Part 4: The Counter-Reformation within the Lutheran Church: Melanchthon's error

      This concludes from Part 3 (Table of Contents in Part 1) in a short series publishing Franz Pieper's last convention essay in 1930 on the 3 Counter-Reformations. — In this segment Pieper speaks of Lutherans, old and new, who have deviated from Lutheran doctrine. And in the process, we get a clear explanation of the doctrinal weakness of Philip Melanchthon in his later years. — From the 1930 Eastern District, pp. 43-47: 

I. The Counter-Reformation within the Lutheran Church.

Notable Quotations:

p. 39: "And now the sad event that even during Luther's lifetime a man arose within the Lutheran Church itself and at the University of Wittenberg who challenged the Gospel of grace, and that this man was Philip Melanchthon"

39: "Melanchthon wanted to be wise beyond the Holy Scriptures. He wanted to know more about things that affect people's salvation than God has revealed to us humans in His Word."

39: "In order to explain to human reason why not all people are saved… Melanchthon came up with the fantastic idea … that man could and must make a contribution to the development of faith in the Gospel"

39: "Melanchthon had truly forgotten what Scripture so clearly teaches… every human being is dead in sins"

40: "Luther had a very serious conversation with Melanchthon, and Melanchthon gave in."

40: "Melanchthon attributed to man the ability to turn to grace before his conversion"

41: "Another example of exaltation over others is the Jews. They did not want to sit on the same bench of sin with the Gentiles and thus excluded themselves from the kingdom of God for time and eternity, Matt. 8:10-12"

41: "…very soon afterwards, so-called “scientific” theology broke out, especially in Germany."

42: "The fathers of the Missouri Synod…were led by God's grace from Germany to America"

43: "Luther also teaches the inspiration of Holy Scripture."

44: "…German university professors no longer consider the Holy Scriptures to be the Word of God."

44: "If a denier of Christ's inspiration …wants to console himself with John 3:16 … the devil may well whisper to him: How can you rely on John 3:16"

44: "the extremely sad fact that modern Lutheran theologians mostly also deny the vicarious satisfaction"

45: "substitutionary satisfaction is the direct teaching of Holy Scripture."

45: "Luther teaches that all those who do not believe in the vicarious satisfaction of Christ are outside the Christian Church"

45: "Unitarianism, however, is the dominant religion in our famous universities." [i.e. Harvard]

46: "Even within the American Lutheran Church, the substitutionary satisfaction of Christ has been directly denied in individual cases."

46: Synergism: "the idea that God has not completely reconciled the world to himself through Christ's substitutionary satisfaction."

46: “ecumenical Lutheranism” [or so-called “catholicity”]: "Some understand it to mean a further development of Lutheran teaching". [e.g. Loehe]

47: "As far as doctrine is concerned, there are no Old Lutherans and New Lutherans. … its “ecumenical” character, which remains the same for all times and places, includes unity in Christian doctrine."

The following gives access to the full essay in English translation:

A download of the DOCX file is provided >>  HERE  << which has been added to the original "Convention Essays" blog listing.

      Pieper's clear condemnation of Melanchthon's later error shows that Prof. Bente, in his Historical Introduction to the Symbolical Books, followed not only Walther, but also Franz Pieper. Pres. Matthew Harrison recently claimed that Pieper is "our greatest LCMS theologian who is still studied at our seminaries today". So why does the LC–MS oppose Pieper on the history and the doctrine of Melanchthon's later error? Is it not true that today's LC–MS has actually joined the "Counter-Reformation within the Lutheran Church"?

Did Melanchthon teach Luther the Gospel? Or vice versa?

      Sometimes one discovers something that previously stared them in the face, but went unrecognized. That was the case while re-reading my series "The 'Carrying' of Melanchthon on the Part of Luther" a year ago. In Part 3 of that series Walther quoted Melanchthon, saying that the quote came from "a particularly splendid confession of Melanchthon in the testament which he wrote in 1539 in a premonition of death." In the language of Melanchthon, Latin, he wrote in his Testimony: 

"Ago autem gratias Reverendo D. Doctori Martino Luthero, primum, quia ab ipso Evangelium didici. Deinde pro singulari erga me benevolentia, quam quidem plurimis beneficiis declaravit, eumque volo a meis non secus ac patrem coli. Ego quia vidi et comperi praeditum esse excellenti et heroica vi ingenii et multis magnis virtutibus ac pietate, doctrina praecipua, semper eum magnifeci, dilexi, et colendum esse sensi."

In English, per Google Translate, he said (Corp. Ref. III, 827, my emphasis):

"I thank the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther, first, because I learned the Gospel from him."

Again, this was stated on "a premonition of death", and so it was made in all seriousness.

       But the exact opposite assertion was made by Dr. Lowell Green († 2014), a noted teacher in the LC-MS now promoted by Drs. Scott Keith (Concordia-Irvine, CA, 1517.org) and John T. Pless (CTS-FW). Keith's "1517 Publishing" has re-published, in a new edition, Dr. Green's 1980 book in 2021. One need only quote the title to discover their assertion:

       “How Melanchthon Helped Luther Discover the Gospel”

Unfortunately for Drs. Green and Keith, Melanchthon disagrees with them!

Walther: Did Luther "carry" Melanchthon's errors? (Part 1 of 28); Bente shunned in LC-MS

[2024-05-25: Hochstetter's History covers this essay on pp. 425-428]

      C. F. W. Walther is a master historian of the Reformation and all the theologians connected with it.  And in 1876, in the pages of Lehre und Wehre, Walther tackled one of the most difficult issues a Lutheran theologian has to face: the relationship between Martin Luther and his associate Philip Melanchthon.  So when I ran across this extensive essay (39 pages in length), I knew that I had to get it translated.  Walther digs deep into Reformation history to unearth what the persons involved actually said, then he ties it all together.  This is no small task, given the ambiguous language that is used at key points in this history. During the translation of this project, I was greatly interested in the content of Walther’s essay and could hardly wait for each new paragraph in order to get the full story on this important–and controversial–subject. — What did Walther think of Melanchthon and his teaching?  He tells us the answer to that question near the end of his essay: 

"How much would we have preferred to be able to help that only the memory of Melanchthon should be kept alive from the time of his faithfulness and blessed efficacy, but that the memory of him from the time of his softening and falling should be wiped out and buried forever!"  

So why then did he take the time to go into this thorny topic?  We find the answer to that question in both the opening and closing comments. — I have spent several months working on this essay, its supporting documentation, and on the controversial arguments against it. We begin now the first of many blog posts presenting this masterful essay by… "The American Luther." From Lehre und Wehre, vol. 22 (Nov., Dec.1876), pp. 321-338, 353-373 [EN]:

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The “Carrying” of Melanchthon on the Part of Luther.

[by C. F. W. Walther, Part 1]

After Luther's death, it has often been pointed out to those Lutherans who did not want to hold fraternal, altar and church fellowship with manifest false teachers within our church, that Luther, as we know, had himself cultivated such fellowship with Melanchthon, even after the latter had no longer agreed with Luther on several important points of doctrine. *) Such Lutherans, it was claimed, obviously wanted to be more strictly Lutheran than Luther himself. A Lutheran in Luther's sense should not break off fellowship with the erring who still professed the faith of our church, but should rather bear and tolerate it, as Luther once did with a Melanchthon. 

In recent times this was also reproached to those East Indian missionaries [Zorn, Willkomm, Zucker] who had been dismissed and who declared that they could no longer remain in the service of the Leipzig Missionary Society if the latter did not break away from fellowship with notorious false teachers in which it is known to stand. Missionary Zorn wrote to us from East India that Director Hardeland had said to them, the missionaries troubled in their conscience, “You want to be more orthodox than Luther. — You have to take a man as a Lutheran for as long as he is Lutheran, that is, not to separate from him when he professes to be Lutheran. Here,” it goes on, “Luther's carrying of Melanchthon from 1542-1546 was cited (and cited again and again) as a resounding example of healthy church practice from the fundamental period of the Reformation.” 

————

*) This was done by, among others, the crypto-Calvinist Dr. Caspar Peucer, Melanchthon's son-in-law, in his Tractatus historicus de Melanchthonis sententia de controversia Coenae Domini, 1576, and the Philippists at the Altenburg Colloquium in 1568, who went further, claiming that Luther agreed with Melanchthon's deviations from the earlier doctrine. 

(LuW 322)   

If Melanchthon had really already become apparent in Luther's time as a stubborn false teacher, and if Luther had really let Melanchthon have his way during this time, then one would have to admit that those Lutherans who do not want to cultivate fellowship with false teachers appearing in our church [i.e. theologians claiming to be Lutheran] do not act in Luther's sense, at least not according to Luther's example. 

But the matter stands, thank God, quite differently; and the intention of the present article is to prove this. 

- - - - - - - - - -  Continued in Part 2  - - - - - - - - - - 

Walther did not want to write this unhappy essay, he was forced into it — forced because of false charges from Lutheran leaders in Germany in the 19th century. But along with the example of the director of the Leipzig Mission Society, Walther gives examples from the 16th Century who tried to hide behind this same false report of Luther.  Unlike his opponents, Walther focuses not on the early years of Melanchthon, but only on the years of the last 10 years of Luther's life. This is exactly the time frame that erring Lutherans want to avoid. —  It is a most unsettling history, not only because of Melanchthon's wavering, but also because it is difficult to defend against the misuse of it by erring Lutheran theologians. What a relief it is to have C. F. W. Walther take on this task, the "heavy lifting", of presenting a full analysis.

      As I progressed through Walther's essay, another work came to mind that would be a perfect compliment to it, Prof. F. Bente's 1921 Historical Introduction to the Symbolical Books, his best known work.  But as I researched Bente's work and reactions to it in today's LCMS, a counter concept of Reformation history came to light.  There is a radical shift in thinking being promoted within and without the LC-MS. And so to counter what is being taught in the LC-MS seminaries and institutions, or at least allowed, I decided to take several months to polish this translation of Walther — adding pictures of many persons, and inserting dozens of links to Walther's source materials so that readers can immediately access them and read them where possible. What makes Bente controversial will certainly make Walther's essay controversial.  More will be said about this in upcoming blog posts. — In the next Part 2, Walther explains the complexity of the problem, then begins to present the matter.

- - - - - - - - -  Table of Contents  - - - - - - - - -

Part 1: This intro; Leipzig Mission dismisses Missouri leaning missionaries

Part 2: The Melanchthon Conundrum; “Slight doubts [rising from] Church Fathers.”; list of LC-MS opponents

Part 3: M.'s good confessions in Luther's last years; Lowell Green's attacks, Marquart's rebuttal 

Part 4: More good confessions by Melanchthon; Green charges Bente on Supper

Part 5: M.'s errors not overlooked; L.'s "guileless, faithful heart"; Rosenbladt's "black hat" charge against Bente

Part 6: Ratzeburger "hits truth" on M.; Scott Keith: Bente's "poorly" covered history

Part 7: M.'s private letters; “objectivity” of modern history?; "Thinking Fellows" "biased" against Bente

Part 8: M.'s “ambiguous behavior”, Calvin: “bread adoration”; "Banned Books" Ban Bente 

Part 9: “Beloved Baumgärtner” testifies against M.; praise for Bente's history from Paul McCain

Part 10: M.: gentle or angry nature?; Dr. Green's false judgment

Part 11: M.'s notorious letter; Green avoids recipient's name (Carlowitz)

Part 12: Quenstedt & Calvin tell the truth about M.; do Dingel & Kolb on Melanchthon & Leipzig Interim?

    Excursus 1: Chemnitz on Melanchthon's errors: Philippism, “horrible heresies”

Part 13: Walther summarizes Melanchthon's ups & downs; Langebartels uses Bente

    Excursus 2: Hutter on Melanchthon's errors

Part 14: Melanchthon: Luther did not carry me; Drs. Keith & Green "perceived errors" vs. Chemnitz

Part 15: Cordatus blows whistle; “‘causa’ must leave”; Walther's Law & Gospel; Gillespie, Riley against Unaltered Augsburg Confession?

Part 16: "necessary cause", “What bondage it was”; the many editions of Melanchthon's Loci

    Excursus 3: Löscher: Melanchthon's “all too political, philosophical mind.”; Löscher vs. Rosenbladt

Part 17: “Luther's mildness; The Thinking Fellows: Bente's "bias" of "confessional historiography"

Part 18:  Luther too mild?; Bente's Historical Introductions uploaded 2 ways

Part 19:  M.'s "game of hide-and-seek"

Part 20: Transubstantiation, Venetians, Swiss; Kolb against Chemnitz on Church Fathers

Part 21: Luther calmed, but Melanchthon “himself was not calm”

Part 22: The unsuspecting Luther… but only too soon…; Kolb avoids Luther's explosive letter

Part 23: Luther to write against Melanchthon, but…; Dr. Green's false thesis on Melanchthon

Part 24: Elector's letter to spare M.; Kolb whitewashes history, theology; LCMS is not true "Missouri Synod"

Part 25: Luther reproaches Melanchthon, Elector seals record; Dr. Keith's Law-driving

Part 26: Luther to Melanchthon: “do away with some points”; Walther's history of Formula polished, uploaded: Kern und Stern (another BTL book)

Part 27: Luther: great harm of silence; Pr Riley on Justification (UOJ) — a contradiction

Part 28: Impossible! (Walther's conclusion); Walther over Drs. Kolb and Green

"Sing, dear daughter, sing!": Melanchthon comforted by Luther's A Mighty Fortress (1 of 2)

      Buried in a series of articles on Lutheran hymns, the Der Lutheraner of Nov. 4, 1857 had a section on Luther's most famous hymn: Ein' feste Burg ist unser Gott. "A Mighty Fortress is Our God",   I had to stop OCRing the German text for awhile and get it translated to find out what the author "G. B." was saying about this most famous hymn.  And as the English translation appeared to me, I had to stop… and share it with the world. From Der Lutheraner vol 13 (1857), p. 42-43:

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =  

A Mighty Fortress is Our God

(Ein’ feste Burg ist unser Gott.)

[An essay by “G. B.”]

A free reworking of the 46th Psalm, composed by Luther in 1529 after the end of the Diet of Speyer, as an open protest song of the entire Protestant Church, which against all its adversaries and enemies trusted in God alone as its refuge and its fortress.  

In Coburg, at the fortress, he sang this psalm daily during the Augsburg Diet in 1530, sitting at the window with his lute and looking up to heaven, and he did so, according to Selneccer's testimony, "because the enemies wanted to devour him.” According to some, he first composed this heroic psalm at the fortress of Coburg, according to others on the way, when he traveled to the Diet of Worms in 1521. Along with the song, Luther also created the melody; both are as if from one cast, flowing from the deepest, noblest enthusiasm of his mind, so that he poured his innermost being in richest abundance into the word and the melody.  

Dr. Conrad Dietrich was already able to boast of the manner, that it has a special spiritual emphasis, like no other, stirs the heart, cheers it up, makes it joyful and glad in the Lord, gives courage and comfort, sap and strength, where it is only modulated and sung in faithful devotion. From the 3rd verse, the climax of the song, the heroic sense shines forth, with which Luther, in the armor of God, not being afraid even of the arch enemy, had already called out to the dissuading friends sent to him by [Georg] Spalatin on his journey to the Worms Imperial Assembly at Oppenheim: “Even if there are as many devils in Worms as there are tiles on the roofs, I will still go and not be afraid in the least. Even if [Jan] Hus was burned to ashes, the truth has not been burned with him.”  

Dr. Jacob Weller [de Wikipedia] says of this verse: “These are the words of a Christian who is completely ready and firm in his faith.” Luther's contemporary, Cyriacus Spangenberg, testifies: “When I looked at Dr. M. Luther 23 years ago in Wittenberg, it seemed to me that I was looking at a large, mighty, well-armed battleship that was confidently deployed among the enemies on the rough sea.”

Very quickly, as if the angels of God themselves had sent messengers, this song spread throughout Germany and all places where adherents of the pure evangelical doctrine lived. As early as 1532, the congregation in Schweinfurt sang it in church against the will of their pastor, and the children sang it at night in the streets, whereupon the Reformation soon took place there. 

Melanchthon, Jonas and Creuziger once entered Weimar in 1547, when Wittenberg had been surrendered to the enemy [Capitulation of Wittenberg] and they had been sent into exile. There they heard a little girl singing this song and were greatly comforted by it, especially by the words: “And if the world were full of devils”. Melanchthon, however, said to the pious young singer: 

“Sing, dear little daughter, sing; you do not know what great people you are comforting now.” 

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -  Conclusion in Part 2  - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

      I took great comfort in Melanchthon's resounding words, for this was after Luther's passing, during Melanchthon's time of weakening faith, yet he was facing severe persecution as a Lutheran.  How would he, the great theologian in his own right, be comforted as he was uprooted by the Papists?  He was comforted by a child singing Luther's majestic hymn.  This is a hymn for all Christians as they face the increasing persecution of this world. Sing, people, sing! – so Melanchthon calls out to us today! — There was another great Lutheran about this time who also took comfort from this hymn in persecution, in the concluding Part 2.

Hist17: Chp 13a— Germany supplies, fights; Election Controversy concluded: “they laugh at us…, in danger"

      This continues from Part 16 (Table of Contents in Part 3), a series presenting an English translation of Pastor Christian Hochstetter's 1885 496-page book entitled (abbreviated) The History of the Missouri Synod, 1838-1884. It also follows an Excursus on a contrary judgment of Walther's theological skill. — The last chapter 13 is by far the longest one and is being split up.  This "13a" portion reports on German Lutheran missionaries who recognized, with Walther's help, the false doctrine in their missionary society regarding the inspiration of Holy Scripture. The most noteworthy member who came to Missouri was Carl Manthey Zorn, a prolific later author of CPH books and others (Find-A-Grave).  An excuse for unionism was put forward by the Leipzig Mission Society, that Martin Luther supposedly "tolerated" or "carried" Melanchthon, to which Walther wrote a definitive, powerful refutation in 1876 [LuW 22 (1876) p. 321-339, 353-373]. (A separate "Excursus" will follow on this.) — The Controversy on the doctrine of Election of Grace had to be finally disposed of and concluded.  To this day, this doctrine still is a watershed event in the Church History of the last 150 years for the (Old) Missouri Synod.

Some quotes from Chapter 13a: (410-437)
411: "formal institution for… training of ministerial students for North America… by Pastor Brunn at Steeden"
412: "the German Lutheran state churches … allowing the liberal spirit of the times, unionism"
414: "We believe that many dear Lutherans… are in Germany, but the organizations are no longer Lutheran"
415: Missouri and verbal inspiration: "they laugh at us as ignorant people who are behind the times"
416: "no longer… Inspiration,… no longer… a purely Lutheran church,… the foundation for it is missing."
416: Breslau: "When a people…falls for the second time…it can happen… as it happened to Jerusalem."
417: Walther: "we take away the sting of the Word… a generation that has become full and died twice!"
421: "G. Stoeckhardt… sentenced to eight months in prison... after he had already left Germany"

422: Brauer: "a divine, salvation-working truth… the preservation of which life and salvation depend"
422: Luthardt: "all Lutheran Christians were warned of the Missouri Synod,… the theories put forward by Professor Walther…  doctrine of transference and the doctrine that the Pope was the Antichrist"
425: Leipzig, German syncretists "appeal to Luther's supposed toleration of the errors of Melanchthon…Walther proves… the matter, thank God, is quite different"
431: Schwan: "we put the article of the Election of Grace on the candlestick again… reason knows nothing of grace… your faith is not your work, but mine [God's]"
433: "Our doctrine is none other than that of Scripture and our dear Lutheran Church at the time of the Reformation and the Formula of Concord.… [to] the two sole causes of Election, namely God's mercy and Christ's merit… they also add a third cause, namely, persevering faith."
435: 1881 Missouri on "in view of faith": "we should rather drop the expressions of the later dogmatists."
437: Inexperienced people: "it is better [than pure doctrine] to devote one's time and energy to missions"
Images of some men appearing in Chapter 13a: (410-437)

    Brunn    —————    Kahnis   ————   G. Fritschel   ———   O. Willkomm   ———   Stoeckhardt  —————  Zorn
                     Ruhland    ————    Luthardt  —————  Scheibel  —————  Wucherer  ————  von Hofmann  ————  Schwan

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The following is an English translation of C. Hochstetter's Geschichte… by BackToLuther utilizing the DeepL Translator with minor assistance from Dr. Fred Kramer's translation.  All hyperlinks, highlighting and red text in square brackets [] are mine. All internal hyperlinks are active in this embedded window, external links should be opened in a new tab or window.

      Much is made of Wilhelm Loehe's contribution to the roster of pastors and leaders in the early Missouri Synod. Loehe is even called "as much responsible for establishing the LCMS as was Walther".  But perhaps the greater, but largely ignored, contributor of trained men for the ministry from Germany was Friedrich Brunn (pic). I was glad to see that Hochstetter reported his activities.   Pastor Brunn is so important that I am inserting another Excursus in the next post in honor of him. — After the break below the customary fine text version, then Part 18, Chapter 13b.

“…but Lutherans die well”– for Otten family: Herman Otten, † 4/24/2019 (Part 1 of 3)

      In reading the May 6, 2019 issue of Christian News, an issue in honor of the passing of the paper's founder Herman Otten, I came across Managing Editor Ruth Rethemeyer's quote (p. 4-5) from Roman Catholic Peter Manns’ 1983 book Martin Luther: An Illustrated Biography, p. 219: 

“How silly that expression was that for centuries we believed hit the nail on the head: ‘To lead a good life one must be Lutheran; to die a good death, Catholic.’ Anyone who follows Luther will live well and die even better, for at the end of the dark tunnel stands someone who loves us and to whom we can look forward. That is Luther's ecumenical legacy for which we should give thanks.”

The "silly expression" that Manns refers to has a history that is explained quite well in an article that C.F.W. Walther wrote in 1868 in his Der Lutheraner magazine.  Walther was defending against fables promoted by Roman Catholic publications in America.  And so to take the opportunity that Rethemeyer presented, I would publish this essay of Walther to comfort the family of the departed Lutheran pastor (emeritus) Herman Otten:

Translation by BackToLuther; highlighting, bolding is mine, underlining follows Walther's emphasis; hyperlinks added.

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Roman Catholics live well, but Lutherans die well.

[By C.F.W. Walther – Der Lutheraner v. 24, no. 18 (May 1868), p. 138-9]

In the Catholic Faith Messenger [Katholischer Glaubensbote] (Louisville, Ky) from April 29 [1868], the old wives’ tale is again served up to ignorant readers that Melanchthon had said to his dying mother, who had been seduced to the Lutheran faith, that for a Lutheran, life was good, but for a “Catholic” it meant dying well. The fable-messenger tells us, as follows:

“When Melanchthon's mother, who had been persuaded by her son to fall away from the Catholic Church and convert to the Reformation, was lying on her deathbed, she was known to have summoned her son and solemnly asked him, ‘Son! On your advice, I left the Catholic Church, and accepted the new religion; so I implore you by the living God, [page 139, col. 1] tell me without a doubt what faith I should die in.’ Melanchthon bowed his head and remained in silence for some time; childlike love fought with the pride of the reformer within his heart. ‘Mother’, he said at last, ‘the Protestant doctrine is easier, but the Catholic doctrine is safer.’ This is the most striking proof that life in Protestantism is considered easier and better as with death is in Catholicism.” So far the Faith Messenger.

The opposite of this narrative is the truth about Melanchthon’s mother…

= = = = = = = = = = =  continued in Part 2  = = = = = = = = = =

      I would call attention to Walther's use of quote marks around the name “Catholic” .  He is pointing out that the use of that name, which means "universal", is a misnomer, or "name-only" in that the Roman church is certainly not the Church Universal, but became a sect with its falsification of the pure Gospel.  What purports today to be "evangelical catholicity" is not a discovery of the doctrine of the Church Universal, but a falling back to the doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church.  —  Walther is going to reveal more than one fiction in this Catholic fable… much more... beginning in the next Part 2. (concludes in Part 3)