Philip Melanchthon: Theologian in Classroom, Confession, and Controversy 9783666550478, 9783525550472, 9783647550473

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© 2012, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen ISBN Print: 9783525550472 — ISBN E-Book: 9783647550473

Refo500 Academic Studies

Edited by Herman J. Selderhuis In Co-operation with Marianne Carbonnier (Paris), Günter Frank (Bretten), Bruce Gordon (New Haven), Ute Lotz-Heumann (Tucson), Mathijs Lamberigts (Leuven), Barbara Mahlmann-Bauer (Bern), Tarald Rasmussen (Oslo), Johannes Schilling (Kiel), Günther Wassilowsky (Linz), Siegrid Westphal (Osnabrück), David M. Whitford (Trotwood) Volume 7

Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht © 2012, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen ISBN Print: 9783525550472 — ISBN E-Book: 9783647550473

Irene Dingel, Robert Kolb, Nicole Kuropka, and Timothy J. Wengert

Philip Melanchthon Theologian in Classroom, Confession, and Controversy

Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht © 2012, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen ISBN Print: 9783525550472 — ISBN E-Book: 9783647550473

Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data available online: http://dnb.d-nb.de. ISBN 978-3-525-55047-2 ISBN 978-3-647-55047-3 (E-Book)  2012, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen/ Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht LLC, Bristol, CT, U.S.A. www.v-r.de All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without prior written permission from the publisher. Typesetting by : Konrad Triltsch GmbH, Ochsenfurt Printed and bound in Germany by Hubert & Co., Göttingen Printed on non-aging paper.

© 2012, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen ISBN Print: 9783525550472 — ISBN E-Book: 9783647550473

Table of Contents

Abbreviations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

7

Introduction

9

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Philip Melanchthon in Classroom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 Nicole Kuropka Philip Melanchthon and Aristotle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

19

Robert Kolb The Pastoral Dimension of Melanchthon’s Pedagogical Activities for the Education of Pastors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

29

Timothy J. Wengert The Biblical Commentaries of Philip Melanchthon

43

Philip Melanchthon in Confession

. . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77

Timothy J. Wengert Philip Melanchthon’s Last Word to Cardinal Lorenzo Campeggio, Papal Legate at the 1530 Diet of Augsburg . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

79

Irene Dingel Melanchthon’s Paraphrases of the Augsburg Confession, 1534 and 1536, in the Service of the Smalcald League . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104 Irene Dingel Melanchthon’s Efforts for Unity between the Fronts: the Frankfurt Recess . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123

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Table of Contents

Robert Kolb Melanchthon’s Doctrinal Last Will and Testament The Responsiones ad articulos Bavaricae inquisitionis as His Final Confession of Faith . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141 Irene Dingel Melanchthon and the Establishment of Confessional Norms

. . . . . . 161

Philip Melanchthon in Controversy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181 Timothy J. Wengert Philip Melanchthon and the Origins of the “Three Causes” (1533 – 1535): An Examination of the Roots of the Controversy over the Freedom of the Will . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183 Timothy J. Wengert Philip Melanchthon’s 1557 Lecture on Colossians 3:1 – 2 Christology as Context for the Controversy over the Lord’s Supper

. . 209

Robert Kolb The Critique of Melanchthon’s Doctrine of the Lord’s Supper by his “Gnesio-Lutheran” Students . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236 Irene Dingel The Creation of Theological Profiles: The Understanding of the Lord’s Supper in Melanchthon and the Formula of Concord . . . . . . . . . . 263

Index of Persons

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 282

Index of Subjects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 286

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Abbreviations

Ap ARG

Apology of the Augsburg Confession Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte/Archive for Reformation History Bds. Philippi Melanchthonis epistolae, Iudicia, Consilia, Testimonia aliorumque ad eum Epistolae quae in Corpore Reformatorum desiderantur. Heinrich Ernst Bindseil (Ed.). Halle: Schwetschke, 1874 Book of Concord The Book of Concord. Robert Kolb and Timothy J. Wengert (Ed.). Minneapolis: Fortress, 2000 BSLK Die Bekenntnisschriften der evangelisch-lutherischen Kirche. 11. ed. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1992 CA Augsburg Confession CR Corpus Reformatorum [1 – 25]. Philippi Melanthonis Opera quae supersunt omnia. C. G. Bretschneider and H. E. Bindseil (Ed.). Halle and Braunschweig: Schwetschke, 1834 – 1860 CR/CO Corpus Reformatorum, Calvini Opera. G. Baum, E. Cunitz, and E. Reuss (Ed.). Braunschweig: Schwetschke, 1863 – 1900 FC Formula of Concord Ep Epitome SD Solid Declaration LQ Lutheran Quarterly LW Luther’s Works. Saint Louis/Philadelphia: Concordia/Fortress, 1958 – 1986 MBWR/MBWT MBW = Melanchthons Briefwechsel. Heinz Scheible (Ed.). Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: fromann-holzboog, 1977–; R = Register volumes, T = Texte volumes MPG Patrologiae cursus completus: series Graece, 161 vol. J.-P. Migne (Ed.). Paris: Petit-Montroye, 1857 – 1866 MPL Patrologiae cursus completus: series Latina, 221 vol. J.P. Migne (Ed.). Paris & Turnhout: Gamer Fratres, 1844 – 1864 MSA Melanchthons Werke in Auswahl [Studienausgabe]. Robert Stupperich (Ed.). 7 vol. Gütersloh: Gerd Mohn, 1951 – 1975

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8 RE2

SCJ SM

TRE VD 16

WA Br TR ZKG

Abbreviations

Realenzyklopädie für protestantische Theologie und Kirche. 2. Ed. J. J. Herzog and G. L. Plitt (Ed.). Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1877 – 1888 The Sixteenth Century Journal Supplementum Melanchthoniana. Werke Philipp Melanchthons die im Corpus Reformatorum vermisst werden. Leipzig: Haupt, 1910 – 1926 Theologische Realenzyklopädie. Gerhard Krause and Gerhard Müller (Ed.). Berlin: de Gruyter, 1977 – 2007 Verzeichnis der im deutschen Sprachbereich erschienenen Drucke des XVI. Jahrhunderts. Bayerische Staatsbibliothek in München and the Herzog August Bibliothek in Wolfenbüttel (Ed.). Stuttgart: Hiersemann, 1988 Martin Luthers Werke. Weimar : Böhlau, 1883 – 1993 Briefe Tischreden Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte

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Introduction

Philip Melanchthon was a Renaissance man. He is often acknowledged as a biblical humanist: indeed, he was a man of many talents. It is true that he did not fashion works of art or new inventions with the hands that so mightily wielded a pen, but that pen promoted learning in theology, the communication arts, philology, ancient literature, history, physics, psychology, and astronomy. As his students began to call him soon after his death, he indeed became the Praeceptor Germaniae, Germany’s preceptor. Myriad assignments from his university and his prince sent him personally and via correspondence into far corners of Europe. The influence of his learning has not ceased to this day. His service as an ecclesiastical diplomat and a counselor and consultant of kings and clergy, of schoolmen and scholars, across northern and central Europe (and beyond) promoted the reform of the church and society, of educational institutions and scholarly discussion. And yet Melanchthon, having only recently become a focus of interest among German scholars (see the detailed bibliographical review of studies that appeared in connection with the observance of the five-hundredth anniversary of Melanchthon’s birth in 1997 in Junghans: 2000, Junghans: 2003, cf. Dingel: 2012), has not commanded very much detailed attention from English-speaking researchers at all. The literature on his roles in church and society is not adequate to offer those students who wish to explore his thought and action in depth a reliable basis if they read best in English. Moreover, much of the available literature on the Praeceptor Germaniae in English repeats old and false clichs and does not reflect clearly the scholarly exposition of Melanchthon in the last quarter century. Therefore, this volume, growing out of conferences and research occasioned by the four-hundredfiftieth anniversary of his death in 1560, presents twelve essays by four Reformation scholars on three areas of his career as a theologian in service to university, church, and prince. A constellation of events brought Melanchthon into the situation of becoming a “Wunderkind” in German intellectual circles by his twentieth birthday. His early mentor and befriender Johannes Reuchlin, a relative by marriage and patron of the fatherless boy, set in place the mind that was able to gain much from instructors of lesser gifts and accomplishments at the Universities of Heidelberg and Tübingen. His father’s place in the employ of princes gave him a sense for negotiating the shoals of life at a princely court

© 2012, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen ISBN Print: 9783525550472 — ISBN E-Book: 9783647550473

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Introduction

and helped prepare him for serving the electors of Saxony and the other Evangelical princes who were able to command his services from time to time. His decision in the summer of 1518 to join the adventure in the study of humanities and theology that the University of Wittenberg was becoming made a decisive difference in his life as his vision of reform in school and society joined Martin Luther’s vision of reform in church and society. The two became a team, and they gathered around them other team members, above all, Justus Jonas and Johannes Bugenhagen, at the core of a larger corps of reformers who complemented one another as they led and spread the efforts to call the church and society to repentance and faith, and thus to a faithful Christian life. This volume grows out of a conference sponsored by the Herzog August Bibliothek in Wolfenbüttel and organized by Professors Johannes Schilling (Kiel) and Timothy J. Wengert (Philadelphia) in May 2010. The volume includes four essays read at that conference, as well as other essays by three of the participants. Two German scholars join two from the United States in assessing aspects of Melanchthon’s contribution to the church and the discipline of theology. Their studies focus on three facets of Melanchthon’s public activity, his activities as a theological educator, his pioneering confession of the Wittenberg theology in the public arena, and his involvement in doctrinal controversy, with special focus on the controversies surrounding his understanding of the freedom of the human will and the presence of Christ in the Lord’s Supper. The three sections of this volume do not, however, represent discrete or separate spheres of Melanchthon’s public service. He confessed and waged controversy in the classroom; his learning and his zeal for educating pastors informed his public teaching in both controversy and confessional documents. These sections only serve to focus on three distinct accents in his calling as professor and public servant.

Praeceptor ecclesiae Above all, Melanchthon found his native environment in the “classroom” or lecture hall. He was a learner and teacher almost by nature. He dedicated his energies and his public life first of all to teaching, in line with humanist thinking to pure teaching, the cultivation of truth and uprightness – piety – in his students. He produced best-selling textbooks on grammar (Latin and Greek), rhetoric, and dialectics (logic). The university formed the fertile ground from which his learning instructed students from German-speaking territories and beyond in various disciplines. But he viewed himself above all as a teacher of the church. In the classroom he sought to convey not only the information students needed for practicing their callings across the spectrum of educated society. He also strove to cultivate their ability to convey that information and to live a life of dedicated service to God and his world. He

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11

fruitfully taught the skills and principles of clear, effective communication. In addition, he taught in the public forum as he presented his own and his colleagues’ theological convictions to the wider church and society. He fashioned the genre of the confessional document, as represented above all by the Augsburg Confession and its Apology, as an important instrument for his wider audience. His insistence on the truthfulness and necessity of faithful conveyance of this message led him into controversy with those who disagreed with him. His careful training of his students came back to haunt him in 1549 and subsequent years as some of his students found that his support for a policy of compromise in neutral practices (adiaphora) in the life of the church (in the so-called “Leipzig Interim” of 1548) compromised the effective confession of the gospel as well as mere outward ritual and custom. His conviction, which he believed matched Luther’s, that these compromises were necessary to save Saxon pulpits for Evangelical preachers aroused objections from students who had gained a different vision of how communication of a message functions beyond simply couching the truth in politically acceptable form. His concern for the receiver of the message led his students to argue that the laity’s reception of such compromises in “merely external” matters would view these old practices, once abandoned, then reintroduced, as an abandonment of the Wittenberg message and way of life. They aroused Melanchthon’s bitter critique of their betrayal of him, just as he had aroused their bitterness and sense that he had betrayed the gospel by pursuing this policy of compromise. But even in the midst of controversy over his compromises, he remained confessor and teacher of the faith.

In the Classroom Melanchthon’s engagement with the thought of Aristotle has provided tinder for controversy in the last century and a half. Nicole Kuropka, winner of Bretten’s Melanchthon Prize in 2009, whose larger study of this subject deserves careful attention, clears away misunderstanding of the Wittenberg professor’s use of the Stagarite. As significant as Melanchthon was in other areas of learning, alongside his recently highlighted activities as an instructor in several disciplines of the humanities, his efforts in behalf of reform of the theological curriculum had a profound impact on the education of pastors. That is the subject of an essay by Robert Kolb, delivered first in German at a conference on Melanchthon and the university in Wittenberg in October 2010. Timothy J. Wengert, winner of Bretten’s Melanchthon Prize in 2000, composed a pioneering analysis of Melanchthon’s exegetical lectures and publications, which rounds out this section of the volume.

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In Confessing the Faith One sign of Melanchthon’s continuing influence arises from his following the logic of the Wittenberg understanding of reality into the development of a new way of defining the church and its public teaching: confession of faith in the form of a published document. The Word of God occupied a central position in Melanchthon’s understanding of reality. Therefore, in 1530 it was natural that he should change the title of his explanation of why the Evangelical governments were introducing Wittenberg reform from “defense” – apologia – to “confession.” In doing so, he found a new way of defining the public teaching of the church. He combined the communicative power that the printing press put at his disposal with his conviction that the message of Scripture, particularly the gospel of the forgiveness of sins, delivers God’s power to change the reality of sinners’ identities. His concern for proper teaching combined with his burning desire to console troubled consciences with that gospel. His diplomatic assignments placed upon him the burden of formulating the Wittenberg theologians’ teaching and understanding of the life of the church in ways that conveyed it to others far beyond their own circle. Some of the points of greatest influence in the course of his career arose when he was called upon to state and restate in formal confessional documents what he and his fellow theologians in Wittenberg believed the life-giving truth of the gospel meant for the people of their age. This section begins with Timothy J. Wengert’s analysis of Melanchthon’s reputation as a compromiser, on the basis of his relationship with the papal legate, Lorenzo Campeggio, especially as the relationship unfolded at Augsburg in 1530 and in Melanchthon’s Apology of the Augsburg Confession. Irene Dingel has investigated a variety of occasions on which Melanchthon continued the activity he had performed so well at Augsburg, the public confession of the Christian faith, as proclaimed by the Wittenberg reforming team. Three of her essays, two of which have not previously appeared in English, appear here, opening up aspects until now unexplored in his career as confessor : his use of confession of the faith in conjunction with the diplomatic efforts of Evangelical governments, his attempts to reconcile disputing parties within the Wittenberg circle through conciliatory formulations of biblical teaching, and his pioneering assembly of confessional documents into a corpus doctrinae [body of doctrine]. Alongside these essays stands one by Kolb, on the Praeceptor’s doctrinal confession that he intended would serve as his theological last will and testament, his critique of the visitation instructions for what Melanchthon labeled the “inquisition” initiated in parts of Bavaria in 1557.

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In Controversy For a “man of peace,” as he is often called (see the opening paragraphs of Irene Dingel’s essay, “The Creation of Theological Profiles,” essay 12, below), Melanchthon fell again and again into controversy. He publicly challenged the positions of Roman Catholics, Antitrinitarians, Anabaptists, of theologians from Andreas Osiander to Ulrich Zwingli, to say nothing of Friedrich Staphylus and Caspar von Schwenckfeld. Tragically, he fell into sharp exchanges with a number of his own students, among them some of the brightest and best. Modern scholars have sometimes praised Melanchthon’s “ecumenical spirit” for suffering such sharp attacks, but they often fail to recognize that his striving for peace and harmony never took place in separation from his convictions regarding the necessity of purity of teaching and forthright confession of God’s Word. His reputation for mild manners, largely created by his students as part of their polemical defense of the Preceptor after his death (Wengert: 1995), was coupled with and contradicted by his inability to suffer gladly those whom he regarded as fools, especially when, as his students, they had learned better from him. His flight from “rabid theologians” reflected his weariness with the battles he experienced and betrayal he felt, but he had never hesitated, when he thought it called for, to move through the assemblies of theologians with sharp elbows himself. Melanchthon’s life-long struggle to maintain the Wittenberg tension between an understanding of God’s grace and the biblical teaching regarding humanity’s call to fulfill God’s plan and purpose for life came to something of a head in the controversy over the freedom of the will in the 1550s and 1560s. Foundational for this debate, which Melanchthon’s students continued after his death, was the Preceptor’s formulation of his position on the subject in the 1530s. Timothy J. Wengert carefully surveys the precise paths he followed in experimenting with the best articulation of the Wittenberg definition of how the Holy Spirit works with the human will in conversion and repentance. Among the most significant of the controversies in which he became entangled, one of the most stubborn to unravel was the controversy over his views of the Lord’s Supper, a subject which still divides scholars trying to determine precisely what he did believe among the tangled web of utterances arising at different times from difference contexts. Wengert assesses Melanchthon’s controversial interpretation of Colossians 3:1 – 2 from his lectures of 1557 and its place in his later Christology, with serious implications for his doctrine of the Lord’s Supper. Kolb offers an examination of his GnesioLutheran students’ criticism of his position on the sacrament. Dingel analyzes how the Formula of Concord sorted out various elements of Melanchthon’s doctrine of the Lord’s Supper. The three essays covering this controversy certainly do not give a complete profile of the role of controversy in Melanchthon’s life, but they do provide fresh insights into Melanchthon’s

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struggle for proper teaching and the impact he had on the formulation of public teaching on this subject. Readers will note different accents and interpretations among the authors. This should spur further analysis and discussion of the structure and impact of Melanchthon’s theological contributions. In some essays editorial updating has added bibliographical items not available at the time of publication. Previously published essays have also been changed to conform them to the style of documentation in this series. Bibliographical listings at the end of each essay do not include references to works in the editions of authors listed in the table of abbreviations. Editorial revisions have been undertaken to correct typographical errors and similar mistakes in the originals and to conform the essays to the style of the publisher of this volume. These sharply focused studies of Melanchthon’s thinking and activities intend to offer readers a fuller picture of the intricate and complex nature of his career of public service and the continuing development of his thinking. As fruitful and lively as his thought was, it is certain that current scholarly judgments need continual refinement and revision. The authors hope that this volume encourages further careful study of the texts and contexts that will enable the Praeceptor Germaniae to continue teaching well beyond Germany’s borders into the twenty-first century.

Acknowledgements Five essays in this volume have not been previously published; two others are appearing in print here in English for the first time. The authors are grateful to publishers and editors for permission to translate or to republish: Essay 1: Nicole Kuropka: “Melanchthon and Aristotle.” Pp. 16 – 27. In: Lutheran Quarterly 25 (2011). Essay 3: Timothy J. Wengert: “The Biblical Commentaries of Philip Melanchthon.” Pp. 106 – 148. In: M. Patrick Graham and Timothy J. Wengert (Ed.). Philip Melanchthon (1497 – 1560) and the Commentary. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1997. Essay 4: Timothy J. Wengert: “Philip Melanchthon’s Last Word to Cardinal Lorenzo Campeggio, Papal Legate at the 1530 Diet of Augsburg.” Pp. 457 – 483. In: Johann Loehr (Ed.). Dona Melanchthoniana: Festgabe für Heinz Scheible zum 70. Geburtstag. Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: frommann-holzboog, 2001. Essay 5: Irene Dingel: “Melanchthon und Westeuropa.” Pp. 105 – 122. In: Günther Wartenberg and Matthias Zenter (Ed.). Philipp Melanchthon als Politiker zwischen Reich, Reichsständen und Konfessionsparteien. Wittenberg: Drei Kastanien Verlag, 1998. Essay 6: Irene Dingel: “Melanchthons Einigungsbemühen zwischen den Fronten: der Frankfurter Rezeß.” Pp. 121 – 143. In: Jörg Haustein (Ed.).

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Philipp Melanchthon, Ein Wegbereiter für die Ökumene. 2. ed., Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1997. Essay 7: Robert Kolb, “Melanchthon’s Doctrinal Last Will and Testament: The Responsiones ad articulos Bavaricae inquisitionis as His Final Confession of Faith.” Pp. 97 – 114. In: Sixteenth Century Journal 36 (2005). Essay 8: Irene Dingel, German original: “Melanchthon und die Normierung des Bekenntnisses.” Pp. 195 – 211. In: Günter Frank (Ed,). Der Theologe Melanchthon. Stuttgart: Thorbecke, 2000; translated as “Philip Melanchthon and the Establishment of Confessional Norms.” Pp. 146 – 169. In: Lutheran Quarterly 20 (2006). Most hearty thanks go to translators Timothy J. Wengert and Paul M. C. Elliott and to Theodore Hopkins for editorial assistance in the preparation of the volume. We also extend hearty thanks for financial support for editorial preparation to Mrs. Ethel Johnson, Harrington, New Jersey, USA. The authors are deeply grateful to Professor Dr. Herman Selderhuis for his acceptance of the volume in the series “Refo 500” and to Christoph Spill of Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht for accompanying us through the editorial process.

Literature Dingel, Irene (2012). “Helmar Junghans als Melanchthonforscher.” Pp. 41 – 50. In: Armin Kohnle (Ed.): Helmar Junghans (1931 – 2020) als Kirchenhistoriker. 2. Leipziger Arbeitsgespräch zur Reformation aus Anlass seines 80. Geburtstags (Herbergen der Christenheit, Sonderband 20). Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. Junghans, Helmar (2000). “Das Melanchthonjubiläum 1997. Teil 1: Quellen, Biographien, Ausstellungen, Reiseführer, Medaillen, Tagungen,” Pp. 95 – 162. In: Luthejahrbuch 67. (2003). “Das Melanchthonjubiläum 1997. Teil 2: Tagungen (Fortsetzungen), Vorlesungreihen, Festschriften, Monographien zur Theologie und Frömmigkeit, Reformationsjubiläum.” Pp. 175 – 214. In: Lutherjahrbuch 70. Wengert, Timothy J. (1995). “‘With Friends Like This…’: The Biography of Philip Melanchthon by Joachim Camerarius.” Pp. 115 – 131. In: Thomas F. Mayer and D. R. Woolf (Ed.). The Rhetorics of Life-Writing in Early Modern Europe: Forms of Biography from Cassandra Fedele to Louis XIV. Ann Arbor : University of Michigan.

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© 2012, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen ISBN Print: 9783525550472 — ISBN E-Book: 9783647550473

Philip Melanchthon in Classroom

© 2012, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen ISBN Print: 9783525550472 — ISBN E-Book: 9783647550473

© 2012, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen ISBN Print: 9783525550472 — ISBN E-Book: 9783647550473

Nicole Kuropka

Philip Melanchthon and Aristotle

1. Aristotle in the Crossfire of Criticism In the spring of 1518 Luther announced at the Heidelberg Disputation that “whoever wants to philosophize in Aristotle without danger must necessarily beforehand become in Christ completely a fool” (WA 1: 355, 2 – 3; LW 31: 41, thesis 29). A half year later Philip Melanchthon arrived in Wittenberg to begin his duties as a professor of Greek. In his inaugural lecture he pleaded for a true understanding of Aristotle, discovered anew in the original sources (De corrigendis adolescentiae studiis, 1518, in: MSA 3: 35 [29 – 42]). In this connection Melanchthon had brought with him from Tübingen a variety of research projects relating to Aristotle. His intention, as he wrote to Georg Spalatin shortly after his arrival in electoral Saxony, was to purify philosophy, so that he might be able to approach theology well armed (12 October 1518, MBWT 1: 82 ff., §29). In the persons of Luther and Melanchthon two critics of Aristotle converged, each with completely different bases for their criticisms. Luther formulated a theological criticism of Aristotle because the Aristotelian understanding of virtue had completely twisted the biblical understanding of human righteousness into pure works righteousness. On the other side, Melanchthon demanded – as had many other humanists – replacing the distorted Latin Aristotle with one again gleaned from the Greek sources. Theological criticism encountered a philological critique. Already in his Tübingen days Melanchthon had expressed the desire to publish a purified edition of Aristotle. His move to Wittenberg put an end to these plans, at least in the beginning. Luther’s Evangelical view of the human being’s righteousness before God quickly fascinated Melanchthon and seized his interest. In his preface to Luther’s 1519 commentary on Galatians he praised the superiority of biblical philosophy and complained that, despite its superiority, people struggled with Aristotle, who actually had barred entry to Christ’s teaching (Otho Germanus [=Melanchthon] to the Reader, Preface to Martin Luther’s In epistolam Pauli ad Galatas commentarius [Wittenberg, April 1519] in: MBWT 1: 121 – 24, §54). According to Melanchthon, the Apostle Paul had already warned against philosophy and its influence on theology (to Nicholas von Amsdorf, Preface to Aristophanes’ Nubes [Wittenberg, April 1520] in: MBWT 1: 204 f., §89). In the following months

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Nicole Kuropka

Melanchthon agreed more and more with the theological criticism of Aristotle, one that finally culminated in this provocative question, written in the first edition of his Loci communes from 1521: “What difference does it make to me what this wrangler said?” (“Quid enim ad me, quid senserit ille rixator?” MSA 2,1: 42). Without a doubt the Greek philosopher stood in the crossfire of criticism, in which Melanchthon also participated. His writings and letters demonstrate that a positive evaluation of the Stagirite completely disappeared from his works between 1519 and 1525. Melanchthon’s colleague from his days at the University of Tübingen, Martin Cellarius, expressed his concern during this period in a letter. He had heard, he wrote, that Melanchthon had become an enemy of philosophy, but he could not believe it (August 1519, in : MBWT 1: 150 – 57, §66). (Melanchthon’s response, if there was one, is unfortunately no longer extant). But it is certain that Melanchthon’s change after his move to Wittenberg was not quite so extreme. Melanchthon never completely became an enemy of philosophy. Nevertheless, the authority of Aristotle for Melanchthon wavered, as shown even in his textbooks on rhetoric and grammar, where every explicit reference to Aristotle disappeared (Kuropka : 2002, 24 – 27). Melanchthon, however, never questioned “Philosophy” in the sense of the liberal arts (Scheible : 1996, 99 – 114 ; cf. Scheible : 2010, 125 – 51). Shorn of Aristotle, the arts faculty at the University of Wittenberg faced a critical problem: how should the philosophical disciplines be taught without referring back to the Greek philosopher? With the renunciation of Aristotle, the Nicomachean Ethics as well as the doctrine of categories and the second book of the Analytics became unusable. Thus, the vacuum of authorities struck especially hard at the subjects of dialectics and ethics. Melanchthon continued to insist upon the necessity of the liberal arts, and thus he refashioned these textbooks accordingly (Kuropka: 2002, 27 – 29). Aristotle had been eliminated, but which philosopher should be used in his place? Melanchthon saw plenty of philosophers that in his view dedicated themselves to nonsensical or overly complicated things. In Plato’s works, according to Melanchthon, one found countless insights, to be sure, but his understanding of virtue eradicated the boundaries between Christian and civil righteousness. For this reason Plato could mislead the inexperienced reader into false doctrine. The Stoics erred in their notion that virtue was the only good. Contrariwise, Melanchthon argued, God had designated the entire creation that he made as good (Gen 1:31). The fact that the Epicureans taught the mortality of the soul and desire as the highest good was completely unchristian (e. g., In ethica Aristotelis commentarius [Wittenberg: J. Klug, 1529], fol. A3b, b2b, c4a). For Melanchthon the only philosopher remaining was the Roman author Cicero, who was distinguished by two factors. For one thing, his ethic did not contradict the second table of the Decalogue, and for another he did not theorize abstractly about moral duties and virtues but

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explained them on the basis of his practical experience (cf. Melanchthon’s De legibus oratio, 1525, CR 11: 66 – 86, esp. 79). While the Greek philosophers indulged in theoretical speculation, the Roman Cicero taught on the basis of his experience with a practical orientation. Because, in Melanchthon’s opinion, education was never an end in itself but instead served to cope with issues in daily life, Cicero, with his orientation to life in De officiis, was an adequate successor to Aristotle, who had presumably been withdrawn from the curriculum. In the curriculum of 1526 Melanchthon took this insight into account : Cicero’s On Duties was now declared to be the basic textbook in place of the Nicomachean Ethics (Friedensburg : 1926, 147, §148). With this Aristotle’s exit from Wittenberg seemed to be sealed. But in this case appearances turned out to be deceiving.

2. The Rediscovery of Aristotle Beginning in the middle of the 1520s, Melanchthon showed a renewed interest in Aristotle. Above all, his textbooks on dialectics demonstrated the intensive process of his struggle with Aristotle. On the basis of the (yearly!) new editions of this textbook, one can trace how Melanchthon achieved a new understanding of Aristotle step-by-step – without betraying or softening his Reformation theology (Kuropka: 2002, 21 – 40). The engine for this development was the ecclesiastical and political disputes that made it necessary for Melanchthon to rethink and reformulate his epistemology. In theology Melanchthon had subscribed to the Reformation Scripture principle of sola Scriptura although he had not yet published an authorized biblical commentary. This changed with his commentary on Colossians from 1527. It contains an extensive excursus on Colossians 2:8 (“Do not let yourselves be led astray by philosophy”). Here Melanchthon laid out the fundamentals of his distinction between secular philosophy and biblical theology, using a variety of examples and pictures. In this he also pointed out the necessity and importance of philosophical knowledge, rightly understood. A gospel-oriented theology can only be learned from Holy Scripture, and reason can be used as God’s good creation in the basic questions of mathematics, ethics, architecture, medicine, and those things accessible to reason (Scholia in epistulam Pauli ad Colossenses, 1527, MSA 4: 230 – 44; cf. Wengert: 1998, 82 – 87. Although reason cannot judge the will of God without God’s Word and the Holy Spirit, nevertheless reason is God’s good creation, which was created to judge whatever is subjected to the senses and whatever serves to preserve this bodily life. If

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someone repudiates something of these matters that reason explains with convincing proof, that person rejects God’s work.1

With this statement Melanchthon clearly defined the limits of reason. Using reason alone a person could perhaps come to the conclusion that there must be a god. Yet reason could only wildly confabulate what attributes this god possessed. For logical understanding could never understand Jesus’ crucifixion or God’s triune existence. This is an insurmountable limit of reason. However, reason can—on the basis of experience and certain theoretical analysis—recognize what is true and right (Scholia in epistulam Pauli ad Colossenses, MSA 4: 223). As Melanchthon was elucidating the possibilities and limits of reason in his biblical commentary, he explained in his dialectical textbook the epistemological axioms—and now not any longer with Cicero but with the rediscovered Aristotle. As Cicero is a master of true knowledge on the basis of common experience, Melanchthon discovered in Aristotle the master of theoretical knowledge, that is, of knowing on the basis of proper, logical syllogisms and definitions (De dialectica libri quattuor [Wittenberg, J. Klug, 1529], a4b – a5a). Thus, not only are the lessons learned from experience true: so are those based on the conclusions of logic. To be clear, Melanchthon’s use of reason has nothing to do with theoretical games, as it may appear at first glance. With his renewed orientation toward Aristotle Melanchthon unfolded a methodology that was intellectually certain, one that became the guarantor of true knowledge. Melanchthon declared dialectics, as in Aristotelian dialectics, to be the basic methodology for all branches of knowledge. On top of that, each of these branches, even theology, had its own methodology. According to Melanchthon, the church needed a methodologically certain and linguistically precise theology. The fundamental method for such a theology is to be found in the book of Romans.2 Moreover, wherever a contradiction between reason and the witness of Scripture arises, one, of course, must follow the Bible (De dialectica, 1529a, d7b–d8a). 1 Commentaria in ethica Aristotelis Philippi Melanchthonis (1531), a4a–b: “Quamquam enim ratio de voluntate Dei iudicare ac statuere sine verbo Dei, et sine spiritu sancto nequeat, tamen est bona Dei creatura condita ad iudicanda ea quae sensibus subiecta sunt, quaeque ad hanc corporalem vitam reinendam ac regendam conducunt, quibus in rebus siquis ea quae ratio certa demonstatione deprehendit, aspernatur, is aspernatur Dei opus.” 2 De dialectica (1529a), k8a–b: “Veteres methodum vocant rationem recte atque ordine docendi iuxta praecepta dialectices, ac saepe monent ut in omnibus negociis, controversiis, artibus demus operam, ut methodum teneamus, quia necesse sit animum vagari incertum, nisi hac ratione regatur. Ac in uno quoque genere semper foelicius docent hi, qui callent methodum, quam qui non callent, quantumvis abundent ingeniis. Utilior est Aristoteles discentibus moralem aut naturalem philosophiam, quam Plato, quia Plato non observavit iustam methodum, tametsi is hoc nomine exagitet Gorgiam, et similes, quod non satis periti sint dialectices. In medicina amatur ab omnibus Avicenna propter methodum. In iure civili propemodum methodus est liber Institutionum. In sacris literis methodus est epistola Pauli ad Romanos. Nulla res est enim, quae penitus perspici possit, nisi animus noster methodum sibi quandam informet, quam in eius rei cogitatione, inquisitione, et explicatione sequatur.”

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Furthermore, Melanchthon declared his own opposition to a theology of human logic. In the same way he also spoke out against an anti-rational theology and against theologians who did not properly interpret the Bible and neither argued precisely nor judged accurately. With this we touch on the ecclesial and political background for this development. At the end of the 1520s Melanchthon singled out two causes for the ecclesiastical struggles: a deficient orientation toward Holy Scripture and a complete lack of linguistic precision in such controversies. For Melanchthon it was without question that whoever properly interpreted Romans would come inexorably to the doctrine of justification by faith alone. Melanchthon first delivered lectures on this textual analysis of Romans in 1529 (Dispositio orationis in epistola Pauli ad Romanos [1529/1530]; cf. CR 15: 443 – 92 and Kuropka: 2002, 138 – 57). In the ensuing years of ecclesial disputes, he wrote and published again and again a new commentary on Romans to address the central issues in the ecclesiastical debates.3 Aristotle is the primary master of theoretical knowledge, Cicero is the master of practical knowledge, and Paul is the master of theological knowledge! This approach rehabilitates Aristotle, without permitting him to sneak into theology through the back door. Melanchthon thereby cut the Gordian knot regarding Aristotle, and he dedicated himself with new energy – and with a new perspective – to his old Aristotle projects. Within a few years his first commentaries on Aristotle’s Politics and his Nicomachean Ethics appeared, as we shall discuss more fully below.

3. Aristotle and the Disputes within the Church Around 1529 Melanchthon had clarified his understanding of Aristotle and remained true to this perspective—save for a few small changes4—until the end of his life. His two orations on Aristotle, for example, prove this 3 In February 1530, as the Diet of Augsburg was approaching, a complete version of his Dispositio appeared. The commentary on Romans from 1532 reflected the theological disputes at the Diet itself (MSA 5), in which the preface made direct reference to the Nuremberg Armistice of the same year. At the time of the imperial religious colloquies in Worms and Regensburg, an expanded and revised new edition of the 1532 commentary appeared (CR 15: 495 – 796). In 1556, in the wake of the Osiandrian controversy and the Council of Trent, Melanchthon published a completely new commentary, the Enarratio (CR 15: 797 – 1052). 4 For example, this state of affairs is demonstrated in Melanchthon’s judgment concerning Aristotle’s Physics. In the beginning he condemned the book completely (Melanchthon to Georg Spalatin, 13 March 1519 in MBWT 1: 109 f., §46). In the 1530s he reported on his project to write his own textbook on physics, given that there was nothing of use in Aristotle (Melanchthon to Leonard Fuchs, 30 April 1534 in MBWT 6: 79 ff., §1430). In the preface to the Physics of 1549 Melanchthon finally defended Aristotle, whose textbook was thin gruel, to be sure, but at least it portrayed the basis for the entire study of physics and was thus suitable for instruction (Mel-

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consistency, with the one published in 1537 (Oratio de vita Aristotelis, dicta in promotione Magistrorum a Phil. Mel. M.D.XXXVII [1537]; CR 11: 342 – 49, delivered by Melanchthon around 12 January 1537) and the other in 1544 (Oratio de Aristotele … cum decerneret gradum magisterii philosophici aliquot honestiis et eruditis viris [1544]; CR 11: 647 – 58, delivered by Erasmus Floccus, the dean of the arts faculty, on 31 January 1544). In these orations he not only gave credence to the life and work of this philosopher, but he also explained Aristotle’s central role and masterly contributions to philosophy to his hearers and readers. Whoever was trained from the cradle, as was Aristotle, to understand and analyze things properly would develop two virtues, namely, the love of truth and carefulness in method.5 These virtues are particularly needed in the church, as Melanchthon wrote in his second oration: Why, then, do we believe that Aristotelian philosophy is especially useful for us in the church? I am of the opinion that the following is certain: amid everything else we need in the church, above all else dialectic, which offers a correct method that defines things cleanly, divides things properly, binds together suitable arguments, and subdivides and judges awful connections in arguments. All who do not master this art rip to shreds the topic in need of explanation.6

Melanchthon’s increased valuing of Aristotle and his increased criticism of theologians in his own camp and on the Roman Catholic side arose from his questioning their abilities to argue precisely – now derived not from a rhetoric of argumentation but from a logic of argumentation. At the 1530 imperial diet of Augsburg Melanchthon criticized the Roman side for its lack of intellectual rigor, which blocked the opponents from true knowledge and effectively prevented church unity. In sum, he called this state of affairs pueriliter, completely puerile (MBWT 4,2: 522 – 525, §1014, to Martin Luther, dated 6 August 1530). Ten years later, at the religious colloquies in Worms and Regensburg, Melanchthon criticized the phrase-thrashing of rhetorical wordfencing. In the colloquies a war of words over terminology, rather than a struggle over the truth, prevailed. That meant for Melanchthon that the goal of unity would not be reached. This criticism Melanchthon summarized in a single word, a Greek technical term, which is also a citation from the Bible,

anchthon to Michael Meienburg, preface to Initia doctrinae physicae, dictata in Academia Vitebergensi [1549], 29 September 1549, in MBWR 5:519 f., §5641 [CR 7: 472 – 77]). 5 CR 11: 348: “Itaque cum esset Aristoteles ab ipsis cunabulis assuefactus non ad inanes et perplexas logomachias, sed ad rerum agnitionem et ad quaerendas causas, ex hac puerili consuetudine duas egregias virtutes, et in primis dignas viro docto consecutus est, videlicet, diligentiam in quaerenda methodo et amorem veritates, abeunt enim studia in mores.” 6 CR 11: 654: “…cur Aristotelicum maxime nobis in Ecclesia usui esse arbitremur. Constare arbitror inter omnes, maxime nobis in Ecclesia opus esse Dialectica, quae methodos recte informat, quae dextre definit, iuste partitur, apte connectit, iudicat et divellit monstrosas connexiones. Hanc artem qui non norunt, lacerant mateterias explicandas.”

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logomachein, that is, to fight over words.7 This Greek concept appears in the New Testament only in Paul’s epistles, where he wrote in 2 Timothy (2:14): “Do not engage in wars of words, which benefit nothing but only leads to the consternation of the listeners.” Fighting over words helps nothing; indeed, it is harmful. Melanchthon is indeed not the wishy-washy diplomat he is often portrayed to be. When the official documents of the religious colloquies were published, Melanchthon stressed the following: He treasured the (Aristotelian) virtue of the golden mean a great deal, but this was not to be confused with indecisiveness and faulty attempts at reconciliation, as happened in Regensburg (MBWT 10: 512 – 16, especially 516, lines 103 – 14, §2816, from September 1541). What is needed in the church in the face of unsolved disputes and endless wars of words is not instruction in overly erudite disputation about the formulation of concepts and also not teaching in overblown, quarrelsome, and dazzling speech. Instead, one needs a language that loves the truth, and for this purpose there is dialectics, on which Melanchthon bestowed a high level of distinction. Writing in the preface to his newly written textbook, he stated that dialectic in the church is the bond of unity (vinculum concordiae) (MBWR 5: 172, §4875, CR 6: 655, addressed to Joachim Camerarius and dated 1 September 1547). The church needs Aristotle – but not as a theologian! For his entire life Melanchthon maintained the distinction between Aristotle and theology, as may be seen in the case of the Marburg professor, Theobald Thamer. At the insistence of Landgrave Philip of Hesse, Thamer came to Wittenberg in 1553 and presented his teaching before Melanchthon. Thamer had abandoned justification by faith alone in favor of the opinion that God was better recognized in the writings of Aristotle than the writings of Luther because Aristotle contained all articles of faith in that he described the way to God as a way of virtue so that righteousness in God’s sight was attained through proper behavior (MBWR 7: 48, §6775 [digest of the copy in the Munich Staatsbibliothek], a memorandum concerning Theobald Thamer, dated 26 March 1553). Melanchthon demanded an unconditional recantation of this erroneous teaching. The measuring stick for theology is neither reason nor Aristotle but Scripture alone, centered in the epistle to the Romans. Only in the tension created by a strict distinction of theology from philosophy and at the same time a clear use of reason (as well as philosophy) in the practice of theology can Melanchthon’s relation to Aristotle be described and understood. In his commentaries on the Aristotelian corpus he paid homage to both points.

7 MBWT 9: 467 ff., here lines 12 – 15, §2557, to Urbanus Rhegius, dated 19 November 1540: “De his nescio, quid scribam, nolo enim studia quorundam mediocria vituperare, sed in his aliqui scioli persuadere nobis conantur totam dissensionem tantum esse ‘kocolaw_am.’”

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4. Melanchthon’s Commentaries on Aristotle In June 1528 Melanchthon wrote to Joachim Camerarius that he had had to expend a great deal of energy in preparing an edition of the Nichomachean Ethics, which was to be published in Wittenberg (MBWT 3: 335, lines 15 – 21, §693). These plans for a text edition never came to fruition. Instead, a year later the printer Joseph Klug published the commentary, In ethica Aristotelis commentarius. The commentary began, as in all of Melanchthon’s philosophical writings, with a detailed treatment of the difference between theology and philosophy. Only after this basic question had been thoroughly discussed and explained, did Melanchthon turn to the actual commentary, using the following pattern. First, Melanchthon summarized the chief statements. Then, on occasion, he cited the central passages in Greek and pointed out Aristotle’s methodology for analyzing a particular topic. When necessary, Melanchthon investigated disputed questions, demarcated his position vis--vis other expositors, and stressed above all where Aristotle differed from a Christian worldview and lifestyle. Regarding the pedagogical goal for reading the Ethics, Melanchthon listed the formation of private morals, the development of powers of judgment, and, above all else, the enabling of governmental leadership (Kuropka: 2002, 176 – 82). In the first edition Melanchthon only commented upon the first and second books of the Nichomachean Ethics. Two years later a commentary on the fifth book came out, followed a year later by an exposition of the third book (Kuropka: 2002, 239 – 43). These then covered the basic scope of the books of the Nichomachean Ethics that Melanchthon was to interpret for the rest of his life. In terms of content he covered the following themes: the basic question of ethics and the happiness of the human being (Book I), the teaching of virtues (Book II), secular righteousness (Book V), and the doctrine of the will in external, civil works (Book III). In this basic form his Aristotle commentary went through several new editions in the next three decades with individual revisions and improvements.8 As the Diet of Augsburg was approaching in 1530, Melanchthon wrote his first commentary on Aristotle’s Politics (Commentarii in aliquot politicos libros Aristotelis [1530]; cf. CR 16: 417 – 52). In the introduction he again placed a guide for distinguishing theology and philosophy. The gospel did not serve the establishment of a Christian form for the state but revealed the 8 Melanchthon worked throughout his life on the exposition of the Nichomachean Ethics. On this point, see Frank: 2008, 1: XXIX-XXV. In this volume Frank also provides a bilingual edition of the commentary on bks. I & II. CR 16: 277 – 88 gives the commentary on the Nichomachean Ethics, bks. I–III according to 1546 edition and book Vaccording to the 1560 edition. The footnotes cite at length passages from the earlier editions, but readers cannot always trust the correctness of either the dating or the texts. Until now, reference back to printings of the sixteenth century is indispensable. See also Kraye: 1997, 195 – 214.

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spiritual and eternal righteousness of the human being. Politics, in contrast, taught about property, contracts, and laws, which all take on different forms in different nations. Thus, Aristotle can and ought only speak about these things, which are areas subject to reason. In the course of the commentary Melanchthon unfolds the difference between politics and the gospel for the secular realm, and he distances himself from all the revolutionary movements of his time. Melanchthon stands in judgment on Wycliff, the Swiss and Strasbourg theologians, the Anabaptists, and the papists. They must all answer to Melanchthon’s criticism that they have meddled in the business of politics and, by virtue of overstepping their area of authority, have endangered the functioning of societal processes. Over against this Melanchthon shows in his exposition that precisely at the moment when the biblical commandments seem to contradict the now standard laws involving feudal service, commerce, and matters of interest (Book 1), the division of property (Book 2), or the form of government (Book 3), Christians must conform themselves to the prescribed societal structures (Kuropka: 2002, 182 f.). In the dedicatory epistle Melanchthon places his commentary in the context of university life and stresses its usefulness in educating students (MBWT 3: 677 – 80, §855, to Ulrich Schilling, preface to Commentarii in aliquot politicos libros Aristotelis [1530], dated late 1529/early 1530). But the actual moment of its publication – shortly before the 1530 Diet of Augsburg – points toward a further use within the ecclesial struggles of the time. What Melanchthon presented to his students offered a defense of Wittenberg theology as an emperor-friendly doctrine (by no means antagonistic toward government), whose adherents, as good citizens, were of the highest value to the state. This commentary, however, was never reprinted. Melanchthon’s high watermark [Hauptaugenmerk] was thus his commentary on the Nichomachean Ethics, whereby he also regularly referred to Aristotle’s arguments in other works that served as textbooks for the students, such as those on dialectics, physics, and even geometry. Melanchthon, however, never fulfilled his goal of publishing a purified working edition of Aristotle. Nevertheless, he had – with deep engagement and theological sensitivity – fulfilled his promise to purify philosophy in order to be able to approach theology well equipped, as he had written to Spalatin in the autumn of 1518.

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Literature Frank, Gnther (2008–). Philipp Melanchthon: Ethica Doctrina Elementa et Enarratio Libri quinti Ethicorum, Editionen zur Frühen Neuzeit: Lateinischdeutsche Quelleneditionen. Stuttgart: fromman-holzboog. Friedensburg, Walter (1926). Urkundenbuch der Universität Wittenberg, part 1: 1502 – 1611. Magdeburg: Historische Kommission für die Provinz Sachsen und für Anhalt. Kraye, Jill (1997). “Melanchthons ethische Kommentare und Lehrbücher.” Pp. 195 – 214. In: Jürgen Leonhardt (Ed.): Melanchthon und das Lehrbuch des 16. Jahrhunderts, Rostocker Studien zur Kulturwissenschaft 1. Rostock: University of Rostock Press. Kuropka, Nicole (2002). Philipp Melanchthon: Wissenschaft und Gesellschaft, Ein Gelehrter im Dienst der Kirche. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Melanchthon, Philip (1531). Commentaria in ethica Aristotelis Philippi Melanchthonis. Hagenau: J. Setzer. (1530). Commentarii in aliquot politicos libros Aristotelis. Wittenberg: J. Klug. (1529a). De dialectica libri quattuor. Wittenberg: J. Klug. (1529/30). Dispositio orationis in epistola Pauli ad Romanos. Incomplete version: Hagenau: J. Setzer, 1529; complete version: Wittenberg: J. Klug. (1529b). In ethica Aristotelis commentarius. Wittenberg: J. Klug. Scheible, Heinz (2010). “Aristoteles und die Wittenberger Universitätsreform: Zum Quellenwert von Lutherbriefen.” Pp. 125 – 51. In Heinz Scheible: Aufsätze zu Melanchthon. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. (1996). “Melanchthons Bildungsprogramm.” Pp. 99 – 114. In idem, Melanchthon und die Reformation: Forschungsbeiträge. Gerhard May and Rolf Decot (Ed.). Mainz: von Zabern. Wengert, Timothy J. (1998). Human Freedom, Christian Righteousness: Philip Melanchthon’s Exegetical Dispute with Erasmus of Rotterdam. New York: Oxford.

This essay appeared originally in Lutheran Quarterly 25 (2011): 16 – 27.

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Robert Kolb

The Pastoral Dimension of Melanchthon’s Pedagogical Activities for the Education of Pastors

When Philip Melanchthon arrived in Wittenberg on 25 August 1518, he had, according to Heinz Scheible, “the sum of his experiences in Tübingen and the plans he made there” in his pocket. And these matched precisely “what those in Wittenberg wanted.”1 Melanchthon’s appeal for the reform of the curriculum for the study of the liberal arts in his inaugural address on 28 August 1518, is well known. He called for a return to the study of the liberal arts based upon the sources in the original languages, and above all urged that “the studies of the young” should prepare them through good training in rhetoric to convey their ideas effectively. The university should abandon the spirit and the method of scholasticism. Less well known is his appeal in this same inaugural address for a transformation of the study of theology. Regarding theology, it is of utmost importance how they equip themselves for their study. For more than all other areas of study, theology really demands the highest possible capacity for thinking, for intensive concentration, and for precision in analysis. The fragrance of the incense of the Lord is sweeter than the aromatic spices of human fields of learning. Led by the Holy Spirit, accompanied by our education in the arts and sciences, it is possible for us to find access to that which is sacred … Since the writings that form the basis of theology are written some in Hebrew, some in Greek, we must learn the foreign languages, so that we do not have to meet the theologians like ‘masks unable to speak.’ First, with the original text we will have access to the words with their luster and their true significance, and, to use a figure of speech, the true and real meaning of the letters, which we are seeking, will reveal itself to us in the glorious light of the midday sun (MSA [1. ed.], 3:40 Melanchthon: 1997, 57 – 60.).

Melanchthon argued that the practice of scholasticism at the university had misled the church, produced a fanatic party spirit, divisions within the faith, quarrelling, and the like, and had traded human traditions for true, genuine piety (MSA 3: 40; Melanchthon: 1997, 60). Melanchthon’s ideas and visions for the university fit together very well with the hopes of those in Wittenberg for a reform of the church. In the years that followed, Luther’s ideas about the 1 Scheible: 1997, 31. Helmar Junghans assessed the desire for humanistic reform in the first sixteen years of the University of Wittenberg in: Junghans: 2002, 57 – 67.

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church and the true Christian faith strengthened his younger colleague in his own convictions. For the leaders of the Wittenberg Reformation began to define the essence of the Christian faith in a different way than had their predecessors in the leadership of church and university.

1. The Wittenberg Understanding of the Christian Life and Theological Education Modern historians of religion argue that several components go together to constitute a religion and its practices. These include doctrine, narratives, ritual, ethics, ideas regarding community (including the polity of the church), and finally, the faith in, submission to, or awe in the presence of some mightier Ultimate and Absolute, whether personal or impersonal (Smart: 1983, esp. 79 – 95). From this perspective medieval Christendom, at least at the popular level, was a religion which focused above all on ritual, that is the sacred realm and its activities, as the avenue for gaining access to God. At the level of the ecclesiastical leadership, the polity of the church, in which supervision was exercised through popes and bishops, became the defining instance since only they guaranteed that the other aspects of the life of the faithful would function in a God-pleasing way. Luther, on the other hand, developed a completely different view of the practice of the Christian faith, which presumed the concept of a personal God who initiates and carries on relationships with his creatures. His God was a God of conversation and community. This concept placed the greatest emphasis on the Word of God in Holy Scripture and indeed in the original languages of its historical witness. This matched Melanchthon’s concept of reform perfectly. Not only did he want to cultivate the ancient languages, but above all he wanted to promote the ability to convey God’s Word in appropriate ways through effective oral delivery. Melanchthon’s emphasis on rhetoric as the instrument for creating human community and conversation fit effectively into Luther’s idea of transmitting God’s Word (Wengert: 2012). Melanchthon and Luther shared much the same conceptions and goals for reform. Their views were in this respect congruent. Helmar Junghans correctly observed: It sheds no real light on the actual developments in Wittenberg to separate a humanistic reform of the university from a subsequent reformational reform, even if the interests of both did not always match completely. For the success of this event that shaped the world that followed, the reform that began in 1518, is the great intersection of both these lines of development, and the desire of the theologians to integrate the efforts of the biblical humanists into the discipline of the theology was decisive (Junghans: 2002, 70).

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Melanchthon contributed to the reform of theological education in a most decisive manner. He did this above all through his lectures and his published writings (Wengert: 2003).

2. Melanchthon’s Plan for Theological Education Melanchthon conveyed his ideas regarding the theological education of pastors in different ways and in a variety of documents. Most succinct and straightforward is probably his “Plan for the Studies of a Student of Theology.” It first appeared in print in 1537 and is to be found in a number of published works by various authors as well as in manuscript copies. When Melanchthon’s disciple Georg Major published the “Plan” in 1564, under the title, “a method for the study of theology” [methodus discendi sacras literas] (MBWT 3: 665 – 68; see Nieden: 2002, 134 – 40, Bayer: 2000, 30 – 35), a title it had borne in manuscript for thirty years, he dated the document 1529. The intended audience of this plan for study is not clear since it does not mention participation in lectures at the university (Nieden: 2006, 74 f., Mager : 1999, 115 ff., Bayer: 2000, 30 – 33). It is clear, however, that the “Plan” presents Melanchthon’s concept of what was necessary for the study of theology, the ideal elements which he believed were involved in its successful completion. His plan for the curriculum of the theological faculty in Wittenberg, composed in 1533, reflects, to a certain extent, the program he had drawn up in 1529. In 1533 he prescribed lectures on the epistle to the Romans, John’s gospel, the Psalms, Genesis, and Isaiah, as well as lectures on Augustine’s De spiritu et littera (Friedensburg: 1926, 1: 155). His more detailed proposal of 1529 presumed a command of the biblical languages and expected that every student of theology know the biblical text well. He advised the student to follow his own example: every morning when he awoke, and every evening before he went to bed, he read one or two chapters of Holy Scripture and prayed. He read through the entire Bible in this manner. When a passage seemed unclear, the student was to discuss it with others. He should also organize the chief ideas in the text into topics – “loci communes” – and write them down, creating for himself a “summary of Christian teaching.” Melanchthon urged the construction and use of topics under the categories of his own textbook; his Loci communes rerum theologicorum of 1521 was to serve as the model for the student’s own studies (MBWT 3: 670 f.). He recommended that the student begin by reading the epistle to the Romans. In it he would find a “methodus totius scripturae” – a method for reading all of scripture –, for, Melanchthon wrote, Paul had written on justification, the use of the law, and the proper distinction of law and gospel, thereby addressing “the most important topics of Christian teaching.” On this foundation the student would learn how to proclaim “repentance and

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forgiveness of sins” in the proper manner. For repentance, that is, fear of God and remorse over sin, and trust in the forgiveness of sins are what the sermon is designed to accomplish. The sermon is the means by which God enters into conversation with his human creatures (Melanchthon’s use of Paul, especially the epistle to the Romans, is discussed by Kruse: 2002, 125 – 30; Wengert: 2009, 129 – 64; Wengert: 1996, 118 – 40. Schäfer : 1963, 216 – 35, downplays Melanchthon’s intention to move hearers to faith and a Christian life through means of rhetoric and dialectic). The next step after reading Romans, Melanchthon stated, was reading the epistle to the Galatians, along with Luther’s commentary on the letter (1519) (WA 2: 443 – 618, LW 27: 153 – 410), which serves “in itself as a method” for interpreting the entire Bible. Thereafter, the student should turn to the epistle to the Colossians. It should be read along with the Praeceptor’s own commentary, recently published (1528/ 1529) (MSA 4: 210 – 202), and his Loci communes of 1521, even if, as Melanchthon wrote, he had over time decided that “many topics in [the Loci] should be altered because they are formulated rather poorly.” Melanchthon’s commentary on Colossians was to function as a corrective to the first edition of the Loci communes, and the students were to recognize the improvements in the theological content of his treatment of the topics (MBWT 3: 670 f.). Reading either Matthew’s gospel or Luke’s was to follow, for these presented the topics of repentance, faith, prayer, love, political or social life, secular government, human traditions, the sacraments, and the distinctions of law and gospel and of the gospel and God’s order for this world, as well as the topics of the cross, the office of the public ministry, and the church. The reading of Matthew or Luke served as preparation for reading the gospel of John, especially to focus on Christ’s words about faith and justification. Here students could expand their collection of loci with John’s treatment of the doctrines of the Trinity, creation, the two natures in Christ, original sin, the free will, the righteousness of faith, the church, and the office of the keys (MBWT 3: 671). The focus of Melanchthon’s model student of the New Testament fell upon learning and understanding the text and its content so that it could be conveyed to the people through the proper distinction of law and gospel (which provided the hermeneutic that integrated what the students found in the text for popular use). At the same time Melanchthon emphasized the way to use and apply this approach in sermon preparation, preaching being the very heart of the students’ future service as pastors. Although Melanchthon focused on the New Testament first, in no way did he ignore the Old Testament. Its study should begin, he thought, with Genesis, and Luther’s Enarratio (his series of sermons preached in Wittenberg in 1523 – 1524, published in 1527) (WA 14: 97 – 488, 24: 1 – 710) should serve as an introduction to the book. The student should continue with Deuteronomy, again with Luther’s Enarratio (his commentary of 1525) (WA 14: 497 – 744, LW 9) as guide, and then turn to the psalms. In reading the Old Testament, too, students should not fail to expand their collection of topics, especially those on

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faith, the fear of God, and the cross, but also on the first table of the law, trust in God, and the righteousness that avails in God’s sight. Once again “promises and threats,” law and gospel, stood at the center of Melanchthon’s conception of the text and the theological task. A proper understanding of the psalms required, in Melanchthon’s view, the ability to distinguish law and gospel. Next, students should move on to the prophets, particularly those on which Luther had already published lectures, “Jonah, Micah, etc.” The Praeceptor recommended Jerome and on occasion Nicholas von Lyra as aids for digging deeper into the text of the Old Testament, but he sternly warned students not to indulge in the “silly legends and allegories” of Origen (MBWT 3: 672 ff.). He gave special praise to Augustine’s writings, particularly his antipelagian works, De spiritu et littera and Contra Iulianum. He found Augustine far superior and more reliable than Jerome (MBWT 3: 675). Reading in the Bible and the church fathers did not excuse students, however, from the necessity of knowing profane writers in the ancient world since from their works the students could learn the way the language functions and how the words are used. Melanchthon set down a list of readings that students of theology in the twenty-first century would find intimidating. He recommended Livy, Virgil, Terence, Ovid, Quintilian, Homer, Herodotus, Demosthenes, and Lucian. In addition, students were to read about dialectic, grammar, and rhetoric, the “trivium” which provided the foundation for a good education. Melanchthon did not want them to neglect or to lose sight of their studies in the liberal arts (MBWT 3: 676 f.). In all these recommendations Melanchthon desired above all to assure that the students paid attention to “how law and gospel are to be distinguished and how to preserve Christian freedom” from the oppression of the law, as well as how to differentiate faith and works (Bayer: 2000, 26 f.). Only by doing that could they correctly perceive how the faith of David, Ezekiel, and other biblical saints could serve as examples worth imitating. Indeed, this hermeneutical approach made it possible for the student to be capable of critically reading the text and thus being free to make judgments about the proper understanding and use of the saints’ deeds and attitudes. More importantly, Christians needed to recognize their own responsibilities in the situations to which God had called them as they performed the specific tasks of those callings (MBWT 3: 674). The only goal of reading of the Scriptures and digesting their teaching was the application of this teaching in the context of congregational life. That task required a devotional, reverent attitude toward the text and the God who was communicating through it. That fact must be taken into consideration when appraising Melanchthon’s approach to the practice of theology. For example, Marcel Nieden emphasizes that, in contrast to Luther’s understanding of theology, which defined “pious practice” as the foremost goal of the theological student, Melanchthon viewed its goal instead as “acquiring a habitus shaped by knowledge and the skill of interpreting the dogma in the Bible” (Nieden: 2002, 151) – although Nieden

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also recognizes that the Praeceptor, like his predecessors within biblical humanism, had always looked for “the impetus toward application” (Nieden: 2006, 78). Timothy Wengert, on the other hand, asserts that Melanchthon did not carry on his exegetical work and his theological tasks apart from his own spiritual struggles, and he always embedded his study of the text in prayer and meditation (Wengert: 2003, 28 – 31, Bayer: 2000, 44 – 47). Johannes Schilling appraised Melanchthon’s translation of his Loci communes into German, completed in 1553, as a catechism which provides a meditation on the Christian faith and proceeds from it, offering thereby “correct teaching in a form that draws readers into meditation” (Schilling: 2000, 252) Furthermore, Melanchthon’s goal in his instruction of theological students always included the use and application of the biblical teaching within the setting of the congregation. He wanted to train these students to be capable of effectively applying law and gospel in their sermons, in such a way that the hearers could be led to a stronger faith and a pious life. In his plan for theological study of 1529, Melanchthon repeated those ideas which he had accentuated from the very beginning of the Wittenberg Reformation. During his entire career he continued to view the understanding of the ancient languages and the exploration of the biblical text, as well as knowledge of the writings of the church fathers, written in the ancient languages, as the basic foundation of the study of theology, pastoral care, and preaching. In 1546 and 1549 he held formal academic orations at the University of Wittenberg on the Hebrew language. He also wrote such an oration on Greek in 1549, which his student Veit Winsheim delivered. He noted that although by that time good German translations were available, the church needed pastors who possessed the erudition to deal with the writings of the prophets and apostles in their original wording. Indeed, in the New Testament, he asserted, many expressions cannot be understood without knowing Hebrew since the New Testament authors had formulated their thoughts within the context of Hebrew ways of thinking. In addition, if the theologian and pastor did not have a good command of Hebrew, he could not read Jerome, Nicholas of Lyra, or Paul of Burgos, to say nothing of contemporary commentators.2 In Winsheim’s oration on Greek Melanchthon underlined the importance of the languages for the battle against Satan, whose “guile and rage” continually threaten the church as he leads those who are interpreting the Bible into error. To guard against this, the pastor needs a firm command of the ancient languages (“De studiis linguae Graecae,” CR 11: 858, 860 – 62 [855 – 67]). 2 “De lingua hebraica,” CR 11:709 – 13 (708 – 15). Among contemporaries he mentioned Petrus Galatinus, the Complutensian Polyglott, Johann Wessel, Wolfgang Capito, Rudolf Agricola, and others. Three years later the Praeceptor repeated this concern but also emphasized how important knowledge of the languages was for checking translations and for grasping the most important concepts of Holy Scripture, e. g., the distinction of “fides” and “fiducia,” in “De studio linguae Ebraeae,” CR 11:869 – 73 (867 – 77).

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On the basis of reading the prophets and apostles in Greek and Hebrew the pastor was to practice the care of souls, above all through the preaching of repentance and forgiveness of sins, that is, by proclaiming law and gospel. Already in 1521, when he composed his guide to reading the epistle to the Romans, his Loci communes (Stolle: 1997), Melanchthon had developed his own “method” for the practice of theology, through the gathering of material under topics, the method that served all other academic disciplines as well. The Loci were to summarize the most important matters in the text and place them in the proper order. This process would aid students in attaining the goal of their studies. Melanchthon asserted that he had carried on the task of proper organization of biblical teaching just as John of Damascus and Peter Lombard had, but with a better method. The apostle Paul had done much the same thing by bequeathing the church a compendium of the Christian faith in the epistle to the Romans. Melanchthon further informed the readers of his 1521 Loci communes that the goal of his teaching was that the people “know Christ” [Christum cognoscere], for those who know Christ recognize the “benefits Christ brings” [beneficia Christi]. Only those who understand the demands of God’s law and flee from their sin to Christ in order to receive his grace will find comfort. The loci communes that convey the teaching of Scripture were intended to equip the preacher to effectively proclaim both repentance and the forgiveness of sins, also through the effects accomplished by rhetorical skill. This preaching comforts those who hear the sermon and strengthens them in their battle against Satan. Only on the basis of a faith so grounded will people produce good works (MSA 2,1: 5 – 8). Nearly forty years later, at the end of his life, Melanchthon ascribed to the Loci the function of a chart that serves as a memory aid, as he said in the introduction of his Latin Loci communes. By means of such topics, users (pastors) gain an overview of the articles of faith, so that they can instruct believers who are suffering spiritual assaults and thereby restore their faith, give them strength, and comfort them (MSA 2,1: 165). This also demonstrates that Melanchthon’s aim in theological education focused on the practical application of the biblical message. Melanchthon formulated doctrine in such a way that it would effectively impact the lives of the faithful. Peter Fraenkel has accurately caught the sense of the term “doctrina” in Melanchthon’s usage by defining it as a “verbal noun,” a noun that necessarily involves action. Concretely this means that the doctrine the student learns must be passed on (Fraenkel 1959). This concept can be extended even further. Like Luther, Melanchthon understood God’s Word, the source of Christian teaching, as the instrument of the Holy Spirit’s salvific dealing with sinners. Consequently, his concept of “doctrina” embraces the Spirit’s activity in accomplishing what the Word is saying. Threat and promise are the instruments through which the teaching of Scripture calls sinners to repentance and then to the forgiveness of sins. In contrast to the topics of philosophy, which do no more than offer a summary of the universal experience of human beings, God’s Word, resting on his

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revelation, handed down by the writings of the prophets and apostles and conveyed by the witness of the “purer church” in the Apostles and Nicene Creeds, is characterized by its great impact and reliability (MSA 2,1: 168 – 72). In 1559 Melanchthon repeated once again a fundamental conviction which had determined his concept of theological education for over forty years: through the “ministry of the gospel” God is active and enlists pastors and teachers in his service. They are to teach faithfully and refute false teaching (MSA 2,1: 171).

3. Melanchthon’s Concept of Theological Education in Public Orations In his university orations Melanchthon also expressed his views of the office of the public ministry and therewith his understanding of good theological education. In his “Oration on the Purity of Doctrine” of 1536, he explained what he expected from a servant of the gospel. On the basis of 1 Timothy 3:2 he accentuated the requirement for future pastors of being able to teach. The pastor should be “apt to teach” so that he can convey proper teaching to his hearers. That was the chief presupposition for the preservation of harmony – concordia – in the church (Oratio “de puritate doctrinae,” CR 11: 272 f.). In addition, those who preach and teach should possess virtue, humility, gentleness, and patience. For Melanchthon believed that doctrine makes its claim on the entire human being, not just his thoughts. Doctrine leads people into a pious life. Finally, concordia is possible only when the pastor himself is able to understand the entire teaching of Holy Scripture, which contains nothing that confuses, nothing ambiguous. Being able to express the teaching of Scripture with persuasive clarity was for Melanchthon the sign of good rhetorical skills. That presumed that the student of theology conscientiously incorporated “doctrina” into his entire way of thinking since Melanchthon assumed that the devil is constantly resisting pure or true teaching and trying to destroy peace through the deceivers he brings to the stage of human life. “The worst of all evils, the worst plague in the life of the church, is the elimination of pure teaching” [“summum malorum est, et certissima Ecclesiae pestis, purae doctrinae depravatio”], Melanchthon stated (CR 11: 277), and he cited the saying, “Plato is my friend; Socrates is my friend, but a greater friend is the truth” [“amicus Plato, amicus Socrates, sed magis amica veritas”] (CR 11: 273 – 78). Melanchthon delivered the oration from which these ideas come during his efforts at establishing concordia with the South Germans, led by Martin Bucer of Strassburg. During this period, however, he was also in controversy with the Roman Catholics, the Antitrinitarian Michael Servetus, and the Anabaptists, especially those who had established their own

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“kingdom” in the city of Münster two years earlier. But he expressly mentioned, by name, only one antagonist, the former Wittenberg student Georg Witzel, who had reconverted to Roman Catholicism three years earlier and had sharply criticized his Wittenberg teachers.3 Witzel demonstrated Melanchthon’s conviction that harmony and truth are inseparable. Melanchthon’s conviction regarding pure teaching, which arose out of the humanistic view of rhetoric that guided his thinking (Mahlmann: esp. 203 – 18), and his concept of the eschatological battle with God’s truth and Satan’s lie fused with his scholarly concern for “bona studia” [proper studies] (Fraenkel: 1961, 52 – 109). Melanchthon’s oration of 1537 on “the merits of theological study” offers a similar perspective. In it he pictured the office of the public ministry, which he interpreted as the duty to teach the public the gospel. The sermon, according to Romans 1:16, is an “effective Word,” through which believers recognize the “beneficia Dei” and love his Word with their whole hearts. That leads to a Christian life. Doctrine and life were, in Melanchthon’s mind, closely joined. From the beginning of the church’s history schools had been established so that the teaching handed down from the apostles could be preserved. The responsible exercise of the teaching office demanded an understanding of the gospel, which could not be attained if a person were only an “!utodid\jtijor” [self-taught], the Praeceptor asserted. This emphasis seemed necessary in the context of the Wittenberg theologians’ dispute with the Anabaptists over untrained preachers – called “Winkelprediger” [preachers who hide themselves in a corner, that is, those without proper official ecclesiastical approval].4

3 This context explains the emphasis Melanchthon placed on achieving “concordia” through pure teaching. It is not necessary to see this oration as a recollection of the recently deceased Erasmus, as does Weiss: 1990, 296 – 302. On the Wittenberg reaction to Witzel, see Kolb: 2009, 107 – 109, and Clemen: 1920, 132 – 52. 4 CR 11:324 f. Cf. the similar ideas expressed in an oration of 1554, “De Officio ministrorum evangelii” CR 11: 703 – 708. This oration began by urging that, in accord with the ancient custom of the church, pastors be examined every two years, so that they could be given good advice on how to preserve the purity of the gospel and apply their knowledge in useful fashion and to remind them of the importance of their functions as pastors. The “Ministerium evangelicum” is the most important assignment given to angels or to human beings, to teach the gospel of Christ, to preserve the purity of the gospel, to make decisions in cases of controversy over doctrine, to lead the church, and to keep it standing in the face of the rage of its enemies. The office of the public ministry delivers the voice of the gospel, which kindles a new light in human hearts and delivers the true knowledge of God when the Holy Spirit speaks to those who are listening and gives them eternal life. The gospel is God’s power to save believers. Melanchthon held that such teaching causes God’s will to be fulfilled. Pastors should promote harmony within the church by preaching the pure gospel and warding off any falsification of this doctrine.

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4. Melanchthon’s Implementation of his Concept of Theological Education Up to this point this essay has explored Melanchthon’s hopes and dreams for theological education. What did he do to implement these ideas? At times in his lectures Luther referred directly to situations students would face in pastoral ministry. Seldom, however, did Melanchthon make references to the application of what his students were hearing from him to their future ministry in the parish. He did, however, emphasize repentance and consolation as the chief ways in which God’s Word impacts its hearers (Melanchthon: 2010, 11, 13, 69). He also presumed that they would apply his frequent references to the proper distinction of law and gospel to their parishioners (CR 15: 563 f., 693 f., Melanchthon: 2010, 74 f., 200 f.). Furthermore, his concerns for the prayer life of believers (CR 15: 673 f., Melanchthon: 2010, 180 f.) or his admonitions to patience (CR 15: 671 ff., Melanchthon: 2010, 179) or his general treatment of Paul’s exhortations to good works (CR 15: 702 – 33, 782 – 92, Melanchthon: 2010, 203 – 38, 285 – 95) indicate that he was thinking of the application of his insights to parish life even when he did not explicitly draw the inferences. A clearer indication of Melanchthon’s implementation of his program for theological education is found in the questions he prepared in 1552 for the examination of candidates for the ministry in the duchy of Mecklenburg. Here Melanchthon expressed, in another genre, his expectations of those who were entering the public ministry. These questions reveal what kind of competences he believed young pastors should have and in what theological context their ideas were embedded. In his preface to this “examination” he described the salvific will of the Creator, who is at work as a God of conversation and community. God gathers his eternal church through public teaching, through which “he calls human creatures to eternal salvation.” It is God’s desire to give his Holy Spirit to all those who are converted to himself by the divine Word and who have true faith and trust in the Savior Christ, and in the forgiveness of sins received through the Lord Christ. He preserves and rules those who recognize him in true faith and call upon him as his beloved church. To accomplish this God “established the office of the public ministry.” It is his will that there be “public, well-ordered gatherings, in which his teaching is publicly presented to the people, and it is his will that through this teaching he accomplish his [saving] purposes” (MSA 6: 169 f.). Therefore, in Melanchthon’s eyes, it is absolutely necessary for the pastors to “know, learn, and present the teaching faithfully, in orderly and understanding fashion.” These assemblies are to implant and preserve this teaching pure and whole which God has revealed regarding his essence and his will, and which is comprehended in the writings of the prophets and apostles and set down in

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the Creeds: Apostles, Nicene, and Athanasian. They agree with Luther’s catechism and his confession [the Smalcald Articles], and the confession which was presented to the emperor at Augsburg in 1530. For “God is at work and exhibits his power through his Word,” Melanchthon posited, citing John 17:17, 1 Peter 1:23, and Romans 1:16 as support. The thirty-five topics which follow, often expressed in the form of questions and answers, served as a basic textbook for mastering the theological competences which the candidates could use in their preparation for their examination. At first glance it may appear that the questions do no more than check on what the candidates had learned at the university. To that end the Examination for Those to Be Ordained contains, for instance, polemic, for example against the Council of Trent or medieval ecclesiastical customs – Melanchthon had a horror of even the smallest appearance of superstition – and also against the Anabaptists, above all those in Münster.5 The detailed answer to the question, “why is the Christian church placed under the cross?” appears to be pure apologetic, but it also contains rich comfort for those who are suffering persecution (MSA 6: 214 – 21). Furthermore, a closer look reveals that Melanchthon had designed the entire Examination with a focus on how the curate of souls is to convey to the congregation the comfort of the forgiveness of sins, and he wove suggestions for how to accomplish that into the presentation (e. g., MSA 6: 179, 190, 192, 193, 195, 198, 202, 212). Again and again he drew attention to the power of the law, which turns the sinner to God, and the power of the gospel, which comforts the repentant, and he worked these themes into his answers (MSA 6: 183, 206). He also paid attention to daily life, for example in treating prayer (MSA 6: 221 – 27) or in presenting the responsibilities of life in the family, as well as in the social and political sphere (MSA 6: 236 – 39, 239 – 46). At one point, under the topic “on the creation of all creatures,” Melanchthon advised the candidates to consider in prayer “that we know that God has his creatures and our lives in his hand, and he can and wants to help us even above and beyond the usual course of nature” (MSA 6: 181). All this makes it clear that for Melanchthon the content of theological learning and teaching is directed toward the congregation which was hearing the sermons. It served to make the saving will of God effective in those who hear his Word through its power.6 Also in these questions for the examination, it is evident that Melanchthon’s pedagogical conception and its intended impact indeed aimed at the future practice of the students. His emphasis presumed a dynamic understanding of 5 MSA 6: 193, 195, 229 (against Trent); 205 f. (against the sacrifice of the mass), and 227 (against the invocation of the saints); 237 (against polygamy, probably a reference to the Anabaptists in Münster); or 201 f. (against the Anabaptists’ view of infant baptism), or 239 (against the Anabaptists’ view of temporal authority). 6 Melanchthon’s Examen ordinandorum launched a genre in Lutheran Germany ; cf., e. g., Chemnitz: 1569, and Selnecker : 1593.

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God’s Word, which is present in his theological lectures and not only in sermons and pastoral care. The lectures at the university were to prepare students for their ministry in the congregation.

*** Melanchthon’s assumptions as a humanist, which focused on the necessity of reading the biblical texts in the original language and on the effective application of these texts through good rhetorical skills, fit together well with Luther’s understanding of God’s Word and of the life of the church and even gave it new dimensions. The theological education which arose out of this “Wittenberg” definition of the Christian faith combined the delivery of the knowledge of true doctrine and the associated theological competence in understanding and interpreting the Holy Scripture with the pastoral application since the two were closely, inseparably, wed to each other. For Philip Melanchthon, good learning naturally coincided with God’s way of dealing with his human creatures through his Word.

Literature Asche, Matthias, Heiner Lck, Manfred Rudersdorf, Markus Wriedt (Ed.) (2012). Institutionen und Formen gelehrter Bildung um 1550 – Die Leucorea zur Zeit des “späten” Melanchthon. Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. Bayer, Oswald (2000). “Melanchthons Theologiebegriff.” Pp. 25 – 47. In: Günter Frank (Ed.): Der Theologe Melanchthon. Stuttgart: Thorbecke. Chemnitz, Martin (1569). Die fu[e]rnemsten heuptstu[e]ck der Christichen Lehre, Wie darinn die Pastores der Kirchen / im Fu[e]rstenthumb Braunschweig … in den Jerlichen Visitationibus/ also examiniret vnnd befraget werden … Wolfenbüttel: Horn. Clemen, Otto (1920). “Georg Witzel und Justus Jonas.” Pp. 132 – 152. In: Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 17. Fraenkel, Peter (1959). “Revelation and Tradition, Notes on Some Aspects of Doctrinal Continuity in the Theology of Philip Melanchthon.” Pp. 97 – 133. In: Studia theologica 13. (1961). Testimonia patrum. The Function of the patristic Argument in the Theology of Philip Melanchthon. Geneva: Droz. Friedensburg, Walther (Ed.) (1926). Urkundenbuch der Universität Wittenberg. Volume 1. Magdeburg: Historische Kommission. Junghans, Helmar (2002). “Martin Luthers Einfluß auf die Wittenberger Universitätsreform.” Pp. 57 – 67. In: Irene Dingel and Günther Wartenberg (Ed.), Die Theologische Fakultät Wittenberg 1502 bis 1602. Beiträge zur 500.

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Wiederkehr des Gründungsjahres der Leucorea. Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. Kolb, Robert (2009). “The Theology of Justus Jonas.” Pp. 103 – 120. In: Irene Dingel (Ed.), Justus Jonas (1493 – 1555) und seine Bedeutung für die Wittenberger Reformation. Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. Kruse, Jens-Martin (2002). “Paulus und die Wittenberger Theologie. Die Auslegung des Römerbriefs bei Luther, Lang und Melanchthon (1516 – 1522).” Pp. 113 – 132. In: Irene Dingel and Günther Wartenberg (Ed.), Die Theologische Fakultät Wittenberg 1502 bis 1602. Beiträge zur 500. Wiederkehr des Gründungsjahres der Leucorea. Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. Mager, Inge (1999). “Melanchthons Impulse für das evangelische Theologiestudium: verdeutlicht am Verlauf der Wittenberger Universitätsreform und am Beispiel der Helmstedter Universitätsstatuten.” Pp. 105 – 126. In: Udo Sträter (Ed.), Melanchthonbild und Melanchthonrezeption in der Lutherischen Orthodoxie und im Pietismus. Wittenberg: Hans Lufft. Mahlmann, Theodor (2009). “Doctrina im Verständnis nachreformatorischer lutherischen Theologen.” Pp. 199 – 264. In: Philippe Büttgen et al. (Ed.): Vera Doctrina. Zur Begriffsgeschichte der Lehre von Augustinus bis Descartes. L’Ide de Doctrine d’Augustin  Descartes. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Melanchthon, Philip (1997). Melanchthon deutsch. Michael Beyer, Stefan Rhein, Günter Wartenberg (Ed.). Bd 1. Schule und Universität, Philosophie, Geschichte, und Politik. Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. (2010). Commentary on Romans. Philip Melanchthon. Fred Kramer (trans.). 2. ed. Saint Louis: Concordia. Nieden, Marcel (2006). Die Erfindung des Theologen, Wittenberger Anweisungen zum Theologiestudium im Zeitalter von Reformation und Konfessionalisierung. Tübingen: Mohr/Siebeck. (2002). “Wittenberger Anweisungen zum Theologiestudium.” Pp. 133 – 153. In: Irene Dingel and Günther Wartenberg (Ed.), Die Theologische Fakultät Wittenberg 1502 bis 1602. Beiträge zur 500. Wiederkehr des Gründungsjahres der Leucorea. Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. Schfer, Rolf (1963). “Melanchthons Hermeneutik im Römerbrief-Kommentar von 1532.” Pp. 216 – 235. In: Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche 60. Scheible, Heinz (1997). Melanchthon, eine Biographie. Munich: Beck. Schilling, Johannes (2000). “Melanchthons deutsche Dogmatik.” Pp. 243 – 257. In: Günter Frank (Ed.), Der Theologe Melanchthon. Stuttgart: Thorbecke. Selnecker, Nikolaus (1593). Operum Latinorum Pars una, Continens formam explicationis Examinis Ordinandorum, olim scripta a D. Philippo Melanthone. Leipzig: Steinmann, 1584; 2. edition, Leipzig: Landtzberger. Smart, Ninian (1983). Worldviews. Crosscultural Explorations of Human Beliefs. New York: Scribner. Stolle, Volker (1997). “Erkennen nach Gottes Geist: die Bedeutung des Römerbriefs des Paulus für Melanchthons Loci communes von 1521.” Pp. 190 – 218. In: Lutherische Theologie und Kirche 21.

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Weiss, James Michael (1990). “Melanchthon and the Heritage of Erasmus: Oratio de puritate doctrinae (1536) and Oratio de Erasmo Roterdamo (1557).” Pp. 296 – 302. In: J. Chomarat, A. Godin and M.-C. Margolin (Ed.), Actes du Colloque International rasme (Tours 1986). Geneva: Droz. Wengert, Timothy J. (2012). “The Biblical Commentaries of Philip Melanchthon.” Essay 3 in this volume. (2003). “Melanchthon, biblischer Theologe der Neuzeit.” Pp. 23 – 42 in: Günter Frank und Ulrich Köpf (Ed.), Melanchthon und die Neuzeit. Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: fromann-holzboog. (1996). “Philip Melanchthon’s 1522 Annotations on Romans and the Lutheran Origins of Rhetorical Criticism.” Pp. 118 – 140. In: Richard A. Muller and John L. Thompson (Ed.): Biblical Interpretation in the Era of the Reformation, Essays Presented to David C. Steinmetz in Honor of His Sixtieth Birthday. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. (2009). “The Rhetorical Paul: Philip Melanchthon’s Interpretation of the Pauline Epistles.” Pp. 129 – 164. In: R. Ward Holder (Ed.): A Companion to Paul in the Reformation. Leiden: Brill.

This essay is the English translation of a lecture delivered at a conference at the Leucorea in Wittenberg, “Institutionen und Formen Gelehrter Bildung um 1550 – Die Leucorea zur Zeit des ‘späten’ Melanchthons,” 13 – 16 October 2010. It will appear in the German in: Matthias Asche, Heiner Lück, Manfred Rudersdorf, Markus Wriedt (Ed.): Institutionen und Formen gelehrter Bildung um 1550 – Die Leucorea zur Zeit des “späten” Melanchthon. Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, forthcoming.

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Timothy J. Wengert

The Biblical Commentaries of Philip Melanchthon

John a Lasco, the Polish reformer, wrote from Wittenberg to John Calvin that 1500 people came to hear Melanchthon lecture on the Bible (CR 44: 330). A clear indication of the importance of Melanchthon’s exegesis for his contemporaries! This importance, however, has not always been appreciated. In the eighteenth century Theodore Strobel had to compile a list of the Wittenberg professor’s exegetical works to refute Gottfried Arnold’s false claim that Melanchthon had led people away from the Bible. As late as 1960, no less a figure than Kurt Aland argued that Melanchthon held next to no lectures in the theological faculty (Aland: 1960, esp. 326 f.). Wilhelm Maurer even constructed a myth that when Melanchthon asked in 1523 to restrict his lecturing to the Arts faculty, he was facing a “crisis of vocation” that represented a distancing of himself from Luther in favor of humanism.1 This essay provides for the first time an overview of Melanchthon’s contribution to biblical interpretation. It depends in large part upon the index to Melanchthons Briefwechsel and the countless notes contained in the digests to the letters.2 It also uses, as the best listing now available of Melanchthon’s publications, the bibliographic material contained in Verzeichnis Deutsch 16 (VD16). Other discussions of Melanchthon’s exegesis in the secondary literature are referred to in passing. This essay examines three facets of Melanchthon’s engagement with the Bible: aids to interpretation of the Bible, biblical commentaries and lectures on the Old Testament, and commentaries and lectures on the New. Because of the complexity of the material, what is offered here may be viewed as simply a prelude to another scholar’s more thorough work on this subject.

1 Maurer: 1969, 2: 421 ff. and the refutation by Scheible: 1990. As we will see, Melanchthon seemed to have refrained from such lectures for the summer semester 1523, during which time he was rector and reformed the Arts faculty, and perhaps for part of 1525. In 1523 there were a plethora of theologians (Bugenhagen, Jonas, Francis Lambert, Luther, and von Amsdorf to name a few). See MBW §272 and 342. In 1526 he received a new position (MBW §446), and he and Luther were given special privileges by the elector to lecture on whatever they wished, which for Melanchthon meant holding lectures in both the Arts and Theology faculties. 2 The author wishes to thank Dr. Heinz Scheible of the Melanchthon-Forschungsstelle Heidelberg for giving him access to this material. This research was made possible by a stipend from the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) for study in Heidelberg during the summer of 1995.

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1. Aids for Interpretation of the Bible The Trivium. In his commentary on Colossians from 1527 Melanchthon insisted that eloquence, which he equated with the biblical gift of tongues, was necessary for the office of bishop. One could not understand the Scripture without a good grounding in grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic. Many arguments in the church today, he added, arose from ignorance of these matters and resulted in the deaf speaking to the deaf (MSA 4: 236 f.). What Melanchthon stated in his commentary, he practiced and supported in his own instruction. Thus, one of the most important tools Melanchthon provided for biblical interpretation was his books on grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic. In them he very often referred to biblical as well as pagan examples. In his first three years at Wittenberg he produced two volumes on rhetoric, one on dialectic, and one on Greek grammar.3 He made later contributions in these areas as well.4 As he wrote in the preface to the 1528 work, “Therefore, although it may seem inept to some, I have included with these [rhetorical] rules many texts taken from good authors and from Holy Writ” (CR 2: 1080). Textbooks of Theology. The Loci communes theologici, as Melanchthon himself often reminded his readers, arose out of lectures on Romans. In fact, this work provided its readers with an introduction to and an organization for the entire Bible. Editions of this important work spread themselves out over Melanchthon’s entire lifetime.5 By the 1550s young scholars, including Tilemann Heshusius and Martin Chemnitz, held lectures on the Loci communes for Wittenberg students.6 There was, however, at the same time a second text for organizing theology : the Nicene Creed. The 1546 statutes of the theological faculty, written by Melanchthon, called for lectures on this Creed. After describing the biblical lectures the statutes continued: “And the Lecturers will try to explicate the 3 De rhetorica libri tres (Wittenberg, 1519; cf. MBW §40 [T1:99]); Institutiones rhetoricae (Wittenberg, 1521; cf. MBW §161 [T1:334 f.); Compendiaria dialectices ratio (Wittenberg, 1520; cf. MBW §78 [T1:179 f.] and CR 20:709 – 64); Integrae graecae grammatices institutiones (Haguenau, 1520; cf. MBW §116 [T1:240 f.] and CR 20:3 – 180). 4 See CR 20:1 – 412 for his work on Greek and Latin grammar. He also provided a preface for a Hebrew grammar (MBW §34 [T1:90 f.). He produced a new book on rhetoric in 1531, the Elementorum rhetorices libri II, which he edited again in 1542 (cf. MBW §1183 [CR 2:542 ff.] and CR 13:413 – 506). A combined work on dialectics and rhetoric, Dialectices libri quatuor … item eiusdem Rhetorices praeceptiuncula doctissima, appeared in 1528 (cf. MBW §695 [CR 1:1079 f.]). A work on dialectics, Erotemata dialectices, was published in 1547 (cf. MBW §4875 [CR 6:653 – 58] and CR 13:507 – 752). 5 1521 (MSA 2,1:15 – 185), 1522 (revision of 1521), 1535 (CR 21:229 – 560), 1543 (CR 21:561 – 1101), 1555 (translation and expansion of the 1543 edition; CR 22), 1559 (revision of 1543; MSA 2,1:186 – 2/2: 816). 6 Notices for their lectures are in Wittenberg Faculty : 1562, 4r-5r (Heshusius in 1553) and 109v110v (Chemnitz in 1555). Chemnitz’s lectures made up a portion of his Loci theologici.

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entire doctrine [of the church], to which end (so that they explain individual articles in order) they may add from time to time an explication of the Nicene Creed” (CR 10: 1003). Caspar Cruciger, Sr. immediately began such lectures, which were then continued by Melanchthon after the former’s untimely death in 1548.7 He took up an exposition of the Creed again in 1557 (Peucer included this set of lectures, the Explicatio Symboli Niceni, in Melanchthon: 1561 – 1564, 2:210 – 376 [CR 23: 347 – 584]). Curricula. Throughout his life Melanchthon concerned himself with the reform of education and the establishment of courses of study for individual students. Invariably these included the study of Scripture. The earliest individual plan, a reading list written at the end of 1529 or beginning of 1530, included references to his Loci and to the Scholia on Colossians (MBW §854 [CR 2: 455 – 61]; others include MBW §3123, 7228, and 7331). In 1533 he reorganized the theological faculty at Wittenberg and included in its statutes the requirement for lectures on Romans, John, the Psalms, Genesis, and Isaiah, as well as on Augustine’s On the Spirit and the Letter (Friedensburg: 1926 – 1927, 1:155). Similar lists of biblical books come up in later statutes and teaching plans. When Melanchthon died in 1560, other members of the faculty had to take over his lectures on Romans, his catechetical instruction, and his Latin sermons on the Sunday gospels (Friedensburg: 1: 320 f.). When he left Wittenberg to attend sessions at the Council of Trent (due to a change in the political climate he never got further than Nuremberg), they gave instruction in Paul, 1 John, and Sirach during his absence (MBW §6307 [CR 7: 912 ff.], dated 13 January 1552). Patristic Commentaries. Melanchthon’s work on the church Fathers has been sufficiently studied by others (esp. Fraenkel: 1961). The Fathers, too, provided an important aid to interpreting Scripture. As mentioned above, Augustine’s On the Spirit and the Letter became a central part of the theological curriculum under Melanchthon’s leadership. In this connection he wrote a preface to a new edition of this work, produced in Wittenberg in 1545 (MBW §3973 [CR 5:803 ff.], dated July 1545; he makes reference to the necessity of studying this tract at Wittenberg). According to the 1533 statutes, through such lectures “the students may see that the teaching of our churches has the testimony of erudite fathers” (Friedensburg: 155). Melanchthon also lectured on other church fathers, including Justin Martyr (MBW §6526, 6632, 6646, where he makes reference to lectures on Justin to refute Stancaro). He used Diodore’s work in his explanation of Daniel (MBW §3082 [CR 4: 896 f.]). He published Nonnos’ paraphrase of John’s gospel (see below). Geography. One of Melanchthon’s continuing concerns for his own interpretation of the Bible was obtaining a proper sense of the Holy Land’s 7 These lectures were published in 1550 under the title Enarratio Symboli Niceni (cf. MBW §5778 [CR 7:575 – 79]), cf. Melanchthon: 1996, and included in Caspar Peucer’s edition of Melanchthon: 1561 – 1564, 1: 388r-442v (CR 23: 193 – 346).

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places. Sometime after 6 March 1522 he wrote to Caspar Cruciger, Sr. (then in Leipzig), in the hopes of obtaining a map belonging to John Reineccus, probably to use in the translation of the New Testament into German (MBW §219 [T1: 458]). At nearly the same time he provided a preface for a new edition of Jerome’s Ecloga de locis hebraicis (MBW §252 [T1: 515 f.]; he stated, “Nam qui sacras literas sine aliarum artium atque literarum adminiculo tentant, nae illi ‘sine pennis volaturi’ sibi videntur. Stultissime autem omnium sentiunt qui hodie nihil esse pietatem nisi contemptum omnium bonarum literarum omnisque priscae eruditionis arbitrantur”. His most lasting contribution in this regard came in 1552. Already in 1549 Melanchthon expressed the desire to publish a work of Philo [actually a work by Annius of Viterbo] as an appendix to a list of places in the Bible (MBW §5609 [printed in H 3606 and 3616], dated 15 August). The same year he mentioned to John Stigel how he longed to go to Palestine like Jerome (MBW §5624 [CR 7: 459 f.], dated 10 September). Then in 1552 he assisted Tilemann Stella in the publication of a map of Palestine. He gave copies of this map to a whole host of his correspondents.8 As a companion volume Melanchthon himself prepared a brief explanation of some place names, his Aliquot insignium locorum Terrae Sanctae explicatio et historiae. Although no copy of the original printing has yet been found (see the note to MBW §6362), it was quickly printed with works of Caspar Peucer, Melanchthon’s son-in-law and the editor of his Opera, and a “Monk Brocardus.”9 History. Melanchthon’s contributions in this regard have been introduced to scholars by Heinz Scheible (Scheible: 1966, 13 – 41). Melanchthon’s preface to the second part of Caspar Hedio’s Ein außerleßne chronick von anfang der welt, included a comment that such a history should be used in the church in order to understand the prophets (MBW §2138 [CR 3: 877 – 84], dated midJanuary 1539). Nine years later he provided the preface to Paul Eber’s Contextu populi Iudaici historia a reditu ex Babylone usque ad ultimum excidium Hierosolymae (MBW §5129 [CR 6: 862 ff.], dated 20/21 April 1548). His most lasting contribution was the publication of his own lectures on and expansion of the so-called Chronicon Carionis (CR 12: 707 – 1094). The first part of these lectures on the history of the world was published in 1558 with a preface to 8 He was in Nuremberg and received information about the map from his son-in-law, Caspar Peucer (MBW §6352 and 6360). See MBW §6358 (Paul Eber), §6388, §6448, and §6506 (Peter Vincentius),§ 6397 (Gallus Schamrot), §6406 (Killian Goldstein), §6409 (Adam Cureus), §6410 (George Fabricius), §6418 (Joachim Moller), §6440 (Georg von Komerstadt), §6441 (John Mathesius), and §6493 (Christian III of Denmark). (See also MBW §8551.) 9 The preface from Peucer to Joachim Camerarius, Jr., is dated 1 March 1554. It was printed by John Crato in Wittenberg under the title De dimensione terrae et geometrice numerandis locorum particularium intervallis ex doctrina triangulorum sphaericorum et canone subtensarum liber … Descriptio locorum Terrae Sanctae exactiima … Aliquot insignium locorum Terrae Sanctae explicatio et historiae …. It was later (1572) appended to an expanded version of the Chronicon Carionis. It has been reprinted in CR 20: 439 – 52.

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Sigismund of Brandenburg, administrator of the archdiocese of Magdeburg (MBW §8600 [CR 9: 531 – 38], dated April 1558). The second part appeared shortly before Melanchthon’s death in March 1560 (MBW §9269 [CR 9: 1073 – 77], dated 25 March 1560). By this time he had reached Charlemagne. Peucer concluded the work, publishing a completed version in 1572. Its mixture of sacred and secular history provide some sense of Melanchthon’s understanding of the historical books of the Bible (especially 1 and 2 Samuel, 1 and 2 Kings, and 1 and 2 Chronicles) as well as of the historical portions of Genesis and Exodus. Biblical texts and translations. Under individual books of the Bible we will see how often Melanchthon provided Greek and Latin texts of the Bible. He also was interested early on in getting his own Greek Bible (MBW §24, 25, 32, 35). In 1544 he wrote a preface for a Basel edition of the Greek Bible, in which he provided a thumbnail sketch of its contents (MBW §3741 [CR 5: 535 – 40], dated 25 November 1544). In 1519 he also asked for a Hebrew Bible (MBW §24 and 87). Years later, in the midst of his flight from a besieged Wittenberg, he could still worry about a copy of the Hebrew Bible (MBW §4529 [CR 6: 338], dated December 1546). Melanchthon was, of course, also heavily involved in the translation of the Bible into German, as were all the theology professors at Wittenberg. He was convinced that this translation would secure the University’s reputation for future generations (MBW §5369 [CR 7: 230], dated 6 December 1548). There is even evidence that the translation of 1 and 2 Maccabees in that text stemmed from Melanchthon (CR 13: 759 f., where Theodore Strobel is cited quoting David Chytraeus and Martin Mylius). His letters are full of questions about the meaning of words, the names of coins, and other related matters (references to this work in Melanchthon’s correspondence include MBW §205, 217, 218, 224, 226, 227, 257, 276, 394, 412, 792, 807, 816, 841, 844, 906, 1026, 1222, 3282, 3525, 3743, 4277, 5362, 7107, and 8006). Supporting the work of others. Melanchthon’s interpretation of the Bible did not take place in a vacuum. Not only was he dependent on the insights of exegetes who had preceded him; he also promoted the efforts of friends and coworkers, especially by writing prefaces to their works. The number and breadth of such introductions is astounding. Some works were aids to interpretation similar to those he himself produced. In his prefaces to both James Micyllus’ De re metrica libri tres and Joachim Camerarius’ collection of Aesop’s Fables, he stressed how this knowledge could be used in the interpretation of Scripture (MBW §2255 [CR 3: 756 – 60], dated 11 August 1539, and MBW §3850 [CR 7: 561 – 64], dated 17/18 March 1545; he made the same comment in his preface to Eber’s history of the Jewish people, see above). Shortly before the outbreak of the adiaphoristic controversy Melanchthon provided a preface to Matthias Flacius’ work on Hebrew words (entitled De vocabulo fidei et aliis … explicatio … ex fontibus Ebraicis, MBW §5466 [CR 7: 345 – 49], dated 1 March 1549). (Only later would Melanchthon’s first

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biographer, Camerarius, deride Flacius’ knowledge of that language!) Melanchthon also provided introductions to Michael Neander’s Graece linguae erotemata, where he stressed the need for languages to understand Scripture, and George Thym’s Exempla syntaxeos, in which he demonstrated how a knowledge of syntax could explain difficult texts, such as John 1:1 (MBW §6746 [CR 8: 37 ff.], dated 1 March 1553, and MBW §5073, published in Hartfelder : 1892, 61 – 65, dated 1 March 1548). Melanchthon also composed prefaces for individual commentaries, some of which will receive more attention below. Others included Justus Menius’ sermons on Romans and Alexander Alesius’ commentary on the same, Jerome Osius’ history of Saul and David, and Caspar Goltwurm’s history of Joseph, John Spangenberg’s, Jerome Weller’s, and Conrad Cordatus’ church postils, Philip Glüenspieß’ commentary on Philippians, and George Rhau’s publication of a harmony of the passion story.10 With Luther and the other theologians at Wittenberg, Melanchthon exercised some control over Wittenberg’s presses. Thus, a letter to Christian Hoffmann in 1540 voiced approval of his commentary on Titus (MBW §2340 [CR 5: 281 f.], dated 2 January ; see also MBW §6816 [unpublished], dated April 1553). From David Chytraeus Melanchthon received a request to publish John Draconites’ Latin translation of Hosea and Joel (MBW §6975 [unpublished], dated 25 September 1553). On the other hand, Melanchthon also rejected a commentary of Thomas Naogeorgus on 1 John (MBW §3438 [CR 5: 295 – 301], an opinion of Melanchthon, Bugenhagen and Luther for Elector John Frederick, dated 25 January 1544). For no other exegete’s writings did Melanchthon provide more prefatory epistles than for Martin Luther’s. His prefaces, sometimes under the name of others, graced Luther’s commentaries on the Psalms, Galatians (two editions), Genesis (two volumes), the Last Words of David (in Cruciger’s Latin translation), Micah, Hosea, Psalm 2, and Isaiah 9.11 He also provided prefaces for volumes 3, 4, 7 – 9, and 12 of the Wittenberg edition of Luther’s German works and volumes 2 – 5 and 7 of the Latin, many of which contained Luther’s exegetica (see MBW §4277, 5515, 5833, 5964, 6575, 6697, 7058, 7739, 7978, 8312, 9017). In the later prefaces one of Melanchthon’s goals was to show how 10 MBW §9077 (CR 9: 925 – 29), dated 29 September 1559; MBW §6696 (CR 8: 8 – 11), dated 1 January 1553; MBW §8913 (CR 9: 793 – 96), dated 1 April 1559; MBW §5972 (CR 7: 717 – 20), dated 1 January 1551; MBW §6698 (no recent publication), dated 1 January 1553; MBW §6696 (CR 8: 161), dated 12 October 1553; MBW §7248 (Bds. 360 – 64), dated 1 July 1554; MBW §2627 (CR 4: 105 – 109), dated February 1541; MBW §2056 (CR 5: 918 ff.), dated June/beginning of July, 1538 (see also MBW §858 [CR 1: 701]). 11 MBW §47 (T1:110 – 13), dated ca. 27 March 1519; MBW §65 (T1:148 f.), dated August 1519, and MBW §283 (T2: 75 f.), dated before August 1523; MBW §3411 (CR 5: 258 – 68), dated 25 December 1543, and MBW §6316 (CR 7: 918 – 27), dated 25 January 1552; MBW §5787 (CR 7: 581 – 85), dated 1 May 1550; MBW §3070 (CR 4: 887 – 92), dated 22 October 1542; MBW §3908 (CR 5: 760 – 67), dated 1 June 1545; and MBW §4205 (CR 6: 87 – 92), dated 25 March 1546.

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he and the University of Wittenberg faculty had not abandoned Luther’s basic theological insights. All analyses of the theological differences between these two reformers must be put in the context of this cooperation. Melanchthon’s occasional pieces on scriptural themes. Before turning to Melanchthon’s specific commentaries on individual books or portions of the Bible, we must briefly mention some of his smaller works on scriptural themes. These occasional pieces flowed from Melanchthon’s humanist training and hence may be found in his poems, declamations, and letters. Poetic renderings in Latin of biblical texts and themes included the Decalogue, Proverbs 1 – 3, the Song of Songs, Colossians 1, 1 Timothy 1 – 2, Luke 16, Daniel (Greek), Daniel 7, Exodus 33, John 17:26, Romans, Genesis, Isaiah 30 and the fourth evangelist (Greek) (CR 10: 492 f., 521 – 24, 524, 524 f., 525 ff., 559, 579, 579, 580 f., 631, 632, 650, 651, 652, respectively, and [for the fourth evangelist] MBW §8818, 8820, 8822, 8826, and 8870). We will examine his work on the Psalms below. While rector of the University in 1523, Melanchthon introduced – alongside traditional disputations – the declamation as a part of the regular life of the school (Bauch: 1900). He produced countless such speeches throughout his lifetime, giving some himself and (in part because of a slight speech impediment) writing many for others to deliver.12 Some of these declamations addressed biblical themes. Already in 1520 he had delivered and published his Declamatiuncula in divi Pauli doctrinam (Koehn 52; MBW §75 – 76 [T1:166 – 76], dated February 1520). In the same year he published his Adhortatio ad Paulinae doctrinae studium (Koehn 54, cf. MBW §94 – 94a [T1: 209 – 12], dated May 1520), CR 11: 34 – 41). Twenty-three years later he wrote a replacement for the Declamatiuncula, delivered by Christopher Jonas on 25 January 1543 (De Paulo Apostolo, Koehn 109, CR 11: 618 – 30; for his discussion in letters see MBW §3191 [CR 5: 56 f.] to John Heß, dated 11 March 1543, and MBW §3193 [CR 5: 57 f.] to Anthony Musa, dated 12 March 1543). Other speeches on specific biblical texts or personages include Querela Lazari (Luke 16:19 – 31), De emendato latrone (Luke 23:39 – 43), De quaestione Simsonis (Judg 13 – 16), De verbo orthotomein (2 Tim 2:15), De Jonatha filio Saulis (1 Sam 18), De maxilla Samsonis (Judg 15:15 – 17), De dicto Pauli: Deus est, qui efficit (Phil 2:13), De Maccabaeis (1 and 2 Macc), De dicto Pauli: Typus esto fidelium (1 Thess 1:7), De dicto Christi: Ego pro te oravi (Luke 22:32), De Moise feriente petram (Num 20:11), De dicto: Pater, sanctifica eos (John 17:17), De dicto Colossenses: Sermo Christi habitet in vobis (Col 3:16), De dicto Salomonis: Nescit homo, an amore vel odio dignus sit (Eccl 9:1), De dicto: Nemo rapiet oves (John 10:28), De dicto Pauli Ephes. IV (Eph 4:8), De dicto 1 Paralip. 17 (1 Chron 17:17), De dicto Coloss. III (Col 3:16), De dicto Mosis Gen. 35 (Gen 35:2), De dicto Pauli: Attende lectioni (1 Thess 5:27), De dicto 12 For a thorough catalog of these works see Koehn: 1984, 1277 – 1486. We will refer to the speeches in his list as Koehn with the number he assigns them.

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Pauli: Sis intentus (1 Tim 4:13), De dicto: Posui mea verba (Isa 51:16), and De dicto Pauli: Probet unusquisque (Gal 6:4).13 The last five alone were among those delivered by George von Anhalt, bishop of Merseburg, to his clergy. Melanchthon seems to have had a special place in his heart for John 17. Not only did he write one oration on John 17:17 for George von Anhalt (Koehn 164), but Jesus’ prayer for unity often found its way into Melanchthon’s letters written during the intra-Lutheran controversies of the 1550s (Koehn 164, MBW §5802, 6795, 6854, 6909, 6939, 7029, 7072, 7600, 7737, 7764, 7813, 7968, and 9268). On Maundy Thursday 1560 he concluded a letter of recommendation for one John Ferinarius by dating it “when 1526 years ago he made a most sacred covenant between himself and us, instituted for an offering, and he wanted us to be one in God” (MBW §9268 [CR 9: 1071 f.], dated 23 March 1560). In fact, Melanchthon often discussed exegetical problems or made reference to important passages of Scripture in his letters.14 Prince George von Anhalt received Melanchthon’s interpretation of Luke 2 and Acts 2 along with many of the orations listed above (MBW §4499 [CR 6: 322 f.], dated 17 December 1546, and MBW §6837 [CR 8: 95 f.], dated 22 May 1553). Next to the references to John 17, the most talked about passage in Melanchthon’s correspondence was Leviticus 18 – and for good reason. Questions about forbidden degrees of marriage had become a dilemma for the reformers ever since Luther’s rejection of Canon Law. Moreover, the particular instance of Henry VIII’s wives (to say nothing of Philip of Hesse’s bigamy) also gave rise to discussion. Thus, in addition to his writing De arbore consanguinitatis et affinitatis (VD 16: M 2557 – 2583, CR 16: 509 – 28), there are twelve references to this chapter in his correspondence (MBW §1180, 1695, 1696, 1705, 3360, 3534, 6660, 6666, 6865, 7296, 7324, 9036; cf. Jnsson: 1994). One occasional piece on Scripture demands comment because of its unique nature. In 1539 a small pamphlet, Sententiae ex Sacris Scripturis collectae, quae docent praecipuum cultum Dei esse, promovere Evangelium, appeared on the scene, published by a Frankfurt/Main printer, Christian Egenolph (it also appeared in German; VD 16: M 4214 – 4219, CR 23: 753 – 60). After a brief introduction there follow selections from the Scripture that demonstrate the centrality of God’s Word in the life of a believer. This booklet shows how loci 13 Koehn 94 (CR 11: 425 – 31), 96 (CR 11: 478 – 87), 114 (CR 11: 689 – 92), 116 (CR 11: 684 – 89), 135 (CR 11: 716 – 21), 137 (two: CR 11: 742 – 46 and 746 – 50), 139 (two: CR 11: 721 – 26 and 901 – 903), 151 (CR 11: 841 – 48), 152 (CR 11: 793 – 98), 163 (CR 11: 883 – 89), 164 (CR 11: 889 – 95), 167 (CR 11: 895 – 901), 168 (CR 11: 903 – 908), 219 (CR 12: 345 – 50), 223 (two: CR 12: 372 – 82 and 382 ff.), 282 (five: CR 11: 692 – 703, 750 – 58, 775 – 83, 799 – 806, 848 – 54). Not included separately in Koehn: De scala Iacob (CR 12: 195 – 200; Gen 28:10 – 17). 14 To name a few: Ps 91 (MBW §3425), Ps 127 (MBW §2255), Daniel (MBW §2053, 2067), Dan 9:3 (MBW §3293), Mt 15 (MBW §5071), Lk 21:25 – 36 (MBW §5690), Jn 1:51 (MBW §3380), Jn 15:5 (MBW §81), 1 Cor 2:1 and 14:10 (MBW §1293), Gal 3:19 (MBW §615), and 1 Tim 4:12 – 13 (MBW §4079).

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communes function in Melanchthon’s exegetical method. Like his earlier work on the Lord’s Supper, in which he gathered the “sententiae veterum scriptorum,” this work gathers the texts of the Bible around a certain theme.

2. Biblical Commentaries and Lectures: The Old Testament Genesis and Exodus. Melanchthon lectured not only to students at the University of Wittenberg proper but also in his schola privata, to those whom he tutored and instructed privately. It may be in that context that his brief annotations on the first six chapters of Genesis and on Exodus 20 came into being. A notice in a letter from April 1522 reported that Melanchthon was reading Genesis “on Sundays and Saturdays” (Barton: 1963, 78, contradicting the assumption of Sick: 1959, 3, that Melanchthon lectured on Genesis in 1519). In the preface to Melanchthon’s annotations on Romans and 1 and 2 Corinthians, Luther mentioned the existence of Melanchthon’s work on Genesis (MBW §230 [T1: 476,21 ff.], dated 29 July 1522). One can only guess that in the same context, perhaps for catechesis, Melanchthon also lectured on Exodus 20 (SM 5,1: LIX-LXI, CXXIII-CXXV, where these lectures are dated to December 1522 or January 1523). Both of these sources were first published by John Setzer of Haguenau in 1523.15 Of the annotations on Genesis, which found their way into the 1541 Basel edition of Melanchthon’s Opera, Melanchthon wrote that they were but “inchoatae enarrationes” for a book of the Bible that needed much more extensive comments (MBW §2780 [CR 4: 718], dated in MBW §27 July and later 1541). Hansjörg Sick has used them as the basis of the first part of his book on Melanchthon’s Old Testament interpretation (Sick: 1959, 7 – 31). Psalms. The Psalter is the mainstay of Christian piety and prayer, and it played a central role in Melanchthon’s own life. As he recounted years later, when his infant son, George, died in 1529, Psalm 100:3 became his foremost comfort (see esp. MBW §7460 [CR 8: 257 f.], dated 14 April 1555, and MBW §8092 [CR 9: 18 f.], dated mid-January 1557). In fact, his interest in Psalms remained constant throughout his life, beginning from some of his earliest lectures in Wittenberg. When Melanchthon was called to teach Greek at Wittenberg, it had been hoped that a lecturer in Hebrew could also be found. This proved more 15 This was only months after he published the annotations on John’s gospel. See below. The one was printed originally in November under the title In obscuriora aliquot capita Geneseos … Annotationes (VD 16: M 3460 – 3467). It was subsequently published by Caspar Peucer in his edition of Melanchthon’s Opera from the 1560s, vol. 3: 377 – 498 [=398] and passed from there into the CR 13:761 – 92. The other was entitled In caput Exodi XX … scholia (VD 16: M 3434 – 3442). It has been edited in SM 5,1: 3 – 19 with its German translation from 1524. It was also inserted into Melanchthon’s Catechismus puerilis of 1532.

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difficult, and Melanchthon’s early correspondence is filled with references to faculty searches gone awry. In the interim Melanchthon himself taught the subject, using among other things the Psalms. On 3 April 1519, he wrote to John Lang about his work on the Hebrew Psalter (MBW §50 [T1: 116,19]). Three months later he was clearly irritated when a candidate for the position refused to take over these lectures (MBW §60 [T1: 142,24 – 30] to George Spalatin, dated 29 July 1519; the Hebraist in question was Jude Bernhard, and in a letter of 21 May to Spalatin Melanchthon discussed the dismissal of a mediocre John Cellarius from that same position, MBW §58 [T1: 131,15 – 16]). No trace of these lectures of Melanchthon has survived, except perhaps as insights preserved in Luther’s Operationes in Psalmos, which were being prepared at the same time. It was no accident that Melanchthon provided the preface to that work, which he himself saw through Wittenberg’s presses.16 However, with this early effort Melanchthon was by no means done with the Psalms. On 4 July 1526, three years before his son’s death, he sent his closest friend, Joachim Camerarius, a Latin poetic version of Psalm 100 (MBW §476 [T2:440 f.]; the poem is reprinted in CR 10: 509). This was merely the first of several attempts at poetic paraphrases of individual psalms.17 The most important collection of these was part of a commentary on the Psalms, published in August 1528 by John Setzer, entitled In Psalmos aliquot Davidis … Enarrationes doctissimae (VD 16: M 3468). It has never been reprinted. This commentary also arose out of Melanchthon’s classroom instruction. When most of the University of Wittenberg was removed to Jena because of an outbreak of the plague in 1527, John Bernhard Feldkirch could write to John Lang in Erfurt that Melanchthon, after returning from the Saxon Visitation, was lecturing on the Psalter, Demosthenes, and Proverbs.18 The results were a peculiar smattering of psalm translations (Pss 1 – 4, 19, 32, 110 – 133), versification (Pss 4, 110 – 112) and commentary (on Pss 1 – 4, 110 – 133). Melanchthon made only brief comments on Psalms 3, 113, 117, 119, 121, 123 – 16 MBW §47 (T1: 110 – 13), dated ca. 27 March 1519. To complete Wittenberg’s commentary on the Psalter, he also provided the preface for John Bugenhagen’s work from 1523. See MBW §299 (T2: 100 f.). 17 In 1527 Melanchthon sent Camerarius a version of Psalm 110; see MBW §610 and 622. The Psalm is printed in CR 10: 517 f. In 1544 Melanchthon translated Camerarius’ Greek poem on Psalm 133 into Latin. See MBW §3502, 3514, 3515, 3518, 3552, 3625, and 3666. The psalm is printed in CR 5: 446. In 1547 he sent a psalm to Justus Jonas and Anthony Musa (MBW §4664 and 4704). A little while later in the same year he sent a rendition of Psalm 50 to Paul Eber (MBW §4720, cf. MBW §4831, 4842, 4861). Other Psalms found in the collection preserved in CR 10 include (with the dates provided by that editor): from 1524: Psalm 127 (CR 10: 488); from 1526: Psalms 119, 118, 112 (twice), 132 (CR 10:509 – 13); 1527: Psalms 4, 111, 81, 84 (CR 10: 517 – 21); 1540: the Psalms in general, Psalms 1, 2 (CR 10: 560 f.); 1541: the Psalms in general (CR 10: 571); 1552: Psalm 122 (CR 10: 606 f.); undated: the Psalms in general (CR 10: 651). 18 CR 1: 884 f., in a letter dated 13 August 1527. Barton: 1963, 84, refers to a letter to Camerarius that he dates with CR 1: 1007 f. to 1528. In fact SM 6,1: 400 and MBW §622 date this letter to 1527. The supposed reference to Micah is to Michael [Roting], and the mention of the Psalms may be to his paraphrase of Psalm 110 (cf. MBW §610).

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126 and 129. Setzer, who made a habit of printing incomplete works of Melanchthon, published this with his own preface. In 1529/1530 Melanchthon could recommend to a theology student that he study the Psalms, and in 1533 he made their study a required part of the curriculum in Wittenberg’s theology faculty (MBW §854 [CR 2: 455 – 61] and Friedensburg: 1926 – 1927, 1: 155). In 1542 he suggested to the Spanish student, Franciscus Dryander, that he study the Psalms on Sundays (MBW §3123 [CR 4: 934 ff.]). However, outside of a brief exposition of Psalm 127 that graced the 1539 preface written by Melanchthon to a work of James Micyllus, Melanchthon himself did not produce any lengthy exposition of the Psalms until the 1550s (MBW §2255 (CR 4: 756 f.), dated 11 August 1539 as a preface to De re metrica libri tres.). By then another Wittenberg exegete and Hebraist, Caspar Cruciger, Sr., had published lectures on the Psalms (110 – 118). This work, published in August 1546, was later falsely attributed to Melanchthon in Caspar Peucer’s edition of his works.19 However, in a letter to Camerarius at the time this work appeared, Melanchthon showed no indication that anyone other than Cruciger was the author (MBW §4366 [CR 6: 220], dated 26 August 1546; Sick: 1959, was unaware of this false attribution, a fact that undermines the value of his otherwise useful work). In the late 1540s and early 1550s, however, Melanchthon did return to the Psalms, providing students with an “argumentum et dispositio” for Psalms 1 – 60 and 110 – 132. These were published first in Peucer’s edition of Melanchthon’s Opera and then in the Corpus Reformatorum along with commentary on Psalms 51, 31, and 34.20 Peucer prefaced them with the comment that they were written partly in 1555, in 1553, and in 1554. However, a manuscript of Psalm 1 – 56 in Melanchthon’s own hand (part of the Bibliotheca Palatina), a clean copy in the same collection, and another copy in

19 It appeared in Peucer’s edition of Melanchthon’s Opera, 2:712 – 871 and was reprinted in CR 13: 1245 – 1472. In a letter from Cruciger to Veit Dietrich in Nuremberg, dated 16 March 1543, [unpublished in the Staatsbibliothek München, coll. Cam. VII: 77] Cruciger complains that Dietrich had published Cruciger’s version of Psalm 110 (Erudita et pia Psalmi “Dixit Dominus” Enaratio [sic!] [Nuremberg: John Montanus and Ulrich Neuber, 1543]) without checking with him because Philip [Melanchthon] had fully revised the section on verse three and on priestly sacrifice. He may have been referring to a text on several psalms, later published in 1546 under Melanchthon’s name; see VD 16: M 3487. (Cruciger’s text corresponds to CR 13: 1245 – 93.) This caused Dietrich to write Melanchthon on 31 March to ask for this new material (MBW §3212 [CR 5: 78 – 80]). Already in 1538 Melanchthon was aware of this older exposition and wanted to publish it. (See MBW §2086 [CR 3: 571 ff.], dated 31 August.) For a fuller discussion see Wengert: 1989, esp. 427 ff. 20 Opera, 2: 548 – 697 and CR 13: 1017 – 1224. A Hamburg manuscript of lecture notes on Psalm 110 includes the notation, “8 November 1550” as does a manuscript from the Francke Archive in Halle (Hs. A 25, no. 5). CR 10:606 f. dates the versification of Psalm 122 to 1552. Regarding the expositions of Psalms 51, 31, and 34 (Opera, 2:697 – 711; CR 13:1224 – 44), Psalm 51 bears the date 13 August 1552. Both dates fell on Saturday and may represent a continuation of Melanchthon’s sporadic engagement with this book of the Bible on that day.

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the Ratsschulbibliothek Zwickau demonstrate that these lectures were in fact delivered in 1547 – 1548.21 Before turning to Melanchthon’s other exegesis, mention must be made of the number of times Melanchthon encouraged others in their work on the Psalms. Besides writing prefaces to the works of Luther and Bugenhagen, Melanchthon’s correspondence indicates nearly thirty other times when Melanchthon referred to the work of others. The list included Eobanus Hessus, who turned the Psalms into Latin poetry, John Stigel and Adam Siber, who did the same, and George Major, who in 1547 produced an immensely popular Latin version of the Psalter with a set of single-sentence argumenta and other Latin hymns for use as a kind of hymnbook in Latin schools.22 Given Melanchthon’s fascination with the Psalms, it is no wonder that he could write in 1547, “Let us listen to the sermons of David in this way, as the voice of God sounding from heaven, through which God reveals himself truly and certainly to the church” (CR 13: 1017 f.). Proverbs. Next to Romans and Colossians, there was no book of the Bible on which Melanchthon produced more commentaries than Proverbs. Already in 1518, shortly after coming to Wittenberg, he announced a grand plan to produce a trilingual version of Proverbs (MBW §24 [T1: 75 f.] to George Spalatin, dated 24 September, see also MBW §25 [T1:76 – 77] to Christopher Scheurl, written the same day. Barton: 1963 59 – 60 disputes contention of Sick: 1959, 2, that this represented lectures). The first fruits of this interest did not appear in print until some seven years later in 1525, when John Setzer of Haguenau was forced to produce Melanchthon’s Latin translation of Proverbs under the title Salomonis Sententiae, versae ad hebraicam veritatem (VD 16 B 3573). Apparently, on one of his many trips to Wittenberg for manuscripts, Setzer had obtained and subsequently printed an error-filled copy of Melanchthon’s lectures on

21 See Bibliotheca Palatina: 1986, 143 f. The clean copy bears the date 1547 and Zwickau manuscript 4 January 1548 (the date the manuscript itself, which runs only up to Psalm 44, was completed). Because of the Smalcald War the University only reopened on 24 October 1547. 22 MBW §443 (John Agricola on Ps 19), 476, 582 and 614 (Hessus), §765 (Latin translation of Luther’s preface to the Psalms from the German Bible), 808 (Hessus), §1152 (the German translation of the Psalms), §1299 (Luther’s Summarien [WA 38: 1 – 69]), §1521 (John Campenius’ translation), §1868 (Luther epigram on Ps 23), §1923 (Hessus), §2017 (Hessus), §2101 (a complaint to Veit Dietrich for adding material to Luther’s exposition of Ps 51), §2952 (commentary on Psalm 119), §3425 (Dietrich of Ps 91), §4001 (Stigel), §4205 (preface to Luther’s commentary on Ps 2), §4366 (Cruciger’s commentary on Ps 110), §4908 (Major), §5282 and §5732 (Stigel), §5751 (Luther on Ps 16), §5825 (Stigel), §6077 (criticism of Andreas Osiander on Ps 71), §6219 (preface to John Reusch’s work on the German Psalter), §6837 (George von Anhalt on Ps 16), §6956 (preface to Nicholas Asclepius on the Psalms), §7622 (on the Psalm commentary of Apollinaris of Laodicea), §7831 (an anonymous work on Ps 67), §8226 (Latin poetry on the Psalms by John Sascerides), §9057 and§9124 (Siber), §9266 (a Latin poem on a psalm by a student, Adam Remp).

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Proverbs from 1523 – 1525.23 He entitled it PAPOIMIAI sive Proverbia Solomonis filii Davidis, cum Adnotationibus Philippi Melanchthonis (VD 16: B 3572 – 76, 3578, 3581 – 82, 3584 – 87, 3589 – 90, 3592, 3594 – 95, 3597, 3600, 3602, 3604 – 05, 3609 – 10, 3612 – 14, 3616, 3619; German: 3622 – 23). Melanchthon was so angered by this unauthorized publication that he forced Setzer to publish his Latin translation with an apology. In Melanchthon’s preface to the translation, addressed to then Duke John Frederick of Saxony, he made clear his hope that it would replace Setzer’s earlier work.24 Two years later, Melanchthon again lectured on Proverbs, in part during the time the University had moved to Jena.25 By the summer of 1528 he wrote to Camerarius that he was preparing the lectures for publication by Setzer.26 Indeed, in May 1529 the new annotations came out with an appropriate title, Nova scholia in Proverbia Salomonis, to distinguish it from Setzer’s earlier fiasco.27 The preface to the bishop of Schwerin, Duke Magnus of Mecklenburg, again echoed Melanchthon’s worry of unauthorized publication of his biblical exegesis (MBW §750 [MSA 4: 306 – 309], dated January/February 1529). He also rejected the medieval, four-fold sense of Scripture in favor of the “one, simple meaning” of Proverbs, which he found contained not only precepts for civil affairs, like the books of ancient Greek writers, but also instruction on fear of God, faith in God, the cross, and promises. In the aftermath of the Smalcald War, as the University of Wittenberg opened under the aegis of a new prince, Elector Maurice of Saxony, Melanchthon turned his attention again to Proverbs.28 By the end of the month Veit Dietrich, who had not yet been driven out of Nuremberg, could write to Melanchthon that a student had sent him the preface to the book.29 23 For these lectures see Barton: 1963, 79 ff. He refers in n. 129 to a letter of Spalatin to Veit Bild (dated 15 June 1524), where Spalatin expressed the hope that Melanchthon would return to his lectures on Proverbs which he had before his trip to Bretten (in February). A copy of student notes may be found in the Ratsschulbibliothek Zwickau, Hss. 38. 24 In fact it did not. The one was often published with the other. MBW §394 (T2: 294 – 302), dated April/May? 1525. Much of the complicated publication history is described in MBW. Melanchthon also produced several Latin poems on Proverbs at this time. See CR 10: 521 – 24. 25 See MBW §580 (CR 1: 886 ff.) to Justus Jonas, dated 28 August 1527. He mentions this in connection with lectures on Aristotle’s Ethics. The letter of Feldkirch to Lang also mentioned lectures on Proverbs. 26 MBW §693 (CR 1: 982 f.), dated 15 June 1528. He was also working on the translation of Isaiah for the German Bible. 27 Twenty-six printings, including 15 not in VD 16, are listed at MBW §394 (T2: 295 – 97). In addition, VD 16 lists B 3579 – 80, 3583, 3588, 3593, 3599 and German: VD 16: B 3622 – 3623. Many were printed with Melanchthon’s preface to the translation of Proverbs. The biblical translation of 1529 was very close to that of 1525. For the most recent publication of this text, see MSA 4: 305 – 464. 28 A notice from Melanchthon to the students was posted on 4 November 1547, and he seemed to have continued the lectures the following year (cf. CR 6: 719 f. and CR 6: 814). (As described below, he also lectured on Colossians.) 29 MBW §4971 (unpublished), dated 25 November 1547. It was probably CR 14: 1 – 6, the in-

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Two years later John Mathesius was begging Melanchthon to publish the lectures (MBW §5646 [published in H 2974a], dated 12 October 1549). However, publication did not occur until 1550, with Melanchthon writing a preface to John Albert of Mecklenburg shortly before 15 April 1550.30 Almost immediately Melanchthon produced revised editions, first in 1552 and finally in 1555.31 This final edition pleased Melanchthon enough that he sent copies to at least two of his correspondents (MBW §7492 [CR 8: 483] to Christopher Leib, dated 18 May 1555 and MBW §7493 [CR 8:484 f.] to George Agricola, dated 20 May 1555). Again he stressed the difference between Solomon’s Proverbs and the pagan writers. Ecclesiastes. In his first years in Wittenberg Melanchthon produced no commentary on this book, but showed some interest in making a translation of Luther’s work on this text from 1526 (WA 20:1 – 203, see MBW §513 [T2: 509 f.]. At year later he also wrote a Latin poem on the Song of Songs, CR 10:524). At nearly the time of his lectures on Proverbs in 1548, however, Melanchthon himself delivered lectures on Ecclesiastes, which he turned into a commentary that appeared six months after the Explicatio on Proverbs appeared. His preface to Joachim Moller in Celle mentioned how meager the interpretation seemed and how Melanchthon did not wish to publish it, save for the demands of “some people” (MBW §5912 [CR 7: 669 – 73 and CR 14: 89 – 93], dated 1 October 1550; he had already told Moller about the dedication earlier, MBW §5908 [CR 7: 661], dated 21 September). He liked his meager work well enough to send copies to friends in Nuremberg and Freiberg in Saxony.32 Entitled Enarratio brevis concionum libri Salomonis cui titulus est Ecclesiastes, it was very quickly reedited and published again in 1551.33 In a letter to Moller dated 6 August 1551, Melanchthon announced that he retained

30

31

32

33

troduction to Proverbs, where Melanchthon discussed the difference between teaching using dialectics or proverbs. MBW §5771 (CR 7: 705 – 10). The first printing, titled Explicatio Proverbiorum Salomonis in schola Witembergensi recens dictata a Philippo Melanthone (Frankfurt/M: Peter Brubach, 1550), came out in May. See VD 16: M 3330 – 3331. See VD 16: M 3332 and M 3333 – 3334, respectively. The third edition stated in the title that the explanation was presented in 1555 (“dictata 1555”). Only a comparison of the various printings would make clear whether this represents yet another set of lectures. The 1555 edition was published in Peucer’s edition of Melanchthon’s Opera, 2: 872 – 935 and in CR 14: 1 – 88. MBW §5926 (CR 7:680 f.) to Jerome Baumgartner, dated 24 October 1550, and MBW §5933 (CR 7: 689), dated the end of October. He also sent a copy to Moller (MBW §5941 [CR 7: 690 f.]) on 14 November. For the first edition, printed by Joseph Klug of Wittenberg, see VD 16: M 3158 – 3159. For the second see M 3160 (Klug) and M 3161 (Veit Creutzer, also of Wittenberg). CR 14:89 claims that there was a second edition produced in 1556, but there is no other evidence for that. A German translation was made by Stephen Reich and published in 1561.

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the old epistle dedicatory but had changed the argumentum that followed because in the prior edition it did not match with that epistle.”34 Isaiah. For the most part Melanchthon’s work on the prophetic material is rather sparse, consisting of little more than introductions. In 1549 he lectured on Isaiah and sent the early results to Bernhard Ziegler in Leipzig on 23 October.35 His comments on the text itself broke off in the fourth chapter, according to what was preserved by Peucer (Melanchthon: 1561 – 1564, 2:498 [=398]-407, CR 13: 793 – 806). Jeremiah. Peucer, who included in Melanchthon’s Opera a brief Argumentum in Ieremiam Prophetam, and the Corpus Reformatorum, which followed him, gave no indication of the origins of this material (Melanchthon: 1561 – 1564, 2:407 – 11 and CR 13: 807 – 14). In fact, it seems to have been published originally in tandem with the commentary on Daniel from 1543 (VD 16: M 2584 – 2586, where the title reads in part … Eiusdem [=Melanchthon] in Hieremiae prophetae uaticina argumentum.). Lamentations. Perhaps in preparation for language instruction, Melanchthon had the Hebrew text of Lamentations published in 1524, for which he provided a preface (MBW §309 [T2: 112 f.]; the printing, by Joseph Klug in Wittenberg, took place in January 1524). Some time after the Smalcald War Melanchthon wrote a brief introduction to the same book. Its origins are otherwise shrouded in mystery.36 Daniel. Daniel provides the one exception to Melanchthon’s reticence concerning the prophetic books. Luther’s interest in apocalyptic thought has been well documented. Melanchthon’s, which exercised considerable influence in its own day, has not; the single exception is the excellent article by Hans Volz: 1955/1956, upon whose work the following is based. Nevertheless, Melanchthon published several works related to Daniel and the apocalyptic visions that book contains. Melanchthon’s first foray into the field of Daniel’s apocalyptic took the form of a preface to a commentary that he never produced.37 Printed by John Setzer, it was addressed to King Ferdinand and described, using Daniel, the rise and fall of kingdoms up to the Turkish empire.38 From other letters written 34 MBW §6159 (CR 7:818 f.). He sent a copy of this edition to Michael Meienburg in Nordhausen on 19 September 1551 (MBW §6208 [CR 7:833 f.]). 35 MBW §5660 (CR 7:468 f.). There Melanchthon explained that he had begun with a description of the genre of prophecy (CR 13:793 ff.), then described Isaiah’s political situation (795 ff.), and had now completed a description of the teaching within the entire work (797 – 800). 36 Peucer’s edition of Melanchthon’s Opera, 2: 411 – 15 and CR 13: 815 – 22. For the date, note 816 f.: “Et umbram vidimus in hoc Germanico bello, factae sunt multis locis dissipationes Ecclesiarum et scholarum.” 37 Barton: 1963, 81, mentions an Aramaic text of Daniel 9 being produced in 1524. Another interesting contribution with apocalyptic overtones was the text for Cranach’s “Passional Christi und Antichristi,” Hartfelder: 1889, 581, no. 34. 38 MBW §769 (CR 1: 1051 – 56), dated before 11 April 1529. It was published under the title Danielis enarratio. Praefatio ad regem Ferdinandum (VD 16: M 4001 – 06). Melanchthon had already

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around that time, we discover that indeed Melanchthon had planned to produce such a commentary (MBW §776 [MSA 7, 2: 85 ff.] to Anthony Musa, dated 9 May 1529 and MBW §770 [CR 1:1051] to Camerarius, dated 11 April). It is not, however, clear whether he also lectured on the book at this time. Melanchthon’s second contribution came in the form of assistance for his colleague and friend, Justus Jonas, who wrote and published a commentary on Daniel 7.39 In a letter to Joachim Camerarius dated 16 November 1529, Melanchthon hinted that he had also assisted in the work (MBW §841 [CR 1: 1110]: “Ionas hic componit libellum de Turcis, cuius operis silvam nos congessimus.” See Volz: 1955/1956, 110, n. 50). VD 16 indicates at least four printings of this German work (Das siebte Kapitel Danielis, von des Türken Gotteslästerung und schrecklicher Mörderei [VD 16: M 4239 – 4243]). In agreement with Hans Volz one can only imagine the influence Melanchthon may have had on Luther’s preface to Daniel for the German Bible, first published in 1530 (Volz: 1955/1956, 111). In 1543, in the midst of another wave of concern regarding the “Turkish threat,” Melanchthon published his first true commentary on Daniel. We know from a note sent to Veit Dietrich on 4 December 1542, that this work was nearly completed and that Melanchthon hoped to have it ready for the New Year’s book fair (MBW §3102 [CR 4: 908 f.]). The lectures on which it was based must have been completed earlier in 1542. The preface, dedicated to Duke Maurice of Saxony, was written on 1 January 1543.40 Melanchthon immediately began sending it to his correspondents (MBW §3127, to Veit Dietrich; cf. MBW §3152; §3148a, to D. Melander, §3142 and §3155, to Frederick Myconius, MBW §3159, to John Sutel, §3174, to Anthony Musa). Philip of Hesse even reported how Melanchthon’s commentary comforted the Hessian chancellor, John Feige von Lichtenau, during his last hours on earth (MBW §3201 [printed in H 2237], dated 21 March 1543). Several early printings included an epigram by John Stigel, but Melanchthon also encouraged Camerarius to write Latin poetry on Daniel. This was published in a Leipzig edition of 1543.41 In 1543 Melanchthon was also deeply

connected the Turkish empire to Daniel’s prophecies in a preface written in 1527 and addressed to Archbishop Albert of Mainz (MBW §546 [CR 1: 874 – 79], dated before 20 May 1527). For the complicated history of the German translation and its connection to events at the second Diet of Speyer, see Volz: 1955/1956, 103 – 10, and especially n. 34. 39 For a discussion of the importance of John Hilten’s commentary on Daniel, see Volz: 1955/1956, 111 – 15. Melanchthon mentioned this commentary several times in his correspondence (MBW §833, 6435, 6450, 7777). 40 MBW §3131 (CR 5: 8 ff.). The work was entitled In Danielem prophetam commentarius in quo seculi nostri status corruptissimus, et Turcicae crudelitatis finis describitur (Wittenberg: Joseph Klug, 1543). See VD 16: M 3443 – 3447 and B 3817, 3819. As mentioned above, it included brief comments on Jeremiah. Peucer included it in Melanchthon: 1561 – 1564, 2: 416 – 527, whence it was reprinted in CR 13: 823 – 980. 41 MBW §3090 (CR 4: 898), dated 18 November 1542. The Leipzig edition is described in VD 16: B

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involved with the reforms in the archbishopric of Cologne. However, when a printer in that city, John Gymnicus, wanted to publish his Daniel commentary, Melanchthon wrote that it was too dangerous.42 However, the commentary also caught the attention of the Genevan reformer, John Calvin, who wrote Melanchthon in 1543 to request a copy of it (MBW §3169 [CR 39: 515 ff.], dated 16 February 1543). Twelve years later it appeared in French translation with an argumentum written by Calvin himself.43 This marked an instance of close collaboration between these two reformers. The commentary itself contained some of Melanchthon’s strongest statements against the papacy and the Mass. It is no wonder that he thought it dangerous to print the book in Cologne. Nor is it surprising that in answering charges of his opponents there he referred specifically to that commentary as containing ready-made refutations (MBW §3281 [CR 5:146 ff.], to Jerome Schreiber in Cologne, dated 21 July 1543). Melanchthon believed that Daniel described two signs of the endtimes: Antiochus and Antichrist. The first referred to the Turks, the second to the papacy. Thus, he wrote: “What happened in the papal kingdom? The name Maozim [Dan 11:38] alludes to the Mass and is related to the word Mazon, which means food or bread. For the chief idol in the papal kingdom is the manifold profanation of the Lord’s Supper” (CR 13:970; this connection contributed to Melanchthon’s later position in disputes between Lutherans and the Swiss after Luther’s death). In Melanchthon’s eyes Daniel offered comfort to the true church in the face of such enemies. Haggai. Nothing is known concerning Melanchthon’s brief comments on Haggai. It would stand to reason that they could well have been delivered shortly before he began with Zechariah in 1553.44 Zechariah. A note in Peucer’s edition of Melanchthon’s works stated that Melanchthon lectured on this book of the Bible in 1553 (Melanchthon: 1561 – 1564, 2:531 – 41 and CR 13:989 – 1004, under the title Commentarius Philippi Melanthonis in Prophetam Zachariam). Again the “commentary,” as Peucer called it, amounted to little more than summary statements, first of the entire book and then of each chapter. It seems to have formed a trilogy with Haggai and Malachi. 3819. Melanchthon had requested it according to MBW §3145 (CR 4: 757 f.), a letter to Camerarius dated 15 January 1543. 42 MBW §3259 (unpublished), dated 11 June 1543 and addressed to Conrad Embecanus. Already in a 18 May letter to John Oldendorp in Cologne did Melanchthon mention attacks on him because of the commentary. See MBW §3248 (printed in H 2176). 43 For the printing by Jean Crespin in Geneva, titled Commentaire de Philippe Melanchton [sic!] sur le livre des rvelations du prophte Daniel, see Catalogue Gnral: 1924 – 1977, 111: 847, §151; for the argumentum see Volz: 1955/56, 115 – 18. 44 CR 13: 981 mentions that they were published in German by Stephen Agricola in “epp. Lutheri germanicis T. VIII. p. 559.” They were included by Peucer in Melanchthon: 1561 – 1564, 2: 527 – 31, under the title Argumentum concionem prophetae Haggaei and in CR 13: 981 – 88.

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Malachi. Again, Peucer’s edition informs us that these lectures were delivered in 1553 (Melanchthon: 1561 – 1564, 2:541 – 47 and CR 13:1005 – 16). What is most striking here is that Melanchthon focused upon one verse, Malachi 1:7, as a prophecy of how the Lord’s Supper would be contaminated horribly in the last days of the church. He defined for his students the sacraments and words such as leitourgia, eucharistia, and diatheke (CR 13: 1009 – 16). Other prophetic books. Barton describes a Zwickau manuscript written by Stephen Roth containing lectures of Melanchthon on Micah 5 – 6 and Jeremiah 31. The comment from Melanchthon’s correspondence, which Barton applies to their dating, in fact refers to Michael Roting (Barton: 1963 85 f., referring to MBW §622; otherwise the material is mentioned by Hartfelder,: 1889, 558, who also refers to lectures on Hebrews 1 – 6). Stephen Roth was in Wittenberg from 1523 – 1528, but he may have obtained these notes after he moved to Zwickau.

2. Biblical Commentaries and Lectures: The New Testament The Gospels. To say that Philip Melanchthon was a layman, which he was, demands careful explanation. For Evangelicals the distinction between clergy and laity arose from one’s office, not from a rite. Thus, although he did not preside at the Lord’s Supper nor preach from Wittenberg’s pulpits, from 1519 until his death Melanchthon was a member of the theology faculty at the University of Wittenberg; he often wrote and occasionally signed ordination certificates, and he was depicted in a painting by Lucas Cranach (which still graces the altar of Wittenberg’s Saint Mary’s church) baptizing a baby. Melanchthon also preached – never in sermons as part of the German services for the town and university communities – but in early-morning (6 a.m.) Latin lectures, usually on the appointed gospels and other texts, especially for Wittenberg’s many foreign students who could not understand German well enough to profit from the vernacular services (Buchwald: 1924). This practice, which started in the 1530s, left behind reams of manuscript evidence.45 The sermons from 1541 – 1544 were assembled for publication (probably by George Helt) and published in 1544 with a prefatory epistle to Helt written by Melanchthon himself.46 Material from after 1548 was mixed together by

45 From the period before the Smalcald War, Buchwald describes manuscripts with sermons from 1533 – 1535, 1536, and 1541 – 1544. Other manuscripts contain sermons from 1548 – 1551, 1549 – 1554, 1549 – 1551 (with several from 1552 – 1553), 1554 – 1555, 1555 – 1556 (two sets). Later lectures dealt almost exclusively with the Sunday texts. 46 MBW §3546 (CR 5: 560 – 563, 14:161 and 20: 783), dated April 1544 by MBW. It was entitled Annotationes in evangelia, quae usitato more diebus dominicis et festis proponuntur (Wittenberg: Peter Seitz, 1544). See VD 16: E 4531 – 34, 4536, 4538, 4540, 4542, 4544, 4546, 4551 – 52,

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Christopher Pezel and published first in 1594 – 1595.47 The importance of Melanchthon’s work on Sunday mornings is demonstrated by the fact that upon his death the theological faculty assigned this work, like all his other, to be continued by a specific faculty member, namely Paul Eber (Friedensburg: 1926/1927, 1: 320). Matthew. When Melanchthon began lecturing on the Latin text of the Bible in 1519, he turned first to Matthew (Lowell Green’s thesis for earlier lectures has been shown to be incorrect, Green: 1957, and Barton: 1963, 62 f.). In a letter to John Lang from 18 December 1519, Luther bemoaned the fact that he could not send all the [Augustinian] brothers to hear these very lectures (WA Br 1: 597, 8 – 10). In a letter to John Schwebel Melanchthon also mentioned that he was lecturing on Matthew and would perhaps publish a commentary (MBW §68 [T1: 159,11 – 15], dated 11 December). By April 1520 he had nearly completed them (MBW §84 [T1: 194,67] to John Heß, dated 27 April 1520). When Luther threatened in the 1522 preface to the annotations on Romans and 1 and 2 Corinthians to publish these lectures, printers in Basel and elsewhere obliged him without his help (they were published beginning in May 1523 under the title, Annotationes … in Euangelium Matthaei, VD 16: M 2486 – 2497, reprinted in MSA 4: 133 – 208). Melanchthon never acknowledged them, and no wonder! They bore all the marks of a beginner’s work. Around 1540 Melanchthon, no longer a beginner, was approached by the Wittenberg preacher, Sebastian Froeschel (1497 – 1570), who was charged with preaching on Matthew at the Vesper services in Saint Mary’s Church, to explain to him the more difficult passages in that gospel. The request, according to Froeschel’s testimony, took years to fulfill, interrupted by plague and wars. At first, in a few days Melanchthon produced “dispositiones et summae” for each chapter. When Froeschel reached Matthew 5 Melanchthon began to add comments in German, with chapter 9 predominantly in Latin but with some German interspersed. In 1555, despite all the interruptions, they completed the gospel. Froeschel then edited these notes for publication after, according to his own testimony, having shown them to Melanchthon. By 1558 they appeared in print, published by George Rhau’s heirs with a preface dated 29 September 1558, addressed by Froeschel to the city council of Amberg, his home town.48 Peucer included it in Melanchthon’s Opera, whence it passed into the Corpus Reformatorum (Melanchthon: 1561 – 1564, 3: 247 – 591 and CR 14: 535 – 1042). It is a curious mixture of evangelical homily (tracing, for 4556, 4564 – 65, 4583; German: E 4592 – 93, 4595, 4597, 4600. The Latin edition was printed by Peucer in Melanchthon: 1561 – 1564, 3:1 – 246 and may be found in CR 14: 161 – 528. 47 It came out in four separate volumes, the first of which is entitled Postilla Melanthoniana. See VD 16: M 3979 – 3982. It was first reprinted in CR 24 – 25. For the complicated publication history, see CR 24: XIII-XLVI. 48 CR 14: 535 – 42. Its title was Conciones explicantes integrum evangelium S. Matthaei, Witebergae habitae in ecclesia, a M. Sebastiano Froschelio Ambergense, archidiacono in eadem ecclesia, scriptae a Philippo Melanthone (VD 16: M 2811 – 2812).

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example, the various comforts of the Passion story) and classroom instruction (giving definitions and answering objections). John. Melanchthon dealt with this book of the Bible only once in his lectures. A manuscript of them, destroyed during the Franco-Prussian War in 1871 as a result of a fire in Strasbourg, bore the date they began: 11 February 1522 (Wengert: 1987, 25 – 54). A letter from Melanchthon to Spalatin gave the date they ended: 11 March 1523 (MBW §268 [T2: 57 f.], dated 12 March 1523). Luther, who had threatened to publish them in his preface to the purloined annotations on Romans and 1 and 2 Corinthians, was true to his word. In the preface to Nicholas Gerbel, written in late May or early June 1523, Luther defended his thievery and praised Melanchthon’s work (WA 12: 53 – 57; the text, the Annotationes in Johannem, enjoyed at least sixteen printings in various forms during Melanchthon’s lifetime, VD 16: M 2473 – 2485, Wengert: 1987, 259 – 63). However, the printers in Basel actually anticipated Luther’s crime with their own slightly different printings of student notes. In these lectures Melanchthon not only rigorously applied his rhetorical insights to a gospel for the first time; he also borrowed heavily from Luther to construct a soteriological approach to texts that had traditionally been exploited only for their christological information. In 1527 Melanchthon had Setzer publish the Greek text of Nonnos of Panopolis’ paraphrase of the Gospel of John. Although this did not represent his own interpretation, yet it showed how important the gospel of John and the interpretation of the ancients were to Melanchthon. It appeared at the same time as his first commentary on Colossians (MBW §548 [CR 1: 925 f.], dated before 20 May 1527, see Wengert: 1987, 63 – 75). Peucer did not include the Annotationes in that work. In their place he put a commentary by Caspar Cruciger, Sr.49 This Enarratio in Evangelium Ioannis, first published in 1546, has now been shown to be Cruciger’s own work.50 To be sure, it represented the approach Melanchthon’s students were taking to this gospel as Wittenberg struggled to define the churchly context of their Biblical interpretation (Wengert: 1992). That Melanchthon approved of Cruciger’s work is demonstrated by the number of times he sent it to others (MBW §4267, 4252, 4256 and 5259). Romans. For Philip Melanchthon Paul’s letter to the Romans was the single most important book of the Bible (this importance is inadequately treated in Arno Schirmer : 1967). Already at the earliest stages of his career as an exegete 49 Melanchthon: 1561 – 1564 3: 592 – 878. He was aware that the Annotationes, with their strong support of the bondage of the will, was available in the 1541 Opera published in Basel. To demonstrate Melanchthon’s own judgment against it, he published Melanchthon’s preface to that collection (MBW §2780 [CR 4: 715 – 22], dated 27 July 1541, where MBW is unaware that indeed it appeared in copies of the Opera in 1541). 50 See Wengert: 1989. Note, for example, that when Melanchthon receives from Heinrich Bullinger a copy of the latter’s work on John in 1544, he wrote (in MBW §3487 [CR 5: 342 f.], dated 25 March) that he had in turn given it to the one working on John.

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he could write in the preface to Luther’s Operationes in Psalmos, “…in the Pauline epistles what is written in Romans points the way for the others as a scopus or an Attic Mercury” (MBW §47 [T1: 112,32 – 33], dated ca. 27 March 1519). Eight months later, to John Schwebel he described Romans as “by far the deepest of all the letters and serving as the scopus of the entire Holy Scripture” [MBW §68, T1: 159,7 – 9], dated 11 December 1519). When composing the statutes for the theology faculty of the University of Wittenberg in 1533, Melanchthon insisted upon lectures on John, Psalms, Isaiah, Genesis, and, of course, Romans (Friedensburg: 1926 – 1927, 1:155; he added, “Nam hi libri maxime erudire studiosos de praecipuis locis doctrinae christianae possunt.”). Four completely independent commentaries on Romans were published under his name. Even his Loci communes theologici had their origins in his interpretation of this book. A host of difficulties in dating Melanchthon’s early lectures on Romans has confronted researchers throughout the years. Although a thorough review of all of the theories and textual evidence goes beyond the scope of this work, some discussion of these problems is unavoidable (see esp. Sperl: 1958a, 115 – 120; Sperl: 1958b, 59 f.; Green: 1957, Barton: 1963, MSA 4: 9 – 13, all of which, to a greater or lesser degree, make the mistake of using internal criteria to date the material; for a [less-than-satisfactory] printing of some of this early material, see Bizer : 1966 and Bizer : 1964). In this early period Melanchthon held two or three kinds of lectures. He was hired as the Greek lecturer in the Arts faculty. Thus, we possess a series of lectures giving very brief grammatical and rhetorical glosses to the Greek text of various New Testament books. On 9 September 1519, Melanchthon defended theses for his Baccalaureus biblicus (MSA 1: 23 – 25. Cf. WA Br 1: 514). This gave him license to lecture on the Bible in the theological faculty. From this activity we possess lengthier annotations on five books (Matthew, Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, John). Finally, as preparation for the Baccalaureus Sententiarius, Melanchthon began work on Paul’s letter to the Romans that grew into his Loci communes theologici, first published in 1521.51 No one doubts that Melanchthon began lecturing on the Greek text of Titus, probably at the beginning of Wittenberg’s winter semester (18 October 1518). He then went on to gloss other texts of Paul and perhaps James, as is mentioned both in a University notice and a letter to John Lang (CR 1: 74, dated March 51 The equally complicated history of these lectures goes beyond the scope of this work. See Bizer: 1966, 87 – 131, where he reproduces CR 21:3 – 60, the Theologica Institutio and the Rerum Theologicarum Capita. In his correspondence Melanchthon calls this other work among other things hypotyposis (MBW §76 [T1:175,231], dated February 1520), obelisci (MBW §84 [T1: 195,70], dated 27 April 1520), methodus (MBW §126 [T1: 260,35], dated 20 February 1521), communissimi rerum theologicarum loci (MBW §132 [T1:270,4], the preface to the Loci, dated March 1521). For the Loci of 1521, see MSA 2,1: 15 – 185. Melanchthon made the same connection between the Loci and Romans in his preface to the second edition, MBW §1555 (CR 2:920 – 30), dated March 1535.

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1519 and MBW §50 [T1: 117,21 – 22], dated 3 April 1519; he also held lectures on the Hebrew Psalter mentioned above). In the summer of 1519 he lectured on Romans,52 in 1520 on the Greek text of Galatians,53 and in 1521 on the Greek text of Romans.54 With the degree of bachelor of the Bible, he could after September 1519 lecture on the Vulgate text, which he did beginning with Matthew. He then turned to Romans, first publishing the Latin text of Erasmus in May, complete with two prefaces (MBW §94 and 94a [T1: 209 – 212]; for one manuscript version, see Bizer : 1964, 309 f.). Luther reported to Spalatin that the lectures were well underway by June (WA Br 2: 122, dated June 1520). By 20 February 1521, he had reached chapter ten (MBW §126 [T1: 260,34] to John Heß), and by April or May he published the Latin text of 1 Corinthians and announced in its preface the completion of his lectures on Romans (MBW §138 [T1:279,2 – 6], dated by MBW April/May 1521). After lecturing consecutively on 1 and 2 Corinthians from 1521 through February 1522 (see below), Melanchthon began lecturing on the Gospel of John on 11 February 1522). Luther then “stole” the entire set of lectures and had them published by John Stuchs, the Nuremberg printer.55 Apart from the insights into the nature of justification, these annotations on Romans provided Melanchthon’s readers with an entirely new way to read the Pauline text by using rhetorical categories (Wengert: 1996). Seven years later, in 1528, Melanchthon returned to lecturing on Romans. By now he was directly involved in the publication of his exegesis. From his correspondence we know that Melanchthon was in Wittenberg for the summer semester, 1528, during which time he must have started lectures on Romans. These lectures focused primarily upon the dispositio, that is, the structure and outline of the text. Except for a short period from mid-January to mid52 MBW §68 (T1: 158,6 – 159,11) to Johannes Schwebel, dated 11 December 1519: “Per aestatem hance interpretati sumus Epistolam ad Romanos Pauli.” This would presumably have been on the Greek text. Although it is unlikely, these brief lectures could perhaps be preserved in the “Artifitium Epistolae Pauli ad Romanos” of Bizer: 1966, 9 – 30. The overwhelmingly rhetorical flavor of these comments is suggestive. 53 See below for a description of the Greek text and glosses. The lectures were begun on 17 July 1520. 54 This is the “Rapsodiai zum Römerbrief” that is given in Bizer : 1966, 40 – 85 as well as the “Breslauer Römerbriefmanuskript” in Bizer : 1966, 310 – 20. The Greek text included a dedication to John Bugenhagen. See MBW §142 (T1: 292 – 93), dated around May 1521. (These texts are so poorly reproduced, that it is difficult to understand their relation to one another.) 55 MBW §230 (T1: 473 – 77), dated 29 July 1522, where Luther described his “theft.” Barton’s assumption that these annotations stemmed from the 1521 lectures on the Greek text is completely unfounded. Not only do the texts published by Bizer demonstrate the nature of those later lectures on Romans, but the Breslau manuscript shows that the basis of the annotations was the Latin text of Erasmus. It was first published under the title Annotationes Philippi Melanchthonis in Epistolas Pauli ad Rhomanos et Corinthios. It was republished (often with corrections of the error-filled first edition) at least ten times by 1525 and translated into German. See VD 16: M 2447 – 2459, MBW §230 (T1: 473 – 76) and WA 10, 2: 306 – 10.

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February 1529, Melanchthon was away from Wittenberg. On 20 February 1529 he left to attend the second diet of Speyer, where he remained until 25 April. During this period Melanchthon gave the ever eager John Setzer a manuscript on Romans, containing material on Romans 1 – 5. Rather than wait for the rest, Setzer published it in May under the title Dispositio orationis in epistolam Pauli ad Romanos with an epistle dedicatory addressed by Melanchthon to Baron Herman von Neuenahr.56 Back in Wittenberg for the summer semester 1529, Melanchthon returned to lectures on Romans’ dispositio (Luther wrote to Spalatin on 28 May 1529 that Melanchthon was lecturing and writing on Romans, WA Br 5: 85 f.). Thereafter he gave the completed outline to Joseph Klug, who published it with an expanded preface in February 1530 (CR 1: 1043 ff., n. 1 – 5 and CR 3: 1284; for a comparison of the two printings and other information, see SM 5,2: XLI-LI). At the end of February Melanchthon was sending this expanded version to correspondents.57 This work was republished separately in 1539, in the Basel edition of Melanchthon’s Opera in 1541, and in Peucer’s edition of his Opera in 1564 (Melanchthon: 1561 – 1564, 4: 1 – 35, from which it was reprinted in CR 15: 441 – 92). Scarcely had he completed the Dispositio than Melanchthon returned to Romans, starting extensive lectures some time after his return from Augsburg in October 1530. The lectures and the commentary that arose from them developed parallel to his work on the Apology of the Augsburg Confession. According to Melanchthon’s own testimony, here for the first time he interpreted Paul’s statements about justification even more clearly than in the Apology.58 As part of Melanchthon’s continuing efforts to defend the evangelical position confessed in Augsburg, he dedicated the August 1532 preface to the Archbishop Albert of Mainz.59 During this time Melanchthon sent out copies to many people and even received a gift from the archbishop for his troubles.60 With the Dispositio and the Commentarii Melanchthon set the standard for dealing with Romans in Wittenberg, so that twenty-five years later his student, George Major, would also write two commentaries on 56 MBW §767 (CR 1: 1043 – 45), dated between 13 March and 25 April 1529 and written in Speyer. According to Melanchthon Romans “veluti methodum universae scripturae contineat.” Past interpreters went astray by ignoring Paul’s dispositio. 57 MBW §866 (CR 1: 1084 ff.), MBW §868 (CR 2: 17 f.) and MBW §870 (CR 1: 1086), all dated to the end of February 1530 by MBW. George Rhau also produced an edition in 1530. See VD 16: M 3042 – 3046 for a more complete list of printings. 58 The only reference to his work on this material came at the end of May or beginning of June 1532 (MBW §1250 [CR 2: 567 f.]); cf. a letter to Joachim Camerarius, dated 1 January 1533 (MBW §1299 [CR 2: 623 f.]). On 23 May 1533, not long after completing these lectures, Melanchthon turned his attention to the Loci communes, MBW §1351 and CR 21: 753 f. 59 MBW §1276 (CR 2: 611 – 14). For this work, entitled Commentarii in epistolam Pauli ad Romanos, see the excellent edition of Rolf Schäfer in MSA 5. For its content, see Schäfer : 1963. 60 See MBW §1282 (CR 2: 615 f.), dated around 20 September 1532; MBW §1286 (CR 2: 615), dated 18 October ; MBW §1287 (CR 2: 617 f.), dated 25 October ; MBW §1288, dated 27 October. For references to Archbishop Albert, see MBW §1292 (CR 2: 627 f.) and MBW §1301 (CR 2: 625 ff.).

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Romans, with one exclusively dedicated to the rhetorical structure and the other to the theology (Wengert: 1997a). Major provided students with a “rhetorical” outline of each of Paul’s letters, but none was as detailed as that for Romans. When Melanchthon prepared his theological testament in 1539, he confessed his faith according to what he had written in the second edition of the Loci communes of 1535 and the commentary on Romans of 1532 (MBW §2302 [CR 3: 825 – 28], dated before 12 November 1539). Nevertheless, even this extensive commentary was not Melanchthon’s last word. Already in 1533 Caspar Aquila, preacher in Saalfeld, was calling for a new edition of the Commentarii (MBW §1303 [CR 4: 1014 f.], dated January 1533). Even Melanchthon seemed dissatisfied (MBW §1809 [CR 3:875 f.], dated around the middle of November 1536). When Peter Braubach, the south German printer, called for a new edition in 1538, Melanchthon finally acted (MBW §2092 [CR 3:585 ff.] to John Brenz, dated 15 September 1538). This revised edition, which may well have been connected to lectures at the university, was published by Krafft Müller in Strasbourg in March 1540. In its new preface, now addressed to Landgrave Philip of Hesse, Melanchthon described how his appeal to the bishops (he must have had Albert of Mainz in mind) had gone for naught.61 Melanchthon was still not done with Romans. After all, the statutes of the university demanded that lectures on Romans be held. From the public announcements for the university, we discover that indeed Melanchthon lectured on Romans over and over again. We have such notices for 1544, 1546, 1548, and 1552.62 Although, with one exception, no traces of these lectures have come down to us, we do have an argumentum attributed to Melanchthon in the interpretation of Romans by George Major, who lectured on that book in 1555. Whether Melanchthon wrote this specifically for Major or whether the latter used portions of Melanchthon’s earlier lectures (but not those of 1552) is unclear. In any event Major included it in his Series et Dispositio on Romans, published in 1556 and never republished (Wengert: 1997a; VD 16: M 2185; it was reprinted in Major ; 1569/1570, 1: 100 – 64, VD 16: M 1988). This argumentum and the ones written for Ephesians and Philippians demonstrate one way in which Melanchthon shaped the exegetical work of his contemporaries, by furnishing them with an outline of a particular book. The students would then expatiate on these insights in their own lectures (this certainly is the case for Major’s work on Paul and may also be the case for Cruciger). 61 MBW §2336 (CR 3: 896 – 901), dated 1 January 1540. Other comments on this edition are found in MBW §2407, 2340, 2416 and 3102. For example, in MBW §2407 (CR 3: 987 ff.), dated 5 April 1540, Melanchthon complains to Camerarius about printers’ mistakes in the material on justification. For the printings of both editions see VD 16: M 2740 – 2747. This was reprinted by Peucer in Melanchthon: 1561 – 1564, 3: 879 – 1091 and thence in CR 15: 493 – 796. No one has yet undertaken a thorough comparison of these two editions of the Commentarii. 62 Reprinted in CR 5: 532 (22 November 1544), CR 6: 121 f. (30 April 1546), CR 7: 151 (18 September 1548), and CR 7: 1048 f. (5 July 1552). On the latter lectures, see below.

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At the same time Major was providing Wittenberg’s students with an outline to Romans, Melanchthon himself held lectures on the same book that eventually became his final published commentary. As mentioned above, Melanchthon announced his lectures on 5 August 1552 (CR 7: 1048 f.). When the university was moved to the Torgau later that year, Melanchthon continued his lectures, as he recalled to the Englishman, John Hales, several years later (MBW §7554 [ARG 74 (1983): 69 f.], dated 18 August 1555; for Hales’ presence in the Torgau, see MBW §6668 [CR 7: 1149 f.], dated 11 December 1552). In that same letter Melanchthon announced that these very lectures were about to be published. Indeed, in the first half of April 1556, Melanchthon was writing a preface, addressing it to Ulrich Mordeisen in Dresden.63 In it he attacked the false interpretations of Romans by Origen, Osiander, and Staphylus. He must have been very pleased with the results, since his correspondence reveals that between 13 April and 12 October 1556, he sent copies to at least fifteen people (MBW §7784, 7795, 7807 & 7869, 7811, 7812, 7825, 7827, 7828, 7832, 7833, 7837, 7854, 7861, 7898, 7987, and 8009). With the Enarratio his engagement with Paul’s foremost letter came to a close. That work had spanned Melanchthon’s entire academic life at Wittenberg, from the brief glosses read out in 1519 through the revolutionary annotations of 1522 to the magisterial works of 1530, 1532, 1540 and 1556. Romans functioned for Melanchthon not so much as a “canon within the canon” – as if he could thereby ignore or distort other books through his single-minded interest – but as a key to the entire Bible, providing the exegete with both the goal (scopus) of the Scripture and the proper method (methodus) for interpretation. 1 and 2 Corinthians. Philip Melanchthon never published a commentary to the Corinthian correspondence on his own initiative. Instead his lectures on these books were twice published by colleagues, once at the beginning of his career and once shortly after his death. The situations that gave rise to both sets of lectures are well documented. In the first case Melanchthon published an Erasmian Latin text of 1 Corinthians in April or May of 1521 in anticipation of his lectures (MBW §138 [T1: 279 – 80]). According to the notes of George Major, at that time a student at the University of Wittenberg, the lectures began on 29 May and ended on 30 October.64 Notes from these lectures became part of Luther’s first “theft” of Melanchthon’s exegetica.65 In September or October 63 MBW §7785 (CR 8: 737 – 41). The work bore the title Epistolae Pauli scriptae ad Romanos enarratio. See VD 16: M 3216 – 3219. It was reprinted by Peucer in Melanchthon: 1561 – 1564, 4: 35 – 209 and is found in CR 15: 797 – 1052. The argumentum is different from that found in Major’s work. 64 See MSA 7,1:146 f., n. 11. On around 20 October 1521 Melanchthon reported to Spalatin that Wolfgang Capito had just heard his lecture on 1 Corinthians 13. See MBW §175 (T1: 373,66 ff.). 65 See MBW §230 for Luther’s preface of 29 July 1522. A copy of the lectures owned by Daniel Schillingk is in the Bratislava University Library, Ms. M 1448. There is also a copy of annotations on 1 and 2 Corinthians in the Landesbibliothek Stuttgart (this fact was communicated to the

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there followed publication of the Latin text of 2 Corinthians (MBW §172 [T1: 357 f.]). In the prefaces to both texts Melanchthon stressed how Paul’s words underscored the differences between the Christian and the “papistic” churches. In 2 Corinthians he additionally emphasized the meaning of true penitence. These lectures, completed by 11 February 1522 (when Melanchthon began lecturing on John), were a part of Luther’s “loot” and enjoyed widespread publication success (MBW §230 lists eleven printings from 1522 – 1525). John Agricola’s 1527 translation changed Melanchthon’s views on penitence markedly (VD 16: M 2457 – 2459). In the second case Melanchthon provided lectures (not just an argumentum) for Paul Eber to deliver in 1550 – 1551 at the University of Wittenberg. Actually, Melanchthon may have had lectures prepared as early as 1547. At that time, in a letter to Jerome Besold of Nuremberg, he promised to complete annotations on 1 Corinthians that he had [recently] begun (MBW §4550 [CR 6: 363 f.], dated 14 January 1547). It could be that this manuscript became the basis for Eber’s lectures. In any event, he made reference in a letter to John Mathesius dated 23 October 1549, that Paul Eber was dictating an Enarratio on 1 Corinthians (MBW §5659 [CR 7: 487]). Unlike most commentaries of Melanchthon, this one is based directly upon the Greek. The text of these lectures, which included comments on the first three chapters of 2 Corinthians, was published in 1561 by Eber, under the title Brevis et utilis commentarius in priorem epistolam Pauli ad Corinthios, et in aliquot capita secundae.66 Eber included a lengthy preface to Duke Wolfgang of the Rhenish Palatinate, not only describing the contours of the Corinthian correspondence but also the circumstances under which Melanchthon wrote his commentary. Eber also managed to attack Tilemann Heshusius, who had recently been driven out of Heidelberg for his views on the Lord’s Supper (dated 1 January 1561, see CR 15: 1053 – 64). In fact, among the most important aspects of this commentary is the lengthy interpretation of the texts related to the Lord’s Supper (CR 15: 1107 – 13, 1121 – 25; a comparison of this text to Melanchthon’s original would be instructive). Galatians. During the initial years of his tenure at the University of Wittenberg, Philip Melanchthon was an instructor of Greek. In his case he not only read classical texts with his students but also biblical ones, beginning with Titus. As we have seen above, he lectured on the Greek text of Romans in 1521. Before that, in 1520, his text was Galatians. Melchior Lotther published the Greek text in 1520, and, if a marginal notation in one copy is to be believed,

author in 1981 by Dr. Stefan Strom, who planned to publish them). For the text and commentary of Romans and Corinthians, see the Fulda manuscript described by Bizer : 1964, 309 f. For Luther’s printing, see MSA 4: 16 – 84. 66 VD 16: M 2618. This was reprinted by Peucer in Melanchthon: 1561 – 1564, 4: 210 – 323 and in CR 15: 1053 – 1220. The original manuscript, in Melanchthon’s hand, is in the Herzog August Bibliothek, Wolfenbüttel. For a complete description see Thüringer: 1982, 96 f.

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Melanchthon began lectures on 17 July of the same year (SM 6,1: 133, n. 1 and Green: 1957, 147). A manuscript published in this century evinces fragments of an argumentum, labeled in the manuscript an “Exegesis Methodica” (Bizer : 1964, 32 – 37). Whether this is the product of Melanchthon’s “Schola privata” as Bizer imagines, is questionable. It seems more likely to fit into the same pattern of biblical interpretation as the lectures on the Greek text of Titus and Romans. (Presumably, translation and textual comments would also have accompanied such work.) Melanchthon’s concern for rhetorical analysis of Paul’s letters is found throughout. However, the proper theological commentary in Melanchthon’s eyes was Luther’s own work on Galatians, which the former heartily had recommended to John Heß only a few months before giving these lectures.67 Ephesians. While George Major was absent from Wittenberg, serving as superintendent in Eisleben (1551 – 1552), he asked Melanchthon to help him publish his lectures on Ephesians. Melanchthon responded by asking him to whom he ought to dedicate them.68 He then wrote, under Major’s name, a dedicatory epistle to King Christian III of Denmark.69 This dedication paid no attention to the book of Ephesians. However, it was not Melanchthon’s only contribution to Major’s work. The commentary also included an argumentum, which Major attributed to Melanchthon.70 Philippians. For Melanchthon this letter reflected the various moods of the apostle Paul as he rejoiced in the light of the gospel among the godly, deplored scandal, and became angry at the imposters. While Melanchthon produced no commentary on this book per se, we do have two pieces that contain his overall assessment of it. In February 1541 Melanchthon ghost-wrote for Christopher Hoffmann of Jena the preface to Hoffmann’s Commentarius in epistolam Pauli ad Philippensis, to be published by Peter Braubach in Frankfurt am Main.71 In this letter Melanchthon examined how the Pauline word “euphema” (Phil 4:8) defined the study of the gospel. He drew parallels between Paul’s attackers and 67 MBW §84 (T1: 189 – 97, especially 195,75 – 79), dated 27 April 1520. Luther’s commentary was the thread of Theseus that may be followed into the labyrinths of this literature. As noted above, Melanchthon wrote prefaces to both the 1519 and 1523 editions. 68 MBW §6417 (CR 7: 984 f.), dated 17 April 1552. He published them as a way of demonstrating his orthodoxy against charges that sparked the so-called Majoristic controversy. 69 MBW §6435 (CR 7: 994 – 98), dated 5 May 1552. The commentary was entitled: Enarratio Epistolae Pauli scriptae ad Ephesios, collecta a Georgio Maiore (Wittenberg: Veit Kreutzer, 1552; reprinted 1557; =VD 16: M 2023 – 2024). It was also included in Major : 1569 – 1570, 1: 551 – 729, where the word collecta in the title is replaced with the words ”praelecta et edita”. 70 Found in Major : 1569 – 1570, 1: 554 – 64, labeled “Argumentum Epistolae ad Ephesios, authore Philippo Melanthone.” It is not found in any modern editions of Melanchthon’s works. 71 MBW §2627 (CR 4: 105 – 109), addressed to Philip Glüenspieß of Mansfeld. (See MBW §2343 for other examples of Melanchthon’s work writing prefaces for Hoffmann.) As MBW points out, a letter from Hoffmann to Paul Eber from 10 March 1541 demonstrates that the preface is Melanchthon’s.

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those of other periods in the church’s history, including Melanchthon’s own day. Nine years later, Melanchthon provided his student and colleague, George Major, with an argumentum of Philippians for the younger man’s lectures on that book.72 In the commentary Major noted that Melanchthon had written this piece in 1550.73 It began with a brief description of Philippi and a discussion of Paul’s call to Macedonia (sections that may have been written by Major) before launching into an outline of the book itself and ending with an extended analysis of Philippians 4:8. Colossians. Next to Paul’s letter to the Romans, no book of the New Testament received more attention from Melanchthon than Colossians. His first encounter with this book came late in 1526, with lectures that likely stretched into the spring of 1527. Several topics dominated his interpretation: the limits of human reason and free choice (over against Erasmus), the nature of repentance (over against John Agricola, who in 1527 published his sermons on the same book delivered at the first Diet of Speyer), and the nature of human and divine righteousness (over against Müntzer and the peasant revolutionaries). A portion of this exegesis, a concise declamatio on the limits of philosophia, based upon Colossians 2:8, was published during August 1527 in Basel, probably without the author’s knowledge.74 At nearly the same time a commentary, based upon these same lectures, also appeared, bearing the title Scholia in Epistolam Pauli ad Colossenses.75 For the first time Melanchthon had edited and published a biblical commentary himself. Gone were the days of Luther’s petty thievery! However, in the preface – addressed to John Agricola’s brother-in-law, Alexander Drachstedt of Eisleben – Melanchthon intimates that he acted under the threat of still another unauthorized printing.76 Melanchthon was very displeased with the result. In his letters he again criticized Setzer’s work and set about revising the Scholia almost immediately.77 The result, which became available almost exactly a year later, seemed 72 They were published in 1554 under the title Enarratio Epistolae Pauli scriptae ad Philippenses authore Georgio Maiore (Wittenberg: Johannes Luft, 1554; reprinted in 1559), VD 16: M 2025 – 2026. Its dedicatory epistle was dated 15 April 1554. 73 This fact is missing from CR 15, which used the reprint in Major: 1569 – 1570, 1: 729 ff. For this text see CR 15: 1283 – 1294. 74 See VD 16: M 4196 – 4197 and, for the German Stupperich: 1961, 146 – 52; see further Wengert: 1997, and Wengert: 1998. 75 Published by John Setzer in Haguenau (VD 16: M 4187). The title page bore the date August, the colophon September. This has been reprinted in MSA 4: 209 – 303 and translated into English as Melanchthon: 1989. It is ironic that the version Melanchthon least liked should have in the twentieth century the widest distribution. 76 MBW §547 (MSA 4: 210). This preface was given to Setzer before his departure from Wittenberg on 20 May 1527. The lectures had to have been completed well before that time. 77 MBW §598 (Bds. 511), a letter to John Agricola dated around 2 October 1527 and complaining about Setzer’s work. Melanchthon also sent copies to Luther (MBW §597) and Spalatin (MBW §606), 720, 843.

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much more to his liking.78 Shorn of a preface, it had grown by fifty percent and included many more classical references and pointed refutations of his opponents. He sent copies to several friends and seemed to have viewed it, among other things, as Wittenberg’s answer to Erasmus’ Hyperaspistes of 1526 and 1527. To replace a rather wooden translation of the 1527 edition, Justus Jonas produced an authorized translation, to which Martin Luther added his famous preface comparing his modus operandi to that of his younger colleague. I have to uproot trunks and stumps, hack at thorns and hedges, and fill in the potholes. So I am the crude woodsman, who has to clear and make the path. But Master Philip comes after me meticulously and quietly, builds and plants, sows and waters happily, according to the talents God has richly given him (WA 30,2: 68,12 – 69,1).

By 1534 Melanchthon’s way of expressing the relation of faith, works, and the law had changed and resulted in a new edition, which contained twenty or so important additions or corrections of the 1528 text from material that could have originated in lectures on Colossians from that time.79 This second revised edition appeared from Klug’s presses at the same time that Valentine Kobian, Setzer’s successor in Haguenau, published the 1528 version for the second time (VD 16: M 4191; Kobian’s edition is not included in VD 16). In the early 1540s all three editions made a new appearance in the book markets of Germany (VD 16: M 4193 [third edition], M 4192 [second edition], M 2330 [the first edition, Basel 1541], in Melanchthon: 1561 – 1564). Although lectures on Colossians were not demanded by Wittenberg’s theological curriculum, Melanchthon returned to the book on various occasions. Besides the lectures in 1526 – 1527 and in the mid-1530s, Melanchthon’s correspondence and the Scripta publica mention two other times when he expounded on that book. Colossians was Melanchthon’s choice when he recommended lecturing at the only recently reopened University of Wittenberg in October 1547 (the official notice, preserved in the Scripta publica I and now found in CR 6: 702, was dated 16 October 1547). He announced this to several of his correspondents, perhaps in an effort to attract through them students to the recently besieged town.80 78 For this dating, see MBW §720, a letter by Melanchthon in Weimar to John Koch in Wittenberg, dated 2 November 1528, in which Melanchthon asks Koch to have several copies bound. This agrees with comments by Stephan Roth to Georg Rörer in August, September and October 1528 (See 77 [no. 176], 79 [no. 181] and 97 f. [no. 240; misdated by one year]). This printing is described in VD 16: M 4189. (For the reprints, including Setzer’s from 1529, see VD 16: M 4188, 4190.) 79 Conrad Cordatus, during the controversy over the necessity of good works for salvation that bears his name, insisted that he had heard these supposed errors in lectures on 1 Timothy by Caspar Cruciger, Sr. and on Colossians by Melanchthon. See Wengert: 1992, 435, n. 67. 80 22 October to Simon Pistoris at the Torgau (MBW §4937 [CR 6: 710 f.]) and 26 October to John

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Finally, in 1556 Melanchthon returned to Colossians, giving the last lectures that he himself would see through Wittenberg’s presses. They caused quite a stir, not because of his extensive refutation of Andreas Osiander, but because of comments on Colossians 3:1 and the sessio ad dextram and the associated problem of the communicatio idiomatum (Wengert: 2012). In 1557 Celio Secundo Curio and Jerome Zanchi could both write from Strasbourg to Melanchthon, who was attending the colloquy in Worms, that Strasbourg already had a hand-written copy of the lectures (MBW §8325 [CR 9: 256 f.], dated 1 September 1557, and MBW §8326 [Bds. 419 ff.], dated 4 September, respectively ; the passage in question is found in CR 15: 1270 ff., cf. Wengert: 2012). On 16 February 1559, Melanchthon wrote the epistle dedicatory to Herluf Trolle, a Swedish nobleman and former student.81 By the end of the month he was sending the Enarratio Epistolae Pauli ad Colossenses to friends.82 If the lectures had already stirred some interest, the Enarratio caused quite a commotion. Bullinger responded favorably to the new commentary (MBW §8909 [Bds. 444 – 51], dated 30 March 1559). Johannes Brenz was upset, voicing his objections in a letter to Melanchthon that went out under Duke Christopher of Württemberg’s name (MBW §9121 [Bds. 457 f.], dated 3 November 1559). Melanchthon responded to the charges by the end of the month (MBW §9147 [Bds. 459 f.], dated 28 November 1559). This drove Brenz to pen the so-called Stuttgarter Bekenntnis, which Melanchthon poked fun of (for its bad Latin) in a letter to James Runge, dated 1 February 1560 (see MBW §9213 [CR 9: 1034 ff.]). In any event, Melanchthon’s own work on biblical commentaries began and ended with Colossians. 1 and 2 Timothy. Melanchthon’s work on these two books is shrouded in mystery. For one thing, the lectures of Caspar Cruciger on 1 Timothy from 1536, published in 1540 and often attributed to Melanchthon (cf. CR 15:1295), were more likely, despite the charges of Conrad Cordatus, the work of Cruciger, although they may have been based upon an argumentum written by

Mathesius (MBW §4939 [6: 713 f.]). On 25 November Veit Dietrich, who had not yet had to leave Nuremberg, wrote to Melanchthon that he had read the preface (probably the Argumentum) to the work on Proverbs and was eagerly awaiting the commentary on Colossians (MBW §4971 [unpublished]). It never appeared. 81 MBW §8862 (CR 9: 745 ff.). Trolle (1516 – 1565), a professional soldier and scion of a Swedish noble family, studied in Wittenberg in 1536. See Svensk Uppslagsbok: 1954, 29:953 f. See also MBW §8294. 82 17 February to Tilemann Heshusius in Heidelberg (MBW §8863 [CR 9: 742 f.]), 21 February to John Marbach in Strasbourg (MBW §8869 [CR 9: 748]), 27 February to Georg Buchholzer (MBW §8876 [CR 9: 749]). This text was printed three times in 1559: twice by John Crato in Wittenberg and once by Petrus Brubach in Frankfurt am Main (VD 16: M 3162 – 3164). It also appeared in the fourth volume of Melanchthon; 1561 – 1564, (reprint: 1577) and in CR 15: 1223 – 82. It was translated into German by Paul Crell in 1563, shortly after Melanchthon’s death, and into Dutch already in 1559 (VD 16: M 3165 – 3166).

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Melanchthon.83 More importantly, in 1550 – 1551, after Cruciger’s death, Melanchthon held his own set of lectures on all of 1 Timothy and the first two chapters of 2 Timothy. They were edited by Paul Crell and published in 1561, a year after Melanchthon’s death.84 The lectures, along with comments on law and gospel, justification, and the nature and work of Christ, contained a lengthy discussion of the nature of the church and ministry, divided into three major questions (CR 15: 1331 – 52). Titus. When the twenty-one-year-old Melanchthon first appeared on the scene in Wittenberg, he announced in his inaugural address that he would, as partial fulfillment of his proposal for educational reform, lecture on the Greek texts of Homer and Saint Paul, beginning in the latter case with Titus (MSA 3: 29 – 42 [held on 28 August 1518], here 41,35 ff.; his work with the Greek text was to help “ad intelligenda sacrorum mysteria” [41,38]). By 12 October he could report to Spalatin that the texts for the lectures had been printed (MBW §29 [T1: 82 ff.]; the Titus text was published by John Grunenberg in Wittenberg under the title Epistola Pauli ad Titum. Qua compendio vere christiani hominis vitam ac mores format). No trace of these early annotations has been found. Revelation. Melanchthon did not ignore the apocalyptic literature in the Bible, as his commentaries on Daniel and Zachariah indicate. Although he produced no commentary on Revelation, he did show some interest in this book as well. Early in his career, after having received a copy of Vaticinia circa Apostolicos Viros et ecclesiam Romanam from Michael Hummelsberg, Melanchthon took an interest in what he thought was Joachim of Fiore’s own revelation (actually pseudo-Joachim; MBW §220 [T1: 458 f.], to Michael Hummelsberg, dated 12 March 1522). At the same time he was discussing with Spalatin the importance of getting Lucas Cranach to produce woodcuts for Luther’s translation of Revelation in the New Testament (MBW §218 [T1: 456 – 57], dated 2 March; he also mentions the Vaticinia). Near the end of his life, while at the Worms Colloquy, he received Heinrich Bullinger’s commentary on Revelation from the author himself (MBW §8356 [CR 9: 283 f.], dated 20 September 1557). Another (perhaps spurious) letter dated 25 November 1558, was supposedly written by Melanchthon as the preface to J[ohannes] F[inck]’s introduction to Revelation.85 If genuine, it would provide the most detailed

83 See Wengert: 1989, 431 – 37. A portion of Cruciger’s commentary on 1 Timothy 2 was published in a translation by Georg Spalatin in 1538. A second translation of this material appeared in 1546. Reprints of the commentary occurred in 1542 with a translation in 1566. 84 Enarratio Epistolae prioris ad Timotheum, et duorum capitum secundae, scripta & dictata in praelectione publica anno 1550 et 1551 (Wittenberg: John Crato, 1561). It was reprinted by Caspar Peucer in Melanchthon: 1561 – 1564, 4: 366 – 434 and in CR 15: 1295 – 1396. Melanchthon also lectured on 1 Timothy in 1559, according to a public notice reprinted in CR 9: 904 and dated 23 August 1559. 85 MBW §8356. See Scheible’s extended commentary on this letter and the commentary. The

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description of Melanchthon’s understanding of this book of the Bible, which corresponded in general terms to Luther’s own.

*** Looking back in 1556 on his long career as an interpreter of the Bible, Melanchthon described his work this way. Truly I can affirm in my conscience that, since God has called me to this labor of teaching, I have taken great care to search for simple explanations and to avoid those labyrinths in which others show off their talent. For daily I pray to God with frequent groans that he would teach me. Therefore, I know that my commentaries are despised by some, and I confess they are feebler than some that may expound on the height of divine wisdom. I write in this way chiefly so that the youth may consider the manner of expression and order of a particular dispute and afterwards draw the meaning from the sources. But whatever the quality of my writings, to this one thing I always subject myself and all of my advice and actions whatsoever: to the judgment of the church, and I pray, if you feel I have wandered off anywhere, that you admonish me. For this reason I send you my pages of the Enarratio of the Pauline epistle [to the Romans], and I want you and the other pious, learned men to be judges (MBW §8009 [CR 8: 893 f.] to John Gigas, dated 29 October 1556).

Whether modern readers use the same criteria to judge Melanchthon’s work or not, this essay begins the necessary work of defining the contours of his biblical exposition. Even this cursory examination of the breadth of his contribution to this type of commentary ought to help restore Melanchthon’s place as one of the premier biblical exegetes of the sixteenth century. Few can match his output in either scope or popularity. None can match his clarity of style or simplicity of method. Perhaps that is his lasting legacy to those who follow after him. Literature Aland, Kurt (1960). “Die theologische Fakultät Wittenberg und ihre Stellung im Gesamtzusammenhang der Leucorea während des 16. Jahrhunderts.” Pp. 283 – 394. In: Kirchengeschichtliche Entwürfe. Gütersloh: Mohn. Bibliotheca Palatina: Katalog zur Ausstellung, 2 vol., Textband. Heidelberg: Edition Braus, 1986. Barton, Peter F. (1963). “Die exegetische Arbeit des jungen Melanchthon 1518/19 bis 1528/29: Probleme und Ansätze.” Pp. 52 – 89. In: Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 54. supposed Wittenberg printer, Zachariah Engelhaubt, is otherwise unknown. The name itself could be a word play (Zachariah, head angel).

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Bauch, Gustav (1900). Die Einführung der Melanchthonischen Declamationen und andere gleichzeitige Reformen an der Universität zu Wittenberg. Breslau: Marcus. Bizer, Ernst (1964). Theologie der Verheißung: Studien zur Theologie des jungen Melanchthon. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Verlag des Erziehungsvereins. (Ed.) (1966). Texte aus der Anfangszeit Melanchthons. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag des Erziehungsvereins. Buchwald, Georg (1924). “Zur Postilla Melanchthoniana.” Pp. 78 – 89. In: Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 21. Catalogue Gnral des Livres Imprims des Bibliothque Nationale (1924 – 1977). 226 vol. Paris: Paul Catin. Fraenkel, Peter (1961). Testimonia Patrum: The Function of Patristic Argument in the Theology of Philip Melanchthon. Geneva: Droz. Friedensburg, Walter (Ed.) (1926 – 1927). Urkundenbuch der Universität Wittenberg. 2 vol. Magdeburg: Historische Kommission. Green, Lowell C. (1957). “Die exegetischen Vorlesungen des jungen Melanchthon und ihre Chronologie.” Pp. 140 – 49. In: Kerygma und Dogma 3. Hartfelder, Karl (1892). Melanchthoniana paedagogica. Leipzig: Teubner. (1889). Philipp Melanchthon als Praeceptor Germaniae. Berlin: A. Hofmann. Jnsson, Mr (1994). “Incest and the Word of God: Early Sixteenth Century Protestant Disputes.” Pp. 96 – 119. In: Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 85. Koehn, Horst (1984). “Philip Melanchthons Reden.” Pp. 1277 – 1486. In: Archiv für Geschichte des Buchwesens 25. Major, Georg (1552). Enarratio Epistolae Pauli scriptae ad Ephesios … Wittenberg: Veit Kreutzer, reprinted 1557. (1554). Enarratio Epistolae Pauli scriptae ad Philippenses … Wittenberg: Johannes Luft. reprinted 1559. (1569 – 1570). Opera. Wittenberg: Johann Crato. Maurer, Wilhelm (1967, 1969). Der junge Melanchthon zwischen Humanismus und Reformation. 2 vol. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Melanchthon, Philip (1561 – 64). Opera omnia, 4 vol. Caspar Peucer (Ed.). Wittenberg: Johann Crato. (1989). Paul’s Letter to the Colossians. David C. Parker (Trans.). Sheffield: Almond Press. (1996). Philipp Melanchthon. Enarratio secundae tertiaeque partis Symboli Nicaeni (1550). Hans-Peter Hasse (Ed.). Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus. (1539). Sententiae ex Sacris Scripturis collectae, quae docent praecipuum cultum Dei esse, promovere Evangelium. Frankfurt/M: Christoph Egenolph. Schfer, Rolf (1963). “Melanchthons Hermeneutik im Römerbriefkommentar von 1532.” Pp. 216 – 35. In: Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche 60. Scheible, Heinz (1966). Die Anfänge der reformatorischen Geschichtsschreibung. Gütersloh: Gerd Mohn. (1990). “Luther and Melanchthon.” Pages 317 – 39. In: Lutheran Quarterly 3. Schirmer, Arno (1967). Das Paulus-Verständnis Melanchthon 1518 – 1522. Wiesbaden: Steiner.

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Sick, Hansjçrg (1959). Melanchthon als Ausleger des Alten Testaments. Tübingen: Mohr (Siebeck). Sperl, Adolf (1958). “Eine bisher unbeachtete Vorlesung Melanchthons über den Römerbrief im Herbst 1521.” Pp. 115 – 20. In: Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte 69. (1958). “Nochmals zur Chronologie der frühen exegetischen Vorlesungen Melanchthons.” Pp. 59 – 60. In: Kerygma und Dogma 4. Stupperich, Robert (1961). Der Unbekannte Melanchthon. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. Svensk Uppslagsbok (1954). s.v. Malmø: Førlagshuset Norden. Thringer, Walter (Ed.) (1982). Die Melanchthonhandschriften der Herzog August Bibliothek. Frankfurt/M: Vittorio Klostermann. Volz, Hans (1955/56). “Beiträge zu Melanchthons und Calvins Auslegungen des Propheten Daniel.” Pp. 93 – 118. In: Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte 67. Wengert, Timothy J. (1989). “Caspar Cruciger (1504 – 1548): The Case of the Disappearing Reformer.” Pp. 417 – 41. In: Sixteenth Century Journal 20. (1992). “Caspar Cruciger Sr.’s 1546 ‘Enarratio’ on John’s Gospel: An Experiment in Ecclesiological Exegesis.” Pp. 60 – 74. In: Church History 61. (1997a). “Georg Major (1502 – 1574): Defender of Wittenberg’s Faith and Melanchthonian Exegete.” Pp. 129 – 156. In: Heinz Scheible (Ed.), Melanchthon in seinen Schülern. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. (1998). Human Freedom, Christian Righteousness: Philip Melanchthon’s Exegetical Dispute with Erasmus of Rotterdam. New York: Oxford University Press. (1997b). Law and Gospel: Philip Melanchthon’s Debate with John Agricola of Eisleben over “Poenitentia”. Grand Rapids: Baker. (1987). Philip Melanchthon’s Annotationes in Johannem in Relation to Its Predecessors and Contemporaries. Geneva: Librairie Droz. (1996). “Philip Melanchthon’s 1522 Annotations on Romans and the Lutheran Origins of Rhetorical Criticism.” Pp. 118 – 40. In: Biblical Interpretation in the Era of the Reformation. Richard A. Muller and John L. Thompson (Ed.). Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. (2012). “Philip Melanchthon’s 1557 Lecture on Colossians 3:1 – 2. Christology as Context for the Controversy over the Lord’s Supper.” Essay 10 in this volume. Wittenberg Faculty (1562). Scriptorum publice propositorum … tomus secundus. Wittenberg: Konrad Rühel and Georg Rhau’s heirs.

This essay originally appeared as “The Biblical Commentaries of Philip Melanchthon” in: M. Patrick Graham and Timothy J. Wengert (Ed.), Philip Melanchthon (1497 – 1560) and the Commentary (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1997), 106 – 148.

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Philip Melanchthon in Confession

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Timothy J. Wengert

Philip Melanchthon’s Last Word to Cardinal Lorenzo Campeggio, Papal Legate at the 1530 Diet of Augsburg

Among the many accolades Philip Melanchthon received during the fivehundredth anniversary of his birth, “father of ecumenism” was among the most frequent. Scholars as diverse as Walter Bouman, professor of systematic theology at Trinity Lutheran Seminary in Ohio, and Stefan Rhein, then curator of the Melanchthonhaus in Bretten, joined the chorus (Bouman: 1999; Rhein: 1998). A collection of essays, Philip Melanchthon: Ein Wegbereiter für die Ökumene, presented the thesis most forcefully. In one essay from that collection Heinz Scheible carefully described Melanchthon’s capacity for living in fellowship with those with whom he did not fully agree while still rejecting certain teachings of the Roman Catholics (prayer to the saints, adoration of the Host, compulsory confession) that undermined the certainty of salvation (Scheible: 1997). The sophistication of this argument, however, is often lost on those who read their own ecumenical agendas into Melanchthon’s behavior. A case in point is Melanchthon’s dealings with Cardinal Lorenzo Campeggio, papal legate at the Diet of Augsburg in 1530. Already in the sixteenth century Melanchthon’s opponents published Luther’s correspondence with him during this period to prove Melanchthon’s indecisive, if not suspiciously ecumenical, nature (Flacius: 1549). His three exchanges with Campeggio and two others, including his assistant, Luca Bonfio, were also published in the sixteenth century. The most famous of them, his proposal for religious peace, appeared already in 1531 with John Cochlaeus’s response appended to it (MBW §953a, Coelestin: 1577, 3: 20r–23v ; for Melanchthon’s letter, see CR 2: 246. The letters to Campeggio are MBW §324, 952, 990, 1012 and to Bonfio MBW §955, 1010). There has long been a lively debate over Melanchthon’s relations with Campeggio at Augsburg. Scholars are divided over the degree to which the two were ready to compromise there.1 When Melanchthon’s letters are analyzed in 1 For a handy review of the debate, see Wenz: 1996: 1: 351 – 418, esp. 358 – 64; cf. Müller: 1989, 166 – 228, the essays “Zwischen Konflikt und Verständigung: Bemerkungen zu den Sonderverhandlungen während des Augsburger Reichstages 1530;” “Die Anhänger der Confessio Augustana und die Ausschußverhandlungen;” “Kardinal Lorenzo Campeggio, die römische Kurie und der Augsburger Reichstag von 1530;” and “Duldung des deutschen Luthertums? Erwägungen Kardinal Lorenzo Campeggios vom September 1530” (Müller : 1981, 7: 604 ff.). See also Immenkötter : 1973; Hone: 1973/74; Immenkötter and Wenz: 1997, especially the article by Hone: 1997.

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light of later, often overlooked, comments about Campeggio in the Apology of the Augsburg Confession, a more nuanced perspective on his relation to adherents of the old faith emerges. In these letters he used all the rhetorical techniques available to him in order to maintain a dialogue with his opponents. However, as the Apology demonstrates, he was never afraid to upbraid them publicly when he perceived that the gospel itself was at stake.

1. An Early Encounter Campeggio recognized the influential role that Melanchthon played in the Evangelical camp early on. In 1524 the legate was in Stuttgart and wrote to Melanchthon, who was visiting his mother in nearby Bretten, in order to entice him to return to the Roman fold and to a position within the Roman church. Frederick Nausea, Campeggio’s private secretary, delivered the offer to Melanchthon in person. Melanchthon’s sharp reply, published in German translation already in 1524 and in the Latin original in 1525, rejected in six pithy theses what Melanchthon considered to be Campeggio’s misconstrual of Luther’s theology and hammered away at the centrality of the distinction between human and divine righteousness (MBWT 2: 133 – 36, §324, contains both versions; Campeggio’s letter is lost). The world, Melanchthon began, is wrong when it imagines that Luther wants to abolish ceremonies. The crowd wants freedom; certain learned people (he probably has Erasmus in mind) think all ceremonies are superstitious; tyrants want public peace at Luther’s expense. Second, Luther teaches greater things: the distinction between human and divine righteousness, instruction that strengthens the conscience “against the gates of Hell” (cf. Mt 16:18), and the true meaning of poenitentia. Third, Luther shows in The Freedom of a Christian and the Formula Missae that, although human traditions do not avail as righteousness before God, they may remain in practice once purified of all defects. Fourth, Melanchthon, speaking now in the first person, states his wish to preserve all ceremonies, “insofar as piety allows” (MBWT 2: 134, 23, §324). Fifth, with the Mass and celibacy there are simply too many defects (vitii, German: “böß und irthuom”). Finally, public peace can come about only if the rulers let godly and educated people teach in the churches. It is important to realize that many people who call themselves Luther’s followers are not. Melanchthon wrote in conclusion: “It is truly impious to think that the whole power of religion depends only upon either the condemnation or the observation of ceremonies” (MBWT 2: 135, 29 – 31, §324). This tract, with its careful delineation of divine and human righteousGenerally speaking, the Roman Catholic scholars (Immenkotter and Hone) tend to view Campeggio as more open to compromise.

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ness, set the guidelines for Melanchthon’s future behavior with the papal legate.

2. At the Diet of Augsburg Even before the presentation of the Augsburg Confession on 25 June 1530, the Saxon party and their allies entered into secret negotiations to prevent its rejection and to find common ground with the defenders of the old faith. Cardinal Campeggio, who as papal legate represented Rome’s interests most directly, had a hand in these discussions.2 He also helped to formulate the Confutatio, the document read publicly at the Diet on 3 August and accepted by Charles V as the faith of the empire, an action that sparked Melanchthon’s response in the Apology of the Augsburg Confession.

2.1 Before the Presentation of the Augsburg Confession This is not to say that any in the Evangelical camp viewed Campeggio simply as a potential ally. To be sure, in early May Melanchthon and others believed the (false) rumors that Cardinal Cajetan (Tommaso de Vio) would be the papal legate. In contrast to him, Melanchthon preferred Campeggio as “a man experienced in civil affairs,” which was still not a ringing endorsement (MBW §899, MSA 7,2: 140, addressed to Martin Luther, dated 4 May 1530. The Nurembergers had correctly heard that the legate would be Campeggio). By mid-June, however, Melanchthon suddenly filled his letters from Augsburg with harsh judgments about the cardinal. In the flurry of negotiations before the presentation of the Augsburg 2 His authority was demonstrated by the fact that, as Justus Jonas reported to Luther (WAB 5: 367, 33, dated 18 June 1530), at the emperor’s grand entrance into Augsburg Campeggio followed directly behind on Charles’s left side, equal to Ferdinand who was on the right. In later reminiscences, Melanchthon remarked that Campeggio had arrogantly demanded to walk alongside the emperor, a place reserved for the archbishop of Mainz (Manlius: 1563, 2: 243.) He also delivered the opening address to Charles Vand the diet on 25 June. See WA Br 5: 391, 9 – 13 (Jonas to Luther, 25 June 1530) and the reference on 393, n. 3, to a letter by Spalatin to Johannes Heß (28 June). The speech impressed both men by its appeal for concord. However, WABr reads it in a more critical light, referring to the German translation (Luther : 1880 – 1910, 16: 801 – 13, esp. 802): “Denn es ist die christl. Religion durch Vorwitz böser Leute nun so weit herunter gebracht worden, daß sie vom ersten Anfange unsers Heils her nie so große Noth gelitten, und das Schifflein Petri, an einerlei Ort, nie von so viel stürmenden Secten umgetrieben worden, als wir zu dieser höchstbetrübten und kläglichen Zeit”). Unlike Spalatin and Jonas, the editors did not find remarkable the fact that there was no direct attack on Luther or the Lutherans but rather only an appeal for concord. The legate stated that the pope sent him so that he “zu allem was Frieden und Eintracht befördern kann, fleißig ermahnen, auch mit Rath und That der Kirche verfallenen und fast gänzlich zertrümmerten und zerscheiterten Zustand wieder aufrichten, heilen und bessern möchte.”

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Confession, Melanchthon established contacts with the imperial court and the papal legate through Alfonso de Valds, the imperial secretary. In meetings with him before 18 June 1530, Melanchthon argued that the Lutherans were not heretics in doctrinal matters. He stated that the three central issues under dispute were communion in both bread and wine at the Lord’s Supper, the marriage of priests, and the abolition of private masses.3 Melanchthon had already broached these three conditions with no less a figure than Archbishop Albrecht of Mainz (MBW §921, MSA 7,2: 163 – 67, dated 3 June 1530. Scheible: 1996, 198 – 220, esp. 201 ff.). In a letter to him Melanchthon insisted that the ordinary bishops will retain jurisdiction and authority if they concede to the Evangelicals communion in both kinds, married priests, and congregational masses (“as we now have”). In this proposal and in discussions with Valds, it is important to note that Melanchthon made no mention of the gospel itself – not because Melanchthon conceded it to the ordinary bishops but because it was non-negotiable!4 He was taking for granted the division between human and divine righteousness already sketched out in 1524. Matters of church practice (a form of human righteousness) were open to debate; Christian doctrine (divine righteousness received by faith alone) was not. At a meeting on 18 June Valds reported that Melanchthon’s description pleased the emperor. However, Campeggio still raised objections regarding the abolition of private masses. Melanchthon deflected Charles’s demand for a written report on the matter by requesting permission to discuss it with others.5 It is significant that the legate objected to the cessation of private masses. As Melanchthon was writing in the Augsburg Confession and as Luther would reiterate in the Smalcald Articles of 1536, from the Roman understanding of justification sprang all the abuses of the Mass. (This became a chief sticking point in negotiations in August 1530 as well.). The reformers consistently rejected the notion that the Mass was a sacrifice effective without 3 This according to a report of the Nuremberg delegation, dated 5 p.m. on 21 June 1530 (CR 2: 121 – 24). It is important to note that these differences assumed agreement in catholic doctrine. This same argument marked the Augsburg Confession itself, where Melanchthon insisted that the entire church catholic agrees with the first twenty-one articles and that the only differences are over certain practices. This included (not surprisingly) communion in both kinds (Augsburg Confession XXII), marriage of priests (Augsburg Confession XXIII), and the elimination of private masses (Augsburg Confession XXIV). It is no accident that they were the first three of the disputed articles. 4 Thus it corresponds completely with Martin Luther’s statement in his Admonition to the Clergy Assembled in Augsburg, 1530 (WA 30,2: 342, 21 – 24): “[…] so ferne jhr uns das Euangelion frey lasset.” In one way Luther is conceding to the bishops an authority they do not possess: to allow the gospel to remain free. In Melanchthon’s eyes, they have no choice, and thus he does not even mention it. 5 A second account, later ascribed to George Spalatin, mistakenly claimed that Melanchthon indeed wrote this report. However, it did mention that the chief problem was with the Mass. See Luther: 1880 – 1910, 16: 768 f., with 735, n. 4.

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faith ex opere operato and, thus, applicable to the living and the dead. Their Pauline understanding of justification by faith alone prevented celebration of private masses. As in the later negotiations with Campeggio, subsequent writers have accused Melanchthon, fearing an eventual split with Rome, of engaging in private negotiations.6 Nothing could be further from the truth. First, the extant reports make clear that the Evangelical party knew of these contacts from the beginning. Second, the notion that Melanchthon could engage in private negotiations presupposes a world foreign to sixteenth-century diplomacy, which would have viewed such behavior as seditious. Third, such accusations arose from Lutheran suspicions about Melanchthon’s theology current after 1548 but not in 1530. Fourth, Melanchthon’s insistence on consulting with others, including Gregory Brück, the electoral counselor, demonstrates that these contacts were part of organized efforts by the Saxons to find a way around the religious impasse. Finally, Melanchthon himself did not keep these meetings a secret. After they occurred, in four separate letters written on 19 June, he described his activities and his impressions of the papal legate.7 Campeggio was the one advising Charles V to take up arms against the Evangelical party. “Campeggio alone proposes that we be put down by force,” he wrote to Luther.8 To Camerarius and Luther he added, quoting a favorite Greek phrase from the Iliad, that things were in God’s hands. In fact, his contacts bore no fruit. The Evangelical princes presented their Confession, which in fact contained the essence of the Saxon proposal: the heart of catholic doctrine on which all Christians agree (Augsburg Confession I-XXI) and seven practical areas of dispute (Augsburg Confession XXII-XXVIII), including the three mentioned in negotiations with Valds.

2.2 After the Presentation of the Augsburg Confession Melanchthon’s encounter with Valds prepared him for his meeting with Campeggio. After the Saxon party and their allies presented the Augsburg Confession, the situation changed considerably for supporters of the old faith. They could not respond with their own confession and then enter into negotiations with the Evangelical side, for fear that that very action would alienate them from Rome and undermine the pope’s authority in doctrinal 6 Scheible: 1997, “Melanchthon und Luther,” 198, 217, notes two: Salig: 1730, and Stupperich: 1981, 316. 7 MBW §933 (CR 2: 119) to Joachim Camerarius in Nuremberg; MBW §934 (MSA 7,2: 173 – 76) to Martin Luther at the Coburg; MBW §935 (Bds. 60 f.) to Justus Menius in Eisenach; MBW §936 (MSA 7,2: 178 f.) to Frederick Myconius in Gotha. 8 MBW §934 (MSA 7,2: 174, 17). The notion that Melanchthon needed to write to Luther for permission to undertake such discussions misunderstands their relationship. To Myconius he huffed that Campeggio would like to solve German problems with Italian arts (namely, war).

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matters (cf. the similar problem in early Roman polemics against Luther, Bagchi: 1991). Instead, they immediately began work on a response to the Augsburg Confession that would reject its premises and demand a reinstatement of the old faith. As they worked first on the Catholica Responsio and later on the Confutatio, Melanchthon and Campeggio came into direct contact. Melanchthon’s mission was twofold: to prevent out-and-out rejection of the Augsburg Confession’s doctrine and to assure that the Evangelical party escaped condemnation for change in practices. Such a condemnation would have carried with it grave political and legal consequences (as in the aftermath of the Smalcald War). He began by writing directly to Campeggio on 4 July 1530.9 Because this letter represented an unbidden approach to someone in a higher station, Melanchthon filled its introduction with the appropriate Renaissance expressions of respect. He asked that the cardinal read it with an open mind (aequo animo, a phrase that five years earlier had gotten Melanchthon into trouble with Erasmus) and great sensitivity (summa moderatione) (MSA 7,2: 195, 4 – 5; for Erasmus, see Wengert: 1998, 72). He then heaped praise on Campeggio, even using a line from Plato’s Republic, and expressed his pleasure that Campeggio was named legate (MSA 7,2: 195, 7 – 196, 9, citing Plato, The Republic, 473d; cf. his early statement to Luther in MBW §899 noted above). Campeggio’s wisdom and abhorrence of violence gave him courage to write, Melanchthon continued, adding prevarication to puffery since he already knew that Campeggio favored opposing the Evangelical party with force. Twenty lines into the letter Melanchthon finally got around to mentioning the reason for writing: “[…] so that he [Campeggio] may understand that we are particularly desirous of peace and concord and do not refuse any tolerable condition for making peace” (MSA 7,2: 196, 19 ff.) In fact, this comment reflected the heart of Saxon policy, already stated publicly in the preface to the Augsburg Confession, where Gregory Brück, the drafter, stressed the signers’ assiduous concern for peace (BSLK, 44 – 49, Book of Concord, 30 – 35). Even in the polemically charged atmosphere of the Apology, Melanchthon insisted that the ordinary bishops bore responsibility for division in the church (Ap XIV, 2: “Ita saevitia episcoporum in causa est quare alicubi dissolvitur illa canonica politia, quam nos magnopere cupiebamus conservare”). He followed this statement with what, at first blush, may seem an outrageous claim. “We have no dogma that differs from the Roman church” and have repressed the opposite (MSA 7,2: 296, 21 – 22). However, far from 9 MBW §952 (MSA 7,2: 194 – 98). Both Johannes Manlius and Coelestinus published this letter in the sixteenth century. Melanchthon was also involved in other contacts with the Roman party, especially through the imperial court preacher, Gil Lopz de Bejar. See MBW §950a (Scheible: 1996, “Melanchthons Auseinandersetzung mit dem Reformkatholizismus,” 242 f.), dated after 1 July 1530. For Melanchthon’s reminiscences of that meeting, see CR 25:11 f. (where Melanchthon compares him favorably to Nicodemus–in contrast to his much more negative view of Campeggio) and Manlius: 1563: 1:77.

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being yet another example of Melanchthon’s “pussy-footing around” (Leisetreten) or of his alleged attempts to make peace on his own (Scheible: 1996, 198 – 220, explains Luther’s comment regarding Melanchthon’s “Leisetreaten” positively ; Coelestinus construed it in just this negative way), it actually matched the Augsburg Confession’s own comments and was intended to have the opposite effect. Melanchthon knew that there were no grounds for compromise on doctrinal issues. Thus, in the transition between the first (doctrinal) and second (practical) sections of the Augsburg Confession, he had written the following in the Latin version. “This is nearly a compendium (summa) of our teaching, in which it is clear that nothing deviates from Scripture or from the universal church (ecclesia catholica) or from the Roman church, insofar as it is known to us from its writers (ex scriptoribus).”10 Of course, this represented a far different way of construing the church’s history and its authors from the Roman insistence on a grand consensus of authorities (Fraenkel: 1961, Wengert: 1999). Here Melanchthon attempted to avoid Roman condemnation of the Augsburg Confession’s doctrine because he knew that no compromise was possible in such matters. In the light of such doctrinal inflexibility, the following concession becomes clear. “We are prepared to obey the Roman Church–only that it overlook or relax these […] few things, which we cannot now change if we wanted” (MSA 7,2: 196, 24 – 28). Although he did not mention what those small things were, a subsequent letter made clear that they consisted of the same “concessions” already proposed to the emperor : the lay chalice, married priests, and the elimination of private masses. Melanchthon followed this proposal with a pointed plea: “Why is it necessary to persecute suppliants with iron and fire?” (MSA 7,2: 197, 38). Here he used the very words Campeggio himself had employed in his own advice to the emperor at the beginning of May.11 Then, Melanchthon reiterated a protestation of innocence designed to force Campeggio to take this request for a hearing seriously. “For no other reason do we endure more hatred in Germany than because we steadfastly defend the heart of the Roman Church’s dogmas” (MSA 7,2: 197, 41 – 43). Of course, he meant dogmas as correctly interpreted in Wittenberg. Melanchthon’s letter bore fruit immediately. The next day he received an audience with Campeggio, at which time he presented a list of nine 10 Augsburg Confession, Conclusion to the First Part, 1 (BSLK, 83c, Book of Concord, 58/59 f.). This echoed Luther’s early appeal to Sylvester Prierias (WA 1: 680, 9 – 12): “The censure of the church will not separate me from the church if the truth of the church joins me,” cited in Hendrix: 1981, 52. 11 Cited in MSA 7,2: 197, n. 7. “[…] metter la mano al ferro et al foco radicitus extirpare queste male et venenose piante.” See also NB Erg. 2: 464, 16. Both men were using a Ciceronian expression for a destructive war. See Erasmus of Rotterdam, Adagia 4, 10, 13 (LB 2: 1166), where he comments, “Quum exitiabile bellum significamus, ferro flammaque rem geri dicimus, sive ferro ignique.” The author thanks Johanna Loehr for pointing out this connection.

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‘concessions’ demanded of the Roman authorities; this may represent a direct result of the consultations he had earlier promised the emperor. The list had not changed from earlier in June: communion in both kinds and respect for those who so communed (1 – 2);12 married priests and monks, lifting charges of “digamy” (marriage to the church and to a woman), and an appeal for leniency from the cardinal (3 – 6); reduction in masses to a single one celebrated for the people on Sunday (7); and, finally, a plea to the cardinal for peace, leaving aside the question of fasting (8 – 9) (MBW §953, [CR 2: 246 ff.], dated 5 July 1530). Melanchthon concluded that people were being killed “who faithfully teach the Christian religion and up until now have repressed many heresies” (CR 2: 248). Again, he was refusing to negotiate doctrine, and he placed the blame for any problems squarely on the behavior of the bishops. Far from representing a “Sonderaktion” on Melanchthon’s part, as the editor of the MSA has characterized it, these letters reflect precisely the Saxon position, expressed in the Augsburg Confession itself. Our teaching is orthodox and catholic; we have changed some practices to match that teaching. This proposal so placed in question Roman intransigence at Augsburg that it demanded a separate answer. In 1531 John Cochlaeus, the hard-nosed Roman polemicist and advisor to Duke George of Saxony, published the proposal with a point-by-point refutation.13 Not to have answered it would have been to demonstrate the stubborn refusal of the Roman party to take the Evangelicals seriously. On the matter of communion in both kinds, Cochlaeus argued that it would destroy the unity of the church, undermine the teaching of the church that Christ was fully present in each element, and cause certain practical problems (spillage and inability to reserve the sacrament). Where did Christ expressly command the wine’s distribution to the laity, he wondered. He then used Melanchthon’s arguments against him: you do not condemn those who receive one kind, but we must condemn those who break the unity of the church. On the matter of reverence for the Lord’s Supper, Cochlaeus pointed to Roman practice: processions, monstrances, Corpus Christi Day, and the like. On the marriage of priests, Cochlaeus argued that, since Melanchthon had admitted it contradicted the canons, such people deserved canonical punishment. Calling it digamy was again an admission of guilt and demonstrated disobedience to the bishops. The marriage of monks ran afoul the teaching of the Latin fathers (Ambrose, Jerome, and Augustine). Any appeal for leniency contradicted the fundamental failure of the Evangelicals to accept papal authority. On the Mass, Cochlaeus reminded 12 This was part of the formal struggle at the Diet, when suddenly the Evangelical princes had refused to take part in Corpus Christi Day processions, thereby risking being excommunicated and outlawed. 13 Petitio M. Philippi Melanchthonis ad R. D. Card. Campegium Augustae scripta; cum responsione D. I. Cochlei ad eandem. MDXXXI (1531), now MBW §953a. It was reprinted in Coelestinus: 1577, 3: 20r-23v. In part, it represented the Roman Catholic position during the August 1530 negotiations in Augsburg.

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Melanchthon of all the terrible things Luther had said about the traditional Mass. He concluded: “If therefore you truly desire peace from the heart, I beg you to accept with us the fair conditions [in the Confutatio] for peace prescribed for us by the most holy Imperial Majesty and Papal Legate with the imperial electors and other princes” (Coelestinus: 1577, 3: 23v) Here, as elsewhere, unconditional obedience to Rome was the precondition for any rapprochement. The proposal and the audience with Campeggio also occasioned a letter to the legate’s private secretary, Luca Bonfio. Melanchthon again made the Evangelical position clear. For the first time he explicitly mentioned the Augsburg Confession as upholding “Roman dogma” and as much as announced his willingness to refute all opponents – anticipating the arguments in the Apology. “I am not reluctant to submit to the risk of judgment by some people, if some dogma in our confession is found to differ either from Scripture or even from the Roman Church itself” (MBW §955, MSA 7,2: 199 ff., here 199, 1 – 200, 4, dated 6/7 July 1530). Evangelical changes in practice actually helped protect the clergy’s reputation. Bonfio (and of course, Campeggio, to whom Melanchthon actually was speaking) could avoid war by urging toleration of lay communion in both kinds, marriage of priests, and changes in the Mass. This would protect episcopal jurisdiction, under whose aegis reform could slowly take place. In this letter Melanchthon made clear he was not speaking on his own. “I do not write these things casually (temere). I have great and serious reasons, why I fear these things [the threat of war]. And I have expressed these to some good people” (MSA 7,2: 201, 22 – 23, emphasis added). Melanchthon’s work seemed to him to have been in vain. He wrote to his friend Camerarius, “I am continuously canvassing many people, even Cardinal Campeggio. However, they seem entirely to expect that they can suppress us by frightening us” (MBW §957, MSA 7,2: 207, 14 – 16, dated 8 July 1530). In fact, that very day he again met with Campeggio. Immediately before this second meeting, Melanchthon wrote to Veit Dietrich, Luther’s companion at the Coburg, that, although the legate spoke in a distinguished fashion (egregie) and discussed matters most pleasantly (suavissime), “nevertheless he opposes us elsewhere” (MBW §958, MSA 7,2: 202, here 6 – 8, written in the morning of 8 July 1530) He could concede communion in both kinds and the marriage of priests but had no authority to lift monastic vows of celibacy, a position Melanchthon would later attack in the Apology.14 14 Luther was even more direct in his response, insisting that Campeggio and the pope had no such authority. Quoting von Amsdorf, he wrote to the Wittenberg theologians (MBW §975 [WA Br 5: 479 – 81], dated 15 July): “Quod Campegius potestatem iactat dispensandi, respondeo verbis Amsdorfi: Ich schisse dem Legaten und seinem Herrn in seine Dispensation, wir wollen Dispensationes genug finden. Quando herus praecipit, servi dispensationem non curate, si servus dicendus est tantus latro et invasor regni.” In August 1530, when informed of the negotiations with the committee of fourteen, in which the pope was asked for certain dispensations, Luther

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After the meeting Melanchthon wrote a second note to Dietrich. Campeggio’s whole conversation made clear that he would not act except in accord with the princes (of the old faith) who wished to return to the old practices until a council. Melanchthon suspected here the influence of Eck and Cochlaeus (perhaps rightly, given the latter’s refutation of Melanchthon’s proposal), who only wanted to suppress the Evangelical side.15 At the same time, he wrote to Luther that, following the reading of the Augsburg Confession, the opponents were weighing three responses (MBW §960, MSA 7,2: 204 ff.). The worst urged a return to the Edict of Worms. A milder one opted for setting up a committee of unbiased judges. The one that seemed most likely to prevail (and indeed did) involved reading a confutation, followed by the emperor’s demand to submit matters to his judgment and to return to the old practices until the convening of a council. (Melanchthon expected this to happen by 11 July, and, indeed, the harsh Catholica Responsio was presented to the papal legate on 12 July. However, the completely reworked Confutatio was not officially read and received until 3 August because Charles Vand some Roman Catholic princes had demanded a shorter, milder version.) Campeggio favored this third approach.16 Luther reacted favorably to Melanchthon’s disappointing encounter with Campeggio. “I rejoice that Philip has experienced the natural skills of Campeggio and the Italians. That philosophy of his does not believe except by experience” (WAB 5: 495 ff., here: 496, 17 – 19, dated 21 July 1530). Luther went on to say that he did not trust a syllable spoken by an Italian. Why? “For my Cajetan so loved me, that he wanted to shed blood for me: my own! They are scoundrels! Although it is true that where an Italian is good, he is the best, but this is a miracle ‘and most like a black swan’” (WAB 5: 496, 20 – 23, refering to Juvenal, Satires, 6, 165 and his description of a rare bird). Luther thus saw a direct connection between his encounter with Cardinal Cajetan at Augsburg in 1518 and Melanchthon’s with Campeggio. At the end of the month, with rumors regarding the content of the Confutatio flying, Melanchthon and John Brenz, the reformer of Schwäbisch Hall, met with Campeggio at the behest of their princes (Elector John of

responded in a similar fashion to Spalatin (WA Br 5: 582 – 83, dated 28 August 1530): “Porro in isto praesertim articulo, in quo petitur, ut a Legato et Papa postulemus nobis concedi, quae nobis permittere velint, obsecro te, ut Amsdorfice respondeas in aliquem angulum: Daß uns der Papst und Legat wollten im Ars lecken.” 15 In a later letter to Luther on 10 July 1530 (MBW §965 [MSA 7,2: 208 – 209]), Melanchthon placed the blame for the emperor’s hardening at Duke George’s doorstep and cited Campeggio as the source of his information. 16 MSA 7,2: 204, n. 4. Melanchthon told Luther that he based his assumption in part on his meeting with Campeggio. (“Cognovi enim sensum Legati Campegii.”) Luther responded to the imperial involvement by likening it to the devil’s work at Worms (MBW §963 [WA Br 5: 456 – 57]). For the developments here see the introduction in Immenkötter : 1979, esp. 23 – 50.

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Saxony and Margrave George of Brandenburg-Ansbach).17 They appealed to him, as a man of peace, for peace and agreed to accept the authority of the ordinary bishops, “insofar as it could be done without offense to the conscience.” Nothing was further from the princes’ minds than overthrowing ecclesiastical order and the legitimate authority of bishops (Melanchthon had defined this legitimate authority quite narrowly in Augsburg Confession XXVIII). The meeting with the cardinal had no positive effect, except to convey to Melanchthon the news that the Confutatio was in preparation. By appealing to the conscience and stressing “legitimate” episcopal authority, Melanchthon had expressed the very Christian freedom unacceptable to the papal legate but consonant with an Evangelical understanding of authority. His comments about conscience may also have reflected ongoing discussions with Luther himself about the nature of episcopal authority in establishing church practices.

2.3. In the Aftermath of the Acceptance of the Confutatio On 3 August 1530 the Roman party presented a response acceptable to the emperor : the Confutatio. This changed everything (Oberman: 1980). Luther and Melanchthon’s correspondence moved on to other topics (the complicated question of the relation between Luther and Melanchthon in July 1530 goes beyond the scope of this essay), and Melanchthon began work in earnest on a defense of the Augsburg Confession that eventually developed into the Apology.18 Nevertheless, Melanchthon wrote two more letters: one to Campeggio’s secretary, Luca Bonfio, on 4 August and one to Campeggio himself on 5 August (MBW §1010, MSA 7,2: 245 – 48, and MBW §1012, MSA 7,2: 248 ff.). To Bonfio he reiterated the Evangelical party’s willingness to maintain peace in the church and give due honor to the Roman see based upon the earlier proposal. Then bishops will be able to correct the abuses in the church. “And we, as we heartily desire, having been freed from these contentions, 17 MBW §990 (CR 2: 171 f. with CR 3: 1286) and MBW §992a, both dated 27 July 1530. These notes record their comments at that meeting. See MBWR 9: 205 where the editors note that the copy in the Stuttgart Landesbibliothek includes the following comment. “Haec dixit Philippus ad Cardinalem Campegium, quando ipse et Brentius a principibus evangelicis ad aulam Cardinalis missi fuerunt.” 18 There was one more exchange over the issue of tradition that helps clarify its role for Melanchthon. In his report to Luther about the Confutatio (MBW §1014 [MSA 7,2: 250 ff.]), dated 6 August, he mentioned how Camerarius chided him for worrying about the causes of traditions when the authors of the Confutatio were incapable of conceiving such issues (MSA 7,2: 251, 20 f.: “Nihil tale istis in mentem venire posse”). Luther responded on 15 August (MBW §1026 [WAB 5: 547 f., here 548, 17 – 18]): “Did I not tell you before that you torment yourself about traditions in vain? For this matter, too, is over the head of the Sophists. There were eternal discussions about laws.” Only Paul understood the matter; here the Spirit alone is judge.

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could then devote all our energy to teaching religion, which must diligently be fortified. Otherwise, intelligent people can easily divine just how many sects there will be for posterity” (MSA 7,2: 246, 19 – 21). Among all of Melanchthon’s comments, this most clearly indicated that Evangelical doctrina was not up for negotiation. He immediately turned to the recently read Confutatio and threatened that, if published with its condemnations, it would not find admiration among prudent people and would irritate “our natural disposition.” He begged Bonfio to appeal to Campeggio regarding this proposal for the sake of the peace in the church. Overturning practices like the marriage of priests or communion in both kinds would lead to unrest. Any call to arms by the pope would contradict his “clemency” (a clear play on Pope Clement VII’s name). Joachim Camerarius, who was back in Augsburg after a hiatus and who had provided Melanchthon with a transcription of the Confutatio (not officially published until years later), delivered the note. He returned to Melanchthon with the news that Campeggio blamed Melanchthon for spreading false rumors about him regarding comments the legate allegedly made about the Germans and eating meat. It evoked from Melanchthon a direct response to Campeggio, in which he bluntly and categorically denied the charges. More importantly, at the end of the letter Melanchthon stated in the strongest possible language his willingness to defend the faith. “I will make Your Most Reverend Lord understand that I devote every effort and all diligence, in any way possible, to defend church dogmas. I have tried this up until now, and some testimonies exist which, if there be need, may easily be produced” (MSA 7,1: 249, 17 – 22; note 3 in the MSA is not helpful: more likely this relates directly to his work on the Apology, see below). August was filled with attempts to find a way around the impasse created by the Confutatio (Immenkötter : 1973, and Scheible: 1996, 222 – 44). Luther continued to insist that the papal representative had no authority in such matters. By the end of August he wrote to Melanchthon and Justus Jonas his judgment against Campeggio. “But what I write to Philip, I write also to you, that in obedience to Christ and in the grace I have (if I am something of Christ), you deign to believe with all our people that Campeggio is one great and extraordinary devil.”19 With the collapse of the negotiations, Jonas could write back to Luther about Campeggio’s Italian arts, “nay rather Satanic deceits and traps.” The Lord would reward this Italian wisdom according to its works, he added.20

19 WA Br 5: 579 f., here 579, 2 – 4 (dated 28 August 1530). See also MBW §1047 (WA Br 5: 576 – 79, dated 26 August): “Obsecro, quid ibi non est insidiarum et doli? Habes nunc Campegium […].” See also Luther’s blunt letter to Spalatin above. 20 WA Br 5: 605 – 607, here 606, 34 – 39 (dated 6 September 1530). He concluded (lines 42 – 45): “Nunquam quicquam in Romanistarum malitiam tam est aspere vehementer et acerbe dictum, quod non probe commeruerint. Si dominus dederit, ipsi aliquando ab aliis quoque audient, quid

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3. Campeggio and the Apology : Melanchthon’s Last Word The excerpt from Melanchthon’s letter cited above described precisely his diligence and effort over the next year with respect to the Apology. While still in Augsburg, he produced first a draft for presentation to the emperor (something not allowed by Charles). Back in Wittenberg, he finished a first edition of the Apology by May 1531 and a second edition by September of the same year (Peters: 1997). Melanchthon worked on it so hard during the trip home from Augsburg that Luther upbraided him for breaking the Sabbath (Peters: 1997, 46 ff.). Recent works on the Apology by Christian Peters and Charles Arand have provided new and exciting insights into Melanchthon’s theology and this important confessional document for Lutherans (Peters: 1997, Arand: 1998). Researchers now appreciate more than ever the priority of the second edition. Melanchthon’s rhetorical skill in writing the Apology has received needed attention. These scholars, like others before them, have rightly understood that the Confutatio provided the major impetus for the genesis of the Apology. In fact, many parts provide a point-for-point rebuttal of the Confutatio’s charges and its use of biblical and patristic evidence. What no one has noticed heretofore, however, is an important passage in the twelfth article of the Apology which, set in the context of Melanchthon’s exchanges with Campeggio, sheds new light on the purpose and audience of that document (Wenz: 1996, 1: 705, mentions it in passing but does not connect it with Melanchthon’s earlier negotiations).

3.1 Excursus: Rhetoric and Apology XII In Augsburg Confession XII, which dealt with poenitentia (for this hard-totranslate term see Wengert: 1997, 15), Melanchthon had explicitly and purposely divided the sacrament into two parts: contrition (defined here as terrors of conscience) and faith (which receives the word of absolution that the person is forgiven on account of Christ) (this was also the gist of his discussion with the imperial court preacher in July 1530; see above and MBW §950a). He then added that good works ought to follow as fruits of poenitentia, implying that they were not a part of poenitentia itself but a consequence. In this same vein Melanchthon condemned not only some Anabaptists, who denied the need for repentance in the (re)baptized, and the ancient Novatians, who denied the possibility of repentance after baptism, but also those “who do not teach that the forgiveness of sins happens through faith but insist that we merit hic de utraque specie, de coniugio, de missa iudicarint.” Striking is that the list of issues had not changed in three months of negotiations.

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grace through our satisfactions.” Here, for the first time and more directly than anywhere else in the early articles of the Augsburg Confession, Melanchthon rejected a position held by his Roman opponents. Buttressed by the authority of Peter Lombard’s Sentences and canon law, medieval theologians all taught a three-fold division of poenitentia into contrition (sorrow for sin out of love of God), confession (before a priest that removed guilt and reduced eternal punishment to temporal penalties), and satisfaction (works that satisfied the remaining punishment for the sin). The penitential system, indulgences (the spark that set off the conflict between Luther and Rome in the first place), purgatory, good works, and many other aspects of medieval piety rested upon this division and especially its third part. Thus, it came as no surprise that the Confutatio categorically attacked this article (Immenkötter : 1979, 104 – 11: CR 27: 109 – 14; it is the longest article among the first twenty-one). It accepted the rejection of the Anabaptists and Novatians but opposed Melanchthon’s division of poenitentia into two parts. Not only had the ancient teachers (they name Origen, Cyprian, Chrysostom, Gregory I, and Augustine) and Scripture itself said as much, but it was for this reason that “Pope Leo X of blessed memory rightly condemned this article of Luther, who had taught that these three parts […] were not based in Scripture or in the holy Christian fathers” (Immenkötter : 1979, 107; CR 27: 110). Faith, far from being a part of poenitentia, is much more prior to it (here they are speaking of fides informata or acquisita, which according to scholastic theology a person could exercise in a state of sin). By rejecting penitential satisfactions the Augsburg Confession stood “against the gospel, the apostles, the fathers, the councils, and the universal catholic church” (Immenkötter : 1979, 107 f., CR 27:111). The authors supported this contention by citing a great number of passages from Scripture and the church fathers. They concluded: “Therefore, satisfactions must not be abolished in the church against the expressed words of the gospel and the decrees of the councils and the fathers” (Immenkötter : 1979, 109, CR 27:113). As work began on the Evangelical response to the Confutatio, Melanchthon sketched out compromise language on this article for use in the negotiations (specifically with the so-called “Committee of Fourteen,” a group of theologians and princes from both sides that met in August and looked in vain for a way around the impasse) (MBW §1027, dated 16/17 August 1530; there is some question whether this stemmed from Melanchthon, Köhler : 1924, 99). When the fathers divided poenitentia into three parts, they understood satisfaction as “fruit worthy of repentance, not that sin is blotted out because of merits that follow.” The first draft of the Apology, prepared in Augsburg, also included comments about the Confutatio and its charges. The Confutatio’s “opinio” harmed the glory of Christ’s merit and satisfaction. The afflictions and punishments of the saints (such as David’s punishment for adultery) were not necessary for the forgiveness of sins but to humble them and give an example

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for others. Canonical penitentials had nothing to do with the forgiveness of sins but were rather public discipline and therefore not necessary.21 By the time Melanchthon published the Apology, this article had undergone a remarkable transformation into the work’s second longest article (next to Apology IV on justification.). Like article four, it possessed a rhetorical structure all its own (Arand: 2000). However, here, in contrast to the previous articles, this structure has a more heated tone and force. For one thing, the document addressed Charles V directly for the first time (until that place, Melanchthon mentioned the emperor in the third person, cf. Ap II.1, 35, 51, IV, 2, X, 57). Immediately upon mentioning that the Confutatio rejected faith as the second part of poenitentia, Melanchthon cries: “What shall we do here, O Charles, most invincible Emperor? This is the very voice of the Gospel, that by faith we obtain the forgiveness of sins” (Ap XII, 2, translation of Jarsolav Pelikan in: Book of Concord: 1959, 182). In the next paragraph he again addresses the emperor directly : “We therefore beg you, most invincible Emperor Charles, to hear us out patiently and to consider carefully this most important issue, involving the chief doctrine of the Gospel, the true knowledge of Christ, and the true worship of God” (Ap XII, 3). What has happened here? For most of its history theologians have viewed the Apology as a theological answer book, comparable to Melanchthon’s Loci communes theologici and serving to refute the Confutatio with a logical presentation of Evangelical theology. However, Charles’s acceptance of the latter meant, as Melanchthon already stated in Apology X, 51, that it was the emperor’s own policy. Thus, in some sense any defense involved the emperor. What Melanchthon tried to do in this document was to separate his opponents and the content of their Confutatio from the emperor. Nevertheless, any defense had to include the emperor since he had declared himself the judge of this matter (of course, the Apology also addressed the reader and “people of good will,” making public opinion a player in the matter as well). Why include a direct address? The answer to this question goes directly to the rhetorical function of the Apology. First, as is well known, in his books on rhetoric Melanchthon expanded the traditional three genres of speech (demonstrative, deliberative, and judicial) with a fourth (didactic [didaskalikon]). This allowed didactical material, shaped by dialectics for teaching, to recover its rhetorical shape. In his Elementorum rhetorices libri duo, first published in 1531 and revised in 1542, Melanchthon distinguished rhetoric and dialectic in these terms (CR 13: 413 – 506, the 1542 version cited here). “The goal of dialectic is to teach; of rhetoric, however, to move and impel 21 CR 27: 285 f. One source, published by David Chytraeus: 1577, adds: “Sed non est hic opus prolixa disputatione. Omnes boni viri ubique testantur, doctrinam nostrorum de poenitentia multas pias conscientias a desperatione liberasse, et ostendisse veram et firmam consolationem iuxta Euangelium. Nemo ex scholasticis unquam exposuit, quomodo remittantur peccata. Tota haec res iacuit ignota.” Cf. Ap XII, 4 – 6.

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minds and to hand down some feeling [adfectus]. Thus, when we discuss the nature of virtue, we will have to consult dialectic, which shows what a virtue is, its causes, its parts, and its effects. However, when we exhort people to cultivate virtue, we will have to follow rhetorical topics. When we speak about the nature of poenitentia and teach people what it is and what are its parts, the dialectical rules must be followed. However, an exhortation to repent [poenitentia] brings rhetorical topics to bear” (CR 13: 420). In Apology XII (on poenitentia) Melanchthon crossed the boundary from teaching and proof (such as found in his Loci communes theologici) to exhortation and reproof. Why? The Confutatio – its name already a rhetorical category, which Melanchthon defined as using dialectics to destroy objectionable arguments – required a rhetorical refutation. The opposition’s arguments were not simply incorrect; they were misleading. Thus, especially on the central dispute over the gospel, they demanded not only logical rebuttal (dialectic/didactic speech) but also exhortation. By addressing the emperor directly in Apology XII, Melanchthon made it clear that the reader was now entering a different phase of his argument with a different dispositio (Melanchthon saw similar shifts in Paul’s epistle to the Romans, cf. Schäfer : 1997, 79 – 104). Apology XII was not simply teaching about a topic (in the manner of Apology IV, for example) (cf. Ap VII, 34, where Melanchthon referred to Ap IV as a krinomenon, the technical term in rhetoric for the point at issue in a dispute; see his own definition [CR 13: 430]). It was far more an oration of the judicial genre, which Melanchthon defined as handling not only legal controversies but also disputes in the church.22 The direct address to Charles, as every sixteenth-century schoolboy would have recognized, was this speech’s exordium, which Melanchthon defined in 1531 as “the beginning of a speech. For before we speak about the matter, the minds of the hearers must be prepared.”23 Melanchthon appealed to the emperor both for a hearing and for his good will. He followed this up with an appeal to “omnes viri boni” (Ap XII, 3). How can one be sure that Melanchthon intended this mixture of rhetoric and dialectic? In the case of Apology XII and its topic, poenitentia, we have direct proof in the Elementorum rhetorices libri duo itself.24 First, while 22 CR 13: 421 and 429, where he stated, “Nam disputationes ecclesiasticae, magna ex parte similitudinem quandam habent forensium certaminum. Interpretantur enim leges, dissolvunt antinomias, videlicet sententias, quae in speciem pugnare videntur, explicant ambigua, interdum de iure, interdum de facto disputant, quaerunt factorum consilia. Ideo hoc genus in his nostris moribus, etiam magnum habet usum.” 23 CR 13: 431. He defined three goals of this part of a speech: to make the hearers well disposed, attentive, and teachable. Melanchthon had the first goal in mind for the emperor. 24 In fact, that book contains a host of references to arguments in the Apology, which Melanchthon was writing at that very time. For example, CR 13: 440 stated: “Magna hoc tempore quaestio est, an Missa seu Coena Domini sit sacrificium.” This was the main topic in Ap XXIV. Melanchthon’s book on rhetoric functions like a Rosetta stone for rhetorical moves in the Apology.

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discussing the didactic genre of speech (genus didascalicum), Melanchthon introduced as an example the question “What is poenitentia?” He included a definition taken right out of Augsburg Confession XII. “Poenitentia is contrition and the faith by which we believe that our sins are forgiven on account of Christ. New obedience before God follows this faith.”25 He then explained its parts (contrition and faith), but noted that a third part, new obedience, is rightly added but as an effect of the other two. Later, under the topic of the judicial genre, Melanchthon investigated a subsection pertaining to the schools and disputes of the doctors, “De statibus legalibus” (On legal cases) (CR 13: 440 – 45; it deals with the applicability of laws to a certain case). It is precisely here, he began, where one can employ dialectics.26 As an example of such speech he mentioned poenitentia. “In the church a dispute has arisen about what poenitentia (that is, conversion of the person to godliness) is and what movements it contains” (CR 13: 440). He immediately added that it contained two parts, contrition and faith. Such a speech possesses an order, borrowed from dialectics. It begins with a definition, moves to a statement of contrary laws, examines specific texts and their meanings (again using the dialectical tools of definition, division, causes, effects, circumstances, contradictions), considers ambiguities, similar cases, and exceptions (CR 13: 440 – 45). The related rhetorical genre, judicial speech, contains an exordium, a narration of the facts, the central proposition, a confirmation (designed to persuade the judge and based upon the status legales), a confutation (refuting contrary interpretations), and a peroration. Apology XII represents a careful mixture of the rhetorical and dialectical sides of this kind of speech. After the exordium Melanchthon structured the narratio as a lengthy prefatory account of the confusing teaching on poenitentia before Luther (Ap XII, 4 – 27). Over against this confusion, Melanchthon placed the propositio, or main point. “Therefore we, in order to disentangle godly consciences from the labyrinths of the sophists, establish two parts of poenitentia, namely, contrition and faith” (Ap XII, 28). He also allowed for good works as a consequence of the first two parts, as in Augsburg Confession XII. In the confirmatio that followed, Melanchthon defined these parts more closely (Ap XII, 29 – 34 [contrition] and 35 – 43 [faith]). He summarized the benefits of the main point in a closing sentence: “This understanding of poenitentia is plain and clear. It increases the dignity of the 25 CR 13: 425: “Est igitur definitio. Poenitentia est contritio et fides, qua credimus nobis remitti peccata propter Christum, quam fidem sequitur nova obedientia erga Deum.” Augsburg Confession XII: “Constat autem poenitentia proprie his duabus partibus: altera est contritio seu terrores incussi conscientiae agnito peccato, altera est fides, quae concipitur ex evangelio seu absolutione et creditur propter Christum remitti peccata et consolatur conscientiam et ex terroribus consolatur conscientiam et ex terroribus liberat. Deinde sequi debent bona opera, quae sunt fructus poenitentiae.” 26 He also listed how to organize such a speech: “definitio, contrariae leges, scriptum et sententia, ambiguum, ratiocinatio, translatio.”

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power of the keys and sacraments, and it illumines the blessing of Christ, teaching that we use Christ as mediator and propitiator” (Ap XII, 43). In a lengthy confutatio Melanchthon then examined several specific objections made in the Roman Confutatio. First, he demonstrated that scripture defined poenitentia in two parts (Ap XII, 44 – 58). Then he raised the Confutatio’s objection to the notion that people receive forgiveness by faith (Ap XII, 59 – 90). A third section attacked the Confutatio’s twisted citations of patristic evidence (Ap XII, 91 – 97). In each case he mixed dialectical arguments with rhetorical appeals (in his work on rhetoric he stressed the importance of dialectic in this section of a juridical oration, CR 13: 434). At this point in the original printed editions, Melanchthon inserted a separate heading: “Confession and Satisfaction”27 The first sentence in this new section served as conclusion to the previous section and a transition to the new topic. “Good people can easily judge [iudicare] how great a difference it makes to preserve the true teaching regarding the above parts (namely, contrition and faith)” (Ap XII, 98). For this reason, he went on, we have not yet mentioned confession and satisfaction, the subjects of the remaining portions of the article. Of course, a proper confutatio demanded attention to each important objection. Thus, he used this final section to deal first with a defense of the Evangelicals’ practice of confession (that did not include enumeration of all sins, something demanded by the other side) (Ap XII, 98 – 112) and with an attack on their definition of satisfactions (Ap XII, 113 – 77). Melanchthon concluded with a peroration matching his own definition in the Elementorum rhetorices libri duo.28 It provided the readers with a handy summary of Melanchthon’s chief arguments while at the same time appealing to them to judge the matter. In fine Renaissance fashion he even included a classical reference (to Lucian) to clinch the matter. We have set forth [exposuimus: used by Cicero to describe an oration] the gist [summa] of our teaching on poenitentia, which we know to be godly and wholesome for good minds [bonis mentis]. Moreover, good folk, if they compare our teaching to the confused discussions of the adversaries, will realize that they have omitted the teaching about faith – faith that justifies and consoles godly hearts. They will also see that the adversaries have made up many things about the merit of attrition, the infinite enumeration of sins, and satisfactions. ‘They say things that touch neither

27 The division by articles, familiar to most modern users of the Augsburg Confession and its Apology, was not a part of the original. Only under certain articles (IV and XII), did Melanchthon provide headings. These correspond to the rhetorical divisions of the work. 28 CR 13: 435. “Peroratio est conclusio orationis, in qua repetitur propositio principalis. Tunc enim vocatur propositio, cum ante confirmationem collocatur. Conclusio vocatur, cum post confirmationem ponitur, ut fit in syllogismis apud dialecticos. Omnis autem peroratio constat duabus rebus, partim repetitione propositionis et potissimorum argumentorum, partim affectibus.”

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heaven nor earth,’ which even the adversaries themselves cannot satisfactorily explain.29

3.2 Address to Campeggio In the middle of Apology XII’s confutatio Melanchthon inserted an excursus, a highly charged rhetorical digression, in which he suddenly addressed and attacked Cardinal Campeggio by name (Ap XII, 124 – 30; par. 131 ends this excursus with the words “Sed redeamus ad propositum”). It was almost as if Melanchthon was returning his readers to the frustrating negotiations of the preceding summer and providing a final, public rebuke of the pope’s own representative, who (in Philip’s opinion) was most responsible for the collapse of discussions. Immediately before this section, Melanchthon’s rhetoric had already heated up, as he contested what he considered a gross misuse of the Scripture in the Confutatio.30 “May God destroy these ungodly sophists, who so evilly twist the Word of God to their completely empty dreams. What good person is not moved by such indignity?”31 After rehearsing one attempt to use the Scripture against the Augsburg Confession, Melanchthon exclaimed, “Who taught these jackasses dialectics? But this is neither dialectical nor sophistical but sycophantical” (Ap XII, 123). At this point Melanchthon directed his attention to the Roman pontiff, who had hardly enhanced his reputation by turning over such an important assignment of response to such incompetent people (Melanchthon is thinking of Eck, Cochlaeus, and Fabri). Since the Augsburg Confession contained quite nearly the gist (summa) of universal Christian teaching, the entire matter should have been turned over to judges of attested learning and faith instead of to the writers of the Confutatio.32 He then fixed his sights on the real culprit in this matter, Cardinal Campeggio himself. “It was up to you, O Campeggio, in keeping with your wisdom to see to it that in these matters they did not write anything now or in the future that might seem to diminish the prestige of the 29 Ap XII.178. The citation is from Lucian, Alex., 54, as cited by Erasmus, Adagia, 1, 5, 44 (LB 2: 199B). Erasmus defined the saying as referring to completely absurd things. I am indebted to Richard Wetzel of the Melanchthonforschungsstelle for this information. 30 Ap XII, 122. “Videte autem quomodo in confutatione quam ausi sunt obtrudere Caes. Majestati, probent haec sua figmenta. Multa dicta ex scripturis citant, ut fucum imperitis faciant, quasi haec res habeat auctoritatem ex scripturis, quae adhuc Longobardi tempore ignota erat.” 31 Ap XII, 123. The use of commovere (to move) signaled a more purely rhetorical section (as opposed to dialectical), in which Melanchthon was attempting to move the reader to contempt for his opponents. 32 Ap XII, 124. In the second edition of the Apology, Melanchthon emended the last sentence to read simply “iudices … quorum doctrina et fides bonis viris probaretur.” This was the proposal for dealing with the issue at Augsburg favored by the Evangelicals. Melanchthon later recalled that Eck had threatened to join the Evangelical side when Campeggio refused to give him the living he had requested. Melanchthon, however, saw through his disingenuous behavior. See Manlius: 1563, 2: 244 f.

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Roman See. If the Roman See imagines that it is proper for all nations to acknowledge her as the Mistress of the Faith, she ought to take care that people of learning and integrity investigate religious matters. How will the world judge our adversaries’ writing, if it is ever published? How will posterity evaluate these slanderous judgments?” (Ap XII, 125). Here Melanchthon placed at Campeggio’s doorstep responsibility for the manner in which the diet handled the Augsburg Confession. Instead of using learned, neutral judges and giving the Augsburg Confession a fair hearing, Campeggio (according to Melanchthon) insisted on handing the matter over to partisans, whose very method of attack undermined Rome’s reputation. By following this policy, Campeggio had undermined the one thing he most wanted to defend: the church’s teaching authority. Who would trust anyone associated with a document like the Confutatio? “You see, O Campeggio, that these are the end times, in which Christ predicted that there would be the greatest danger for religion. All of you, who should sit and govern religious matters as in a watchtower, ought in these times to employ special prudence and diligence. There are many signs that, unless you all take care, threaten change in Rome’s status. And you [Campeggio] err, if you believe that the churches must be maintained exclusively by force of arms” (Ap XII, 126). Here Melanchthon upped the ante. It was not simply a matter of allowing the production of a bad document. Campeggio and his compatriots (Melanchthon’s use of the plural included the pope himself) have missed the fact that they are living near the end, when Christ predicted evil things would happen in the church. The change in Rome’s status (Romanus status) echoed the Evangelical interpretation of Revelation 17 – 18 and the destruction of Babylon (depicted in the Luther Bible as the destruction of Renaissance Rome, recently sacked by imperial forces) and, hence, a veiled reference to Rome as antichrist.33 Campeggio’s complicity arose in relation to his advice to attack the Evangelical princes with arms, something Melanchthon had been aware of since at least 19 June 1530, and had not forgotten. Now the entire world, and not just Melanchthon’s correspondents, knew Campeggio’s involvement in the matter. Next, Melanchthon insisted that people throughout Europe (and not just in Germany) were demanding instruction in religious matters. He begged Campeggio and others to consider those who, filled with doubts about Rome, at least tacitly had become indignant over Rome’s policy of refusing to examine these important questions, of providing no comfort for distressed consciences, and of calling for a military response (Ap XII, 127, where Melanchthon employed verbs in the second person plural). By thus permitting the promulgation of a poor document, Campeggio had not only undermined Rome’s reputation; he had also missed the signs of the 33 The older English translation mistakenly associates it with the Roman State, that is the Holy Roman Empire.

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times, ignored the concerns of sensitive, thinking people, and trivialized the matter. This charge made explicit what Melanchthon had only hinted at in his correspondence when he complained about the Cardinal’s suavity. As Cardinal Cajetan, papal legate at the 1518 Diet of Augsburg, had missed Luther’s estimate of the church’s pastoral crisis (Hendrix:1981, 56 – 65), so did Campeggio twelve years later. “There are many good people for whom this doubt is worse than death.34 You do not properly assess the importance of religion if you imagine that good people are frivolously anxious when they become uncertain about some doctrine. And such doubt cannot but cause the bitterest hatred against those who ought to be healing consciences but instead refuse to let the issue be explained” (Ap XII, 128). Melanchthon denied that he was threatening God’s judgment, noting (with evident irony) that the pontifices could easily exercise the power of the keys and be forgiven. Instead, he was talking about “human judgment and the tacit desires of all nations.” They require a settlement of these matters “so that good minds may be healed and freed from doubt.” The alternative, which a wise person like Campeggio should have been able to figure out, would be universal hatred and worse. “However, through kindness you could bind all nations to yourselves because, if you heal doubting consciences, all reasonable people adjudge this a great and wonderful thing” (Ap XII, 129). As Melanchthon had stated years earlier in the first edition of the Loci communes theologici, to know Christ is to know his benefits. Here, too, respect for the papacy could arise only out of their proper use of God’s word: healing doubting consciences. In closing, Melanchthon underscored that his appeal did not call into question the Evangelicals’ confession. Instead, it represented one last attempt to make Rome and its chief representative, Campeggio, understand the seriousness of the situation not only for Rome but also for doubting consciences. “We have not said this because we doubt our own confession. For we know that it is true, godly, and useful for upright consciences. However, it is probable that there are many people in many places who are not ‘disputing about unimportant issues’ and for all that do not hear suitable teachers, who could heal their consciences” (Ap XII, 130). This then is the fitting conclusion to Melanchthon’s encounter with Campeggio at the Diet of Augsburg. Master Philip had Rome’s own best interest at heart and, even more important, the use and benefits of the gospel. The point was always and only to free doubting consciences through the gospel. With their summary and sloppy rejection of the Augsburg Confession, the opponents under Campeggio’s direction had not taken their pastoral role seriously. Thus, Melanchthon’s encounter with a papal legate ended as had Luther’s in 1518. The younger man, too, ended up affirming his confession of faith and pleading for uncertain consciences. However, Melanchthon also 34 In the second edition, Melanchthon changed this sentence to read: “who more easily put up with death and all kinds of punishments than to put up with this doubt.”

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ended up affirming what he had stated already in his first encounter with Campeggio in 1524. The gospel has to do with evangelical teaching, not with power politics. From Melanchthon’s perspective Campeggio seemed incapable of understanding this fundamental distinction. This excursus and personal appeal, however, also revealed for the Apology’s readers that this document did not only aim to refute the Confutatio or to instruct the emperor. It also challenged the pope’s representatives and demonstrated that at this crucial moment they had abandoned their true office by employing threats against the gospel and leaving the doubting to their own devices. Melanchthon’s negotiations, far from demonstrating his vacillation and indecision, heightened the opponents’ unwillingness to take the matter seriously. They employed threats; they dismissed doubting consciences; they even ignored dangers to the church during these last days and refused to negotiate in good faith. As a result, they and not the Evangelicals were responsible for the ensuing divisions.35 A year later in 1532, with Melanchthon again involved in negotiations with his Roman opponents, he wrote a note to his close friend, Joachim Camerarius. In this letter he complained about Campeggio’s efforts to undermine efforts to establish peace in the church (MBW §1244 [CR 2: 589], dated 22 May 1532). Campeggio, he said, was again behaving as he had in Augsburg. There, when he sensed that certain princes and the emperor himself were inclined to refrain from making any pronouncements but rather to put matters off until a future council, Campeggio, using all his rhetorical skills, approached the emperor several times and, using blandishments with which Melanchthon was familiar, argued that he (Campeggio) was not simply supporting the pope’s cause but the cause of Christ.36 Melanchthon’s public response in the Apology overturned precisely that line of argument. Campeggio’s pugnacious policy toward the Evangelical side had ignored the needs of the people, had undermined the papacy’s authority and standing among the people, had refused to come to the aid of the weak, and had ignored the signs of the times. Having met Campeggio and having been privy to rumors concerning the legate’s advice, Melanchthon wanted to do nothing other than remain true to his confession of faith. This brand of honest confession in encounters with other Christians may not stand him in good stead with some ecumenically minded Christians today. However, it accurately portrays the unwavering behavior of the author of the chief confession of the Lutheran church, for whom compromise never meant 35 See also Ap XIV, 2, where Melanchthon also addressed the bishops and said, “Let them see how they will answer to God for disrupting the church.” 36 CR 2: 589: “Idem fecit Augustae, cum intelligeret in eam sententiam propendere animum Caesaris et certorum principum, ne quid pronunciaretur, sed reiiceretur res ad concilium, sicut antea saepe decretum erat, publicae tranquillitatis causa, hic aliquoties Campegius adiit Caesarem, faces ei subditurus, et his verbis scio usum fuisse, non se agere Pontificis, sed Christi causam;” see also a fragment from Justus Jonas in WA Br 12: 120, dated 27 July 1530.

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capitulation, and conversation about the faith always entailed confession of the same. Literature Arand, Charles P. (2000) “Melanchthon’s Rhetorical Argument for the Sola Fide in the Apology.” Pp. 281 – 308. In: Lutheran Quarterly 14. (1998). “The Texts of the Apology of the Augsburg Confession.” Pp. 461 – 84. In: Lutheran Quarterly 12. Bagchi, David V. N. (1991). Luther’s Earliest Opponents: Catholic Controversialists 1518 – 1525. Minneapolis: Fortress. The Book of Concord (1959). Theodore Tappert (Ed.). Philadelphia: Fortress. Bouman, Walter R. (1999). “Melanchthon’s Significance for the Church Today.” Pp. 33 – 55. In: Scott H. Hendrix and Timothy J. Wengert (Ed.), Philip Melanchthon Then and Now (1497 – 1997): Essays Celebrating the 500th Anniversary of the Birth of Philip Melanchthon, Theologian, Teacher and Reformer. Columbia, SC: Eastern Clusters of Lutheran Seminaries. Chytraeus, David (1577). Historia Comitiorum anno M. D. XXX. Augustae celebratorum … . Frankfurt/M: Johann Eichorn. Coelestinus, Georg (1577). Historia Comitiorum Anno MDXXX Augustae, Repurgatae Doctrinae Occasionem, praecipuas de religione deliberationes … Frankfurt/Main: Eichorn. Flacius, Matthias (Ed.) (1549). Aliquot Epistolae Reverendi Patris piae memoriae D. Martini Lutheri quibusdam theologis ad Augustana comitia, Anno 1530 scriptae, de conciliationibus Christi et Belial disserentes … Magdeburg: Lotter. Fraenkel, Peter (1961). Testimonia Patrum: The Function of Patristic Argument in the Theology of Philip Melanchthon. Geneva: Droz. Hendrix, Scott (1981). Luther and the Papacy : Stages in a Reformation Conflict. Minneapolis: Fortress. Hone, Eugne (1997). “Kontinuität und Konsistenz der katholischen Concordiapolitik während des Augsburger Reichstags 1530.” Pp. 84 – 97. In: Immenkötter/ Wenz: 1997. (1973/74). “Zur Vorgeschichte des ersten Augsburger Reichsabschieds: Kardinal Lorenzo Campeggio und der Ausgang der Glaubensverhandlungen mit den Protestanten im Jahre 1530.” Pp. 1 – 63. In: Nederlands archief voor kerkgeschiedenis, n.s. 52. Immenkçtter, Herbert (1973). Um die Einheit im Glauben: Die Unionsverhandlungen des Augsburger Reichstages im August und September 1530. Münster : Aschendorff. (Ed.) (1979). Die Confutatio der Confessio Augustana vom 3. August 1530. Münster : Aschendorff. –, and Gunther Wenz (Ed.) (1997). Im Schatten der Confessio Augustana: Die Religionsverhandlungen des Augsburger Reichstages 1530 im historischen Kontext. Münster : Aschendorff.

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Kçhler, Walther (1924). “Brentiana und andere Reformatoria IX.” Pp. 95 – 104. In: Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 21. Luther, Martin (1880 – 1910). Johann Georg Walch and A. H. Hoppe (Ed.), Dr. Martin Luthers sämmtliche Schriften. Saint Louis: Concordia. Manlius, Johannes (1563). Locorum communium collectanea. 3 vol. Basel: J. Oporinus. Mller, Gerhard (1981). Art. Campeggio, Lorenzo. Pp. 604 – 606. In: TRE 7. Berlin: de Gruyter. (1989). Causa reformationis: Beiträge zur Reformationsgeschichte und zur Theologie Martin Luthers. Gütersloh: Mohn. Oberman, Heiko (1980). “Dichtung und Wahrheit: Das Wesen der Reformation aus der Sicht der Confutatio.” Pp. 217 – 231. In: Erwin Iserloh with Barbara Hallensleben (Ed.), Confessio Augustana und Confutatio: Der Augsburger Reichstag 1530 und die Einheit der Kirche. 2. ed. Münster : Aschendorff, 1980. Peters, Christian (1997). Apologia Confessionis Augustanae: Untersuchungen zur Textgeschichte einer lutherischen Bekenntnisschrift (1530 – 1584). Stuttgart: Calwer. (1997). “’Er hats immer wollen besser machen […]’: Melanchthons fortgesetzte Arbeit am Text der lateinischen Apologie auf und nach dem Augsburger Reichstag von 1530.” Pp. 98 – 126. In: Herbert Immenkötter and Gunthar Wenz (Ed.), Im Schatten der Confessio Augustana: Die Religionsverhandlungen des Augsburger Reichstages 1530 im historischen Kontext. Münster : Aschendorff. Rhein, Stefan (1998). “The Influence of Melanchthon on Sixteenth-Century Europe.” Pp. 383 – 394. In: Lutheran Quarterly 12. Salig, Christian August (1730). Vollständige Historie der Augspurgischen Confession. Halle: Renger. Schfer, Rolf (1997). “Melanchthon’s Interpretation of Romans 5.15: His Departure from the Augustinian Concept of Grace Compared to Luther’s.” Pp. 79 – 104. In: Timothy J. Wengert and M. Patrick Graham (Ed.), Philip Melanchthon (1497 – 1560) and the Commentary. Sheffield: Sheffield University Press. Scheible, Heinz (1996), Melanchthon und die Reformation: Forschungsbeiträge. Mainz: Philipp von Zabern. (1997). “Philipp Melanchthon, der Reformator neben Luther.” Pp. 7 – 45. In: Jörg Haustein (Ed.), Philipp Melanchthon: Ein Wegbereiter für die Ökumene. 2. ed. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Stupperich, Robert (1981). “Philipp Melanchthon.” Pp. 314 – 328. In: Heinrich Fries and Georg Kretschmar (Ed.), Klassiker der Theologie. Munich: Beck. Wengert, Timothy J. (1998) Human Freedom, Christian Righteousness: Philip Melanchthon’s Exegetical Dispute with Erasmus of Rotterdam. New York: Oxford University Press. (1997). Law and Gospel: Philip Melanchthon’s Debate with John Agricola of Eisleben over Poenitentia. Grand Rapids: Baker. (1999). “Qui vigilantissimis oculis veterum omnium commentarios excusserit’:

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Philip Melanchthon’s Patristic Exegesis.” Pp. 115 – 134. In: David C. Steinmetz (Ed.), Die Patristik in der Bibelexegese des 16. Jahrhunderts. Wiesbaden: Harrossowitz. Wenz, Gunther (1996, 1998). Theologie der Bekenntnisschriften der evangelischlutherischen Kirche, 2 vol. Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter.

This essay originally appeared in Johanna Loehr (Ed.), Dona Melanchthoniana. Festgabe für Heinz Scheible zum 70. Geburtstag. (Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: fromann-holzboog, 2001), 457 – 483.

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Irene Dingel

Melanchthon’s Paraphrases of the Augsburg Confession, 1534 and 1536, in the Service of the Smalcald League

Philip Melanchthon had a European-wide reputation and made a Europeanwide impact as a scholar through his extensive correspondence and his theological counsel in memoranda for governments across Western Europe: that he was deeply involved in continental political affairs needs no special mention. Within the framework of a single article it is impossible to organize the massive and diverse source material as it figures into specific aspects of his political and diplomatic roles, to summarize the theological and political factors in the negotiations in which he was involved, and to characterize the various groups to and for which he wrote. The attempt to give at least an overview of such groups reveals that along with countless letters to Swiss theologians and exiles in Western Europe, much of his wide-ranging correspondence addressed individuals or groups in Denmark, England, and France. The occasions and content of these letters include the many and various short messages and bits of information passed on in letters which supplement formal memoranda, theological pronouncements, and ambitious plans for furthering reform as he strove to restore unity in the church. His efforts to establish concord among various groups within Christendom form part of Melanchthon’s story throughout his life. These efforts are clearly reflected and recognizable in the various tasks he undertook. Initially he emphasized bridging the differences between the Roman Catholics and the Evangelicals, but the differences within Protestantism after the Augsburg Interim shifted his focus to resolving those differences. The hope of finding a way to heal the ever-growing breach between Evangelicals and Catholics, really not realistic at any point, continued on Melanchthon’s agenda until the collapse of the Colloquy of Worms in 1557 (Bundschuh: 1988, 426 – 72). The desire for theological unity and ecclesiastical peace was not only a concern of Emperor Charles V but also occupied his two great Western European foes: the French king, Francis I, and the leader of England, King Henry VIII. Both from the French side and the English side attention focused on Melanchthon when those two governments fell into negotiations with the German Evangelicals on projects that could establish concord in the church. In him they found a theological counselor, whom they also tried to gain for tasks that needed to be addressed within France and England. In both lands some desired to have him settle in their respective countries. To be sure, in both cases weighty political interests arising from these nations’ anti-Habsburg

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policies contributed to these developments. These interests played an influential role in the contacts these two kings made with the German Protestants, the princes of the Smalcald League, and in the negotiations that resulted from these contacts. Both kings’ approach to the theologians of the Reformation and their intervention in behalf of ecclesiastical reforms in their own lands must be evaluated in the light of these factors (Wolgast: 1977, 230 – 39). Studies on these topics exist (Seidel: 1970; Prüser : 1929; Delius: 1971, 283 – 91), and their results do not need to be repeated. This essay therefore focuses on two documents which Melanchthon composed, both of which offer good examples of the ways in which his theological influence and his involvement in the political maneuvering of the Western European powers worked in coordination with each other : the Consilium ad Gallos of 1534 and the Wittenberg Articles, which he negotiated with English diplomats in 1536. Both texts arose at a time in which the negotiations for reconciliation between the Wittenberg theologians and those of southern Germany were proceeding at full throttle. Those conversations not only led to the Wittenberg Concord (1536) but they also provided the basis for a common commitment to the Augsburg Confession and its Apology, thus opening the way for the southern Germans to join the Smalcald League. The contemporaneous efforts at reaching agreement with England and France took much the same course and must have fostered, at least among the theologians, the prospect of the possibility of a Western European unified front under the Augsburg Confession. This is the reason why the Consilium ad Gallos and the Wittenberg Articles often reflect the text of the Augsburg Confession. Both documents were intended as steps along the way to a common confession of the faith. Clearly, Melanchthon placed his concern for theological concord atop his list of priorities which he sought to foster as he took into consideration the specific situations in which such a confession had to function in France or in England. With the Concilium ad Gallos and the Wittenberg Articles he drafted texts that would bring the confessional positions of those two nations and of the lands of Wittenberg reform as close to one another as possible. Francis I and Henry VIII viewed the documents in terms of their pursuit of national policy. The persecution that was sparked by the affaire des placards in France and the limited impact of the Wittenberg Articles demonstrate that both monarchs viewed them as no more than instruments in their policies opposing the Habsburgs. Henry VIII did not accept the Wittenberg Articles though traces of their influence can be found in Henry’s “Ten Articles” (1536) and the “Forty-Two Articles” of Edward VI (1553) and through that document in Elizabeth I’s “Thirty-nine Articles” (1563/1571) (Mentz: 1905/1968, 12 – 16; cf. on the “Ten Articles,” Dickens: 1989: 199 f., and Hughes: 1993, 348 – 60). Melanchthon’s readiness to work for consensus in the Consilium ad Gallos and the Wittenberg Articles must be viewed in the matrix of religion and politics. A comparison of the two texts is instructive. We begin with a brief glance at the

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political conditions in France and England in order to assess Melanchthon’s contribution to the pursuit of theological accord in Western Europe.

I In Francis I France had, since 1515, a monarch who was truly open to the spirit of humanism and who promoted a course of university study of the ancient languages and literature that was free of the scholastic structures of the Sorbonne.1 Despite this he consistently proved himself unpredictable in his relationship to the rising efforts for reform in the church and theology. This became clear not only in the eventual collapse of the reform-minded group in Meaux, gathered around Bishop Guillaume BriÅonnet, which could not stand up to the pressure on it from the Parisian theological faculty. Above all, the royal opposition revealed itself in the several waves of persecution that from the beginning of the 1520s attempted to bring an end to the influence of the socalled “luthriens.” Precisely these developments made it clear that in the midst of the tensions between Parlement and the Sorbonne, the king ardently strove to distance his government unambiguously from the Reformation. The importance of doing this is clear from Erasmus’s own expression of the suspicion that the French court itself was “verstekt luthert” [covertly Lutheran].2 This repression, it appears, chiefly made an impact on the scholarly humanists. However, Francis was prepared on occasion to offer them protection against the Sorbonne and the Parlement of Paris (Wolf: 1983, 387). As a result, in the circle of influence which Francis’ sister Margurite of Navarre was establishing at the time, there arose a moderate reformed-minded group of scholars and humanists, which exercised influence in the formulation of royal policy. They knew how to couple developing policies of the French national state with their theological concerns (Imbart de la Tour : 1914, 504 ff., Bourilly : 1900, 348 ff.). In these circles the search for unity in the church grew ever more important between 1530 and 1536. This search was nurtured in the soil of the concept of a council. Erasmus, who already in 1523 sent a memorandum endorsing such a program to the pope and to secular 1 Francis created the Collge des trois langues to transfer the study of Hebrew, Greek, and Latin away from the Sorbonne; see Wolf: 1983, 387 – 89. 2 “When I go to Italy, the raving Evangelicals pursue me like 600 dragonflies with their screaming that I have fallen away from the gospel for mere profit and reward although I never gave my allegiance to that gospel. When I go to France, which loves me dearly, I encounter the calumny that I am seeking refuge with the enemies of the emperor, and I have the feeling that the royal court secretly turns to Luther [et subodoror regiam Aulam rpokouheq_feim]. In Brabant you know well which monsters wield the sword [against me].” Erasmus, “Epistola secretissima an Conrad Goclenius in Löwen,” cited from Polenz: 1857/1964, 129 f.; cf. Erasmus: 1924, 5: 436 f., §1437 of 2 April 1524.

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authorities and who a decade later summarized his program for peace in his Liber de sarcienda ecclesiae Concordia, had prepared the way for this effort. In France the chief players in this search for concord were the two brothers du Bellay : the older, Guillaume, Seigneur de Langey, and his younger brother, Jean, a cardinal and bishop of Paris. Both had enjoyed an education formed, at least in part, by humanism; both had studied ancient literature and law. Since 1527 Jean du Bellay had been serving as the French ambassador in England, where considerations shaped by Henry VIII’s plans to divorce Catherine of Aragon were determining the policies of the time. Guillaume led the diplomatic negotiations with the Protestant princes in Germany, whose activities in opposition to the Habsburgs were being supported by France in so far as that was possible. His several visits to Germany and his travel there had won him the trust and respect of the Protestants, and he had been able to gain countless friends among them. Among these friends were the Strasbourg physician Ulrich Geiger, called Chelius, whose contacts with theologians in Basel and Zurich, along with the Strasbourg ecclesiastical superintendent Martin Bucer, were of use for these French diplomatic efforts. Above all it was Johann Sturm, after 1538 rector of the Academy in Strasbourg (Schmidt: 1855), who tirelessly worked to win over Melanchthon and Bucer for the policy of the confessional convergence which du Bellay favored. Thus, in 1533 du Bellay traveled to Germany on a two-fold mission. The first was political; after the dissolution of the Swabian League which he had been trying to attain, he was to offer the prospect of French support for the plan of Landgrave Philip of Hesse to return Duke Ulrich of Württemberg to the rule of his territory. Du Bellay was pursuing a theologically related mission as well, which had as its goal to win the Protestants for his idea of a convergence of the churches. His diplomatic efforts nicely tied into the emperor’s wish for a general council, so that the efforts for concord could be presented to Pope Clement VII as a measure which could point to the council that the emperor desired (on the various constellations of the French political scene of that time, see Bourrilly : 1900, 348 – 54). His real goal, however, was a narrower solution, in which the Evangelicals, including the Swiss, would be drawn closer to the currents of humanistic and reformational thought within the French church and could support a policy which focused on political maneuvering in Italy in opposition to the Habsburgs. Du Bellay presented this plan for attaining concord in May 1534, in a speech delivered in Zurich to Swiss theologians. It forms the background for a proposal formulated by Melanchthon, Bucer, and Caspar Hedio of Strasbourg at the end of 1534. Du Bellay asked the theologians of Zurich, Bern, Basel, and Schaffhausen to inform the king in writing which issues they believed were possible points on which they could reach agreement and also to summarize the articles in which differences dominated – without harsh tones, in so far as possible – and which should be discussed as theological questions (Bourilly : 1900, 338 f., Imbart de la Tour: 1914, 536 f., n. 3, and in Bourilly : 1900, 339, n. 1

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the reference to du Bellay’s speech in the Bibliothque Nationale, fds fr. 2846, f8 70v ff.). The response of the Swiss conceded little; indeed, it rejected the proposal.3 However, Melanchthon and Bucer, to whom du Bellay had also turned with the same proposal, responded very differently. Bucer and du Bellay began a written exchange. They won Melanchthon’s support for this plan to pursue accord through the efforts of Ulrich Chelius.4 This striving for such a rapprochement on the theological level could only improve the standing of the French king in the eyes of the princes who had come together in the Smalcald League. About the same time the German Protestants were also trying to draw Henry VIII into their alliance. The League had become a significant factor in a European-wide strategy for opposing the house of Habsburg. The alliance also brought to the table the desire to discuss the possibility of a theological agreement, a common confession, that it regarded as a necessary presupposition for common commitments and common action. Thus, the princes of the Smalcald League demanded that any agreement go beyond the political sphere alone. This demand made it necessary to make the Augsburg Confession acceptable to the distinctive situations in which political and confessional issues had taken form in England and France. In both instances Melanchthon was the key figure, who was supposed to pave the way for both potential partners in the alliance to find unity in their confession of the faith. Nevertheless for him – and for Martin Bucer also – the political concerns of France and England were secondary to his own overarching theological goal of restoring a comprehensive unity of the church by attaining agreement on the doctrine of the Reformation.

II Already on 1 August 1534 Melanchthon sent du Bellay a memorandum and anticipated in the accompanying letter what he would later make clear in the Consilium; essentially, there were not all that many divergent positions separating the two theological parties. Melanchthon expressed his firm conviction that a colloquy called by the secular authorities could lead to a reconciliation of differences in public teaching. The goal was not to change ecclesiastical structures since all for whom Melanchthon was speaking wanted to preserve them in so far as possible: “The leaders among us most ardently desire to preserve the form being used in the church to the greatest extent possible” (“Praecipui ex nostris maxime cupiunt usitatam ecclesiae formam 3 On 17 January 17 1535, Bullinger reacted to du Bellay‘s appeal; Haller in Bern joined in his response. Myconius’ answer is dated 29 January 1535. See Imbart de la Tour: 1914, 540 – 43. Bourrilly : 1900, 337 – 65, offers a detailed examination of the Swiss responses. 4 Bucer’s reply is dated 2 June 1534. Cf. Bourilly : 1900, 337 – 65, and Pollet: 1962, 2: 488 – 509.

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conservare quantum possibile est.” MBWT 6: 172 f., §1469, CR 2: 740, §1204). On the basis of this fundamental presupposition, which left the public structure of the church in France established by the Concordat of 1516 untouched, Melanchthon hoped to pave the way for agreement in doctrine and above all to prevent a radicalization of the relationships, as some feared (“Qualia impendeant tempora, si nemo praesentibus dissidiis medicinam faciat, quanta dissipatio reipublicae et ecclesiae futura sit, si res ad arma deducitur, melius videt Celsitudo tua quam ego.” MBWT 6: 172 f., §1469, CR 2: 740, §1204). On this point the Consilium ad Gallos5 resembled the Confessio Augustana in so far as both strove to demonstrate the greatest possible agreement between the theological opponents and thereby to prove the catholicity of the Evangelicals. This goal informed the way in which Melanchthon constructed his memorandum. He distinguished between external matters, in which, he believed, it is easy to attain unity, and the truly important questions of doctrine, which affect the conscience and public worship (MBWT 6: 134 ff., CR 2: 743 – 47). Thus, it was simply presumed that the article “on ecclesiastical governance” (thus the title of the first part of the correction in Melanchthon’s own hand, see Collection Dupuy 424: 9v), and the questions of papal authority in the church were placed in the category of adiaphora. In contrast to the Swiss theologians, who long had seen no possibility for negotiations aimed at reconciliation, Melanchthon was prepared, as long as the other side did not intend to raise the question of the papacy, to make this concession as a point of departure for an agreement that would reconcile the two sides. He could expressly recognize the hierarchy with the papacy and the bishops at its head, for, as he formulated it, “it is necessary that there be those who govern the church . . . And although ideally there would be no bishops, nevertheless it is necessary to create them” (“Opus est enim in Ecclesia gubernatoribus, … Et ut maxime nulli essent Episcopi, tamen creari tales oporteret.” MBWT 6: 135, CR 2: 745 f.). In fact, that was true for Melanchthon only under one presupposition, which determined the validity of this concession, that the pope and the bishops not abuse their authority by suppressing true doctrine, that they dedicate their exercise of office to promote “sana doctrina” [sound doctrine]. For under this condition the “monarchia Romani Pontificis” [the rule of the Roman pontiff] would benefit the retention of “consensus doctrinae” [agreement in public teaching] a great deal. With this maneuver Melanchthon had 5 Corpus Reformatorum prints three different versions (§1205, 2: 743 – 66, 766 – 76), which do not reflect Melanchthon’s draft with his own corrections and his signature (from the Collection P. Dupuy, vol. 424, Bibliothque Nationale), cf. MBWT 6: 129 – 69, §1467. This was graciously provided by the director of the Melanchthon-Forschungsstelle in Heidelberg, Dr. Johanna Loehr. A comparison of the texts reveals that the first text in the CR, “A,” varies only in very small measure from Melanchthon’s authorized manuscript. Therefore, in the following analysis, in order to facilitate reader use, the CR text will be cited. Seidel: 1970, esp. 16 – 18, discussed the problems of the various drafts.

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adroitly taken over du Bellay’s campaign for unity in the church and, by emphasizing the benefits of dominant ecclesiastical structures, argued for a reformation of the office of governor in the church. In this way Melanchthon found a different path from the one he had trod in the Augsburg Confession, which placed Article XXVIII, “on the power of the bishops,” among the controverted articles. If in the Consilium ad Gallos Melanchthon took another approach, that fundamentally no disagreement in the question of “ecclesiastical power” existed, he must have had the situation of the Gallican church in mind. While the Augsburg Confession denounced mixing temporal and spiritual competence in the hands of ecclesiastical officials, the question did not even come on the table for discussion in Consilium ad Gallos. For the Concordat of 1516 had been particularly sensitive to the limiting of spiritual jurisdiction. It made the king lord of the church in his land by giving him extensive rights in the filling of church offices (see Pithou: 1594, Schulte: 1899, 355 – 59, and Adrinyi: 1984, 17 – 21) Against this background Melanchthon differentiated an improper power of the papacy, which was limited by the power granted to the kings (and did not need to be debated in that case), from the kind of exercise of power that benefited the church in the preservation of “consensus doctrinae” [doctrinal consensus] across political boundaries (MBWT 6: 134 f., CR 2: 744 f.). Melanchthon saw no obstacles to concord in external matters. Among them he included ecclesiastical ceremonies and customs as well as the practice of confession and absolution, so long as these rites and rituals were not among the merely superstitious usages of medieval church life. He believed that such practices were receding. Also in this instance Melanchthon presumed the affirmation of the correct framework of biblical doctrine. He set them apart from questions of teaching and public confession of the faith, in which consensus had to be reached. He limited those points to four central articles of faith, “on justification, on the mass and communion in both kinds, on the veneration of the saints, on vows and celibacy,”6 so that it would appear that unity already existed to a large extent. Nonetheless, the questions of the free will, original sin, the forgiveness of sins, and good works were also treated in brief formulations so that the essential topics of the Augsburg Confession were all addressed, with few exceptions.7 Here too it was of great importance for Melanchthon to emphasize that the consensus for which he argued did exist in regard to these decisive points. That was particularly true of the article “on justification,” for which Melanchthon used a summary of Article IV of the Apology of the Augsburg Confession as the basis for his treatment in the 6 “De iustificatione, De Missa & de utraque specie, De cultu Sanctorum, De votis & coelibatu.” See Melanchthon, Consilium ad Gallos, in: MBWT 6: 136, CR 2: 747, found also in the manuscript corrected by Melanchthon. 7 Articles I, III, VII, VIII, XVI, XVII, and XIX of the Augsburg Confession were not specifically considered here. In regard to the free will and original sin, Melanchthon simply posited the agreement without elaboration, see Consilium ad Gallos, in: MBWT 6: 135 f., CR 2: 747 f.

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Consilium ad Gallos (BSLK, 158 – 233. Book of Concord, 120 – 73). He viewed the scholastic appreciation of the power of human works in God’s sight as already set aside, apparently in view of the reformational movements in France. “All confess that faith is necessary, that is, trust in Christ for the remission of sins . . . All already confess that it is vital for the honor of Christ that faith be taught to the people.”8 In these contexts Melanchthon repeatedly referred to the “learned,” “good and prudent men,” or “all the prudent.” Behind all these references stood Jacques Lefevre d’Etaples (Faber Stapulensis), whose work Melanchthon undoubtedly knew (Maurer: 1967/1968, 1: 76, 2: 66, 111); his disciple Grard Roussel, the court preacher of Margurite of Navarre; and their associates who were favorable toward reformational thinking. Lefevre himself had repeatedly tried to pave the way for reconciliation and unity as questions of doctrine began to arise in the 1530s (Bedouelle: 1982, 781 ff.), so that Melanchthon could properly make such an appeal in his memorandum. The possibility that the dispute over the doctrine of justification could easily be resolved appeared to him to be possible if only the pope and the kings would take the opportunity to hold a dialog between the parties, a colloquy (MBWT 6: 136, CR 2; 748). In a similar fashion Melanchthon addressed the question of good works, using the fourth article of the Apology of the Augsburg Confession as a source for illuminating the issue (BSLK, esp. 192,1 – 196,31). His observations about the God-pleasing nature of good works, which were based on the previous discussion of “reconciliation in Christ,” are taken over almost word for word from the first edition of the Apology (MBWT 6: 137, CR 2: 749 ff., cf. BSLK, 230,2 – 9), and therefore should not be seen as any unusual accommodation to the other side. Against this background Melanchthon was able to speak of “iustitia bonorum operum seu bonae conscientiae” [righteousness of good works or a good conscience] in the Consilium ad Gallos, but he interpreted that expression in a strictly reformational way and placed it in the context of trust in Christ and the good works that result from this trust which produces a new obedience and an initial (active) righteousness (MBWT 6: 137, CR 2: 749 f.). All other articles of faith were intimately connected with the unity that Melanchthon envisioned in the article on justification. Unanimity regarding the proper teaching on Christ and its general acceptance would lead to the disappearance of the veneration of the saints. It would also lead to the granting of permission to determine rites and monastic rules on the local level, to be practiced as adiaphora without any superstitious excesses – if it were still the case that the monasteries which had been abandoned had not been transformed into schools, as Melanchthon recommended (MBWT 6: 139 – 8 “Omnes iam fatentur,” he stated, “fide opus esse, hoc est fiducia in Christum et remissionem peccatorum, … Omnes iam fatentur, interesse gloriae Christi, ut illa fides inculcetur hominibus.” Melanchthon, Consilium ad Gallos, in: MBWT 6: 136, CR 2: 747, §1205. Cf. the Apology IV, in: BSLK, 188,54 – 189,17, Book of Concord, 143.

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42, CR 2: 755 – 62). Without any room for misunderstanding, he argued for the abolition of the veneration of the saints and referred to the continuation of countless abuses in regard to it. He recognized the possibility of concession on this subject only in the same way that he had in Augsburg Confession XXI: the saints should serve as examples for the life of the Christian (MBWT 6: 139 – 42, CR 2: 755 – 59, cf. CA XXI, in: BSLK, 83b-d, Book of Concord, 58 ff.). On the other hand, he viewed the question of the abolition of clerical celibacy as a matter for the church and the pope to decide. He presumed that, in view of the desirability of concord in the church, the other side would be eager to reach a common understanding of this matter and also that all spiritual and temporal powers were in fact committed to ridding the church of all existing abuses. For, as he emphasized, the goal of reform should not be to overturn existing structures but rather to organize them in Christian freedom according to the gospel (MBWT 6: 141 f., CR 2: 761, 763). The article on the question of the mass offers an exception to what has been said. It did not contain details regarding the proper understanding of the Lord’s Supper, not even a hint of a rejection of the doctrine of transubstantiation. Instead, Melanchthon referred to the negotiations he had begun to conduct with Martin Bucer,9 and he justified this by saying that he did not want to comment on this controversial question, on which no clarity had yet been reached. Instead, he spoke of the necessity of holding a synod and appealed to Francis I and Henry VIII to take the initiative in moving toward such a council (MBWT 6: 148, CR 2: 751). The Consilium ad Gallos therefore offered only some comments on the liturgy and the question of the private mass, which Melanchthon decisively rejected in view of his understanding of the sacrifice of the mass. However, he signaled his desire for conciliation in the question of the proper reception of the Lord’s Supper in so far as he only spoke of granting permission for communion in both kinds but did not mention the abolition of communion under one kind (MBWT 6: 148 f., CR 2: 751 – 56). In this memorandum Melanchthon had presented a text which at first met approval on all sides. Bucer and Hedio in Strasbourg signed Melanchthon’s draft. Bucer himself composed a document which was close to Melanchthon’s in its content.10 Chelius and du Bellay presented Melanchthon’s program for establishing concord, as it found expression in Melanchthon’s memorandum, to theologians of a number of Evangelical cities in southwestern Germany. Positive reactions came from Ulm, Memmingen, Heilbronn, Pforzheim, Lindau, Isny, and Augsburg. But a short time later it became apparent that the realization of du Bellay’s 9 The colloquy at Kassel took place in December 1534; on it, see Bizer : 1940/1962, 65 – 95, and Bucer : 1988, 62 – 76. 10 On this, see Greschat; 1990, 115 ff. Greschat maintains that no difference existed between Bucer and Melanchthon in regard to the acceptance of the traditional ecclesiastical structures, provided that the pope and bishops live and teach according to correct doctrine.

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diplomatic efforts in behalf of concord would fail just as would Melanchthon’s goal of paving the way with his carefully formulated memorandum for the French which sought to move toward the Reformation of that country. In midOctober 1534 placards surfaced in Paris and several other French cities agitating for the introduction of the Reformation. In them the movement advocating Reformation suddenly revealed its anti-papal stance. The king intervened with harsh measures to suppress it.11 The placards were entitled “Articles vritables sur les horribles, grands et importables abus de la Messe Papale, invent directement contre la saincte Cne de Nostre Seigneur, seul Mdiateur et seul Sauveur Jsus-Christ” [“True Articles on the Horrible, Huge, and Significant Abuses of the Papal Mass, Contrived Directly Against the Holy Supper of our Lord, our only Mediator, and only Savior, Jesus Christ”] Their author was Antoine Marcourt, a religious refugee from Lyon who was working in Neuch tel (Bourrilly/Weiss: 1904, 107 f.; and Skalweit: 1965, 454), and they focused precisely on the point which Melanchthon had left open in his memorandum and had referred to a synod which was to be called in the future (Bourilly/Weiss: 1904, 106 f.). With the bloodshed that marked the royal suppression resulting from the “affair of the placards,” the king of France demonstrated, in the eyes of the Protestants, that he was a foe of the gospel. All further efforts of du Bellay to sustain Melanchthon’s influence in France had no chance of success.12 The French diplomat rewrote Melanchthon’s, Bucer’s, and Hedio’s memoranda in order to integrate them into his own plan. His revision largely eliminated their specifically reformational tone. He presented this plan to the Sorbonne in October 1535 but was not able to accomplish anything anymore (MBWT 6: 153 – 65, CR 2: 765 – 75, §1205B; see Du Bellay to Melanchthon, 16 July 1535, in: MBWT 6: 399, §1587, CR 2: 886 – 89, §1283, and Bourrilly : 1900, 347). Melanchthon also attracted criticism when an abridged, German version of his Consilium ad Gallos became public13 since it obscured the original focus on the French situation and therefore inevitably aroused the appearance of playing into the hands of the persecutors and the Roman church.

11 Bourrilly pointed out that since 11 October Pope Paul III held the papal office, and, in contrast to Clement VII, was not opposed to holding a council. This, along with the absence of Margurite de Navarre and the influential humanists in her circle – Guillaume du Bellay was engaged in a mission to England –, gave Francis a free hand for this move against the Reformation; see Bourrilly : 1900, 351 f. On this, cf. Skalweit: 1965, 445 – 65; Imbart de la Tour: 1914, 540. 12 As he described his intention himself, e. g., in a letter for Francis I, written to revive the connection with the German princes. The invitation for Melanchthon to come to France also fits into this context; on this, see Bourrilly/Weiss: 1904, 130 – 35, 139 – 43. 13 See CR 3: 830 – 38, §1876, and Melanchthon’s complaint to du Bellay, 8 August 1535, in: MBWT 6: 428 – 31, §1611. Peucer published another revised draft of the Consilium, more or less to save Melanchthon’s honor, MBWT 6: 134 – 43, CR 2: 743 – 66.

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III That Melanchthon’s efforts toward church unity, while indeed getting rid of the worst abuses, at the same time coincided very closely with the political interests of Western European political powers became clear not only in his approach to France but also in the contemporaneous intensive negotiations between England and the Wittenberg theologians. The relationships between the German Protestants and Henry VIII began in 1531, about the same time as closer contacts with France were emerging. At that point the dissolution of his marriage with Catherine of Aragon,14 the aunt of Charles V, stood at the center of Henry’s concerns. The Wittenberg theologians, however, distanced themselves from that question. The fear that war could break out with the Habsburgs caused Henry to draw closer to France. He also looked favorably upon the possibility of entering the Smalcald League, a proposal strongly promoted by his minister of state Thomas Cromwell. But the question of unity in doctrine and confession of faith had to be clarified. The climax of the efforts to reach agreement in 1535/1536 made it appear that this goal might be realized. The disciple of the Wittenberg reformers, Robert Barnes, was among the most influential negotiators in these efforts (Beiergrößlein: 2011, Maas: 2010). He came to electoral Saxony in December 1535 with a delegation including Edward Fox, the bishop of Hereford, and Nicholas Heath, the archdeacon of Canterbury.15 After conferring with the Saxon elector in Weimar, they traveled with him to the diet of the League in Smalcald.16 There they presented Henry’s request that a scholar be sent to England who could instruct the king in religious matters and also assist him in the introduction of the Reformation. The king was said to have already concluded that he would “not in any way concede power and primacy, as it has been labeled,” to the pope (“Acta cum legatis Anglicis,” in: CR 2: 1009, §1375). They placed his desire for unity in the confession of the faith within the context of the concept of a council and made it clear at the same time that Henry was not at all opposed to entering the Smalcald League (“Acta cum legatis Anglicis,” in: CR 2: 1008, §1375). The members of the League liked to hear that. In a “Petitio” to Henry VIII of 25 December 25 1535, which the two leaders of the Smalcald League and Herford, Heath, and Barnes signed, they urged the king to promote 14 On 23 May 1533, Henry’s marriage was declared invalid by the English assembly of bishops under the chairmanship of Thomas Cranmer. The king had already married Anne Boleyn in secret on 25 January. The pope declared the first marriage between Henry and Catherine of Aragon to be valid in March 1534 and excommunicated Henry and Anne Boleyn. On this, see Dickens: 1989: 125 – 29, and Hughes: 1993, 156 – 91. 15 On Luther’s and Melanchthon’s description and evaluation of these people, see Prüser : 1929, 42 – 44. 16 On the developments leading up to the Wittenberg Articles, see Mentz: 1905/1968, 1 – 17, and Prüser : 1929, 16 – 38.

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the gospel and the true faith in England in accord with the Augsburg Confession and its Apology if indeed no more changes in the confession were thought to be necessary (“…, nisi fortasse quaedam interim ex iis communi dicti Serenissimi Regis et ipsorum Principum consensu ex verbo Dei merito corrigenda aut mutanda videbuntur.” See the Responsum ad legatos Anglicos, in: CR 2:1032 – 36, citation from 1032, §1383). The conversations with the theologians continued the negotiations begun by the governmental leaders. They began on 1 January 1536, in Wittenberg and lasted into April, resulting in the so-called Wittenberg Articles. The real conversations on doctrinal issues began in February/March after endless sessions on the question of the divorce of the English king had consumed a great deal of time. The subject continued to arise in the negotiations because the English envoys kept attempting diplomatic sleight of hand to bring the theologians to recognize the divorce as something that had taken place “propter iustissimas causas” [“for most justified reasons”] even though the Wittenberg negotiators persisted in rejecting it. Even that level of agreement eluded their grasp.17 The English delegation could not attain the chief goal of the king, the recognition of his divorce by the German Protestants. Henry’s hope to have them on his side to defend this action against the pope at any council that might be held collapsed. That called into question his most important motive for joining the Smalcald League. In this situation the discussion of the confession of faith became even more important for the English envoys as well as for the Wittenberg theologians. Luther, Bugenhagen, Justus Jonas, and Caspar Cruciger took part in the conversations. In accord with the wish of the English, Chancellor Brück and Vice-chancellor Franz Burchard were also invited to the sessions beginning in March. That Melanchthon, who had dedicated the second edition of his Loci to the English king (CR 2: 920 – 30, §1311 [MBWT 6: 332 – 40, §1555]), was finally drawn into the negotiations was due to the insistence of the English delegation; they had hopes that he would be a negotiator who was inclined in

17 Apparently bribery was also being mentioned. At least Luther later reported, “Es hett mit das wort ein dreihundert fl. tragen, sed nolui“. The qualification “maximis et gravissimis causis” was the only possible grounds, cited by Prüser : 1929, 50. In marrying Catherine of Aragon Henry had taken the wife of his deceased brother Arthur and at the time obtained a papal dispensation for such a marriage, which is forbidden in Lev 18:16, with reference to Lev 20:21 (if someone takes his brother’s wife, it is a shameful act; they shall not have children); Catherine had had five stillbirths, among them three boys, Henry tried at this point to have the marriage annulled. He argued that it was an offense against a law from which no dispensation is possible and therefore had to be recognized as invalid, thereby justifying his divorce. Luther and Melanchthon had – in contrast to Zwingli und Oekolampadius – rejected this in a formal opinion in 1531. Andreas Osiander argued in a similar way that Henry‘s marriage was indeed invalid and with his argumentation influenced the argumentation of the Wittenberg theologians, but they continued to reject the case for the divorce in general. See the detailed presentation of the argumentation in Prüser : 1929, 46 – 53.

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their direction.18 After protracted conversations a document was put together ; it had fifteen articles and summarized the doctrinal and confessional convictions of both the Wittenberg theologians and the English representatives. Melanchthon had composed these articles (Mentz: 1905/1968, 12, confirmed by Scheible: 1992, 379). They were to be presented to the king for his acceptance when the English delegation returned. These articles, later labeled the Wittenberg Articles, were to be the decisive threshold for English entry into the League. What makes them comparable to the Consilium ad Gallos is the fact that at their foundation both documents were driven by the politically motivated desire for a common commitment to a confessional position among Western European powers. But they also revealed under what circumstances the theologians, specifically Melanchthon, were prepared to make concessions in public teaching in order to win allies such as the English king or the French king. At the same time they were preparing the soil for taking the fundamental principles of the Reformation seriously – or actually introducing these principles – into those countries. That becomes clear when the two texts are compared.

IV Georg Mentz pointed to the fact that the Wittenberg Articles were not a new creation. Instead, they offer – with a view toward accepting the English into the Smalcald League – a reworking of the Augsburg Confession. The Apology of the Augsburg Confession and the Loci communes of 1535 also served as a basis for the text, sometimes supplying the precise wording of those documents for a section. In that regard the Wittenberg Articles are more detailed and nearer to the Augsburg Confession than is the Consilium ad Gallos. No comparable consultation of the two sides took place before the composition of the latter ; it was rather a more or less private memorandum of Melanchthon which aimed at supporting the project of the “most Christian king” for promoting Christian unity, and because of this it strove to reconcile the most important differences between the two sides. In contrast, the Wittenberg Articles offer a set norm for the agreement of the two parties.19 The parallels between the documents lie, apart from their common goal, above all in the similar emphases which the content of both reveals. Apparently, the articles of the Augsburg Confession were taken up with the English representatives one after another and discussed with a genuine back18 Because of the plague Melanchthon went directly from Smalcald to Jena. During the first three weeks of the meeting in Wittenberg the discussion centered on Melanchthon’s participation. See Prüser : 1929, 41, n. 4, and p. 44. 19 Composed in Latin. A German translation was prepared for the Saxon elector ; both texts are printed in Mentz: 1905/1968, 18 – 79, cf. Prüser : 1929, 53 – 64.

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and-forth exchange (Mentz: 1905/1968, 8 – 9). In the text which Melanchthon composed, however, only sections of the Confession were used on specific points. Quickly it became clear that it would not be easy to reach agreement on the Augsburg Confession as it stood. According to a missive of Elector Johann Friedrich of 20 March 1535, to Landgrave Philip of Hesse, difficulties arose in discussing the topics of the mass, distribution of the Lord’s Supper under both kinds, clerical celibacy, and monastic vows (Prüser : 1929, 53). As he had in the Augsburg Confession, Melanchthon had placed them at the end of the document, as articles on abuses which should be set aside. They dealt with the same questions which Melanchthon had striven to clarify when looking toward the French; these questions set forth the issues that could be grasped most clearly as visible signs of the disagreement between the Roman Catholic teaching and that of the Reformation. In addition, on 12 March 1536, Henry VIII let his representatives know again in terms that could not be misunderstood that no unity in religious questions was possible without a modification of the Augsburg Confession (Prüser : 1929, 58). So these disputed articles make clear the extent to which Melanchthon and the other Wittenberg negotiators were prepared to go to meet their Western European conversation partners in their public teaching and confession of the faith. One indication for that is, for example, the retention of the medieval catholic concepts which could be placed upon an Evangelical foundation and filled with reformational ideas. For example, Melanchthon maintained the principles of the Augsburg Confession in the article on the Lord’s Supper (Article VI) and taught in strict accord with the Augsburg Confession that Christ’s body and blood are present “vere, substantialiter et realiter … sub speciebus panis et vini” [truly, substantially, and really … under the forms of bread and wine] (Mentz: 1905/1968, 48). That did not stop him, however, from retaining the concept of sacrifice in the article on the mass (Article XII) and in that way signaling a willingness to meet the concerns of the other side in the negotiations. The Consilium ad Gallos had taken a similar path. The idea that the mass constituted a meritorious good work, however, was clearly repudiated. On this basis in both the Consilium ad Gallos and the Wittenberg Articles the practice of holding private masses was rejected although both of the parties with whom the Wittenberg theologians were negotiating wished to retain the practice (Prüser : 1929, 54. Presumably the French would have held this position as well). Melanchthon attempted to maintain the concept of sacrifice in the Wittenberg Articles by using the ancient Christian understanding of the Lord’s Supper as a meal of commemoration and thanksgiving. In the Consilium ad Gallos he had sketched this construal of the concept of sacrifice only briefly ; it was placed into a version published later, probably by Melanchthon’s son-in-law, Caspar Peucer (MBWT 6: 138 f., CR 2: 753 f.). It must be noted that in his use of this concept of sacrifice Melanchthon was doing nothing other than reproducing his argument in the Apology of the

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Augsburg Confession (BSLK, 353 – 71, Book of Concord, 260 – 72). In the Wittenberg Articles he stated that in view of the believers’ thankful recollection of the forgiveness of sins delivered by the sacrament of the altar, “this ceremony was called a sacrifice by the ancient fathers; they did not mean that such a work has validity for others, to merit for them forgiveness of punishment and guilt, but that they should believe that a person should strengthen faith in this sacrament and therefore give thanks.”20 Similarly Melanchthon could call faith a good work, as he had in the Apology (fides as virtus) and as Luther had in On Good Works (1520) (WA 6: 204,25 – 205,13, LW 44: 23 f., and Apology IV, in: BSLK, 203, Book of Concord, 154). The efforts to win the conversation partners for the teaching of the Wittenberg Reformation did not find expression in specific demands for the abolition of practices or the alterations that would logically follow from the reformatory teaching. Rather, these efforts concentrated on following the policy of permitting new practices on the basis of that teaching and the use of the contrast between lex humana and lex divina. In both the Consilium ad Gallos and the Wittenberg Articles (Article XIII) Melanchthon described the withdrawal of the chalice from the laity as merely a human law, as opposed to Christ’s institution of the gift of bread and wine. On that basis Melanchthon did not call for, as one might logically expect, the abolition of communion in one kind but simply urged that the people not be forced against their conscience to act against this divine ordinance.21 This meant essentially that the practice of the Lord’s Supper was left open without approving the medieval catholic ritual while at the same time permitting continuation of the past practice of both sides in the negotiations. Melanchthon found a similar path in seeking agreement on clerical celibacy. In the Consilium ad Gallos he was speaking within the context of the exercise of spiritual power. Through carefully-wrought formulations he expressed his presumption that the pope and the church could and would set aside such unnecessarily harsh laws as celibacy that had been invented by human law in the interests of seeking unity in the faith and a settlement to disputes. In the Wittenberg Articles he took a different approach and addressed the objections of the English negotiators more clearly. He conceded that celibacy is a good 20 “Et in hanc sentenciam sentimus hanc sacratissimam ceremoniam vocari sacrificium a sanctis patribus, qui certe non senserunt id opus applicatum pro aliis mereri eis remissionem culpae et poenae idque ex opere operato, sed senserunt in usu sacramenti exercendam esse fidem et graciarum actionem faciendam esse”: Wittenberg Articles XII, in Mentz: 1905/1968, 62. The citation follows the translation of that time, ibid., 63: “diese ceremonia ein opfer, sacrificium, genennet von den alten vettern, welicher meinung nit geweßen, das soliche werk fur andere sollten gelten, inen vergebung [der] peen und schuld zu verdienen, sondern sie haben gehalten, das man den glauben in diesem sacrament uben und also danksagen soll.” See Apology XXIV, in: BSLK, esp. 359, Book of Concord, 270. 21 Cf. Consilium ad Gallos, in: MBWT 6: 138 – 140, CR 2: 753 – 756, and Wittenberg Articles XIII, in Mentz: 1905/1968 , 64 – 65. On Melanchthon’s willingness to leave questions of practice and usage open, see Arand: 2006, 211 – 27.

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work, and in the proper context, such as in the service of the church, was regarded favorably by God. At the same time he compared marriage – instituted by divine law – and celibacy – instituted by human law – with each other. He left no doubt, therefore, that the requirement of clerical celibacy was an unjust papal invention, which had caused a great deal of mischief. That assertion could only fall on fertile ground in the context of the break between Rome and the English church that had taken place in 1534. Nonetheless, Melanchthon did not argue for the abolition of this abuse, but rather, with a positive appeal, for the permission to follow divine and natural law in practice.22 Melanchthon’s treatment of monastic vows followed the same pattern. The Wittenberg Articles made it clearer than had the Consilium ad Gallos that this could only be seen as a human creation which had fallen into misuse and had obscured the merit of Christ by being regarded as a good work which contributed to salvation. This article must be viewed in the light of the English policy of dissolving the monasteries initiated after the break with Rome by the crown (Delius: 1986, 9 – 11). Similar to his suggestion to the French, Melanchthon’s proposal in the Wittenberg Articles emphasized the usefulness of the monasteries for education and preparation for ecclesiastical service in the way in which the Wittenberg reformers had spoken of this. Much like Luther in De votis monasticis (1522), Melanchthon argued that the monasteries should be returned to this, their original purpose, and made into schools. Melanchthon was even ready in the Wittenberg Articles to define a monastic way of life that was connected with true evangelical teaching and to permit its rituals, ceremonies, and vows as adiaphora so long as they were practiced in accord with Evangelical teaching. Melanchthon and also his Wittenberg colleagues were convinced that they had attained unity with the English on most points, and that they could help introduce a transformation of the English church into a church of the Reformation. But in the end the king refused to agree to the articles since they had only value for him only in so far as they served his political concerns.

22 This is expressed much more clearly in the Wittenberg Articles than in the Consilium ad Gallos. Cf. Wittenberg Articles XIV, Mentz: 1905/1968, 66 – 69, and MBWT 6: 152 f., CR 2: 763 – 66. The corresponding passage in Apology XXIII argues for abolition of celibacy. Melanchthon makes a greater concession than in other places in the Wittenberg Articles at this point. See BSLK, 332,32 – 349,28, Book of Concord, 247 – 57.

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V Since neither the Consilium ad Gallos nor the Wittenberg Articles had reached their original goals, not on the political level and not on the theological level, they were quickly forgotten. Contemporaries reproached Melanchthon for being too willing to give in to opponents and to eager to narrow the differences. Indeed, certain specific aspects, such as the way in which he evaluated the traditional papal structures as adiaphora in the Consilium ad Gallos and the maintenance of the concept of sacrifice in the Wittenberg Articles’ treatment of the mass, are understandable only in the specific political and ecclesiastical contexts in which they were conceived. Again and again, however, it was clear that Melanchthon’s attempts at reconciliation with the partners in these negotiations always also took his chief concern into consideration, the preservation and propagation of the reformational doctrine of justification. It was presumed as the foundation, and every concession had to be viewed within its context. Melanchthon was concerned to show that there existed far-reaching agreement in external structures and in the chief points of doctrine. It is noteworthy, in addition, that in his efforts to win over the conversation partners, Melanchthon fell back upon existing patterns or models. As the Augsburg Confession had originally, so also the Consilium ad Gallos intended first of all to demonstrate existing consensus. The Wittenberg Articles, as a revised version of the Augsburg Confession, pursued the same concern. The Confessio Augustana served as the springboard for the content of both of these drafts. Melanchthon’s use of reconciliatory formulations in the disputed articles largely reflects the content of the Apology of the Augsburg Confession. The Consilium ad Gallos and the Wittenberg Articles are therefore not, as is often asserted in the literature, proofs for a compromising stance on Melanchthon’s part that can hardly be justified. Instead, they were attempts to use the politically motivated efforts for concordia in behalf of the evangelical cause. Melanchthon composed these documents aimed at reconciliation and agreement, the Consilium ad Gallos and the Wittenberg Articles, as documents which, despite concessions in the questions which he viewed as “res externa” [external matters], sought to introduce the doctrinal position of the Augsburg Confession into different Western European contexts. They merit being taken seriously as steps, even if failed steps, in the search for a Western European communion in the confession of the faith.

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Literature Adrinyi, Gabriel (1984). Art. Gallikanismus. Pp. 17 – 21. In: TRE 12. Berlin: de Gruyter. Arand, Charles P (2006). “The Apology as a Backdrop for the Interim of 1548.” Pp. 211 – 227. In: Irene Dingel and Günther Wartenberg (Ed.): Politik und Bekenntnis. Die Reaktionen auf das Interim von 1548. Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2006. Bedouelle, Guy (1982). Art. Faber Stapulensis. Pp. 782 f. In: TRE 10. Berlin: de Gruyter. Beiergrçsslein, Katharina (2011). Robert Barnes, England und der Schmalkaldische Bund (1530 – 1540). Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus. Bizer, Ernst (1962). Studien zur Geschichte des Abendmahlsstreits im 16. Jahrhundert. Gütersloh, 1940; Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Bourilly, V.-L. (1900). “FranÅois Ier et les protestants. Les essais de concorde en 1535.” Pp. 337 – 65, 497 – 95. In: Bulletin de la Socit de l’Histoire du Protestantisme FranÅais 49. and N. Weiss (1904), “Jean du Bellay, les protestants et la Sorbonne.” Pp. 97 – 143. In: Bulletin de la Socit de l’Histoire du Protestantisme FranÅais 53. Bucer, Martin (1988). Robert Stupperich, Marijn de Kroon, and Hartmut Rudolph (Ed.): Martin Bucers Deutsche Schriften Bd. 6.1: Wittenberger Konkordie (1536). Schriften zur Wittenberger Konkordie (1534 – 1537). Gütersloh: Mohn. Bundschuh, Benno von (1988). Das Wormser Religionsgespräch von 1557. Unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der kaiserlichen Religionspolitik. Münster : Aschendorff. Delius, Hans-Ulrich (1986). Art. Heinrich VIII. von England. Pp. 9 – 11. In: TRE 15. Berlin: de Gruyter. (1971). “Königlicher Supremat oder evangelische Reformation der Kirche. Heinrich VIII. von England und die Wittenberger 1531 – 1540.” Pp. 283 – 291. In: Wissenschaftliche Zeitschrift der Ernst-Moritz-Arndt-Universität Greifswald, gesellschafts- und sprachwissenschaftliche Reihe 4/5. Dickens, Arthur G. (1989). The English Reformation. 2. edition, London: Batsford. Erasmus, Desiderius (1924). P.S. Allen and H.M. Allen (Ed.), Opus epistolarum Des. Erasmii Roterodami, vol. 5. Oxford: Clarendon. Greschat, Martin (1990). Martin Bucer. Ein Reformator und seine Zeit. Munich: Beck. Hughes, Philip (1993). The Reformation in England, vol. I: The King’s Proceedings. Reprint. Aldershot: Gregg. Imbart de la Tour, P. (1914). Les Origines de la Rforme, t. III. Paris: Hachette. Maas, Korey D. (2010). The Reformation and Robert Barnes. History, Theology and Polemic in Early Modern England. Woodbridge: Boydell & Brewer. Maurer, Wilhelm (1967 – 1968). Der junge Melanchthon. 2 vol. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht.

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Mentz, Georg (Ed.) (1905/1968). Die Wittenberger Artikel von 1536. Leipzig. Reprint, Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Pithou, Pierre (1594). Les Liberts de l’Eglise gallicane. Paris. Polenz, Gottlob von (1857/1964). Geschichte des französischen Calvinismus bis zum Gnadenedikt von N mes im Jahre 1629, Bd. 1. Gotha: Reprint. Aalen: Scientia. Pollet, J.V. (1962) Martin Bucer. Etudes sur la correspondance, vol. II. Paris: P. U. F., 1962. Prser, Friedrich (1929). England und die Schmalkaldener 1535 – 1540. Leipzig: Eger & Sievers. Scheible, Heinz (1992). Art. Philipp Melanchthon. Pp. 371 – 410. In: TRE 22. Berlin: de Gruyter. Schmidt, Charles (1855). La vie et les travaux de Jean Sturm, premier recteur du Gymnase et de l’Acadmie de Strasbourg. Strasbourg: Schmidt. Schulte, Johann Friedrich von (1899). Art. Gallikanismus. Pp. 353 – 359. In: RE3 6. Seidel, Karl Josef (1970). Frankreich und die deutschen Protestanten. Die Bemühungen um eine religiöse Konkordie und die französische Bündnispolitik in den Jahren 1534/35. Münster : Aschendorff. Skalweit, Stephan (1965).“Die ‘affaire des placards’ und ihr reformationsgeschichtlicher Hintergrund.” Pp. 445 – 465 in: Erwin Iserloh und Konrad Repgen (Ed.): Reformata Reformanda. Festgabe für Hubert Jedin. 1. Münster : Aschendorff. Wolf, Gerhard Philipp (1983). Art. Franz I. Pp. 387 ff. In: TRE 11. Berlin: de Gruyter. Wolgast, Eike (1977). Die Wittenberger Theologie und die Politik der evangelischen Stände. Studien zu Luthers Gutachten in politischen Fragen. Gütersloh: Mohn.

This essay originally appeared as “Melanchthon und Westeuropa,“ in: Günther Wartenberg and Matthias Zenter (Ed.): Philipp Melanchthon als Politiker zwischen Reich, Reichsständen und Konfessionsparteien. (Themata Leucoreana, Wittenberg: Drei Kastanien Verlag), 1998, 105 – 22.

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Irene Dingel

Melanchthon’s Efforts for Unity between the Fronts: the Frankfurt Recess

The theology of Philip Melanchthon has not only met with warm reception but has also aroused controversy from Melanchthon’s own time to the present day. Both appreciation and criticism have greeted not only some of his more controversial writings; his thought also received both as it assumed the form of a public norm for confession and doctrine in Protestantism in the Augsburg Confession, its Apology, and his Loci Communes. For Melanchthon’s influence had fostered a number of differing approaches to biblical teaching among his Wittenberg students. Their lack of homogeneity evoked mistrust, and this mistrust extended to the person of the teacher as well as his thought. Already in the final years before Melanchthon’s death in 1560, some of his contemporaries attempted to enlist him for their own causes while others attacked him and openly denounced him as a propagator of heterodox doctrine.1 Melanchthon, who had stood at Luther’s side throughout the elder reformer’s career and who had fallen into Luther’s position as the authority for their followers after Luther’s death in 1546, very quickly became himself the epicenter of various disputes. However, that does not at all imply that he lost his authoritative influence in all quarters. Melanchthon’s opinion, his approaches to confessing the faith, and his manner of seeking consensus continued to provide orientation for the development of doctrine and confession in the Wittenberg circle and beyond. Appeals to his authority arose particularly out of the efforts to restore unity in public teaching, at times as the basis for a political alliance, at times to unite divided Protestant churches and theologians. Melanchthon’s ecumenical impact and significance emerge, therefore, with particular clarity in his publications which were composed to reconcile the feuding parties within the Protestant churches. This long series of documents 1 Up to the present time there have been repeated attempts to assess Melanchthon on a standard set by Luther’s theology, to gauge him in comparison to his friend and colleague, and to classify his work, his impact, and his ability to integrate various currents of thought by this standard. That then often leads one not only to blame Melanchthon for a deviation from the Lutheran doctrine, but also to find elements in his thinking that show far too much readiness to compromise with Roman Catholics or positions which pave the way directly to Calvinism. One could see him as a timid tactician intent on avoiding conflict and an advocate of “Crypto-Calvinism” at the same time. These evaluations are not originally the products of historical judgments of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, but rather their roots reach back to the sixteenth century itself.

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began with the Augsburg Confession of 1530, led to the Wittenberg Concord of 1536 (text in Bucer : 1988, 120 – 134), which was meant to establish a consensus with the South Germans, went on to the electoral Saxon Confession of 1551 (CR 28: 369 – 568 and MSA 6: 80 – 167), which Melanchthon had prepared as the Saxon agenda for the Council of Trent, and then to the “Declaratio in conventu Naumburgensi” (MBWR 7: 199, §7195, CR 8: 282 – 92, § 5606) of 1554, with which Melanchthon attempted to resolve the disputes that had broken out after 1548. This series came to its climax with the Frankfurt Recess of 1558 (“Abscheid der evangelischen Chur= und Fürsten in Religionssachen zu Frankfurt am Mayn aufgerichtet, anno 1558,” in: CR 9: 489 – 507, §6483), the last example of his attempts to attain an understanding among the differing theological tendencies within Protestant churches. Therefore, developments that led to the composition of this consensus document and the creation of the texts that led to the final version of the Recess illuminate Melanchthon’s concept of his ecumenical mission. They must be viewed in the context of the various political and theological interests that were present at the time, often in tension with each other. Of course, Melanchthon’s contemporaries appraised his work as a whole in completely different ways. Not everyone could be persuaded to accept the theological consensus that Melanchthon was seeking. Once again, some saw in his efforts a compromise that deviated from the genuine teaching of the Reformation, the authentic form of which, they believed, was to be found in Luther’s writings. The theological authority of Melanchthon became the focal point of these disputes even beyond his death. The Frankfurt Recess and the development of its text reveal the characteristic traits of the “ecumenical” Melanchthon; his efforts to attain the greatest possible integration of opposing parties within the Wittenberg circle reveal these elements of his leadership of the church. For these efforts brought his theology into the middle of the fronts between the contemporary theological factions, as his search for a confession that would bring the feuding sides together both shaped his theology and extended its influence and impact on the church around him.

1. Melanchthon in the context of the theological disputes The occasion for this development and the ambivalent assessment of Melanchthon’s person arose, above all, out of the events following the defeat of the Smalcald League in the military confrontation between the League and Emperor Charles V. It was Melanchthon’s caution in the time of the ensuing Interim of 1548 which cast him in an unfavorable light in the eyes of his contemporaries and even made him theologically suspect. Melanchthon earned the mistrust of many of his former students and those who agreed with them because he was prepared to attempt to preserve the doctrine of the

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Wittenberg Reformation through the so-called Leipzig “Interim.” Initiated by the recently appointed elector of Saxony, the Albertine Duke Moritz, this proposal for the Saxon diet mandated retention of rites and ceremonies which he viewed as irrelevant for the salvation of sinners and which might therefore be practiced in the evangelical church as “Adiaphora.” Melanchthon was deeply involved in the creation of the text of this Leipzig Proposal, particularly in his composition of its article on justification. Indeed, under his influence his colleagues on the Wittenberg theological faculty were drawn into the composition of this draft of electoral religious policy. Eventually, this led to the persisting division of the relatively cohesive circle of followers of the Wittenberg theologians within the Empire. The adiaphoristic controversy (von Hase: 1940) set off a series of further disputes within the Evangelical churches — over the role of good works (the Majoristic controversy), the function of the law (the Antinomian controversy), and the role of the human will in conversion (the Synergistic controversy); these all were related directly or indirectly to issues raised by the Leipzig Proposal. These controversies raged between those students of Melanchthon who consistently invoked his positions as they formulated their own expressions of biblical thought and those who separated themselves from Melanchthon and leaned heavily on Luther’s formulations of Wittenberg thinking. Alongside these controversies ensued other debates over the Wittenberg legacy, that incited by the former Nuremberg preacher, since 1549 active in Königsberg, Andreas Osiander with his doctrine of justification (Stupperich: 1973, 110 – 223), that over the Lord’s Supper (Bizer : 1940, esp. 275 – 84; Gollwitzer : 1937; Hund: 2006, and Dingel: 2008), and over Christology (Mahlmann: 1969). Feelings ran high on both sides from the beginning of the 1550s. The struggle had to be waged no longer merely against adherents of the papacy or those labeled “enthusiasts,” but also, above all, against those in their own number who were thought to be adulterating the theology of the Reformation. In this situation Melanchthon was thrown, so to speak, between the fronts. While he had already, after 1548, lost his standing as the Wittenberg Reformation’s authority for the one faction, the other constellation of Wittenberg students was absolutely confident that he provided orientation for their theology. They were ready to continue to shape their doctrine and confession in accord with Melanchthon’s opinions. However, those who opposed his position on the Leipzig Proposal raised their voices ever more loudly. Not only the former student and colleague of Melanchthon, Matthias Flacius Illyricus, but also his like-minded friend, Nikolaus Gallus, pastor in Regensburg, began to attack Melanchthon very sharply in the early 1550s. They reproached him for an excessively conciliatory stance toward the Roman Catholic party, which came at the expense of pure doctrine. Moreover, in the late 1550s, Gallus attacked Melanchthon’s teaching on the role of the free will in conversion, and in 1560 he addressed Melanchthon’s alleged Calvinizing tendencies in the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper in an edition of Melanchthon’s

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letter on the subject to Elector Friedrich III of the Palatinate (Kolb: 2000; Kolb: 2012). Already at that time the followers and friends of Melanchthon had intervened publicly and decisively on his side. At the same time theologians and political leaders were attempting to conduct negotiations to lead to reconciliation. Melanchthon was involved in these negotiations, if not always personally, at least in correspondence, as the leaders of both church and Evangelical courts strove to attain conciliation among the groups dividing the Wittenberg circle (including the attempts of Duke Christoph of Württemberg to attain reconciliation and concord as well as the so-called Coswig Colloquy ; see Preger : 1861, 2: 1 – 103, Heppe: 1852, 109 – 30, and Wolf: 1888, 7 – 13). However, the antagonism between the group which oriented its thinking more closely to Luther’s under the leadership of Flacius2 and Melanchthon’s disciples who tended to follow him more closely broke out anew in the context of the religious colloquy held in Worms in 1557. The fact that there the opposing parties within Evangelical circles came into open conflict in the presence of their Roman Catholic opponents became a truly traumatic experience for the Evangelical side. The Roman Catholics were able to exploit those differences in their propaganda against the Evangelicals, and they could disavow the Evangelicals as partners who were incapable of negotiating with them since the Evangelicals were so divided on various doctrinal issues. Thus, the religious colloquy failed in the end because of the disunity of the Protestant side. The doctrinal authority of Melanchthon had – as it would seem for some – permanently lost its ability to create unity.

2. The role of Melanchthon in responding to the concerns of the princes The growing theological fragmentation of Protestantism naturally caused great concern for the princes as well. For even though the adherents of the Augsburg Confession had acquired legal status in the Empire with the Religious Peace of Augsburg of 1555, confessional and political unity among those who held this status still remained extremely important. Indeed, deviation from the Augsburg Confession could incur political consequences. Emperor Ferdinand’s call for the religious colloquy between the Evangelicals 2 The appellation “Gnesio-Lutheran” was applied to the group of theologians who understood themselves to be the defenders of the true theology of Luther. Their opponents who were more influenced by Melanchthon called them “Flacians” in their polemic. After the division of the Gnesio-Lutherans over the question of original sin around 1570, the partisans of Matthias Flacius Illyricus and his doctrine of original sin were actually distinguished from the Gnesio-Lutherans by the label “Flacian.” Before this theological controversy the followers of Flacius could be grouped together with the Gnesio-Lutherans.

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and Roman Catholics in 1557 made concord among the Evangelicals even more urgent. Already at the beginning of the colloquy, the Danish king, Christian III, had appealed to Melanchthon to repudiate the doctrine of Albert Hardenberg of Bremen concerning the Lord’s Supper (important for the monarch because of Denmark’s close trading ties with the city) as well as the doctrine of the Wittenberg professor Georg Major on the value of good works for salvation.3 However, Melanchthon had not wanted to become the lone arbiter for these delicate questions. Both Hardenberg and Major had longstanding, close connections to Melanchthon. In his efforts to introduce a doctrine of the Lord’s Supper shaped by the position of Strasbourg superintendent Martin Bucer in Bremen, Hardenberg used certain ways of expressing the doctrine used by Melanchthon in his argumentation (on Bucer’s influence on Hardenberg, see Janse: 1994), as did Major in his discussion of the necessity of good works in the life of the reborn (Scheible: 1991). Furthermore, personal relationships bound them together. Major had been a student and close coworker of Melanchthon. Melanchthon remained in close correspondence with Hardenberg.4 Thus, it is clear that Christian’s request placed him in a very difficult situation. For Hardenberg stood in conflict with his Bremen colleague Johann Bötker, who sought to defend the Real Presence of the body and blood of Christ in the elements of the Lord’s Supper on the basis of Luther’s Christology (Mahlmann: 1969, esp. 83 – 93, 174 ff.). Melanchthon had already taken sides with the Hardenberg faction in January 1557 in an opinion of the Wittenberg faculty for the Bremen Senate.5 In a letter of April 1557, he had given details about how to refute the “artolatreia” [bread worship] of which he accused Hardenberg’s Lower Saxon opponents, and the doctrine of the omnipresence of the human nature of Christ, two arguments which had been fielded against Hardenberg’s position (Melanchthon to Hardenberg, 18 April 1557, in: MBWR 8: 62, §8195, CR 9: 137 f., §6230; and 9 March 1557, in: MBWR 8: 46 §8151, CR 9: 115, §6208). In further correspondence a few weeks later, he held out the prospect that a solution to the king’s concerns regarding the questions which had troubled him might be reached with the Danish ambassadors during the colloquy in Worms (Melanchthon to Hardenberg, 9 May 9 1557, in: MBWR 8: 70, §8219, CR 9: 154, §6247). Against the background of Christian’s pressure, it is clear why Melanchthon had recommended postponing any decision concerning these doctrinal questions 3 Christian had requested this from Melanchthon earlier. This is implied in Melanchthon’s answer of 22 May 1557, MBWR 8: 73, §8227, CR 9: 156 ff., §6251. Christian’s new appeal to Melanchthon on 14 September 1557, is printed in Wolf: 1888, 379 – 83, Anhang §62. 4 This connection is documented through some 74 letters which Melanchthon had written to Hardenberg in a time span of about fifteen years. 5 “Responsum Theologorum Vitebergensium ad Senatum Bremensem,” in: MBWR 8: 20 f., §8085, CR 9: 15 – 18, §6150. The correspondence of Bremen Senate with the Wittenberg theologians on 22 December 1556, is found in MBWR 7: 526, §8065, CR 8: 928 ff., §6136; cf. Janse: 1994, 63 – 77.

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and suggested referring them to a larger gathering of theologians. However, Christian quickly succeeded in convincing his son-in-law, Elector August of Saxony, of the urgency of the problem during the latter’s visit in Copenhagen. August contacted his theologians and advisors who were gathered in Worms for the religious colloquy, reminding them to give priority to the elimination of any differences among the Evangelicals, especially concerning the Lord’s Supper and the unclear teaching of Major, before reaching a settlement with the Roman Catholics (Elector August to Melanchthon, 11 September 1557, MBWR 8: 118, §8338, text in: Wolf: 1888, 376 – 79, Anhang, §61, and Melanchthon to August, 19 October 1557, in: MBWR 8: 142 f., §8398, CR 9: 344 f., §6380). All this finally made Melanchthon ready to take to the offensive by composing such a document of reconciliation (Wolf: 1888, 110 f.). However, it was no longer possible to attain the agreement necessary to hold the Evangelicals in the colloquy together. The skillful argumentation of the Jesuit Peter Canisius clearly brought out not only the differing theological positions on the Evangelical side in Worms but also the impossibility of reaching accord among them. The points of dispute included those already mentioned and the doctrine of original sin, Andreas Osiander’s doctrine of justification, and the question of the explicit naming of those whose positions were being rejected. The delegation of the Ernestine Gnesio-Lutherans (the lawyer Basilius Monner and the theologians Erhard Schnepf, Victorin Strigel, and Johann Stössel) had lent support to Flacius’ emphasis on the power of original sin. Against this background they had already vehemently rejected the teaching of Georg Major, which had been influenced by Melanchthon, regarding the necessity of good works for the salvation of sinners and the positive estimation of good works that was associated with it. Together with nearly all Evangelicals, they had rejected Osiander’s doctrine that saving righteousness is the indwelling righteousness of the divine nature of Christ, viewing it as a spiritualizing and, at the same time, “catholicizing” attitude regarding the justification of sinners; with both Luther and Melanchthon they held fast to the “iustitia imputata” [imputed righteousness] bestowed by God’s word of forgiveness. Württemberg superintendant Johannes Brenz, who was one of the very few who had tried to mediate the dispute with Osiander, was also present in Worms (Melanchthon to Christian III of Denmark, January 26, 1558, in: MBWR 8: 183, §8505, CR 9: 432 ff., §6446). Canisius placed him in an ambiguous position by raising the question of Osiander’s doctrine. Moreover, the Jesuit’s urging that the Protestants condemn false teaching caused a crisis in their camp. The Ernstine theologians, who wanted to decide the question of the proper confession by means of the listing of doctrines that had to be rejected by name and whose stance was decisively rebuffed by the other Evangelical delegations, presented a letter of protest to the Roman Catholics, and their departure eventually brought about the disruption of the colloquy on 28 September 1557. The colloquy had come to naught (von Bundschuh: 1988; Slenczka: 2010).

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This problematic result, which caused difficulties also on the political level, moved both of the great Protestant powers in the south of the Empire, Elector Ottheinrich of the Palatinate and Duke Christoph of Württemberg, to make the concern of the Danish king and the Saxon elector their own. In the meantime Christian and August had also contacted the landgraves of Hesse. The princes demanded that the theologians develop firm norms of teaching and, furthermore, that they prepare memoranda on the question whether a synod might offer a promising possibility to settle their differences. The theologians who were still present and Johannes Brenz, who had returned to Worms in the meantime, met together in November 1557 for a small conference. Melanchthon offered them a draft as he had earlier promised, the Latin “Formula Consensus” (MBWR 8: 154, §8425, CR 9: 365 – 72, §6399), which was meant to serve simply as a transitional solution, especially since this small group could only speak for themselves. The decision to convene a synod was left to the princes, who were advised to come to an understanding among themselves first. Melanchthon’s formula for agreement committed its adherents to the Augsburg Confession, its Apology, and the Smalcald Articles, and it added some condemnations of individual false teachers. It treated the unresolved controversies: those over Osiander’s doctrine of justification, Major’s teaching of the necessity of good works, the understanding of the Lord’s Supper, and the question of adiaphora, which had been contested with the Flacians since the Leipzig Proposal of 1548. The conception and content of this formula showed that Melanchthon tried to take up the concerns of the GnesioLutheran-minded Weimar theologians, who had expressed these concerns at the colloquy in Worms, holding out the possibility of integrating them still at this point. But even within his own ranks Melanchthon could no longer win its adoption. Brenz refused to agree to the article against Osiandrianism, so that no accord was possible in the end. In order to prevent any further division, nothing else remained for Melanchthon to do but to withdraw his formula. He related this to his sovereign, Elector August, in December 1557, and he sent him a revised version of the “Formula Consensus” (cf. with the printed copy in: CR 9: 403 – 11, §6425, MBWR 8: 179, §8494). In this text, which was translated into German and altered to express its positions with greater clarity, his earlier readiness to compromise with the Flacians was no longer detectable. For example, Melanchthon now set down his detailed response to the contentious questions of doctrine only to the extent they had been treated in the Augsburg Confession, and he dispensed with reliance on the Smalcald Articles. The Gnesio-Lutherans had always insisted that they be included as a norm for public teaching. Moreover, he abandoned the enumeration of positions to be rejected, which had signaled a clear compromise with the Weimar theologians in the “Formula Consensus”( even if the names of those whose were rejected included only those whose exclusion already met unanimous approval) (CR 9:

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372). He also dispensed with the short article on questions of adiaphora, which had made Melanchthon and Flacius into bitter opponents since 1548. Nonetheless, this meant no extensive alteration of the statement’s content, for Melanchthon had in fact brought up the problem in his “Formula Consensus” only in so far as he called for settling disputes according to the norm set by the Confessions and the verdict of a synod that would be held should the occasion arise (see Christoph’s letter to Melanchthon on December 1.1557, MBWR 8: 160, §8444, printed by Heppe; 1852, 1: 266 ff., n. 1). He openly took into account Johannes Brenz’s pro-Osiander stance, which had made consensus in his camp impossible. Against this background the revised text also indicated that the Weimar theologians were no longer the only objects of his efforts for reconciliation. This development strengthened the desire for a synod among the theologians once more. On the side of the princes Duke Christoph of Württemberg in particular came to their side after the reconciliation of the theologians had proved impossible because of the stance of Johannes Brenz, Christoph’s theological confidante and advisor. The duke favored a gathering of the princes, accompanied by their theologians and political advisors. He saw this as the only feasible way that they might yet construct a comprehensive reconciliation of the Evangelicals. This proposal met even the concerns of Melanchthon, who feared that further divisions could result from a synod composed only of theologians. Already during the colloquy at Worms Christoph had striven for the organization of such a meeting. Christoph proposed that this time the objective should also be to establish a norm for confession of the faith and public teaching under the Augsburg Confession, the Apology, and the Smalcald Articles that would channel the plurality of positions that had developed in German lands since 1548 into an accord. At the same time he wanted such an agreement to avoid excluding the Swiss (Heppe: 1852, 266 ff.). So conceived, this objective presupposed a formulation of the articles of faith that would be as open as possible and also presumed that there would be no condemnations of false teaching. After the electors of Saxony, Brandenburg, and the Palatinate, together with the landgrave of Hesse, had signaled their readiness to attend such a conclave of princes, the occasion for meeting came with the ceremonies bestowing the imperial crown upon Ferdinand I on the 25 February 1558, in Frankfurt am Main. The assignment fell to Melanchthon once again to create a formula of consensus. With his “Matters to Consider regarding a Synod of all Electors and Princes and Estates of the Augsburg Confession” (“Bedenken vom Synodo”) (the text is printed in CR 9: 462 – 78, §6471, cf. MBWR 8: 199 ff., §8543) he first of all made clear which questions could be decided without a problem, namely at which points the opposing sides should be ready to accept the stance of the other (including the question of exorcism at baptism and the usage of vestments, CR 9: 465 ff.). He also stated clearly, on which controversial questions arbitration was still necessary (CR 9: 467). He implied throughout

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that at the present point in time it was more likely that a synod would lead to further divisions than that it would produce a positive result. Unlike Flacius, who continued to advocate vigorously that the church be kept free from the influence of secular authorities, Melanchthon, in pursuit of his ecumenical goal, stressed precisely that the princes, as “the foremost members of the church,” were to see to right doctrine and confession in their territories (Estes: 2005, 135 – 63). Therefore, the princes should reach agreement with one another at the outset of these efforts (cf. “Bedenken von Synodo,” in: CR 9: 465). The Recess of the Frankfurt diet of princes, which was formulated on the basis of a draft composed by Melanchthon, represented a document of reconciliation par excellence and served this objective. It brought together the three electors, Ottheinrich of the Palatinate, August of Saxony, and Joachim II of Brandenburg, as well as Landgrave Philip of Hesse, Duke Christoph of Württemberg, and Count Palatine Wolfgang as signatories. In the wake of the collapse of the colloquy at Worms, this theological and political progress towards reconciliation initially brought hope that it might bring together even more Evangelical estates under its formula for reconciliation. To this end the diplomatic efforts of all the signatories concentrated on the Ernestine Duke Johann Friedrich the Middler of Saxony since all previous consensus efforts had failed on account of his theologians.6

2. The Frankfurt Recess The Frankfurt Recess represented a significant advance in the efforts to unify the Evangelical churches for three reasons: 1. It presented itself as a restatement of and commentary on the Augsburg Confession and the Apology of the Augsburg Confession. 2. It avoided any mention of the names of those who had advanced positions to be rejected. 3. Its doctrinal formulation was entirely concerned with questions that were currently under public discussion, causing controversy. It offered the groundwork for a minimal consensus, without restricting theological plurality within this framework. First of all, just as with the “Formula Consensus” of November 1557, with which Melanchthon had still hoped to win over the Gnesio-Lutheran-oriented Ernestine theologians after the dispute in Worms, the Frankfurt Recess 6 Moreover, the Palatine Elector was to attempt to enlist the support of Strasbourg and other cities associated with it. August of Saxony and Joachim of Brandenburg were to contact Margrave Georg Friedrich of Brandenburg-Ansbach, the princes of Anhalt, the city of Magdeburg and other cities in their area; Joachim was to win over his brother, Margrave Johann of Brandenburg-Küstrin, and in addition — among others — the houses of Lüneberg, Mecklenburg, and Pomerania. Christoph of Württemberg was assigned the task of winning the agreement — among others — of his cousin, Georg of Württemberg, and of the upper German cities. See CR 9: 504 f.

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explicitly claimed a place within the framework of the Evangelical attempts to clarify their confessional position. However, it dispensed with the designation of Luther’s Smalcald Articles as an authority ; it was at odds with Melanchthon’s on-going development of his doctrine of the Lord’s Supper (Dingel: 2012). Instead, the Frankfurt Recess focused only on the Augsburg Confession and its Apology, and it defined both as a “Summarium et Corpus Doctrinae,” as guides for public teaching, in which the teaching of the Holy Scripture and the doctrine of the three ancient creeds of the church were summarized and formulated.7 There was no desire to go further than that. The Frankfurt Recess was intended to do no more than clarify the persisting questions that were causing controversy within the framework set by existing Evangelical confessions and doctrine, as acknowledged at the time by all sides in the Evangelical churches. Therefore, it specifically defined itself as a “repetitio” of the Augsburg Confession, which intended to “condemn no one without examination but to repeat the confession of the faith that had already been explained in the Confessio Augustana.”8 On this basis it was hoped that the adherents of the Augsburg Confession, including those of Ernestine Saxony, could attain unity. The directives that were given at the end of the Recess for the solicitation of further commitments to the document by the cities and princes demonstrated that the authors of this attempt at reconciliation aimed at a comprehensive settlement and wished to see its successful completion (“Bedenken vom Synodo,” in: CR 9: 465). Secondly, precisely to win such comprehensive acceptance for the document, Melanchthon, as well as the princes, had to see to it that it excluded no one by name.9 Therefore, they chose a different approach than the GnesioLutherans, who wanted to use the practice of explicitly naming those who had advanced false teachings, not only as a means of preserving pure doctrine but also of regaining true unity among the Evangelicals (Gensichen: 1955, 94 – 117, esp. 104 – 107). On the contrary, the representatives of these variations of public doctrine were not named at all in the Frankfurt Recess; instead, the document engaged them by summarizing four articles of doctrine that were under dispute. That meant abandoning a practice which up to this point had 7 Cf. CR 9: 494. The term “corpus doctrinae” did not at this point designate a collection of writings which set the standard for public teaching but rather referred to a summary of pure biblical teaching. See Dingel: 2012b. 8 Cf. the Frankfurt Recess, in: CR 9: 494, §6483. The usage of the term “repetitio” for the designation of a commentary on the Augsburg Confession is found in the title of the German translation of the “Confessio Saxonica”; CR 28: 481 – 568. 9 While Melanchthon practiced the rejection of those in error in the Augsburg Confession in 1530 and did again in the Confessio Saxonica in 1551, with the ecumenical goal of verifying the Wittenberg agreement with the Roman Catholics in true, catholic doctrine, he dispensed with this practice entirely in the process leading to the Frankfurt Recess; it would not have been useful here for seeking concord among the disputing parties. Nonetheless, it was clear from the context of the individual articles of the Recess which divergences in public doctrine were being treated. On the rejection of false teaching in the Augsburg Confession, see Gensichen: 1955, 65 – 84.

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also been Melanchthon’s practice. Even in the revised version of the “Formula Consensus,” which Melanchthon had sent to his elector, it had become clear who in particular was made responsible for the false teaching and, therefore, for the divisions that they caused, even if he had already reduced the naming of names to a minimum in the text. Later Melanchthon continued to designate false teachers clearly, even in his subsequent “Bedenken vom Synodo.” Of course, he was also concerned about naming opponents in his memorandum who, should a synod actually become a reality, would be in attendance, defending their positions. Thus, he mentioned, for example, Nikolaus Gallus and Anton Otho as those who undermined the ethical responsibility of humankind with their radical rejection of any ability of the human will; he did present their positions in a negative light (CR 9: 467 f.). It was Andreas Osiander and his colleague Johann Funck who dangerously shifted the emphases in the doctrine of justification (CR 9: 468 ff.). The Wittenberg theologian regarded the positions set forth by the opponents of Hardenberg in Bremen and the Hamburg theologian Joachim Westphal on the Lord’s Supper as false doctrine. In addition, he explicitly rejected the Roman Catholic and Zwinglian positions on the Lord’s Supper. Indeed, Melanchthon did not hesitate to relate a small episode from the Regensburg colloquy of 1541 to show that the position advanced by two prominent Roman Catholic representatives, the controversial theologian and Ingolstadt professor Johannes Eck and the imperial plenipotentiary Nicolas Perrenot de Granvelle, regarding the veneration and worship of the elements in the Lord’s Supper, were untenable.10 Also, the teachings on good works that Melanchthon found among the GnesioLutherans, Nicholas von Amsdorf, Nicholas Gallus, and Johannes Wigand, were rejected. Matthias Flacius clearly appeared as the detested opponent of Melanchthon whenever the question of the reintroduction (or especially the approval) of medieval ceremonies as adiaphora arose. However, in his first memorandum aimed at reconciliation in Evangelical circles Melanchthon had already hesitated to name the names of those whose doctrine was near to his own, but who had aroused controversy with some particular expressions of their teaching. To this group belonged, above all, Georg Major, who had stirred up discord with his formulation, “Good works are necessary for salvation,” and Albert Hardenberg, whose reforming work in Bremen had incorrectly brought him under suspicion of Zwinglianism (see 10 This incident is reported already in the revision of the “Formula Consensus.” There it states: “Contrary to this and other such papal idolatry, I set forth this rule twenty years ago and have often repeated it in writing: there can be no sacrament apart from its divine institution. I have also advanced this rule against Eck in an open conversation in Regensburg, where Granvella was in attendance, as I opposed their advocacy of the Corpus Christi parade. And because Eck could not argue against this, he became very angry and drank so much that evening that he became deathly ill, and Granvella was very upset with me,” CR 9: 409. This report was repeated with minor alterations in the “Bedenken vom Synodo,” CR 9: 472; on the Lord’s Supper in general, see CR 9: 470 – 73.

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above). Clearly, their names surfaced no more in the Frankfurt Recess than the names of others whose positions Melanchthon did not endorse but whom he wanted to win for his comprehensive plan for reconciliation through a common confessional formula which could permit some theological plurality within the boundaries of the Augsburg Confession. His consequent renunciation of any discussion of doctrine that was connected to the person teaching it was intended to allow for the greatest possible integration of opposing parties and to guarantee a formulation of a proper confession based upon the Augsburg Confession that would be able to stand over time. Thirdly, it has already become clear that the Frankfurt Recess is not a completely new draft of Melanchthon’s program for reconciliation. The four articles of doctrine which it contains represent to a large extent a revision of the “Formula Consensus” (the “Formula Consensus” itself did not provide the exact text of the Frankfurt Recess, as falsely implied in BSLK 744, n. 1) Long passages of the Recess follow its predecessor almost word-for-word. Only Article Four concerning adiaphora is new when compared with the revision of the “Formula Consensus.” Indeed, it took over ideas from the “Bedenken vom Synodo,” but it approaches the topic from a new direction. The development of the texts concerning justification (Article One), the necessity of good works (Article Two), and the Lord’s Supper (Article Three), however, on the whole reproduce the revision of “Formula Consensus.” In comparison with its predecessor and especially in comparison to Melanchthon’s “Bedenken vom Synodo,” the Recess distinguishes itself from the previous efforts in each article in that it repeatedly avoids an explicit recounting of the particular controversial and opposing positions. Thus, the article on justification begins with the clarification of the reformational doctrine of the justification of sinners, which takes place only by faith in the mercy of God and the merit of Christ. Justification, the “iustitia imputata propter Christum” [righteousness imputed for Christ’s sake], produces the renewal of humankind, which – as Melanchthon formulated it – results in God’s indwelling in those who are justified (CR 9: 495). Therefore, he picks up consciously and positively on the language that Osiander had used. However, Melanchthon insisted that this renewal can only be the beginning of a long process, in which the person remains a sinner in this life, despite the reception of the imputation of the merits of Christ. Almost incidentally, between the lines, it becomes clear that as a means of distancing himself from Osiander’s teaching Melanchthon expressly placed regeneration after the divine action of justification and that he described regeneration as a work only begun by God. For Osiander had defended the idea that the person is justified through the indwelling of the “iustitia essentialis” of Christ, and so the righteousness of Christ belongs to the person in a “natural-substantial” way (on Osiander, see Seebaß: 1995, 507 – 15). According to Osiander, in his act of justification God operates not so much through outward means but much more by working within the person. This led to his being criticized for

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spiritualism and compared with Caspar Schwenckfeld. Osiander’s opponents also regarded his teaching of an infusion of the divine righteousness of Christ as fostering human reliance on one’s own works, and they charged him with drifting very close to Roman Catholic works-righteousness. Melanchthon did not treat this position in detail here, even though he had discussed it in the past in detail. Nor did he take issue, as he had previously, with Johannes Brenz’ sympathetic interventions in behalf of Osiander’s teaching. The Frankfurt Recess was nonetheless able to make clear that Osiander’s variations on the Wittenberg doctrine of justification had taken a false path, in two ways. It defined the relationship of justification and renewal by characterizing renewal primarily as the work of God that always results from his act of justification and has only begun and is not yet complete. Second, it emphasized that the righteousness in God’s sight is imputed by grace through faith in the work of Christ. Compromises were not necessary here, for, as Melanchthon formulated it: “This doctrine is clearly expressed in the divine Scripture, and by God’s grace it is known in our churches. It is not incorrect or incomprehensible, but rather it must be exercised in daily prayer, faith, and trust” (CR 9: 496). In its implicit rejection of Osiander the Frankfurt Recess expressed a position that the Gnesio-Lutherans and the Philippists had in common. At the same time, it was still possible for Brenz to join the effort and accept the statement despite the fact that until that point he had still been striving to mediate in Osiander’s behalf and had believed that the genuine Lutheran doctrine of justification could be recognized in Osiander’s teaching (von Bundschuh: 1988, 104, 168; Wolf: 1888, 144). In a similar way Melanchthon addressed the teaching of Georg Major and his opponent and critic Nikolaus von Amsdorf, again without explicitly setting forth either of the two positions in detail. However, Melanchthon’s positive doctrinal formulations make his position clear. In regard to Major’s assertion that good works are necessary for salvation, Melanchthon acknowledged the first part “nova obedientia est necessaria” [new obedience is necessary] and even the statement “nova obedientia est debitum” [a person is obligated to practice new obedience] (CR 9: 496 – 99) to be completely valid, but through the corresponding definition of the terms “necessary,” “new obedience,” and “good works,” he insured an understanding of the statement which agreed with the doctrine of justification set forth in Article One: renewal, new obedience, and good works necessarily follow from the justification of the person through faith alone. This statement in itself repudiated Amsdorf ’s teaching; he—in his exaggerated reaction to Major—had taught that good works are detrimental to salvation, repeating language used by Luther early in the Reformation (cf. the list of such statements by Karl Thieme: 1908, 41 f.), in order to hold fast to the character of justification as pure gift. Melanchthon fought against this expression decisively with the statement “new obedience is necessary.” However, at the same time he insisted that the addition “ad salutem” [for salvation] must be rejected in order to preclude a misunder-

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standing that human works have merit in God’s sight. Thus, Melanchthon affirmed neither Major’s position nor Amsdorf ’s in toto. Neither did he reject either of them completely. Even here, the door to a mutual understanding remained open to both sides. The article on the Lord’s Supper pursued the same objective. While it clearly expressed the distinction of Evangelical teaching from medieval Catholic doctrine and practice of the Lord’s Supper, just as the “Formula Consensus” and its revision had already articulated it, the Frankfurt Recess skirted the differences within Protestantism. Here, in contrast to Melanchthon’s “Bedenken vom Synodo” and also to both of the preceding articles of the Recess, these differences hardly surfaced. On the contrary, the document set forth the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper which had become typical in Melanchthon’s public articulations,11 as it already had won confessional stature in the Variata of the Augsburg Confession. If the signers of the Recess who confessed the Augsburg Confession of 1530 and its Apology could view the Recess as an interpretation of that revised version of the Confessio Augustana which could be used for settling the controversies, then a door had been opened to understanding Article X of the Augsburg Confession in a more open fashion. This decision would be repeated in a similar way by the Naumburg diet of Evangelical princes in 1561 (Calinich: 1870). There were only two points that Melanchthon highlighted in the Frankfurt Recess to reconcile the different positions within Protestantism. First, he emphasized the true, living, and essential presence of Christ in the Lord’s Supper, in so far as it was celebrated according to its institution by Christ. Thus, he shifted the emphasis of Luther on the true and essential presence of the body and blood of Christ in and under the elements, which Luther had accentuated, to a focus on the essential presence of the entire person of Christ, in the celebration of the sacrament. In connection with the presence of the entire person of Christ in the celebration of the Lord’s Supper, his body and blood are distributed to Christians – not to the unbelievers – with the Communion elements, bread and wine. Thus, eating and drinking in the Lord’s Supper represent Christ’s real and essential giving of himself to believers. Secondly, Melanchthon unmistakably placed the accent on the character of the Lord’s Supper as a meal expressing fellowship, between believers and Christ and among believers. Bread and wine establish – according to Paul (1 Cor 10:16) – a true fellowship of Christ with the body and blood, i. e. with the humanity of Christ. On the one hand, Melanchthon thus distanced himself from the Lutheran understanding of a “manducatio impiorum” and a “manducatio oralis” in the Lord’s Supper ; on the other hand, on this basis a merely symbolic understanding of the Lord’s Supper could be rejected as false. 11 See Dingel: 2012a. Stupperich: 1961, 120 f., wrongly claims that the Frankfurt Recess “held fast to the Roman opinion,” on the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper.

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Thus, Melanchthon had introduced a doctrine of the Lord’s Supper into the Frankfurt Recess which was indeed formulated in opposition to the medieval Catholic abuses but which at the same time stood unmistakably in contrast to the teaching of the Gnesio-Lutherans with their dependence on Luther. In his “Bedenken vom Synodo” Melanchthon had clearly brought this position to the table as well and had placed the discussion of the Lord’s Supper in the context of the incipient Christological controversies. There he had decisively criticized the opinion of Joachim Westphal in Hamburg regarding the omnipresence of the humanity of Christ (“Bedenken vom Synodo,” CR 9: 470; on Westphal, see Mahlmann: 1969, 198 – 202), opposing the proposition that the entire person of Christ in his divine nature and his human nature could be omnipresent. Melanchthon could indeed accept a doctrine of the omnipresence of the person of Christ by virtue of the communicatio idiomatum. However, he regarded it as improper to speak of the omnipresence of the body of Christ. From his point of view this posed the danger of reintroducing an adoration of Christ in the elements of the sacrament (“artolatreia”), and, thus, of reviving within Evangelical circles the abuses which had arisen from the teaching of transubstantiation (CR 9: 470 – 73). The Frankfurt Recess discretely ignored these Christological issues, just because its purpose was to lead to greater unity and not further divisions. However, precisely the article on the Lord’s Supper, even though Melanchthon had formulated it so cautiously, brought him into controversy in the following years between the fronts of Lutheranism and Calvinism (Dingel: 2012a; Kolb 2012). While Melanchthon formulated a mediating position regarding the role of good works in the life of the reborn and interpreted the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper in the Augsburg Confession according to the standard set by the Confessio Augustana Variata, the Frankfurt Recess clearly made concessions to the Gnesio-Lutherans around Flacius on the question of adiaphora. In his “Bedenken vom Synodo” Melanchthon had continued to refute the Flacian principle that nothing can be regarded as a free and neutral matter if the confession of the true faith is at stake, and he had repudiated the Flacian refusal to compromise as a matter of principle over against the Roman Catholics.12 He had confronted them with the evidence of his own experience and his own treatment of the necessity of compromise, which he saw as mandated in those cases when the continuation and care of the church under the gospel could not otherwise be secured in any other way.13 In the Frankfurt Recess this brusque rejection of the Flacian position was no longer present. In fact, Melanchthon did maintain that ceremonies that did not involve the clear 12 “Bedenken vom Synodo,” CR 9: 476. Cf. the formulation of Flacius: “Nihil est adiaphoron in casu confessionis et scandali” and on it von Hase: 1940, esp. 59 – 63. 13 Melanchthon had referred to the situation of the pastors in Franconian electoral Saxony in this context, namely that they should not have abandoned their congregations on account of the reintroduction of choir robes and the old, already-eliminated festivals and songs; “Bedenken vom Synodo,” in: CR 9: 476. See also Arand: 2006.

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confession of the faith could be freely used or set aside, but the Frankfurt Recess reached out to the Flacians at the same time, in so far as Melanchthon had adopted their language concerning the “casus confessionis” [case in which confession of the faith is involved] in formulating the article: “However, where the right Christian doctrine of the holy gospel is polluted and persecuted, not only neutral matters, but also other ceremonies, are harmful and unholy” (CR 9: 501). However, the Frankfurt Recess, which seemed at first to be so promising for the reconciliation of the theological and confessional fronts that were beginning to form within the Wittenberg circle in the 1550s, could not attain its goal in the end. The Gnesio-Lutheran-minded Ernestine Saxons could not be won over for this formula of consensus. They responded with their Weimar Book of Confutation. The dispute that was associated with it also shaped the decades after Melanchthon’s death. Nevertheless, Melanchthon’s ecumenical efforts pointed the way toward settlement and continued to do so. In his appeal to common theological roots in the Holy Scripture, the fundamental confessions of the ancient church, and the Augsburg Confession, he emphasized the common foundation of all the positions involved in these controversies and the bond that united them. He created a framework within which theological plurality could be articulated without mutually exclusive, uncompromising claims for the truth of one’s own teaching. At the same time he set forth the standards and premises for all theological work which, in specific times and places, could serve as a basis for interpreting this common foundation and also provide momentum in its direction. Against this background his quest for a compromise took shape. On the one hand, he was proposing doctrinal formulations which he thought should enable agreement between the parties. On the other hand, this opened the possibility for him to put forth his own theological insights, for example, his understanding of the Lord’s Supper, as a workable path to reconciliation and to do so in full confidence that it would work. His abandonment of the condemnation of false teachers by name demonstrated that he was ready to recognize a legitimate theological concern even in the position of opponents and to use this as an opportunity for attaining understanding and integration. Melanchthon had himself already experienced that such an effort for reaching consensus carried in itself the risk of placing himself between the fronts. This became ever clearer after his death. His attempt to attain a comprehensive understanding and integration of Evangelical theologians while preserving theological plurality did not extend its impact beyond his initial efforts and thus remains the continuing task of theology.

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Literature Arand, Charles P. (2006). “The Apology as a Backdrop for the Interim of 1548.” Pp. 211 – 27. In: Irene Dingel and Günther Wartenberg (Ed.), Politik und Bekenntnis. Die Reaktionen auf das Interim von 1548. Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. Bizer, Ernst (1940). Studien zur Geschichte des Abendmahlsstreits im 16. Jahrhundert. Gütersloh: Bertelsmann. Bucer, Martin (1988). Robert Stupperich, Marijn de Kroon and Hartmut Rudolph (Ed.), Martin Bucers Deutsche Schriften, Bd. 6,1: Wittenberger Konkordie (1536), Schriften zur Wittenberger Konkordie (1534 – 1537). Gütersloh: Mohn. Bundschuh, Benno von (1988). Das Wormser Religionsgespräch von 1557, unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der kaiserlichen Religionspolitik. Münster : Aschendorff. Calinich, Robert (1870). Der Naumburger Fürstentag 1561. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Luthertums und des Melanchthonismus aus den Quellen des Königlichen Hauptstaatsarchivs zu Dresden. Gotha: Perthes. Dingel, Irene (Ed.) (2008). Controversia et Confessio. Theologische Kontroversen 1548 – 1577/80. Kritische Auswahledition. Bd 8: Die Debatte um die Wittenberger Abendmahlslehre und Christologie, 1570 – 1574. Göttingen:Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. (2012a). “The Creation of Theological Profiles. The Understanding of the Lord’s Supper in Melanchthon and the Formula of Concord.” Essay 12 in this volume. (2012b). “Melanchthon and the Establishment of Confessional Norms.” Essay 8 in this volume. Estes, James M. (2005). Peace, Order and the Glory of God. Secular Authority and the Church in the Thought of Luther and Melanchthon 1518 – 1559. Leiden: Brill. Gensichen, Hans-Werner (1955). Damnamus. Die Verwerfung von Irrlehre bei Luther und im Luthertum des 16. Jahrhunderts. Berlin: Lutherisches Verlagshaus. Gollwitzer, Helmut (1937). Coena Domini. Die altlutherische Abendmahlslehre in ihrer Auseinandersetzung mit dem Calvinismus, dargestellt an der lutherischen Frühorthodoxie. Munich: Kaiser. Hase, Hans Christoph von (1940). Die Gestalt der Kirche Luthers. Der casus confessionis im Kampf des Matthias Flacius gegen das Interim von 1548. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Heppe, Heinrich (1852). Geschichte des deutschen Protestantismus in den Jahren 1555 – 1581, Bd. 1 Marburg: Elwert. Hund, Johannes (2006). Das Wort ward Fleisch. Eine systematisch-theologische Untersuchung zur Debatte um die Wittenberger Christologie und Abendmahlslehre in den Jahren 1567 bis 1574. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Janse, Wim (1994). Albert Hardenberg als Theologe. Profil eines Bucer-Schülers. Leiden: Brill.

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Kolb, Robert (2012). “The Critique of Melanchthon’s Doctrine of the Lord’s Supper by his ‘Gnesio-Lutheran’ Students.” Essay 11 in this volume. (2000). “Nikolaus Gallus’ Critique of Philip Melanchthon’s Teaching on the Freedom of the Will.” Pp. 87 – 110. In: Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 91. Mahlmann, Theodor (1969). Das neue Dogma der lutherischen Christologie. Problem und Geschichte seiner Begründung. Gütersloh: Mohn. Preger, Wilhelm (1859, 1861). Matthias Flacius Illyricus und seine Zeit. 2 vol. Erlangen: Blaesing. Scheible, Heinz (1991). Art. Major, Georg. Pp. 725 – 730. In: TRE 21. Berlin: de Gruyter. Seebass, Gottfried (1995). Art. Osiander, Andreas. Pp. 507 – 15. In: TRE 25. Berlin: de Gruyter. Slenczka, Bjçrn (2010). Das Wormser Schisma der Augsburger Konfessionsverwandten von 1557: Protestantische Konfessionspolitik und Theologie im Zusammenhang des zweiten Wormser Religionsgesprächs. Tübingen: Mohr/ Siebeck. Stupperich, Martin (1973). Osiander in Preussen, 1549 – 1552. Berlin: de Gruyter. Stupperich, Robert (1961). Der unbekannte Melanchthon. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. Thieme, Karl (1908). “Die Schädlichkeit der guten Werke bei Luther.” Columns 41 – 43. In: Theologisches Literaturblatt 29. Wolf, Gustav (1888). Zur Geschichte der deutschen Protestanten, 1555 – 1559. Berlin: Seehagen.

This essay originally appeared as “Melanchthons Einigungsbemühen zwischen den Fronten: der Frankfurter Rezeß,“ in: Philipp Melanchthon, Ein Wegbereiter für die Ökumene, ed. Jörg Haustein (2. ed., Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1997), 121 – 143.

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Melanchthon’s Doctrinal Last Will and Testament The Responsiones ad articulos Bavaricae inquisitionis as His Final Confession of Faith

As he sensed death approaching, Philip Melanchthon viewed the state of the church which he had sought to reform at Martin Luther’s side in a state of confusion, embattled by foes within and without. Adherents of the papacy were grasping new weapons with which to suppress his fellow believers. Sectarians – he called them Schwärmer, we call them Radicals – were challenging and undercutting his message from several directions. Worse yet, some of his own students – former understudies such as Matthias Flacius, Joachim Westphal, and Nikolaus Gallus – had embittered the final decade of his life with incessant attacks upon him.

1. Melanchthon’s Summary of Christian Teaching In the eschatological moment created by his own physical deterioration and the harassment of his opponents, Melanchthon wished to make sure that his legacy was clearly expressed, and it was natural for him to do so in what he regarded as a confession of faith. He himself had adapted the concept of confessing the biblical message in a written document to Lutheran theological and ecclesiastical purposes in 1530 (Kolb: 1991, 15 – 38), and he had found the genre a valuable means of asserting his views several times. Even before Melanchthon, Luther had used the concept of “confessing” in the epitome of his doctrine of the Lord’s Supper Vom Abendmahl Christi, Bekenntnis (1528). At the conclusion of that work Luther had written a “final instruction,” a kind of doctrinal last will and testament, presenting his own teaching in a summary of the biblical message according to the outline of the Apostles Creed to prevent misinterpretation after his death.1 At the end of his life Melanchthon designated his 1 WA 26: 499,15 – 509,28; LW 37:360 – 372. Scholars debate to what extent also his “Smalcald Articles” were intended to serve as a doctrinal testament. Luther’s own testimony in the preface to the printed edition (1538) indicates that he had indeed prepared these articles as an Evangelical agenda for the papal council, but evidence supports the conclusion that Luther also intended the document to fulfill Elector Johann Friedrich’s request for another doctrinal testament from him: Wenz: 1996, 526 – 49. In 1544 Luther issued another “Confession,” his “smaller” Confession on the Lord’s Supper, WA 54: 141 – 67; LW 38: 287 – 319.

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recently composed Responsiones ad articulos Bavaricae inquisitionis as his final confession. Almost immediately, this document became part of a larger effort to secure Melanchthon’s doctrinal legacy. In 1559 the Leipzig publisher Ernst Vögelin, with the author’s help, issued a collection of Melanchthon’s most important doctrinal writings, his own “Corpus doctrinae” [body of doctrine] as he titled it. Melanchthon wanted to make certain that his followers had a clear statement of his theology. The collection, the Corpus doctrinae Philippicum, as it came to be called, summarized his attempts to define the faith in his confessions (the Augsburg Confession in its original and its revised versions, the Apology of the Augsburg Confession, and the Repetition of the Augsburg Confession (1551) [the Confessio Saxonica]) as well as in textbooks (the review for theological examination of the candidates for the pastoral office which he had prepared in 1552 for the dukes of Mecklenburg [revised 1554], his repudiation of the Christological teaching of the former Königsberg professor Francesco Stancaro, and the Loci communes theologici) along with the Responsiones (Dingel: 2012b). The Wittenberg theologians understood the term “corpus doctrinae” as a synonym for “analogia fidei,” a standard and guide for public teaching,2 and so Melanchthon was designating this collection of his key works as an orientation for biblical teaching. In the prefaces to the Latin and German editions of the Corpus doctrinae Philippicum, Melanchthon explained that he had written these documents at the request of others, including Luther, and that these other theologians had approved what he had written. The Corpus doctrinae was to demonstrate that the Preceptor (as his students would soon call him) (cf. his colleagues’ announcement of his death, 19 April 1560, CR 9:1100) remained true to the biblical message as Luther had understood it. The collection was intended to repulse the attacks of his enemies, Roman Catholic above all, but also those from among his own students and associates, such as Stancaro, Friedrich Staphylus (a former student who apostasized to Rome), and renegade Lutheran disciples, Matthias Flacius and Nikolaus Gallus.3 Melanchthon himself viewed the final document in this collection, the Responsiones, also as his own personal “confession,” a kind of doctrinal last will and testament. The day before his death he wrote his legal will, bequeathing his worldly goods to his children and grandchildren. The document began, “I would have written a confession of faith and given thanks to God and the Lord Jesus 2 Dingel: 2012. In this sense Melanchthon, his colleague Paul Eber, and two Leipzig pastors, Johannes Pfeffinger and Heinrich Salmuth, called the Responsiones an expression “de toto corpore doctrinae Ecclesiae” in a memorandum on justification and related questions in November 1559, CR 9: 969, §6864, MBWR, 8: 411 f., §9129. 3 The preface to the German edition of the Corpus doctrinae Philippicum, CR 9:929 ff., dated 29 September 1559, precedes an attack by Melanchthon’s son-in-law Caspar Peucer against Gallus and Flacius, 931 – 34; cf. the Latin, CR 9: 1050 – 55, dated 16 February 1560; although different in construction and wording, it contains the same ideas. MBWR 8: 394, 447 f., §9078, §9236.

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Christ, but the pages were taken away from me [perhaps a reference to his failing health]. I want the Responses to the Bavarian Articles to be my confession against the papalists, the Anabaptists, and the Flacians.” He then proceeded with the distribution of his worldly goods (CR 9:1098 ff., §6978, MBWR 8: 470, §9300).

2. Melanchthon and the Bavarian Visitation He had begun composing this work, designed as an attack against ever more vigorous attempts within Bavaria to eliminate the Evangelical faith, nineteen months earlier, soon after receiving the “Articles” from an unknown correspondent. Duke Albrecht V (1528 – 1579) had exhibited a concern for reform since his accession in 1550. His government had obtained imperial permission to offer Bavarians the Lord’s Supper in both kinds in 1556. He had also summoned Jesuits to his lands to insure that reform would be conducted within the Roman obedience, one of his efforts to eradicate the growing Lutheran movement within his lands. To further his plans for improving church life in his domains, Albrecht planned a visitation of parishes in June 1558, beginning in the province of Salzburg. Evangelical visitations of the sort that Luther and Melanchthon had supervised within electoral Saxony thirty years earlier had included questions regarding the teaching of the local pastor; it was natural that Albrecht’s visitation prescribed a similar review of public teaching (although the “Articles of the Bavarian Inquisition” to which Melanchthon replied are not regarded as important enough by most modern scholars to gain mention in their general treatments of the period.4) Melanchthon probably received the thirty-one questions used in the initial stage of the visitation from an Evangelical acquaintance. He reported on “atrocities incited against the pious [in Bavaria]” to Duke Johann Albert of Mecklenburg on 10 September 1558 (CR 9: 611, §6594, MBW 8: 266, §8723). Two weeks later he wrote, “Duke Albrecht of Bavaria recently published horrible Articles, particularly to strengthen this idolatry [the Roman Catholic mass]” (CR 9: 626, §6602, MBW 8: 269, §8732) Philip published the thirty-one questions of the “Inquisition,” with his own preface dated 3 October, containing 4 Pfeiffer: 1980, 365 mentions the Articles only because they occasioned Melanchthon’s critique. Brief references to the visitation occur within the discussion of Albrecht’s attempts at reform in Bauerreiss: 1975, 220 – 23; Brandmüller : 1993, 32 – 41; and Schindling/Ziegler : 1989, 63 f.. Heil: 1998 does not mention these Visitation Articles. The text of the articles, without Melanchthon’s comment, was published with other documents providing evidence of Roman Catholic persecution of Protestants, in Ursinus: 1611. Others in the Wittenberg circle continued the criticism of Bavarian Counter-Reformation measures; see Amsdorf: 1564. In addition to Amsdorf ’s treatise and Brenz’s memorandum attached to it, the 32–leaf work contains an anonymous piece of consolation and encouragement, with the initials W.S.A.T. at the end. On the defense of the Evangelical cause in Bavaria by Flacius and Gallus, see Schottenloher: 1970, 36 – 54.

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a sharp condemnation of “papal idolatry and tyranny.”5 He sent these Articles to a wide circle of acquaintances, noting in some letters that he was at that time also attacking “the blindness of Bavarian tyranny” in his lectures.6 In late October he was announcing to his correspondents that he was preparing a response to each of the articles, and that this response would treat his opponents within the Wittenberg circle, the followers of Flacius, as well (in a letter to Abdias Praetorius, professor in Frankfurt/O, 24 October 1558, CR 9: 648 f., §6621, MBW 8: 279, §8759). By March 1559 his acquaintances were receiving requests for reactions to at least a part of the Responses.7 The preface to the work as it appeared in full, dedicated to Albrecht’s distant relative, the Evangelical count palatine Wolfgang of Zweibrücken and Neuburg, was dated August 1559. It recalled God’s blessings to the Bavarian (Wittelsbach) family in the earlier history of Germany, made a passing rhetorical reference to Emperor Ludwig IVof Bavaria (1284 – 1347), who had resisted papal encroachment in imperial affairs in the fourteenth century, and conveyed to the count the seriousness of the current situation created by the attached inquisitorial questions.8

5 Die Abgo[e]ttische Artickel: 1558. The preface contains the names of the authors of the questions, Duke Albrecht’s court preacher Johannes Cressanicus; Leonhart, abbot of Fürstenfeld; Heinrich Schweichardt, ducal secretary ; Stephan Thrayner, ducal counselor ; and Johannes Einckhorn, an indulgence preacher from Landshut. 6 See letters to Christoph Libius, pastor in Brandenburg, 15 October 1558, CR 9: 646, §6617, MBW 8: 277, §8752; Count Ludwig von Everstein, 16 October 1558, MWB 8: 277, §8753; Eberhard Rogge, mayor of Kulm, 16 October 1558, CR 9: 646 f., §6618, MBW 8: 277 f., §8754; Georg Agricola, rector in Amberg, 18 October 1558, CR 9: 647, §6619; MBW 8: 278, §8755; Johannes Matthesius, pastor in Joachimstal, 25 October 1558, CR 9: 649, §6622, MBW 8: 280, §8761; Tilemann Heshusius, professor in Heidelberg, 29 October 1558, CR 9: 649 f., §6623, MBW 8: 281, §8764; Lorenz Moller, rector in Hildesheim, November 1558, CR 9: 664, §6640, MBW 8: 8: 291, §8790. The Zurich theologian Heinrich Bullinger had received the publication and acknowledged it on 27 February 1559, MBW 8: 320 f., §8877. Melanchthon reported that he was preparing his Responsiones, in a letter to Bullinger of 24 March 1559, CR 9: 751, §6702, MBW 8: 322, §8881. 7 See letters to Hieronymus Besold, pastor in Nuremberg, December 1558, CR 9: 671, §6651, MBW 8: 308, §8840; Albert Hardenberg, pastor in Bremen, 20 March 1559, CR 9: 783 f., §6713, MBW 8: 329, §8896; Landgraf Philipp von Hessen, 20 March 1559, CR 9: 778 – 81, §6710, MBW 8: 330, §8898; Johann Aurifaber, professor of medicine in Königsberg, 1 May 1559, CR 9: 810 f., §6742, MBW 8: 342 f., §8935; Johann Marbach, ecclesiastical superintendent in Strasbourg, 1 May 1559, CR 9: 811 f., §6744, MBW 8: 344, §8939; Peter Sicke professor in Königsberg, 1 May 1559, CR 9: 809 f., §6741, MBW 8: 344, §8941; even King Maximilian (II) received a copy of Melanchthon’s treatise, acknowledging it on 14 May 1559, MBW 8: 349, §8953. In several letters Melanchthon mentioned that he would treat the freedom of the will, in opposition to the Flacian party, specifically to the recently published Flacian Book of Confutation (Saxony, ducal: 1559a and 1559b). 8 The work appeared as Melanchthon: 1558, under the same title in the expanded edition, 1559, and was translated by April 1559 into German by Jacob Eisenberg: Melanchthon: 1559; MSA 6: 279 ff. Melanchthon had written a lecture delivered in Wittenberg’s law faculty by Georg Cracow on 12 December 1558, for the promotion of Mathias Coler, which presented Duke Ludwig of Bavaria as a defender of the true church against the popes of his time, CR 12: 286 – 95.

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3. The Responsiones as a Summary of Melanchthon’s Teaching Melanchthon chose this particular document to be his final last will and testament not only because he considered it a good expression of his theology. In fact, it reaffirms key elements of his thought expressed in the Augsburg Confession and its Apology and contains nothing not found in the latest revised edition of Loci communes theologici and other contemporary works. Not only do readers find a repetition of his leading ideas of the late 1550s in the Responsiones; formulations and phrases also echo from contemporary writings into this work.9 It was indeed a digest of his thought at this time. But above all this document became his testament because in early 1560 his illnesses were warning that death was approaching, and the Responsiones was his most recent declaration of his beliefs. He believed that the document stated clearly his differences not only with an ever more aggressive papal church but also with the variety of teachers he regarded as sectarians as well as with his own students who had challenged his teaching on certain doctrines, particularly the freedom of the will and the Lord’s Supper. The structure of Melanchthon’s critique was determined by the opponents’ agenda for their visitation. The Bavarian visitors intended to begin their interviews with the doctrine of the church, the fundamental point of orientation for their theology ; the first seven of the thirty-one questions asked what the priest thought about the church and papal authority. Fourteen subsequent questions treated the sacraments: nine the mass, three confession and absolution, one ordination, and one the sacraments in general. Then came questions about free will, justification, and good works, the heart of Wittenberg concern. Thereafter the Bavarian Articles posed questions regarding the invocation of the saints, purgatory, the marriage of priests, pilgrimages, and consecrations of various kinds. The critical difference in the orientation of the theologies of Rome and Wittenberg is clear in this contrast between a focus on church and sacraments, on the one side, and, on the other, on justification and faith. Heinz Scheible’s summary of Melanchthon’s treatise notes, “these thirtyone [Bavarian] questions are as far away from the foundation of the piety of the Reformation, Luther’s struggle for a personal relationship with God, as heaven is from earth. They are not concerned with the person who needs comfort but with the church” (Scheible: 1997, 242). Had Melanchthon composed his testament according to his own outline of biblical teaching, he might have followed the pattern laid down in the Augsburg Confession, the Saxon Confession of 1551, or his Loci communes. The Bavarian visitors, however, determined the structure for 9 E.g. cf. the Responsiones on contingency and the freedom of the will, MSA 6: 310 – 24, with the 1559 revision of the Loci on the subject, MSA 2,1: 224 – 52, or on the communicatio idiomatum, MSA 6: 370 – 77, with comments in the 1559 Enarratio on Colossians, CR 15: 1226, 1237 – 41, 1252 f., 1271 f.

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him, in part shaping the way in which he clarified his teaching for the next generation in this treatise. Nonetheless, the amount of attention accorded the questions reveals much regarding Melanchthon’s own concerns and perspectives. He dealt harshly, for instance, with the last five questions, which addressed what he regarded as magical, tyrannous, or exploitative medieval practices, devoting the largest section of the work, one quarter, to their refutation. This reflected Melanchthon’s ever stronger revulsion against medieval “superstition.” (Scheible: 1997, 248 ff. summarizes the abuses to which he objected). After this extensive critique, Melanchthon dwelt longest on the Flacian view of the freedom of the will, as he understood it – nearly twenty percent of the entire treatise. He also offered relatively detailed assessments of three issues related to the practical expression of justification by faith: the Evangelical understanding of repentance in contrast to the medieval sacrament of penance, good works, and devotion to the saints. The topics of justification by faith, the Lord’s Supper, and the church received brief yet incisive treatment. Both the polemic against the Flacians and the concern to counteract increasingly aggressive efforts at Counter-Reformation by Roman Catholic princes and prelates must be seen against the background of the collapse of the colloquy called by Emperor Ferdinand in Worms in 1557. Since the failure of attempts to reconcile Evangelical and Roman Catholic teaching at the Regensburg Colloquies of 1541 and 1545/1546, Melanchthon had become increasingly strident in his criticism of certain aspects of Roman Catholic teaching and practice, particularly the mass and transubstantiation as well as a number of what he regarded as superstitious customs. In each case his critique rested on what he perceived to be contradictions of the evangelical understanding of God’s righteousness (expressed in his love and mercy) and human righteousness in God’s sight (expressed exclusively in trust of God and his promise of free salvation in Christ) (Arand: 2001). At the same time he grew ever more sensitive to Roman Catholic criticism of the Wittenberg teaching which denied the freedom of the will. This topic offered a forum for attacking his unfaithful former students, whose criticism had embittered his later years. In Worms in 1557 he had again encountered sharp hostility from Roman Catholic participants, but even worse, he felt himself betrayed and the Evangelical cause undermined by the allies of Flacius. They had insisted on clarity of confession among the Evangelical participants in the colloquy before its negotiations could begin. This resulted in the collapse of the colloquy and an intensification of Melanchthon’s rancor toward his critics among his own former students (von Bundschuh: 1988, 417 – 25, 453 – 68, 473 ff.). He sensed himself in the final conflict that would lead to the end of the world. Therefore, his confession of faith had to oppose both sets of opponents. To them he added the “sectarians.” In his opinion all threatened his church and his message. Melanchthon’s criticism of the papal party addressed the full range of problems which the visitors’ questions raised for his and Luther’s followers. In

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each case his objections to Roman Catholic teaching and practice are based upon his understanding of the justification of the sinner through faith in Christ and upon his concern for the consolation of terrified consciences, issues that had shaped Melanchthon’s teaching for nearly four decades. There has been much scholarly debate about changes in Melanchthon’s teaching; certainly over the forty years of his public exposition of the Christian faith new emphases and angles did appear in his writings. But the underlying structure and the dynamic core of his doctrine remained much the same as they had been at Augsburg when he composed the Augsburg Confession.

3.1 Melanchthon’s Teaching on the Justification of the Sinner The Augsburg Confession and its Apology, as well as his Loci communes, demonstrate that the doctrine of justification on the basis of Christ’s work was the centerpiece and governing principle of Melanchthon’s theology (Wengert: 2001, 405 – 12). Even as he reshaped the wording of the Augsburg Confession for use in France and England in the 1530s, justification by faith was the doctrine on which there could be no yielding or ambiguity. It was the major criterion for shaping his formulation of other doctrines in his “Consilium ad Gallos” (1534) and the “Wittenberg Articles” (1536), two attempts to paraphrase the Augsburg Confession for use in France and England respectively (Dingel 2012a). Justification by faith remained his guiding principle in his appeal against the Roman Catholic party within Germany. In commenting on justification by faith, he began by stating simply, “It is a true statement and must be maintained as firmly as possible: human beings are justified by faith alone, in God’s sight,” emphasizing the “excluding expression”10 expressed by Paul with the word “GRATIS,” referring readers to Romans 3:24 and to extensive writings from his own pen. Like Luther, the Preceptor believed that the sectarians had perverted the doctrine of justification in much the same way that Roman Catholics had. He mentioned the Silesian nobleman Caspar Schwenkfeld, a sharp critic of Wittenberg theology, whose spiritualizing, neoplatonic theology, Melanchthon said, repeated Origen’s error, namely that this exclusive emphasis on grace and faith is only a synechdoche, that faith only prepares sinners for justification, which takes place through other virtues or love, or through the bestowal of essential righteousness. This last definition of justification recalled the teaching of Andreas Osiander, Melanchthon’s Lutheran foe in Königsberg, a decade earlier. In his rejection of the papal teaching of “fides formata” Melanchthon repudiated Osiander’s teaching that human beings become righteous before God when God himself dwells in them and creates new 10 “Particula exclusiva” had become Melanchthon’s technical term for formulations that affirmed that God’s grace or God’s saving action is alone responsible for human salvation, excluding all human merit from the justification of the sinner.

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virtues. It is indeed true, the Preceptor averred, that God comes to dwell in the hearts of the faithful at conversion through his Holy Spirit and that he initiates their new obedience, but “it must also be maintained that in this life a person is righteous in God’s sight, that is, has remission of sins and reconciliation or the imputation of righteousness and is pleasing to God and acceptable in his sight for life eternal and as an heir of eternal life, by faith alone, that is, by trust in the Mediator” (MSA 6: 324 f.; cf. Wengert: 2012). God justifies sinners not because of our righteousness but only because of the mercy of the Lord (Dan 9:18) (MSA 6: 325). The Preceptor insisted that God alone is responsible for human salvation and at the same time, in the mystery of the relationship between Creator and creature, the human being is also totally responsible for carrying out the will of God and expressing the identity the Creator has bestowed through his grace. Melanchthon shared Luther’s pastoral concern for troubled consciences. Any denial of the “excluding expressions,” which place the entire responsibility for salvation upon Christ, deprives believers of the Holy Spirit’s comfort and their freedom from the terrors of hell. The Holy Spirit creates new life, peace, and joy by bringing believers to recognize that God the Father remits sins for the sake of his Son, the Mediator. Therefore they cry, “Abba, Father,” knowing that the Holy Spirit is the guarantee of their inheritance (Rom. 8:1, Eph 1:13 – 14) (MSA 6: 325 f.). To support his position Melanchthon called upon Bernard, Basil, and Augustine, all of whom, he asserted, taught that sinners are saved through faith alone (MSA 6: 326 f.). Melanchthon condemned his opponents for denying the exclusivity of God’s justifying grace in salvation particularly because this debilitated the gospel’s power to console troubled consciences. The Council of Trent’s condemnation of the Lutheran claim that the gospel grants believers assurance of salvation (decree on justification, Cap. 9, in: Denzinger: 1991, 508 f., §1533 – 1534) troubled Melanchthon deeply. It was one example he cited when rejecting the authority of councils (MSA 6: 293). It was one reason why Lutheran practice of confession and absolution was superior to that of the Roman Catholics, for Trent had only confirmed the monks’ fostering of doubt in believers’ hearts regarding God’s gracious disposition toward them (MSA 6: 307 f.). The Tridentine decree was also treated in connection with the freedom of the will. The reborn will struggles against sin, and in the midst of that struggle doubts arise. Even so, “the repentant retain their certainty and do not succumb to doubt, which leads to licentiousness or despair. Believers hope in the Lord (Ps. 130:5)” (MSA 6: 318 f.). The gospel that creates faith when it is heard, Melanchthon insisted, is the fountain of true consolation. “This consolation the papists destroy ; they command people to remain in doubt,” he remarked, noting that the sectarians do the same thing when they transfer faith from God’s Word to faith in supposed inner movements of the Spirit (MSA 6: 319 ff.). Melanchthon used Romans 5:15, Romans 5:1, Matthew. 17:5, 1 John 5:10, Job 9:2, Romans 7:24, Psalms. 32:5, 51:5, 8:3, Romans 14:1, and Mark 9:23 to prove this point.

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Related to his treatment of justification was his discussion of good works or new obedience. Addressing the Bavarian question, “whether they believe that good works done in love merit eternal life,” Melanchthon repudiated every concept of merit in order to secure comfort for believers. The Holy Spirit, who comes through the hearing of the gospel into believers’ hearts, kindles the beginning of new obedience (MSA 6: 328 – 34). New obedience is necessary, Melanchthon insisted, rejecting antinomianism, probably an oblique reference to the refusal of some in Flacius’ circle to accept his concept of the third use of the law (MSA 6:333; see Richter: 1996, 170 – 207, 251 – 329) and to his old bete noir, Johann Agricola, whose antinomianism he had refuted thirty years earlier (Wengert: 1997, 77 – 175). He specifically repudiated Anabaptists who “reject a differentiation among sins, and say that they remain righteous, even when they fall into sinning against their consciences” (MSA 6: 333). He stated that he did not use the words, “good works are necessary for salvation,” explaining that “merit is understood by the addition, ‘for salvation’.” Thus, he disassociated himself from the controversial position of his colleague Georg Major, that “good works are necessary for salvation” (MSA 6:334). In general, Melanchthon supported his disciples in public disputes, e. g. in the case of Albert Hardenberg, pastor in Bremen, in his controversy over the Lord’s Supper (Janse: 1994, esp. 52 – 81), or Johannes Pfeffinger and Viktorin Strigel, professors in Leipzig and Jena respectively, in their defense of a concept of the freedom of the will. In contrast, Melanchthon had always expressed himself with reserve regarding his colleague Georg Major’s proposition, “Good works are necessary for salvation;” here he simply rejected Major’s proposition, siding with his opponents (see Wengert: 1997, and Kolb: 1976). He concluded his treatment of good works by condemning both the Roman Catholic teaching that good works merit eternal life and the antinomians, who conclude that new obedience is neither necessary nor obligatory for the Christian life (MSA 6: 334 f.). In 1530 concern over the false teaching of antinomianism had not explicitly appeared in Melanchthon’s confessions, but the fundamental understanding of good works as the fruit of faith had remained unchanged over the years even though he had introduced new terminology (the “third use of the law,” for example) to express it.11

3.2 Melanchthon’s Views of Repentance and Penance Melanchthon’s concern for pious and tender consciences shaped his answer to the Bavarians’ nineteenth question, “do you believe that there are three parts of penance: contrition, confession, and satisfaction?” He dismissed this common scholastic analysis as unnecessary. He called canonical satisfactions false 11 Augsburg Confession VI and XX as well as extensive sections of his Apology, especially article IV (122 – 182), BSLK 60, 75 – 83a, 185 – 96, 313 – 16, Book of Concord, 40 f., 52 – 57, 140 – 149, 235 ff. On the third use of the law, see Wengert: 1997.

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worship and the basis of many impious errors, among them the practices associated with indulgences. True contrition involves turning to God, a “conversio.” Paul defined this conversion as consisting of two parts: mortificatio [killing] and vivificatio [making alive]. Contrition remains a suitable name for the sorrow over sin that the repentant feel, but definitions such as the scholastics sought, distinguishing, for example, contritio [genuine sorrow] and attritio [less sincere sorrow], must be avoided. Melanchthon condemned seven errors in the medieval theological teaching regarding repentance. Attempting to define what constitutes sufficient contrition is futile and impossible. In any case, sorrow apart from faith produces desperation. Contrition does not merit remission of guilt. The scholastic theologians omitted any mention of faith from their discussion of penance. They insisted on the enumeration of sins and the merit of enumerating them, the former unnecessary, the latter a seedbed for doubt and despair. The rites associated with performing satisfactions stemmed from pagan practice. Monks in times past impudently invented the idea that the punishments of purgatory could be remitted through satisfactions, an example of worshiping God in vain through human commands. All the lies regarding indulgences arose out of false interpretations of contrition (MSA 6: 302 – 305). True sorrow must be followed by faith in the promise of the gospel that “affirms that sins are freely remitted and righteousness is imputed and the Holy Spirit and eternal life are given for the sake of the Son of God and through him. For forgiveness of sins comes truly by faith and trust in God’s Son, and this is consolation and new life, which is the second part of conversion.” New obedience certainly follows this faith. Melanchthon noted that private absolution should be retained for many reasons, above all as one more means of applying God’s promise (MSA 6: 305ff; Scheible: 1997, 245 ff. gives an overview of the doctrine of the sacraments, including penance, in the document). Here Melanchthon was harking back to the teaching he drafted in Augsburg almost thirty years earlier (BSLK, 66 f., 249 – 91, Book of Concord, 44 – 47, 185 – 218). 3.3 Melanchthon’s Teaching on the Sacraments Melanchthon began his answer to the “Inquisition’s” eighth question, regarding the seven sacraments as effective and certain signs of grace, by rejecting five of the seven medieval sacraments and all impious practices connected with them, including the invocation of the dead. He accepted only baptism and the Lord’s Supper as sacraments although he did not oppose calling absolution a sacrament as well. Confirmation as the papalists practiced it was an “empty spectacle, without God’s command or promise.” He dismissed as “pharasaic madness” the idea that the sacraments give grace “ex opere operato, without any good disposition on the part of the one receiving the sacrament.”12 This notion 12 MSA 6: 297 f. Melanchthon regarded masses for the dead, subject of the seventeenth of the

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undercut the biblical definition of faith as the core of the Christian life. Melanchthon’s horror of the magical elements of medieval theology and piety expressed itself again. The Responsiones presented Melanchthon’s criticism of the “artolatreia” [bread worship] of which he had also accused some of his Wittenberg students, above all Joachim Westphal.13 Concerning the Bavarians’ question regarding transubstantiation and adoration of the sacrament, he condemned adoration, elevation, or parading with the sacrament on festivals as “manifest idolatry,” on the basis of his principle that outside its use as Christ instituted it the sacrament has no purpose. To undercut any possibility of adoration of the elements, Melanchthon emphasized that the sacrament was instituted to be a “remembering of the death and resurrection of Christ and of his benefits. It embraces the public commemoration of the entire teaching concerning the Son of God and his benefits, the application of his benefits, the remission of sins, and faith. It is public prayer and thanksgiving” (MSA 6: 298 f.). Melanchthon confessed his own view of Christ’s presence in the Supper. His definition contained three elements. First, Christ is “truly and substantially present” in the Supper. Second, the person who is present is the Son of God, who is of one nature with the Father and almighty, and who assumed our human nature. Third, Christ wants his people to believe that he has truly won remission of sins and righteousness for believers through his death, that he lives risen from the dead, and that he has made them his members, and wants to be efficacious in them.14 This summary of the Preceptor’s understanding of Christ’s presence supports the analysis of Melanchthon’s later doctrine of the Lord’s Supper by Peter Fraenkel: after drafting the Wittenberg Concord of 1536 the Preceptor insisted that Christ is truly present in the Sacrament but avoided precise definition of the manner of Christ’s presence, not mentioning Christ’s body and blood, and emphasizing above all the sacrament’s function (Fraenkel: 1961, Hund: 2006, 66 – 96.).

Inquisition’s questions, another indication of the false worship of the Roman party and its utter failure to comprehend God’s grace, MSA 6: 301. 13 Mahlmann: 1969, 38 – 41, 44 – 61, 126 – 37, 198 – 204. In 1550 Westphal and Melanchthon had fallen out over the question of concessions to the Roman party. The Preceptor criticized the student harshly in the debates over the presence of Christ in the Supper ; see Kolb: 2012. 14 MSA 6:300. The sacrament is a foedus “quod haec persona, quae non est angelus creatus, sed filius bloo}sior aeterno Patri et omnipotens, assumit massam naturae nostrae, et placata ira aeterni Patris nos sibi inserit tanquam surculos, et nos sibi membra facit. Hoc testatur in hac sumptione. Vere et substantialiter adest, applicat sese et sua beneficia communicatione corporis et sanguinis sui, et vult nos credere, quod vere sua morte meruerit nobis remissionem peccatorum et iusticiam, et resuscitatus vivat, et nos sibi membra faciat, et vere velit in nobis esse efficax, sicut Hilarius inquit: Haec sumpta et hausta faciunt, ut Christus sit in nobis, et nos in Christo.”

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3.4 Melanchthon’s View of the Church Melanchthon’s answers regarding the church also reveal how his concept of the gospel of Christ governed and shaped his thought. His initial definition of the church, in answer to the question, “What is the holy church?” arose directly from articles VII and VIII of the Augsburg Confession: “The church in this life is an assembly of those who embrace the gospel and rightly use the sacraments, in which the Son of God is truly at work through the ministry of the gospel; he regenerates many through the word of the gospel and the Holy Spirit, making them heirs of eternal life. There are in this assembly many elect but there are others who are not saints, but [outwardly] conform to true teaching.”15 The papalist foes stood outside the true church because of their adoration of the bread in the mass, their sale of masses, and their denial of the doctrine of the remission of sins and reconciliation through faith by grace. He further asserted that the Roman bishop and his “gang of bishops” cannot be the true church because they defend idolatry and inflict unjust persecution, designed to root out true teaching, upon believers; they are guilty of blasphemy and fratricide. The Praeceptor’s definition of the church indicates the place of the doctrine of justification in his understanding of the shape of public teaching and indicates how seriously he took the threat of the Counter-Reformation. In answering the second question, regarding the signs or marks of the church, he listed its three signs: the confession of the uncorrupted teaching of the gospel, the use of the sacraments, and the proper obedience to the ministry of the gospel. Melanchthon had not previously included such obedience to the ministry of the church in his discussion of the signs or marks of the church. His concern for proper teaching and order in the church was growing (MSA 6: 286 – 89, cf. 291).

3.5 Melanchthon’s Teaching on the Freedom of the Will Melanchthon had made it clear that he would use the Bavarian Articles as the occasion for writing against the Flacian position on the freedom of the will. On 21 December 1558 he informed his former student, the counselor at the court of Braunschweig-Lüneburg, Joachim Moller, that his new treatise addressed Flacius’ description of the sinner before conversion as a block of wood (CR 9: 669 f., §6648, MBW 8: 296, §8806, dated 21 December 1558: “Nam ibi et de Flacii Trunco dixi …”). Since 1556 Melanchthon had feared a public attack in regard to 15 MSA 6:285: “Ecclesia in hac vita est coetus amplectentium evangelium et recte utentium Sacramentis, in quo filius Dei per ministerium Evangelii vere est efficax, et multos regenerat voce Evangelii et Spiritu sancto, et facit haeredes vitae eternae. Et sunt in eo coetu multi electi et alii non sancti, sed tamen de vera doctrinae consentientes.” See also MSA 6: 292 f. Cf. CAVII: BSLK, 62, Book of Concord, 42 f. For a fuller summary of the doctrine of the church in the document, see Scheible: 1997, 243 ff.

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this topic from Flacius’ friend Nikolaus Gallus, superintendent in Regensburg and a leading critic of the positions Melanchthon had taken on good works and adiaphora in the early 1550s.16 Gallus’ attempts to discuss the bondage or freedom of the will with his Preceptor in letters met with only a vaguely expressed objection to “stoic necessity ;” Melanchthon avoided every effort to reach agreement through theological analysis. His suspicions of his former students remained too high to permit him to risk offering what he considered a proper solution. During 1559 Gallus published four treatises directed against what he believed to be Melanchthon’s errors on the free will (Gallus: 1559a, 1559b, 1559c, 1559d; cf. Kolb: 2000). Melanchthon chose his Responsiones as the occasion to make his own position clear. In composing the preface to his Latin Corpus Doctrinae in February 1560 he noted that his Responsiones had dealt with the calumnies woven together from excerpts from his writings by “the synagogue of Flacius and Gallus’ horde concerning divine necessity” (CR 9: 1054), a subject they in fact also largely avoided. Melanchthon found “necessity” a handy label for their commitment to Luther’s position because he regarded it as Luther’s most vulnerable point in his defense of bound choice. From the beginning of his career in Wittenberg Melanchthon had shared Luther’s conviction that God is totally responsible for all things, including the salvation of sinners, and that his human creatures have been created with complete responsibility for the sphere of life given to them, for their obedience to God’s will (Wengert: 1998, Matz: 2001). The paradox of these two responsibilities is reflected in the writings of both Wittenberg reformers. Melanchthon’s concern for total human responsibility took shape, among other ways, in his expressions regarding the freedom of the will. That concern dominates his treatment of the will in his answer to the Bavarians’ question, “Whether they [the local priests] believe that there is free choice in human beings.” It began with the assertion, “In human beings who are not reborn there is some freedom of the will which is able to perform external works” (MSA 6: 310). It was God’s will that this much freedom remain in all people so that they might recognize the difference between acting freely and not being able to act freely, and so that they might be governed by the discipline that comes through their obedience to moral commands. This external discipline creates external works that conform to God’s law and respond to his threats against those who break that law. God’s punishment of those who break his laws are testimonies of his providence, for he wants all people to know the difference between righteousness and unrighteousness. At the same time two things horribly impede the freedom of external actions: human weakness and the devil’s impulses (MSA 6: 311). Before turning to the critics of his formulations among his own students, 16 Letter to Albert Hardenberg, 23 April 1556, CR 8: 736, §5968, MBW 7: 420, §7793; letters to Johannes Mathesius, 1 May 1556, CR 8: 747, §5976, MBW 7: 426, §7807, and 30 June 1556, CR 8: 789, §6022, MBW 7: 450, §7873.

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Melanchthon repeated his fundamental definition of both freedom of choice (liberum arbitrium), and the related concept of original sin against the Roman Catholic position. He explicitly condemned the “Pelagians,” all who claim that original sin does not exist and that human beings can satisfy God’s law through natural human powers without the Holy Spirit. This is blasphemy against the Son of God and the Holy Spirit and destroys true teaching regarding the law, sin, grace, and God’s benefits. From birth human beings possess both a small spark of knowledge of God’s law and a large torch of evil desires, created by original sin. Melanchthon defined original sin in his usual fashion as “a heart devoid of the fear of God and true trust in God, a heart without God, which burns with love of self, craves what God has forbidden, is restless, rages, hates God, fights against laws and other people …,”17 language reminiscent of his description of original sin in the Augsburg Confession and Apology (CA, Ap II, BSLK, 53, 145 – 57, Book of Concord, 36 – 39, 111 f.). These human desires are made worse by the impulses of the devil. The failure to trust God and the impulses of the devil cause the horrible evils that beset the human race, such as the atrocities of Nero and unjust wars, and the presumptuousness of false teaching, for example, of Mohammed or other heretics (MSA 6: 311 f.). Having repeated his basic conviction regarding human powers under sin, Melanchthon turned to the foes among his own students. “I reject and detest the madness of the Stoics and Manichaeans, who affirm that everything happens by necessity, both good and evil actions … I beg the young to flee these monstrous opinions, which insult God and are harmful to public morality. For if all things happen by necessity, there is no need to reflect on our actions and take care in making decisions, as Paul admonished, ‘be careful how you live’ (Eph. 5,15).” Against such a doctrine of absolute necessity, which none in the Wittenberg circle was in fact advancing,18 and against the double predestinarian doctrine of his epistolary friend, John Calvin (Wengert: 1999, 26 – 33), Melanchthon stated: “it is the most certain truth that God does not will sin, nor does he drive the human will to sin, nor does he support or approve of sin, but truly turns his anger against sins” (MSA 6: 312: “Firmissima veritas est, Deum nec velle peccata, nec impellere voluntates ad peccandum, nec adiuvare nec approbare peccata, sed vere et horribiliter irasci peccatis”). From this fact Melanchthon concluded that the wills of human beings and the devil were not coerced to do 17 MSA 6: 311: “Quia utrunque nascentes afferimus, et exiguam lucem, quae est aliqua legis noticia, et ingens incendium malorum affectuum, quos gignit peccatum originis, quia corda vacua timore DEI et vera fiducia DEI, seu vacua DEO, ardent amore, appetunt res prohibitas, dolent, fremunt, oderunt DEUM, leges et homines impedientes, quo minus possint vagari, ut cupiunt.” 18 Even in Luther’s De servo arbitrio, alongside an appeal to a doctrine of absolute necessity to defend God’s total responsibility, [cf. WA 18: 614,27 – 620,37; LW 33: 36 – 44], to which Melanchthon objected, passages can be found which insist on full human responsibility [WA 18: 771,38 – 40; LW 33: 270; WA 18: 752,7 – 8; LW 33: 240]. Cf. Luther’s concluding comments, WA 18: 784,1 – 785,38; LW 33: 289 – 92.

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evil, but misused their freedom to turn themselves away from God. “Contingency exists, and the source of contingency in our actions is the freedom of the will” (MSA 6: 312 f. “Est igitur contingentia, et contingentiae nostrarum actionum fons est libertas voluntatis”). Melanchthon conceded that, in the words of one of his instructors in Tübingen more than forty years earlier, Franz Kircher of Stadion, “Both propositions must be believed: there is divine determination, and there is contingency, and not every point of contradiction between the two can be explained.” He steadfastly held to the Wittenberg assertion of total divine responsibility for salvation and total human responsibility for obedience to God’s command, insisting on three axioms. First, God is not the cause of sin. Second, human beings can exercise freedom in external actions, which Paul calls the righteousness of the flesh. Third, God wants to maintain discipline among all people. This discipline is not a fulfillment of God’s law, which demands perfect conformity to his will, both internal and external obedience. It is not even the beginning of the inner obedience, the obedience of faith, and therefore it is not be counted as righteousness in God’s sight. Believers must maintain these axioms or they will fall into Pyrrhonian doubts that lead to hatred of God and his teachings (MSA 6: 313 f.). Just as he could not abide the Council of Trent’s objections to Christians finding assurance in the promise of the gospel – the undercutting of total divine responsibility –, so he reacted strongly against the temptations posed by what he believed to be a deterministic view of salvation – the undercutting of total human responsibility. For he strove to make clear how human beings as creatures of God function: God wants a correct understanding of his teaching to fill the minds of believers, doubts to be overcome, and their assent to the truth to be confirmed. He wants their minds to be taught by God’s Son and carried and led by the Holy Spirit. Melanchthon was trying to emphasize that God is responsible for the sanctified life of the believers whom he has created anew by converting them to faith in Christ. He not only insisted on the necessity of the obedience of converted minds and hearts; he also averred that the performance itself does not please God but rather the “righteousness of a good conscience,” that is, the righteousness of faith that clings to Christ (MSA 6: 314 ff.). In fact, Melanchthon’s Flacian opponents agreed with him at nearly every point, as Gallus had made clear in a letter of 12 January 1557 (MWB 8: 22 – 23, §8089) and in his Explanation of the Religious Controversies (Gallus: 1559b). But Gallus, Flacius, and their comrades remained suspicious of their Preceptor’s way of describing the action of the human will; they believed that the will does act in conversion but only under the impetus of the Holy Spirit, who produces faith and the will’s grasping of Christ through faith. They believed that Melanchthon was leaving room for a contribution of the human will to this process apart from the Holy Spirit’s empowerment. It is not clear whether Melanchthon realized that his argumentation neither met the concern of his Flacian opponents regarding his own teaching nor rejected a position they held. He had good

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reason to oppose their criticism, but his failure to focus clearly on the precise issue as they defined it insured continuation of the tensions between him and the Flacians. 3.6 Melanchthon’s Critique of the “Radicals” In the second edition of the Responsiones, Melanchthon added a critique of the “errors of the Anabaptists and others who spread sectarian madness.” These included the antitrinitarian teaching of “the followers of Mohammed, Servetus, Paul of Samosata, ‘Ebion,’19 Cerinthus, Arius, and Nestorius.” For thirty years Melanchthon had repeated a similar defense of the catholic, creedal confession of the Trinity.20 He attached a brief summary of his understanding of the Johannine concept of the “Logos,” which had become a matter of dispute between him and Flacius three years earlier (MSA 6: 369 f.; Preger: 1859, 1: 426 – 31). This led to a further treatment of the relationship between the two natures in Christ. In the midst of a controversy in Bremen over the teaching of the ancient church regarding the sharing of the characteristics of the divine nature and the human nature of Christ [communicatio idiomatum] within the personal union of his natures, Melanchthon had told Bremen pastor Albert Hardenberg that he would treat the topic in the Responsiones (in a letter of 25 July 1559, CR 9: 845 f., §7688, MBW 8: 367, §9010, see Mahlmann: 1969, 44 – 61). He set down his own views, emphasizing that when speaking of the two natures, it is necessary to speak concretely, not abstractly : of Christ’s suffering rather than the divine suffering, of God becoming a human being, not of the divinity becoming humanity. Melanchthon was trying to avoid substituting philosophical speculation for the concrete historical event of the incarnation. He also rejected a distinction between a “communicatio idiomatum dialectica” [a sharing of characteristics in the rhetorical sense] and a “communicatio idiomatum physica” [a sharing of characteristics in the physical sense], favoring the former, rejecting the latter (MSA 6: 370 – 77). Hardenberg’s opponents used this distinction to argue that because he affirmed the former and denied the latter, he was making the sharing of characteristics between Christ’s two natures a matter of mere words, not an actual act of sharing which brings the characteristics in 19 Melanchthon shared the universal belief in the Middle Ages that the Ebitonites were named after their founder. The name actually derives from the Aramaic for the poor. 20 Cf. CA I, 5 – 6, BSLK, 51, Book of Concord, 36/37. As Michael Servetus first attacked the doctrine of the Trinity, in De erroribus Trinitatis (1531) and Dialogorum de Trinitate (1532) Melanchthon wrote against his views to Joachim Camerarius (CR 2: 630, 640, §1094 and 1099, MBW 2: 89 and 92, §1305 and §1311) and Johannes Brenz (CR 2: 660 f., §1123, MBW 2: 106, §1351). In his Loci communes theologici (1535, cf. the 1543 edition, MSA 2:1 182, 189 f.) and in his De ecclesia et de autoritate verbi Dei (1539, MSA 1: 327), he criticized Servetus in print. Melanchthon also approved of Servetus’ execution in Geneva (1553) in a memorandum of 10 April 1557 (CR 9: 133, §6226, MBW 8: 58, §8185).

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fact to the other nature (Mahlmann: 1969, 44 – 61, Janse: 1994, 45 – 89). The text of the Responsiones does not address the specific issues being raised by the opponents of Hardenberg and those who were suspicious of what they viewed as their Preceptor’s changing doctrine of the Lord’s Supper. For Melanchthon what he had written was sufficient. He let his faith and confession rest upon his understanding of the two natures of Christ. He did not wish to comment further because such disputes injure the weak. He simply concluded that his reader should rather listen to Christ’s words, “Come to me, all you who are weary and carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest” (Matt 11:28), “I am the vine, and you are the branches. Apart from me you can do nothing ” (John 15:5), and “You will call the Lord ‘the Lord our righteousness’” (Jer 23:6) (MSA 6: 377). *** Though not a significant part of the Bavarian Counter-Reformation, the Articles prepared for Duke Albrecht’s visitation of 1558 gave Philip Melanchthon the opportunity to compose a statement of faith that placed a summary of his theology before the public eight months before his death. It reveals the Preceptor’s assessment of the conflicts in which he found himself entangled in his last years. It also makes clear that the abiding foundation of his thinking remained his understanding of justification by grace through faith in Christ. This focus on God’s promise of forgiveness in Christ and on the trust it creates had governed Melanchthon’s thought as he composed the Augsburg Confession and its Apology almost thirty years earlier. Also at the end of his life this justifying promise of God in Christ continued to shape his view of salvation, the sacraments, the Christian life of repentance and new obedience, God’s work in behalf of sinners, and believer’s life of trust in God. Precisely this concern for faith, as a gift of God and as an exercise of human trust, led him to affirm the nature of the Lord’s Supper as a word of promise against what he defined as magical views of its efficacy. This concern for a clear understanding of faith led him to insist that preachers and teachers pay attention to the cultivation of faith and thus to the psychological dimension of religious experience rather than simply defend God’s sovereign control of human life. A majority of his disciples interpreted his expression of the faith in the Augsburg Confession in another manner than did the Preceptor in regard to these two issues. In the Formula of Concord they articulated a definition of Wittenberg teaching that was not totally in accord with Melanchthon’s in the Responsiones.21 Thus, in the final analysis the Responsiones remained limited in 21 Formula of Concord articles VII and VIII on the Lord’s Supper and Christology, BSLK, 796 – 812, 970 – 1049, Book of Concord, 503 – 14, 591 – 634 (see Dingel: 2012c); articles II and XI, on freedom of the will and election, BSLK, 776 – 81, 866 – 912, 816 – 22, 1063 – 91, Book of Concord, 491 – 94, 517 – 20, 543 – 62, 640 – 56.

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influence and significance. Because Melanchthon designated it his own confession, and did so in his last will and testament, it is nonetheless an important piece of evidence regarding the continuing development of Wittenberg theology. The Responsiones is Melanchthon’s own chosen doctrinal self-portrait at the end of his life. In the pages of this work he revealed himself as a Wittenberg thinker, a theologian of the church catholic, defending the tradition that he believed united all those who truly were faithful to the church and its message. He was, above all, a biblical theologian. His understanding of the message of Scripture made him an Evangelical theologian, who insisted above all that God justifies sinners without any contribution on their part, so that they may exercise human life in its full integrity in conformity to God’s will.

Literature Die Abgo[e]ttische Artickel: Gestellet von einem Mo[e]nch in Bayern/ Darauff die INQVISITIO sol fu[e]rgenomen werden/ Die Gott gnediglich abwenden wolle. ANNO 1558. Mit einer kurtzen Erinnerung PHILIPPI MELANTHONIS. Wittenberg, 1558. Amsdorf, Nikolaus von (1564). Zwo Trost vnnd vermanung Schrifft ahn die verjagten Christen auß dem Bayerlandt. Item ein Rathschlag Joannis Brentij. S.l. Arand, Charles P. (2001). “Two Kinds of Righteousness as a Framework for Law and Gospel in the Apology.” Pp. 417 – 39. In: Lutheran Quarterly 15. Bauerreiss, Romuald (1975). Kirchengeschichte Bayerns, vol. 6. St. Ottilien: Eos. Brandmller, Walter (Ed.) (1993). Handbuch der Bayerischen Kirchengeschichte, Bd. 2. St. Ottilien: Eos. Bundschuh, Benno von (1988). Das Wormser Religionsgespräch von 1557 unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der kaiserlichen Religionspolitik. Münster: Aschendorff. Denzinger, Heinrich (1991). Peter Hünermann (Ed.), Kompendium der Glaubensbekenntnisse und kirchlichen Lehrentscheidungen. 37. ed. Freiburg/B. Herder. Dingel, Irene (2008). “The Culture of Conflict in the Controversies Leading to the Formula of Concord (1548 – 1580).” Pp. 15 – 64. In: Robert Kolb (Ed.), Lutheran Ecclesistical Culture, 1550– 1675. Leiden: Brill. (2012a). “Melanchthon’s Paraphrases of the Augsburg Confession, 1534 and 1536.” Essay 5 in this volume. (2012b). “Philip Melanchthon and the Establishment of Confessional Norms.” Essay 8 in this volume. (2012c). “The Creation of Theological Profiles. The Understanding of the Lord’s Supper in Melanchthon and the Formula of Concord.” Essay 12 in this volume. Fraenkel, Peter (1961). “Ten Questions Concerning Melanchthon, the Fathers and the Eucharist.” Pp. 146 – 64. In: Vilmos Vajta (Ed.), Luther und Melanchthon,

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Referate und Berichte des Zweiten Internationalen Kongresses für Lutherforschung. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Gallus, Nikolaus (1559a). Das der freye Wille nichts sey. Antwort/D. Martini Lutheri/ an Erasmum Roterodamum/ Verdeudscht durch D. Justum Jonam … Regensburg: Heinrich Geißler. (1559b). Erklerung der Religions streite/ zu nottu[e]rfftigem vnterricht der Kirche/ vnd ablenung falscher Calumnien. Wider die verfelscher der waren Augspurgischen Confession. Regensburg: Heinrich Geißler. (1559c). Erklerung vnd Consens vieler Christlichen Kirchen/ der Augspurgischen Confession/ auff die newe verfelschung der Lehre vom Freyen willen/ wie die aus dem INTERIM von etlichen noch gefu[e]rt vnd verteidigt wird. Regensburg: Heinrich Geißler. (1559d). Qvaestio libero arbitrio, qvatenvs illa qvibvsdam nunc disceptatur in Ecclesijs Augustanae Confessionis … Regensburg: Heinrich Geißler. Heil, Dietmar (1998). Die Reichspolitik Bayerns unter der Regierung Herzog Albrechts V. (1550 – 1579). Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Hund, Johannes (2006). Das Wort ward Fleisch. Eine systematisch-theologische Untersuchung zur Debatte um die Wittenberger Christologie und Abendmahlslehre in den Jahren 1567 bis 1574. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Janse, Wim (1994). Albert Hardenberg als Theologe, Profil eines Bucer-Schülers. Leiden: Brill. Kolb, Robert (1991). Confessing the Faith, Reformers Define the Church, 1530– 1580. Saint Louis: Concordia. (2009). “Confessing the Faith, the Wittenberg Way of Life.” Pp. 247 – 265. In: Tidskrift for teologi og kirke 14. (2012). “The Critique of Melanchthon’s Doctrine of the Lord’s Supper by his ‘GnesioLutheran’ Students.” Essay 11 in this volume. (1976). “Georg Major as Controversialist: Polemics in the Late Reformation.” Pp. 455 – 68. In: Church History 45. (2000). “Nikolaus Gallus’ Critique of Philip Melanchthon’s Teaching on the Freedom of the Will.” Pp. 87 – 110. In: Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 91. Mahlmann, Theodor (1969). Das neue Dogma der lutherischen Christologie. Problem und Geschichte seiner Begründung. Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus. Matz, Wolfgang (2001). Der befreite Mensch. Die Willenslehre in der Theologie Philipp Melanchthons. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Melanchthon, Philip (1558). Responsiones scriptae a Philippo Melanthone ad impios articvlos bavaricae inqvisitionis. Wittenberg: Georg Rhau. (1559). Anleitung Philippi Melanthonis/ wie Christliche zuantworten sey/ auff die abgo[e]ttischen Artickel in Baiern gestellet … Translated by Jacob Eisenberg. Wittenberg: Hans Lufft. Pfeiffer, Gerhard (1980). Art. Bayern, 1520 – 1799. Pp. 361 – 387. In: TRE 5. Berlin: de Gruyter. Preger, Wilhelm (1859). Matthias Flacius Illyricus und seine Zeit. Vol. 1. Erlangen: Blaesing.

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Richter, Matthias (1996). Gesetz und Heil. Eine Untersuchung zur Vorgeschichte und zum Verlauf des sogenannten Zweiten Antinomistischen Streits. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Saxony, ducal (Ernstine) (1559a). Des Durchleuchtigen … Herrn Johans Friderichen des Mittlern … in Gottes wort/ Prophetischer vnd Apostolischer schrifft/ gegru[e]ndete Confutationes/ Widerlegungen vnd verdammung etlicher … Corruptelen/ Secten vnd Irrthumen … Jena: Thomas Rebart. (1559b). Illvstrissimi principis … Iohannis Friderici secvndi … sumpta confutatio & condemnatio praecipuarum Corruptelarum, Sectarum, & errorum … Jena: Thomas Rebart. Scheible, Heinz (1997). Melanchthon, eine Biographie. Munich: Beck. Schindling, Anton, and Walter Ziegler (Ed.) (1989). Die Territorien des Reichs im Zeitalter der Reformation und Konfessionalisierung. Land und Konfession 1500– 1650, Bd 1. Der Südosten. Münster: Aschendorff. Schottenloher, Karl (1970). Das Regensburger Buchgewerbe im 15. und 16. Jahrhundert. Mainz, 1920; Nieuwkoop: De Graaf. Ursinus, Johannes (Ed.) (1611). Hispanicae inquisitionis & carnificinae Secretiora … Amberg: Johannes Schönfeld. Wengert, Timothy J. (2001). “Bearing Christ as Melanchthon’s Contribution to The Book of Concord.” Pp. 396 – 416. In: Lutheran Quarterly 15. (2012). Defending Faith. Lutheran Responses to Andreas Osiander’s Doctrine of Justification. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. (1997). “Georg Major (1502 – 1574), Defender of Wittenberg’s Faith and Melanchthonian Exegete.“ Pp. 129 – 56. In: Heinz Scheible (Ed.), Melanchthon in seinen Schüler. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. (1998). Human Freedom, Christian Righteousness. Philip Melanchthon’s Exegetical Dispute with Erasmus of Rotterdam. Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press. (1997). Law and Gospel, Philip Melanchthon’s Debate with John Agricola of Eisleben over Poenitentia. Grand Rapids: Baker. (1999). “‘We Will Feast Together in Heaven Forever’: The Epistolary Friendship of John Calvin and Philip Melanchthon.” Pp. 19– 44. In: Karin Maag (Ed.), Melanchthon in Europe, His Work and Influence beyond Wittenberg. Grand Rapids: Baker. Wenz, Gunter (1996). Theologie der Bekenntnisschriften der evangelisch-lutherischen Kirche, Band 1. Berlin/New York: de Gruyter.

This essay originally appeared as “Melanchthon’s Doctrinal Last Will and Testament: The Responsiones ad articulos Bavaricae inquisitionis as His Final Confession of Faith,” in Sixteenth Century Journal 36 (2005): 97 – 114.

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Irene Dingel

Melanchthon and the Establishment of Confessional Norms

The theology of Philip Melanchthon has shaped the public teaching and confession of faith within German Protestantism from his own time up to the present. To be sure, the creation of the Evangelical confessional churches reduced the theological diversity that still existed throughout much of the sixteenth century to the prevailing rivalry of Lutheranism and Calvinism. Nonetheless, it is important to recognize that the relatively independent influence of Melanchthon exercised a critical role for setting the direction of public confession and teaching. This essay will treat the impact Melanchthon had on Evangelical public teaching, particularly in the years just prior to his death. The question of the establishment of norms for public confession of the faith focuses on the process that led theologians to begin to regard specific confessional and doctrinal texts as appropriate for setting theological norms and exercising authority as confessions of the faith. This process then led to their formal recognition as such standards, at least for a period of time. Melanchthon played a critical role in this development. That can be seen above all in the publication of a collection of texts in 1560 under the title Corpus doctrinae Christianae; along with the three ancient Creeds it contained exclusively works by Melanchthon. This Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum – also called the Corpus Doctrinae Misnicum1 – remained unchallenged for more a decade as a compendium of proper teaching and a Scriptural confession of the faith in electoral Saxony and beyond its borders. From 1561 it was binding on pastors and teachers in Pomerania. Anhalt, Hesse, Nuremberg, certain Silesian principalities, Schleswig-Holstein, and Denmark adhered closely to its teaching. Other territories and cities developed their own norms for teaching and confession following the model of the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum. Such similar volumes in different territories clearly bore its stamp in the very way in which they were conceived.2 In this context, therefore, the terms “confession” and “establishment of confessional norms” do not refer to the text of a single confessional document – such as the Augsburg 1 “Misnicum” is the Latin adjectival form of “Meissen,” the core territory of the Albertine branch of the Wettin family, from which Elector August of Saxony came. 2 In Pomerania, for example, in 1564 the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum was expanded chiefly through works of Luther. Cf. Tschackert: 1919, 613 – 20, and Dingel: 1996, 15 f.

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Confession – but rather to the standard for teaching and confession in Protestantism in general, as such a standard was framed in specific places to exercise authority in an all-embracing sense as the “doctrina christiana.” The “historical necessity” for the gradual formulation of norms and guiding principles for public confession and teaching in the sixteenth century, summarized in such a Corpus doctrinae, arose out a crisis of authority that developed within Protestantism. The warrant for establishing these norms was transferred from the great personal authorities of reform to confessional documents, a characteristic phenomenon dubbed Confessionalization. Indeed, this development did not progress according to an immutable logic of its own; it was influenced by the historical constellations and theological disputes of that time. A brief overview – with a glance at the details within their context – can illuminate the nature of the question regarding authority within Protestantism, so that the course and substance of the process of creating these norms can be viewed more clearly against this background.

I The Reformation called into question the very foundations on which the existing authorities of the medieval church rested. Early on, Martin Luther called attention to the possibility that popes and councils can err. Indeed, he could even view the papacy as one form in which the Antichrist appeared, in which he saw a preview of the advent of the end of the world as it came ever nearer (Seebaß: 1978, 28 – 43). While the Council of Trent appealed to Scripture and Tradition as bearers of revelation (Denzinger : 1991, 496, §1501), the Evangelicals cited Tradition, as reflected in the writings of the Church Fathers and the decisions of councils, as a standard for Christian teaching only in a very limited fashion. Against the papal monopoly on biblical interpretation and the dominating place of Tradition in public teaching, the Reformation emphasized the Holy Scripture itself as the only valid norm for faith and doctrine. Scripture held exclusive claim to the central location of authority in the church. The claritas [clarity] which Scripture possesses along with the capability ascribed to it to interpret itself, could be marshaled against the authorities which traditionally had claimed the right to reform the church but had refused to do so. That meant, however, at the same time that in regard to matters that were dubious and questions under dispute in the life of the church and in its teaching neither popes nor councils, nor the tradition in general, could be put to use as the final arbitrator any longer. New aids for defining the orientation point for making such decisions had to be found when differences arose in the interpretation of Holy Scripture and its application in the teaching and life of the church. Alongside the primary authority of the Bible emerged such evaluative instruments – binding summaries of the faith –

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that might be designated “secondary authorities.” They took on a consultative function which could help define the proper orientation for resolving divisive doctrinal disputes. At first these “secondary authorities” were found in the most prominent personalities of the Reformation. Above all, Martin Luther assumed such a central role. The reformer was viewed as the one whom God had sent to rediscover the gospel. His adherents saw in him the successor to John the Baptist as the Third Elijah, the Elijah of the end time. His friend and colleague in Wittenberg, Philip Melanchthon, contributed to this characterization of his senior associate (Dingel: 1994, 38 – 43, esp. p. 41, n. 23). The woodcuts, engravings, and drawings of that time which depict Luther’s head surrounded by a halo under the figure of the Holy Spirit as a dove to some extent reflect this elevation of his person to a position of authority (see, e. g., Martin Luther und die Reformation in Deutschland: 1983, 177, plate 217, and 22, plate 280). At the same time, however, alongside the authority of Luther emerged the authority of the entire theological faculty in Wittenberg and its professors, among whom Melanchthon undoubtedly held a particular place of importance. For when an official opinion on a matter was needed, that of the Wittenberg theological faculty was sought. Many requested the opinion of Melanchthon above all when theological disputes required resolution or when directives which set the course of ecclesiastical practice were necessary. Into the middle of the sixteenth century these Wittenberg theologians served as consultants, as judges, indeed, it could be said, as authoritative interpreters of God’s Word. This situation began to change in the years 1546 to 1548. A kind of vacuum of authority materialized for a time when Luther died on 18 February 1546. Initially, Luther’s place could be filled by Melanchthon, who for a long time had exercised considerable influence on his countless students in Wittenberg. However, the disastrous outcome of the Smalcald War in 1547 produced a turning-point in this regard. It contributed to the sudden undermining of the established vehicles that had been exercising authority in deciding questions of faith and teaching. The defeat of the Smalcald League by Emperor Charles V led to the drafting of the Augsburg Interim. The enforcement of this recatholicizing policy sent many Evangelical clergy into exile and reversed the Reformation in a number of localities. The fact that Melanchthon and the Wittenberg faculty took part in the drafting of a special form of the imperial settlement for electoral Saxony, called by its opponents the “Leipzig Interim” – more accurately the draft of the proposal for the electoral diet in Leipzig –, engendered the opinion in the eyes of many that Luther’s closest adherents remaining in Wittenberg, who were expected to guarantee the integrity of the Reformation, had come to abandon its original fundamental principles. Some believed that they could recognize in Melanchthon and his Wittenberg colleagues genuine traitors to the Evangelical cause, even if the article on justification which Melanchthon had drawn up in the “Leipzig Interim” preserved Evangelical teaching. Furthermore, it was

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no more than a draft proposal for the electoral diet; it never became law. But it did return some Saxon churches to medieval practice in certain ceremonial practices, the so-called adiaphora or neutral matters that could be decided on without constraint of biblical command or prohibition. Many, above all Melanchthon’s former disciple Matthias Flacius Illyricus, rejected such readiness to compromise “in casu confessionis,” that is, when the confession of the faith itself was on the line. These critics regarded Melanchthon as an ally of the despised “Judas of Meissen,” Moritz of Saxony, of the Albertine branch of the Wettin family (Günther Wartenberg has fundamentally corrected this image of Moritz as betrayer, see Wartenberg: 1994, 302 – 11, and the other publications mentioned there). His political policy had not only made possible the victory of the imperial forces but through that victory had also secured for himself and his family the electoral office that had lain in the hands of the Ernstine branch of the Wettin family up to that point. Melanchthon, together with some of his Wittenberg colleagues, was stamped with the reputation of a desultory and unreliable compromiser, who wantonly abandoned Luther’s teaching. The question regarding the standards and authorities which would provide orientation for the interpretation of Holy Scripture for Evangelical teaching and confession of the faith was posed anew, especially because the draft for the electoral diet that Flacius labeled the “Leipzig Interim” ignited several of the most important disputes within the Protestantism of the time and placed Melanchthon between the fronts. Finding a standard for public teaching and confession of the faith, that is, the process of providing norms for doctrine and confession, became one of the most important tasks of the church in the second half of the sixteenth century precisely because of these developments. This task became ever more urgent after the Religious Peace of Augsburg of 1555, which guaranteed the adherents of the Augsburg Confession legal toleration in the Empire. For in the course of the controversies on the Lord’s Supper which had surfaced after 1552 it became clear that not only those who had a Lutheran understanding of the sacrament but also the adherents of a Calvinistic understanding of the Lord’s Supper could appeal to the Augsburg Confession. This had become possible only because Melanchthon had begun to alter the Augsburg Confession at a number of points. He did this in the context of the negotiations for unity with the southern Germans gathered around Martin Bucer and especially in anticipation of negotiations with Roman Catholics in reconciliation talks mandated by Emperor Charles V. Most controversial of his alternations became those in Article X, the article on the Lord’s Supper, which was so formulated after 1540 that it could take into account the consensus achieved between Luther and Bucer in the Wittenberg Concord of 1536. By 1542 there were three altered versions of the Unaltered Augsburg Confession (as it was later called) of 1531, those of 1533 (German), 1540 (Latin), and 1542 (Latin) (Dingel: 2012a). After 1555 this posed the problem of which version of the Augsburg

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Confession was the basis of the Religious Peace of Augsburg. This also meant that the appeal to the Augsburg Confession could not by itself contribute anything to the settlement of the controversies over the Lord’s Supper. Also the other disputes of the period after the Interim – for instance over the role of good works in the Christian life (Majoristic controversy), over the significance of the human will in conversion (synergistic controversy), and over the doctrine of justification held by Andreas Osiander – could not be laid to rest by simply appealing to the Augsburg Confession (see Andresen: 1980, 102 – 38, and Dingel: 2008b). The Augsburg Confession with its Apology no longer sufficed as the chief secondary norm for public confession and teaching that could bring the parties to the disputes together. That became clear once again at the diet of Evangelical princes in Frankfurt in 1558, when the princes tried to find the way back to Protestant accord in the confession of the faith that embraced the many Protestant lands and cities. They did so on the basis of a formula for consensus, the Frankfurt Recess, based upon groundwork drafted by Melanchthon (Dingel: 2012b). The Recess defined the articles of doctrine which were being debated in the controversies after the Interim and which had not been treated in sufficient detail in the articles of the Augsburg Confession to provide the clarity which had become necessary because of the current disagreements. But these efforts in Frankfurt were thwarted by the opposition of the adherents of Luther in Ernstine (ducal) Saxony under Flacius’s leadership. He and his associates presented instead a compendium of doctrine, the Weimar Book of Confutation, which immediately attained confessional standing in ducal Saxony. Its publication as such a norm began the development of norms for public teaching within individual principalities. They took their place as necessary amplifications of the Augsburg Confession. Within the borders of these lands or cities they were able provide a standard for public teaching and confession of the faith, even if the attainment of a general solution valid for all Protestant churches was no longer possible. Thus, as mentioned above, “Corpora doctrinae” were created which gave a firm and also a legally binding framework for the faith and public teaching of the Evangelical principalities and cities. These “Corpora doctrinae” provided a fixed standard for public teaching and confession of the faith. The Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum of 1560 played a pioneering role in this development. It was the most influential of the collections which arose at this time.

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II By this time a certain tradition already stood behind the listing of various confessional texts and doctrinal writings to which churches ascribed confessional standing. Such lists could be found already in 1535 and 1541.3 This development did not reach its conclusion within the historical situation that has been described above until some three decades later. In this period the designation “Corpus Doctrinae” attained the definition that became characteristic for its use as a vehicle aimed at establishing norms for public confession of the faith and teaching. Melanchthon himself had spoken in several contexts of this kind of definition of authority in literary form some years before the Leipzig printer Ernst Vögelin introduced the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum to the public, printing it under the title Corpus Doctrinae Christianae. Quae est summa orthodoxi et catholici dogmatis; complectens doctrinam puram & veram Euangelii Iesu Christi. He conceived of a volume that would contain a “summary of doctrine” or would present a “form for doctrine.” The very expression that later developed into a technical term, “corpus doctrinae,” can be found already in the 1530s in the statutes of the University of Wittenberg, which originated out of Melanchthon’s thinking. There the “corpus doctrinae” is viewed as the teaching that Paul formulated in the epistle to the Romans and the statements in John’s gospel on the Trinity (Wirsching: 1980, 499, 508, n. 48; on the further development, see Hauschild: 1980, 239 ff.). To be sure, at this point the concept had not been specifically applied to a concrete collection of documents that was accorded the character of a confession or a compilation of authoritative documents with the status of a confession of the faith.4 In fact, the term was used for a long period in a manner which did not restrict its usage in this way. In a letter to Joachim Mörlin, Joachim Westphal, and the group of those who had sought to mediate between Flacius and Melanchthon in the Coswig negotiations of 1557, Melanchthon stated, for example, that Flacius had up to that point never stated so openly “de toto corpore doctrinae quid sentiat” [“what he thought about the entire body of teaching”] (cf. Melanchthon’s letter to the pastors of Lower Saxony, 21 January 1557, MBWR 8: 26, §8097, CR 9: 34 f., §6164). In this case “Corpus doctrinae” designated quite clearly the entire content of the doctrine which was presented 3 Wolf-Dieter Hauschild referred to this in the Church Order of Pomerania of 1535, in which the Augsburg Confession, the Apology, and Luther’s catechisms are stipulated as “criteria” for choosing Evangelical preachers; cf. Hauschild: 1980, 236. The Church Order of Halle, 1541, by Justus Jonas offers a longer list of confessional texts for the orientation of Evangelical preaching, see Tschackert: 1919/1979, 590. 4 Also the usage in the Wittenberg University statutes did not refer to a group of doctrinal writings. Wirsching: 1980, 499 states that it does, but his interpretation is contradicted by the content of his own n. 48, p. 508.

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or simply the totality of public teaching. Many further examples may be found that demonstrate that this is the case (e. g. Melanchthon’s letters to Caspar Aquila, 10 February 1556, MBWR 7: 392, §7715, CR 8: 675, §5926, and to Johann Albrecht of Mecklenburg, 9 December 1556, MBWR 7: 52 f., §8051, CR 8: 918 f., §6129). Melanchthon used the term to refer to the structure of public teaching when a bit later he reported to Albert Hardenberg of Bremen on the Coswig colloquy ; he wrote that the pastors from Braunschweig, Hamburg, Lübeck, and Lüneburg not only wanted to negotiate the articles that were being disputed at the time but also wanted to draw him – Melanchthon – into a discussion of the entire body of teaching [“ut de toto corpore Doctrinae agatur”] (Melanchthon’s letter to Hardenberg, 26 January 1557, MBWR 8: 31, §8111, CR 9: 74 f., §6185). It was in this sense that the term “Corpus Doctrinae” was used in the Frankfurt Recess of 1558, which Melanchthon had inspired. It made specific reference to the Augsburg Confession and its Apology as “Summarium und Corpus Doctrinae” [summary and body of teaching], in which the statements of Holy Scripture and the ancient creeds of the church were summarized as a standard for public teaching (see the Frankfurt Recess, CR 9: 494). Here, too, as can be seen from the larger context, the term did not mean a collection of writings that established norms, but rather the foundations of correct teaching that were contained in such a “Summarium” (see Dingel: 2012b, Hauschild: 1980, 240, and Wirsching: 1980, 499). Johannes Wigand and Matthaeus Judex emphasized the term and its Greek synonym “Syntagma” in the title for their lengthy digest of New Testament teaching within the framework of their own version of the Melanchthonian topics, in 1558 (Wigand/Judex: 1558, see Kolb: 2010). The designation “binding summary,” [“Summarischer Begriff”] is the expression that the Formula of Concord later substituted for the synonymous term “Corpus Doctrinae” in order to assure Melanchthon’s supporters that the Formula was not intended to compete with the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum (cf. BSLK 767,8 – 9; “Summarischer Begriff” in this context is not simply the same thing as “Epitome;” see Dingel: 1996, 17, n. 9). By this same time the expression “Corpus Doctrine” can be found as a designation not only for the content of public teaching but also as a concrete collection of doctrinal writings. There are several examples. In the formulation of the Frankfurt Recess there is an echo of the development of this aspect of the definition. The Augsburg Confession and its Apology are viewed as authoritative documents. In various contexts Melanchthon had been citing the Saxon Confession of 1551, which he had prepared for use by the Saxon delegation that was to be sent to the Council of Trent (e. g., in his letter to Johann Baptist Haintzel, MBWR 7: 340, §7577, CR 8: 530, §5834), and his way of referring to it also reveals how the two definitions of “Corpus Doctrine” overlapped. The term referred both to a concise summary of public teaching and also to an authority for establishing norms for that teaching. Indeed, the very list of documents that later constituted the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum was

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already by and large in use among the Wittenberg theological faculty by 1557 when it had to invoke confessional standards. In a faculty opinion prepared by the Wittenberg theologians for the Senate of the city of Bremen Johannes Bugenhagen offered an almost complete table of contents of the later Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum: “We have the Augsburg Confession, Philip’s Apology, our Confession of the Saxon Churches and Philip’s Loci communes, in which are to be found the forms for speaking to which we and our churches bind ourselves.”5 This reveals that among the reformers in Melanchthon’s and Luther’s circle a basic collection of Melanchthon’s writings was crystallizing as a Corpus of documents that summarized the standard for public teaching. The choices for this list were in no way coincidental.

III The fact that such a Corpus Doctrinae Christianae actually appeared in 1560 was due to a private initiative by the Leipzig printer Ernst Vögelin. At his urging Melanchthon undertook the task of assembling the writings for the volume (according to Scheible: 1997, 243). Melanchthon also provided the prefaces first for the German edition and then for the subsequent Latin edition (CR 9:929 ff., 1050 – 55). In these prefaces he indicated that the compilation of the Corpus Doctrinae had a two-fold goal. First, it sought to achieve a settlement of disputes and unanimity in public confession and teaching in the midst of a period of internal strife among the Protestants. In accordance with this goal the Corpus Doctrinae contained only documents in which Melanchthon himself had set down the “summa doctrinae” or those which he regarded as a “form for speaking” that reproduced the content of Holy Scripture and the ancient creeds of the church. Furthermore, since the several documents in the collection focused on a variety of topics, it could be cited as a standard for public confession and teaching in church and school. In fact, the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum became a standard for doctrine in instruction in the schools and for university level study (Ritschl: 1927, 65 f.). But it was certainly not intended to be restricted to this function of setting such standards. Secondly, Melanchthon regarded it at the same time as just as important to give public expression to his final position in the controversies that continued to smolder, in which he had been publicly attacked or had chanced into the line of fire. The documents 5 “Habemus Confessionem Augustanam, Apologiam D. Philippi, Item et nostram Confessionem Saxonicarum Ecclesiarum, et locos communes D. Philippi, in quibus sunt formae verborum, in quibus nos et nostrae Ecclesiae se continent,” “Wittenberg Opinion for the Senate of Bremen on the Lord’s Supper.” Bugenhagen’s remark is found at the end of the Opinion, CR 9: 17, §6150 (see MBWR 8: 20 f., §8085).

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assembled in the Corpus Doctrinae that followed the Augsburg Confession and its Apology were chosen against this background. They were documents that for the most part could be used to address the points under theological dispute at the time. Melanchthon had revised or expanded some of them precisely for this purpose. The Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum met both goals – setting the standard for public confession and teaching, as well as demonstrating the continuity of Melanchthon’s adherence to correct teaching by defending positions that had marked differences between him and his opponents within the ranks of the Wittenberg theologians. The two goals reinforced each other. The Corpus Doctrinae therefore represents not only a collection of various basic theological texts; it also provides a much needed interpretation of the Augsburg Confession, making that document’s teaching more precise in regard to controverted issues, without jeopardizing its claim to authority.6 At the same time the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum developed into an expression of the identity of the Philippist movement, which played a not inconsiderable role in the later “Crypto-Calvinistic” turmoil (Dingel: 2008, Hund: 2006). What follows here assesses the close connection between these two lines of thought, setting standards for confession of the faith and an apologetic which safeguards the continuity of public teaching. The function of setting standards for public doctrine was inherent in the way in which the Corpus Doctrinae was conceived, in the selection of its texts and in the fact that they were assembled as a group. The German edition contained along with the three ancient creeds of the church the 1533 version of the German Augsburg Confession, the so-called “prima variata.” The first Latin edition of the work contained the Augsburg Confession of 1542, the “tertia variata.” Subsequent Latin editions printed both the Unaltered Augsburg Confession of 1531 and the Altered Augsburg Confession of 1542 alongside each other (Neuser : § 52, 63, 64, 74, 76, 78, 105, and 116). The Apology of the Augsburg Confession came next. Then came the Saxon Confession of 1551, the Loci Theologici of 1556, the Examination of Candidates for Ordination, which Melanchthon had prepared for the churches of Mecklenburg in 1552, and finally the Response to the Articles of the Bavarian Inquisition, which Melanchthon had composed in 1559 as a critique of the thirty-one articles of the Inquisition that had been composed for use in the Counter-Reformation in Bavaria (Kolb: 2012). In the Latin edition of the Corpus Doctrinae Melanchthon’s Response to the Controversy with Stancarus was also printed.7 6 This goal was expressed for the first time in so many words by the Formula of Concord some twenty years later. In doing so it intended to differentiate its position from that of the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum. In contrast to the Formula of Concord the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum and all the Corpora Doctrinae that followed its model treated not only the points under dispute in the controversies of the time but also the entirety of evangelical teaching. 7 The MSA, volume 6, does not present the authentic Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum because some of the texts in it are not the editions of the documents used in the original printing.

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The very assembly of these particular texts tells a great deal. The three creeds of the ancient church and the Augsburg Confession, with its Apology, the foundational confessional texts for the Wittenberg theologians,8 were expanded in the Corpus Doctrinae Christianae by one more confessional document, the Saxon Confession of 1551. Melanchthon, however, emphasized explicitly that in this document he had not composed a new confession. He pointed out that it agreed with the Unaltered Augsburg Confession, so that he designated it in the prefaces to the Corpus Doctrinae as a “Repetition of the Augsburg Confession” (“Repetitio eiusdem Confessionis” and “Repetitio der Confessio,” see the prefaces in CR 9: 930 and 1053; on the Saxon Confession, see Wartenberg: 1996). Melanchthon regarded the Saxon Confession, like the Augsburg Confession, as an expression of the “summary of public teaching” [summa doctrinae] (MSA 6: 164), as an authoritative digest of the content of the Evangelical faith and teaching. But alongside the texts of confessions, the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum also contained doctrinal treatises and polemical writings. To be sure, these were all publications to which Melanchthon expressly ascribed the function of providing orientation for public confession and teaching. He considered his Loci communes, for example, as a catechism for young people, as he made clear in the German preface dedicated to Anna Camerarius (CR 22: 47). He had designed his Loci as a presentation of the “summary of Christian teaching” (Preface to the Christian reader, CR 22: 47), the goal of which was intended to serve the spread and maintenance of true teaching and thereby to promote unity and peace in the church. By characterizing these documents in this way Melanchthon himself had drawn the analogy to confessional documents by ascribing to them the same function that was being attributed to the entire Corpus Doctrinae, the task of serving as a summary and standard, a paradigm for public confession and teaching (Preface to the Christian reader, CR 22: 48 f.). In a similar way the Examination of Candidates for Ordination found its place in the nexus of the Corpus Doctrinae. As a “textbook of basic theological knowledge” (Scheible: 1992, 384), it offered, as Melanchthon wrote, a “form for speaking” [forma verborum] (Melanchthon’s letter to Georg von Cracow, MBWR 8: 441, §9216, CR 9: 1036, §6916), that is, a condensation of the Word of God extracted from the Holy Scripture. His Response to the Articles of the Bavarian Inquisition seems to lie outside the conception of the Corpus Doctrinae as a collection of confessions of faith along with instructional works since it is clearly rooted in the theological controversies of the period. However, Melanchthon did expressly view it as his own personal confession of faith. The document not only expressed the author’s antagonism toward the activities of the Jesuits; its comments on the

8 They constitute the foundational elements of the Corpora Doctrinae even if they take on a different theological or confessional orientation through the addition of other documents.

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free will also criticized Flacius’s position on that topic.9 The Responsio constituted the link between the establishment of doctrinal standards represented by the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum and Melanchthon’s apologetic interest in fighting for the continuity of proper teaching. That was also his concern in the Refutation of the Errors of Servetus and the Anabaptists, which he had composed as an appendix to and amplification of his Response to the Articles of the Bavarian Inquisition when its second edition appeared. His Response to the Controversy over Stancarus, which he had originally appended to the edition of Examination of Candidates for Ordination of 1559 (CR 23:CXIII-CXIV), found its way into the second edition of the Latin edition of the Corpus Doctrinae. Thus, alongside the confessional and instructional works, with the standards for public confession and teaching they expressed, Melanchthon placed articulations of his positions which ruled out recently advanced variations of doctrine that he regarded as false. With these three works of the Corpus Doctrinae – his Response to the Articles of the Bavarian Inquisition, the Refutation of the Errors of Servetus and the Anabaptists, and his Response to the Controversy over Stancarus – Melanchthon drew the line which definitively divided his own person from those who opposed his theology within his own ranks. At the same time inclusion of these documents in the Corpus Doctrinae placed his theology in the line of continuity of correct teaching and correct confession of the faith that stretched from the ancient creeds of the church into his own time. Whether this was the intention of the printer and publisher Vögelin or not, this conception of the book made clear that the process of setting the standard for public confession blended together with Melanchthon’s apologetic argument that he had preserved the continuity of correct teaching in the midst of the various theological fronts. The necessity of taking such a position in regard to the theological disputes of the time appears to have been more clearly in view as the more extensive Latin edition was prepared than was the case for the German edition. This is clear not only in view of the number of documents in each but also in the prefaces of each edition. While the German clearly states that it is above all a “summary of Christian teaching,” that all controversial exchange must have a standard, and rather incidentally mentioned the goal of ending the existing controversies, the Latin edition made special reference to Melanchthon’s own theological position in his Response to the Articles of the Bavarian Inquisition. Particularly the appendices against Servetus and Stancaro are meant here.10 9 Melanchthon designated this work as “my confession,” MBWR 8: 441, §9216, CR 9: 1098 ff., §6978, MBWR 8: 470, §9300. He directed it against the three chief opponents of his efforts at Reformation, “contra Pontificios, Anabaptistas, Flacianos et similes.” Cf. Melanchthon’s critique on the doctrine of the free will advanced by Flacius and Nikolaus Gallus in his “Memorandum on the Weimar Book of Confutation,” MBWR 8: 325, §8886, CR 9: 766 – 69, §6705. See also Kolb: 2012. 10 The prefaces, German as well as Latin, mentioned expressly as opponents the following: the

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But also in the German versions of the Corpus Doctrinae the context of the disputes of the time came under discussion, for example in the “Reminder for the Reader” which was probably composed by Melanchthon’s son-in-law, Caspar Peucer, and was added to the German as well as the Latin edition (CR 9: 931 – 34). Peucer characterized the Corpus Doctrinae as a necessary reaction to the slanders stemming from the Flacian party against the church of Saxony and Meissen. He pointed to the Corpus Doctrinae as a counter-proposal which had a rightful claim to doctrinal authority (CR 9: 931 f.). For in Ernstine, or ducal, Saxony the theologians with a Gnesio-Lutheran mindset, under Flacius’s leadership, had rejected Melanchthon’s efforts at restoring unity when they issued the Weimar Book of Confutation. Duke Johann Friedrich the Middler had made that work binding as a symbolical book, as an expression of public confession of the faith, even if he did so against the objections of prominent theologians in Jena (particularly Viktorin Strigel, professor of theology, and the ecclesiastical superintendent Andreas Hügel, see Tschackert: 1919/1979, 523 f.). In reaction to the Frankfurt Recess, to which Melanchthon had contributed a great deal by preparing the earlier drafts of the document, the Weimar Book of Confutation worked out precisely what its proponents had accused Melanchthon and his adherents of not doing in the formula of consensus of 1558: it defined Lutheran teaching on the basis of “antitheses,” that is, the repudiation of false teachers and their doctrinal positions by name. The Frankfurt Recess had not chosen this procedure precisely because it wanted to create rapprochement between the feuding sides. The guiding principle of the Weimar Book of Confutation was not to set forth a summary of the topics or articles of teaching that expressed the faith and public confession but rather to identify the errors and heresies against which that faith and confession had to be defended. The Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum addressed this challenge in so far as it placed alongside the confessional and instructional texts that were recognized by all sides within the Wittenberg circle its own “confutations,” which Melanchthon had made more than clear as he composed his responses to the Roman Catholic party, the Anti-Trinitarians, and others who stood as outsiders, like Stancaro, as well as his reply to the criticism of the Gnesio-Lutherans.11

former student of Melanchthon who had converted to Roman Catholicism, Friedrich Staphylus, Francesco Stancaro, Matthias Flacius Illyricus, and Nikolaus Gallus, MBWR 8: 394 and 447 f., §9078 and §9236, CR 9: 931, §6830; 1054, §6932. 11 See Melanchthon’s words in his Refutation of the Errors of Servetus: “Est autem certissimum signum verae Ecclesiae doctrinae Euangelii incorrupta, quam cum sonet confessio Ecclesiarum nostrarum firmissime retinens symbola, et cum puriore antiquitate consentiens, et damnans contrariam doctrinam et idola, affirmo nostras Ecclesias vere esse membra catholicae Ecclesiae Dei, et profiteor me earum civem esse, et ad earum societatem alios invito, ut unum simus in Deo, et hortor, ne sint errones, qui nullius Ecclesiae cives esse velint,” MSA, 6:366.

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IV The topics under discussion in the controversies at that time reveal especially and specifically how Melanchthon aimed to employ the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum as he combined the task of setting standards for public confession and teaching with the apologetic substantiation of the continuity of the teaching that he set forth in the Corpus Doctrinae. That can be seen above all in the questions of the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper and Christology. In fact, Melanchthon did not focus primarily upon the problematic of the Lord’s Supper at any point in the Corpus Doctrinae or give it special emphasis in the polemical documents at the conclusion of the collection. Nonetheless, there are indications that the Corpus Doctrinae aimed at bringing together the positions of various sides of that controversy. The Latin Altered Augsburg Confession was placed alongside the Unaltered text. Decisive was also the situating of the Saxon Confession together with the two versions of the Augsburg Confession, as if to function as a bridge between the two. Melanchthon had expressly composed it as a parallel to the Unaltered Confession. In May 1551 he had created this confession at the command of the Saxon elector Moritz, so that it could be presented at the Council of Trent as the Saxon position (the Council’s second session was supposed to begin in September 1551).12 At the same time through this Confession he succeeded in winning back the allegiance of some of his critics who had harbored deep distrust of him since the time of the Interims, including the counts of Mansfeld and their theologians. The Confession found widespread support among the adherents of the Augsburg Confession, including even the theologians at the time in the service of the court in Mansfeld, Michael Coelius and Johannes Wigand.13 Indeed, Melanchthon had so formulated the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper in the Saxon Confession that it clearly taught that Christ is present “vere et substantialiter” [truly and substantially] in the proper use of the sacrament and that the distribution of the gift of his body and blood gives to those who receive the Lord’s Supper communion with Christ and the forgiveness of sins.14 But he avoided the precise wording which specified that this presence

12 The Saxon Confession never fulfilled this purpose since the electoral delegation did not reach Trent because its journey was interrupted by the outbreak of the war between Emperor Charles V and Moritz, who was allied with other Evangelical princes. 13 Theologians of the city of Strasbourg were also among its subscribers. As late as 1580 opponents of the city’s ecclesiastical superintendent Johannes Pappus published the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum as he was trying to advance the cause of the Formula of Concord; see Dingel: 1996, 60 f. On the subscribers to the Saxon Confession, see Salig:1730, 663 – 67. 14 Confessio Saxonica, article “De coena Domini” (MSA 6:130): “ … sed in usu instituto in hac communione vere et substantialiter adesse Christum et vere exhiberi sumentibus corpus et

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and this distribution took place under the forms of bread and wine, as the Unaltered Augsburg Confession had formulated the teaching (see the CA invariata German, article X, BSLK, 64, Book of Concord, 44). Thereby the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper in the Saxon Confession came close to that of the Latin Augsburg Confession of 1531, which also did not mention the elements of the Supper but did speak of the true presence and the distribution of the body and blood (BSLK 64, Book of Concord, 45). The Saxon Confession differed almost imperceptibly from its position, but in a manner that became decisive for the further impact of the confession. The Saxon Confession did not emphasize the presence of Christ’s body and blood but the presence of the entire person of Christ, and that “in usu instituto,” that is, in the celebration of the sacrament according to its institution by Christ (Confessio Saxonica, “De coena Domini,” MSA 6: 130). Within this context Melanchthon was able to speak of the distribution of the body and blood of Christ to those who receive the sacrament without mentioning the elements of the sacrament, the bread and wine. He used similar expressions in his Examination of Candidates for Ordination in 1552 (MSA 6: 202 ff.). In this way Melanchthon refocused the real presence of the body and blood of Christ, which the followers of Luther continued to emphasize, on the true presence of the person of the Son of God. In the Altered Latin Augsburg Confession Melanchthon had gone one step further. Its article X had avoided any mention at all of the presence of Christ and recognized only a presentation of the body and blood with the elements (Neuser : 1990, 16). In contrast, the Confessio Saxonica reintroduced mention of the “vere et substantialiter adesse” [being present truly and substantially] of the person of the mediator of salvation in the celebration of the sacrament according to its institution by Christ – it must be noted, not under the elements of the Supper – with an emphasis on the character of the Supper as witness, a guarantee of salvation (cf. Confessio Saxonica, article “De coena Domini,” MSA 6: 127, “Et baptismus et coena Domini sunt pignora et testimonia gratiae, …”). The broad support that the Confessio Saxonica found even among some who can be labeled Gnesio-Lutherans shows that at the point in time at which it was composed, it was understood to be in agreement with the Unaltered Augsburg Confession and that the differences between the two offered no reason for disagreement with the prevailing understanding of the Lord’s Supper among the Evangelicals. When the Saxon Confession appeared in the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum in 1560, however, in the midst of the disputes over the Lord’s Supper that had broken out anew since 1552,15 its text made it possible for opponents of the

sanguinem Christi, Christum testari, quod sit in eis, et faciat eos sibi membra, et quod abluerit eos sanguine suo.” 15 From 1552 to 1557 Joachim Westphal of Hamburg was locked in dispute with John Calvin in the “second controversy over the Lord’s Supper” which was followed by the dispute over the Lord’s

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Lutheran doctrine of the real presence of Christ’s body and blood in the Lord’s Supper, some Philippists and later also those sympathetic with Calvinism, to appeal – above and beyond the Saxon Confession and the Altered Augsburg Confession – to the correct teaching of the Augsburg Confession, to Melanchthon, and to the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum as interpreters of the correct Confession. In the eyes of the Gnesio Lutherans this, of course, definitively cast suspicion upon the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum. On the one hand, it firmly maintained the true and essential presence of Christ in the celebration of the Lord’s Supper. But on the other hand, the appended writings on the controversies opposed those streams of thought that were beginning to develop an argument for the real presence based upon the omnipresence of the humanity of Christ in the context of the question of the Lord’s Supper.16 This was part of a doctrinal development which proceeded from the doctrine of the personal union of Christ. This provides the second example through which the Corpus Doctrinae reveals Melanchthon’s specific personal position in distinction to that of others. As was the case with Melanchthon, too, his critics sought to comprehend that union with the help of the paradigm of the “communicatio idiomatum,”17 the assignment of the characteristics of divine and human natures of Christ to the person of the Savior as a unity. Important to note is that some of the former students of Melanchthon who identified themselves as heirs of Luther had gradually developed a different focus than that of their teacher. Their view expressed itself in the teaching that the divine characteristics of Christ were communicated to his human nature. The discussion of the real presence of Christ had come to a head within the context of this issue, focusing the problem of the formulation of the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper on the real presence of the humanity of Christ. It is against this background that Melanchthon’s position opposing Servetus and Stancaro, and the inclusion of his polemic against them in the Corpus Doctrinae, must be seen. In those positions Melanchthon had confronted two diametrically opposed doctrinal stances. While Servetus raised fundamental questions regarding the divine nature of Christ, Stancaro did not advance an anti-trinitarian point of view in any way. In opposition to Andreas Osiander and in a separate though related dispute with Andreas Musculus, he formulated a doctrine of justification which emphasized only the human nature of Christ as he treated Christ’s work for the salvation of sinners.18 Therefore, in his writings against Servetus and Stancaro MelanSupper in Bremen (1557 – 1563). See Tschackert: 1919/1979, 531 – 38, Bizer : 1940, 275 – 84, and Mahlmann: 1969, 44 – 61. 16 That did not include the entire group of the Gnesio-Lutherans but only a part of them, among those Johannes Bötker and Joachim Westphal, but not, for example, Tilemann Heshusius; the theologians of Württemberg held this position as well; see Dingel: 1996, 438 – 48. 17 Melanchthon had developed his concept in dispute with Johannes Timann and his statements in the Second Controversy over the Lord’s Supper, Mahlmann: 1969, 61 – 76. 18 According to Stancaro the three persons of the Holy Trinity together were responsible for

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chthon’s primary goal had to be to accent the unity of the human and divine natures in the person of the Savior. But neither in the Response regarding the Controversies with Stancaro nor in the Refutation of the Error of Servetus did he address individual elements of the views of these two. Instead, he developed his own Christology. By including the Refutation and the Response in the Corpus Doctrinae Melanchthon made Servetus and Stancaro exemplars, through whom he addressed and refuted all his opponents in the various Christological questions that had been raised at that time. Thus, his comments expressed at the same time his opposition to the spiritualistic elements of Osiander’s doctrine of justification. That doctrine, which had fueled violent controversies within Protestantism since 1551, was often also being associated with the views of Caspar von Schwenckfeld.19 These polemical writings took on additional significance as reactions against those approaches advanced among the Gnesio-Lutherans that further developed the concept of the “communicatio idiomatum.” Melanchthon himself had brought that term into the discussion, but he believed that the Gnesio-Lutherans were characterizing the personal unity of Christ in a way that he found inappropriate and false. For instance, in the controversy over the Lord’s Supper in Bremen (1557 – 1563) Johann Bötker developed a doctrine of the “communicatio idiomatum realis” against the background of the Christology of Johann Brenz, with recourse to Luther. This view was cited in some situations for support of an understanding of the real presence in the Lord’s Supper. Although the Lutheran side in the second controversy over the Lord’s Supper (Joachim Westphal’s critique of John Calvin and others) had been hesitant to undergird a doctrine of the Lord’s Supper based on a literal understanding of the words of institution with the help of Christological argumentation, Bötker’s and Brenz’s views brought the Christological question into the heart of the controversy over the Lord’s Supper. Some theologians had developed a position arguing that even divine omnipresence was communicated to the human nature of Christ, an extension of the doctrine which its opponents characterized disparagingly as a “doctrine of ubiquity.” In his writings against Servetus as well as against Stancaro Melanchthon made it unmistakably clear that these opponents, who certainly were able to appeal to formulations Luther had made in his Confession on the Supper of Christ of 1528, had taken a decisive and in his view improper step that went well beyond his own doctrinal formulations. With the aid of the distinction between a proper way of speaking “in concreto” and an improper way of

sending the Savior, whose divine nature was therefore a participant in this sending. Thus, only the human nature of Christ was actually sent as mediator for the salvation of sinners. Only the human nature accomplished the reconciliation of sinners with God, in Stancaro’s view. See Tschackert: 1919/1979, 497 – 501; and Koch: 1992, 143 – 56. 19 Osiander’s name did not appear at all, while Schwenckfeld’s position was sharply criticized. See Refutatio erroris Serveti, MSA 6: 373, 377.

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speaking “in abstracto,”20 he limited the term “communicatio idomatum” specifically to the person of the Savior. He insisted that the concept should not be put to use apart from its proper function as no more than a “forma loquendi,” an expression that makes the substance of the idea clearer.21 Melanchthon wanted to employ the term only as a “communicatio idiomatum dialectica,” as an expression, a way of describing in a more comprehensible fashion what the relationship between the two natures of Christ is. He could not regard it as a “communicatio idiomatum physica,” an actual sharing of characteristics, which he accused his opponents of teaching and which he regarded as an unjustified extension of the term.22 Melanchthon thus used his writings against Servetus and Stancaro to sharpen his christological doctrine. By placing these two writings in his Corpus Doctrinae he intended to prevent this doctrine from being developed in a false direction. With this two-fold focus – on the one side setting standards for public confession of the faith and on the other side defining his position apologetically and more precisely and placing the Melanchthonian teaching into the continuity of the historic confession of the faith – the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum attained the status of an official confession of the faith in several territories or cities and for many individuals. Although it was not able to retain its function as a secondary authority, to be used to interpret the Holy Scripture, in the long run, it remained a signpost for Protestant standards of public teaching and confession.

20 It was permissable to speak of a communication of characteristics only with concrete reference to the person of Christ and his office, according to Melanchthon. That happens, for example, when we say that God became a human being, that God was born of a virgin and died. In contrast, to say these things in the abstract, that is, regarding the divine nature or to attribute divine characteristics to humanity was unacceptable to Melanchthon. “Non dicitur : Natura divina est passa, sed Christus est passus, qui est Deus et homo,” Refutatio erroris Serveti, MSA 6: 376. 21 MSA 6: 374 f. Here he wrote, “Nequaquam dicitur in abstracto, Natura divina est humana. Sed in concreto dicitur, Deus est homo, cum Christo nato ex virgine loquimur. Item, Deus est natus ex virgine, Deus est passus. Et nominatur haec forma loquendi communicatio idiomatum, quae est praedicatio, in qua proprietas unius naturae dicitur de persona in concreto, et significatur in Christo duas esse naturas, non tantum ita, ut altera sit socia et separabilis, sicut in Elia et aliis Sanctis adest Deus societate, ut auxiliator, et separabiliter, sed sic, quod k|cor assumserit humanam naturam miranda unione inseparabili et personali.” Cf., on this topic, the Responsio de controversiis Stancari, MSA 6: 262 f. 22 See his reference to this in the Responsio de controversiis Stancari, MSA 6: 261. Melanchthon speaks of a two-fold sharing of characteristics, “communicatio idiomatum duplex”: “dialectica” and “physica.” The latter is a “confusio naturarum,” Refutatio erroris Serveti, MSA 6: 377. There were similar disputes regarding this terminology also among the Gnesio-Lutherans.

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Literature Andresen, Carl (Ed.) (1980). Handbuch der Dogmen- und Theologiegeschichte. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Bizer, Ernst (1940). Studien zur Geschichte des Abendmahlsstreits im 16. Jahrhundert. Gütersloh: Bertelsmann. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1962. Denzinger, Heinrich (1991). Peter Hünermann (Ed.), Kompendium der Glaubensbekenntnisse und kirchlichen Lehrentscheidungen. 37. ed. Freiburg/B. Herder. Dingel, Irene (1994). “Ablehnung und Aneignung: Die Bewertung der Autorität Martin Luthers in den Auseinandersetzungen um die Konkordienformel.” Pp. 35 – 57. In: Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte 105. (1996). Concordia controversa, Die öffentlichen Diskussionen um das lutherische Konkordienwerk am Ende des 16. Jahrhunderts. Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus. (Ed.) (2008a). Controversia et Confessio. Theologische Kontroversen 1548 – 1577/80. Kritische Auswahledition. Bd 8: Die Debatte um die Wittenberger Abendmahlslehre und Christologie, 1570 – 1574. Göttingen Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht. (2012a). “The Creation of Theological Profiles. The Understanding of the Lord’s Supper in Melanchthon and the Formula of Concord.” Essay 12 in this volume. (2008b). “The Culture of Conflict in the Controversies Leading to the Formula of Concord (1548 – 1580).” Pp. 15 – 64. In: Robert Kolb (Ed.), Lutheran Ecclesistical Culture, 1550 – 1675. Leiden: Brill. (2012b). “Melanchthon’s Efforts for Unity between the Fronts: the Frankfurt Recess.” Essay 6 in this volume. Hauschild, Wolf-Dieter (1980). “Corpus Doctrinae und Bekenntnisschriften. Zur Vorgeschichte des Konkordienbuchs.” Pp. 235 – 52. In: Martin Brecht and Reinhard Schwarz (Ed.), Bekenntnis und Einheit der Kirche. Studien zum Konkordienbuch. Stuttgart: Calwer Verlag. Hund, Johannes (2006). Das Wort ward Fleisch. Eine systematisch-theologische Untersuchung zur Debatte um die Wittenberger Christologie und Abendmahlslehre in den Jahren 1567 bis 1574. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Koch, Ernst (1992). “‘Das Geheimnis unserer Erlösung’. Die Christologie des Andreas Musculus als Beitrag zur Formulierung verbindlicher christlicher Lehre im späten 16. Jahrhundert.” Pp. 143 – 56. In: Heiko Franke et al. (Ed.), Veritas et Communicatio. Ökumenische Theologie auf der Suche nach einem verbindlichen Zeugnis. FS zum 60. Geburtstag von Ulrich Kühn. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Kolb, Robert (2010). “The First Protestant ‘Biblical Theology.’ The Syntagma of Johannes Wigand and Matthaeus Judex.” Pp. 189 – 206. In: Torbjörn Johansson, Robert Kolb, and Johann Anselm Steiger (Ed.), Hermeneutica Sacra. Studien zur Auslegung der Heiligen Schrift im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert / Studies of the

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Interpretation of Holy Scripture in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries. Berlin: de Gruyter. (2012). “Melanchthon’s Doctrinal Last Will and Testament. The Responsiones ad articulos Bavaricae inquisitionis as His Final Confession of Faith.” Essay 7 in this volume. Mahlmann, Theodor (1969). Das neue Dogma der lutherischen Christologie. Gütersloh: Mohn. Martin Luther und die Reformation in Deutschland. Ausstellung zum 500. Geburtstag Martin Luthers (1983). Frankfurt/M: Insel Verlag. Neuser, Wilhelm (1987). Bibliographie der Confessio Augustana und Apologie, 1530 – 1580. Nieuwkoop: de Graaf. (1990), (trans.). Das Augsburger Bekenntnis in der revidierten Fassung des Jahres 1540. Speyer : Evangelischer Presseverlag Pfalz. Ritschl, Otto (1927). Dogmengeschichte des Protestantismus. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Salig, Christian August (1730). Vollständige Historie Der Augspurgischen Confeßion und derselben Apologie … Vol. I. Halle: Renger. Scheible, Heinz (1992). Art. Melanchhon, Philipp. Pp. 371 – 410. In: TRE 22. Berlin: de Gruyter. (1997). Melanchthon. Eine Biographie. Munich: Beck. Tschackert, Paul (1919/1979). Die Entstehung der lutherischen und der reformierten Kirchenlehre samt ihren innerprotestantischen Gegensätzen. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Wartenberg, Gnther (1994). Art. Moritz von Sachsen. Pp. 302 – 11. In: TRE 23. Berlin: de Gruyter. (1996). “Die ‘Confessio Saxonica’ als Bekenntnis evangelischer Reichsstände.” Pp. 275 – 94. In: Christine Roll (Ed.), Recht und Reich im Zeitalter der Reformation. Festschrift für Horst Rabe. Frankfurt/M: Lang. Wigand, Johannes, and Matthaeus Judex (1558). SUMTACLA seu Corpus doctrinae Christi, ex novo testamento tantum, Methodica ratione singulari fide & diligentia congestum. Basel: Oporinus. Wirsching, Johannes (1980). “Bekenntnisschriften.” Pp. 487 – 511. In: TRE 5. Berlin: de Gruyter.

This essay appeared originally as “Melanchthon und die Normierung des Bekenntnisses,” in Günter Frank (ed.). Der Theologe Melanchthon (Stuttgart: Thorbecke, 2000); 195 – 211, and in English translation as “Philip Melanchthon and the Establishment of Confessional Norms,” in Lutheran Quarterly 20 (2006): 146 – 169.

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Philip Melanchthon in Controversy

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Timothy J. Wengert

Philip Melanchthon and the Origins of the “Three Causes” (1533 – 1535): An Examination of the Roots of the Controversy over the Freedom of the Will Some scholars may still assume that early on Philip Melanchthon either abandoned Luther’s position on the bound will against Erasmus or was, at very least, torn between the two figures.1 Others imagine that Melanchthon rescued the Reformation and its theology from the excesses of Luther’s hyperbole on the subject (see Graybill: 2010). In previous work on the subject the author of this essay discovered that the 1527 and 1528 Scholia on Colossians contained sustained and sophisticated refutations of two enemies, John Agricola, at the time a proto-antinomian, and Erasmus (Wengert: 1997, Wengert: 1998). This set of studies, too, clarified where interpreters of Melanchthon easily go astray, by treating his work like the finished product of a nineteenth-century German professor of Dogmengeschichte instead of as the lucubrations of a Renaissance man. The nature of theology that was developing in Wittenberg in the 1520s and 1530s was far more sophisticated than the glib theories that pit Martin against Philip or Gnesio-Lutherans against Philippists. Just to give one example of the problem: when Luther praised the Loci communes theologici, he was praising the second Latin edition, which contained the famous three causes of “conversion” (Holy Spirit, Word and Will).2 Given this endorsement, in order to drive a wedge between the two reformers on the question of the free will, one is forced to speculate: Melanchthon was duplicitous; Luther was old and not thinking clearly any longer; Luther never actually read later editions of the Loci. However, a more respectful reading of the historical record argues instead both that theology in Wittenberg was done by conversation, not by fiat, and that critical differences in theological expression and orientation did not necessarily mean betrayal of the gospel for either man. Melanchthon did not serve Luther ; Luther did not stand over Melanchthon as a judge. Rather, both men understood themselves to be serving the gospel and the church with their unique gifts (Wengert: 1999). 1 For a criticism of Melanchthon’s doctrine of justification, see Ritschl: 1900, 6 – 7, and Holl: 1921, 107. On Melanchthon “between Luther and Erasmus,” see Maurer: 1964, 137 – 62. 2 See, especially, WA TR 3: 539ff (§3695), where on 10 January 1538 a Hungarian visitor put three questions to Luther, the third being about free will. Luther concluded: “‘Ita nostrum liberum arbitrium est passive, non active, quod non consistit in nostris viribus.’ Deinde iussit illum legere bibliam et Philippi locos communes.” Not surprisingly, Matthias Flacius’s supporter, Johann Aurifaber omitted the final line.

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In particular, Melanchthon’s Loci communes theologici, from the first editions of 1521/22 through the second and third editions of 1535 and 1543 to the fourth and final edition of 1553 (this last one in German), were masterpieces in the blending of rhetoric and dialectics in the service of biblical interpretation and confession of faith. They were not theological answer books like their distant relatives from the seventeenth century, and they have nothing in common with Albrecht Ritschl of the nineteenth century or Karl Barth of the twentieth—neither in form nor in content. Moreover, they were, like Melanchthon’s biblical commentaries, remarkable examples of what one might call organic theology, which were edited and changed, tweaked and rewritten, to meet new theological and ecclesial challenges. Then, too, some recent interpreters have simply ignored what Heinz Scheible and this author (among others) have identified as the heart of Melanchthon’s theological method: the distinction between law and gospel and, as a corollary, the two-fold righteousness of God (justice for this world from the law and forgiveness for believers from the gospel) (Scheible: 2010). When, at the beginning of almost every theological or exegetical treatise he produced, Melanchthon insisted upon talking about these categories, this was not lip service to worn-out principles but a sincere attempt to ground both philosophy and theology in justification by grace through faith on account of Christ. This essay will focus on Melanchthon’s approach to free choice in the development of the second edition of the Loci communes but also with a sidelong glance at the additional changes that Melanchthon wrought in 1543 and beyond, in order to discover the origin and function of the “three causes” for Christian action in Melanchthon’s thought.

1. Free Choice from 1532 to 1548 In recent years two dissertations, one in English and the other in German, have appeared, in which both authors attempt to examine the development of Melanchthon’s understanding of the free will. In both cases, by ignoring much of the precise way in which Melanchthon’s thought developed in his writings, these works have only limited usefulness. It is tempting to sit in a library with the Melanchthon Studienausgabe and imagine that Robert Stupperich and his coworkers (for the Loci, Hans Engelland) knew what they were doing. With the remarkable exception of Rolf Schäfer’s work on volume 5 (the 1532 Commentarii on Romans), this is not the case. Thus, ignorant of the fact that in 1528 Melanchthon added fifty percent to his Scholia on Colossians, Wolfgang Matz argues that Melanchthon changed his view of civil righteousness in reaction to the Peasants’ War of 1525, when in point of fact Melanchthon announced in the 1528 Scholia that Luther’s tract On Secular Authority shaped his approach (Matz: 2001, 79 – 107). Moreover, a close

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examination of the correspondence between Luther and Melanchthon during the former’s stay in the Wartburg, demonstrates that this change took place (for both reformers) during this time (Wengert: 2003). In the case of Gregory Graybill, an ignorance of similarities between earlier expositions on free will in the Commentarius de anima of 1540 and the later Liber de anima of 1552 makes his claims for development in Melanchthon’s position suspect. And these are just two examples among many. When investigating Melanchthon’s later comments on free will, one must observe the chronology of the documents very carefully ; otherwise one runs the risk of mistaking an old position for a “new” twist. The following preliminary list provides a glimpse into the complexity of Melanchthon’s statements on the liberum arbitrium.

A Summary of the Chronology of Melanchthon’s Statements from 1532 – 1560 on Liberum Arbitrium Before September 1531: Preface for Elementa Rhetorices written. (http://www.mdznbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn=urn:nbn:de:bvb:12–bsb10184246 – 6; MBW §1183) April 1532: Preface to the first printing of the In Primum, Secundum, Tercium, & Quintum Ethicorum Commentarij. (http://www.mdz-nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:12–bsb00026299-1; MBW §1236) August 1532: Preface to first printing of the Commentarii ad Romanos. (E.g., MSA 5: 232 ff.; MBW §1276) 1533: Slightly revised edition of De dialectica libri quatuor published (http:// epub.ub.uni-muenchen.de/11094/) 1533: Lectures/Preliminary notes on a new edition of the Loci, including an attack on Ulrich Zwingli’s De Providentia. (CR 21: 274 – 81) March 1535: Preface written to the second edition of Loci communes theologici, including an attack on Lorenzo Valla. (CR 21: 373 – 78; MBW §1555) January 1540: Publication of Commentarius de anima with a section on free choice. (http://www.mdz-nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:12–bsb10192022-7; MBW §2361) 1 January 1540: Publication of the revised Commentarii ad Romanos. (Cf. CR 15: 660 – 64; similar to 1532; MBW §2336) 1542: Revised edition of the Elementorum rhetorices libri duo. (CR 13: 426 ff.) March/April 1542: Melanchthon writes a preface to Jonas’s translation of the second edition of the Loci: Heubtartikel Christlicher Lere. (MBW §2921)

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1543: Preface to the third edition of the Loci theologici recens recogniti with a section on free choice as in second edition. (Cf. notes to CR 21: 652 – 65; MBW §3419) 11 November 1544: Promise to Veit Dietrich to edit material on de libero arbitrio. (MBW § 3730 [CR 5: 522 ff.], dated 11 November [1544]) February 1545: New preface for revised text of Aristotle’s Ethics: Enarratio aliquot librorum Ethicorum Aristotelis Primi, Secundi, Tertij, & Quinti ad intelligendum Aristotelem utilis (Wittenberg: Klug, 1545). (CR 16: 326 – 30, cf. 339 – 46, which includes refutation of syllogisms in favor of [philosophical] necessity ; MBW §3825) 1545: Changed text of the third edition of the Loci. (CR 21: 652 – 58; 660 – 65) 18 February 1546: Luther dies. 1 September 1547: Preface to the first edition of the Erotemata dialectices written. (CR 13: 573 – 78; MBW §4875) 1548: Addition of further paragraphs against the Stoics in the third Loci (after the appearance of the Augsburg Interim and the exchange between Pighius and Calvin), which included Erasmus’s definition of free choice from the Hyperaspistes, where it is credited to Augustine. (CR 21: 658 – 60) 1550: Nicholas Gallus and Matthias Flacius publish Der Theologen Bedencken (a printing of the so-called “Leipzig Interim” with critical glosses), perhaps printed by March 1550 but certainly by August 1550, which attacked the material on free choice (word-for-word from the Augsburg Interim). (http://www.mdz-nbn-resolving.de/ urn/resolver.pl?urn=urn:nbn:de:bvb:12–bsb10160554-7) 25 April 1550: Melanchthon writes a preface for Enarratio Symboli Niceni, where (in a section added after Caspar Cruciger’s published material from 1548) he writes at length about the liberum arbitrium. (CR 23: 273 – 90; MBW §5778) 29 August 1550: Melanchthon promises Albert Hardenberg that he will write against Flacius and Gallus on the free will. (MBW §5891 [CR 7: 650], dated 29 August [1550]) October 1550: Preface written for Ethicae doctrinae elementa. (CR 16: 189 – 201; MBW §5934.) Melanchthon responds to Flacius and Gallus in one of his longest statements on the subject, answering both philosophical and theological (Biblical) objections on the question. 1 November 1552: Preface to Liber de anima (MBW §6627 [CR 7: 1123 – 28]; material on free choice in CR 13: 157 – 63). Published early in 1553. (The section on the free choice is a slight reworking of the Commentarius de anima) 24 February 1553: Preface written for Heubtartikel christlicher Lere. (Melanchthon: 2002, 139 – 59) 1556 – 1558: Conflict between Gallus and Melanchthon over bound will. 1558: Flacius

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Philip Melanchthon and the Origins of the “Three Causes” of Conversion 187 first attacks the Loci for the additions in 1548. (See, among other things, MBW §8016 [CR 8: 895 – 902], Gallus to Melanchthon on 9 November 1556) August 1559: Preface written for Responsiones ad articulos Bavaricae inquisitionis, specifically addressing the challenge of Gallus and Flacius, although also refuting (John Calvin’s) doctrine of limited atonement. (MSA 6: 310 – 24; MBW §9040) 19 April 1560: Melanchthon dies. August 1560: Debate over free will between Flacius and Victorin Strigel in Jena, where Flacius points out additions by Melanchthon to the Loci that took place after Luther’s death and Strigel sticks to the 1535/43 edition, i. e., those published during Luther’s lifetime. (In Disputatio de originali peccato et libero arbitrio inter Matthiam Flacium Illyricum & Victorinum Strigelium [Weimar, 1562], 211 f.; http://www.mdz-nbnresolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn=urn:nbn:de:bvb:12–bsb10160488 – 8)

This superficial summary of many of the important documents (others could be added) simply indicates how important it is to reconstruct the actual publication history and to match it to Melanchthon’s situation as reflected in comments made from his correspondence at the time. Even from this basic listing, one can immediately see the complexity of Melanchthon’s comments – something that both Matz and Graybill overlooked. For example, the fact that the last addition to the question of free will in the Loci came in 1548 and served, perhaps, to excuse the language in the Leipzig Interim helps explain why Melanchthon would have included such statements at that time. Equally interesting, however, is that Melanchthon never defined free choice using Erasmus’s language before or after this time.3 3 CR 21: 658 [beginning: “Vidi multos…”] – 660 [ending: … copulationem caussarum, verbi Dei, Spiritus sancti et voluntatis.”]. Later, the debate would center on the following statement: “Ideo veteres aliqui sic dixerunt: Liberum arbitrium in homine facultatem esse applicandi se ad gratiam, id est, audit promissionem et assentiri conatur et abiicit peccata contra conscientiam.” Most scholars have traced this definition to Erasmus’s De libero arbitrio Diatqibg : (Erasmus: 1968 – 1980, 4: 36): “Porro liberum arbitrium hoc loco sentimus vim humanae voluntatis, qua se possit homo applicare ad ea, quae perducunt ad aeternam salutem, aut ab iisdem avertere.” But this ignores Melanchthon’s reference to “veteres.” Instead, Melanchthon seems to have been basing his citation on Erasmus’s Hyperaspistes Diatribae adversus servum arbitrium Martini Lutheri, Liber Primus. Erasmus, Hyperaspistes I (Erasmus: 1968 – 1980 4: 652): “Juxta aliorum opinionem, quae est Augustini, potest applicare sese ad gratiam exstimulantem ac revocantem, ac rursus eam spernere. Vides hic aliquid libertatis. Rursus potest se praebere gratiae justificandi, potest ab ea sese avertere.” Erasmus’s citation of Augustine is vague. The references in Erasmus: 1968 – 1980, 4:653, to MPL 38: 1236 and MPL 44: 969 – 70 are less than helpful (and simply give two places where Augustine discusses Cornelius in Acts 10, which was the context for Erasmus’s remarks). See also Peter Lombard, Sententiarum libri quatuor, II.25,5 (“Inde igitur dicitur liberum arbitrium, quod libere et spontanee ducatur, vel ad bonum eligendum, non tamen sine auxilio gratiae, vel ad malum in quod per se sufficit”) and Thomas Aquinas II/I q. 109, a. 6 on the “Praeparatio ad gratiam.” For the text of the Augsburg Interim passage, see Mehlhausen: 1996, 49: “… tamen Deus misericors non agit hic cum homine, ut cum trunco, sed trahit eum volentem, si adultus sit. Talis enim non accipit beneficia illa Christi nisi praeveniente gratia Dei mens eius atque voluntas moveatur ad detestationem peccati.”

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2. Free Choice in the Lectures of 1533: Summarizing the Exegetical Results of 1527 – 1532 By avoiding a search for changes and developments (or : lies and betrayals), one has a better chance of understanding Melanchthon’s position in situ (Kolb: 2005, 67 – 117, offers a fine example of this kind of careful reading and anticipates many of the arguments made here). An early, important question for Melanchthon was not whether the will was bound but how best to prove that it was bound. At first, in the Loci communes of 1521, Melanchthon used predestination, causation, and the incapacity of human beings to control their affections to prove his point. This first attempt was almost immediately expanded in the 1522 edition, as he (and Luther) began to take seriously the first use of the law and civil righteousness as gifts from God. The debate between Luther and Erasmus did not shake Melanchthon to the core (Wengert: 1998). Instead, he recognized that Luther’s harsh words would never convince Erasmus to change his mind. Moreover, he came to understand that the arguments about necessity and, hence, predestination finally could not bear the entire weight of the Wittenberg theologians’ arguments supporting the bound will, especially given their commitment to the twofold righteousness of God. Thus, instead of imagining that Melanchthon was trying to find ways to mediate between Erasmus and Luther or that Melanchthon was attempting to abandon Luther’s statements in De servo arbitrio, we discover instead that Melanchthon took the conclusions and some assumptions of Luther from that work and transformed them into the central arguments for his own understanding. Luther depicted this difference in approach in his preface to the 1529 German translation of Melanchthon’s Scholia: I, Luther, clear the path; Melanchthon sows seed (WA 30, 2: 68,12 – 69,1). Thus, as he first expressed in the Scholia on Colossians, while not giving up the notion that God truly ruled this world (what he now labeled the actio Dei generalis), Melanchthon took the positive aspects of Luther’s (and his own!) arguments in favor of human freedom and distinguished this relative freedom of choice coram mundo and the bondage coram Deo. The Word of God and the work of the Holy Spirit were central to his approach. He completely dismissed Erasmus’s position as Pelagian while providing answers to the most serious objections of the opponents. Regarding the liberum arbitrium, he argued, the Wittenbergers were neither Manichaean nor Pelagian. Melanchthon then summarized these exegetical results briefly in article XVIII of the Augsburg Confession and its Apology. The lecture notes of 1533, therefore, summarize twelve years of arguments regarding the bound will. The opponents at almost every turn were the Roman theologians of Augsburg, above all Eck, Cochlaeus, and—in the background— Erasmus. As I have also shown elsewhere, Erasmus realized that he was being

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attacked in the second edition of the Loci, and he sent a rather sharp letter to Melanchthon as a complaint (Wengert: 2005). Indeed, every time the name “Origen” appears in Melanchthon’s writings, one must always first ask whether perhaps the Praeceptor Germaniae was attacking the Prince of Humanists. How, then, did Melanchthon argue in the lectures of 1533? He began by stating that discussion of free choice was simply a prolegomenon to the central topics of sin, law, and Christ’s benefits. Although this explicit connection would disappear from this locus in 1535, he simply moved it to its proper locus, “De gratia et de iustificatione.”4 His comments demonstrated that he continued to understand Paul’s epistle to the Romans as providing the central topics for Christian theology. It was no accident that lectures on Romans preceded the first edition of the Loci from 1521/22. Similarly, the second edition began in 1532 with publication of the Commentarii ad Romanos. There he again concentrated his exegesis on sin and grace, law and gospel, faith and works. When in the 1533/35 Loci he added the sections, for example, on the Trinity or the Lord’s Supper because of contemporary disputes, he nevertheless interpreted them in the light of this scopus Pauli. The same was true for de libero arbitrio. Thus, to search in 1533 for an approach to free will apart from sin, law, and justification would misread Melanchthon’s intent. If for Melanchthon the context of this locus was crucial, then the specific question that he posed for this locus was even more important. Although he accepted and continued the argument of Augustine (and Luther) regarding the freedom of the original human beings before sin, Melanchthon’s question was whether in this corrupt nature there can be true and perfect (vera et perfecta) obedience to God’s law without sin. This obedience, he went on to explain, consisted of “true knowledge of God without doubting, true fear, true trust, true love of God, and finally full obedience without sin” (CR 21: 274 f.). The gospel requires knowledge of human corruption so that it may declare Christ’s righteousness offered not because of human merit or purity but on account of Christ, something human nature cannot perform [praestare]. 4 CR 21: 428: “Et ne hic obstrepant piis mentibus, labyrinthi disputationum de praedestinatione, aut de libero arbitrio, breviter moneo: non esse huc accersendam [to this place is not to be summoned] disputationem de praedestinatione, sed tenendum, quod promissio gratiae sit universalis. Sicut praedicatio poenitentiae ad omnes pertinet, ita omnibus offert Deus promissionem…. De libero arbitrio supra diximus: Quoniam a verbo ordiendum est [must begin], non debemus repugnare verbo.” Later (CR 21: 437), under the topic “De promissionibus legalibus,” he stated: “Non tollimus bona opera, tantum causam remissionis peccatorum transferimus in Christum. Et nihil hic absurdi de libero arbitrio aut praedestinatione admisceo.” Under the topic, “De scandalo” (CR 21: 518 – 19), Melanchthon goes after those who teach incorrectly. “Ita in caeteris articulis nisi vere, proprie ac dilucide explicentur, obrepunt persuasiones valde perniciosae. Cum dicimus fide homines iustificari, [519] quam absurdae opiniones oriuntur, nisi moneantur auditores, qua de re agatur, et quod fide reconcilietur persona, et postea nostra obedientia sit necessaria et quomodo in reconciliatis sit iustitia. Item de libero arbitrio. Deum non esse caussam mali, et pleraque alia, quae suo loco diximus….”

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Having defined the quaestio for this locus, Melanchthon then excluded other questions that had gotten “shoved in” (infartiendae) to this topic, especially the problem of contingency. Here we discover Melanchthon’s true enemy, Ulrich Zwingli, and one of his last works, De providentia. “Thus, Zwingli eliminates free choice only in this way : because all things happen by God’s discernment and predestination” (CR 21: 275). This, Melanchthon argued, placed the debate under the incorrect topic; it belonged instead to the beneficia Christi (CR 21: 275; this topic demonstrates that we cannot be justified by the law; “non movent quaestiones utrum omnia bona et mala et indifferentia fiant necessario etc.”). Thus, throughout the discussion in 1533 Melanchthon was mainly concerned for Christ’s benefits. Accordingly, he rejected any argument that undermined this central doctrine. As we shall see, this dominant concern is the red thread that runs through all of his comments. This means that changes in “doctrine,” as modern readers may label them, were for him not changes at all but simply clearer ways to defend what was central. From this initial rejection of Zwingli, Melanchthon then turned to definitions of human beings gleaned from philosophy. Twentieth-century scholars who assumed a basic incompatibility between theology and philosophy have also misunderstood Melanchthon’s use of philosophy here. First, already in the 1521 Loci Melanchthon began with a discussion of anthropology and especially of the affections, certainly not foreign to philosophy. In 1533 he again reduced the discussion to two basic powers: intellect [vis cognoscendi] and will [vis appetendi], where the first included the senses and intellect and the second the lower and higher appetites. He more clearly explained how the intellect was the superior power that knows and judges right things. The will is able to command “external and simulated [hypocritical] works” for us, even against the sensual appetites. He then provided a simple definition of the liberum arbitrium as “combining the will and the judgment of the intellect” (CR 21: 275: “complectitur voluntatem et iudicium intellectus”). Although he would later prefer Aristotelian categories to the Ciceronian ones that he employed in the 1520s (according to Kuropka [2012]), here we still read, “Therefore we may pay attention to Cicero’s partition, which is most appropriate for this matter” (CR 21: 276: “Sumamus igitur Ciceronis partitionem, quae est aptissima huic negotio:” see Kuropka: 2002, 27 – 32): The Latin philosopher spoke of two chief powers: the kcor and the bql^, where the logos meant judgment and will obeying right judgment and commanding right things and the horme included the superior appetites of the senses. Thus, Latin speakers defined ratio as including judgment and will as they command right things, what the Scripture called heart or mind, which in the latter case included true appetites and not just hypocritical, external works (CR 21: 276: “ipsas appetitiones veras non aliquod simulatum externum opus”). With these definitions out of the way, Melanchthon could return to what he

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had already indicated was his main question: whether the will could do anything by its natural powers. In case the students were not paying attention, the first thing Melanchthon did was to reiterate that this question could only be judged in light of the magnitude of sin since the law demanded not simply external obedience but the obedience of the entire nature. Without sin, the human being would have retained clear notitia of God and, hence, would have had no doubts about God’s will, and would have acted with perfect fear and perpetual trust in God. In its present corruption, the will is weak, hates God, and is subject to horrible calamities. The corruption of nature overwhelmed these things [=images of God], so that minds conceive no firm knowledge of God naturally. After this, God revealed his Word; he gave the law and promises. Nevertheless, human nature does not understand the law nor can it truly obey, nor would it be given comfort from the promises with doubting. You will easily see that the human being was not able to produce complete obedience of God.5

Note that throughout his argument, Melanchthon used adjectives like “complete” and “perfect.” Thus, in line with his and Luther’s distinction between the twofold righteousness, Melanchthon insisted both that the human could perform external works but that such works were never complete and remained external. “Concerning these things, they [those who imagined that the law could be fulfilled by the will] imagine that the law of God can be satisfied through external works, which is completely false” (CR 21: 277). So the teaching of the gospel takes away free will when it teaches about this horrible corruption. Human nature and its will can no more remove this corruption than it can abolish death. This last point was a crucial move for Melanchthon and one that dare not be forgotten. Melanchthon understood that the best way to argue in favor of the bound will was to focus on Paul’s basic loci communes: sin, law, Christ. Any other approach (such as that of Zwingli, Valla or, later, Calvin) simply replaced the biblical truth with a philosophical, human construct and always ran the risk of Stoicism. The next section of the lectures Melanchthon preserved with some changes throughout all subsequent editions of the Latin Loci. The section in the lectures came at a different place in his argument, namely before he discussed the relative freedom of the will in this world. The fact that he moved it in 1535 may indicate the importance of this summary. In order not to allow people to smuggle in a complete freedom of the will from the relative freedom in this

5 CR 21: 276 – 77: “Has obruit naturae corruptio ut nullam firmam notitiam de deo mentes naturaliter concipiant. Praeterea revelavit deus verbum suum, dedit legem et promissiones, Neque tamen intelligit natura hominis legem neque vere obtemperare potest, neque promissionibus sine dubitatione assideretur, facile videbis quod homo non potest praestare integram obedientiam dei.”

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world, Melanchthon moved this summary conclusion to the end of the conclusion of his main arguments and before his discussion of Bible passages. Lectures: 277: End of Loci II: 375: Conclusion Loci III (rev. 1545): 656, conclusions in first sec- of main argument before at the end of third section Scripture texts tion: The will is not able without the Holy Spirit to cast off doubt about God, truly to fear God, to conceive true trust in God’s mercy, to offer true obedience in death and other afflictions, and to possess similar internal motions in accordance with God’s law.

Furthermore, this must be added. The human will is not able without the Holy Spirit to bring about spiritual affections which God requires, namely, true fear of God, true trust in God’s mercy, obedience and toleration of afflictions, love of God and similar motions.

However, this position must be held and is true; The human will is not able without the Holy Spirit to bring about spiritual affections which God demands, namely, true fear of God, true trust in God’s mercy, true love of God, toleration and courage in afflictions in the approach of death, as Stephan, Laurence, Agnes, and countless others faced death with vast strength.

One of the first things to notice is the slight change in verbs. In the lectures Melanchthon used five verbs to clarify what the human will could not do without the Holy Spirit: abiicere, temere, concipere, praestare and habere [to drive away doubts; fear God truly ; conceive true trust; perform true obedience; have similar interior movements]. The need for true as opposed to external, hypocritical things is especially clear. In 1535 and 1543, Melanchthon simply used a single verb: efficere [to cause or bring about, to effect]. Moreover, in 1535 he summarized the list under the rubric “spiritual affections.” (This term seems to have come from a parallel comment in 1533, which mentioned “interior motions in accord with the law of God.”) The ensuing list lacks only a reference to doubt. But why? For one thing, rejecting something is, finally, not a positive affection. For another, however, it was precisely doubts that played an important role in Melanchthon’s later comments about the “voluntas non otiose” (see below). It could also be, however, that Melanchthon realized that the ability to reject doubt was never perfect, given that the human being is simul iustus et peccator. There were other small changes as well. Whereas the 1533 and 1535 versions include obedience, in 1543 the word was eliminated. Instead, a second word, tolerantia, which first appeared in 1535, continued to be used in 1543. Here

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Melanchthon had both replaced a general term (obedience to the law) with what God required or commanded and used a more appropriate term for affliction: toleration. But then, too, a concept from the 1533 version, “obedience in death,” came back in 1543 so that it read: “toleration and bravery in afflictions in the approach of death.” At this very point Melanchthon, who himself had come close to dying in 1540, added an important explanation in 1543 by including a list of saints who bore up in the face of death: Stephen, Lawrence, and Agnes. There was but one other addition: love of God. By including this, Melanchthon hearkened back to Luther’s explanations of the first commandment in the catechisms, placing (especially in the 1543 edition) fear, trust, and love at the top of the list.6 Of course, as Luther’s comments of 1539 in On the Councils and Churches demonstrated (WA 50: 641,35 – 643,5), afflictions were also an important mark of the Christian church. This list, in one form or another, however, appeared everywhere in Melanchthon’s Loci and other writings. Whenever talking about the results of original sin or the work of the Holy Spirit, Melanchthon employed this kind of language. The fact that by 1543 he even eliminated the reference to “similar movements” may well be because he now thought the list complete. Also worth noting is the fact that what Melanchthon says here is completely consistent over the years. In the search for change in a thinker, it is important to realize that sometimes things do not change. For Melanchthon, the point was simply this: without the Holy Spirit the human will is helpless to fulfill God’s law the way God wanted it fulfilled. Thus, it would be up to those who imagine Melanchthon kept changing his mind about this matter to explain how on earth such clear statements remained in the Loci. For Melanchthon, whatever else he added to the various editions of the Loci (here, for example, a reference in 1543 to saints who remained constant in the face of death), he believed he was building on these primary explanations of the topic that remained the same over twenty years. Emphasizing this continuity provides an alternative approach to understanding these changes. With nearly every change one must first carefully examine the immediate context and the purpose for their addition that Melanchthon himself sometimes provided. This will preserve both the continuity of his thought and provide new insights into the way in which he constructed theology throughout the years. True to his understanding of loci communes, Melanchthon then provided biblical texts that made this point, including Romans 8:7, John 3:6, 2 Corinthians 3:6, John 3:3, 1 Corinthians 2:15, and Romans 8: 14 and 9. He summarized them this way : “For these and similar texts [sententiae] it 6 In Melanchthon: 2002, 140, the connection is even stronger: “Denn Gott wirt nicht angenomen, wo nit der heilig geist verstand, willen und hertzen erleuchtet und anzundet. Und khonnen die menschen auß eigen krefften dise tugenden und werk one den heiligen geist nicht wirken, nemlich rechten glauben, gottes lieb, vertrauen uff gott und rechte gottes forcht.”

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becomes clear that without the Holy Spirit the human will cannot bring about spiritual works—namely, true fear of God, true trust in God, true love etc.” (CR 21: 278). With this Melanchthon next turned to his second topic, namely, that there is some freedom of the human will in human nature. What he (and Luther!) worked out in 1522 and beyond as the twofold righteousness of God came to full expression here. Some judgment remains in human beings after the Fall that allows them to judge in matters subject to reason and to perform deeds of civil righteousness. This is what philosophers are concerned with and what Paul calls the righteousness of the flesh. (It is important to note that for humanists, the word philosophia was not so much defined by metaphysics as by ethics. Thus, Melanchthon thought of philosophers as what we would call moral philosophers, not metaphysicians.) Even this liberty, however, is often overwhelmed by the weakness of nature. Melanchthon then asked why knowledge of this kind of freedom was important. First, it showed that human beings cannot satisfy God’s law. Second, it indicated that the old nature must be destroyed and a new one put in its place. This was the same for him as understanding the Holy Spirit’s work and the role of God’s promises. Those who rely on their free will alone do not exercise true faith, do not come near true knowledge of God, and are helpless against the devil. Third, external works are demanded although they do not justify. Through them the law becomes a pedagogue, driving to Christ. In the next section Melanchthon examined what the scholastic doctors thought. He began with a rejection of the misuse of philosophy in theology. We allow freedom as did philosophers; our interest is not in arguing over the free will but in the chief topics of law, sin, and justification. The scholastics, by contrast, think the law is fulfilled through civil works. Thus, they err concerning sin and the law of God, imagining that civil righteousness effects justification and ignoring the gospel’s teaching about faith and trust in God’s mercy. “But the Scripture, on the contrary, teaches that the law of God cannot be satisfied through civil deeds or through that discipline which reason can perform” (CR 21: 280). In human nature inheres ignorance of God, diffidence, and concupiscence—what Paul calls enmity with God. By including diffidence here (and elsewhere), Melanchthon made clear that such an attitude (a vice) could not become a virtue for earning God’s favor—precisely the notion he would later argue against when insisting that the will is not lazy or diffident. In this case, however, he was clearly taking aim at the Roman opponents to the Augsburg Confession and its Apology. “Therefore we will transform the question of free choice into a question about sin and law, and we will recount seriatim what we will prove.” This approach provided Melanchthon with the proper reasons “why we dispute [litigemus] concerning free choice.” Again, the point for Melanchthon was that philosophical arguments could not possibly do the job. His opponents did not understand the basics of the faith and therefore did not know why free choice could not, in Gabriel Biel’s words,

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ex puris naturalibus bring forth love of God above all else and of the neighbor as one’s self. Then, using a rather uncommon Greek word, synechon (from Iliad II.218: joining together), Melanchthon warned the readers to remember one synechon of the whole business: Everywhere Paul contends that human beings cannot be justified by the law, that is, not pronounced righteous on account of the fulfillment of the law, because we cannot satisfy the law. This argument of Paul destroys our opinion [sententia] concerning free choice. For the entire controversy concerning free choice must be transferred to this purpose [usus]: that we acknowledge sin in nature fighting with God’s law and that we learn to understand the teaching of grace and faith (CR 21: 281).

In contrast, the scholastics imagine that this is only a matter of fulfilling political laws. “Thus this synechon is seen by them to be most absurd—to think or teach that people on their own cannot obey God’s law, seems to be [like] a silly lawgiver who commands impossible things.” This final comment introduced Melanchthon’s discussion of Jerome, who (in Canon Law at least) said, “Let them be anathema whoever said God has commanded impossible things.” This charge came directly from Wittenberg’s opponents. In particular, Nicholas Herborn’s Enchiridion of 1529 included an entire section on the topic (Herborn: 1927, 39 – 42, where Jerome is not cited; see also Cochlaeus: 1534). Melanchthon insisted that Jerome simply did not mention that, of course, this fulfilling could not be done without the Holy Spirit, and he pointed to Paul (in Rom 3:23, Gal 2:16, Rom 8:3 and Rom 7), who insisted the law could not be fulfilled by the flesh. Indeed, for Melanchthon the law’s proper function was to put to death and terrify. As we will see, in 1535 he expanded this section to include a second quote from Jerome much more supportive of his contention. With this the lecture notes come to an end, followed in the manuscript by three blank pages.7

3. The Loci communes theologici of 1535 Rather than give a running account of the arguments in the 1535 Loci and keep Melanchthon’s argumentation intact, this section of the essay will instead point out significant changes and additions to the 1533 lectures, but it will also note places where no change occurred. In doing so, it now asks a narrower question: what do these changes tell us about the way Melanchthon actually 7 Given that the quotation from Jerome concluded this topic in the 1535 Loci, it is safe to say that the 1533 version is complete. A discussion of Deuteronomy 30:11 which then followed (after three blank pages) continued the argument over whether the commandments were impossible and was quoted by Herborn: 1927, 40, in support of his position. It need not concern us here.

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practiced theology? Can we trace these changes and additions to particular issues of the day or to specific places in his argument that he felt needed explanation or defense? What do those places where no changes occurred tell us about what he saw as most important? By asking these questions, we are to some degree disturbing the arguments themselves, so we must still be quite clear that what Melanchthon published in 1535 was what he intended to say publicly on the issue in 1535. Indeed, his statements would last for a decade until further changes were made to the 1543 Loci in 1545 and again in 1548. Of course, we must also remember that the Loci were not the only forum in which Melanchthon dealt with the problem in the 1530s and 1540s. Already in the very beginning of this locus, Melanchthon expressed the same concerns about which he had already spoken in 1533. Contingency and predestination, despite Valla and many others, were not the way to handle this question. But we know from the lectures that Zwingli himself may be the real culprit behind this comment. His absence from the published Loci reflected two things: first, one was not to speak ill of the recently deceased; second, Wittenberg was at the very brink of agreement on the Lord’s Supper with former supporters of Zwingli, in what became known as the Wittenberg Concord, and Melanchthon did not want to publish anything that might upset those negotiations. One difference immediately strikes the reader. Melanchthon did not begin the 1535 Loci, as he had the 1533 lectures, with a positive linking of this locus with law, sin, and Christ. Instead, he began by rejecting the alternative. But before one imagines that Melanchthon had suddenly capitulated to philosophical arguments, it is important to watch how he unfolded the argument, namely, by warning the reader to put aside (seponere) and separate (seiungere) completely arguments about predestination and contingency. Then, Melanchthon made a striking change to the first person plural—conjoining to his arguments a very personal confession in order to speak about this issue: “May we ourselves confess and remember that we speak now about our infirmity” (CR 21: 373). The rhetorical power of this sentence spelled the total rejection of philosophical speculation and human capabilities. Melanchthon continued using a single Greek verb, “to walk on air” (aerobatein), which he probably got from Plato’s Apology, 19c, as a description of Socrates in a play. In English one would say “to have your head in the clouds.” So, “It is not necessary to wander in the clouds and to gaze on heavenly things about the mode of divine governance or predestination.” He then concluded with a line word-for-word out of the 1533 lectures: “And provisions must be made lest good and useful things are buried by such quarrels that do not at all pertain to the matter, which customarily happens when wandering loci are mixed in” (CR 21: 373). Only then came the positive application of the matter : “Therefore I will briefly state here how Scripture teaches about the weakness of human nature. For this [weakness] must be recognized, so that we may learn why we have need of Christ’s benefit” (CR 21: 373). It would be easy to imagine that,

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because Melanchthon had reduced Christ to a single line, it was of little or no importance. Quite the contrary! Instead it showed just how single-minded he was in following his method. Indeed, in the 1533 lectures, at this very place, he stated that dialecticians warn about keeping to the “status negotii.” Melanchthon was now in 1535 simply following their advice. Christ’s benefits would be discussed in the right place. All he needed to do here was make clear with a single line that this locus was indeed connected to that one. This was nothing less for him than the proper division of law and gospel. In similar fashion as in 1533, Melanchthon turned to philosophy for help in defining the nature of human beings. Actually, he had already done this in 1521/22, but there he was not at all sure that the developing Wittenberg theology fully allowed him to use philosophical terminology. That came to light only later, beginning in August 1521, as Luther (and Melanchthon!) began to develop their understanding of the twofold righteousness of God. With a first use of the law and civil righteousness as the creator’s gift to humanity, Melanchthon could use philosophy with a clear conscience. Despite Matz’s claims (Matz: 2001, 139 – 58), the definitions in 1533 and 1535 remained the same: reason or the mind (what others call the intellect) judges; the will obeys or fights such judgment and commands the inferior powers of senses, appetites of the senses and the affections. Free choice is simply the will conjoined with reason. Melanchthon said this more clearly here than in the 1533 lectures and replaced the Ciceronian language with Aristotelian. At least, no reference to Ciceronian terminology arose. Yet, and here is the important thing, the last line of this paragraph comes again directly from 1533: “When Scripture speaks of heart, mind, and similar things, it is including judgment and those true appetites – not faked ones or external work” (CR 21: 373). This statement elucidates the use of the term “vera,” as the adjective describing every good movement of the will. And this is the crux of the matter for Melanchthon. For human beings external works and hypocrisy come naturally ; true works demanded by God are impossible. Scholastic theologians erred regarding this very distinction. Next, as in the 1533 lectures, Melanchthon posed the question for this locus, but with an interesting change. In 1533 Melanchthon asked directly : “What can the will effect by its natural powers without the Holy Spirit?” In 1535 he sharpened the question. In agreement with 1533 he began: “This is asked: ‘How is the will free?’” but then added: “that is, ‘How can it obey the law of God?’” (CR 21: 373 f.). In essence, the question removed in 1535 was now being subsumed under the larger question – precisely because he had already stated in 1533 that this matter could only be taken up in the light of the law and sin. Sure enough, what then followed as prolegomena to his answer in 1535 was the warning, almost word-for-word out of the 1533 notes, that one could only judge this question knowing the magnitude of human sin and human weakness, on the one hand, and the fact that the law demanded perfect obedience on the other. Had the human being remained sinless, it would have

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had clearer knowledge (needed for the intellect) and no doubts in the will and, hence, true fear, faith, etc. Now, since it was oppressed by the sickness of original sin, it was filled with doubt, darkness, errors and could not truly fear or trust God and was filled with vicious affections. All of this conformed to the 1533 lectures. In the light of human weaknesses, Melanchthon restated the question: “Concerning this weakness it is asked: how much can the human will perform [praestare; or : offer]?” Then came an important change. In 1533, what was more or less an introduction to the first answer to the question became in 1535 truly a prolegomenon to the entire discussion, so that the first answer to the question was then given after the results of sin were described. What difference did that make? Apart from making the arguments clearer, it had the added effect of bracketing the entire discussion of this locus with a description of human weakness. Thus, the helpful distinctions of the philosophers in determining the different parts of the human being did not obscure the depth of humanity’s original sickness. By making this one simple change, Melanchthon had announced that any subsequent discussion (and not just the first answer to the question posed for this locus) must be viewed in light of the human condition. But Melanchthon also made another change. He placed the second argument from 1533 (about the freedom of the human will outside of grace) first. This, of course, allowed for a clearer contrast between human sickness and human capacity, which had to do with those things subjected to reason and sense, namely, external, civil works. This is what the philosophers rightly attribute to human beings—where the word “rightly” was an addition over the 1533 notes. Of course, as in 1533, Melanchthon also attributed this kind of freedom to Scripture’s mention of a iustitia carnis and Paul’s teaching in 1 Timothy 1:9 and Galatians 3:24 (the law is a paedagogus). Despite this freedom Melanchthon again mentioned how it was also conquered by the weakness of the flesh and the devil. He concluded: “Nevertheless, among these difficulties, somehow some freedom remains for the effecting of civil righteousness” (CR 21: 374). Melanchthon’s position on free choice, first expounded upon in the Scholia of 1527 and 1528 and then placed into article eighteen of the Augsburg Confession and its Apology, again came to expression here. At this point, Melanchthon turned to a second answer of the question (“How much can the human will offer?”), what had been the first answer in 1533. Here a certain repetition was inevitable; some of this material now provided an introduction to the entire matter. But Melanchthon took much of what was stated in 1533 and repeated it here. “The gospel teaches that there is a horrible corruption which fights against God’s law, that is, makes it impossible for us to offer [or : perform] complete obedience. And the human will is not able from its own nature to remove this corruption, no more than it can remove death, which is the most direct effect of this corruption” (CR 21: 374 f.). This was taken almost word-for-word from 1533. What he then added, however, was

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new and may come as a shock to those who assume that Melanchthon and Luther never saw eye-to-eye on this subject. “However, there is such blindness in human nature that we cannot rightly [satis] perceive this corruption. Therefore, we do not see the amount of weakness in human powers, which [weakness] if we could truly discern it, then we would at last know that human beings cannot satisfy the law of God” (CR 21: 375). This is hardly any different from what Luther wrote in The Bondage of the Will (WA 18: 680, 13 – 37). Even in 1543/45 Melanchthon wrote: “As a result, human nature is oppressed by sin and death, nor can the magnitude of this evil be conceived by human judgment but [only] in God’s revealed Word” (CR 21: 655). Luther had said very much the same thing in 1537 in the Smalcald Articles (BSLK 434, Book of Concord, 311). Returning to the 1533 text, Melanchthon then concluded this section in 1535 by reiterating the impossibility of human beings fulfilling God’s law, which did not merely demand external deeds but perfect obedience. In Melanchthon’s view perfect obedience and corrupt human nature simply did not mix. Moreover, Melanchthon gave another reason for not watering down this corruption (extenuari neque dissimulari): “so that we understand that human beings cannot satisfy the law [and] so that we know we have need for mercy.” This connection to law and gospel in the face of sin, found in a different form at the beginning of the entire locus in 1533, now came to full expression. What followed was the short paragraph analyzed above together with the 1533 and 1543 texts. Following it, Melanchthon gathered together the pertinent biblical texts to show just how bad off human beings really were. He slightly rearranged the list from 1533, placing 1 Corinthians 2:14 second, after Romans 8:14. He also added references to John 6:44 [“No one can come to me”] and John 15:5 [“Without me you can do nothing”], a text also cited in Augsburg Confession XX. After concluding this list, in which he offered shorter glosses similar to those in 1533, Melanchthon added an interesting section, appealing (as he had in Augsburg Confession XX) not only to Scripture but also to experience. But neither is there need for a long disputation. Let each examine his [or her] own soul and deliberate with him- [or her-] self and ask whether astonishing doubts about God do not exercise the soul; whether it is not conflicted with amazing despair ; whether it truly fears and loves God; whether it is not offended that this weak nature is oppressed by such calamities and death, and besides that is exposed to the terrors of eternal punishment; what are in these afflictions, how the souls are affected when it seems to be deserted by God; whether they then do not doubt: whether God cares for human beings, whether God hears the prayers of human beings? These huge motions of souls must be considered when there are disputes about free choice (CR 21: 376).

This is precisely the point at which Melanchthon’s theology most shone throughout the debate. For him it was always and only a matter of what we

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might call pastoral care or what he would call the effect of a teaching on the person. As was true of Martin Luther, Melanchthon’s authorities included not only Scripture or, as we shall see in a moment, the Fathers, but also experience. When speaking of faith in Augsburg Confession XX, he stated that those without experience do not understand what is being talked about in the least. Here, Melanchthon preached the law and told the truth about the human situation or, rather, forced the readers to examine themselves in order to discover what was there: doubts, struggles, and sin against the first commandment. But Melanchthon did not only want to preach the law, so he immediately turned to the gospel. “These things are not said here so that we cast snares on consciences or frighten people away from zeal for obeying or believing or from even trying. On the contrary, we ought to be ordered by the Word, certainly not fighting against the Word of God but striving [adnitendum] to obey, and attending to the promise of the gospel, which is universal.” In other words, for Melanchthon the law, which revealed the bound conscience, had to drive to the gospel, not to despair. He criticized other approaches to the bound will that trapped or frightened people or led them to give up on God, thus undermining the universal nature of God’s promise. It was this concern – that theology was not merely about definition but also about effect – that drove him here to preach law and gospel. This concern also helps explain why in later editions of Loci and elsewhere he worried that human beings, upon hearing that the will could do nothing without the Holy Spirit, would become “indifferent” (otiosus), to use his word for it. This, for him, was the height of Schwärmerei or enthusiasmus, that one would sit around waiting for God to act in the soul – as if diffidence were a virtue – when, in fact, God acted upon the soul through the Word in such a way that the human soul – intellect and will – were truly affected. So that the reader did not miss the point, Melanchthon then added, “Furthermore, these matters can be more clearly judged in true struggles [certamina] than in leisurely disputations.” Years earlier, Luther had laid this charge at Erasmus’s doorstep, indicated (in Luther’s view) by the latter’s use of the Greek word “diatribe” (discussion) in the title of his work. The will’s bondage was never a matter of neutral discussion [another translation of otiosus] but in the midst of the actual struggles of human existence. Melanchthon continued: For in true agony, where we are tormented about forgiveness of sins, we ought to rouse ourselves and gaze into the promise. However, although the will struggles with weakness, nevertheless because it does not cast off [abiicit] the Word but sustains itself with the Word, there follows consolation. And the Holy Spirit is there efficacious through the Word (CR 21: 376).

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In this context, Melanchthon brought up another Bible passage, this time Romans 8:26 (“The Spirit comes to our aid in our weakness”). He glossed it in this way : In this struggle [lucta, literally, wrestling match], the soul is exhorted to retain the Word with every effort [or : in every occasion]. Nor must it be dissuaded from trying but must be taught that the promise is universal and that it ought to be believed. In this instance [exemplum], we see these causes are conjoined: Word, Holy Spirit and the will – surely not neutral but fighting its weakness.8

This clarifies how the statement about the three causes arose. For Melanchthon, diffidence and neutrality were sins deeply imbedded within the human being. To make them into the virtues with which either to discuss free choice (a la Erasmus) or to deny free choice (a la Valla and Zwingli) meant destroying the very nature of the Word and the effectiveness of the Holy Spirit. Moreover, it violated the very nature of human beings, whom God had created to be affected by the law and the gospel. In short, the reason Melanchthon later could be so critical of “our Zeno,” as he nicknamed John Calvin, rested in the latter’s inability to take into account the effect of his teaching regarding predestination and human bondage. This concern finally led Melanchthon to allowing even Erasmus’s definition of the will, which Melanchthon mistakenly thought was derived from patristic sources, in the infamous addition to the Loci in 1548. In the reaction to this addition, in particular by Flacius and Gallus, we discover evangelical theologians who, depending on one’s point of view, either refused to link the truth of a doctrine to its purpose and effect or saw that Melanchthon’s statements did not finally support the very purpose for which they were intended. Moreover, this concern for the effect of one’s theological statements also explains why the authors of the Book of Concord could reject the three causes while in principle keeping their Melanchthonian theology intact—the problem with mentioning the will as a cause was its effect on the readers: young people in the schools became confused.9 This reference to three causes, however, reflected Melanchthon’s interpretation of Romans 8:26: “The Spirit aids our weakness.” Thus, the Spirit (working through the Word) aids the will’s own weakness. In Melanchthon’s interpretation of Paul, the will had to have a role to play simply because the apostle did not say, “The Holy Spirit works by ignoring our weakness” but 8 CR 21: 376. Cicero used the term otiosus in connection with struggles; we might say in English: “sitting on one’s hands” or even “indifferent.” 9 See the Solid Declaration, II.90: “Weil auch den Schulen die Jugend mit der Lehr von den dreien Ursachen unserer Bekehrung zu Gott hefftig irrgemacht worden, wölchergestalt dieselbige (nämlich das gepredigt und gehört Wort Gottes, der Heilig Geist und des Menschen Wille) zusammenkommen: ist abermals aus hievorgesetzer Erklärung offenbar, daß die Bekehrung zu Gott allein Gottes des heiligen Geistes Werk seie, wölcher der rechte Meister ist, der allein sollichs in uns wirket, darzu er die Predig und das Gehör sines heiligen Worts als sein ordenlich Mittel und Werkzeug gebraucht.” Cf. BSLK 910 ff., Book of Concord, 561 f.

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precisely aids our weakness. This meant for Melanchthon that the very thing the will brought to the table was weakness and, therefore, not neutrality or laziness. The very thing the law revealed to the intellect was what the will then could act upon: “I am weak, but you are strong,” to quote a famous American children’s hymn. Another source also illumines how these three causes functioned in Melanchthon’s thought, namely, his commentary on Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, book 2. Starting in the 1545 edition, he included a section labeled “On the Causes of Virtues” (CR 16: 326 – 30). For human virtues in this world, he wrote, there are two causes: the intellect and the will. But then he added, “In Christian doctrine [emphasis added] the causes of actions are thus given as three: The mind judging according to the Word of God, the will assenting, the Holy Spirit impelling mind and will and helping these weak powers and governing the outcome [exitus], as Christ says [John 15:5]: ‘Without me, you can do nothing,’ as when Joseph rejected the enticements of his mistress.” Melanchthon followed that up with a description of how such (virtuous) action ensued. “First, the mind contemplates [intueri] God’s Word, and he [Joseph; or : his mind] is engaged [detinetur] in his thinking by the Holy Spirit so that he collects many great grounds [causae (for action)],” which Melanchthon then listed in detail. He concluded: “To all of these arguments the will assents, being driven [impulsa] and aided by the Holy Spirit” (CR 16: 238). Even though Joseph ended up in jail, “God is still with him and governs the outcome [exitus].” Although there are other important aspects to his argument, the most important was simply that Melanchthon, first, added the Holy Spirit to the cause of virtuous action—completely missing from Aristotle—and makes the Word (and not just law in the heart or moral teachings of the world) the instrument that informs the mind. Thus, for Melanchthon, the emphasis was here not so much on the mind and will – even Aristotle understood that they were at work – but precisely what philosophy could not dream of: the work of the Word and the impulse and aid of the Spirit. He also mentioned the parable of the talents and 2 Corinthians 6:1, along with the quote from Pseudo-Basil (see below).10 Yet this line of reasoning was not new for Melanchthon. Already in the edition from 1532 – thus nearly contemporaneous to his work on the second edition of the Loci communes theologici – we find the same concern (Melanchthon: 1532, F5v-G1v. = http://dfg-viewer.de/show/?set%5B 10 Melanchthon concluded this section of his commentary with a discussion of how to use various causes (in nature), citing two Greek sayings [one about navigating with the winds (Erasmus, Adagia, 2516) and a saying of Naumachius about celibacy and marriage]. He added that Aristotle’s admonitions proved human weakness and the wiles of the devil. On the basis of Luke 11:13 Christians should pray to be ruled by the Holy Spirit, who (col. 330): “repels the tricks of the Devil and curbs the erring impulses of the souls and instills better movements and governs events and gives success, if nevertheless the will also strives a bit to act rightly.” He concluded with reference to Pseudo-Basil and Chrysostom.

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mets%5D=http%3 A%2F%2Fmdz10.bib-bvb.de%2F%7Edb%2F mets%2Fbsb00026299_mets.xml The Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, 25 September 2011). Some sects of philosophers and afterwards some theologians disputed variously concerning the freedom of the human will or concerning free choice. And they have many defenders, who are absurdly pleased with statements because they are new rather than because of some [sound] judgment. Furthermore, by a double mode they overthrow the free choice. Some [=Zwingli] argue about the foreknowledge of God, that because God foresees all things and because it is impossible for God’s to fail, it seems to follow that those things are immutable which human beings do. Hence this absurd position [sententia] appears: All things that occur necessarily occur ; contingency is nothing (Melanchthon: 1532, F 7v – F 8r).

Melanchthon instead argued that God worked upon the depraved human being to effect true Christian virtues, such as fear of and faith in God. Christian doctrine, as has often been said elsewhere, clearly explains this question. First, it teaches that in human nature depraved desires naturally exist and chiefly that human beings cannot, without God’s help, obtain or effect such virtues, by which it is acted upon through God [quibus cum deo agitur], namely true fear of God, true trust in God, and similar things (Melanchthon: 1532, G8v-G1r).

Returning to the 1535 Loci, we discover other important additions to the 1533 notes that help explain the three causes. Melanchthon wrote, “In this way ecclesiastical writers are accustomed to conjoin these causes.” Again, this introduction must not be ignored. Melanchthon was simply demonstrating that he was not the first to notice that these three things came together for understanding the movement from law to gospel. For him, the preaching of human inability was not to lead to despair or virtuous neutrality and inaction but precisely the opposite: to the recognition of one’s weakness and, therefore, to crying out to God for help. But in his description of these causes, Melanchthon was not the first. The first citation came from pseudo-Basil: “Only desire and God takes steps in advance.”11 It was a part of a sermon on penance, in which the author was arguing in favor of its validity. He was explaining the story of the prodigal son. How Melanchthon then glossed this text was also important. “God turns toward us beforehand [antevertit], calls, moves, helps, but we should see [viderimus] that we do not resist. For he affirms that sin arises from us, not from God’s will.” This anti-stoical comment, which had received far more playing time in the preceding locus on contingency, reveals at least part of the cause for these additions. Melanchthon wanted to avoid any possibility that God became the source of evil. Yet, before 11 Pseudo-Basil, Homil. de paenit. 3 (MPG 31: 1480 f.). It is a sermon on repentance, arguing in favor of the possibility of repentance, where he gives the example of the prodigal son, who returned and whom the father ran out to greet.

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we simply imagine that this was a philosophical or theological tenet, we must not forget the context: the experience of the soul under the law and the danger of despair. Melanchthon’s logic ran as follows: “God is not the cause of evil, therefore the promise of salvation is universal. Therefore, the sinner need not despair. Christ is truly ‘for you.’” The second quote, from one of Chrysostom’s homilies on Acts 9:1 in praise of Saint Paul,12 was actually a gloss on John 6:44 (“No one can come to me, except the Father draw him”), which Melanchthon had already cited as proof that the individual could not truly fulfill the law without the Holy Spirit. Here he quoted simply, “The One who draws draws the willing person.” Again, the gloss is important. “This is clearly said to one who begins well [auspicanti] from the Word, so that he/she may not resist or fight against the Word. And indeed, this is the way we ought to judge. For we ought not indulge in diffidence or natural idleness.” This gloss, like that last one, is crucial for understanding what Melanchthon thought he was up to. If the comment by [pseudo-]Basil warned against Stoic or Manichaean excesses, this one emphasized that a natural vice of the soul [diffidence or idleness] should not suddenly be made into a virtue. In both cases, however, the comments also seem to presuppose that the situation described by these quotes involves believers (Green: 1980). But now comes the historical question: Why did Melanchthon add this very language? Rather than searching back into the De servo arbitrio to some source in Luther (after all, that was ten years earlier), the answer lies instead both in the theological point itself and in the immediate context, namely, in the specific conclaves and discussions that Melanchthon held in 1534 with the English and the French in Wittenberg and with the so-called Reformed Catholics in Leipzig. In the Consilium with the French of 1 August 1534, we read: “Likewise, among the learned belong [questions] concerning free choice, original sin and many other conjoined questions (MBW § 1467 [T 6: 136, 84 – 86]: “Convenit item inter doctos de libero arbitrio, de peccato originis, et de plerisque aliis questionibus coniunctis”). After speaking of the sin against the Holy Spirit, he added, “Likewise, that the free choice does something in guarding against such iniquities. Likewise, that it [free choice] is helped by the Holy Spirit so that it may guard against such iniquities” (MBW § 1467 [T 6: 137, 123 – 25]: “Item quod liberum arbitrium aliquid agat in cavendis talibus delictis. Item quod adiuvetur a spiritu sancto, ut caveat talia delicta”). In a different version of the same document, heavily edited by the French party, Melanchthon was recorded as having stated that he wanted to leave the matter of purgatory and free choice to disputations in the academy rather than in the pulpit, where it would be fruitless and not be edifying, 12 Chrysostom, Hom. XXV in loca N. T.: In Ac. 9:1 (De mutatione nominum), III.6. MPG 51: 143: “Ideo namque dicit: Nemo venit ad me, nisi Pater meus traxerit eum (Joan. 6. 44). Qui vero trahit volentem trahit, humique jacentem ac manum porrigentem.”

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according to Saint Paul (MBW § 1467 [T 6: 164, 376 – 83], see Dingel: 2012). More importantly, in an address to the those gathered in Smalcald on 20 December 1535, the French ambassador, Guillaume du Bellay, gave a response to the negotiations: “Sixth, that our position on free choice also pleased the king. For, although at first it displeased the theologians, nevertheless after the Loci communes of Philip were inspected, they also came over to this our position” (CR 2: 1015). This, so to speak, is the smoking gun. The very conversations with the French in 1534 prodded Melanchthon to take up two sticking points in the negotiations, both of which had to do with the efficacy of the Word. The Word was not lifeless but, through the Holy Spirit, effected what the will could not do on its own. Lutherans were also not Stoic fatalists blaming God for evil, nor did they contend that the will remained neutral or lazy in the face of the Word. But Melanchthon was not yet done with his additions to the 1535 Loci. The comments about Word, Spirit, and will arose directly out of his concern not to frighten consciences by this announcement of the law. After this discussion, he then introduced a different matter : “Besides, if we may speak about the entire life of the godly,” he began, clearly indicating a new theme (CR 21: 377). Here, too, Melanchthon’s care in expression must be noted, especially since it nicely parallels the preceding. “Although there is inborn weakness, nevertheless, there is some freedom of the will since indeed now it is helped by the Holy Spirit and is able to do something in avoiding external lapses. Then, too, the help of the Holy Spirit ought to be magnified and at the same time our diligence ought to be inflamed [or whetted, sharpened, incited].” Then came two Bible verses, one from Paul (2 Corinthians 6:1 about accepting God’s grace in vain) and Luke 11:13. Here the gloss is again very instructive. “And Christ, when he said, [God] will give the Holy Spirit to those who ask, promises [the Spirit] not to the indifferent, not to those who despise, not to those who resist. And God increases gifts in those who rightly use [them], as the parable of the stewards teaches” (CR 21: 377). Then Melanchthon added a third and final (postremo) thought, returning to Galatians 3:24 and the notion that the law is a pedagogue driving to Christ. He recalled his earlier arguments under the first point (that the will by its own powers can bring forth civil righteousness, that God requires this also in those who are not yet made holy, and that there is temporal and eternal punishment for sin),13 and then concluded by quoting Galatians 3. “For this pedagogy comes about so that people may also be taught and may hear the Word of God. And, because God is efficacious through the Word, therefore through these exercises many are called to true godliness.” Here we see how Melanchthon combined the first and second uses of the law. In 1527 John Agricola had objected that Melanchthon, by connecting this text to the first use of the law, 13 Here, pace Matz: 2001, the word “sanctificare” does not yet mean sanctification in the technical sense but simply the entire scope of salvation.

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interpreted the text in opposition to Luther, who assigned it to a second use of the law. In 1535 Melanchthon included both uses. The law was an external discipline (which seemed to him clear from the text—it was after all for Israel) and therefore connected to the first, civil use of the law, but this very discipline pointed to human weakness and a need for a savior (that is, the second, theological use). Melanchthon’s closing comments underscored this French connection. This position on the free choice contains nothing absurd and is true [germana] both to other ecclesiastical writings and also to Augustine. For it does not lead to desperation of good minds, nor does it frighten away those who try weakly [minus]. On the contrary, the aid of the Holy Spirit increases, too, and it incites the care and diligence of our will. Nor do I approve the ravings of the Manichaeans, who attribute absolutely no action to the will except the Holy Spirit helps, as if there were no difference between a statue and the will.

It was on this last point that later debates would rage, but not yet in 1535 (except perhaps in the Cordatus Controversy).14 Instead, Melanchthon ended with two points, which must surely have arisen in the discussions with the French. The first dealt with Ecclesiasticus 15:24 (“God leaves a person in the hand of his counsel”). Here Melanchthon simply stated, “I say that the will in godly actions and attempts is not idle but still must be helped by the Holy Spirit. Thus it becomes truly free.” This is remarkable since Luther and Erasmus had already discussed this text. What Erasmus took for one of his most important texts for proving the will’s freedom, Melanchthon applied only to believers and further insisted that even then the Holy Spirit had to help (see also Luther in De servo arbitrio, WA 18: 675 – 76). For Melanchthon, as for Luther, true freedom came only from the work of the Holy Spirit on the will, not from the will itself. Then, almost as an afterthought, Melanchthon included not just one quote from Jerome about God not commanding the impossible, which was already in the 1533 lectures, but also a second one, which he must have discovered after the 1533 lectures and which stated that one cannot fulfill the law of God without God’s grace. And then, as an indication of how important forensic justification was becoming for him, he defined grace, “Not only that we receive help from the Holy Spirit but also that gratuitous imputation of righteousness or acceptation itself, that namely we are reputed righteous on account of Christ and that afterwards the inchoate obedience, although it does not satisfy the law, is pleasing” (CR 21: 377 f.). Of course, this was the theme of the locus on good works, as Melanchthon hinted at in his very last sentence of the locus.

14 Gallus would later say, “Of course not. A statue does not hate God; our will does.” Then, of course, the problem became whether there was anything good left in the human creature—but that was for a later generation of Lutherans to debate. See Kolb: 2005, 107 – 13.

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4. Concluding Comments It is indeed very difficult to cut through the haze of inaccurate and even biased interpretations of Melanchthon to arrive at a more balanced view of his position on free choice. This microscopic look at a two-year period in Melanchthon’s development may offer more hints simply on how best to do Melanchthon studies than on how to assess his maturing view of free choice. It demands, to use the German phrase, “Millimeterarbeit.” It means paying special attention to all of Melanchthon’s publications, not just those easily accessible on CD or in library reference volumes. It also means respecting the specific context of Melanchthon’s comments – whether the introduction of the three causes in 1535 (parallel to his work on Aristotle and his discussions with the French) or the 1548 addition of the “Erasmian” definition of free choice. In this regard it means taking seriously what Melanchthon most feared: Manichaeanism and Pelagianism and the concomitant myths that God’s governance of the world destroys freedom or that the vices of laziness (and neutrality) become a virtue when teaching about the will’s bondage. Finally, what becomes clear in 1535 is the heavy weight that Melanchthon placed upon experience. One cannot judge doctrine by appealing to logic or exegesis alone; this can only result in what I have called “justification by right answer alone.” If faith is truly trust – and it is! – then it must always remain firmly connected to our experience of God’s Word as law and gospel. Any doctrine that disconnects the relation between an effective Word of God and the life of the believer can always and only end either in despair or in hypocrisy.

Literature Cochlaeus, Johannes (1534). Velitatio … in Apologiam Philippi Melanchthonis. Leipzig: Blum. Dingel, Irene (2012). “Melanchthon’s Paraphrases of the Augsburg Confession, 1534 and 1536, in the Service of the Smalcald League.” Essay 5 in this volume. Erasmus, Desiderius (1968 – 1980). Ausgewählte Schriften, 8 vol. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Graybill, Gregory (2010). Evangelical Free Will: Philipp Melanchthon’s Doctrinal Journey on the Origins of Faith. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Green, Lowell C. (1980). “The Three Causes of Conversion in Philipp Melanchthon, Martin Chemnitz, David Chytraeus, and the ‘Formula of Concord.’” Pp. 89 – 114. In: Lutherjahrbuch 47. Herborn, Nicholas (1927). Locorum communium adversus huius temporis haereses Enchiridion (1529). Patricius Schlager (Ed.). Münster : Aschendorff. Holl, Karl (1921). “Die Rechtfertigungslehre in Luthers Vorlesung über den Römerbrief mit besonderer Rücksicht auf die Frage der Heilsgewißheit.” In: Karl

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Holl: Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Kirchengeschichte, vol. 1: Luther. Tübingen: Mohr [Siebeck]. Kolb, Robert (2005). Bound Choice, Election, and Wittenberg Theological Method: From Martin Luther to the Formula of Concord. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Kuropka, Nicole (2012). “Philip Melanchthon and Aristotle.” Essay 1 in this volume. (2002). Philipp Melanchthon: Wissenschaft und Gesellschaft. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Matz, Wolfgang (2001). Der befreite Mensch: Die Willenslehre in der Theologie Philipp Melanchthons. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Maurer, Wilhelm (1964). “Melanchthons Anteil am Streit zwischen Luther und Erasmus.” Pp. 137 – 62. In: Wilhelm Maurer: Melanchthon-Studien. Gütersloh: Mohn. Mehlhausen, Joachim (Ed.) (1996). Das Augsburger Interim von 1548. 2. ed. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchner Verlag. Melanchthon, Philipp (2002). Heubtartikel Christlicher Lere: Melanchthons deutsche Fassung seiner Loci Theologici nach dem Autograph und dem Originaldruck von 1553. Ralf Jenett and Johannes Schilling (Ed.). Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. (1532). In Primum, Secundum, Tercium, & Quintum Ethicorum Commentarij. Philippi Melanthonis. Wittenberg: Joseph Klug. Ritschl, Albrecht (1900). The Christian Doctrine of Justification and Reconciliation. Translated by H. R. Mackintosh and A. B. Macaulay. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark. Scheible, Heinz (2010). “Die Bedeutung der Unterscheidung von Gesetz und Evangelium für theologische Ethik und Praktische Theologie am Beispiel Melanchthons.” Pp. 241 – 52. In: Heinz Scheible, Aufsätze zu Melanchthon. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Wengert, Timothy J. (2005) “Famous Last Words: The Final Epistolary Exchange between Erasmus of Rotterdam and Philip Melanchthon in 1536.” Pp. 18 – 38. In: Erasmus of Rotterdam Society Yearbook 25. (1998). Human Freedom, Christian Righteousness: Philp Melanchthon’s Exegetical Dispute with Erasmus of Rotterdam. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. (1997). Law and Gospel: Philip Melanchthon’s Debate with John Agricola of Eisleben over Poenitentia. Grand Rapids: Baker. (1999). “Luther and Melanchthon – Melanchthon and Luther.” Pp. 55 – 88. In: Lutherjahrbuch 66. (2003). “Philip Melanchthon and a Christian Politics.” Pp. 29 – 62. In Lutheran Quarterly 17.

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Timothy J. Wengert

Philip Melanchthon’s 1557 Lecture on Colossians 3:1 – 2 Christology as Context for the Controversy over the Lord’s Supper

In the 1550s the University of Wittenberg’s theological curriculum required regular lectures on specific books of the Bible, especially Romans. After interpreting Romans for a final time in the mid-1550s – the Enarratio on Romans was published in 1556 –, Philip Melanchthon turned his interpretative skills to Colossians. In June 1557 he had reached Colossians 3:1 – 2, and his comments set off a firestorm of reactions. Indeed, what Philip Melanchthon had to say produced shock waves that echoed in the consistories and lecture halls throughout Protestant Europe and, with the publication of those lectures in 1559, determined in part the direction of intra-Lutheran struggles over the Lord’s Supper leading up to the publication of the Book of Concord in 1580. This essay will use Melanchthon’s interpretation of these verses as a lens through which not only to elucidate his contribution to Eucharistic theology and Christology in the formative years of the Lutheran confessional movement but also to demonstrate that confessionalization, far from being merely a cultural and political phenomenon, as it is sometimes depicted, also arose in the midst of fierce exegetical debates and theological distinctions. Viewed from the modern perspective of a world that champions culture and politics, precisely these intellectual pursuits provide a most surprising and, thus, easily overlooked component for the maturation of confessions in sixteenth-century central Europe.

1. Melanchthon’s View of Christ’s Presence in the Lord’s Supper before 1557 In the course of the Reformation Colossians 3:1 – 2 had become a locus classicus for Reformed theologians as they sought to defend their view of the Lord’s Supper and its concomitant Christology. “If you are raised with Christ, seek the things that are above (sursum), where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God; understand the things that are above (sursum), not the things upon the earth.” Already at the beginning of their debates with Martin Luther over the presence of Christ in the Lord’s Supper, John Oecolampadius and, immediately thereafter, Ulrich Zwingli had argued that Christ’s body and

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blood could not be in the bread and wine because he had ascended bodily to the right hand of God (the so-called sessio ad dextram).1 As in the Apostles’ Creed, which also confessed that Christ had ascended to God’s right hand, so in Colossians 3, they argued, Christ’s body was no longer on earth but only sursum, above. To be sure, thinkers such as John Calvin would argue that the Holy Spirit worked in the Supper to unite the participants with Christ above (sursum), so that they might partake of his gifts in the Supper, but the importance of the bodily ascension was still a crucial part of the argument (Steinmetz: 1995, 178 – 81). Philip Melanchthon had never been impressed with the Christological aspects of Zwingli’s rejection of the Real Presence. He had early on ridiculed Zwingli as an Arian, following the spiritualizing theology of Erasmus.2 In the third article of the Augsburg Confession, for which he was the chief drafter in 1530, Melanchthon included an important gloss for the reference to God’s right hand, defining it in terms of Christ’s rule.3 The benchmark for Melanchthon’s interpretation of the Lord’s Supper was established in 1536 with the signing of the Wittenberg Concord by some of the theologians originally in Ulrich Zwingli’s camp (including Martin Bucer and Wolfgang Musculus) and the Wittenberg theologians, led by Luther and Melanchthon (Dingel: 2012, Scheible: 1997, 117 – 21, Quere: 1977, and Neuser : 1968). That document replaced the terms “in the bread” (in pane) or “under [the forms of] the bread” (sub pane) with language that Martin Bucer found more acceptable, namely, “with the bread” (cum pane).4 This agreement, which formed the backbone of comments even in the Formula of Concord of 1577, was accepted for a time by a good number on the Reformed side, including a young preacher to the French refugees in Strasbourg, John Calvin. The Solid Declaration of the Formula quoted the Concord this way : 1 Burnett: 2011, presents the possible contexts in which Zwingli may have developed his position on the sessio ad dextram. In any case, it proved a constant counterpoint to the Lutheran defense of the Real Presence. The classic description of this debate is still Köhler : 1924/1953. For a more partisan view, see Sasse: 1959. 2 MBW §807 (T 3: 550 f., 34 – 38). Arius, the heresiarch of the fourth century, taught that God the Son was subordinate to God the Father in such a way that “there was [a time] when he [the Son] was not.” He was roundly rejected in the Creed of Nicea, the basis of the Nicene Creed, which taught that the Son was “of one substance” (homo-ousias) with the Father. 3 CA III, 4 (German): “… ‘[he is] sitting at the right hand of God,’ in order to rule and reign forever over all creatures …” Cf. CA III.4 (Latin): “Thereafter, ‘he ascended into heaven’ in order to ‘sit at the right hand of the Father,’ and he will reign forever and have dominion over all creatures.” In BSLK 54, Book of Concord, 38. Even when Melanchthon, worried about “bread worship” [see Kolb: 2012a] and Christ’s permanent inclusion in the bread, began to shift the language he used to describe the Real Presence, he still insisted that God’s right hand meant God’s power and not a place. 4 This formulation influenced the 1540 version of the Augsburg Confession (the so-called Variata), which Melanchthon officially distributed at the Colloquy of Worms. See CR 26: 357: “De Coena Domini docent quod cum pane et vino vere exhibeantur corpus et sanguis Christi vescentibus in Coena Domini.”

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We have heard how Martin Bucer has explained his own position and that of the other preachers who came with him from the [south German] cities regarding the holy sacrament of the body and blood of Christ: They confess, in the words of Irenaeus (Adversus Haeresios, IV, 18,5), that there are two things in this sacrament, one heavenly and one earthly. Therefore, they hold and teach that with the bread and wine the body and blood of Christ are truly and essentially present, distributed, and received. Although they do not believe in a transubstantiation (that is, in an essential transformation of the bread and wine into the body and blood) and they do not hold that the body and blood of Christ are localiter, that is, spatially enclosed in the bread or are permanently united in some other way apart from reception in the sacrament, they nevertheless admit that through the sacramental union the bread is the body of Christ, etc. For they do not hold that the body of Christ is present apart from reception—for example, when the bread is laid aside and kept in the tabernacle or carried about and put on display in the procession, as happens in the papacy.5

Publicly, Melanchthon affirmed Christ’s presence in the Supper but had never commented on the question of the ascension and sessio ad dextram in print. For example, in his Examen ordinandorum of 1554 (Melanchthon: 1554), Melanchthon defined the Lord’s Supper as the “communication of the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, as instituted in the words of the gospel, in the eating of which the Son of God is truly and substantially present and witnesses that he applies his benefits to believers.”6 However, he made no mention of Christ’s ascension or God’s right hand in the entire document. Again, in the Saxon Confession of 1551, prepared in order to make the Evangelical case at the Council of Trent, Melanchthon insisted on the Christ’s real presence without any discussion of the ascension or session to God’s right hand.7 This is not to say that Melanchthon completely ignored this theological question. Indeed, at several places in the Examen he discussed the communicatio idiomatum [communication of attributes] and insisted 5 SD VII, 13 – 15 in: BSLK, 977, Book of Concord, 595. This formula was so important that it was sometimes even preserved in manuscripts glued into the cover of The Book of Concord or other important documents. 6 CR 23: 61 f.: “communicatio corporis et sanguinis Domini nostri Iesu Christi, sicut in verbis Evangelii instituta est, in qua sumptione Filius Dei vere et substantialiter adest, et testatur se applicare credentibus sua beneficia.” 7 Repetitio Confessionis Augustae (Basel: Oporinus, 1552); CR 28: 418: “Docentur etiam homines Sacramenta esse actiones diuinitus institutas, et extra vsum institutum res ipsas non habere rationem Sacramenti, sed in vsu instituto in hac communione vere et substantialiter adesse Christum et vere exhiberi sumentibus corpus et sanguinem Christi, Christum testari, quod sit in eis, et facit eos sibi membra, et quod abluerit eos sanguine suo. Sicut et Hilarius inquit, Haec accepta et hausta efficiunt, vt et nos in Christo, et Christus in nobis sit.” This same language also appears in Melanchthon’s letters from the period. See MBWR 7:18, §6694 (CR 8:12 f.), to Johannes Praetorius in Breslau, dated 1 January 1553: “Docemus in usu Coenae Domini vere et substantialiter adesse Christum, et efficacem esse in sumentibus … Filius Dei est Emanuel, ac vere et substantialiter adest nobis. Hanc propositionem, scio verissimam esse.”

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strongly on the unity of the two natures in the one person of Christ.8 At the same time, an unpublished source from this period indicates that Melanchthon briefly touched on the question of the session at God’s right hand. In student exercises at the University of Wittenberg, at least according to notes from 1555 now in the Herzog August Bibliothek (Wolfenbüttel), Melanchthon argued that the syllogism, “Christ has ascended to God’s right hand, therefore Christ is not present in the Supper,” was false since the phrase sedere ad dexteram did not circumscribe a physical place but indicated that he reigns with God in power.9 If in 1555 Melanchthon spoke out on the question of the relation between Christ’s presence in the Sacrament and the sessio ad dextram, in the Colossians lectures of 1557, he for the first time examined the question of the Christ’s ascension per se. In his recently published dissertation Johannes Hund takes another view of Melanchthon’s position on the Lord’s Supper (Hund: 2006, 66 – 96). That work sometimes reflects some of the old nostrums about Melanchthon, and, in this connection, it fails to use some of the English literature, especially contributions by this author and Peter Fraenkel. In addition, by driving a wedge between cum pane and in or sub pane, Hund misreads the available evidence. Even more troubling is Hund’s dismissal on page 79 of Melanchthon’s use of the communicatio idiomatum as “a mere verbal expression.” Luther had employed the term as early as 1528, indeed even earlier but had never assigned it to “verbal” status (WA 26: 38,18). Hund’s specific analysis of Colossians 3 is also faulty. While admitting that Melanchthon rejected any encounter in the Supper with a nudus Deus (page 90), he reads Melanchthon’s statement about Christ’s body being present in heaven “localiter,” as denying Christ’s presence in the Supper. Indeed, this kind of argument contradicts what was for Melanchthon the central point of the communicatio idiomatum, namely, the indivisibility of Christ’s two natures (Hund: 2006, 90). Complaints about ubiquity stem from this: that to say that Christ’s human nature is everywhere denies the hypostatic union. Hund’s inability to grasp the complexities of Melanchthon’s argument means that he cannot explain why Melanchthon held to Christ’s presence in the Supper throughout his life.10 Hund rightly states (page 90) that the central issue for Melanchthon was 8 To be sure, as Mahlmann: 1969, 62 – 76, has demonstrated, Melanchthon still defined the term as a manner of speaking rather than as directly real. A sharpened definition of terminology had to wait for Melanchthon’s onetime student, Martin Chemnitz, in his writings from 1561 (ibid, 205 – 49). 9 Unpublished notes from an unknown source, found in the Herzog August Bibliothek. HAB: 221.3 Theol. 48, secundum argumentum. 10 Hund: 2006, 93 (emphasis added): “Obwohl die Person Christi gemäß ihrer göttlichen Natur, die die räumlich abwesende menschliche Natur im Dasein erhält, nach wie vor ihren Substanz nach wahrhaftig im Abendmahl gegewärtig ist, so hat sich doch ihre Funktion erheblich gewandelt.” Had Hund written wegen instead of gemäß and bestimmte instead of abwesende, he would have more accurately reflected Melanchthon’s position. He simply does not prove that the function (to provide comfort and forgiveness to the believer) had changed at all.

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soteriology and the assumption of the entire human being by the divine. What Hund neglects, however, is Melanchthon’s stated goals with respect to Colossians 3: 1) to explain biblical texts, 2) not to divide the two natures in the one person of Christ, 3) to use the Fathers as an authority for biblical interpretation.

2. The Lectures When Melanchthon entered the lists in his lectures on the first verses of Colossians 3 in June 1557, there were already plenty of combatants in the field. Melanchthon’s contribution to the fray, however, is not easy to determine, given that the sources are somewhat contradictory and open to misinterpretation. As far as is now known, there are three different sources for his comments. The final version of his commentary on Colossians from 1559 represented Melanchthon’s own “last word” on the subject (see below). However, what he said in the lectures themselves from June 1557 was so important for some of the disputants that reports of his comments quickly spread. Two other sources have been preserved. One, first printed in the sixteenth century and reprinted in the Corpus Reformatorum of the nineteenth century, may go back to Melanchthon’s son-in-law, Caspar Peucer, but was edited to conform to the text of the Enarratio.11 A second copy, hitherto unpublished, is in the Bremen city archive.12 Both of these copies reflect the intensity of the debates and provide one way to interpret Melanchthon’s comments. The Bremen Stadtarchiv’s copy reads:13 11 CR 7: 883 ff., dated here 1551. There is also a copy of the Enarratio on Colossians 3:1 – 2 inserted into the middle of Christoph Pezel’s publication in 1594 of Melanchthon’s Postil. See CR 24: 861 f. This is another indication of how important these comments remained for the CryptoPhilippists. (Pezel even referred to the communicatio idiomatum in his preface [cf. CR 24: XXXIX-XL].) 12 SA Bremen, 2–T. 1.c.2.b.2.a. I am grateful to Wim Janse for sharing this information with me. See also Brandy : 1991, 39, who credits Wilhelm Neuser with the discovery of the Bremen manuscript. In his book on Albert Hardenberg, Janse: 1994, 315 – 19, also mistakenly lists another manuscript source from Strasbourg, which is actually by Paul Eber, as Walter Thüringer of the Melanchthon-Forschungsstelle in Heidelberg indicated to the author of this article in 1999. 13 It begins with this title: “Against the Ubiquity of the Body of Christ. Philip Melanchthon on the third chapter of Colossians, in June 1557.” A somewhat confused version of the Vulgate is then cited: “If you are raised with Christ, understand the things from above not the things that are on earth. Seek the things that are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God.” CR 7: 883 ff. includes marginal glosses that it claims are from Melanchthon when in fact they most closely resemble Caspar Peucer’s own position and that of other Crypto-Philippists (7:884: “Explicatio articuli: Ascendit in coelem: Item, Sedet ad dexteram patris. Dictata in schola Wittenbergensi, in enarratione epistolae Pauli ad Colossens. Quae in margine asscripta sunt, ex ore D. Philippi sunt excepta.”). This is hardly surprising given the origin of the first printing, Pezel: 1600, 2: 159 [VD 16: M 2384]. Indeed, Pezel first quoted the passage in Melanchthon’s Enarratio in 1580, when writing a defense of his Christology. See Pezel; 1580, 264 f.

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Here many important matters flow together (CR 7:884, 15:1270 “are contained,” in CR 7 and 15 these points are not numbered). 1. An exposition of the article (CR 7:884, 15:1270: “articles”) of the Creed, “He ascended into Heaven” (CR 7:884, 15:1270: “into the heavens, is seated at the right hand of God the Father”); 2. Likewise what the properties of the glorified body are; 3. How it may be said, “Christ is in you” and “Christ is your life.” Now, first concerning the saying, “He ascended into heaven.” How does this fit? Elsewhere it is said [John 1:18], “The Son, who is in the bosom of the Father” and John 3[:13], “The Son of Man who is in heaven”? I respond: In the Creed the saying may be understood as the literal text reads, namely concerning the body and (in SA Bremen, 2–T, the words “body and” are in the margin) bodily location. He ascended (in SA Bremen, 2–T, a marginal gloss adds, “he did not vanish”), namely, from a bodily and physical location into heaven, that is, into a heavenly place, wherever that place is (CR 7:884 adds: “whoever or wherever it is”). For here allegories must not be contrived (n SA Bremen, 2–T, a marginal gloss adds, “Heaven is the name of a place, not a dignity”). The ascension was visible and bodily. And the entire ancient [church] always writes in this way : that Christ by bodily location is in some place, wherever he wants. And the bodily ascension was made above (sursum). Therefore, Paul in this chapter calls this place “above” (sursum). Now, in the proposition “the son of Man (CR 7:884, 15:1271 omit “of Man”) who is in heaven” the saying may be understood by the communication of attributes.14 The Logos is always in heaven although by bodily location the body is below (CR 7:884; 15:1271 “in the Virgin”), in this your visible conversation (“in this … conversation” omitted in CR 7 and 15; in SA Bremen, 2–T, a marginal gloss adds: “concerning which John 3 then spoke”). This interpretation is expressed in the Exposition of the Creed, which is found in the books of Cyprian (although elsewhere it is ascribed to Rufinus): “He ascended to the heavens not where the Word God [sic!] had not been before— indeed he was always in heaven and remained with the Father—but where the body (CR 7:884, 15:1271 replaces “body” with “the Incarnate Word”; CR 7 adds: “had not sat, that is where the body”) had not” had bodily location.15 So also Augustine says in

14 In SA Bremen, 2–T, a marginal gloss adds, “The communication of attributes is when the property of the one nature is communicated so that it is property of the other. This is necessary in many of the most serious matters and ought to be wholly retained.” Thus, on the second argument (not contained in the Bremen document) the glossator lists Enoch, Moses, and Elijah as others who have ascended “above all creatures,” and on the third argument about the right hand of God, the glossator refers to Gregory of Nazianzus (CR 7:885: “Ita loquitur Nazianz. secundum naturam invisibilem”) and (on the biblical phrase, “Christ is in you”) states that this has only to do with prayer and consolation (“Cogitate ista in vera invocatione non ut cavillaturi. Haec sunt simplicissime vera, recta, utilia, necessaria ad consolationem”). 15 Rufinus of Aquila, Commentarius in Symbolum Apostolorum, 31 (MPL 21: 367): “Ascendit ergo ad caelos, non ubi Verbum Deus ante non fuerat (quippe qui erat semper in caelis, et manebat in Patre), sed ubi Verbum caro factum ante non sederat.” CR 15:1271 is more accurate in that after “sedebat” follows an “id est,” to demarcate Melanchthon’s gloss on the text.

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the letter to Dardanus, 57,16 and the words are cited in Lombard, Book 3, dist. 22: “Christ did not leave the Father when he came into the Virgin (CR 15:1272 replaces “came into the Virgin” with “became weaker.”). The whole Christ is everywhere; the perfect Christ is everywhere.” Then is added the [grammatical] form of the word. “The whole (totus) Christ is everywhere, but not wholly (totum).” And a little after this: “Whole (totus) refers to the hypostasis, wholly (totum) to the nature” (CR 7:884, 15:1272 omit: “And a little … nature.”). Others have spoken more fittingly that the proposition, “Christ is everywhere,” is true by the communication of attributes. Athanasius spoke thus concerning the Incarnation of the Word: “The Logos has not been constricted to the body but it contains the body … so that it may also be in it and outside all things and in the bosom of the Father,17 but all things receive life and sustenance from him.” Thus far Philip in his lecture on the epistle to Colossians (CR 7:885, 15:1272 omit: “Thus far … Colossians.”).

First, a word about the text is in order. With the exception of the first marginal note, where the copyist corrected the manuscript in line with the printed commentary, other marginal comments show a marked “Reformed” orientation. Christ ascended; he did not disappear.18 Heaven is a physical place, and God’s right hand is as well – and not, as defined by Luther and the Augsburg Confession, dignity and power. The communication of attributes is important 16 CR 7:885, 15:1271 f. omit: “in a … 57.” This is a reference to Ep. 187, where, however, the exact text is not found. But cf. Ep. 187, ch. 5, par. 17 (MPL 33: 838): “Quomodo ergo verum supra diximus, quod Deus ubique sit totus, quando in aliis est amplius, in aliis minus? Sed non est negligenter intuendum quod diximus, in seipso esse ubique totum,” where the reference is to ch. 4, par. 14 (MPL 33: 837): “Non tamen per spatia locorum, quasi mole diffusa, ita ut in dimidio mundi corpore sit dimidius, et in alio dimidio dimidius, atque ita per totum totus; sed in solo caelo totus, et in sola terra totus, et in caelo et in terra totus, et nullo contentus loco, sed in seipso ubique totus.” Lombard, III. d. 22C: [257]: “Vnde Augustinus, Non dimisit patrem Christus cum venit in virginem, vbique totus, vbique perfectus. … sicut & modo totus est ubique est, sed non totum.” [p. 258] “Totum enim ad naturam refertur, totus autem ad hypostasim: sicut aliud & aliquid ad naturam, alius vero & aliquis ad personam referuntur.” In the margin the reference is to Augustine, contra Foelicianum, de unitate Trintatis ad Optatum ca. 14, to. 6; ibid., c. 16 [=Pseudo-Augustine (Virgil of Tapso), MPL 42: 1170]: “Non dimisit patrem cum venit ad virginem, ubique totus, ubique perfectus, quia nec divisionem incorporei simiplicitas recipit, et partes nomen plenitudine non novit.” See below. 17 CR 7:885, 15:1272 add: “nor, although it may be in all things, may it become a part of other things.” See De incarnatione Verbi, III.17 [ET: De Incarnatione Verbi Dei: Athanasius on the Incarnation, trans. T. Herbert Bindley (London: Religious Tract Society, [1903])]: “For He was not circumscribed in the body ; nor was [he] so in the body as not to be elsewhere too. [Nor, while He moved that, had He emptied the universe of his effectual working and providence; but, what is most marvelous, being the Word,] He was not contained by anything, but rather contained all things Himself [and as, when present in the whole creation He is essentially distinct from it all, but in it all by His power, ordering all things, and unfolding His providence over all things in all, and quickening each and every thing at once, containing the universe, and not being contained], but existing wholly in His Father alone in every respect….” 18 At a later point in the dispute Brenz will get so angry that he will calculate the maximum speed at which Jesus’ body could have traveled and announce that in 1500 years his body would still not have reached heaven.

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although the definition lacks the clarity Melanchthon brought to such matters. At the same time the places where the text itself varies from the printed commentary seem to reflect Melanchthon’s original lecture. Thus, we hear that John 3 distinguishes the Christ in heaven from the one with whom people speak on earth. The citation from Augustine is identified as coming from a letter to Dardanus, and Lombard’s contribution is expanded to include the comment about the difference between the hypostasis (person) of Christ and his two natures. This expansion might even seem to support outright the Reformed position, so that its later omission indicates one argument Melanchthon was unwilling to make in print. In his book on Albert Hardenberg Wim Janse misses the closing line of the Bremen manuscript, which marks the end of the Melanchthon quote (Janse: 1994, 316). Janse assumes that what follows (which specifically outlines a Reformed position) also comes from Melanchthon. As a result, he argues that Melanchthon got instruction from his younger colleague in Bremen and came to accept the “extra-Calvinisticum” (or, as Janse argues, extra-Hardenbergianum), the notion that outside (extra) the humanity of Christ there is some divinity. Thus, the finite body of Christ cannot contain the infinite divinity of God the Son. A close reading of this material, however, points in another direction altogether. First, it is important to note that the Bremen manuscript, perhaps like a now-lost copy distributed in Strasbourg (see below), cut Melanchthon’s own arguments short since it dealt only with the first one (an explanation of the Creed in light of other statements in Scripture) and not with the subsequent comments on the nature of God’s right hand. We will deal with the other points when we examine the 1559 commentary below. Second, Melanchthon posed this as an exegetical quaestio, a scholastic method he used throughout his career as a biblical interpreter (Wengert: 1987). The Creed and Colossians 3 talk about Christ ascending to God’s right hand, but John 1:18 and John 3:13 talk about the Son already being in heaven. This traditional Christological conundrum was the mirror image of the debate over the Lord’s Supper. In the latter, the question was how could Christ’s body in heaven be on earth. In the former, the question was how could Christ ascend into heaven if he was already there. Melanchthon’s solution, first, insisted that the ascension was not simply an allegory. (The marginal note, by claiming that Christ did not simply vanish and that heaven is a bodily place, read into his statements a more Reformed view of the matter.) Melanchthon supported his claim by referring to Colossians 3 and the church fathers (here: pseudoCyprian [Rufinus], pseudo-Augustine, and Athanasius). The “place” to which Christ ascended Paul called sursum (above). Having sided with a literal interpretation of the Pauline text “against” the Johannine ones, Melanchthon then had to explain the Johannine texts. He immediately invoked the communicatio idiomatum (communication of attributes from one nature in Christ to the other), a technical, scholastic

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term already used by Luther.19 Melanchthon did not want to leave the impression that his solution to this exegetical dilemma was new. Thus, he cited three patristic sources that seemed to agree with him. After all, this Christological conundrum had been fodder for exegetical debates in the ancient church over the divine and human natures and their union in the one person of Christ. Melanchthon’s use of the Fathers will be discussed at length below; for now it is enough to note that in his lectures he used these authorities not to undermine Christ’s presence in the sacrament but to interpret contradictory texts in Scripture in such a way as to preserve the unity of the two natures in the one person of Christ. The additional line of text in the Bremen manuscript underscores this interest by including the comment concerning the hypostasis. Melanchthon’s summary of his position is important: “Christ is everywhere by virtue of the communication of attributes.”20 Third, the one line that most clearly permits a more Reformed reading of the citation from Augustine via Lombard is found only in the Bremen manuscript. However, even this gloss (that totus refers to the person of Christ and totum to the human nature) may be construed in a quite different way : not to exclude the presence of Christ’s body and blood with the bread and wine but to insist that it can only happen in the unity of the person through the communication of attributes from the divine nature (which is omnipresent) to the human nature (which is not) in the one person of Christ. Again, as this question became more seriously debated in the intervening years leading up to the Formula of Concord, Martin Chemnitz, building on the work of Johannes Brenz and others, argued that this communication could not be understood simply as mode of theological discourse (verbaliter) but had to be confessed as real (realiter) (Mahlmann: 1969, 205 – 49). Melanchthon, who did not separate reality from rhetoric in the same way as these later Lutherans were forced to, did not make such a distinction. As a result, another group of his students, best called Crypto-Philippists, insisted that Christ’s presence, through the communication of attributes, is only true “in a manner of speaking” and thus, in reality, is a spiritual presence.21 In all of this, however, it must be 19 See, for example, Luther’s lectures on 1 John and 1 Timothy (1527 and 1528, resp.) in WA 20: 603 and WA 26:38, resp., Disputatio … de illa sententia: Verbum caro factum est (11 January 1539) in WA 39,2: 12, 20 – 21 (where Luther ties it to the ascension); Disputatio … de divinitate et humanitate Christi (28 February 1540) in WA 39,2: 98, 101, 108, 121; Enarratio in Genesin (published in 1552) in WA 44:94; Von den letzten Worten Davids (1543) in WA 54: 90. Luther was familiar with this term already from his annotating Gabriel Biel’s Collectorium. See WA 59: 32. 20 This will become one of the keystones for the Christological arguments in the Formula of Concord. But in the 1560s and 1570s one of Wittenberg’s best students, Martin Chemnitz developed a more sophisticated use of the communicatio idiomatum, one that allowed the old term designed for a linguistic solution to contradictory Christological propositions now to be used for a real, not fictive, communication of attributes. See Mahlmann: 1969, 205 – 49. 21 This position is reflected in the last gloss from CR 7: 885, where the glossator wrote: “Cogitate ista in vera invocatione non ut cavillaturi. Haec sunt simplicissime vera, recta, utilia, necessaria

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remembered that Melanchthon refused to bring the Lord’s Supper into the interpretation of Colossians 3. As we shall see, far from being a sign of his indecision, this was instead a conscious choice not to make pronouncements on something that needed discussion by preachers and theologians of all evangelical churches. A comparison to John Calvin’s comments from 1548 on the same text further sharpens the “non-Reformed” perspective of Melanchthon’s interpretation (CR 80/CO 52: 117 f.). Calvin argued that because Christ is in heaven, hearts must ascend to him there. In the fuller commentary published in 1559, Melanchthon by contrast held that although Christ is in heaven locally, he is also present on earth by the communication of attributes. Nevertheless, Melanchthon’s position also differed from some other Lutherans, who in Melanchthon’s view were insisting that Christ’s body was present everywhere, especially in the Lord’s Supper, and not limited to a single place in heaven.

3. Reaction to the Lectures Interest in Melanchthon’s comments on this text arose almost immediately after he had delivered the lectures. Celio Secundo Curio wrote on 1 September 1557 to Melanchthon while the latter was in Worms for that star-crossed colloquy (MBW §8325 [CR 9: 256 f.]; Brandy : 1991, 39 – 41, mentions comments to John Calvin by Peter Martyr Vermigli on 19 August 1557 [CR 44: 586 f.]). Curio was in Strasbourg to comfort his son-in-law, Jerome Zanchi, at the death of Zanchi’s wife (Curio’s daughter). While there, Zanchi showed him a letter, supposedly written by Melanchthon and appended to a 1557 printing of Joachim Westphal’s Confessio fidei de eucharistiae sacramento, in which Melanchthon had attacked the Zwinglians and said he would rather die than accept the notion that Christ’s body could only be in one place.22 How, Curio asked, was one to square such a letter (were it genuine) with Melanchthon’s comments on Colossians 3:1, contained in a manuscript of lectures copied by one of Melanchthon’s students and now in Zanchi’s possession (see above). There, Melanchthon argued that the body of Christ was in a single place. Three days later, on 4 September, Zanchi himself wrote a letter to Melanchthon, again referring to the comments on Colossians 3 (MBWR 8: 113, §8326 [Bds. 419 ff.]). He posed several questions to Melanchthon: whether the ad consolationem.” The “cogitate” hints at a purely rhetorical construal of Christ’s promises in John. 22 MBWT 4/1:112 – 15, §887 (CR 2: 24 f.), written to Martin Görlitz in Braunschweig and dated by MBW §887 March 1530. Melanchthon stated that the Zwinglians had nothing of Christian teaching; they misinterpreted John 6:63; he would rather die than affirm with them that Christ’s body can only be in one place; they do not understand justification. It was by no means spurious. See Kolb: 2012a.

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comments on Colossians 3 had indeed been dictated by him; whether he would object to having Zanchi quote him in his own lectures in Strasbourg; and whether he would approach the staunch Lutherans, Johannes Marbach (of Strasbourg) and Johannes Brenz (both of whom were also in Worms), on this matter. Zanchi stated his own position succinctly : Christ as God could be everywhere but as a human being could not be everywhere at the same time since this is a property of the divine nature. Zanchi’s implication was clear : Melanchthon had in his lectures on Colossians approached Zanchi’s own position. No wonder that Melanchthon’s commentary would later appear in not only a German but also a Dutch translation! (VD 16: M 3165 – 3166). As far as is known, Melanchthon never responded to Zanchi’s letter. That these theologians had misread Melanchthon’s position on Christ’s presence in the Eucharist becomes clear in a personal confession of faith that Melanchthon penned while in Worms, dated 11 November 1557.23 There he insisted, as always, that There is no doubt that the Son of God is present with this ministry [of the Supper] that he instituted and is efficacious through it. Thus, however, he is present in this ministry substantially, so that by the communication of his body and blood he makes us members of his body and testifies that he applies his benefits to us and wants to be efficacious in us and wants to save our sorry selves, who have been inserted into him, and to make us alive.24 23 MBWR 8:154, §8425 (CR 9: 365 – 72). At the same time, he wrote an opinion for the city council of Wesel, dated 13 November 1556, on whether to allow the French and English to establish their own faith communities and celebrate the Lord’s Supper. There he again specifically defended Christ’s real presence in the Supper while explicitly rejecting the way in which Osiander had argued for it. See MBWR, 7:510 f., §8023 (CR 8: 908 ff., here 910): “Lutherus recepit Argentoratenses et Augustanos, fatentes, in ipso usu adesse Christum substantialiter et efficacem esse. Caeterae disputationes omissae sunt. Necesse est enim certe fateri, coenam domini non tantum esse signum foederis, seu consociationis inter homines sine praesentia et efficacia filii Dei. Quod autem dicunt aliqui, confirmari a nostris idola pontificia, manifeste fit nobis iniuria. Et saepissime a nobis repetita sunt haec verba: nihil habet rationem Sacramenti extra institutum usum. Non dicimus: hic panis est Deus, ut dicebat Osiander; non dicimus fieri transsubstantiationem [sic!] panis, sed loquimur cum Paulo: panis est communicatio corporis Christi, id est, hac re Christus suum corpus nobis communicat, et nos testatur membra esse sui corporis, in quo est efficax.” A year later, on 16 January 1558, Melanchthon wrote a similar opinion for the congregations in Siebenbürgen (MBW 8498 [CR 9: 429 – 32]), stating (431): “Postea de instituto usu in vera Ecclesia de manducatione affirmo, prorsus filium Dei vere et substantialiter adesse praesentem in ministerio instituto: quia persona est ab aeterno patre missa, ut proferat Evangelium ex sinu aeterni patris, et sit efficax, et colligate Ecclesiam. Haec persona in hoc ministerio sic adest vere et substantialiter, et est efficax, et communicatione corporis et sanguinis sui facit nos sibi membra, et sese, et beneficia sua nobis applicat.” Hund: 2006, seems unfamiliar with these passages. 24 CR 9: 371: “De Coena Domini retinemus confessionem Augustanam, et Apologiam. Nec dubium est, filium Dei adesse ministerio, quod instituit, et per illud efficacem esse. Sic autem adest in hoc ministerio substantialiter, ut communicatione sui corporis et sanguinis nos membra faciat sui corporis, et testetur, se nobis applicare sua beneficia, et velle se in nobis efficacem esse, et nostram miseram massam insertam sibi velle servare, et vivificare … Cum autem verba Christi

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4. The Commentary The book of Colossians had always held a special place in the exegetical interests of Philip Melanchthon. In 1527, when his Scholia on Colossians were first published, they comprised the first biblical commentary that he himself had seen through the presses: all previous commentaries having been purloined by publishers or even by Luther himself (Wengert: 2012). Now, in February 1559, as he neared the end of his life, Melanchthon published his final biblical commentary, the Enarratio on Colossians. These lecturesturned-commentary included an epistle dedicatory to Herluf Trolle, a Swedish nobleman, dated 16 February, 1559, Melanchthon’s sixty-second birthday.25 The Enarratio boldly announced on its title page that this work reproduced Melanchthon’s earlier lectures, and indeed the book contained all the hallmarks of the 1556 classroom work (these lectures stretched into 1557, see Brandy : 1991, 39, n. 69). It was printed three times in 1559, was included in the fourth volume of Melanchthon’s Opera that appeared in 1564, and it was translated into German and Dutch.26 Until the republication of the first edition

et Pauli expresse de sumtione loquantur : Accipite, manducate. Item, Panis est joimym_a s~lator, et nihil habeat rationem Sacramenti extra actionem institutam …” 25 MBWR 8:315, §8862 (CR 9:745 ff.). Herluf Trolle (1516 – 1565), a professional soldier and scion of a Swedish noble family, studied at Wittenberg in 1536; see Svensk Uppslagsbok: 1954, s.v. “Trolle, Herluf,” 29:953 f. 26 ENARRATIO jj EPISTOLAE jj PAVLI AD COLOS= jj SENSES PRAELECTA AN= jj NO. M.D.LVI. jj A jj PHILIPPO MELANTHONE. jj [Medallion of Paul] jj VITEBERGAE. jj EXCVDEBAT IOHANNES jj CRATO. jj ANNO. M.D.LIX. jj A 2r-4v : Dedicatory letter, A 5r-7r : Psalm 50 in Latin by Johannes Stigel. A 8: Blank. B i – I vii: Text. [70] leaves + 2 blank (A 8 and I viii), HAB: 1020.9 Theol. (2) (VD 16: M 3163). A second printing by Johannes Crato has exactly the same title page, but uses a different medallion of St. Paul, HAB: Alvensleben Ac 433 (VD 16: M 3164). The third printing (VD 16: M 3162), clearly a reprint, took place in Frankfurt. ENARRATIO jj EPISTOLAE jj Pauli ad Colos= jj SENSES PRAELECTA jj ANNO. M.D.LVI. jj A PHILIP. MELANT. jj ADDITA EST RESPONSIO HV= jj manissima ad uirulentas calumnias Staphy- jj li & Auij [sic], edita ab eodem Phi- jj lip. Melant. jj Accessit etiam rerum uerborumq; jj memorabilium Index. jj FRANCOFORTI EX- jj cudebat Petrus Brubachius, An- jj no M.D.LIX. jj. 142 numbered pages + [8] leaves. This text also includes Psalm 50 on pages 108 – 12. Caspar Peucer included this commentary on Colossians in the fourth volume of the Wittenberg edition of his father-in-law’s works. Peucer’s epistle dedicatory to that volume was dated 10 August 1564. I have examined the 1577 reprint: OPERVM REVERENDI jj VIRI PHILIPPI ME- jj LANTHONIS, jj PARS QVARTA. jj … jj VVITEBERGAE jj EXCVDEBAT IOHANNES jj CRATO, jj ANNO M.D.LXXVII. jj, pages 324 – 365. This edition, which omits the Latin version of Psalm 50, was reprinted in CR 15: 1223 – 82 with the dedicatory letter appearing in CR 9:745 ff. German (VD 16: M 3165): Auslegung der Epistel S. Pauli an die Coloss. In der Schul zu Witteberg Anno 1556 gelesen; Jtzt erst verdeudschet/ Durch den Ehrwirdigen Hochgelerten Herrn Philippum Melanthonem. Paul Crell (Trans.) (Wittenberg: Creutzer, 1563); Dutch (VD 16: M 3166): Een wtlegginghe des Sendbriefs Pauli tot de Colossensen, voorgelesen in’t Latijn, door Philippus Melanthon, in’t jaer 1556. Ende nu eerst wtgehgaen in drucke, in’t jaer 1559. Ende om de groote nutticheyt ende stichtinge der ghemeynte Christi, nu overgheset in Nederlantsche sprake (Emden: Gellius Ctematius, 1559).

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of the Scholia in the twentieth century, the Enarratio was Melanchthon’s only commentary on Colossians widely available to theologians and scholars for four centuries. This commentary provides the modern reader with a variety of insights into Melanchthon’s interpretation of the Scripture. Closely related as it is to Melanchthon’s work in Wittenberg’s lecture halls, it exemplifies the shape of his pedagogy late in life, especially in his use of syllogisms for the analysis of theological arguments. It also demonstrates aspects of Wittenberg’s ecclesiological exegesis, that is, the penchant for viewing texts in connection with the nature of the church as a poor, persecuted minority (Wengert: 1992). Moreover, like Melanchthon’s last Romans commentary from 1556, large portions of the commentary were devoted to a refutation of the errors of Andreas Osiander, the deceased professor from Königsberg and former preacher in Nuremberg who rejected Melanchthon’s view of forensic justification and held instead that justification was the result of an infusion of Christ’s divine righteousness into human beings (Wengert: 2012b). Thus, this commentary, like all of Melanchthon’s exegetical works, furnished him with a platform from which to develop not only interpretive insights but also full-blown theological arguments against contemporary opponents. Although Melanchthon had already published three distinct versions of the Scholia on Colossians in 1527, 1528, and 1534 (Wengert: 1998, 159 ff.), it was first in the Enarratio that he commented on Colossians 3:1 – 2 (CR 15: 1270 ff.). As shown above, his introductory comments on this chapter listed three questions that arise from this verse. While the notes found in Bremen had recorded only his comments on the first question, the commentary (doubtless like the actual lectures) discussed all three. Melanchthon’s use of the church fathers in this context may provide an important window for understanding his approach (Wengert: 1999). As described above, to prove his point about the “bodily location of Christ’s body,” Melanchthon quoted several church fathers: Augustine, Cyprian, and Athanasius. Melanchthon’s Augustine, found in Peter Lombard’s Sentences, reads, in a more literal rendering of the Latin: “Christ did not leave the Father when he came [to be] weaker : everywhere the whole [totus] Christ; everywhere the perfect Christ.” Then the grammatical meaning (forma) of the word totus is added [from Lombard!]: “Everywhere the whole Christ, but not wholly (totum).”27 By immediately adding that others had spoken “more fitly” when they stated that the proposition, “Christ is everywhere,” is true by the communication of attributes, Melanchthon already reveals something of his skepticism regarding this quote from Augustine. There are several 27 CR 15:1271. “Non dimisit patrem Christus, cum venit infirmior [Lombard: in Virginem], ubique totus, ubique perfectus. Deinde additur [from Lombard!] forma sermonis: [Lombard: Quod Christus] ubique totus est, sed non totum.” The “forma sermonis” or general notion of the discourse is the question Lombard posed at the beginning of this section.

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peculiarities about this citation, besides the fact that Melanchthon explicitly depended upon Peter Lombard. Lombard was quoting from Contra Felicianum, de Unitate Trinitatis, ad Optatum, a work already discounted as spurious by no less a scholar than Erasmus and now held to have been written by Vergil of Tapso, although in his lecture Melanchthon thought (as the Bremen manuscript demonstrated) that Lombard was actually using what Augustine had said in his letter to Dardanus (Ep. 187) (di Berardino: 1986, 401; the text is published under the title De unitate Trinitatis contra Felicianum arianum in MPL 42:1157 – 76). Nevertheless, whether he knew it or not, Melanchthon was quoting a “medieval” Augustine. Moreover, the gloss to the text (the forma sermonis additur) came not from [pseudo-]Augustine but from Lombard himself. And the “others” referred to here could well refer to medieval commentators on Lombard, who often employed the term communicatio idiomatum, or perhaps even to Luther.28 Moreover, the final line from the lecture notes, also from Lombard,29 dropped out completely, as if Melanchthon was now taking pains to avoid anything that would divide the natures in such an obviously Reformed construal of the text. To shed light on why Jesus on earth could say the Son of Man was in heaven, Melanchthon also cited Cyprian’s explanation of the Creed (which Melanchthon knew was entitled Enarratio Ruffini).30 However, the citation and explanatory gloss of the lecture (“where the body had not had a bodily location”) slightly distorted Rufinus’s point by making it appear that the latter was interested in a bodily location when in fact he was more concerned about the equality between the Father and the Logos. Instead, Rufinus stated, as the 28 Evangelical theologians, including Luther and Melanchthon, borrowed the term “communicatio idiomatum” from medieval theologians. See, for example, Seeberg: 1977, 2:110, 192, 323. This citation indicates that Melanchthon connected that concept to [pseudo-]Augustine through Lombard and his commentators. See, for example, Gabriel Biel’s concluding summary on this very text of Lombard in Biel: 1977 – 1979, III d. 22 “Puncta summaria … epilogantia,” 174 – 179 [3, 356] and III d. 7 A 12 f. [3, 154]. In the former reference we read “Idiomatum communicatio in Christo est mutua praedicatio concretorum utriusque naturae de se invicem et de nomine suppositi in his subsistente.” In the latter Biel refers to Nicholas of Oresma, De communicatione idiomatum, c. 3. 29 Lombard, Sentences III, d. 22C: “Totum enim ad naturam refertur, totus autem ad hypostasim: sicut aliud & aliquid ad naturam, alius vero & aliquis ad personam referuntur.” Cf. the Bremen ms.: “Totus refertur ad Hypostasin totum ad naturam….” 30 It is in fact by Rufinus Aquileia [MPL 21:335 – 386], entitled Expositio Symboli [=Commentarius in Symbolum Apostolorum]. In earlier editions of Cyprian’s works it was included in an appendix. Melanchthon’s citation reads: “Ascendit [MPL adds: ergo] ad coelos, non ubi verbum Deus antea [MPL: ante] non fuerat, quippe qui erat semper in coelo [MPL: coelis], et manebat cum patre, sed ubi verbum caro factum antea non sedebat.” The fact that Melanchthon still refers to this as a work of Cyprian may be a further indication of another subtle rejection of Erasmus, who first attributed the piece to Rufinus. I am indebted to Professor Dr. Irena Backus for this suggestion. However, a gloss on this comment, attributed to Melanchthon in CR 7:884 but more likely inserted by a Crypto-Philippist, added: “Est posterior Cypriano sine dubio, quia attengit controversias, quae post Cyprianum sunt motae.”

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Enarratio accurately quoted, “where the Word made flesh had not sat before,” thereby underscoring the unity of the two natures in the one person of Christ, before Melanchthon added his gloss: “that is, where the body had not before had a bodily location.” Melanchthon also cited Athanasius in De incarnatione Verbi31 to the effect that the Logos is not bound to the body but that the body contains it so that it is in it, outside all things, and in the Father’s bosom, not as if divided, but in such a way that all things receive life and sustenance from him. Melanchthon then turned to the meaning of the sessio ad dextram in the Enarratio by going on to the other points (listed in the Bremen manuscript but not discussed there). He emphasized the distinction between the ascension and God’s right hand, a point completely missing from the Bremen manuscript. To ascend into heaven concerned the local ascension of the human nature; to sit at God’s right hand, however, concerned the exaltation of that very human nature above all creatures (thus, despite the gloss in CR 7:883 ff., not like Enoch, Moses or Elijah). Or, as Paul put it in Colossians 3:1, Christ is sursum, but not as the saints and angels are above but rather exalted above all of them and in that hidden light of God, reigning with the Father. Because, according to Augustine, Christ is locally some place secundum veri corporis modum, propositions such as “Christ is in you” or “I in them, we will come to him and make a dwelling with him” must be true by the communication of attributes. Melanchthon concluded: Concerning this presence of the Son in the preaching of the Gospel and in the saints, it is necessary for the Church to be faithfully instructed, so that we acknowledge our Lord Jesus Christ to be present for the church and to be the Head perfecting all things in all (CR 15: 1272).

Melanchthon’s point, then, was not to lock Christ’s body in heaven but to assure his hearers that, by virtue of the communicatio idiomatum, the person of Christ was—despite the ascension—also with them on earth.32 It was not, however, as if the human nature and its body had an independent existence, so that it could be present on the basis of its own attributes. But it was also not as if the whole Christ could only be spiritually present, a teaching that Peucer and other “Crypto-Philippists” would defend. Peter Fraenkel has explained the grand continuities in Melanchthon’s understanding of the Eucharist.33 Whatever the evolution of Melanchthon’s 31 See De incarnatione Verbi III.17. This and the other sources may in fact have been used in other collections of references from the Fathers compiled in the sixteenth century. 32 Again, Brandy : 1991, 36, insists on reading these comments in the light of Melanchthon’s commentary on the Nicene Creed. In defending the unity of Christ’s person, Melanchthon might better be described as defending Christ as present anywhere (“alicuby”) rather than Christ present everywhere (ubiquity). 33 Fraenkel: 1961, 146 – 64. Fraenkel’s brief comments did not include any discussion of the sessio ad dextram, hardly surprising since the Loci communes of 1543 and 1555 also do not address this

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thought on this subject, he consistently combined his emphasis on the benefits of the Lord’s Supper with Luther’s insistence on a real presence but under the restrictions of patristic arguments. Melanchthon, like most in his age, feared innovations. He would avoid doctrinal novelties by taking seriously the vocabulary and language of the Fathers. In this singular comment on the subject originally made in 1557 and redacted in 1559, one can detect the same kind of limitation imposed upon Melanchthon by the patristic and medieval sources that Fraenkel discovered elsewhere. Rufinus, pseudo-Augustine (=Virgil of Tapso and mixed with Peter Lombard), and Athanasius all spoke of a distinction between the Logos and the ascension of Christ. Thus, they allowed Melanchthon to develop an understanding of the ascension that included an emphasis on the bodily nature of Christ’s humanity. However, Luther’s insight into the figurative meaning of God’s right hand as God’s power also influenced Melanchthon’s interpretation. Christ was “in the light of God, reigning with the Father.” Thus, Melanchthon tried – unsuccessfully from the point of view of both other Lutherans and Swiss theologians (Dingel: 1996, 141 – 60, Sturm: 1972, 78 – 82, Kolb 2012) – to weave Christ’s presence among the faithful with the location of Christ’s body in heaven. Yet this failure preserved for the next generation an important move for unblocking the impasse within the Lutheran camp: the communicatio idiomatum, itself an expression of the ancient fathers and councils, used also in medieval scholastic terminology and employed by Luther (FC VIII, cf., e. g., WA 43: 579 f. [lectures on Genesis] and WA 39,2: 3 – 33 [the “Disputatio … Verbum caro factum est” of January 1539]). (Later, some “Crypto-Philippists” would reduce this term to references about Christ’s divine nature, an indication that the views of these followers should not always be equated with their teacher.)34 It is no wonder that many of his students, even those associated with Gnesio-Lutherans such as Tilemann Heshusius, also rejected the omnipresence of Christ’s body per se while at the same time insisting on Christ’s real presence in the Lord’s Supper. Moreover, secondgeneration reformers like Martin Chemnitz also seemed to have accepted the results of Melanchthon’s interpretation (Christ ascended into heaven bodily ; Christ is present with believers via the communicatio idiomatum) but improved upon the traditional understanding of this communicatio by countering Crypto-Philippist insistence upon a (mere) spiritual presence of

topic. The two monographs on the subject break off their investigation with the 1530 Augsburg Confession in one case and the Wittenberg Concord of 1535 in the other: Neuser : 1968, and Quere: 1977. 34 See, for example, the Grundfest of 1571 in: Dingel; 2008, 632 ff. Cf. Kolb: 1999. For a description of the arguments in the anonymous Exegesis perspicua et integra controversiae de sacra coena, which appeared in Wittenberg in 1574 [Dingel: 2008, 1014 – 89], see Thomasius: 1876, 2:371 f.

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Christ’s body with a defense of the Lutheran understanding of the Real Presence.35 If we may assume that the Bremen manuscript represented a fairly faithful rendering of the original lectures, then the small differences found in the Enarratio also signal a sharpening of Melanchthon’s viewpoint. First, with one small exception, none of the marginalia from either the Bremen manuscript or Corpus Reformatorum 7 may be found in the 1559 publication. The very things that were used by the Crypto-Philippists to buttress their position of a spiritual presence of Christ in the Supper are absent from the Enarratio. Second, several comments in the text itself were dropped as well. Melanchthon removed the phrases “wherever that place is” (ubique is locus est) and “below in this your conversation” (inferius [CR 7 & 15: in Virgine] in hac vestra visibli conversatione), as well as Lombard’s distinction between hypostasis and nature and the (perhaps mistaken) reference to Augustine’s Epistle 187. These omissions made it easier for Melanchthon to argue both that Christ was truly bodily ascended but to God’s right hand, which was beyond all places, and that, through the communication of attributes, the whole Christ could also be everywhere. The additions to the Enarratio had much the same effect. Thus, Melanchthon no longer referred to just one article of faith (concerning the ascension) but used the plural and specifically added “he sits at the right hand of God the Father” to the citation. By completing the citation of Rufinus more accurately and even by adding what was clearly a gloss (“that is, where the body had not before had a bodily location”), Melanchthon made a distinction between Rufinus’s point (about the Word made flesh) and his own (about a bodily and not imaginary ascension). Finally, Melanchthon’s Enarratio also included a fuller citation of Athanasius, so that the passage read: “The Logos has not been constricted to the body but it contains the body, so that it may be both in it and outside of all things and in the bosom of the Father, and, although he is in all things, he may not become a part of other things.”36

5. Reactions to the Commentary Once the Enarratio was published in 1559, other theologians read and reacted to the comments on Colossians 3:1 – 2. When it first appeared, Melanchthon sent copies to (among others) his former student, Tilemann Heshusius, then 35 This was nowhere better demonstrated than in the way in which, by contrast, the Wittenberger Katechismus (1571) cited Melanchthon’s Enarratio on the sedere ad dextram, completely leaving out any reference to the communicatio idiomatum. See Dingel: 2008, 8: 206 – 209. 36 CR 15: 1271 (the addition italicized): “k|cor non colligatus est corpori sed ipse corpus continet vt et in eo sit et extra omnia, et in sinu patris, neque cum sit in omnibus, fit pars in aliorum [sic! cj.: partim aliorum] sed omnia, vitam sustentationemque ab ipso accipiunt.”

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superintendent in Heidelberg (MBWR 8: 316, §8863 [CR 9: 742 f.], dated 17 February 1559), to Johannes Marbach in Strasbourg (MBWR 8: 317 f., §8869 [CR 9: 748], dated 21 February 1559), and to his friend Georg Buchholzer in Berlin (MBWR 8: 320, §8876 [CR 9: 749], dated 27 February 1559). To Marbach Melanchthon remarked that the commentary “repeated the same things I have often said elsewhere.” (Perhaps sending this commentary to Marbach fulfilled, in part, Zanchi’s request from 1557, but in a way Zanchi would not have intended.) Reactions came immediately. On the one side, Heinrich Bullinger, to whom Melanchthon may also have sent a copy of the Enarratio, praised Melanchthon for having witnessed that he did not agree with those who taught the body of the Lord extended through all things and was everywhere and who denied that “heaven” denoted a place. Melanchthon had stated that Christ’s body occupied a place, “according to the mode of a true body …” (MBWR 8: 334 f., §8909 [Bds., 444 – 51, especially 448 ff.], dated 30 March 1559). However, Bullinger was looking for more. Since you are not ignorant how those brothers of ours—who up to now noisily defend the contrary and forced their opinion on many—will take up and exaggerate these comments of yours, therefore, my Philip, add this, which follows from what you professed in the commentary on Colossians: that the presence and eating of Christ in the Supper are not bodily or carnal (as our adversaries understand the words “truly” and “substantially”) but mystical and spiritual, which in its own way is no less true than a bodily presence.37

This comment demonstrated that Bullinger at least realized that confessing Christ’s localized presence in the ascension into heaven was only a first step toward acceptance of Zurich’s position. Something still needed to be added: connecting that interpretation with the mode of Christ’s presence in the Supper. If Bullinger hoped for Melanchthon to draw closer to Zurich’s position, Württemberg’s reformer, Johannes Brenz, on the contrary, was anything but pleased with Melanchthon’s comments.38 His discontent arose during the case of the preacher Bartholomäus Hagen from Dettingen. Suspected (for good 37 Ibid, 448 f. Bullinger also raised the specter of Erasmus’s indecisiveness to spur Melanchthon to taking a stand. Melanchthon, on the contrary, used the word substantialiter only in two ways: to describe Christ’s presence in the Supper and to confess the reality of Christ’s two natures. 38 For this section see Brandy : 1991, 28 – 54, and the literature listed above. Part of Brenz’s consternation over Melanchthon could have arisen due to the fact that their joint opinion, written at Worms on 12 September 1557 for Margrave Georg Friedrich of Brandenburg-Ansbach (MBWR 8: 119 §8340 [CR 9: 276 f.]), stated (276): “Etsi igitur vere et substantialiter adest filius Dei in sumtione faciens nos sibi membra, et testificans, nos esse sua membra, et nos consolans: tamen non ponatur conversio panis vel inclusio localis, ut Papistae docent.” See also MBWR 3: 120, §8344 (CR 9: 277 f.), bearing the same date and signed in addition by Jakob Andreae, Johannes Marbach, Johannes Pistorius, Michael Diller, Paul Eber, and Jakob Runge, which states (277): “Instituta autem est sumptio, in qua cum pane et vino vere et substantialiter adest filius Dei….”

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reason) of holding “Calvinist” views on the Lord’s Supper, Hagen was summoned to Stuttgart for an interview with Brenz on 13 April 1559. When Brenz tried to explain to him that differences still remained with the Swiss on the question of Christ’s ascension and then required him to confess that the body of Christ was at the same time in heaven and on earth, Hagen responded by citing especially Melanchthon’s recently published commentary on Colossians. Hagen’s Apologia was in Duke Christopher’s hands by September. In contrast to a mild personal letter to Melanchthon on 19 October, in which Brenz mentioned in passing the problems Heshusius was experiencing in Heidelberg over the Lord’s Supper (MBW §9104 [Bds. 456 f. and 464 f.]), two weeks later, in November 1559, Brenz wrote a letter in the name of Duke Christopher of Württemberg concerning the offending passage. Brenz and his Duke also noticed what Bullinger had pointed to: Melanchthon’s comments on Colossians 3:1 – 2 could be construed as excluding the possibility of Christ’s presence in the Lord’s Supper. To be sure, you do not mention anything about the Lord’s Supper in the same place, and we also hope that in your writing you did not mean to take something away from the true and substantial presence of the body and blood of Christ in the Lord’s Supper, as it was comprehended in the Augsburg Confession and Apology and explained at the same time by the blessed Dr. Luther and understood by all those joined through the same Confession. Nevertheless, we do not want to hide from you our gracious opinion, that we are particularly worried—and it has been sensed by some people of both high and low estate—that the above-mentioned writing will be interpreted as if you had changed your opinion of the Lord’s Supper … and wanted to separate the person of Christ through the physical location of the body of Christ in the starry heavens … but then only the half part, namely the divine essence, is by his church on earth … So we graciously beseech you, so that you are completely in the clear on this matter, to explain and declare what your opinion is here in this writing, so that we may be put at ease regarding your person and so that others may have lifted from them the burden of your struggling (MBW §9121 [Bds. 457 f.]).

Melanchthon responded by the end of the same month (MBW §9147 [Bds. 459 f.], dated 28 November 1559). Recalling the Argonauts and the Crusades, he quoted the Aeneid (“There ought to be communal deliberation in communal danger”), and he expressed his support for a synod to discuss the Lord’s Supper. Knowing that he was arguing with Brenz and not just Duke Christoph, Melanchthon continued: Your excellency gravely accuses me that I tear asunder (divello) the natures of Christ because I have said, as the ancients said, that this proposition (“Christ is everywhere”) is true by the communication of attributes. This proposition is present in the writings of many who, despite this fact, do not tear asunder the natures in Christ (Bds. 459).

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The citations of the Fathers were, as this comment shows, hardly accidental in Melanchthon’s exegesis but were instead central to his approach to this issue. Given the disputes around him, Melanchthon refused to take a stand publicly, despite attacks from all sides.39 He concluded: “But neither do I ask to be heard [by you] alone, but at the same time I ask that the old and purer church be heard and that the teachers of the present time who love truth and godly concord be called together” (Bd. 460). Brenz’s response was not long in coming: he wrote the so-called Stuttgart Confession on the Lord’s Supper, which was signed by Württemberg’s clergy on 19 December 1559. Melanchthon mocked it as “Hechinger Latin”40 and objected to its position on the ubiquity of Christ’s human nature and on the adoration of the sacrament. Melanchthon’s words in the Enarratio along with his famous opinion for Elector Frederick III of the Palatinate from the same year ended up linking him permanently to the later Crypto-Philippists and may have prevented a more balanced appreciation of his theology and exegesis down to the present (Wengert: 1995). Probably the most significant arguments over the Enarratio came not immediately after their publication in 1559 but twelve years later in the Lord’s Supper controversy that swirled around the professors at the University of Wittenberg from 1570 – 1574, culminating in the arrest and/or dismissal of several of their leading lights (for a more detailed analysis, see Hund: 2006, 113 – 704). Where the Enarratio chiefly played a role, especially among these so-called Crypto-Philippists, was precisely on the issue of the ascension, by far the most disputed article among these later Lutherans, and its relation to the session to God’s right hand (Dingel: 2008, 8: 84). For this reason, Melanchthon’s summary statement about the bodily ascension was quoted numerous times, beginning in the Wittenberger Katechismus of 1571, where in the first editions it was used without attribution (Wittenberger Katechismus, in: Dingel: 2008, 8: 204 – 207; see also Disputatio grammatica [1571], in: Dingel: 2008, 8: 366). Then, when Chemnitz, Selnecker, and others attacked this section of the book, the German translation and later Latin editions revealed their source in the margins and derided these opponents for attacking as a novum not only what was in Melanchthon’s works but also what Melanchthon claimed was in all of the ancient Christian writers as well. What is also important to notice, however, is that the citation itself breaks off before Melanchthon’s discussion of Christ’s continued presence on 39 He did, however, send Christopher some writings outlining his position indirectly, probably the Responsiones ad articulos Bavaricae inquisitionis (MSA 6: 278 – 364) and the disputation theses for Paul Eber, which touched on questions about Christ’s two natures (CR 12: 645 – 57, especially theses 19 – 26). See Kolb: 1202b. 40 MBW §9213 (CR 9: 1034 ff.), to Jacob Runge dated 1 February 1560. Melanchthon recounted a story from the time of Maximillian I, when a count from near Hechingen in Swabia responded at a Reichstag to a French emissary in Latin spoken with a very heavy Swabian accent. Gregory Lamparter called the accent “Hechinger Latin,” after the Swabian county.

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earth.41 It is also important to note that Melanchthon’s words are not cited with complete accuracy. Thus, references to the Creed and to Colossians 3 were omitted. The ascent into heaven, “wherever that is,” is thus missing—an important point for Melanchthon’s later invocation of the communicatio idiomatum, which also was not even mentioned. Thus, the Katechismus obscured the exegetical conundrum that Melanchthon was trying to resolve (how to correlate passages about Christ’s presence in heaven before the ascension with the bodily ascension). When dealing with the sessio ad dextram, the Katechismus made a small but important change in the Enarratio. Again citing the Enarratio, it stated “The blessed angels and human beings are also in heaven because they enjoy the light and visibly viewing God’s face, but Christ is exalted in that mysterious light and is reigning with the Father and is the head of the church, perfecting all in all” (Wittenberger Katechismus, in: Dingel: 2008, 8: 206). Melanchthon, by contrast, had stated that “[Paul] said that Christ is ‘above,’ and indeed at the right hand of God, that is, not as the blessed angels and human beings are ‘above’ but exalted above the angels in that mysterious light of God, reigning with the Father” (CR 12: 1271, emphasis added). The very thing that distinguished Christ’s presence in heaven from saints and angels had been made ambiguous. The Exegesis perspicua (1574) also cited the Enarratio. By this time, the identification of Christ’s bodily ascension with a specific place in heaven was considered a matter of course.42 The Crypto-Philippists not only omitted or changed portions of Melanchthon’s text; they also glossed it to fit their own purposes. Nowhere is this clearer than in the Grundfest, also first published in 1571. To be sure, that tract cited not only the material on the ascension but also Melanchthon’s later comments on the communicatio idiomatum. Because it was a technical term, the author left the phrase in Latin, followed by a gloss: “By the communicatio idiomatum, that is, by the person of Christ according to his divine nature” 41 The quote of CR 15: 1271 reads (noted here in brackets are the original terms omitted or changed: “[+In symbolo] Intelligatur autem ascensio [=dictum] ut sonat litera et de corpore et de corporali locatione. [+Ascendit, scilicet corporali et physica locatione, in coelum, id est in locum coelestem, ubicunque est, quia nic non sunt fingendae allegoriae.] Ascensio fuit visibilis et corporalis et semper ita scripsit tota antiquitas, Christum corporali locatione in aliquo loco esse, ubicunque vult, et ascensio corporalis facta est sursum. [+Ideo Paulus in hoc capite locum illum nominat sursum.]” The Grundfest (1571), in: Dingel: 2008, 8: 631 – 34, continued the attack on Chemnitz and others, but expanded the quotation from the Enarratio to include the references to the communicatio idiomatum. 42 For example, see Grundfest (1571), in: Dingel: 2008, 8: 438, “Denn das solch Himelfart nicht sey nur eine disparitio oder verschindung des Leibs Christi, der nu unsichtbar und unbegreifflich und unendlich an allen orten zugleich sey im Himel vnd auff Erden … sondern das Christus mit seiner Menscheit warhafftig gen Himel gefaren vnd sein Leib und Seel aus dieser Welt hinauff in das liecht der herrlichen offenbarung Gottes gefüret habe und von dannen werde widerkomen …”, cf. the Exegesis perspicua (1574), in: Dingel: 2008, 8: 1032: “Humana natura physica locatione est in coelo, hoc est in loco coelesti, qui est sursum abducta a nobis neque reddetur nobis ante ultimum Christi aduentum.”

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(Grundfest [1571], in: Dingel: 2008, 8: 632: “… communicatione idiomatum, das ist, von der Person Christi nach seiner Göttlichen Natur”). Melanchthon invoked the communicatio idiomatum to unite the two natures of Christ (and thus make it possible to talk about Christ’s presence on earth); the author of the Grundfest glossed the term to distinguish them. No wonder that the Grundfest insisted that the right hand of God was a fixed place! (Grundfest [1571], in: Dingel: 2008, 8: 438). Finally, the Crypto-Philippists availed themselves of Melanchthon’s references to the Fathers. The section of the Grundfest titled “Sprüche der Veter” began with a reference to Athanasius, cited in its own translation, and only later identified Melanchthon’s Enarratio as the source for the quotation using his rendering (Grundfest, 1571, in Dingel: 2008, 8: 463, 579; there are important differences in these translations of the Greek, and it is not clear if either source is quoting from an existing translation). In the middle of an attack on Caspar von Schwenkfeld, with whose Christology the author identified Chemnitz and others, a reference to Peter Lombard occurred.43 Reference to Cyprian’s exposition of the Creed—without Melanchthon’s comment about Rufinus—appeared twice in the Grundfest (Grundfest, 1571, in: Dingel: 2008, 8: 448 and 690).

6. Concluding Comments Melanchthon’s exegesis must be viewed through the lens of contemporary theological debates. His peculiar method of interpretation lent itself to lengthy discussion of theological commonplaces within each passage of Scripture. The case of Colossians 3:1 – 2 and the reactions of Reformed theologians and Bartholomäus Hagen prove that Melanchthon’s interpretations could also easily be excerpted and recycled into the theological debates themselves. Thus, his influence over his contemporaries must be measured not merely by statements in his Loci communes but by his exegetical arguments as well. The Enarratio reveals what drove Melanchthon’s exegesis as he sought to apply Paul’s theology to sixteenth-century theological dilemmas in the struggle over the viva vox evangelii for his church: text, circumstance, and the witness of the Fathers. It also reveals a certain narrowing of the exegetical debate by the use of the witness of the ancient church. Although earlier in his career he repudiated the Erasmian search for a consensus patristicus, 43 Grundfest (1571), in Dingel: 2008, 8: 532, where only the phrase “Totus Christi est ubique, sed non totum, quod est Christi” occurred. The author’s point was, against Chemnitz and others, to define the communicatio idiomatum and to distinguish Christ’s presence “theologically” from his presence “physically.” Other references to Pseudo-Augustine were from other parts of that tract, not cited by Melanchthon. See Niedersächsisches Bekenntnis (1571), in: Dingel: 2008, 8: 744; Grundfest (1574), in: Dingel: 2008, 8: 918, 924.

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Melanchthon cherished the ancient church’s testimony and allowed the Fathers’ voices to limit what he would say on certain exegetical issues. Thus, he rejected what he viewed as novel ideas about the ubiquity of Christ’s body while still holding to the time-tested notion of the communicatio idiomatum and, at the same time, refusing to link his comments to the Lord’s Supper. The result pleased no one. His refusal to take a stand, however, demonstrates again a stubborn streak that marked much of his approach to this matter. Perhaps more clearly than in other disputes of the Reformation, Melanchthon saw here the dangers of theological pronouncements. Thus, he refused to take his very arguments that extra step that Bullinger demanded and Brenz feared. Instead, he wrapped himself in the testimonia Patrum while awaiting an open discussion of this issue by the church. This stubbornness may in fact have been motivated by his deep dislike for and fear of the theology of Andrew Osiander, whose Platonizing approach to justification had led to a bitter dispute in the early 1550s.44 That Melanchthon may have had especially him in mind is pointed to in a marginal notation to the other manuscript version of notes on this very passage. Beside the initial list of questions, the scribe wrote: “the opinion of Osiander and others.” Osiander, who had in the 1540s been quoted to Melanchthon as saying, “The bread is God,” and who had mistakenly attributed salvation to the divine nature of Christ alone, had poisoned the well, so that Melanchthon rejected any position—including Brenz’s and Timan’s—that in his opinion hinted at dividing Christ’s two natures. In this case such suspicion resulted in Melanchthon’s being in both camps and in no camp: chided by one side (Bullinger’s) as being too Erasmian for his fence sitting, and by the other (Brenz’s) as being too accommodating and un-Lutheran. In fact, he was being typically Melanchthonian: sure of his text and the witness of the Fathers; unwillingly to venture beyond what he thought they said (nor beyond the confines of the 1536 Wittenberg Concord); and single-minded in his 44 One interesting example of this comes in a letter to Georg Buchholzer in Berlin (MBWR 6: 386, §6654; CR 7: 1444 f.), dated 28 November 1552, in which Melanchthon described first his dispute with Osiander and then mentioned the related controversy with Andreas Musculus. “Nemo unquam in Ecclesia dixit: naturam divinam in Christo mortuam esse; neque sic loquuntur scriptores: Christus secundum naturam divinam et humanam mortuus est, etiamsi communicatione Idiomatum recte dicitur : Christus est mortuus, Deus est mortuus.” In this connection Melanchthon quoted from Athanasius in De incarnatione Verbi (page 28 in the Cologne edition). See also an enclosure in a letter to Albert Hardenberg (MBWR 6: 393, §6671; CR 7: 1147 ff.), where Melanchthon attacked Stancaro and defined three grades of characteristics in Christ: those attributed to his divinity alone, those to his humanity alone, and those attributed to the entire person, including being mediator and priest. In the preface to Melanchthon’s Explicatio Symboli Niceni, the editor (Johann Sturio) mentioned Melanchthon’s fights over the communicatio idiomatum with Stancaro, Osiander and Schwenkfeld. (The phrase appeared in this book more than in any other—thirteen times. See CR 23: 370 ff., 375 f., 505, 509 f., 519.) See also Koch: 1992.

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insistence that disputes over the meaning of Scripture could not be solved by individual pronouncements but only by communal discussion set within the exegetical history of a passage. What emerged after Melanchthon’s death, however, were two competing versions of Melanchthon’s invocation of the sessio ad dextram and the communicatio idiomatum. On the one side, Caspar Peucer, his son-in-law, and others in Wittenberg developed the rhetorical nature of the communicatio idiomatum, using it as a rhetorical construction to solve dilemmas in Christology and thereby insisting upon the spiritual presence of Christ in the Supper. On the other side, Martin Chemnitz and others introduced a new understanding of the term that insisted upon the real sharing of attributes of the divine and human natures within the one person of Christ. This also allowed for the real presence of the whole Christ in the Supper. Melanchthon, in one way, had prepared the way for both sides and yet, because this more precise formulation of the communicatio idiomatum had not yet come up for debate, said nothing specifically about the problem. However, when the full discussion in Melanchthon’s commentary is carefully analyzed, it becomes clear that he wanted to adhere to a literal view of Christ’s ascension while understanding that the “place” to which he ascended and the sessio ad dextram was much more than a specific place. Thus, although to him the ubiquity of the human nature (as opposed to the person of Christ) sounded like a Nestorian division of the two natures, he nevertheless insisted that the whole Christ is still truly present to believers. Finally and most importantly, this dispute also points out the sheer complexity of theological confessionalization. Unlike the relatively simple legal formula derived from the 1555 Peace of Augsburg, where the one who ruled could determine the territory’s religion (and make appropriate political accommodations for others), the presence of Christ in the Lord’s Supper allowed no such easy solution for theologians. On the edge of the eventual breakdown in relations between Lutheran and Reformed confessions and yet doggedly holding to a third way suggested to him by the Wittenberg Concord, Melanchthon struggled with texts and theological expression. His unique reputation among Europe’s Evangelical parties, however, meant that those who had a stake in determining the direction the churches of the Augsburg Confession would take digested, reacted to, and used whatever he said or wrote as ammunition in the coming battles over confessional concord. At the same time, however, the interest in Melanchthon’s comments on this text shown by such a wide variety of church leaders demonstrates just how important the actual content of theological and exegetical debates remained for the development of confessional identity. The unity of the human and divine natures in the one Christ and the nature of Christ’s presence in the Lord’s Supper were not theological curiosities but rather crucial components needed to construct a confessional church. Potential partners and opponents were fiercely listening to one another. What was said from the lecterns and

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pulpits in Wittenberg, Strasbourg, Zurich, and Stuttgart mattered greatly to the leaders in other places. Moreover, what was written and published made an enormous difference to the theological publicum created by the letters, opinions, commentaries, and pamphlets printed by central European presses. At the same time, the fact that such widespread reaction centered specifically on Melanchthon’s comments also demonstrates that, as he neared his death four hundred fifty years ago and despite the damage to his reputation sustained in the intervening years, Philip Melanchthon himself remained in the wake of Luther’s death the central Protestant reformer in early modern Europe, overshadowing all of the other pastors and teachers of his age, including Brenz, Bullinger, and even Calvin. In the developing world of theological conversation and controversy Philip Melanchthon’s opinion mattered. And when it seemed to some that he was changing his views on the Lord’s Supper, corralling his views into their specific camps became a crucial part of constructing confessional churches. As the history of Melanchthon’s comments on Colossians 3 demonstrates, precisely this theological give-and-take formed one central building block for the confessionalization of early modern Europe.

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Untersuchung zur Debatte um die Wittenberger Christologie und Abendmahlslehre in den Jahren 1567 und 1574. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Janse, Wim (1994). Albrecht Hardenberg als Theologe: Profil eines Bucer-Schülers. Leiden: Brill. Koch, Ernst (1992). “‘Das Geheimnis unserer Erlösung’. Die Christologie des Andreas Musculus als Beitrag zur Formulierung verbindlicher christlicher Lehre im späten 16. Jahrhundert.” Pp. 143 – 156. In: Heiko Franke et al. (Ed.), Veritas et Communicatio. Ökumenische Theologie auf der Suche nach einem verbindlichen Zeugnis. FS zum 60. Geburtstag von Ulrich Kühn. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Kçhler, Walther (1924/1953). Zwingli und Luther : Ihr Streit über das Abendmahl. 2 vol. Leipzig: M. Heinsius/ Gütersloh: Bertelsmann. Kolb, Robert (1999). “Altering the Agenda, Shifting the Strategy : The Grundfest of 1571 as Philippist Program for Lutheran Concord.” Pp. 705 – 726. In: Sixteenth Century Journal 30. (2012a). “The Critique of Melanchthon’s Doctrine of the Lord’s Supper by his ‘Gnesio-Lutheran’ Students.” Essay 11 in this volume. (2012b). “Melanchthon’s Doctrinal Last Will and Testament. The Responsiones ad articulos Bavaricae inquisitionis as His Final Confession of Faith.” Essay 7 in this volume. Mahlmann, Theodor (1969). Das neue Dogma der lutherischen Christologie. Problem und Geschichte seiner Begründung. Gütersloh: Mohn. Melanchthon, Philip (1529). ENARRATIO jj EPISTOLAE jj PAVLI AD COLOS= jj SENSES PRAELECTA AN= jj NO. M.D.LVI … Wittenberg: Johannes Crato, 1529. (1559). ENARRATIO jj EPISTOLAE jj Pauli ad Colos= jj SENSES PRAELECTA jj ANNO. M.D.LVI. Frankfurt/M: Peter Brubach, 1559. Translated as: Auslegung der Epistel S. Pauli an die Coloss. In der Schul zu Witteberg Anno 1556 gelesen. Paul Crell (Trans.). Wittenberg: Creutzer, 1563, and Een wtlegginghe des Sendbriefs Pauli tot de Colossensen, voorgelesen in’t Latijn, door Philippus Melanthon, in’t jaer 1556. Emden: Gellius Ctematius, 1559. (1554). Examen eorum qui audiuntur ante ritum publicae ordinationis, qua commendatur eis ministerium Evangelii. Wittenberg: Peter Seitz. (1577). OPERVM REVERENDI jj VIRI PHILIPPI ME- jj LANTHONIS, jj PARS QVARTA. jj … . Wittenberg: Johannes Crato. Neuser, Wilhelm (1968). Die Abendmahlslehre Melanchthons in ihrer geschichtlichen Entwicklung (1519 – 1530). Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag. Pezel, Christoph (Ed.) (1580). Argumentorum et obiectionum, de praecipuis articulis doctrinae christianae, cum responsionibus quae passim extant in scriptis Philippi Melanchthonis … Coll. Studio et industria Christophori Pezeli: et ante annos 7 dialectica methodo dictate in Academia Witembergensi: Nunc vero ab eodem retexta et primum in lucem ed., vol. 1. Neustadt a. d. Haardt: Harnisch. (1600). Consilia sive Iudicia Theologica, Itemque Responsiones ad Quaestiones de rebus variis ac multiplicibus secundum seriem annorum digestae. 2 vol. in 1. Neustadt: Heirs of Wilhelm Harnisch.

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Quere, Ralph (1977). Melanchthon’s Christum cognoscere: Christ’s Efficacious Presence in the Eucharistic Theology of Melanchthon. Nieuwkoop: de Graaf. Sasse, Hermann (1959). This Is My Body : Luther’s Contention for the Real Presence. Minneapolis: Augsburg. Scheible, Heinz (1997). Melanchthon: Eine Biographie. Munich: Beck. Seeberg, Reinhold (1977). The History of Doctrines. Charles E. Hay (Trans.). 2 vol. Grand Rapids: Baker. Steinmetz, David. C. (1995). Calvin in Context. New York: Oxford University Press. Sturm, Erdmann K. (1972). Der junge Zacharias Ursin. Neukirchen: Neukirchener Verlag. Thomasius, Gottfried (1876). Die Dogmengeschichte des Mittelalters und der Reformationszeit, Vol. 2 of Die Christlich Dogmengeschichte als EntwicklungsGeschichte des kirchlichen Lehrbegriffs. Erlangen: Deichert. Wengert, Timothy J. (2012a). “The Biblical Commentaries of Philip Melanchthon.” Essay 3 in this volume. (1992). “Caspar Cruciger Sr.’s 1546 ‘Enarratio’ on John’s Gospel: An Experiment in Ecclesiological Exegesis.” Pp. 60 – 74. In: Church History 61. (2012b). Defending Faith: Lutheran Responses to Andreas Osiander’s Doctrine of Justification, 1551 – 1559. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. (1998). Human Freedom, Christian Righteousness: Philip Melanchthon’s Exegetical Dispute with Erasmus of Rotterdam. New York: Oxford University Press. (1987). Philip Melanchthon’s ‘Annotationes in Johannem’ of 1523 in Relation to Its Predecessors and Contemporaries. Geneva: Droz. (1999). “‘Qui vigilantissimis oculis veterum omnium commentarios excusserit’: Philip Melanchthon’s Patristic Exegesis.” Pp. 115 – 134. In: David C. Steinmetz (Ed.), Die Patristik in der Bibelexegese des 16. Jahrhunderts. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. (1995). “‘With Friends Like This…’: The Biography of Philip Melanchthon by Joachim Camerarius.” Pages 115 – 131. In: Thomas F. Mayer and D. R. Woolf (Ed.), The Rhetorics of Life-Writing in Early Modern Europe: Forms of Biography from Cassandra Fedele to Louis XIV. Ann Arbor : University of Michigan.

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Robert Kolb

The Critique of Melanchthon’s Doctrine of the Lord’s Supper by his “Gnesio-Lutheran” Students

Within a decade of the death of Philip Melanchthon a spectrum of interpretations of his understanding of the Lord’s Supper had emerged within the Wittenberg circle. There were those, led by Wittenberg professors Christoph Pezel and Caspar Peucer, whose interpretation prompted their own exclusion from that circle because of what their opponents dubbed “CryptoCalvinism” (on the term, see Mahlmann: 2005; 173 – 230; Dingel: 2008, 3 – 15, and Hund: 2006, 14 – 42). Related to these Wittenberg “crypto-Philippists” were transitional groups like the theologians of Anhalt, who combined Melanchthon’s expressions on Christ’s presence in the Lord’s Supper and certain Christological presuppositions in a variety of ways (Dingel: 1996, 104 – 11). Second, there were those who leaned heavily on Melanchthon’s formulation of his views in the 1540s and 1550s but who insisted, despite some divergence of his language from Luther’s choice of sacramental formulations, that the two had remained in essential agreement. They included Wittenberg professors such as Paul Eber and Paul Crell. Crell’s views of Melanchthon’s understanding of the sacrament found expression in the Torgau Articles of 1574 and the electoral Saxon campaign of the mid-1570s to convince the public of the essential agreement between Melanchthon and Luther.1 Agreeing with those who held an essential, enduring agreement between Luther and Melanchthon but grounding their teaching to a much greater extent in Luther’s expression than Melanchthon’s at critical points were theologians like Martin Chemnitz and David Chytraeus, Paul von Eitzen and Jakob Runge.2 Finally, there were those who had, during the course of the 1550s, added critiques of the Preceptor’s views of the Lord’s Supper to their previous criticism of his role in the development of the Leipzig Diet Proposal of 1548 and the related controversy over compromise in adiaphora in a time of persecution. These former students of Melanchthon included Joachim Westphal, Nikolaus Gallus, Joachim Mörlin, and Tilemann Heshusius, 1 Kurtz Bekentnis vnd Artickel vom heiligen Abendmal des Leibs vnd Bluts Christi (Wittenberg, 1574), in: Dingel, 2008; 1090 – 1151. See Hund: 2006, 630 – 44; Hasse: 2000, 172 – 79; Dingel: 1999, 44 – 59. 2 David Chytraeus was the primary author of the Formula of Concord’s article VII, on the Lord’s Supper, BSLK, 970 – 1016, Book of Concord, 591 – 615. Martin Chemnitz was the major contributor to the Formula of Concord’s article VIII, on Christology, BSLK, 1017 – 49, Book of Concord, 616 – 34.

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among others; in the scholarship of the past two hundred years they have borne the designation “Gnesio-Lutheran.” Though within that party sharp disputes arose among its adherents from time to time, these theologians generally stood on the same side in the series of controversies within the Wittenberg circle during the quarter century following the Augsburg Interim. Against the background of these disputes the Gnesio-Lutheran examinations of their Praeceptor’s sacramental views, which form the focus of this study, unfolded.

1. The Mounting Storm The landscape on which this story played itself out was already dotted with a series of battlefields: over the Leipzig “Interim” and the related issues of the use of adiaphora, over the role of both confession of the faith and secular government in the life of the church, and over the role of good works in salvation. Developing roughly simultaneously with these critiques of Melanchthon’s teaching on Christ’s presence in the Lord’s Supper was the controversy over his views and those of some of his disciples regarding the freedom of the human will (Kolb: 2005, 103 – 34). Like Luther, Melanchthon continued throughout his life to experiment with the best expressions for his teaching. His formulation of the biblical doctrine of the Lord’s Supper changed in what Johannes Hund has set in three stages (Hund: 2006, 66 – 96). It seems clear that Melanchthon carefully gauged what he said and what he did not want to say, guided by both his convictions concerning Christ’s presence in the Supper and his desire to avoid controversy. But he failed to explain his position in a clear, convincing manner toward the end of his life. His artful ambiguity seems to have aimed at a unique position designed to reconcile divergent views through recourse to the Wittenberg Concord, but he failed in defining precisely what this position was. Thus, the critique of some of his students and the artful assimilation of his expressions into a framework governed by Luther’s understanding of the sacrament by others of his students left his position at the end of his life undeveloped. As in the case of others of these disputes of the 1550s, the differences between Melanchthon and his “Gnesio-Lutheran” students over the Lord’s Supper had been, in a limited fashion, anticipated by the discomfort Nikolaus von Amsdorf expressed over Philip’s and Martin Bucer’s formulation of the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper in the reforming constitution for the church of Köln published in September 1543 (Amsdorf ’s criticism can be deduced from several reports, see CR 5: 459, MBWR 4: 112, §3646; CR 5: 461 f., MBWR 4: 114 f., §3653, and WA Br 10: 614 – 18). Amsdorf ’s several unpublished criticisms of Melanchthon’s positions on a variety of issues in the 1530s and 1540s foreshadowed the very public disputes that rent the Wittenberg circle

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after Luther’s death, the Smalcald War, and the publication of the Leipzig Proposal for electoral Saxony religious policy of 1548. Several of Melanchthon’s devoted students joined Amsdorf in sharp critique of the Praeceptor’s pursuit of protection for the Wittenberg Reformation through concessions in practice and in some doctrinal formulations in that policy statement. Prominent among them, alongside Matthias Flacius and Nikolaus Gallus, was Joachim Westphal of Hamburg, who helped organize the series of criticisms of the Leipzig Proposal. For example, he assembled a collection of citations from Luther to assail the Leipzig Proposal (Westphal: 1549, 1550; see Dingel: 2005, 32 – 50).

2. Joachim Westphal’s Critique of Melanchthon’s Doctrine of Christ’s Presence Westphal, pastor in Hamburg since 1541, initiated the first serious confrontation between Lutherans and Swiss theologians over the Lord’s Supper following Luther’s attack on Heinrich Bullinger, Ulrich Zwingli’s successor in Zurich, and others in his Short Confession of 1544 (Kurzes Bekenntnis vom heiligen Sakrament, WA 54: 141 – 67, LW 38: 287 – 319). In 1552 the appearance of the text of the Consensus Tigurinus of 1549 (Consensus Tigurinus: 2009, see Bizer : 1940/1962, 243 – 74; Rorem: 1988, 155 – 84, 357 – 89) in print raised anew the issue of the definition of Christ’s presence in the Lord’s Supper. The Consensus represented the agreement of the theologians of Zurich and Geneva on the Lord’s Supper, in which Calvin had rejected some expressions he had previously employed, formulations which seemed close to a Lutheran position. Melanchthon himself apparently expressed his dissatisfaction or disappointment with the position of the Consensus on the reprobation of the ungodly ; Calvin’s reaction to this critique did not comment on any associated rejection of its teaching on the Lord’s Supper (Calvin’s letter to Melanchthon, 28 November 1552, MBWR 6: 386, §6655, Bds., 334). When the text of the Consensus began to circulate in those Hansa cities with English commercial connections, including Hamburg and Bremen, particularly in the form of an appendix to a treatise by Jan a Lasco, pastor in London (a Lasco: 1552), the document evoked the attention of the Lutheran leadership in these two cities. Westphal’s response to the document (Westphal: 1552, cf. Bizer : 1940/1962, 275 – 84; Tylenda: 1974), his Assortment of Confused and Mutually Contradictory Opinions on the Lord’s Supper, gathered and rebutted various and varying statements on the Lord’s Supper from several Zwinglian and Calvinist theologians. Westphal reinforced his position in the following three years,3 3 Westphal: 1553, 1555b, 1555c. See Janse: 2008; this article exaggerates the amount of agreement between Westphal and Calvin; see Dingel: 2010.

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and in late 1556 he responded to an inquiry regarding Melanchthon’s position on the issue with an open letter filled with citations from Melanchthon’s pen (Westphal: 1557c). By October of 1556 the lines of division which separated former friends among the disciples of Luther and Melanchthon into two camps were hardening. In addition to the rejection of the compromises associated with the Leipzig Proposal and of Georg Major’s insistence on “the necessity of good works for salvation,” which had animated Westphal, Flacius, Gallus, and others, Gallus was engaging Melanchthon in an epistolary exchange by this time over the freedom of the will (Kolb: 2000, 90 – 94). We cannot know to what extent Westphal knew about that dispute, at the time still private, which his friend and their common mentor were conducting. But in regard to the Lord’s Supper, Westphal claimed Melanchthon for his own position, which he regarded as Luther’s position, the teaching that he believed both his Wittenberg professors had propagated while he studied under them in 1529 – 1532, 1534 – 1535, and 1537 – 1540. Twice recommended for positions by Melanchthon,4 Westphal presumed he knew what his Praeceptor had taught. Westphal did not lay out his own teaching on the Lord’s Supper in this treatise. In his own writings he employed and developed Luther’s Christological defense of the possibility that Christ’s body and blood could be present in the elements of the Lord’s Supper to a greater extent than most of the Wittenberg students (Mahlmann: 1969, esp. 37 – 61, 126 – 37, 198 – 204; see Luther’s Vom Abendmahl Christi, Bekenntnis [1528], WA 26: 209,27 – 249,28 , LW 37: 209 – 35). This issue had brought him into conflict with a leading preacher in the allied city of Bremen, Albert Hardenberg, a former student and epistolary friend of Melanchthon. Hardenberg’s doctrine of the Lord’s Supper followed Martin Bucer’s in a spiritualizing direction (Janse: 1994). Hardenberg became locked in a battle within the Bremen ministerium with his colleague, the Lutheran Johannes Timann, whom Westphal supported. The friendship of Hardenberg and Melanchthon, combined with Melanchthon’s own fear of a superstitious use of material elements, including the elements of the sacrament, led the Praeceptor to distance himself from Westphal’s views of the Lord’s Supper. Noticeable first in 1554, Melanchthon’s accusation that Westphal was a bread-worshipper, guilty of !qtokatqe_a, rang through a number of his letters, particularly to Hardenberg.5

4 As teacher in Hamburg, 14 January 1532, MBWR 2: 56, §1211, MBWT 5: 241 f., CR 2: 565, §1029, and as professor in Rostock, Sillem: 1903, 29, but at the same time came a call to Hamburg, Vogt: 1966, 204 f. 5 Melanchthon’s letter of 14 October 1554, implicates but does not name Westphal as one who is renewing strife over \qtokatqe_a, MBWR 7: 241, §7306, CR 8: 362, §5675; cf. letters to Hardenberg which at first did not name but implied the same criticism of Westphal, e. g., 21 August 1555, MBWR 7: 334, §7559, CR 8: 524 f., §5828; 14 September 1556, MBWR 7: 481, §7950, CR 8:

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Westphal’s published treatise does not indicate to what extent he might have known of Melanchthon’s contacts with Calvin and Bullinger in this time,6 and thus to what extent his presentation of Melanchthon’s earlier position as that to which he still held fast, was forthright, or to what extent it was a rhetorical ploy. As the Hamburg pastor wrote this treatise as an open letter to an anonymous friend in October 1556, Westphal had already published more than ten examinations of the “sacramentarian” position (Westphal: 1552, 1555a, 1557a. 1557b, 1557d, 1557e, 1557 f, 1558a, 1558b, 1558c, 1558d). Calvin had replied in three publications of his own.7 In 1558 he called upon Melanchthon to state his position on the presence of Christ in the Supper clearly, agreeing to accept his Wittenberg correspondent’s view as his own (in a letter of 19 November 1558, MBWR 8: 287, §8782, Bds., 435 – 38, §448, CR 45/ CO 17: 384 ff.). Westphal obliged in his Clarissimi Viri Philippi Melanthonis sententia de Coena Domini. ex scriptis eius collecta a Joachimo Westphalo … (1557c), summarizing and reprinting significant citations that demonstrated Melanchthon’s agreement with Westphal’s own view. As he understood Melanchthon, Westphal believed that he was doing no more than reproducing Luther’s and Melanchthon’s common, shared teaching as he had learned it from them twenty years earlier. Designating as “Zwinglian” all those who disagreed with Luther’s teaching regarding the true presence of Christ’s body and blood, received through the mouth with the bread and wine, by the pious and impious alike, Westphal claimed Philip for his own teaching and presented evidence from familiar texts. He began with the Praeceptor’s letter to Johannes Oecolampadius of April 1529, some six months before their meeting in Marburg. Melanchthon had there rejected a separation of the divine and human natures that led to a definition of the elements as only representations of his absent body (MBWR 1:335, §775, MBWT 3:487 – 95, CR 1:1048 ff., §598). This epistle affirmed that the sacrament is a joimym_a with the presence of Christ’s body, and this presence cannot be understood with “geometry,” with academic or rational explanations, but only on the basis of God’s Word. In support of this teaching Melanchthon cited the testimony of ancient fathers of the church (Melanch-

577 ff., §5840; 18 April 1557, MBWR 8: 62, §8195, CR 9: 137 f., §6239; MBWR 8: 70, §8219, CR 9: 154, §6247; 20 June 1557, MBWR 8: 82, §8254, CR 9: 167, §6264. 6 E.g., Melanchthon explained to Calvin that he was more concerned about Trinitarian teaching than those who were renewing the battle over !qtokatqe_a, 14 October 1554; cf. his letter of 12 May 1555, to Calvin, MBWR 7: 310, §7489, CR 8: 482 f., §5783. He wrote to Bullinger, 8 August 1555, that others were writing against him on the subject of !qtokatqe_a, MBWR 7: 334, §7558, CR 8: 523 f., §5827; cf. letters of March 3, 1556, MBWR 7:404 f., §7747, Bds., 383 f., §401. 7 These include Defensio sanae et orthodoxae doctrinae de sacramentis eorumque vi fine usu et fructu quam pastores et ministri Tigurinae ecclesiae et Genevensis ante hac brevi Consensionis mutuae formula complexi sunt (1555), CR 37/CO 9: 1 – 40; Secunda defensio piae et orthodoxae de sacramentis fidei contra Ioachimi Westphali calumnias (1556), CR 37/CO 9: 41 – 120, Ultima admonitio ad Ioachimum Westphalum (1557), CR 37/CO 9: 137 – 252.

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thon: 1530, A1b-A6a). Westphal’s second source was Melanchthon’s letter to Friedrich Myconius which had served as a preface to his Sententiae veterum de coena domini of early 1530 (Melanchthon: 1530). In this letter Melanchthon again called on patristic testimony to conclude that “the body and blood of Christ are truly present in the Supper.” He rejected any interpretation of the words of institution as a sign of an absent body or as a trope, metaphor, hyperbole, or allegory. This letter clearly stated Melanchthon’s critique of Carlstadt. Westphal added his own observation, “and if Calvin would read this letter, he could not ignore the proper meaning” of the confession which Melanchthon wrote at Augsburg a few months later (Melanchthon: 1530, A6aA8b; the letter is in MBWR 1: 861 f., §863, MBWT 4/1: 42 – 50, CR 2:29 – 32, §674). The intended sense of the Augsburg Confession is also made clear by the Apology, Westphal argued, which affirmed its doctrine of the presence of Christ in the sacrament and added that the body and blood of Christ are substantially present and distributed [Westphal paraphrased “exhibere” with “dispensentire”] in the Lord’s Supper. “There is indeed reason to wonder why Calvin and a Lasco separate the Augsburg Confession and the Apology,” Westphal observed, especially since Melanchthon’s name is directly associated with the Apology, not the Confession (Melanchthon, 1530: A8b-B3a [=B2a]). (It indeed may be the case that Calvin recognized that only the Augsburg Confession had more formal, if not yet in imperial law fully legal, status – and the Apology did not –, whereas Westphal recognized that among German adherents of the Augsburg Confession it was already being linked with the Apology in a “body of doctrine,” an “analogia fidei,” as it had been in Wittenberg since the early 1530s (Dingel: 2012a). It may also be that Calvin preferred the text of the Variata of the Augsburg Confession to that of the Apology. In the following years Melanchthon subscribed to the Smalcald Articles, Westphal continued with its explicit avowal that “the bread and the wine in the Supper are the true body and blood of Christ” (BSLK 450, Book of Concord 320). At Regensburg in 1540 Melanchthon had reaffirmed the doctrine in the Augsburg Confession and Apology that Christ’s body and blood are substantially present in the Lord’s Supper (Melanchthon: 1530, B3a [B2a]B2a [B3a]). At Regensburg the following year the theologians from Wittenberg confessed to Elector Friedrich of the Palatinate and Nicolaus Granvella, Charles V’s state secretary, that they “retain and defend the teaching of the catholic church that in the Lord Supper after the consecration the body and blood of Christ are truly and substantially present in the bread and wine and are eaten there, and we do not agree with those who deny that the true body and blood of Christ are present and eaten; especially we abhor that opinion, which comes from human reason alone and apart from the Word” (Melanchthon:1530, B2b [=B3b]). Westphal refuted the “idle talk” that claimed that Melanchthon had changed his views after Luther died by citing the Saxon Confession of 1551. In its preface

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Philip had stated that the confession simply repeated what the Augsburg Confession had said. He affirmed not only its teaching about the use of the Eucharist but also its substance.8 In the preface to the seventh volume of Luther’s Works, which Melanchthon composed in 1554, he commended the doctrine of Prince Georg of Anhalt, which, he said, agreed with Luther’s (Melanchthon’s preface, MBWR 7: 150, §7058, CR 8: 201 – 10, §5524; cf. von Anhalt: 1551, with several subsequent editions, and Dingel: 1996, 282 ff.). The previous year Georg had issued a book on the sacrament of the altar in which he had refuted both the papists’ and the sacramentarians’ doctrines of the sacrament. There the prince had stated that Christ’s body and blood are given to be eaten “by our mouth” and his blood given to be drunk by the communicants. Georg had rejected spiritual reception of the Supper as the explanation of Christ’s presence there and insisted that the body and blood of Christ are distributed to the worthy and unworthy through the body’s mouth. Westphal concluded that those who say that while the mouth eats the bread and drinks the wine, the spirit enjoys the body and blood in faith, are casting shadows over the true meaning of Christ’s words and the consensus of the catholic church (Melanchthon: 1530, B6a–B7b). Also in his Examen ordinandorum, which Westphal dated to 1554, the year of the publication of its Latin translation, Melanchthon had affirmed the teaching of Scripture, the ancient creeds, Luther’s catechism and confession (presumably his Smalcald Articles), and the Augsburg Confession. In the Examen the Praeceptor had further thanked God for the harmony of the churches in Lower Saxony. They included not only Mecklenburg’s but also those of Lübeck, Hamburg, and Lüneburg, which Westphal had represented in the dispute over the Lord’s Supper in the years preceding 1554. In the Examen the candidates for ordination are asked, “What is distributed and received in the Lord’s Supper?” Melanchthon’s answer : “the true body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. For the Lord Jesus Christ instituted this meal, as he testified, that he might be truly and substantially among us and in us, and he wishes to dwell in the reborn, to communicate his benefits to them and be efficacious in them, as he says in John 15[:4], ‘you remain in me, and I in you’” (Melanchthon: 1530, B8a–b). It was too early in the dispute within the Wittenberg circle for Westphal to notice the significance of the absence of specific words defining this true and substantial presence as that of Christ’s body and blood rather than simply of the person of the God-man. Beyond these public statements Westphal also repeated the testimony that Philip had offered to a “master, a son of this city,” Hamburg, who adhered to 8 Ibid., B5a–B5b; cf. Confessio Saxonica, 1551, MSA 6: 87 – 88, on the validity of the sacrament only in its use, the text of the confession, 130, where it states, “Docentur etiam homines Sacramenta esse actiones divinitus institutas, et extra usum institutum res ipsas non habere rationem Sacramenti, sed in usu instituto in hac communione vere et substantialiter adesse Christum et vere exhiberi sumentibus corpus et sanginem Christi, Christum testari, quod sit in eis, et faciat eos sibi membra, et quod abluerit eos sanguine suo.” See Dingel (2012b).

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the same teaching to which Westphal adhered. In 1555 Melanchthon had congratulated him on the confession of the city and said that the light of the gospel was shining without any corruptions in the city. How would that be possible, Westphal asked readers, if the city’s doctrine of the Lord’s Supper was false? Westphal concluded his letter to his anonymous friend with an appeal to Melanchthon to repudiate the abuse of his name, his patience, and his silence by the sacramentarians, who were perpetrating this abuse, and thereby to save the church from the very serious danger being done by their lies about him.9 Despite his sharp public disagreement with Melanchthon on the Leipzig Proposal and with his Wittenberg colleague Georg Major on the necessity of good works for salvation, Westphal still strove to enlist Melanchthon for his own cause in the exchange with Calvin which he was conducting in 1556. Whether he knew that Melanchthon’s formulations had led him to a different position in the public discussion of the Lord’s Supper than he had occupied in the 1530s, when Westphal studied under him, is not clear. By the time of this tract’s appearance Melanchthon had already begun to express his irritation with his former student turned critic in private correspondence. To what extent Caspar Peucer’s selection of the epistolary legacy of his father-in-law has shaped our perception of the aging Melanchthon will never be known (Wengert: 1996, 60 f. on Peucer’s editorial work), but prominent among those whose letters have been preserved is the Praeceptor’s exchange with Albert Hardenberg, a key figure in the unfolding controversy over the Lord’s Supper within the Wittenberg circle. Locked in struggle with Timann, Hardenberg had drawn Melanchthon into their feud as early as August 1554 (Melanchthon’s letter to Hardenberg, 29 August 1554, MBWR 7: 227, §7274, CR 8: 336, §5658). A year later Melanchthon linked his critics who defended !qtokatqe_a with those Stoics who rejected his view of the freedom of the will in a letter to Hardenberg (21 August 1555, MBWR 7: 334, §7559, CR 8: 524, §5828). In June 1556 he referred Hardenberg to Hugo, Paschasius, Vigilius Martyr, and Lombard on the location of Christ’s body (17 June 1556, MBWR 7: 446, §7862, CR 8: 782, §6014) and sought his support when the Danish chancellor Johan Friis appealed to Duke Christoph to condemn those who did not approve !qtokatqe_a (20 June 1556, MBWR 7: 448, §7867, CR 8: 786, §6018). He reported to Hardenberg that Flacius had written him concerning his openly-expressed suspicions regarding !qtokatqe_a (7 September 1556, MBWR 7: 479, §7946, CR 8: 845, §6069). Melanchthon brought his opponents into association with the Christology of Andreas Osiander (14 September 1556, MBWR 7: 479, §7946, CR 8: 845, §6069; cf. his letter to Christoph Stathmion, pastor in Coburg, 4 July 1556, MBWR 7: 9 Melanchthon: 1530, C1b-C3b. Westphal appended a letter from Johannes Brenz to Jan a Lasco from 2 September 1556, which Brenz had apparently shared with him. In addition, the concluding pages presented five very brief citations on the combating of error from patristic authors.

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453 f., §7883, CR 8: 790 f., §6024). The Praeceptor expressed his concern to Hardenberg that the colloquy at Worms, scheduled for September 1557, would raise the issue of !qtokatqe_a and of “ubiquity,” p\mtawor. (9 March 1557, MBWR 8: 46, §8151, CR 9: 115, §6208 and 4 April 1557, MBWR 8: 62, §8195, CR 9: 137 f., §6230) After Worms his concern about “bread worship” did not diminish (letters to Hardenberg of 20 February and 20 March 1559, MBWR 8: 316, §8865, CR 8: 676 f., §5928, and MBWR 328 f., §8896; cf. CR 9: 783 f., §6713). Melanchthon’s sympathy for and support of Hardenberg in his battle with Timann found echoes in his correspondence with others as well (e. g., his letter to Christoph Leib of Brandenburg town, 6 March 1557, MBWR 8: 45, §8148, CR 9: 113, §6206). By May 1557 he had begun explicitly to mention Westphal as his foe, specifically regarding the phrase, “outside the use there is no sacrament” (in letters to Hardenberg, 20 June 1557, MBWR 8: 82, §8254, CR 9: 167, §6264, Heinrich Buscoducensis in Copenhagen, 22 May 1557, MBWR 8: 72 f. §8226, CR 9: 156, §6250; Christoph Leib, 3 June 1557, MBWR 8: 79, §8246, CR 8: 496, § 5799; and Johann Mathesius, 30 July 1557, MBWR 8: 95, §8288, CR 9: 188 f., §6291). In a memorandum to Philip of Hesse regarding the Weimar Book of Confutation of 20 March 1559, he condemned Westphal for calling the martyrs in England “the devil’s martyrs” (31 July 1559, MWBR 8: 330, §8898, CR 9: 778 – 81, §6710, 779; cf. a letter to Joachim Camerarius, 8 October 1559, MBWR 8: 397, §9088, CR 9: 942, §6838). Writing to Adam Curaeus, pastor in Breslau, he condemned Westphal’s defense of the true presence of Christ’s body and blood in the Supper with an argument from his omnipresence (MBWR 8: 369, §9014, CR 9: 850 f., §6792, where the addressee is identified as the Brandenburg pastor Georg Buchholzer). In this letter he also brushed aside “the [unspecified] demands of [Leonhardt] Stöckel and your [Johannes] Praetorius” in regard to the Lord’s Supper. Leonhard Stöckel, Melanchthon’s former student and a leader of the church in Upper Hungary (Slovakia), had entered into dispute with Joachim Curaeus and Zacharias Ursinus in Breslau on the Lord’s Supper. A member of the city council, Johann Morenberg, sought Melanchthon’s opinion on that and other issues under discussion in the city. Melanchthon’s reply focused its attention on defending the proposition that nothing can be regarded as a sacrament apart from its instituted use, a principle Luther defended as well, he insisted. He implicitly associated the position which he attributed to the papal party, that mice can eat Christ’s body in the consecrated remnants, with Westphal and explicitly accused him of asserting that Christ’s body is in all places, in stones and wood. He rejected Stöckel’s suggestion that he and Westphal sit together so that he could improve his former student’s writings. He deplored idolatrous papist masses and Corpus Christi parades and the persecution of those in France, Italy, and England who opposed such practices (memorandum of 31 July 1559, MBWR 8: 370, §9015, CR 9: 847 – 50, §6791; in this letter Melanchthon urged the deposition

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of Praetorius). He completely avoided the heart of Morenberg’s inquiry, Christ’s presence in the sacrament. Westphal’s collection of Melanchthon citations did attract readers. Coelius Secundus Curio, professor of rhetoric in Basel, wrote Melanchthon 1 September 1557, expressing his disbelief that Melanchthon could have disapproved of the Swiss churches that followed Zwingli since he knew that the Praeceptor had expressed his conviction in his lectures on Colossians 3 that “Christ’s body is in one place, according to this epistle ….” (MBWR 8: 112, §8325, CR 9: 256 f., §6330; see Wengert: 2012b). Hieronymus Zanchi understood Melanchthon’s comments on Colossians 3:1 the same way (his letter to Melanchthon, 4 September 1557, MBWR 8: 113, §8326, Bds., 420, §432). Duke Christoph of Württemberg appealed to Melanchthon to refute the rumors that he was teaching that Christ’s two natures were divided after the ascension, with his human nature physically located only in the starry heavens at God’s right hand and only his divine nature present with the church on earth (MBWR 8: 409, §9121. Bds., 457 f., §463). It is unlikely that Melanchthon’s reply satisfied the court in Stuttgart since he expressed his wish to seek an opinion from the University of Paris on the communication of attributes, a faculty that had long since lost the respect of the Württemberg ecclesiastical establishment. He further deplored calling those who had died because they did not approve !qtokatqe_a “the devil’s martyrs.” But he avoided addressing Christoph’s concern, which arose out of the case of Bartholomäus Hagen, whose alleged Calvinism was at the time a critical issue in Württemberg (MBWR 8: 417, §9147. Bds., 459 – 460, §465). At the same time both Calvin and Bullinger were pressing their Wittenberg conversation partner to embrace their position on the Lord’s Supper openly, Calvin in print, Bullinger by letter (Calvin mentioned his citation of Melanchthon in his own defense in his Ultima admonitio ad Joachimum Westphalum, CR 37/CO 9: 137 – 252, and in a letter of 3 August 1557, MBWR 8: 97, §8291, Bds., 417 ff., §431; cf. Calvin’s letters to Melanchthon of 19 November 1558, MBW 8: 287, §8782, Bds., 435 – 38, §448; cf. also Bullinger’s letter of 27 October 1557, MBW 8: 148, §8408, Bds., 423 ff., §435). Others were circulating similar accusations, to the delight Melanchthon’s bÞte noir, Johann Agricola, according to a report of Georg Buchholzer (a letter to Melanchthon of 9 July 1559, MBWR 8: 363, §8996, Kawerau: 1881, 348 f.). It is noteworthy that in 1560 an anonymous booklet published in Nuremberg depicted the same Melanchthon as Westphal had in 1557, faithful to the end to the sacramental doctrine he had held and shared with Luther three decades earlier. This booklet cited many of the same documents Westphal had used to affirm his faithfulness to Luther’s teaching. “Master Theophilus N., a disciple of Philip Melanchthon” wrote in the preface that he had assembled this material because in writing and by mouth some were saying that Melanchthon “did not hold, teach, and believe, as the blessed Martin Luther and others did, that the body and blood of Christ are truly

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distributed and present with the visible elements of bread and wine.” The treatise was dedicated to the preservation of Melanchthon’s honor as a faithful teacher of the truth and honor of God (Melanchthon 1560a, A2a–b). The brief preface introduced Melanchthon’s letter of April 1529 to Oecolampadius, Melanchthon’s letter to Friedrich Myconius which served as a preface to his Sententiae veterum de coena domini of early 1530, article ten of the Unaltered Augsburg Confession, and an excerpt from the Apology’s tenth article as well as the article on the Lord’s Supper from the Smalcald Articles, the Mecklenburg Examen, and the Saxon Confession of 1551. This collection departed from Westphal’s with the addition of a brief quote from a letter to Erhard Schnepf of 1530, the text of the Wittenberg Concord, and letters to Martin Görlitz, pastor in Braunschweig of March 1530 (see Visitation Articles, WA 26: 213,19 – 31; the letter to Görlitz, MBWT 4: 112 – 15, §887, CR 2: 24 f., §671), to the preacher at the Wittenberg Castle church, and to Christoph Lasius, of 16 March 1546 (MBWR 4: 343, §4192, CR 9: 1086 ff., §6969). The treatise closes with a quotation of Melanchthon which rejected Zwingli’s teaching at Worms in 1557 and a few lines from his preface to the seventh volume of Luther’s Works, his reference to Georg von Anhalt’s stance on the Lord’s Supper (Melanchthon: 1560a, A3a-C3b). Christoph Heussler printed this pamphlet in Nuremberg; the “Wittemberg” on the cover page indicates Melanchthon’s location of work, not the place of publication.10 Precisely who might have prepared the volume is not clear, but it may reflect the tensions that broke into open dispute in Nuremberg two years later over, among other issues, the presence of Christ in the Lord’s Supper (Ilic: 2012, 160 – 63). Among the most ardent Gnesio-Lutherans the belief that Melanchthon had remained an adherent of Luther’s understanding of the presence of Christ’s body and blood in the sacrament did not disappear even after the voices of colleagues such as Tilemann Heshusius and Joachim Mörlin accused him of doing precisely that. About the time Heshusius and Johann Friedrich Coelestin became colleagues at the University of Jena, in 1568, the latter issued a critique of “Zwinglian” views of the Lord’s Supper. In it Coelestin asserted that Melanchthon had remained committed to the Augsburg Confession of 1530 and never became Zwinglian in his heart (Coelestin: 1568 or 1569, E1a).

10 According to the authority on sixteenth century German printing, Ulrich Kopp, of the Herzog August Bibliothek, Wolfenbüttel. Other publications published by Heussler in the 1560s did not come from Gnesio-Lutheran authors.

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3. Melanchthon’s Judgment on the Controversy over the Lord’s Supper On 20 July 1558 Melanchthon told Hardenberg of his fears that the ducal Saxon theologians would soon publish criticism of his positions on Stoic necessity, antinomianism, and !qtokatqe_a (MBWR 8: 243, §8666, CR 9: 575, §6558). But serious criticism of his understanding of the Lord’s Supper did not become public until more than a year later, when he entered into a dispute between his student and friend Tilemann Heshusius and Heshusius’ Palatine colleagues with leanings toward Geneva or Zurich. That caused several of Westphal’s Gnesio-Lutheran allies to abandon attempts to enlist Melanchthon as their ally ; they rejected the position he outlined in his memorandum to Elector Friedrich III of the Palatinate, Heshusius’ prince. Melanchthon’s friendship with Heshusius had lasted much longer than his friendships with Westphal and Mörlin, Gallus and Flacius. Heshusius had begun his studies in Wittenberg under Melanchthon’s tutelage after Luther’s death, in 1546, returning in 1549 after leaving the city during the Smalcald War. Melanchthon’s correspondence in the period leading up to Heshusius’ defense of what he thought was the Wittenberg teaching on the Lord’s Supper in 1559 had reflected a warm, mutually appreciative relationship between the two (letters from Melanchthon to Heshusius, 10 October 1553, MBWR 7: 125, §6987, CR 8: 159 f.0, §5478; 20 March 1554, MBWR 7: 172 f., §7122, Herzog August Bibliothek manuscript; 25 November 1555, MBWR 7: 366, §7644, CR 8: 616, §5875; 1 January 1558, MBW 8: 178, §8491, CR 9: 427, §6441; from Heshusius to Melanchthon, April 1556, MBWR 7: 422, §7798, Magdeburg LHA manuscript; 5 September 1558, MBW 8: 264, §8717, 12 August 1558, MBWR 8: 253, §8687, Herzog August Bibliothek, Wolfenbüttel, manuscript). Melanchthon had counted Heshusius on his side against the Gnesio-Lutherans (letters to Heshusius, of 1 June 1555, MBWR 7: 317, §7511, manuscript in the Hannover Landesbibliothek; 25 January 1559, MBWR 8: 308, §8841. CR 9: 733, §6679; 17 February 1559, MBWR 8: 316, §8863, CR 9: 742 f., §6690) and recommended his former student for positions, including one in Heidelberg in 1558 (e. g., his plans to recommend Heshusius as court preacher, in a letter to David Chytraeus, 18 June 1556, MBWR 7: 446, §7863, CR 8: 783, §6016; cf. a recommendation for service to King Christian III of Denmark, 22 April 1558, MBWR 8: 219, §8594, CR 9: 528, §6508). In the oration Melanchthon composed for delivery at the death of his colleague Johannes Bugenhagen in April 1558 he reported that Heshusius had visited Bugenhagen shortly before his death, and the two had had a good conversation (CR 12: 304). Melanchthon’s initial reaction to reports from Heidelberg in autumn 1559 that Heshusius was involved in a controversy over the Lord’s Supper was cautious but uneasy (letters to Johannes Aurifaber of Bratislava in Königsberg,

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10 October 1559, MBWR 8: 397, §9089, CR 9: 943 f., §6840; and to Peter Sicke in Königsberg, on the same day, MBWR 8: 398, §9091, CR 9: 942 f., §6839). Within a week he was accusing Heshusius of !qtokatqe_a and expressing regret that his student had not listened to him (letters to Jakob Runge, 18 October 1559, MBWR 8: 403, §9103, CR 9: 946 f., §6845; to Jacob Bording in Copenhagen, 26 October 1559, MBWR 8: 406, §9112, CR 9: 952 f., §6853; to Albert Hardenberg, 14 November 1559, MBWR 8: 412, §9131, CR 9: 971 f., §6865). A week thereafter he associated Heshusius’ position with Timann’s in Bremen, that “the bread is essentially body” (in a letter to Johannes Aurifaber, 1 November 1559, MBWR 8: 407 f., §9117, CR 9: 959 f., § 6860). On the same day he dispatched his memorandum for Elector Friedrich III of the Palatinate, in which he supported the prince against his former student (a letter of 1 November 1559, to Friedrich, MBWR 8: 408, §9118, CR 9: 960 f., §6861 A, with the memorandum text MBWR 8: 408, CR 9: 961 – 66, §6861B), whose understanding of the Lord’s Supper had now earned his enmity. This hostility matched the enmity he visited upon other former students and friends who were opposing their Praeceptor for views they believed he had developed in the past decade (expressed, e. g. in letters of 11 December 1559, to Georg Agricola in Amberg, MBWR 8: 415, §9141, CR 9: 978 f.; 15 December 1559, to Christoph Leib, MBWR 8: 423, §9165, CR 9: 669, §6647; 28 December 1559, to Jakob Runge, MBWR 8: 428, §9177, CR 9: 999 f., §6892; 1 January 1560, and several to Albert Hardenberg, MBWR 8: 430, §9182, CR 9: 1022 f.; 5 January 1560, MBWR 8: 432, §9190, CR 9: 1027, §6905; 12 January 1560, MBWR 8: 434, §9196, CR 9: 1029 f., §6908; 9 February 1560, MBWR 8: 444, §9226, CR 9: 1046, §6927; 30 March 1560, MBWR 8: 462, § 9277, CR 9: 1081 f., §6962). Melanchthon’s accompanying letter commended the elector for silencing both parties to end the dispute and supported the search for a form of true teaching that would pass on an unambiguous resolution of the dispute to posterity (CR 9: 960 f.; the elector published the letter and memorandum as Melanchthon: 1560b). He began by noting that it was not difficult but was dangerous to respond since controversy over the Lord’s Supper had spread throughout the world. He laid as the foundation for his position 1 Corinthians 10:16, the bread which we break is “joimym_a 5sti toO s~lator.” That word should not be understood as indicating a change in the nature of the bread, as the Papists say, he asserted. Nor should it be said, “as do those in Bremen [Timann and his supporters] that the bread is the substantial body of Christ, nor … as Heshusius, that the bread is the true body of Christ.” Rather, it is the association (consociatio) with Christ’s body, the “joimym_a,” which takes place in its actual sacramental use, not in such a way that mice could eat Christ’s body in the bread. Melanchthon did not meet squarely Heshusius’ concerns in his critique of the positions he was opposing in Heidelberg but rather associated his teaching and that of Braunschweig pastor Joachim Mörlin with the “papist” teaching, quoting Mörlin as saying, “you dare not say, ‘mum, mum,’ but say what the priest has there in his hand” (CR 9: 961 f.) If accurately

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quoted, these words seem to confirm Melanchthon’s concern regarding the use of the sacrament as determining its sacramental force; the point of his criticism seems unclear. Appealing to his declaration on the Lord’s Supper in the Examen Ordinandum for Mecklenburg, Melanchthon focused on the efficacy of the sacrament in believers, repeating his much-favored expression that Christ is present in the sacrament, not for the sake of the bread but for the sake of the people. Christ is present because he told his people that they should remain in him as he remains in them (John 15:4, 17:21) (CR 9: 962 f.). Melanchthon rejected Heshusius’ rejection of the Fathers’ labeling the bread and wine “s}lboka” of the body and blood of Christ and accused him of introducing “new dogma.”

4. Joachim Mörlin’s Critique of Melanchthon’s Doctrine of Christ’s Presence Heshusius and others who supported him reacted to the publication of this letter, not only because of what it stated but above all because of what it did not say, giving room for the elector’s own interpretation of the presence of Christ in the sacrament. Coming to Heshusius’ support were several GnesioLutherans. Joachim Mörlin would play a vital role in the Lower Saxon ministeria’s rejection of Hardenberg’s position on the Lord’s Supper in 1561 with the Lüneburg Declaration (Lower Saxon Ministeria: 1562). In 1565 he would label as “Landlügen” [“notorious lie”] the Heidelberg efforts to spread the idea that Luther had changed his position on the Lord’s Supper at the end of his life (Mörlin: 1565). Mörlin had studied under Melanchthon and Luther, 1532 – 1540. In the frontlines against Andreas Osiander in Königsberg he had commanded Melanchthon’s respect, admiration, and assistance in finding a new position when Duke Albrecht exiled this recalcitrant critic of his favorite, Osiander, in 1553.11 Melanchthon asked his colleague Paul Eber to give Tübingen professor Jakob Beurlin either his own or Bugenhagen’s copy of Mörlin’s Historia of the Osiandrian controversy (letter of 24 May 1554, MBWR 7: 197, §7190, CR 8: 294, §5609; cf. Mörlin; 1554; see Wengert: 2012a). Mörlin 11 Bugenhagen and Melanchthon were concerned about Mörlin, their “amicus carissimus,” in a letter of 25 March 1553, MBWR 7: 47, §6771, CR 8: 52 f., §5352. Melanchthon wrote to Sebastian Ersam in Lübeck, recommending Mörlin as the city’s ecclesiastical superintendent, 25 April 1553, MBWR 7: 61, §6808 and to Erasmus Sarcerius, expressing his support for Mörlin’s candidacy should Sarcerius not accept the post, 26 March 1553, MBWR 7: 48, §6774, Halle, Francke Archiv, MS. Melanchthon asked Chemnitz to greet Mörlin, 8 July 1555, MBWR 7: 324, §7530, Bds., 375 f., §393.

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addressed Melanchthon as his “carissime domine praeceptor” on 12 November 1555 (MBWR 7: 362, §7631; Clemen: 1938, 113 f.). This relationship dissolved no later than the colloquy in Worms in August and September 1557 when Mörlin, representing the city of Braunschweig, along with Erasmus Sarcerius of Mansfeld, another formerly close associate of the Praeceptor, sided with Melanchthon’s ducal Saxon antagonists (von Bundschuh: 1988, 240 ff., 272, 274, 411 f., 417 – 25). Melanchthon held Mörlin responsible for the defense of what he perceived as !qtokatqe_a in a work by Tilemann Krag, superintendent of the church in Hildesheim (letter to Hardenberg, 18 September 1558, MBWR 8: 268, §8730, CR 9: 616 f., §6601, cf. Krag: 1558). As ducal and electoral Saxon theologians continued to seek unity in contrary ways, Mörlin aided Flacius’ allies in constructing the ducal Saxon Book of Confutation in 1558. When it appeared in February 1559, Melanchthon attributed it to Flacius, Sarcerius, and Mörlin (letter to Hardenberg, 2 February 1559, MBWR 8: 310, §8847, CR 9: 735, §6682). In the last days of his life Melanchthon complained of Mörlin, associating him with Flacius and his followers (letters to Jakob Runge, 14 April 1560, MBWR 8: 468 f., §9296, CR 9: 1094 f., §6974, and to Duke Albrecht of Prussia, 15 April 1560; MBWR 8: 469, §9297, CR 9: 1095 ff., §6975). Since Melanchthon had directly attacked him, associating him with the Roman Catholic view of the sacrament, Mörlin apparently felt obligated to respond. He noted that the letter to Friedrich III was published under Melanchthon’s name, and whether that claim was accurate or not, he would address its contents. He first addressed the issue of his own person, affirming that he remained Luther’s “ex professo discipel,” and would only teach what he had learned from Luther. Therefore, he had admonished all to state clearly what is received by communicants in the sacrament – what is in the hand of the person distributing the elements and what is received through the mouth by the communicant. Without using the Latin term, he insisted on the manducatio oralis (Mörlin: 1560, A2a-A3a). With Luther, Mörlin opposed “Zwinglian arguments” which argued that the “power” of Christ’s body is all that is present in the Lord’s Supper, or that Christ’s human body ascended to heaven and so only his divine power remains on earth. That idea he rejected as a similar point of view to that of the “papists’” devotion in front of statuary since both tied Christ to a specific place, the far reaches of heaven or in idols cut from wood. That was part of his reaction, Mörlin explicitly stated, against the false charge that he shared the papists’ position that outside the use of the sacraments the elements enclose Christ’s body and blood and that they should be adored and paraded through the streets. He regarded this statement of Melanchthon’s as unjust and a violation of his reputation. For, he claimed, he had always taught that outside its instituted use there is no sacrament and that in its use bread and wine are present as are the body and blood of Christ, “which were given and shed for us on the cross” “in an incomprehensible and supernatural manner.” Without doubt the elements are “the true essential

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body and blood of Christ.” Mörlin based this teaching on Christ’s words of institution and deduced from them that both believers and unbelievers receive Christ’s body in the consecrated elements (Mörlin: 1560, A3a–B1a). He thus affirmed the manducatio impiorum on the basis that Christ’s institution, not the faith of the believer, enables his body and blood to be present in the sacrament. Mörlin rejected the charge that he taught a local inclusion of the body in the bread and the omnipresence of Christ’s body. He appealed to the ancient Fathers, as their opinions had been gathered by Martin Chemnitz, his coadjutor in the church of Braunschweig (Mörlin: 1560, B1b). This probably refers to Chemnitz’s patristic study that began appearing in print in his critique of Hardenberg the next year (Chemnitz: 1561). To the memorandum’s dictum that preachers should dwell on the benefits of the Supper and not the question of whether Christ’s body is present Mörlin responded that this only confuses the laity : it raises the question of what Christ’s testament really bequeaths to those who receive it. Melanchthon’s statements seemed to Mörlin to separate the reception of the Supper from its benefits. They posed a threat to those who might receive the sacrament without understanding what it is (1 Cor. 11:27) and directed those who learn Luther’s catechism away from what it was intended to teach (Mörlin: 1560, B2a–b). Mörlin appended to his arguments an excerpt from Luther’s open letter to the people of Frankfurt am Main of 1533, warning against those who deny the presence of Christ’s body and blood in the Lord’s Supper (Mörlin: 1560, B3b-B4a; cf. WA 30,3: 558 – 71).

5. Nikolaus Gallus’s Critique of Melanchthon’s Doctrine of Christ’s Presence Regensburg ecclesiastical superintendent Nikolaus Gallus also intervened in the conflict between Melanchthon and Heshusius. In 1553 Gallus had actually entered into the dispute between Westphal and Calvin with his own new edition of Melanchthon’s citations on the Lord’s Supper from patristic sources, which he had composed in opposition to Johannes Oecolampadius in 1530. Melanchthon labeled this an affront as he exchanged letters with Gallus concerning a series of their disagreements in late 1556.12 By that time 12 See Gallus‘ letter of 9 November 1556, MBWR 7: 508, §8017, CR 8: 895 – 902, esp. 899 f., in which he tells Melanchthon that others suspect him of abandoning the earlier Wittenberg teaching on Christ’s presence in the sacrament, and Melanchthon’s reply of 1 December 1556, MBWR 7: 518 f., § 8042, CR 8: 915 ff., §6127, in which Melanchthon comments that he has kept silence out of fear of malicious misinterpretation, as Gallus’ foreword in 1553 had demonstrated. Gallus appealed to Melanchthon to republish the Sententia to refute Zwinglian claims that he supported their position, in a letter to Melanchthon on 12 January 1557, MBWR 8: 22, §8089, CR 8: 930 – 35, §6137.

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the two were trading charges regarding the bondage and freedom of the will as well, first in private correspondence, then in published tracts (Kolb: 2000). The electoral Palatine court had published a German translation of Melanchthon’s letter to Friedrich and his memorandum, and Gallus reissued it with annotations in November 1560 (Gallus: 1560). Like the Palatine government and Mörlin, he brought the issue to the German-reading audience. On Melanchthon’s telling the elector that governmental authorities should not permit public disputes, Gallus commented sarcastically, “for the peace of the churches, errors are to be given free rein.” Implicitly, he was drawing a parallel to Melanchthon’s alleged seeking of middle ground on the Lord’s Supper to the Praeceptor’s position on adiaphora a decade earlier. Gallus interpreted Melanchthon’s urging that preachers from other lands be called to positions in the Palatine church as an opening for Zwinglians. He feared that the “clear form of doctrine” that Melanchthon anticipated these theologians creating foreshadowed the abandonment of the Augsburg Confession and the Smalcald Articles. The Praeceptor’s seeking “moderate counsel” meant for Gallus only the introduction of human opinions instead of Christ’s teaching (Gallus: 1560, A2b-A3b). A decade of bitterness born of mutual feelings of betrayal and deceit had created strong suspicions in both sides. Gallus did not interpret the memorandum with any greater charity. He attributed Melanchthon’s statement that found answering the elector’s request dangerous to the Preceptor’s desire to hide his turning to Calvinism (Gallus: 1560, A3b-A4a). Melanchthon’s advice to find a new, clear, certain form of expression seemed aimed only at a heretical compromise to Gallus. When Melanchthon appealed to the words of Saint Paul in 1 Corinthians 10:16, Gallus asked why he did not hold to Christ’s words of institution. While Gallus could affirm with Melanchthon that Paul did not say that the nature of the bread was transformed, he objected to the redefinition of the word joimym_a in order to deny that Paul spoke of the communion of bread and body, cup and blood. When Melanchthon attacked the view of the Lord’s Supper held by the theologians of Bremen and Heshusius, Gallus asked why he had not also included “Christ,” since those theologians had, with Luther, the Augsburg Confession, and the Smalcald Articles, only repeated Christ’s words, “this is my body.” That meant not a fabricated or figurative body, but the “true, essential body, the body that was given for us.” He cited Luther in his Small Confession regarding the Lord’s Supper (“the true natural body of Christ”), the Smalcald Articles, “to which Philip himself subscribed” (“the true body of Christ”) as well as the Augsburg Confession and the Apology. These words should govern the interpretation of the “communion of the bread with Christ’s body.” Furthermore, Gallus regarded as unjust Melanchthon’s implicit suggestion that his former students shared the same position as the Roman Catholics on the presence of Christ’s body and blood with the elements outside

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their instituted use. Melanchthon knew better, Gallus charged (Gallus: 1560, B1a–B3b). In an annotation to Melanchthon’s allegation that Mörlin and Sarcerius indeed held idolatrous views like their Roman opponents, Gallus also expressed his indignation that Melanchthon should be so dishonest. He found the Praeceptor’s mentioning the question whether the body of Christ comes into the recipient’s stomach a Zwinglian trick to misrepresent what Christ does in the sacrament. He expressed his preference for the “form of words” used by Christ to that of Melanchthon’s Examen Ordinandum and suggested that readers should examine that text because the Praeceptor’s preferring it to the Augsburg Confession, the common confession of “our churches,” might indicate that it was designed to lead people away from the Confession’s position. He found Melanchthon’s statement that the Supper was given for the sake of people, not for the sake of bread, “poisonous and cynical” and Philip’s general approach aimed at a spiritualizing interpretation of the presence of Christ in the sacrament (Gallus: 1560, B3a-C1a); Gallus further objected to Melanchthon’s misrepresentation of his comrades’ views (C1bC2b, D1b-D2b). Gallus dismissed Melanchthon’s patristic argument with a simple appeal to the words of Christ and Paul, but then, in the longest single section of his annotations, he looked carefully at the references from the ancient fathers, whom Melanchthon had cited in some detail, to demonstrate that they in fact did not contradict the teaching of the Gnesio-Lutherans (Gallus: 1560, C3a-D1b). Gallus was not about to abandon the ancient fathers to the sacramentarians. At the end of his annotations Gallus concluded that “we do not have to believe just Calvin anymore; we can believe [Melanchthon] himself” that he shared Calvin’s position on the Lord’s Supper. Calvin had made that claim two years earlier, Gallus stated, probably in a reference to Calvin’s assertion in his Ultima Admonitio. Respect for Melanchthon’s person had created a conspiracy of silence regarding his abandonment of the Augsburg Confession, Gallus asserted. His own feelings of betrayal by his Praeceptor, which had shaped his rejection of the Leipzig Proposal a decade earlier, and his disappointment and anger in what he viewed as Philip’s intentional misrepresentation of his comrades, emerge clearly from his sadness sketched at the end of his comments (Gallus: 1560, E1a-E3a). He added quotations from Luther to undergird his case in various ways at the conclusion of the treatise, adding his own comments to insure that readers understood the significance of Luther’s words for the present case (Gallus: 1560, E3b-F2a).

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6. Tilemann Heshusius’ Critique of Melanchthon’s Doctrine of Christ’s Presence Heshusius’ own reply to Melanchthon was published in Latin though a series of his expressions of the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper appeared in print in German about this time, both general treatments (Heshusius: 1560a, 1560c; see Steinmetz: 1990, 172 – 86) and one in opposition to Hardenberg specifically (Heshusius: 1560b). His response was more extensive than those of Gallus and Mörlin, in part because it contained details about his disagreement with the Zwinglian and Calvinist theologians in Heidelberg, his colleagues in the electoral Palatinate religious establishment. He accorded special mention to Wilhelm Klebitz, his deacon whose removal from office provoked electoral intervention, and also to the court preacher Michael Diller ; Peter Boquin, professor in Heidelberg; and Stephan Zirler, the elector’s private secretary, prominent in Friedrich’s shift in religious policy, who had made contact with Melanchthon, his wife’s great-uncle, to obtain the Praeceptor’s memorandum opposing Heshusius (Heshusius: 1560d; Melanchthon’s letter and memorandum for the elector were reprinted on G1a-G3b; on the Heidelberg dispute, see Barton: 1972, 158 – 225; on Zirler [Cirler, Cirlerus], see Sturm: 1972: 221). At the end of his defense he accused the Palatine court of cruelty and criminality in sending into exile the superintendent in Kaiserslautern, Alceensis; the Heidelberg pastor Georg Kuhn; and the court preacher Otomar Stabius, without cause, simply because they would not embrace the sacramentarian lies, a typical Calvinist modus operandi throughout Germany wherever they attained power (Heshusius: 1560d: F2a–b). Heshusius’s sense of disappointment and puzzlement at what must have seemed like betrayal at the hands of his promoter and Praeceptor reveals itself in his comments on Melanchthon. He claimed to be following what Melanchthon had taught, for example, in his condemnation of the Zwinglians in the Frankfurt Recess of 155813 and in the Examen Ordinandum written in 1552 (though revised several times in the subsequent eight years).14 Heshusius also appealed to the 13 Heshusius: 1560d, A3a: “Abscheid der evangelischen Chur- und Fu[e]rsten in Religionssachen zu Frankfurt am Mayn aufgerichtet, anno 1558,” CR 9: 499 f.: “Vom wahrhaftigen Sacrament in unsern Kirchen. Von diesem Artikel soll gelehrt werden, wie in der Augsburg Confession bekannt wird. Na[e]mlich, daß in dieser, des Herrn Christi, ordnung seines Abendmahls, er wahrhaftig, lebendig, wesentlich und gegenwa[e]rtig sey, auch mit Brod und Wein also von ihm geordnet, uns Christen sein Leib und Blut zu essen und zu trincken gegeben, und bezeuget hiermit, daß wir seine Gliedmaßen seyen, applicirt uns sich selbst und seine gna[e]dige Verheißung und wirkt in uns … Daß auch etliche dieses allein sagen, daß der Herr Christus nicht wesentlich da sey, und daß dieses Zeichen allein a[e]ußerliche Zeichen seyen. Dabei die Christen ihre Bekenntniß thun und zu kennen seyen, diese Reden sind unrecht.” See Dingel: 2012b. 14 Heshusius: 1560d, A3a–b: “In Coena Domini distribuitur & accipitur VERVM Corpus & VERUS Sanguis Christi.” Cf. CR 23:LXVI (the German from 1552), “Was wird im Abendmal des HERRN

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Examen’s preface, which requires adherence to the “catechism and confession of Luther and the confession presented to the emperor at Augsburg in 1530” (CR 23: XXXVII–XXXVIII). Later he cited Melanchthon’s words in the Instructions for the Visitors of 1528, where he had paraphrased 1 Corinthians 10:16, “the bread that we break is the distributed body of Christ.” In that document Melanchthon continued, “If this is not to be understood as the true body, but only God’s Word, as some interpret it, it would not be the distribution of Christ’s body but only of the Word and spirit” (Heshusius: 1560d, C3a–b. Cf. WA 26: 213, 25 – 29, LW 40: 289). He appended to his own Response Melanchthon’s confession that “Christ’s true body is present and truly consumed” in the Lord’s Supper (Heshusius: 1560d, F3b–G1a). Heshusius believed that the teacher and friend who had been primarily responsible for Elector Ottheinrich’s calling him to Heidelberg had turned against him. He singled out two issues that had led to his dismissal by Elector Friedrich. He had rejected ambiguous language about the presence of Christ in the bread and wine of the Supper and had insisted on the “manducatio indignorum,” the partaking of Christ’s body and blood by the unworthy. His opponents, particularly Klebitz, had defended the opposite teaching, that of Zwingli and Calvin. Heshusius claimed faithfulness to Luther’s teaching (Heshusius: 1560d, A4b, B1b–B2a). He focused on the presence of Christ’s body and blood in the elements with the words “true” and “substantial,” explicitly rejecting any avoidance of the forthright statement of the presence of Christ’s body and blood (Heshusius: 1560d, D1b, cf. CR 23: 62). In addition to insisting on the manducatio indignorum he held to the oral reception of Christ’s body and blood by those who received the elements, the manducatio oralis. He elucidated what he meant through its opposites: that Christ’s body is enclosed in a certain place separated from his people on earth, and that the bread is a mere symbol of this absent body of Christ. These positions were being obscured cleverly by lots of talk about the fruits of the sacrament – Heshusius added, “on which we all agree” (Heshusius: 1560d, C4a, cf. D1a–b). Heshusius placed himself in the long line of those who had to oppose false teaching, beginning with Elijah’s confrontation of the Baalites, continuing with John the Baptist’s conflict with the Pharisees, the apostle John’s with Cerinthus, Polycarp’s with Marcion, Athanasius’ with Arius, Augustine’s with Pelagius, Cyril’s with Nestorius, and Luther’s with Eck and other papal Christi ausgeteilet vnd empfangen? Antwort, Warer Leib vnd Blut des HERRN Jhesu Christi. Denn der HERR Jhesus Christus hat diese Niessung eingesetzet, das er bezeuget, das er warhafftiglich vnd wesentlich, bey vns vnd in vns sein wil, vnd wil in den bekerten wonen, jnen seine gutter mitteilen, vnd in jnen krefftig sein …;” the Latin from 1559: “Quid est Coena Domini? Est communicatio corporis et sanguinis Domini nostri Iesu Christi, sicut in verbis Evangelii instituta est, in qua sumptione Filius Dei vere et substantialiter adest, et testator se applicare credentibus sua beneficia, et se assumpsisse humanam naturam propter nos, ut nos quoque sibi insertos. Fide membra sua faciat, et nos ablutus esse sanguine suo …” Cf. Heshusius: 1560d, D1a.

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theologians (Heshusius: 1560d, B2b–B3a). His opponents had invented their own new pamsov_a (Heshusius: 1560d, B3a). Heshusius insisted on grounding his understanding of the Lord’s Supper on Christ’s words of institution. He also used 1 Corinthians 10:16 though not in Melanchthon’s more recent interpretation, which focused on the association of Christians who receive the sacrament in the body of Christ, the church. Instead, he reverted to the Praeceptor’s and Luther’s earlier interpretation that both body and bread, blood and wine, are truly present in communion with each other in the Supper. Heshusius did not deny the spiritual communion of Christians with one another in the church, but he rejected the idea that this was what Paul was describing in 1 Corinthians 10:16. Nor was there merely a spiritual association or connection between bread and Christ’s body, wine and his blood. Heshusius cited the first, the quarto, edition of the Apology of the Augsburg Confession, article ten, to defend the belief that “in the Lord’s Supper, the body and blood of Christ are truly and substantially present and are truly distributed with those things that are seen, the bread and the wine, to those who receive the sacrament: “since Paul says [in 1 Corinthians 10:16] that the bread is a ‘sharing in the body of Christ,’ etc., it would follow that, if the true body of the Lord were not truly present, the bread would not be a participation of the body but only of his spirit” (Heshusius: 1560d, B4a–C 2a, cf. BSLK, 184, Book of Concord, 84, n. 268). Heshusius acknowledged that these words were later omitted from the Apology, “but not with honest intent” (Heshusius: 1560d, C1a). Against the argument that the external word is only the medium by which God builds faith, and thus creates a spiritual association, Heshusius replied that indeed the benefits of the sacrament come to those who have faith, but God’s Word has the power to create reality and does so according to Christ’s words of institution (Heshusius: 1560d, C2a–b). Because Melanchthon had cited patristic evidence for his position in his memorandum for Friedrich, Heshusius analyzed a long list of passages from the ancient Fathers to support his own position (Heshusius: 1560d, C2b–C3b, D4b–E1b; Heshusius cited Theophylactus, Chrysostom, Gregory of Nazianzus, Augustine, Theodoret, and Basil). He also rejected the authority of Origen and Clement, whom Melanchthon had also cited (Heshusius: 1560d, D2a–D4b). He defended Mörlin and Sarcerius against what he considered to be Melanchthon’s misrepresentations of their position in his memorandum to Friedrich since they had simply repeated the position of “God’s chosen instrument, our Luther” (Heshusius: 1560d, C3b–C4a; cf. Melanchthon’s statements in CR 9: 962). He also defended himself. There were no secrets in the Wittenberg circle. He already knew what Melanchthon was writing about him to Jacob Bording and Peter Sicke, namely, that he was guilty of committing !qtokatqe_a (Heshusius: 1560d, §4a). He rejected charges that he was teaching “the conversion or transubstantiation of the elements, a papistic adoration of the bread, or ubiquity,” and cited his own works to prove that (Heshusius: 1560d, D2a). He did not teach that there is a “personal union” between bread

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and body but rather understood the communion of the elements with Christ’s body and blood as a presence in the proper use of the sacrament for the delivery of the forgiveness of sins (Heshusius: 1560d, E4b). Heshusius reacted moderately – compared to his polemic in many tracts – to what he regarded as Melanchthon’s change of position and betrayal of what Heshusius had learned from him, but his sense of hurt emerges. Heshusius left Heidelberg shortly before Melanchthon died, less than five months after he had composed his letter to Friedrich.

*** Westphal failed in his attempt to enlist Melanchthon for his defense of Wittenberg teaching as he had learned it. Melanchthon did not respond positively to Westphal’s overture. By the end of the 1550s several other GnesioLutherans added aberrations regarding the presence of Christ in the Lord’s Supper to the list of grievances they had against Melanchthon. The letter of their Praeceptor to Elector Friedrich III of the Palatinate rejecting Heshusius’ formulations regarding Christ’s presence not only alienated this former friend and supporter but also several who had studied in Wittenberg shortly before his time there, who had already felt estranged from their Praeceptor by his stands on the Leipzig Diet Proposal of 1548. Melanchthon’s memorandum to Friedrich elicited open opposition to its formulation of the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper, specifically the presence of Christ in the sacrament, from the Gnesio-Lutheran friends turned foes. Their critique stands against the background of those feelings of betrayal elicited by Melanchthon’s positions on the Leipzig Proposal and freedom of will; his concise statement against Heshusius confirmed their image of their Praeceptor and his relationship to Luther’s teaching, which set their standard, even when they attributed it also to the earlier Melanchthon. This incident also chronicles how one seemingly still faithful disciple of the Preceptor ten years after the “great betrayal” of the Leipzig Proposal moved from warm correspondence to puzzled but sharp criticism of Melanchthon on the Lord’s Supper. The Praeceptor’s death in April 1560 did not end the controversy ; his personal authority loomed too large over the Lutheran landscape to permit that. Controversy continued. That was due in part to the ambiguity of some of the formulations with which he was experimenting in the last years of his life as he sought concord while trying to remain faithful to biblical teaching, especially in the light of what he understood patristic interpretation to have been. What he did not say proved as significant as these formulations in the context of the critical issues which demanded address but which he refused to address. He avoided any mention of the elements in which Christ’s body and blood were present and also circumvented mention of his body and blood themselves, substituting the person of the “Son of God” so that he did not state

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that the human nature was in any way present (though he probably meant to include it because of his insistence on the hypostatic union of the two natures while at the same time making clear that the human nature is not everywhere where the divine nature is present). Furthermore, his writings revealed that his earlier expression of the actual conveying of the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation through the sacrament had given way to the statement that the sacrament conveys assurance of the forgiveness of sins. Only slowly did his opponents begin to weigh the significance of these subtle shifts in language as well as his refusal to address certain issues on which he was challenged, for instance, by Brenz regarding his Christology. Such silence, also in the face of Westphal’s challenge that he reaffirm his earlier position, only heightened suspicion and enmity. He believed he had made his position clear over the years, even as he continued to experiment with the proper expression for the biblical message. Those around Peucer and Pezel believed that Melanchthon had moved significantly away from Luther’s position on the presence of Christ in the Supper, and they developed this interpretation of his views further (Dingel: 1996, esp. 336 – 51; Dingel: 2008, esp. 5 – 15; Hund: 2006, passim). The GnesioLutherans agreed with this Crypto-Philippist assessment of Melanchthon’s last expressions and could not conceive of a position that was neither “Zwinglian” or “Calvinist” nor Luther’s. Both those who insisted that Melanchthon had never abandoned Luther’s view (Eber, Crell, and other electoral Saxon theologians) and those who strove to maintain the unity of their Preceptors’ teaching on the sacrament without addressing the “later Melanchthonian” expressions (e. g., Chemnitz, Chytraeus,15 von Eitzen, Runge) did not share the assessment of the Crypto-Philippists and the Gnesio-Lutherans, but neither did they leave any critical analytical comparison of the reformers’ respective formulations. All of these parties bequeathed tinder for scholarly and also not so scholarly debate to later generations. With their two Wittenberg mentors they demonstrate in this dispute how personalities and principles, hopes and fears, concerns for truth and for concord are inextricably woven together in the life of the church.

15 Heshusius was certain that Chytraeus agreed with his position, Heshusius: 1560, D1a, whereas Melanchthon was sure that the Rostock professor agreed with his and Hardenberg’s position. He told Hardenberg that Chytraeus’s negative expression about some expression of Hardenberg was probably ironically intended, MBWR 8: 96, §8291, CR 9: 192, §6295, a letter to Hardenberg, 3 August 1557. At the end of his life Melanchthon was writing to Chytraeus, expecting him to support his critique of the Württemberg theologians’ position as well as those of Heshusius and Mörlin; MBWR 8: 452 f., §9252, CR 9: 1065 f., 5 March 1560; see Dingel: 2012a.

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Kryptocalvinismus.” Pp. 173 – 230. In: Günter Frank and Herman J. Selderhuis (Ed.). Melanchthon und der Calvinismus. Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: frommannholzboog. (1969). Das neue Dogma der lutherischen Christologie, Problem und Geschichte seiner Begründung. Gütersloh: Mohn. Melanchthon, Philip (1560a). Gewise lehr vnnd meynung/ deß Hochgelerten Herrn Philippi Melanchthonis (seliger gedechtnuß) von der waren gegenwertigkeyt Christi im Heyligen Abendtmal/ auß Seinen eignen schriften zusammen gezogen. Nuremberg: Christoph Heussler. (1560b). Iudicium D. Philippi Melanchthonis de controversia coenae Domini ad Illustriss. Principem ac D.D. Fridericum, Comitem Palatinum Rheni … Heidelberg: Ludwig Lucius. (1530). Sententiae veterum de coena domini. Wittenberg: Josef Klug. Mçrlin, Joachim (1560). Auff den Bericht vnd Radtschlag/ So vnter dem namen des Herrnn Philippi Melanthonis zu Heidelberg gedruckt vnd ausgangen ist/ Antwort vnd Bericht … S.l. (1554). Historia Welcher gestalt sich die Osiandrische schwermerey im lande zu Preussen erhaben/ vnd wie dieselbige verhandelt ist. Magdeburg: Michael Lother. (1565). Wider die Landlu[e]gen/ der Heidelbergischen Theologen. Eisleben: Petri. Rorem, Paul (1988). “Calvin and Bullinger on the Lord’s Supper.” Pp. 155 – 84, 357 – 389. In: Lutheran Quarterly 2. Sillem, C. H. W. (Ed.) (1903). Briefsammlung des Hamburg Superintendent Joachim Westphals. Hamburg: Graefe & Sillem. Steinmetz, David C. (1990). “Calvin and His Lutheran Critics.” Pp. 179 – 94. In: Lutheran Quarterly 4. (1995). Calvin in Context. New York/Oxford: Oxford University Press. Sturm, Erdmann K. (1972). Der junge Zacharias Ursin. Sein Weg vom Philippismus zum Calvinismus (1534 – 1562). Neukirchen: Neukirchener Verlag. Tylenda, Joseph N. (1974). “The Calvin-Westphal Exchange. The Genesis of Calvin’s Treatises against Westphal.” Pp. 182 – 209. In: Calvin Theological Journal 9. Vogt, Otto (Ed.) (1996). Dr. Johannes Bugenhagens Briefwechsel. 1888 – 1889, reprint. Hildesheim: Olms. Wengert, Timothy J. (2012). Defending Faith: Lutheran Responses to Andreas Osiander Tübingen: Mohr/Siebeck. (1997). “The Scope and Contents of Philip Melanchthon’s Opera omnia, Wittenberg, 1562 – 1564.” Pp. 57 – 76. In: Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 88. Westphal, Joachim (1555a). Aduersus cuiusdam sacramentarii falsam criminationem, ivsta defensio. Frankfurt/M: Peter Brubach. (1558a). Apologetica aliqvot scripta … quibus & sanam Doctrinam de Eucharistia defendit, & foedissimas calumnias Sacramentariorum diluit. Ursel: Nicolaus Heinrich. (1558b). Apologia confessionis de coena Domini, contra corrvptelas et calumnias Ioannis Caluini. Ursel: Nicolaus Heinrich.

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(1557a). Apologia adversvs venenatvm antidotvm Valerandi Pollani sacramentarii. Ursel: Nicolaus Heinrich. (1557b). Ein Christliche vnd trewliche Warnung … die Sacramentirer belangend/ geschrieben an die Erbarn Herrn/ die Burgermeister vnd Rath zu Franckfurt am Meyn. Ursel: Nicolas Heinrich. (1557c). Clarissimi Viri Philippi Melanthonis sententia de coena Domini ex scriptis ejus collecta. Hamburg: Johannes Wickradt. (1555b). Collectanea sententiarum D. Aurelii Augustini de Coena Dominae. Regensburg. (1557d). Confessio fidei de evcharistiae sacramento, in qva Ministri Ecclesiarum Saxoniae solidis Argumentis sacrarum Literarum astruunt Corporis et Sanguinis Domini Iesv Christi, praesentiam in Coena sancta, et de libro Iohannnis Caluini ipsis dedicato respondent. Magdeburg: Ambrosius Kirchner. = Confessio/ oder Bekantnuß deß Glaubens vnd der Lehr von dem Hochwirdigen Sacrament deß waren Leibs vnnd Bluts Jhesu Christi … Regensburg: Heinrich Geissler, 1558. (1558c). Confvtatio aliqvot enormivm mendaciorum Iohannis Caluini, secuturae Apologiae aduersus eius furores premissa. Ursel: Nicolaus Heinrich. (1558d). De coena Domini confessionis. Ursel: Nicolaus Heinrich. (1550). Des Ehrwirdigen vnd tewren Mans Doct. Marti. Luthers seliger gedechtnis meinung/ von den Mitteldingen. Magdeburg: Michael Lotther. (1557e). Epistola qua breuiter respondet ad conuicia Iohannis Calvini … Ursel: Nicolaus Heinrich. (1552). Farrago confusanearum et inter se dissidentium Opinionum de coena Domini, ex Sacramentariorum libris congesta. Magdeburg: Christian Rhode, 1552. (1555c), Fides Cyrilli Episcopi Alex. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Brubach. (1557 f). Ivsta defensio, adversvs insignia mendacia Ioannis  Lasco quae in Epistola ad Sereniss. Poloniae Regem &c. contra Saxonicas Ecclesias sparsit … Strassburg: Blasius Fabricius. (1553). Recta fides de coena Domini ex uerbis Apostoli Pauli, & Evangelistarum demonstrata ac communita. Magdeburg: Michael Lotther = Der rechte vngefelschte Glaub/ von dem Hochwirdigen Sacrament des waren leybs vnd blute vnsers Herrn Jesu Christi … Nuremberg: Georg Merckel, 1554. (1549). Sententia Reverendi Viri D. M. Luth. Sanctae memoriae de Adiaphoris ex scriptis illius collecta. S.l.

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Irene Dingel

The Creation of Theological Profiles: The Understanding of the Lord’s Supper in Melanchthon and the Formula of Concord

At the time of his death on 19 April 1560, Philip Melanchthon was in the midst of a number of theological controversies. That had become the case despite his making every effort to preserve religious harmony, to maintain peace, and to establish consensus consistent with his confession of the faith while executing his responsibilities as a leading theologian in Evangelical circles. The sketches of his life that appeared immediately after his death emphasized his desire for consensus and harmony. They did so, to be sure, in the endeavor to construct apologiae for Melanchthon, and in so doing they were indeed giving the correct impression. The Memoria of Melanchthon that appeared in subsequent years reinforced this point. They depicted this longing for consensus as a positive character trait in contrast to the contentiousness of the strict followers of Luther who had been attacking him.1 Melanchthon’s concept of consensus, of course, was not open-ended. He refused to make concessions regarding certain elements of his teaching because they belonged to the very structure and core of evangelical theology. In his negotiations with the Roman Catholics they included the doctrine of justification, a point at which Melanchthon was in complete agreement with Luther. He decisively rejected any hint that human works, even if it was only the infused caritas which stimulated human powers, could merit consideration in the justification of the sinner in God’s sight. Against that viewpoint the reformers emphasized that God’s grace alone accomplishes the salvation of sinners; they rejected any suggestion of the merit of any human activity (Dingel: 2012c). Closely connected with this fact was the Wittenberg theologians’ decisive rejection of the popular medieval understanding of the Lord’s Supper as a sacrifice, for behind that doctrine clearly stood the idea that human works – in this case the priest’s renewal of the sacrifice of Christ’s body and blood in the transformed elements on the altar – could influence God’s gracious disposition toward sinners. Roman Catholics and Protestants continuously differentiated themselves from each other on the fundamental 1 See, e. g., the report of his dying that appeared immediately after his death: Wittenberg Faculty : 1560. On the history of its printing, see Hammer : 1967, 206 – 11, §160 – 3. See especially the biography of Melanchthon composed by Camerarius: 1566. Further editions appeared in 1591, 1592, 1696, and 1777. On this work, Dingel: 2010, 775 – 804, esp. 797 – 804; and Wengert: 1995, 115 – 31.

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question of the doctrine of justification and God’s grace, and all negotiations aimed at reaching consensus – actually, up to the present day – failed to produce reconciliation.2 Within Protestantism, however, it was above all the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper that became the rock of offense dividing one group from another. This was true although, in view of the fact that all sides strove to take their understanding of the Lord’s Supper only from Holy Scripture, they should have been able to reach a broad consensus. However, their different hermeneutical approaches to the relevant biblical texts produced a decisive divide between them precisely at that point. Indeed, the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper became the most important divisive issue that separated the Protestant confessions from each other. That is most obvious in the confrontation between Lutheranism and Calvinism. Even within Wittenberg theological circles the Lord’s Supper became the foremost point which determined theological profiles and which also became an explosive point in the political sphere – after the Religious Peace of Augsburg of 1555. For the legality of those governments that were introducing a more spiritualizing understanding of Christ’s presence in the Lord’s Supper depended, under provisions of that imperial settlement, on the acceptance of the revised version of the Augsburg Confession’s tenth article, on the Lord’s Supper. Melanchthon had prepared the revisions of the Confession at the behest of his prince, Elector Johann Friedrich, in 1540 for negotiations with the Roman Catholics. His changes focused on the doctrine of justification and the good works forgiveness of sins elicits, but subsequent political developments concentrated attention on the altered wording regarding the Lord’s Supper in this Confessio Augustana variata.3 The spectrum of different doctrines of the Lord’s Supper within the Protestant churches throughout the sixteenth century presents such a varied picture that it would be worthwhile to make a comparative study of each of their differing approaches, which went far beyond the two great controversies over the Lord’s Supper.4 In this essay only two of the strands of these developments in the continuing discourse on the doctrine can be analyzed. These two assumed particular significance for the 2 During the Reformation several significant religious colloquies took place; see Dingel: 1997, 654 – 81, esp. 658 – 63. Contemporary ecumenical dialogues face new challenges, which cannot be discussed here. 3 The Religious Peace of Augsburg guaranteed the so-called “adherents of the Augsburg Confession” – along with the adherents of the papacy – toleration under imperial law. All those who diverged from its confessional position, e. g., in the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper, continued to be heretics by law. However, the Religious Peace had not defined precisely which version of the Augsburg Confession was supposed to determine who was included. On the latitude for differing interpretations which this fact permitted, see Dingel: 2007, 157 – 76. 4 The first controversy over the Lord’s Supper (1525 – 1529) pitted Martin Luther and Huldrych Zwingli against each other, the second (1552 – 1557), Joachim Westphal and John Calvin. Just in these two controversies, which involved other theologians as well, the multiplicty of positions is clear. On these controversies, see Andresen: 1980, 46 – 64 and 272 – 85.

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development of official confessional positions: that of Melanchthon and that of the Formula of Concord (1577), both of which set the standard for the public doctrine of the Lutheran churches. This comparison will show that, despite all the efforts to seek consensus, in the final analysis two distinct profiles took shape and won lasting significance within Wittenberg theological development.

1. The Shaping of Melanchthon’s Understanding of the Lord’s Supper in the Context of the Tension Produced by Developments in Imperial Law Efforts to establish concord within the church permeated the life and work of Philip Melanchthon. This central concern reflects his conviction that proclamation of God’s Word on the basis of Scripture is vital for the proper worship of God and the consolation of consciences. Harmony was to be urgently pursued so that this proclamation could continue to bring its benefits to the hearers of the proclamation. In addition, before 1555, the efforts at agreement among the churches were pursuing the goal of attaining the imperial government’s legal recognition of reform as a defense against the Edict of Worms of 1521, which had decreed the eradication of Luther’s followers as the goal of Charles V’s religious policy. After 1555 Evangelicals sought harmony not only for theological reasons but also to insure the legal protection afforded by the guarantee of limited toleration to adherents of the Augsburg Confession. At first Melanchthon concentrated on bridging the gap between the Roman Catholics and the Evangelicals, as, for example, in the Augsburg Confession of 1530. His focus shifted soon thereafter to the reconciliation of differences within Protestantism that had appeared early regarding certain questions of public teaching. These included especially, though not only, the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper. This shaped the course that Melanchthon took from the “unaltered Augsburg Confession,” the Confessio Augustana invariata, to the revision of 1540, the Variata, and finally to his proposal for negotiation at the Council of Trent, the Confessio Saxonica – the Saxon Confession of 1551. In the text of the Augsburg Confession presented at the imperial diet in June 1530 Melanchthon formulated a proposal for agreement with a carefully articulated statement which emphasized the true presence of the body and blood of Christ under the form of bread and wine.5 This formulation created the possibility for 5 See CA X, BSLK, 64,2 – 6, Book of Concord, 44: “Von dem Abendmahl des Herren wird also gelehrt, daß wahrer Leib und Blut Christi wahrhaftiglich unter der Gestalt des Brots und Weins im Abendmahl gegenwärtig sei und da ausgeteilt und genommen werde.” “Concerning the Lord’s Supper it is taught that the true body and blood of Christ are truly present under the form of bread and wine in the Lord’s Supper and are distributed and received there.”

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the Roman side to find its own position represented in this text. For the German article of the Augsburg Confession diverged only slightly from the Latin version of the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper of the fourth Lateran council although it expressly eliminated the council’s accent on transubstantiation.6 Melanchthon knew what to say and what not to say in pursuing the goals of Wittenberg reform. Both the German and the Latin versions of article X of the Augsburg Confession7 could at least in part be acceptable for the Roman party. Nonetheless, the Roman Catholic negotiators at Augsburg vehemently insisted in their Confutation that both the doctrine of concomitance and the doctrine of transubstantiation should be employed as explanations of the “modus” of the presence of Christ’s humanity in the sacrament.8 Melanchthon’s readiness to negotiate and that of the other Evangelical theologians did not extend as far as making such concessions. The pursuit of consensus in his own camp marked the following years since unity in the confession of the faith, that is, subscription to the Augsburg Confession, became a requirement for entry into the Smalcald League (on the relationship of confession of the faith and political alliances, see Müller 1989, 25 – 45). Evangelical governments within the Empire had organized this league as a defensive military alliance in reaction to the renewal of the Edict of Worms and the refusal of the imperial government to grant the adherents of Wittenberg reform legal recognition. For a long time the hope remained alive that those who had been influenced by the Reformation in Zurich could be won over to the Augustana, but the composition of the Confessio Helvetica prior in 1536 hardened the lines of division (Müller : 1903, 101 – 109). However, the relationship of the Wittenberg theologians with the South Germans was developing along different lines. The negotiations with the reformer of 6 In 1215 that Council maintained in its “Constitutio 1 ‘De fide catholica’”: “Corpus et sanguis in sacramento altaris sub speciebus panis et vini veraciter continentur, transsubstantiatis, pane in corpus, et vino in sanguinem potestate divina.” “The body and blood in the sacrament of the altar are truly contained under the forms of bread and wine, transubstantiated, bread into body, and wine into blood, by the power of God.” Mirbt: 1967, 312, §602. See also BSLK, 64, n. 1. 7 CA X lat. 1531 reads, “De coena Domini docent, quod corpus et sanguis Christi vere adsint et distribuantur vescentibus in coena Domini.” “Concerning the Lord’s Supper they teach that the body and blood of Christ are truly present and are distributed to those who eat the Lord’s Supper.” BSLK, 64, 2 – 5, Book of Concord, 45. 8 That the Confutation, composed under the leadership of John Eck, understood this article as an affirmation of transubstantiation, as stated in BSLK, 64, n. 1, is a misunderstanding of the position represented there; the Roman Catholic theologians laid this interpretation down as a condition of acceptance: see Immenkötter : 1979, 101 (German on p. 100): “Decimus articulus in verbis nihil offendit, quando fatentur, in eucharistia post consecrationem legitime factam corpus et sanguinem Christi substantialiter et vere adesse, si modo credant, sub qualibet specie integrum Christum adesse, ut non minus sit sanguis Christi sub specie panis per concomitantiam, quam est sub specie vini, et e diverso … Adiicitur unum tanquam ad huius confessionis articulum valde necessarium, ut credant ecclesiae potius quam nonnullis aliter male docentibus omnipotenti verbo Dei in consecratione eucharistiae substantiam panis in corpus Christi mutari. Ita enim in concilio generali definitum est.” Cf. the translation in Kolb/Nestingen: 2001, 112.

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Strasbourg, Martin Bucer, which led to agreement in the Wittenberg Concord of 1536, constituted an important step both theologically and politically for the Wittenberg Reformation (Bucer : 1988, 114 – 34). For this accord reconciled the divergences in the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper between Wittenberg and the South Germans, at least for a time. These differences had led the South Germans to produce their own confession, the Confessio Tetrapolitana, in Augsburg in 1530 instead of accepting the Augsburg Confession as their own (Bucer : 1969b, 35 – 185). The Wittenberg Concord opened a new avenue for interpreting the position of the Augsburg Confession and made it possible for some princely and municipal governments to subscribe to it and enter the Smalcald League. At the same time it set forth not only Bucer’s but also Melanchthon’s theological position. Even before the Concord itself, Melanchthon and Bucer had drawn closer together in their understanding of the Lord’s Supper, at the colloquy at Kassel on 27 December 1534 (see Bucer‘s report: “Bucerj vergriff seiner handlung wegen einer Concordia mit Philippo Melanchtone zu Cassel (nach dem 29. Dezember 1534),” in: Bucer : 1988, 62 – 76). In this exchange Melanchthon and Bucer forged important doctrinal foundations that contributed to the Wittenberg Concord. Here it became clear that Melanchthon had definitely distanced himself from Luther on the Lord’s Supper and was developing his theology independently. The positions on which Melanchthon and Bucer had hammered out agreement at the colloquy in Kassel found a place in the Wittenberg Concord, albeit in somewhat altered form. For Melanchthon had composed the document in such a way that it could be read as an affirmation that the South Germans were teaching what Luther taught.9 It maintained the true and essential presence and the distribution of Christ’s body and blood with the elements of bread and wine. This was based upon the “unio sacramentalis” – an expression that goes back to Irenaeus – of bread and wine with Christ’s body and blood. This “union” or “communion” remained limited to the use of the sacrament in accord with its institution by Christ, and apart from this “usus” did not continue to exist. Luther’s expression “manducatio impiorum” (partaking by the ungodly) was tempered by using the phrase “manducatio indignorum” (partaking by the unworthy) from 1 Corinthians 11:29, so that it spoke not of the godless, but of those Christian recipients of the Lord’s Supper who came to the Table of the Lord without honestly repenting and without adequate faith. According to the Wittenberg Concord it is they who receive Christ’s body to their judgment (Bucer : 1988, 121 – 27). The use of this formulation, which emphasized the points of agreement and veiled their differences, permitted both sides to believe that their own understanding of the Lord’s Supper was represented in the Concord. 9 This can be seen in the regular return to the expression, “they confess …” and also that the subscription of the individual South German representatives preceded those of the Wittenberg theologians, as if to acknowledge the Concord as their own confession.

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Luther certainly held to his doctrine of the true presence of Christ’s humanity in, with, and under the elements, which even the godless receive through orally partaking (manducatio oralis) of the sacrament. The godless do partake (manducatio impiorum) of Christ’s body and blood, present by the power of the words of institution, albeit to their judgment. The Smalcald Articles of 1537, which can be read as Luther’s interpretation of the Wittenberg Concord – and indeed later was treated in this way (for example in the Book of Concord of 1580) –, provide clear evidence that this is indeed the case (cited in FC SD VII, 12 – 17, BSLK, 450 f., Book of Concord, 59 f.). Melanchthon, however, dealt with the consensus that had been attained in the Wittenberg Concord in another way. He retained the phrase “manducatio indignorum,” for example, in his Loci communes. There he emphasized the remorse and repentance which precede the reception of the sacrament as the way to prepare for receiving it.10 He also took the Wittenberg Concord into account when in 1540 he was working on his revisions of the Augsburg Confession: he incorporated part of its position into the revised text of the Confession (Seebaß: 2005, 411 – 24), which he prepared for the religious colloquy that took place in Hagenau, Worms, and Regensburg. There it was to serve as a common statement for the Evangelical estates. The wording of the revision of Article X, on the Lord’s Supper, stated that Christ’s body and blood are truly given to those receiving the sacrament with the bread and wine.11 What Melanchthon did not say – his avoidance of precise doctrinal definition – was particularly significant and had a great impact. This open formulation found in the socalled Confessio Augustana Variata made it possible for even John Calvin, who at that time was residing in Strasbourg, to subscribe to the Confession. It achieved recognition in large part because its use spread quickly to churches and schools. While the Variata certainly provides evidence regarding one stage in the development of Melanchthon’s doctrine of the Lord’s Supper, it dare not be overlooked that Melanchthon continued to refine his language regarding the sacrament; eleven years later another confessional document appeared that reflected the position of the Wittenberg theologians of that time and expressed that position more precisely : the Confessio Saxonica. In composing it Melanchthon expressly reflected the text of the Augsburg Confession, and therefore he did not regard it as a new confession but as a repetition of the 10 This is not found in the Loci of 1521, the so-called first edition (prima aetas). It is found, however, in his Loci praecipui theologici (1543/1559), in: CR 21: 864 f., MSA 2,2: 565 f., and in the German translaton which Melanchthon made for Anna Camerarius in 1553: Melanchthon: 2002. 11 Cf. CA X (1540), in: BSLK, S. 65, 45 f., Book of Concord, 44: “De coena domini docent, quod cum pane et vino vere exhibeantur corpus et sanguis Christi vescentibus in coena domini;” the German in: Mau: 2008, 42: “Vom Mahl des Herrn lehren sie, daß mit Brot und Wein Christi Leib und Blut den Essenden und Trinkenden beim Mahl des Herrn wirklich dargereicht werden.” Cf. also Neuser : 1990, 16.

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Augsburg Confession itself.12 It functioned as something of a bridge between the two versions of the Augustana (Dingel: 2012b). In May 1551 the Saxon elector Moritz directed his theologians to produce this confession so that it could serve as a basis for presenting the Evangelical teaching at the Council of Trent, the second session of which was scheduled to begin in September 1551. Although it never fulfilled this purpose, since, as things developed, war intervened, and the Saxon delegation never reached Trent, it became a document of no little significance. At the time of its composition Melanchthon was already involved in the controversies of the period that were initiated by the imperial imposition of the Augsburg Interim. He was under intense attack for his efforts to draw up an alternative proposal that would replace the Interim religious policy of Emperor Charles V. This strife began when Melanchthon’s former student and then colleague Matthias Flacius published what he dubbed the “Leipzig Interim” without authorization of the Saxon government or the Wittenberg theologians (Dingel: 2012a). With the Confessio Saxonica Melanchthon succeeded once again in winning over some of the critics, who had been demonstrating their mistrust of him (e. g., the counts of Mansfeld and their theologians Michael Coelius and Johannes Wigand, who subscribed to Confessio Saxonica). This confession received widespread affirmation among the adherents of the Augsburg Confession, among them the theologians of the city of Strasbourg (Salig: 1730, 663 – 67). In the Confessio Saxonica Melanchthon had so formulated his doctrine of the Lord’s Supper that he once again emphasized that Christ was “truly and substantially” (vere et substantialiter) present in the proper use of the sacrament. He also stated that the distribution of the gift of Christ’s body and blood bestowed communion with Christ and the forgiveness of sins upon those who partook of the Supper.13 But he also consciously avoided teaching the real, sacramental presence of the Son of God and the conveying of his saving body and blood under the forms of bread and wine to those who received, as the German version of the Augsburg Confession invariata had taught (BSLK, 64, Book of Concord, 44.). However, there were parallels to the Latin version of the Augsburg Confession of 1531, in which Melanchthon had already at that time failed to mention the elements of the Lord’s Supper while indeed still speaking of the true presence and distribution of Christ’s body and blood (BSLK, 64, Book of Concord, 45). The Confessio Saxonica departed from 12 Melanchthon emphasized this a number of times and and even referred to its agreement with the Confessio Augustana invariata. In the preface to the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum he called the Confessio Saxonica a “Repetitio eiusdem Confessionis,” and a “Repetitio der Confessio.” CR 9: 930, §6830, and 1053, §6932. On the Confessio Saxonica itself, see Wartenberg: 1996, 275 – 94. 13 Cf. Repetitio Confessionis Augustanae sive Confessio Doctrinae Saxonicarum Ecclesiarum, Auctore Philippo Melanthone [= Confessio Saxonica], Art. “De coena Domini,” in: MSA 6: 130: “… sed in usu instituto in hac communione vere et substantialiter adesse Christum et vere exhiberi sumentibus corpus et sanguinem Christi, Christum testari, quod sit in eis, et faciat eos sibi membra, et quod abluerit eos sanguine suo.”

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this decisively in so far as it does not teach a true and essential presence of the body and blood, but rather the presence of the entire person of Christ, restricting that presence to its use as Christ instituted it, “in usu instituto,” that is, in the actual celebration of the sacrament (Art. “De coena Domini,” in: MSA 6:130). Within this framework, which focused on the whole person of Christ in his divinity and humanity, Melanchthon was able to continue to speak of a conveying of the body and blood to the recipients without addressing whether this meant a real presence of body and blood, that is, the humanity of Christ, under, in, or with the elements of bread and wine. In assessing the reception and impact of the Confessio Saxonica, this meant that both those who wished to adhere to Luther’s position14 as well as those who were tending toward Calvinism15 could find a common position in this Confession (Cf. Melanchthon, Examen Ordinandorum, 1552, in: MSA 6: 202 ff., reference on p. 202). This stage of the development of Melanchthon’s teaching on the Lord’s Supper is also reflected in the Examen Ordinandorum [Examination of Those to Be Ordained] (1552), which stated in tersest form, “What is distributed and received in the Supper of our Lord Christ? Answer : The true body and blood of the Lord Jesus Christ.” When administered according to Christ’s institution, it gives witness to the true and essential communion of Christ and the recipients and to the strengthening of the faith of those who have been converted to faith (MSA 6: 202). Here again it is evident that it had become characteristic of Melanchthon’s teaching on the Lord’s Supper that he – in contrast to Luther and his adherents – spoke not of a real presence of his body and blood, that is, of Christ’s humanity, but rather the true presence of the person of Christ (in his divinity and humanity), while emphasizing that he is present only during the administration of the sacrament according to the words of institution. The Confessio Augustana variata (1540) had even gone a step further in its newly revised article on the Lord’s Supper, by avoiding any mention of a real presence. There Melanchthon simply confessed that the body and blood are given with the elements of the Lord’s Supper (Seebaß: 2005). In contrast, in the Confessio Saxonica he returned to the formulation that the person of the Savior is “truly and substantially present” “in the use for which it was instituted” – note! not under the elements of the Supper. At the same time his emphasis on the nature of the Lord’s Supper as a testimony that serves as a pledge of grace (“De coena Domini,” in: MSA 6: 127: “Et baptismus et coena Domini sunt 14 The acceptance which the Confessio Saxonica received among some strict adherents of Luther shows that it actually was understood as agreeing with the Confessio Augustana invariata and that the various expressions of the understanding of the Lord’s Supper had not yet become a cause for disagreement. 15 The Reformed “Walloon” immigrant congregation, which had found refuge in Frankfurt am Main under the leadership of Valrand Poullain, submitted the Confessio Saxonica as its own confession, to which it subscribed, to the diet of princes which met in 1557 in Frankfurt. Later the congregation appealed to its adherence to this confession as proof of its adherence to the Augsburg Confession. See Mangon: 2004, 66 f., and Bauer : 1920, 52.

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pignora et testimonia gratiae, ….”) and on the communion of Christ with believers for the strengthening of their faith served as an alternative to the concept of a concrete “union” of bread and wine with Christ’s body and blood which conveys the assurance of experiencing participation in God’s grace through the manducatio oralis. Melanchthon taught the same position in subsequent redactions of his Loci communes. In the version which Melanchthon himself composed in German for Anna Camerarius, the wife of his close friend Joachim Camerarius, in 1553, he stated, “Therefore, this activity has been instituted so that this Supper should be conducted, in which the Son of God, his suffering and resurrection, his promise, grace, and lordship are proclaimed and his word is spoken over the bread and wine and they are distributed to the congregation. With this bread and wine he gives us his body and blood and gives testimony thereby that he accepts us, makes us members of his body, gives us the forgiveness of sins, cleanses us with his blood” (Melanchthon: 2002, 333). Whereas here the giving of Christ’s body and blood with the bread and wine as a testimony to God’s gracious dealing with sinners in Christ is mentioned explicitly, explicit reference to the elements is lacking in the Latin Loci of 1559 although its text should probably be understood in the same way. This version of the Loci reiterated that Christ is truly present when the sacrament is being administered. Melanchthon did not cite Scripture as his witness, but the church fathers Cyril and Hilary in support of the correct understanding of Holy Scripture: The Lord’s Supper is not “an empty spectacle but Christ is truly present as he gives his body and blood through the exercise of his ministry to those who are eating and drinking. The ancient writers speak in this matter … When they are received, they cause us to be in Christ and Christ to be in us … we believe that Christ was truly made a sacrifice for us and died and that he was in fact raised from the dead so that he reigns and is present for his church and through the exercise of this ministry he truly joins us to himself as his very members” (Melanchthon, Loci praecipui theologici, 1559, in: MSA 2,2: 558 f.). Melanchthon here emphasized the real presence of the person of the Savior during the administration of the sacrament, and he connected the salvific participation of the worthy participants in the Supper to its characterization as a witness and a sign. For the proliferation and acceptance of this doctrine of the Lord’s Supper it was decisive that both the Confessio Saxonica and the Loci communes (though in the edition of 1556) found a place, along with the Confessio Augustana Variata in the collection of Melanchthon’s writings published in 1560 under the title Corpus doctrinae (which also contained the Latin invariata).16 This collection appeared in the midst of the controversies of 16 It contained, along with the three ancient creeds, a number of Melanchthon’s works. The first was the 1533 version of the German Augsburg Confession, the so-called “prima Variata;” the first Latin edition of the work contained the Augsburg Confession of 1542, the “tertia variata.”

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the so-called second controversy over the Lord’s Supper. This dispute initially pitted Johannes Westphal against John Calvin, and then, in the years between 1557 and 1563, witnessed its continuation in the on-going exchange between Albert Hardenberg and his Lutheran colleagues in Bremen (Tschackert: 1910/ 1979, 531 – 38, Bizer : 1940, 275 – 84, and Mahlmann: 1969, 44 – 61). Within this context the Confessio Saxonica became an authoritative text for those who were modifying Luther’s doctrine of the Lord’s Supper, the “CryptoPhilippists,” and later for those sympathetic to Calvinism. In the eyes of Luther’s adherents this aroused suspicion of Melanchthon’s doctrine of the Lord’s Supper since after his death, especially since the end of the 1560s, a theology took root at the University of Wittenberg which was prepared to build a bridge between Wittenberg and Calvinism through a combination of the Melanchthonian doctrine of the Lord’s Supper and a Christology which came close to Genevan theology. These theologians, the next generation of the Wittenberg faculty, much like Theodore Beza, accepted the validity of the argument that Christ’s ascension into heaven rendered a real presence of his humanity on earth impossible, thus making it impossible to distribute his body and blood in the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper (on the structure of the argument, see Hund: 2006, 209 ff., 239 – 43; primary sources of the “CryptoCalvinist,” or more accurately, “Crypto-Philippist” period, which document the further development of Melanchthon’s theology, are presented in a critical edition in Dingel: 2008).

2. The Article of the Formula of Concord on the Lord’s Supper : a Counter-Proposal or an Attempt at Integration? The authors of the Formula of Concord had the theology of the so-called “Crypto-Calvinists” in mind when they integrated a presentation of the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper into the Formula of Concord. The most prominent representatives of this line of thinking in Wittenberg included, among others, Christoph Pezel,17 the professor in Wittenberg who later Subsequent Latin editions printed both the Unaltered Augsburg Confession of 1531 and the Altered Augsburg Confession of 1542 alongside each other. In addition, the Corpus Doctrinae Philippicum contained the Apology of the Augsburg Confession, the Confessio Saxonica, the Loci Theologici of 1556, the Examen Ordinandum in the edition of 1554, and the Responsio ad articulos Bavaricae inquisitionis of 1559, composed as a critique of the thirty-one articles of the Inquisition that had been formulated for use in the Counter-Reformation in Bavaria. His Refutatio erroris Serveti et Anabaptistarum was added in a subsequent edition, as was his Responsio controversii Stancari of 1553 in the Latin editions of the Corpus Doctrinae. The sixth volume of MSA presents most of the documents in the Corpus but not in the form in which they appeared in it. Dingel: 2012b, and Neuser : 1987, § 52, 63, 64, 74, 76, 78, 105, and 116. 17 The Wittenberg Catechism of 1571, of which Pezel was the primary author, contained, in

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became a preacher in Bremen, and the physician and former Melanchthon student, Joachim Curaeus,18 as well as Melanchthon’s son-in-law Caspar Peucer, professor of medicine and personal physician for Elector August (Wartenberg/Hasse: 2004). The Concordists intended their Formula of Concord to address only disputes within the ranks of those who adhered to the Augsburg Confession, but the “Crypto-Calvinist” teachings in electoral Saxony drew them inevitably into comment on the broader range of “sacramentarian” deviations from that position.19 The article on the Lord’s Supper in the Formula of Concord does not represent the position of Melanchthon at the end of his life as such but rather a further development of his theology by many of his students and colleagues, developed, to be sure, in a different direction than that of Peucer, Pezel, and Curaeus (FC SD VII, 6, BSLK, 974,44 – 975,7, Book of Concord, 594; the Formula of Concord clearly associates the “Crypto-Calvinists” or “Crypto-Philippists” with the Calvinists; on a significant element of Melanchthon’s later development of his Christology, see Wengert: 2012). For that reason the latter and their associates who thought they were representing faithfully what Melanchthon had taught at the end of his life had to take offense at the position of the Formula.20 In fact, those territories which most ardently sought to preserve Melanchthon’s theological legacy did not subscribe to the Formula, among them, e. g., the principality of Anhalt and the city of Bremen, both of which later became Calvinist (Dingel: 1996, 280 – 351 [Anhalt] and 352 – 412 [Bremen]). That was due above all to their recognition of the way in which the Concordists

contrast to the Large Catechism of Martin Luther, no statement of the true presence of Christ’s body and blood under the elements of the Lord’s Supper but taught instead a doctrine of the Lord’s Supper and a Christology that was in accord with Calvin in that it presumed that the humanity of Christ occupied a “locatio corporalis,” a physical place, in heaven. The typical Lutheran teaching of a “unio sacramentalis” of Christ’s body and blood with the elements, a “manductio oralis,” and a “manducatio impiorum” are not present, as would be expected. See Dingel: 2008, 76 – 289, Nr. 2, and the editor’s introduction, 3 – 15. 18 Curaeus died in 1573, the year before his Exegesis perspicua appeared in print. This book made it immediately clear that the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper and the Christology which was being taught in electoral Saxony and at its universities, Wittenberg and Leipzig, was not at all in accord with Luther’s teaching but actually did tend toward Calvinism. Elector August, who feared political complications among other factors, tried to reverse this development with severe measures. See Dingel: 2008, 1014 – 89, § 13. 19 FC SD VII,1, BSLK, 970,3 – 971,7, Book of Concord, 591 f. The Concordists intended their document to resolve the controversies among the adherents of the Augsburg Confession, but they did reject the positions of others who had deviated from Luther’s doctrine of the Lord’s Supper, such as “Sacramentarians.” 20 These disciples of Melanchthon felt particularly targeted when one of the articles of repudiation in the Formula of Concord rejected the distinction between unworthy participants in the Lord’s Supper and the unbelieving, godless participants. Melanchthon’s disciple Paul Eber had taken up this distinction from his teacher in his printed works, and the Concordists believed that the concept had to be rejected, FC SD VII, 123, BSLK, 974,44 – 975,7, Book of Concord, 614 f.

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demarcated their own teaching to the exclusion of those in Wittenberg who bore the label “Crypto-Calvinist.” These critics of the Formula failed to take into account its attempts to integrate Luther’s and Melanchthon’s teaching – although such formulations were certainly present in its text, framed in such a way as to harmonize the positions of the two Wittenberg reformers. In terms of the content of their teaching two doctrinal issues are particularly noteworthy : 1) the understanding of the “unio sacramentalis” and the related question of the real presence of Christ’s body and blood, and 2) the question of the reception of the Lord’s Supper by the unworthy, the “manducatio indignorum.” The Formula of Concord attempted to accommodate its position structurally to the followers of Melanchthon in that it intentionally drew into its argument, along with the Augsburg Confession, both the Apology of the Augsburg Confession and the Wittenberg Concord. Moreover, it was clear that the formulation of the Confessio Augustana invariata served as the touchstone for its own understanding of the sacrament. The Concordists repeated its wording in article VII of the Formula of Concord: “the true body and blood of Christ are truly present under the form of bread and wine in the Holy Supper and are distributed and received there” (FC SD VII, 9, BSLK, 976, 2 – 6, Book of Concord, 594). The later developments in Melanchthon’s expression of his own teaching had reshaped this way of expressing Christ’s presence in the sacrament, which reproduced Luther’s understanding of the real presence. Nonetheless, the Formula also expressed the Praeceptor’s concerns in that it at the same time explicitly referred to the wording of the Apology, which unambiguously mentioned that the essential presence of Christ’s body and blood took place “in its use as Christ instituted the sacrament” [in usu] and that the body and blood are distributed “with” the elements.21 In a similar way the text of the Wittenberg Concord was incorporated into the Formula’s seventh article. To be sure, the desire for integrating the two positions which the Concordists of 1576/1577 displayed met certain limits at this point since, in the way in which Article VII of the Formula was constructed and, later, in the structure of the Book of Concord, Luther’s Smalcald Articles were recognized as the framework for interpreting the Wittenberg Concord. Therefore, it was clear at the very beginning of the Formula’s article on the Lord’s Supper that it excluded not only Bucer’s point of view but also that of those who accepted Melanchthon’s further development of his doctrine of the Lord’s Supper, as it took shape in the Confessio Augustana variata, the Examen Ordinandorum, or the Loci communes. The Concordists followed this pattern of tying Melanchthon’s doctrine of the Lord’s Supper into the context of Luther’s understanding of the sacrament 21 FC SD VII, 11, BSLK, 976,25 – 31, Book of Concord, 594 f.: “we confess that in the Lord’s Supper the body and blood of Christ are truly and essentially present and they are truly distributed with the visible elements to those who receive the sacrament.”

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when they treated the questions of the “unio sacramentalis” and of the unworthy participants in the Supper. In the Formula of Concord it was crystal clear that its authors regarded the language of a real presence of Christ’s humanity under, with, and in the bread as an adequate interpretation or equivalent of the conception of an “unio sacramentalis” of body and blood with bread and wine, a phrase which countered the Roman Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation (FC SD VII, 35, BSLK, 983,12 – 21, Book of Concord, 599). Precisely the formulations using “in” and “ under” to describe Christ’s presence in the elements, which appear again and again in Luther’s writings, had been excluded from the Wittenberg Concord. In their place its text chose to speak of the simultaneity of the conveying of the true presence of Christ’s body and blood with the elements of bread and wine when they were distributed in the celebration of the sacrament according to the words of institution. The Concordists undoubtedly recognized that the Wittenberg Concord’s wording implicitly called into question Luther’s concepts of the “manducatio oralis” and the “manducatio impiorum.” Melanchthon had, in addition, preferred to speak of the “unworthy” participants in the Lord’s Supper, and he had employed that terminology in the Wittenberg Concord, referring to those whose unworthiness consisted not in their contempt for the sacrament and their lack of faith, but rather in the disingenuous repentance which they had been practicing. The Concordists returned to Luther’s terminology. Even when the Formula spoke of the “indigni” [unworthy], the “impii” [impious] were meant. It was the “unworthy, godless hypocrites” (FC SD VII, 60, BSLK, 991,25, Book of Concord, 603) who “go to the Lord’s table without true repentance and turning back to God” (FC SD VII, 60, BSLK, 991,28 – 29, Book of Concord, 603) who receive the body and blood to their judgment as a result (among other passages, FC SD VII, 63, BSLK, 994,4 – 6, Book of Concord, 604). Indeed, a later passage explained in detail that the incorrigible, obdurate sinners were seen as unworthy and the Christians who were filled with uncertainty, were weak in faith and under spiritual assault, were precisely those who received the sacrament worthily (FC SD VII, 68 – 70, BSLK, 996,14 – 997,13, Book of Concord, 605 f.). Melanchthon had fully shared this pastorally focused aspect of the understanding of the Lord’s Supper, as it is expressed in the Formula of Concord, with Luther (e. g., in his Examen Ordinandorum, MSA 6: 203). However, in addition, he had also incorporated the ethical dimension in the life of the Christian who comes to the Lord’s Supper into his treatment when he – in accord with his teaching of the third use of the law – admonished recipients to examine themselves and to repent sincerely of their sins before they received the sacrament (Melanchthon: 2002, 334 f.). But these were minor nuances. Clearer were the differences in all those passages in which the Formula of Concord insisted on the typical expressions that characterized Luther’s understanding of the Lord’s Supper. Most important was the emphasis on the

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true presence of Christ’s body and blood in, with, and under the elements, which in the celebration of the Lord’s Supper are not to be viewed as simply bread and wine, but rather as that which in the oral eating makes possible a “communicatio” with the human Christ who died on the cross (FC SD VII, passim; references to Luther’s argumentation are particularly prominent in VII, 77 – 82, BSLK, 999 f., Book of Concord, 607). These statements had to be viewed as a clear departure from Melanchthon’s understanding by his partisans in the “Crypto-Philippist” camp since he had indeed referred the true presence in the sacrament to the person of Christ when the sacrament was being celebrated and detached that presence from being bound to the elements. The differing ways of handling the Scriptural basis for the teaching demonstrated the difference between the two sides as well. The Formula of Concord, depending on Luther, presumed that the literal understanding of the words of institution served as the hermeneutical framework for every other passage that related to the Lord’s Supper. This presupposition was repeatedly cited in defense of the doctrine of the real presence of Christ’s body and blood (esp. 1 Cor 10:16, see FC SD VII, 45 – 53, BSLK, 986,23 – 989,19, Book of Concord, 600 ff.). Melanchthon understood that the eating which had been instituted in the sacrament was an experiential proof of God’s promise of grace that brings assurance and strengthens faith, which effectively receives the sacrament.22 For him the interpretation of the concept of communion in 1 Corinthians 10:16 moved toward an understanding that emphasized the communion of the earthly with the heavenly. This shift had also laid the basis for his later students to move to a spiritualizing understanding of the Lord’s Supper and find the equivalent to their teaching in the Genevan theologians’ concept of the spiritual presence of Christ’s body. On the other hand, all sides united in the emphasis on the “usus,” which became a constitutive part of their definition of the real presence, no matter which theological content was used in the definition (FC SD VII, 83 – 88, BSLK, 1000,27 – 1002,9, Book of Concord, 607 f.). However, the Concordists answered the Crypto-Philippist tendency to deny the presence of Christ’s humanity with reference to the argumentation based on his ascension into heaven, and they did so with a clear reference to Luther’s position. Everyone knew that in his dispute with Zwingli, in his On the Supper of Christ. Confession (1528), Luther had set forth three different manners in which the body of Christ can be present in the world. The Formula of Concord specifically referred to this section of Luther’s book (FC SD VII, 97 – 103, BSLK, 1006,13 – 1008,44, Book of Concord, 609 ff.; cf. Luther : 1986, 95 ff. [Vom Abendmahl Christi. Bekenntnis]). With this reference to Luther’s line of reasoning the Concordists brought the 22 Melanchthon: 2002, 334: “Also weiset die eusserliche Niesung uff das wort der Verheissung und uff den Son Gottes, der für uns gestorben und wiederumb ufferstanden Und erhöret seine Kirchen und Gliedmas und wil sie selig machen. Dahin sol das hertz und der Glaube sehen und also in der bekerung und besserung trost suchen an Christo.”

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Christological argument into the formulation of the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper as an additional basis for the real presence, along with the hermeneutical principles used to interpret the words of institution. In the dispute over the sacrament in Bremen (1557 – 1563) the Christological argument had played a decisive role and had been sharply attacked by the opponents of the Lutheran side.23 Indeed, at least in the Formula of Concord’s treatment of the Lord’s Supper, it was used with restraint. The terminology of a “communicatio idiomatum realis” [a real communication of attributes], which presumed the communication of divine omnipresence to Christ’s humanity, was not used at all. The discussion of this concern leaned heavily on the lengthy citation from Luther’s Concerning the Lord’s Supper. Confession of 1528. There he deduced from the personal union of the divine nature and the human nature that the body of Christ could be present wherever God is, and he rejected the argument of the “Schwärmer” that Christ’s body is simply not everywhere where God is present, and this mode of his presence is a [human] concoction [translated by Nikolaus Selnecker in 1584 “quod Christi corpus nequaquam ibi esse valeat, ubi Deus est, et quod hic modus praesentiae confictus sit”] (Selnecker’s translation of the German of the Formula of Concord VII, 201, BSLK, 1008,20 – 23). For, Luther concluded, it is beyond human knowledge exactly how God is present in various situations on earth. In principle Melanchthon’s doctrine of the Lord’s Supper could incorporate this way of expressing the point without any problem since he had certainly given prominence to the “unio personalis” in his emphasis on the real presence of the person of Christ and had also made use of the term “communicatio idiomatum” to describe the unity of the person of Christ and to explain the sharing of characteristics of the divine and the human natures in the one person of the Savior.24 However, no one could ignore the fact that the direction of the argument in the Formula of Concord moved in quite another direction from Melanchthon. In the final analysis it aimed at the repudiation of the Calvinist argumentation that the body of Christ is located at a particular place 23 Johannes Bötker, pastor in Bremen, had developed a doctrine of the communicatio idiomatum realis in the context of the dispute over the Lord’s Supper in Bremen, based upon the Christology of Johannes Brenz and with the use of Luther’s writings, and this concept was used on occasion as a support for teaching the real presence of Christ’s body and blood in the Lord’s Supper. During the second controversy over the Lord’s Supper the Lutheran side (especially Joachim Westphal) very hesitantly strengthened its case for a literal interpretation of the words of institution and the Lutheran understanding of the Lord’s Supper connected with it with the help of Christological argumentation, which brought the Christological issue into the controversy. For some had deduced from the communicatio idiomatum a communication of divine omnipresence to Christ’s humanity, a development of the doctrine which the opponents disparagingly dismissed as a “doctrine of ubiquity.” See Mahlmann: 1969, esp. 44 – 61, 125 – 204, Dingel: 2012b, and Baur : 2002, 224 – 41. 24 Melanchthon had developed this concept in his dispute with Johannes Timann and Joachim Westphal as he intervened in the second controversy over the Lord’s Supper on the side of Albert Hardenberg, see Mahlmann: 1969, 61 – 76, and Kolb: 2012.

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at God’s right hand in heaven. Indeed, some Philippists had also taken over the argument that Christ is present in his divine nature, which is omnipresent, as their own in order to make a place for the sacramental experience of Christ’s presence.25 Despite the fervent desire of the Concordists to integrate all sides within the Wittenberg circle, the seventh article of the Formula of Concord gave witness to the differing profiles of the teaching of the Lutherans and the Philippists which had already taken form.26 With the Formula of Concord Martin Luther became the real interpreter of the Augsburg Confession,27 that work which under Melanchthon’s authorship had attained and maintained its deeplyrooted dominant status in Protestantism.

3. Conclusion Melanchthon continued to seek to fashion his own expression of the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper as he was drawn into the dispute that erupted around his student (and, up to this time, friend) Tilemann Heshusius, in the Palatinate in 1559 (Kolb: 2012). The Preceptor died in the midst of this exchange. In his experimentation with the proper way of formulating the biblical doctrine of the Lord’s Supper he had traversed some distance while publicly indicating that he had retained the intention and understanding he had shared with his Wittenberg colleagues from the 1520s on. In the Confessio Augustana Invariata he hoped to reach consensus with the 25 Some of Melanchthon’s former disciples who understood themselves as heirs of Luther had developed the view of the communicatio idiomatum, as Melanchthon formulated it, in that they, going beyond him, taught a communication of divine characteristics to the human nature of Christ. In this context the discussion of the real presence of the person of Christ focused on the real presence of Christ’s humanity, that is, his human nature. This is reflected in the position of the Formula of Concord. Melanchthon had, however, carefully qualified his definition with the help of the distinction between a correct way of speaking in concreto – referring to Christ’s person – and an improper way of speaking in abstracto – referring to his two natures. See Melanchthon, Refutatio erroris Serveti, in: MSA, 6:262 f. Melanchthon was willing to use this language referring to Christ’s two natures as a way of speaking that helped clarify human understanding (communicatio idiomatum dialectica) but not as a communicatio idiomatum physica, which he polemically reproached his opponents for teaching. That was no more than a “confusio naturarum,” he charged in Refutatio erroris Serveti, in: MSA 6:377. Similar disputes arose among the so-called Gnesio-Lutherans themselves, e. g. between Wigand and Heshusius, and then between Heshusius and the Concordists, over this language. See Dingel: 1996, 438 – 48. 26 That can be demonstrated from other articles of the Formula of Concord as well, particularly articles I and II and IV-VI. 27 The Formula of Concord also speaks of Luther as the foremost interpreter of the Augsburg Confession, e. g. FC SD VII, 34, BSLK, 983,3 – 10, Book of Concord, 598, FC SD VII, 41, BSLK, 984,36 – 985,9, Book of Concord, 600; cf. in the “Binding Summary” of the Formula of Concord, SD, 5, 7, BSLK, 834,42 – 835,27, 835,46 – 836,15, Book of Concord, 527 f.

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Roman Catholic party and, in agreement with Martin Luther, taught the real presence of Christ’s body and blood under the elements of bread and wine. In the course of the 1530s, in negotiations with the South Germans under Martin Bucer’s leadership, which led to the Wittenberg Concord of 1536, he modified his language, reflected as well in the Confessio Augustana Variata. He continued this way of formulating his doctrine in the Confessio Saxonica (1551), the Examen Ordinandorum (1554), and in later editions of his Loci communes. This formulation emphasized the real presence of the entire person of Christ “in the sacrament when received in accord with the usage instituted by Christ,” and it also accented the communion of Christ with those who receive the sacrament, departing from his earlier interpretation of 1 Corinthians 10:16 as describing the communion of his body and blood with the bread and wine. The authors of the Formula of Concord, all of whom desired at least to some extent to be faithful followers of Melanchthon, departed from this way of formulating the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper and reaffirmed Luther’s insistence on the sacramental presence of Christ’s body and blood in, with, and under the elements of bread and wine, received through the mouth (manducatio oralis) by believers and unbelievers alike (manducatio impiorum) even though the unbelievers, apart from faith, receive no benefit but rather judgment. At the same time the authors of the Formula desired to affirm Melanchthon’s position wherever possible, particularly by insisting on the validity of the sacrament within the framework of the “use” instituted by Christ, by rejecting transubstantiation and a “Capernaitic” eating and drinking, and by emphasizing the necessity of faith for beneficial reception of the sacrament. This was not enough to meet the concerns of those followers of Melanchthon whose presuppositions drove them in a spiritualizing direction, to a confession of Christ’s presence that did not place his body and blood in or under the bread and wine.

Literature Andresen, Carl (1980). Handbuch der Dogmen- und Theologiegeschichte, Bd. 2: Die Lehrentwicklung im Rahmen der Konfessionalität. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Bauer, Karl (1920). Die Beziehungen Calvins zu Frankfurt a. M. Leipzig: Heinsius. Baur, Jçrg (2002). Art. Ubiquität. Pp. 224 – 41. In: TRE 34. Berlin: de Gruyter. Bizer, Ernst (1940). Studien zur Geschichte des Abendmahlsstreits im 16. Jahrhundert. Gütersloh: Bertelsmann. Bucer, Martin (1969). Martin Bucers Deutsche Schriften. Robert Stupperich et al. (Ed.). Gütersloh: Mohn. (1969). Martin Bucers Deutsche Schriften: Band. 3: Confessio Tetrapolitana und die Schriften des Jahres 1531. Robert Stupperich et al. (Ed.). Gütersloh: Mohn.

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(1988). Bd. 6,1: Wittenberger Konkordie (1536), Schriften zur Wittenberger Konkordie (1534 – 1537). Robert Stupperich et al. (Ed.). Gütersloh: Mohn. Camerarius, Joachim (1566). DE PHILIPPI MELANCHTHONIS ORTV, TOTIVS VITAE CVRRICVLO ET MORTE, … NARRATIO DILIGENS ET ACCVRATA. Leipzig: Ernestus Voegelin. Dingel, Irene (1997). Art. Religionsgespräche IV. Altgläubig – protestantisch und innerprotestantisch. Pp. 654 – 81. In: TRE 28. Berlin: de Gruyter. (2007). “Augsburger Religionsfrieden und ‘Augsburger Konfessionsverwandtschaft’ – Konfessionelle Lesarten.” Pp. 157 – 76. In: Heinz Schilling und Heribert Smolinsky (Ed.). Der Augsburger Religionsfrieden 1555. Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus. (Ed.) (2008). Controversia et Confessio, Theologische Kontroversen 1548 – 1577/80. Kritische Auswahledition. Bd 8: Die Debatte um die Wittenberger Abendmahlslehre und Christologie, 1570 – 1574. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. (Ed.) (2012a). Controversia et Confessio, Theologische Kontroversen 1548 – 1577/80. Kritische Auswahledition. Bd 2: Der Adiaphoristische Streit. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. (2012b). “Melanchthon and the Establishment of Confessional Norms.” Essay 8 in this volume. (2012c). “Melanchthon’s Paraphrases of the Augsburg Confession, 1534 and 1536, in the Service of the Smalcald League.” Essay 5 in this volume. (2010). “Philipp Melanchthon – Freunde und Feinde.” Col. 775 – 804. In: Theologische Literaturzeitung 135. Hammer, Wilhelm (1967). Die Melanchthonforschung im Wandel der Jahrhunderte. Ein beschreibendes Verzeichnis, Bd. I: 1519 – 1799. Gütersloh: Mohn. Hund, Johannes (2006). Das Wort ward Fleisch. Eine systematisch-theologische Untersuchung zur Debatte um die Wittenberger Christologie und Abendmahlslehre in den Jahren 1567 bis 1574. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Immenkçtter, Herbert (Ed.) (1979). Die Confutatio der Confessio Augustana vom 3. August 1530. Münster : Aschendorff. Kolb, Robert (2012). “The Critique of Melanchthon’s Doctrine of the Lord’s Supper by his ‘Gnesio-Lutheran’ Students.” Essay 11 in this volume. Kolb, Robert, and James A. Nestingen (Ed.) (2001). Sources and Contexts of the Book of Concord. Minneapolis: Fortress. Luther, Martin (1986). Studienausgabe 4. Hans-Ulrich Delius (Ed.). Berlin: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. Mahlmann, Theodor (1969). Das neue Dogma der lutherischen Christologie. Gütersloh: Mohn. Mangon, Abraham (2004). Kurze doch wahrhafftige Beschreibung der Geschichte der Reformierten in Frankfurt. 1554 – 1712. Irene Dingel (Ed. with commentary). Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. Mau, Rudolf (Ed.) (2008). Evangelische Bekenntnisse. Bekenntnisschriften der Reformation und neuere Theologische Erklärungen. Vol. 1. 2. ed. Witten: LutherVerlag.

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Melanchthon, Philip (2002). Philipp Melanchthon, Heubtartikel Christlicher Lere. Melanchthons deutsche Fassung seiner Loci Theologici. Ralf Jenett and Johannes Schilling (Ed.). Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. Mirbt, Carl (Ed.) (1967). Quellen zur Geschichte des Papsttums und des römischen Katholizismus. Revised by Kurt Aland. Bd. 1: Von den Anfängen bis zum Tridentinum. Tübingen: Mohr/Siebeck. Mller, E.F. Karl (Ed.) (1903). Die Bekenntnisschriften der reformierten Kirche. Leipzig: Deichert. Mller, Gerhard (1989). “Bündnis und Bekenntnis. Zum Verhältnis von Glauben und Politik im deutschen Luthertum des 16. Jahrhunderts.” Pp. 25 – 45. In: Gerhard Müller : Causa Reformationis. Beiträge zur Reformationsgeschichte und zur Theologie Martin Luthers. Gottfried Maron and Gottfried Seebaß (Ed.). Gütersloh: Mohn. Neuser, Wilhelm H. (Trans.) (1990). Das Augsburger Bekenntnis in der revidierten Fassung des Jahres 1540. Speyer : Evangelischer Presseverlag Pfalz. (1987) Bibliographie der Confessio Augustana und Apologie 1530 – 1580. Nieuwkoop: de Graaf. Salig, Christian August (1730). Vollständige Historie Der Augspurgischen Confeßion und derselben Apologie …, Bd. I. Halle: Renger. Seebass, Gottfried (2005). “Der Abendmahlsartikel der Confessio Augustana Variata von 1540.” Pp. 411 – 24. In: Johanna Loehr (Ed.). Dona Melanchthoniana. Festgabe für Heinz Scheible zum 70. Geburtstag. 2. ed. Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: frommann-holzboog. Tschackert, Paul (1910/1979). Die Entstehung der lutherischen und der reformierten Kirchenlehre samt ihren innerprotestantischen Gegensätzen. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Wartenberg, Gnther (1996). “Die ‘Confessio Saxonica’ als Bekenntnis evangelischer Reichsstände.” Pp. 275 – 94. In: Christine Roll (Ed.), Recht und Reich im Zeitalter der Reformation. Festschrift für Horst Rabe. Frankfurt/M: Lang. –, and Hans-Peter Hasse (Ed.) (2004). Caspar Peucer (1525 – 1602). Wissenschaft, Glaube und Politik im konfessionellen Zeitalter. Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt. Wengert, Timothy J. (2012). “Philip Melanchthon’s 1557 Lecture on Colossians 3:1 – 2. Christology as Context for the Controversy over the Lord’s Supper.” Essay 10 in this volume. (1995). “‘With Friends Like This …’: The Biography of Philip Melanchthon by Joachim Camerarius.” Pp. 115 – 31. In: Thomas F. Mayer and D. R. Woolf (Ed.), The Rhetorics of Life-Writing in Early Modern Europe: Forms of Biography from Cassandra Fedele to Louis XIV. Ann Arbor : University of Michigan. Wittenberg faculty (1560). Kurtzer Bericht / Wie der Ehrwirdig / vnser lieber Vater vnd Praeceptor / PHILIPPVS MELANTHON sein Leben hie auff Erden geendet … Nuremberg: Valentin Newber.

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Index of Persons (Not mentioned are those who sent letters to Melanchthon or received letters from him.) Aesop 47 Agricola, Johann/John 68, 70, 149, 183, 205, 245, 248 Albert of Brandenburg, archbishop of Mainz 58, 65 f., 82 Albrecht V, duke of Bavaria 143 f., 157 Albrecht, duke of Prussia 249 Alceensis, superintendent in Kaiserslautern 254 Alesius, Alexander 48 Amsdorf, Nicholas von 43, 87 f., 133, 135 f., 143, 237 f. Aristotle 19 – 28, 55, 186, 202, 207 Arius 156, 210, 255 August, elector of Saxony 128 f., 131, 273 Augustine 31, 33, 45, 86, 92, 148, 186 f., 189, 206, 214 – 218, 221, 225, 255 f. Augustine (pseudo-) 187, 215 f., 222 ff., 230 Aurifaber, Johannes (Weimar) 183 Barnes, Robert 114 Basil 148, 256 Basil (pseudo-) 202 ff. Bellay, Guillaume de 107 f., 110, 112 f., 205 Bellay, Jean de 107 Bernard of Clairvaux 148 Bernhard, Jude 52 Beurlin, Jakob 249 Biel, Gabriel 194 f., 217, 222 Bötker, Johann 127, 175 f., 277 Bonfio, Luca 79, 87, 89 f. Boquin, Peter 254 Bording, Jacob 256 Brenz, Johannes 66, 72, 88, 128 ff., 135,

143, 156, 176, 215, 217, 219, 226 ff., 231 ff., 243, 257, 277 BriÅonnet, Guillaume 106 Brück, Gregor/Gregory 83 f., 115 Bucer, Martin 36, 107 f., 112 f., 127, 164, 210 f., 237, 239, 267, 274, 279 Buchholzer, Georg 244 f. Bugenhagen, Johannes/John 10, 43, 48, 52, 54, 64, 115, 168, 247, 249 Bullinger, Heinrich 62, 72 f., 108, 144, 226 f., 231 ff., 238, 240, 245 Burchard, Franz 115 Cajetan, Cardinal (Tommaso de Vio) 81, 88, 99 Calvin, John 43, 59, 154, 174, 176, 186 f., 191, 201, 210, 218, 233, 238, 240 f., 243, 245, 251, 253 ff. 264, 268, 272 f. Camerarius, Anna 170, 268, 271 Camerarius, Joachim 26, 47 f., 52 f., 55, 58, 66, 83, 87, 89 f., 100, 156, 263, 271 Campeggio, Lorenzo 79 – 85, 87 – 91, 97 – 100 Canisius, Peter 128 Carlstadt, Andreas Bodenstein von 241 Catherine of Aragon, queen of England 107, 114 f. Cellarius, Johannes/John 52 Cellarius, Martin 20 Cerinthus 156, 255 Charles V, emperor 81 ff., 88, 91, 93 f., 104, 114, 124, 163 f., 173, 241, 265, 269 Chelius, Ulrich, 107 f., 112

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283

Chemnitz, Martin 39, 44, 212, 217, 224, 229 f., 232, 236, 249 ff., 258 Christian III, king of Denmark 69, 127 f., 247 Christoph/Christopher, duke of Württemberg 72, 126, 129 ff., 227 f., 243, 245 Chrysostom 92, 202, 204, 256 Chytraeus, David 47 f., 93, 236, 258 Cicero 20 – 23, 85, 96, 190, 197, 201 Clement of Alexandria 256 Clement VII, pope 90, 107, 113 Cochlaeus, Johann/John 79. 86, 88, 97, 188 Coelestin(us), Georg 84 f. Coelestin(us), Johann Friedrich 246 Coelius, Michael 173, 269 Cordatus, Conrad 48, 71 f., 206 Cranach, Lucas, the Elder 57, 60, 73 Crell, Paul 72 f., 236, 258 Cromwell, Thomas 114 Cruciger, Caspar, Sr. 45 f., 48, 53 f., 62, 66, 71 ff., 115, 186 Curaeus, Adam 244 Curaeus, Joachim 244, 273 Curio, C(o)elio Secundo 72, 218, 245 Cyprian 92, 214, 221 f., 230 Cyprian (pseudo-) 214, 216, 222, 230 Cyril 255, 271

Fabri, Johannes 97 Feige, Johann/John, von Lichtenau 58 Ferdinand I, emperor 57, 81, 126, 130, 146 Finck, Johannes 73 Flacius, Matthias, Illyricus 47 f., 79, 125 f., 128, 130 f. 133, 137, 141 – 144, 146, 149, 152 f., 155 f., 164 ff., 171 f., 183, 186 f., 201, 238 f., 243, 247, 250, 269 Fox, Edward 114 Francis I, king of France 104 ff., 112 f. Friedrich/Frederick II, elector of the Palatinate 241 Friedrich III, elector of the Palatinate 126, 228, 247 f., 250 ff., 254, 257 Friis, Johan 243 Froeschel, Sebastian 61 Funck, Johann 133

Dietrich, Veit 53 ff., 58, 72, 87 f., 186 Diller, Michael 227, 254 Draconites, Johann/John 48 Dryander, Franciscus 53

Hagen, Bartholomäus 226 f., 230 Hales, John 67 Hardenberg, Albert 127, 133, 149, 156 f., 167, 186, 216, 231, 239, 243 f., 246 – 258, 272 Heath, Nicholas 114 Hedio, Caspar 46, 107, 112 f. Henry VIII, king of England 50, 104 f., 107 f., 112, 114 f., 117 Herborn, Nicholas 195 Heshusius, Tilemann 44, 68, 175, 224, 226 f., 236, 246 – 249, 251 – 258, 278 Heussler, Christoph 246 Hoffmann, Christopher 48, 69

Eber, Paul 46 f., 52, 61, 68, 142, 213, 227 f., 236, 249, 258, 273 “Ebion” 156 Eck, Johann 88, 97, 133, 188, 255, 266 Eitzen, Paul von 188, 236, 258 Erasmus, Desiderius 24, 37, 64, 70 f., 80, 84 f., 97, 106, 183, 186 ff., 200 ff., 206, 210, 222, 226. 249

Gallus, Nikolaus 125, 133, 141 ff., 153, 155, 171 f., 186 f., 201, 206, 236, 238 f., 247, 251 ff. Geiger, Ulrich, see Chelius, Ulrich Georg, prince of Anhalt 50, 242, 246 Glüenspieß, Philip 48 Goltwurm, Caspar 48 Gregory I, pope 92 Gregory of Nazianzus 214, 256

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Hügel, Andreas 172 Hugo 243 Joachim of Fiore 73 Joachim II, elector of Brandenburg 131 Johann/John, elector of Saxony 88 – 89 Johann Friedrich the Elder, elector of Saxony 48, 55, 117, 141, 264 Johann Friedrich the Middler, duke of Saxony 131, 172 John of Damascus 35 Jonas, Justus 10, 43, 52, 58, 71, 81, 90, 115, 166, 185 Judex, Matthaeus 167 Kircher, Franz, of Stadion 155 Klebitz, Wilhelm 254 f. Krag, Tilemann 250 Kuhn, Georg 254 Lasco, Jan a 43, 238, 241, 243 Lefevre d’Etaples, Jacques 111 Leib, Christoph 56 Lopz, Gil, de Bejar 84 Luther, Martin 10 f., 19, 25, 29 f., 32 f., 35, 38 ff., 43, 48 – 52, 54, 56 – 59, 61 – 65, 67 – 71, 73 f., 79 – 85, 87 – 92, 99, 114 f., 118 f., 123 – 127, 132, 135 ff., 141 ff., 145 – 148, 153 f., 161 – 166, 168, 174 ff., 183 – 189, 191, 193 f., 197, 199 f., 204 ff., 209 f., 212, 216 f., 219 f., 222, 224, 227, 233, 236 – 242, 244 – 247, 249 – 258, 263 ff., 267 f., 270, 272 – 279 Major, Georg/George 31, 54, 65 ff., 69 f., 73, 127 ff., 133, 135 f., 149, 239, 243 Marbach, Johannes 219, 226 Marcourt, Antoine 113 Margurite, queen of Navarre 106, 111, 113 Maurice, see Moritz, elector of Saxony

Menius, Justus 48 Micyllus, James/Jacob 47, 53 Mörlin, Joachim 166, 236, 246 – 253, 256, 258 Monner, Basilius 128 Morenberg, Johann 244 f. Moritz, elector of Saxony 55, 58, 125, 164, 173, 269 Musculus, Andreas 175, 231 Musculus, Wolfgang 210 Myconius, Friedrich 58, 83, 108, 240, 246 Naogeorgus, Thomas 48 Nausea, Frederick 80 Neander, Michael 48 Nestorius 156, 255 Oecolampadius, Johannes 209, 240, 246, 251 Origen 33, 67, 92, 147, 189, 256 Osiander, Andreas 13, 54, 67, 72, 115, 125, 128 ff., 133 ff., 147, 165, 175 f., 219, 221, 231, 243, 249 Otho, Anton 133 Ottheinrich, elector of the Palatinate 129, 255 Paschasius 243 Paul of Samosata 156 Perrenot, Nicolas, de Granvelle 133, 241 Peter Lombard 35, 92, 187, 215 ff., 221 f., 224 f., 230, 243 Peucer, Caspar 45 ff., 51, 53, 56 – 62, 65 – 68, 73, 113, 117, 142, 172, 213, 220, 223, 232, 236, 243, 258, 273 Pezel, Christoph 61, 213 f., 236, 258, 272 f. Pfeffinger, Johannes 142, 149 Philip, landgrave of Hesse 25, 50, 58, 66, 107, 117, 130 f., 244 Plato 20, 22, 36, 84, 196 Praetorius, Johannes 211, 244

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Index of Persons Reuchlin, Johannes 9, 65 Rhau, Georg/George 48 Roth, Stephen 60, 71 Roussel, Grard 111 Rufinus 214, 216, 222 ff., 230 Runge, Jakob 227, 236 Sarcerius, Erasmus 250, 253, 256 Schnepf, Erhard 128, 246 Schwenckfeld, Caspar 13, 135, 147, 176, 230 f. Selnecker, Nikolaus 229, 258, 277 Servetus, Michael 36, 156, 171 f., 175 ff., 278 Setzer, Johann/John 51 – 55, 57, 62, 65, 70 f. Siber, Adam 54 Sicke, Peter 256 Spangenberg, Johannes/John 48 Stabius, Otomar 254 Stancaro, Francesco 45, 142, 169, 171 f., 175 ff., 231, 272 Staphylus, Friedrich 13, 67, 142, 172 Stigel, Johann/John 46, 54, 58, 220 Stöckel, Leonhardt 244 Stössel, Johann 128 Strigel, Viktorin 128, 149, 172, 187 Sturm, Johann 107, 224 Thamer, Theobold Theodoret 256

Theophylactus 256 Thym, Georg 48 Timann, Johannes 175, 239, 243 f., 247 f., 277 Trolle, Herluf 72, 220 Ulrich, duke of Württemberg Ursinus, Zacharias 244

107

Valds, Alfonso de 82 Valla, Lorenzo 185, 191, 196, 201 Vermigli, Peter Marytr 218 Vigilius Martyr 243 Vögelin, Ernst 142, 166, 168, 171 Westphal, Joachim 133, 137, 141, 151, 166, 174 ff., 218, 236, 238 – 247, 251, 256 f., 264, 272, 277 Wigand, Johannes 133, 167, 173, 269, 278 Winsheim, Veit 34 Wolfgang, count palatine 68, 131, 144 Wycliff, John 27 Zanchi, Jerome 72, 218 f., 226, 245 Ziegler, Bernhard 57 Zirler, Stephan 254 Zwingli, Ulrich 13, 115, 185, 190 f., 196, 201, 203, 209 ff., 245 f., 255, 264

25

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Index of Subjects

Adiaphora, adiaphoristic controversy 11, 47, 109, 111, 119 f., 125, 129 f., 133 f., 137, 153, 164, 236 f., 252 Anhalt, theologians of 236, 273 Antinomian controversy(ies) 125, 149, 183, 246 Apology of the Augsburg Confession 11 f., 65, 80 f., 84, 87, 89 – 97, 100, 105, 110 f., 115 – 120, 123, 129 – 132, 136, 142, 145, 147, 149, 154, 157, 165 – 170, 188, 194, 198, 227, 241, 246, 252, 255 f., 272, 274 Apostles Creed 36, 39, 141, 210, 214, 216, 222 f., 229 f. See also Creeds, ecumenical Athanasian Creed 39. See also Creeds, ecumenical Augsburg Confession 11, 39, 81 – 92, 95 – 99, 104 – 120, 123 f., 126, 129 – 132, 134, 136 ff., 142, 145 ff., 149 f., 152, 154, 157, 161 f., 164 – 170, 175, 188, 194, 198 ff., 210, 216, 227, 241 f., 246, 252 – 255, 264 – 274, 278 Augsburg Confession, Variata 136 f., 164 f., 169, 173 ff., 210, 241, 264 f., 268, 270 ff., 274, 278 f. Augsburg Interim 163, 186 f., 269 Augsburg, diet of, 1518 88, 99 Augsburg, diet of, 1530 24, 27, 79 – 89, 91 – 100 Augsburg, Religious Peace of 126, 164 f., 232, 264 Bavarian Visitation/“Inquisition” Articles 12, 143 – 158, 169 ff. Bishops, power of 30, 82, 84, 89, 109 f. Body of doctrine, see Corpus doctrinae

Catholica Responsio 84, 88 Celibacy, clerical 80, 82, 86 f., 90, 110, 112, 117 ff., 145, 202 Christ, two natures of 32, 127 f., 137, 151, 156 f., 175 ff., 212 – 217, 219, 221 – 233, 240, 245, 257, 275, 277 f. Christology, See Christ, two natures of; communicatio idiomatum Church, doctrine of 25, 32, 36, 39, 45, 68, 73, 131, 145 f., 152, 193, 221 Colossians, Melanchthon’s commentary on 21, 32, 44 f., 62, 70 ff., 183 f., 188, 209 – 223, 245 Communicatio idiomatum 72, 137, 145, 156, 175 ff., 211 ff., 217, 222 – 225, 229 – 232, 277 f. Communion in both kinds 32, 86 f., 90, 110, 112, 117 f., 143 Confessio Helvetica prior 266 Confessio Saxonica, see Saxon Confession of 1551 Confessio Tetrapolitana 267 Confutation, Book of, see Weimar Book of Confutation Confutation of the Augsburg Confession 81, 84, 87 – 100, 266 Consilium ad Gallos 105, 108, 110 – 113, 116 – 120, 147, 204 Corpus Christi procession 86, 133, 244 Corpus doctrinae 12, 132, 142, 161 – 177, 271 f. Coswig, colloquy of 126, 166 f. Creeds, ecumenical 39, 132, 161, 167 – 171, 242, 271 Curriculum reform 21 – 40, 45

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287

Index of Subjects Ecclesiastical governance 109. See also Bishops, power of; and Papacy Ex opere operato 83, 118, 150 Examen ordinandorum 39, 211, 242, 246, 249, 252, 254, 270, 272, 274 f., 279 “Excluding expressions” 147 f. Formula of Concord 105, 157, 167, 169, 210, 217, 236, 263 ff., 272 – 278 Forty-two Articles 105 Frankfurt, diet of 1558 165 Frankfurt Recess 123 – 138, 165, 167, 172, 254 Freedom, Christian 33, 89, 112, 146 Freedom of the will 144 ff., 148 f., 152 – 155, 157, 183 – 207, 237, 239, 243, 251 Good works 145 f., 148 f., 153, 165, 189 ff., 194, 197 f., 201, 206, 237, 239, 241 ff., 263 f. Justification by faith 23, 25, 31 f., 64 ff., 73, 82 f., 93, 110 f., 120, 125, 128 f., 133 ff., 142, 145 – 148, 152, 157, 163, 165, 175 f., 183 f., 189, 194, 206 f., 218, 221, 231, 263 f. Keys, office or power of 32, 96, 99 Loci communes of Melanchthon 20, 31 – 35, 44 f., 63, 65 f., 93 f., 99, 115 f., 123, 142, 145, 147, 156, 168 ff., 183 – 193, 195 – 206, 224, 231, 268, 271 f., 274, 279 Loci communes, method of 31 f., 35, 50, 63 Law and gospel, distinction of 31 – 35, 38, 73, 184, 189, 197, 199 f., 207 Leipzig Proposal/”Interim” 11, 125, 129, 163 f., 186, 236 – 239, 243, 253, 257, 260 Lord’s Supper 13, 51, 59 f., 68, 82, 86, 112, 117 f., 125 – 129, 132 – 134,

136 ff., 141, 143, 145 f., 149 ff., 157, 164 f., 168, 173 – 176, 189, 196, 209 – 219, 224, 227 f., 231 ff., 236 – 258, 263 – 279. See also Communion in both kinds Majoristic controversy 69, 125, 165 Manducatio impiorum/indignorum 136, 240, 242, 250, 255, 267 f., 273 ff., 279 Manducatio oralis 136, 240, 242, 250, 255, 268, 271, 273, 275, 279 Mass 39, 59, 80, 82 – 87, 110, 112 f., 117, 120, 143, 145 f., 150, 152, 244 Mass, private 82 f., 85 ff., 112 Naumburg, diets of princes, 1554/1561 124, 136 Nicene Creed 36, 39, 44 f., 210. See also Creeds, ecumenical Original sin 198, 204

32, 110, 126, 128, 154, 193,

Papacy 30, 59, 86 f., 98 ff., 109 f., 114, 118 ff., 125, 144 f., 147, 152, 162 Particulae exclusivae, see “Excluding expressions” Penance/poenitentia 80, 146, 149 f., 203 Placards, affair of the 105, 113 Regensburg, colloquy of (Hagenau/ Worms), 1540 – 1542 23 ff., 133, 146, 241, 268 Regensburg, colloquy of, 1545 – 1546 146 Presence of Christ in the Lord’s Supper 86, 117, 127, 136 f., 151, 173 – 176, 209 – 213, 217 ff., 223 – 233, 236 – 258, 263 – 279 Repentance 31 f., 35, 38, 70, 80, 91 – 96, 146, 148 ff., 157, 203, 267 f., 275 Rhetoric 20, 24, 29 f., 32 f., 35 ff., 40, 44, 63 f., 66, 69, 91 – 97, 184, 196, 232

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288

Index of Subjects

Romans, Melanchthon’s commentary on 23, 51, 61 – 67, 74, 184, 189 Sacraments 32, 60, 96, 133, 145, 150 ff., 157 Sacrifice 82 f., 117 f., 263, 271 Saxon Confession, 1551 124, 132, 142, 145, 167, 169 f., 173 ff., 211, 241, 246, 265, 268 – 272, 279 Smalcald Articles 39, 82, 129 f., 132, 141, 199, 241 f., 246, 252, 268, 274 Smalcald League 104 f., 108, 114 ff., 124, 266 f. Smalcald War 54 f., 57, 60, 84, 163, 238, 247 Stuttgart Confession 72, 228 Synergistic controversy 125, 165 Ten Articles 105 Thirty-nine Articles 105

Tradition(s) 29, 32, 80, 89, 158, 162 Transubstantiation 112, 137, 146, 151, 211, 256, 266, 275, 279 Trent, council of 23, 39, 45, 124, 148, 155, 162, 167, 173, 211, 265, 269 Veneration of the saints 39, 79, 110 ff., 145 f., 150 Vows, monastic 87, 110, 117, 119 Weimar Book of Confutation 138, 144, 165, 171 f., 244, 250 Wittenberg Articles of 1536 105, 114 – 120, 147 Wittenberg Concord 105, 124, 151, 164, 169, 210, 224, 231 f., 237, 246, 267 f., 274 f., 279 Worms, colloquy of, 1557 72 f., 104, 126 – 131, 146, 210, 218 f., 243 f., 245 f., 249

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