was familiar, this was hardly the way the rector of Eisleben would have described the situation. For him the fear and terror that arose from the law ran counter to the purpose of the gospel and true mortification.
From this basis, however, Melanchthon could easily defend his position. While Melanchthon admitted that he had called the catalyst of poenitentia either fear of divine judgment or a sense of divine wrath, he contended that the common people understood the former better, "and indeed in that agony one cannot deny that it is fear of eternal punishment."69 As Luther had done in his letter to his young colleague, Melanchthon appealed to experience. This kind of argument was nearly impossible to refute. It also showed dramatically the difference in the opponents' theology: Agricola searching for the proper definition that most faithfully transmitted Luther's theology; Luther and Melanchthon using the experience of the human predicament to define an issue. Of course Luther, more quickly than either Melanchthon or Agricola, discerned the paradox of the person living under fear of punishment and fear of God at the same time.
Melanchthon also realized that Agricola's attack was motivated by a fear that the doctrine of justification by faith alone was itself being undermined. Therefore he immediately added that the fear in humans is not something they create in themselves by their own power, but something that God effects in them. Of course at this point Melanchthon could have gone on to speak of the function of the law. In this case, however, he limited himself to the issue at hand. According to Melanchthon, Agricola had insisted that these motions in the heart ought (debent) to arise from the love of justice. Rather than arguing with him, Melanchthon accepted Luther's admonition and simply acquiesced innocently: "Who denies it?"70 Of course by adding the word "debent," Melanchthon tactfully avoided the real issue. Agricola had insisted not only that poenitentia ought to, but that in true Christians like Peter it actually does arise from love and not fear.
Having appeared to accept Agricola's argument, Melanchthon now had to indicate why he did not so express himself in the Visitation Articles. Here he returned to the pedagogical argument set up in the introduction to the letter. It is easier to say that poenitentia arises from the love of righteousness than to understand it. It appeared to Melanchthon-and here he attempted to correct the instructional methods of his friend the school rector-that in teaching one should flee from "obscure loci." He quoted for a second time from Aristophanes' Frogs in his defense. A single sentence undermined Agricola's entire theology of poenitentia: "But you know that the Christian mind arrives there [at such love of righteousness] only late. 1171 It was as if Melanchthon were arguing that someone with Agricola's Christian experience should be able to perceive that we fear God on his own account and that we are converted to God by the love of righteousness, but for the simple these things are too difficult.
Melanchthon continued the pedagogical attack in his examination of the phrase "timor filialis (filial fear)." Here he avoided the "old definition" because those who were little schooled in such things did not understand what it meant to love God on God's own account and not because of the fear of punishment. Melanchthon mentioned that he had the support of "some learned men," an oblique reference to the ap proval he had received from Luther and Bugenhagen. He graciously allowed that the old terminology (after all, the terms "filial" and "servile fear" were used by the Scholastics) could be used, but not with children who need milk. "Nor do I forbid you from placing solid food before the grown-ups."72 In a battle over catechesis, this comment simply eliminated the opposition. The irony would not have been missed by Agricola, who had already in the first phase of this battle accused Melanchthon of reintroducing old terms into evangelical churches. Melanchthon had succeeded in turning the same charge back on Agricola's head.
Melanchthon now turned his attention to another of Agricola's charges, that he had distorted some Pauline text. Because Agricola did not say which one, Melanchthon guessed that it was Galatians 3:19, "The law is given on account of transgression." (As we have seen, Melanchthon also used Gal. 3:24 and 1 Tim. 1:8-9.) Here the charge was that Luther's and Melanchthon's interpretations did not agree: "For Luther understood it regarding the increase [of sin], and I regarding coercion."73 To use later terminology, Luther referred the text to the second (theological) use of the law, that the law increases our transgressions, Melanchthon to the first (civil) use, that the law restrains our transgressions. Melanchthon's answer was quite matter-of-fact. He was not ignorant of this difference, but he preferred to follow the older interpreters (probably Jerome).74 He could not imagine that this would anger Luther. He then proceeded to give Agricola a lesson in the two uses of the law: "For there is no doubt that Paul teaches that the law has been proposed for two reasons: first, to coerce the flesh with carnal righteousness; then to terrify the conscience. I have adapted the interpretation of this Pauline text to the former effect of the law; Luther adapts it to the latter."75
With this Melanchthon completely eliminated Agricola's arguments. By accepting the validity of Agricola's terminology onpoenitentia (for the mature) and of Luther's interpretation of Galatians 3:19 (as one of two possibilities), he took the teeth out of Agricola's attack. It now appeared that Agricola had picked a fight, used terms from Scholastic theology, did not understand how to teach the young, and was trying to cause tension within the Wittenberg theological faculty. Without having yielded on a single point, Melanchthon had his friend on the ropes.
In his closing remarks, Melanchthon expressed the powerful anger behind his defense. Looking back at the letter of his friend, he again mentioned a willingness to yield, even recant, if only he could be shown where he had "contaminated the Scriptures" or "wounded evangelical liberty." This language signified that Agricola had not proven his case. The point of the visitation, Melanchthon added, had been to investigate everything as exactly as possible and to admonish the unlearned: "0 that all who teach would accommodate themselves to the understanding of the hearers! I certainly try."76 The implication was that Agricola had not. One parting shot, intended perhaps for the situation in Saalfeld, dealt with Agricola's final objection: that Melanchthon had not restrained the sermons of some, namely the evangelical preachers' Roman opponents.77 Melanchthon again agreed completely, but reminded Agricola that this was none of his business. "For I do not dare to impose upon you, dear man, the burden of our defense."78
Having answered Agricola's challenges to his satisfaction, Melanchthon turned his attention in two other directions. First, he wanted to make sure that his version of the affair reached the court. For this he turned to George Spalatin. Second, having hinted to Agricola that he could defend himself against charges brought by others, Melanchthon turned to Aquila in an attempt to remove any resentment that he might still be harboring.
When he wrote to Spalatin at the beginning of November, Melanchthon had good reason to think that his response to Agricola would suffice to solve the problem. He told Spalatin not to worry about this "offensiuncula."79 He assured Spalatin that his feelings toward Agricola had not changed and that Agricola would reciprocate that affection. Whatever the basis in fact, such comments were also meant for public consumption. They again placed Agricola on the defensive, this time in the position of having broken a friendship. As if that were not enough, Melanchthon with more than a tinge of sarcasm described Agricola's character: "As you know, he is by nature clever and so is in love with his own inventiveness, which I gladly permit him."80 Melanchthon's condescending attitude managed to dismiss any substantive attack by Agricola. He also predicted that the day would come when Agricola would tire of these arguments and discover how hard it is to teach simply.81 Instead of sending Spalatin his own response to Agricola's arguments, Melanchthon sent Luther's letter. No wonder Melanchthon added to his description of Luther's illnesses: "May Christ preserve that man for us and for the church!"82
If Melanchthon played the diplomat with Spalatin, with Aquila he attempted to diffuse Agricola's criticisms. In November 1527 Melanchthon wrote five letters to Aquila in which he not only argued his case but, as the conference at the Torgau drew near, worried about the nature of Agricola's attacks. Just after he received Luther's and Agricola's letters, Melanchthon wrote his first letter to Aquila on the same day he wrote to Spalatin. Melanchthon worried that Aquila might have been moved by "calumnies and curses," and mentioned the attack of Agricola as an example.83 He sketched the chief (new) charge, namely, that Melanchthon claimed poenitentia began with fear of punishment rather than love of righteousness. Melanchthon reminded Aquila that he, Melanchthon, had tried to avoid the whole dispute about the love of righteousness, not because he did not believe that God maybe loved for himself, but because he believed that this kind of love occurs much later in the process of justification. He also reminded Aquila that they had discussed the difference between servile and filial fear.84
Melanchthon then turned to Agricola's character. As in the letter to Spalatin, he commented on his opponent's cleverness. On the basis of his letter to Agricola, Melanchthon expected to receive a rebuttal and feared that it would mean war. What followed typified Melanchthon's technique of conflict avoidance: "I will ask that he find among those who fight against our doctrine another opponent with whom he can quarrel. For me it has been decided not to fight with him."85 He had earlier admonished Aquila to deal in this fashion with his opponents. Here Melanchthon followed his own advice. By taking the moral high ground, he continued to put Agricola and his friends on the defensive. What more devastating advice to give someone who felt that his theology was under attack? "Pick on our real opponents; I will not fight you openly."
In a now lost response Aquila charged that Melanchthon had made disparaging remarks about him. Melanchthon in turn responded with righteous indignation in a letter dated 12 November.86 He had never said such things about Aquila, who was given permission to show the letter to those who had lied about Melanchthon. He then related that he had been summoned to the court because of a text in Paul (Gal. 3:19). His defense in this letter added some interesting refinements to the arguments made to Agricola. First, his biblical interpretation followed the church fathers (he mentioned Jerome) and contained nothing absurd. Second, he agreed with Luther in points of dogma, so it should not have made much difference if he disagreed with Luther regarding this verse in Paul. Third, Melanchthon took Luther's notion that this was a war over words and turned it into an attack on Agricola. He worried that "sophistica theologia" would once again rule, and he threatened that if his opponents tried to upset him, they would get what they deserved. This surprising outburst led Melanchthon to say, fourthly, that these opponents would already have upset him had he not restrained himself; he wanted not to increase dissent, but instead to patch up (sarcienda) harmony.87
Without having received a reply from Aquila, Melanchthon wrote again on 17 November.88 Much of the letter contained the same arguments as the preceding one. In his interpretation of Galatians 3:19, which would be discussed at court, he had followed nothing absurd and stuck to the exegetes of the ancient church. He was not, as Aquila had written, departing from Christianity.89 On this point Melanchthon was indignant. Who says things like this? Christ will judge these things, not human beings. Still, "I have decided to suffer these calumnies and to bear them for God's sake."90 Clearly Melanchthon's refusal to do open battle was a theological and tactical decision ("decrevi ... propter Deum") designed to place the burden of proof on the attacker. Of course, at least three of Melanchthon's writings in 1527, especially the Visitation Articles, were probably construed as attacks on Agricola's theological position (see ch. 3).
Melanchthon closed the letter with a different approach. He expressed the wish that theologians of the age would not condemn the honest disciplines, and immediately flattered Aquila by counting him among those who did not. He begged Aquila to conserve the "former good feelings" toward him and not to let himself be alienated "by some perverse sycophants" who just want to sow dissension in the church 9t Thus, using counterarguments, passivity, and flattery, Melanchthon attempted to woo Aquila back to his side. When he had not heard from Aquila by 21 November, Melanchthon made one last plea. He worried that he was to be called to the Torgau to face his "censores, who certainly will inquire severely (67roi6µ(oS, as the Greeks say) into my booklet."92
Only this last letter made clear who was actually being attacked in this controversy: not Agricola, and certainly not Luther, but Melanchthon. Despite the fact that several scholars have turned even this controversy into a dispute between Luther and Agricola, we must remain quite clear that the person most dreading the conference at the Torgau was Melanchthon. In the month since the new controversy had arisen, however, Melanchthon had done his best to outmaneuver his opponent. Spalatin, Luther, and even Aquila were brought to Melanchthon's side. Although his theology and its alleged deviations from Luther's were supposed to be the center of attention, Melanchthon had done his best to place the burden of proof on Agricola's shoulders. Agricola was the cause of the controversy; Agricola used poor pedagogy; Agricola was fighting over words; Agricola was disturbing the peace of the church; Agricola was reintroducing sophistry into theology; Agricola had broken a friendship. Melanchthon portrayed himself as the of fended party, as the peace-lover, and thereby made room for his own attack.
Round Three: Eisleben Strikes Back
While Melanchthon was preparing for a long siege, Agricola formulated his own battle plan. We have already seen parts of it. After an initial, unsuccessful appeal to Luther, he tried to use his friendship with Aquila, his contacts at the court, and even a direct approach to Melanchthon to win his case. In the middle of this, however, Agricola was shepherding an even more devastating attack through the presses of Wittenberg: a reworking of his "Christliche Kinderzucht" into a catechism for the girls' school in Eisleben. This work was a refutation of Melanchthon's Visitation Articles.
The catechism itself, "Hundert vnd Dreissig gemeyner Frage stucke/ fur die iungen kinder/ ynn der Deudschen Meydlin Schule zu Eyssleben," was published in 1528 and experienced immediate, though not lasting, success (see pp. 60-6 1). The prefatory letter, addressed to Agricola's brother-in-law, Bartholomew Drachstedt, Alexander's brother, was dated 18 November 1527, squarely in the middle of the fray. 3 Although in that letter Agricola claimed that he was just reworking the earlier catechism to make it simpler, in fact the revision represented an entirely new contribution to the flood of catechisms. It was the clearest exposition of Agricola's position in this controversy and could be interpreted as his censure of Melanchthon's Visitation Articles.
Melanchthon, especially in the Visitation Articles, saw the Christian life moving from mortificatio to vivificatio, from law to gospel, from terror to comfort and faith. Agricola began his catechism instead with a discussion of Gottseligkeit, which consists of Word and faith. The Word gives a promise, and faith trusts that God will keep it. Human nature and reason cannot comprehend God or God's Word, therefore they must believe it. God's promises are revealed through the preaching of the gospel. By listening to preachers and believing their words, we recognize God's goodness that is proclaimed to us, see at the same time our errors and transgressions, and cry to God for help.
Agricola had constructed a theological system that avoided the law. He derived everything, especially poenitentia, from the gospel promise alone. This promise reveals God's goodness; then (we could add here, out of love of righteousness or for God's sake alone) one recognizes one's sins and repents. In twelve simple questions-Melanchthon underestimated Agricola's pedagogical abilities-Agricola constructed a clear alternative to Melanchthon's law-gospel approach.94
Agricola then distinguished two kinds of sermons (law and grace) and two kinds of preachers (Moses and Christ). Moses together with the law "forces and pressures the people with punishment and pain, that they should love God above all things or else must die an eternal death."95 As could be expected, Agricola had reduced preaching of the law entirely to forcing people to do things through fear of punishment. Agricola wanted to exclude this preaching completely from any discussion of poenitentia and the Christian life. Just to make sure the girls understood, Agricola summarized his arguments in question 18:
The law says, "You must love God more than yourself or die."
The law has no positive function whatsoever. Only through the gospel, which proclaims God's prior love ("erst vnd zuuor"), does God love us in spite of our self-love and afterwards give us power through the Holy Spirit to hate ourselves and follow him.
This approach to the Christian life also changed Agricola's view of sin and baptism. Baptism removes original sin, but some little spark remains which the devil can fan into sin. When asked how one can be freed from this sin, Agricola responded, "My child, as often as you feel this poisonous spark, you should remember the three holy names, fall on your knees, and call to God."97 Of course, by avoiding the law in one place, he let it in the back door without realizing what he was doing. He regarded the promise of baptism as the motivating factor in asking for forgiveness ("remember the Trinity"), but prescribed a series of actions, concluding with a prayer which beseeched God not to remove the gift of the Holy Spirit.
In questions 66 and 67 Agricola reiterated the initial theme of his cat- echism.99 A person becomes a believer when the Father draws the unbelieving heart to himself and lets it be sprinkled with Jesus' blood. With that the heart believes, cries over its unbelief (that is, it does Bufle), is contrite, confesses, and tries hard to make sure that God, who has forgiven so much, does not reject it.100 Once again, Agricola placed grace at the beginning, Bu/3e thereafter, and the uncertainty of works at the end. In this process, preaching the satisfaction of Christ comes first and then we do BuJe.101
Agricola then took Melanchthon on directly. What about those who say that if we preach Christian freedom we will make "brutish Christians" out of people? Agricola answered with the example of Paul himself: "Saint Paul did not avoid this, but instead preached the word of the resurrection and satisfaction of Christ among the heathen and Jews. For had he first wanted to oppress and burden the people with laws, fear and terror before God's judgment, and the awareness of their sins, then they would not have been able to say, `Let us do evil so that good may come' [Rom. 3:8]."102 Here the Visitation Articles were challenged as being un-Pauline. Agricola's charge concerning Melanchthon's use of Paul might have included more than just the single text of Galatians 3:19. On the basis of the reaction of Paul's audience, Agricola argued for an exclusion of the law and the notion that it preceded the gospel. The presence of "brutish Christians" could even be taken to be a sign that the gospel was being properly preached!
At the same time, Agricola made it clear that the move from law to gospel, as Melanchthon had attempted it, was simply a reflection of this world's wisdom, which viewed evil things as a sign of God's disfavor. But the gospel is a foolish sermon, wherein God sees the human predicament and decides to win the world over not through force but through foolishness, love, and the gift of the Son. What people previously could not attain through punishment or fright (Melanchthon's "poenae" and "pavores"), they now set about happily attaining without necessity or force.103 The world-one would have to include Melanchthon's theology here-thinks it foolish that a person is made righteous through goodness, but this is God's highest wisdom, to make a virtue of necessity.
Agricola showed that the inner motivation of the believer, which Melanchthon wanted to see grow and change from fear of punishment to love of righteousness, had to be correct from the very beginning. Otherwise law overpowers gospel. What Agricola could not imagine was a complex human being in whom the old and the new still struggle. The very "simul," to which Luther in his letter to Melanchthon quite naturally reached to solve the war of words, was the very thing Agricola rejected in his attempt to make Christians whole through the gospel.
After the exposition of the Ten Commandments, Agricola closed with a summa summarum, taking dead aim at Melanchthon's Articles and leaving no doubt as to his censure:
130. In conclusion, for what purpose is the Holy Scripture given?
Lere then straffe: this movement characterized Agricola's theology and his pedagogy for the Christian life. It made preaching of the law and its threats unnecessary and actually dangerous for the gospel. He even stressed that the Christian is freed from the entire law of Moses ("vom gantzen gesetz"), not just parts of it, as Melanchthon had insisted. In 130 questions and answers Agricola succeeded in undermining Melanchthon's entire theological program as formulated in the Visitation Articles. Instead of law and gospel, Agricola proposed gospel first and then, according to one's wishes and God's works, law or punishment.108 The choice is between Judas and Peter, Moses and Christ. Melanchthon, having in Agricola's eyes chosen Judas and Moses, threatened to bring the entire evangelical movement back in line with what Agricola perceived to be the Roman religion.
Round Four: The Torgau and Melanchthon's "Aristarchus"
In late November 1527 Spalatin convened a second conference over the Visitation Articles. This time, besides those who had served as visitors (Schurff, Melanchthon, and Asmus von Haubitz), the participants included Luther, Bugenhagen, Caspar Giittel, and John Agricola. The dates for the conference are somewhat in doubt. Gustav Kawerau contends it took place on 26-28 November; Susi Hausammann, following Joachim Rogge, on 26-29 November; and Gustav Hammann, on the morning of 29 November.'09 A notice in the account books of the Torgau concerning payment for the participants' stay is dated 30 November, but this indicates only when the entry was made, not when the expenditures were incurred.110 We know from the first Torgau conference that Luther could reach the castle within a day. Chances are that his letters dated 29 November were written the same day he left the Torgau but upon his return to Wittenberg.' 11 It seems most likely that the meeting took place on 26-28 November, with departure early the next day.112
What happened there? On 10 December Luther wrote a letter to Justus Jonas in response to an inquiry for news.113 Irritated by the rumor mill and by the waste of time, Luther huffed, "Our famous dissension at the Torgau was scarcely more than nothing," 114 adding that it was regarded with contempt. One thing (about which Jonas must have heard from Agricola) was proposed, immediately settled, and resulted in beautiful consensus: the way had been cleared for the publication of the Visitation Articles. 1 15 The most the participants did, Luther added, was to feast at the expense of the prince.' 16 He then reconsidered his evaluation, adding that what was best about the conference was that the notoriety and suspicion that the disagreement had engendered had been buried there.' 17
The only other participant in this conference whose reports have survived was Melanchthon, certainly not an unbiased observer. His anger was scarcely hidden in a letter written at the Torgau and sent with Agricola to Veit Amerbach in Eisleben.118 Refusing to use Agricola's name, Melanchthon wrote, "Now a satisfactory agreement has been reached between your rector and me."119 This was hardly a ringing attestation of renewed friendship, nor did it agree with Luther's "beautiful consensus." Before stating his conclusion, Melanchthon included a thinly veiled defense of his own position. He made three bitter judgments against Agricola's behavior. First, he said, "I do not desire nor do I go around drumming up praise for [my] cleverness in the interpretation of the Holy Scriptures."120 He had leveled such an accusation against Agricola. Second, he insisted that he had tried to show "simplicissime" those texts which needed to be taught in the churches. Here Melanchthon placed Agricola's pedagogical shortcomings under renewed suspicion. Third, he declared his willingness to be deeply criticized, as long as he was not judged aitotioµcog, as Paul says (2 Cor. 13:10; Titus 1:13). Here he used a word already employed twice in letters to Aquila, this time in an effort to cast suspicion on Agricola's exaggerated accusations. Even after an agreement had been reached, Melanchthon insisted on drawing attention to his injuries.
Luther's disgust and other letters from Melanchthon give the impression that Agricola was much less ready to attack Melanchthon at the Torgau than Melanchthon had anticipated. Two points in a letter to Caspar Aquila, written on 20 December 1527, are worth noting.121 First, Melanchthon accepted Aquila's second apology (the first having been received in September) very graciously. It seemed that Agricola's attempt to broaden the attack on Melanchthon had failed. Second, Melanchthon reported that at his whipping in the Torgau his Aristarchus was not as severe as some (including Melanchthon) had expected.
On the same day Melanchthon wrote more broadly about the conference in a letter to Jonas, who, having failed to get any information from Luther, had turned to Melanchthon for news.122 Melanchthon used the letter as one final opportunity to encircle Agricola. This time he employed the offices of a mutual friend to try to revive their old friendship. Melanchthon's sorrow and hurt, as well as his anger, sound forth on every page. He regretted that Agricola's little book (most likely the "130 Fragestucke") was being carried around by everyone. Everyone "per universam Germaniam," including Duke George, had known about the controversy before Agricola finally wrote to Melanchthon himself. Throughout the letter Melanchthon maintained his position as the injured party: he could have struck back but, for the sake of peace in the church and friendship, did not. For his "lenissime" letter to Agricola, he received in return only a summons to the court, where some were estranged from him-something that suited Melanchthon just fine.123
Melanchthon then recounted what had happened at the Torgau. Agricola began by attacking Melanchthon's view ofpoenitentia, a teaching with which others (Melanchthon meant Luther and Bugenhagen, of course) saw no wrong. Agricola claimed that it ran contrary to the Scriptures and to the dogmas of Luther. Luther supposedly taught that poenitentia began with the love of righteousness, as was proven in the case of the prophet Jonah and in Luke 24, where Jesus said that poenitentia was to be taught in his name, not Moses'. Melanchthon, who after all had already seen Luther's opinion in the matter, responded that there were always terrors before justification and that in the midst of such terrors Christians could not easily distinguish whether they were motivated by love of righteousness or fear of punishment. To protect himself from the charge of works-righteousness, he also stressed that he was not talking about a simulated poenitentia, but something divinely worked in the person's heart.
Agricola responded by agreeing to what Melanchthon said, except that he insisted that poenitentia began from "fides minarum."124 Melanchthon retorted that such "fides minarum" was not without "terrores" and could even be defined as "pavor." He pointed out that this term, along with "amor iustitiae," was simply not used among the theologians with whom he was familiar.125 He used Agricola's odd terminology to introduce another part of his defense: Agricola's pride. Eisleben's rector was guilty of ingratitude; he had insulted Melanchthon's intelligence, although Melanchthon had done nothing of the kind to him. At this juncture Agricola became more civil, and there seems to have been room for joking and an exchange of compliments.
At this point in the letter, Melanchthon introduced Luther's solution to the controversy. Given some of the stereotypes about their relationship,126 it is important to note that Luther was the one ready to resolve the dispute by compromise and by-dare the term be used?-treading softly (Leisetreten, a favorite charge against Melanchthon). When we speak of faith, Luther proposed, we usually mean justifying faith. But we can also talk about a general faith that could be said to include poenitentia. That this in fact contained the kernel of Luther's solution to the dispute may be seen in a notice in Veit Dietrich's hand to the same effect.127 Here the issue was clearly put in terms of what we know from the catechisms and other writings and letters, namely, that the dispute focused on how to order poenitentia and faith.
Luther also addressed the suspicion that their Catholic opponents would claim that the evangelicals had abandoned their previous teaching.128 Luther's response? Poenitentia and law belonged to "gemeynen glauben (general or common faith)," since one must believe that there is a God who threatens. But "for common working persons (fur den gemeynen groben man)" it is better simply to leave these matters under the names poenitentia, command, law, and fear, so that they may more clearly understand what the apostles call "justifying faith," which makes a person righteous and forgives sin. It was to be taught that righteousness and forgiveness could not be achieved by obeying commands or by poenitentia, so that the common folk would not get confused and bring up unnecessary questions.129
Luther's solution was a marvelous example of theological diplomacy. First, he continued to insist that the controversy was a war of words and could thus be solved with definitions. Then, he refused to accept any of Agricola's substantive argumentation and asserted that the Christian life moved from law to gospel or, in this case, from poenitentia to faith. The notion of a faith prior to justification was put in terms of the creative order and law and not, as Agricola stated in his latest catechisms, in terms of the proclamation of the satisfaction and forgiveness of Christ. Finally, Luther did not paper over the differences. He had read and approved the Visitation Articles. He had a clear idea of his own position in this matter, and he brooked no exception that would confuse law and gospel. In 1529 he also added a closing word to this controversy when his own catechisms replaced Agricola's in the bookstalls of Germany (see pp. 148-53).
While this was the end of public dispute, Melanchthon also reported to Jonas that the differences were discussed over breakfast on the next day.130 At that time Agricola argued, in line with his catechism, that there is no place for the preaching of the law, since we are free from it, but only for preaching the "praecepta Pauli."131 Melanchthon responded by pointing out that Paul's paraenesis and Christ's sermons were expositions of the Decalog. Agricola objected that Christ was speaking only to the Jews. Melanchthon here broke off his report and, using Aristophanes and bitter sarcasm to make his point, derided Agricola's position as that of a "homo subtilis."132 He then took the opportunity to call attention to Agricola's guilt and his own innocence in the matter. Three times Melanchthon asked that their friendship be restored, but Agricola stood there like a statue.133 Returning to the breakfast conversation, Melanchthon reminded Jonas of his attempts to accommodate his teaching to the capacities of the reader, especially in the Visitation Articles. Again he was echoing Luther's expressed concerns and portraying the rector of Eisleben as an inept teacher.
At the same time an older charge came to mind: that Melanchthon was soft on the papists. Here it can be seen how the fear of mob violence played into Melanchthon's understanding of preaching's moral function. Preaching that attacked infested pontifical doctrine resulted only in rocks being thrown at monks.134 Melanchthon preferred to reprimand rather than to incite the mob. Here echoed again the advice to Aquila, whose objections to Melanchthon's methods had caused the furor in the first place.
The heated charges against Melanchthon did not die completely. In May 1528 he wrote to George Spalatin concerning a rumor that his theology was not in agreement with Luther's and that Luther had rejected the Visitation Articles.137 Melanchthon responded to the rumor in no uncertain terms: "No word between us concerning this thing has been exchanged; nor could it have been, since I always would contend that those things that are in the commentary on the churches' inspection [the Visitation Articles] converge in all things with Luther's teaching."138 To avoid the impression that the evangelicals dealt only in contentions, Melanchthon refused to use harsh words. He realized that some would not approve of this approach, but insisted that he would rather please God than sycophants. He invited Spalatin to show the letter to anyone he wanted, and added, "Whoever judges that Luther rejects something in my work is insane many times over."139 If his teaching seemed to conflict with Luther's, then people should take up the matter with him, not Luther, so that he could respond. He concluded with the justified claim that Luther would vouch for his approach: "And Luther is my best witness; I had always desired in this entire dispute that all our own people would have used the highest degree of consideration and equanimity." 140
This was not Melanchthon's last word on the subject. One year after the event he spoke with complete candor in a letter to Joachim Camerarius. It seemed that John Fabri, coadjutor of Constance, had written to Melanchthon in an attempt, based on what he had heard of the Visitation Articles and the surrounding controversy, to get him to defect to Catholicism by offering him various inducements. Fabri undertook this effort despite the fact that, true to his method, Melanchthon saw himself as having done nothing more than excerpt and systematize Luther's thought without resorting to sharp language. 141 An ironic reference to "homines acuti" (specifically Count Albert of Mansfeld) led to a description of a dinner at which Count Albert and Prince Philip of Hesse in the presence of some 6eo2 oyoi t discussed the Visitation Articles. In satirical style Melanchthon related that someone threw in a comment about confession, about which there was disapproval. Apparently the count said that they would have to guard their freedom (not to confess), lest they be returned to servitude by the evangelicals. 142 The charge was again made that Melanchthon simply wanted to renew old traditions: "So you see what they think about us-not only our enemies, but also those who want to seem to be on our side." 143
The letter to Camerarius epitomized Melanchthon's position at this time. On the one hand, he placed himself squarely on Luther's side, using his dialectical skills to cull from Luther's thought and systematize what the older man had said. He also adopted a nonpolemical approach as the best way to deal with his enemies and as a teaching tool. On the other hand, he was misunderstood by friend and foe alike. Against these charges Melanchthon used irony, satire, and scorn, holding firm to his theological position without necessarily having to defend it directly.
Melanchthon's parting shots might have ended the dispute were it not for the fact that after the dust had settled, both Melanchthon and Agricola, as well as Luther, continued to work out their differences in print. In particular the 1528 Scholia testify that Melanchthon's position in fact remained very much the same, with some small, almost cos metic, changes to reflect the agreement worked out at the Torgau. For Melanchthon the Scholia functioned as his last word in the dispute, determining the outline of his thought on the subject at least until the publication of the second edition of the Loci communes in 1535. Agricola, too, made changes in his commentaries to reflect the new consensus, while still maintaining his basic position. A decade later those opinions would run afoul of Luther's theology in the more famous antinomian controversy.