sermon preached at Wittenberg on Pentecost; he spoke to a larger audience in this Open Letter.
The date of its composition is uncertain. The earliest reference to its publication is in a letter of Spalatin’s from which we gather that he was sending out copies of it on August 1st. That would throw the date of composition into the early part of July. The fact that it is addressed to Kaspar Mueller, who was a member of the party that came up from Mansfeld to help celebrate Luther’s wedding (June 27th), and the
additional fact that in his letter of invitation to his Mansfeld friends (June 15th) fb5 he makes no reference to it, point to the conclusion that it was written after June 27th. fb6
In the Open letter Luther upholds the views that he had expressed in the Admonition to Peace and in the tract against the peasants. He maintains that there is no excuse for insurrection and armed rebellion. On the other hand, he declares that the severe treatment which the lords are inflicting on those who have surrendered cannot be justified, and the conclusion of the work condemns unsparingly “the furious, raving, senseless tyrants, who even after the battle cannot get their fill of blood.”
The text of the Open Letter is found in Weimar Ed. 18:384-401. Erlangen Ed. 24:295-319; St. Louis Ed., 16:77-98; Clemen, 3:75-93; Berlin Ed.
7:358-82. The translation follows Clemen.
For literature, see Introduction to the Admonition to Peace, above p. 209, and K. MUELLER, Kirche, Gemeinde und Obrigkeit nach Luther (1910).
CHARLES M. JACOBS. MOUNT AIRY,
PHILADELPHIA.
AN OPEN LETTER CONCERNING THE HARD
BOOK AGAINST THE PEASANTS
1525
To the honorable and wise Caspar Mueller, fb7 Chancellor of Mansfeld, my good friend. Grace and peace in Christ.
I have been obliged to answer your letter fb8 in a printed book, because the little book that I published against the peasants fb9 has given rise to so many complaints and questions, as though it were unchristian and too hard. To be sure, I had intended to stop my ears, and let the blind, unthankful creatures who seek in me nothing but causes of offense smother in their own vexation until they had to rot, since they have got so little
improvement from my other books that they cannot accept such a plain, simple judgment upon earthly things. For I remembered the word of Christ in <430312>
John 3:12, “If ye believe not when I speak of earthly things, how shall ye believe when I speak of heavenly things?” And when the disciples asked, “Knowest thou that the Pharisees are offended at this saying?” He said, “Let them be offended; they are blind and leaders of the blind”
(<401514>
Matthew 15:14).
They cry and boast, “There, there you see Luther’s spirit! He teaches bloodshed without mercy. He must be the devil’s mouthpiece.” Ah, well, if I were not used to being judged and condemned, this might move me; but I am not conscious of any pride that is greater than my pride in this, that my work and teaching must at first suffer reverses and be crucified. No one is satisfied unless he can condemn Luther. Luther is the target of
contradiction. Everyone has to win his spurs against him and carry off the honors of the tournament. In these matters everybody else has a higher spirit than I, and I must needs be altogether fleshly. Would God that they had a higher spirit! I would then gladly be a man of flesh indeed, and say, as St. Paul to his Corinthians, “Ye are rich; ye are full; ye reign without us.” But I fear it is all too true that they have a high spirit, for I have not as yet seen them undertake very much that does not bring them to sin and shame.
But they do not see how they stumble, when they thus pass judgment on me, and how, by their contradicting, they reveal the thoughts of their hearts, as Simeon says of Christ in <420234>Luke 2:34. They say that they note well what kind of a spirit I have; I, too, note how splendidly they have grasped and learned the Gospel. They have, in fact, not a spark of knowledge of it, and yet they babble much about it. How can they know what heavenly righteousness in Christ may be, according to the Gospel, when they do not know what earthly righteousness in rulers is, according to the law? Such people are not worthy to hear a single word or see a single work that might make them better; but they ought to have nothing but offense, as the Jews had in Christ, because their hearts are so full of wicked wiles that they desire nothing more than to be offended, so that they may fare according to the saying in <191827>Psalm 18:27, “With the froward thou wilt show thyself froward,” and in <053221>
Deuteronomy 32:21, “I will move them to jealousy with those that are not a people; I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation.”
This was the reason why I wanted to keep silent, and let them stumble unconcernedly on, and take offense, until they received their deserts, and their hearts were hardened and their eyes blinded by sheer offense, and they went to destruction — these people who have hitherto learned nothing from the great, clear light of the Gospel, which has shone so lavishly everywhere; fb10 who have made so little of the fear of God that they think nothing “evangelical” except to despise and judge others, and to consider themselves great in spirit and lofty of understanding; and who from the doctrine of humility take nothing but pride, like the spider, which sucks only poison out of the rose. You seek an explanation, however, not for yourself but to stop the mouths of these useless fellows. I suspect that you are undertaking a vain and impossible task; for who can stop the mouth of a fool? His heart is crammed with folly, and that which fills the heart must overflow the lips. Nevertheless, because you ask it, I will do you this vain and lost service.
First of all, then, I must warn those who criticize my book that they ought to hold their tongues and have a care lest they make a mistake and lose their own heads; for they are certainly rebels at heart, and Solomon says,
“My son, fear thou the Lord and the king, and mingle not with the
rebellious; for their calamity shall rise suddenly, and who knoweth the ruin of them both?” There we see that both rebels and those who mingle with them are condemned, and God will not have it made a jest, but king and
government are to be feared. But they who are “mingling with the rebellious” are those who take their part, lament over them, justify them, and show mercy to those on whom God has no mercy, but whom He will have punished and destroyed. For the man who thus takes the part of the rebels makes it perfectly plain that he, too, if he had opportunity, would cause disaster, as he has determined in his heart. The rulers, therefore, ought to seize these people by the cap and make them hold their tongues and note that this is a serious matter.
If they think this answer too hard, and that this is talking violence and only shutting men’s mouths, fb11 I reply that this is right. A rebel is not worth answering with arguments, for he does not accept them. The answer for such mouths is a fist that brings sweat from the nose. The peasants would not listen; they would not let anyone tell them anything; their ears must be unbuttoned with bullets, till their heads jump off their shoulders. Such pupils need such a rod. He who will not hear God’s Word, when it is spoken with kindness, fb12 must listen to the headsman, when he comes with his axe. If it is said that in this I am uncharitable and unmerciful, I answer, “This is not a question of mercy; fb13 we are talking of God’s Word. It is His will that the king be honored and rebels destroyed; and He is as merciful as we are.”
Of mercy I will neither hear nor know anything, but give heed to God’s will in His Word. Therefore my little book will be right, and will remain so, though the whole world take offense at it. What care I that you do not like it, if God likes it? If He will have wrath, and not mercy, what have you to do with mercy? Did not Saul sin by showing mercy upon Amalek, when he failed to execute God’s wrath, as he had been commanded? Did not Ahab sin, when he had mercy on the King of Syria, and let him live, contrary to God’s word? If you wish for mercy, then do not “mingle with the
rebellious,” but fear the powers that be, and do good; if you do evil, then be afraid, for, says Paul, “He beareth not the sword in vain.”
This ought to be answer enough to all who take offense at my book and make it useless. Is it not right for a man to hold his tongue, when he hears that God says this, and that this is God’s will? Or is God bound to give reasons to such empty babblers, and tell them why this is His will? I had thought that the mere wink of His eye would be enough to put every creature to silence, much more a word of His. There stands God’s Word,
“My son, fear God and the king; if not, thy calamity will come quickly”;
and Romans 12, “He that resisteth the ordinance of God, will receive judgment.” Why is not St. Paul merciful? If we are to preach God’s Word, we must preach the word that declares His wrath, as well as that which declares His mercy; we must preach of hell as well as of heaven, and help extend God’s Word and judgment and work over both the righteous and the wicked, so that the wicked may be punished and the good protected.
And yet, in order that the righteous God may hold His own against these His judges, and His decree be found just and sure, we shall undertake to advocate His Word against these blasphemers and show the reason for His divine will, and light two candles for the devil. fb14 They throw it up to me that Christ teaches, “Be ye merciful as your Father is merciful”; and again,
“I will have mercy and not sacrifice”; and again, “The Son of Man is come not to destroy souls, but to save them”; etc. Here they think they have hit the nail on the head. “Luther ought to have taught that we should have mercy on the peasants, and he teaches, instead, that we should kill them out of hand. What do you think of that? Let us see whether Luther will jump that ditch! I think he is caught.” Thank you, my dear masters. If these high spirits had not taught me, how would I ever have known this or found it out? How should I know that God demands mercy, — I, who have taught and written more about mercy than any other man in a thousand years?
This is the devil himself. He wants to do all the evil that he can, and so he stirs up good and pious hearts and tempts them with things like this, so that they may not see how black he is, and tries to deck himself out in a
reputation for mercy. But it will not help him! My good friends, you who are praising mercy so highly because the peasants are beaten, why did you not praise it when the peasants were raging, smiting, robbing, burning, and plundering, until they were terrible to men’s eyes and ears? Why were they not merciful to the princes and lords, whom they wanted to wipe out entirely? No one spoke of mercy then. Everything was “rights”; nothing was said of mercy; it was nothing. “Rights, rights, rights!” they were everything. Now that they are beaten, and the stone that they threw at heaven is falling back on their own heads, no one is to say anything of rights, but speak only of mercy.
And yet they are stupid enough to think that no one notices the rascal behind it! Ah, no! You are in plain sight, you black, ugly devil! You praise mercy, not because you are in earnest about it and love mercy, or you