StL5d: Young pastors want complete writings; England translated, circulated Luther’s Galatians

[†††  Today is 91 years after Prof. Dr. Franz Pieper went home to his Saviour  †††] 

      This concludes from Part 5c (Table of Contents in Part 1) in a series on the St. Louis Edition (StL) of Luther's complete writings in English. —  Pieper finishes his essay by showing how "younger pastors" in the Synod, and even England, at that time, highly valued Luther's writings. So his Missouri Synod should not fall behind in doing the same. 

(From Der Lutheraner, vol. 63 p. 403-405 (No. 26, Dec. 17, 1907) (all underlining and bolding follows Pieper's emphasis):

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Luther's Writings.

[by Franz Pieper; concluded from Part 5c]

The undersigned was therefore very pleased when, at a district synod, younger pastors of our synod expressed the wish that they should come into possession of the complete writings of Luther. They inquired whether our publishing house could not make it possible for the less well-off to acquire Luther's works by producing a cheaper edition and accepting partial payments. Our Concordia Publishing House has accommodated this request. We refer to the relevant advertisement in Der Lutheraner. (No. 13, p. 203.) But also our dear Christians in general should take advantage of this offer of our publishing house. Many of them spend larger or smaller sums on books every year. Why should they not also purchase the writings of the Reformer of the Church, or at least a part of them? He will have great spiritual profit from it. When our publishing house began to publish Luther's writings, among the first buyers was an old Christian from one of our St. Louis parishes. He has since gone home. He began reading the first two volumes, which contain Luther's interpretation of the first book of Moses, and, as he joyfully informed the undersigned, he was amazed at the abundance of spiritual light with which Luther's writings illuminate all things in church and world from God's Word.  

Another example: An American preacher, who belongs to a sectarian church but has a better Christian knowledge than most of his comrades, made a trip to Europe and met in England with a man who displayed an exceptionally clear knowledge of sin and grace, Law and Gospel. When asked in amazement where he got the knowledge of who his teacher had been, the man replied: “I read Luther's Explanation of Galatians.” Luther's Explanation on the Epistle to the Galatians — the most formidable human writing on the main article of Christian doctrine, the article of justification — was in fact translated into English early on and widely circulated in England.

So we Lutherans, too, do not want to let the great treasure we have in Luther's writings lie unused.   F. Pieper.

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I have experienced Pieper's point about England and Luther. While searching for English translated works of Luther 20+ years ago, I found that in the 19the century, there were several writings of him available in English from England. My "Luther's Letters" blog documents several of these. Another example is from Henry Cole in 1824, Select works of Martin Luther. And the Bible given to me at my confirmation?… printed in Great Britain. How things have changed in that country since then! — In the next sub-series Part 6x, I present a translation of Walther's announcement of Volume 11, the first one (of four) of Luther's sermons.