Baptism: [in a section where Luther indicates that the manner of applying water is a matter of indifference] “It is correct to say that Baptism is a washing from sins. Yet that expression is too weak and mild to bring out the full meaning of Baptism, for it is rather a symbol of death and resurrection. For this reason I would have those who are to be baptized completely immersed in the water… Not that I hold this to be necessary. But it were well to give to so perfect and complete a matter a perfect and complete sign.” [W 37, 668]
Bible: “The Bible is a remarkable fountain: the more one draws and drinks of it, the more it stimulates thirst.” [W 43, 366]
Bible: “If the words are obscure at one place, yet they are clear at another place… But if many things still remain abstruse to many people, this does not arise from the obscurity of Scripture but from their own blindness and feebleness of understanding… With the same audacity he who covers his own eyes or goes from the light into darkness and there hides himself may charge the sun and the day with being obscure. Let miserable men, therefore, cease to impute, with blasphemous perverseness, the darkness and the obscurity of their own hearts to the brilliantly clear Scriptures of God.” [W 18, 609]
Bible: “The rule is: Listen and allow the Word to make the beginning; then the knowing will nicely follow. If, however, you do not listen, you will never know anything. For it is decreed: God will not be seen, known, or comprehended except through His Word alone… He did not want us to let it lie there in neglect, as if He were speaking with mice under the bench or with flies on the pulpit. We are to read it, to think and speak about it, and to study it, certain that He Himself (not an angel or a creature) is speaking with us in it.” [W 48, 148]
Bible: “I may say with a clear conscience that I desire nothing more than the destruction of all my books. I have been obliged to publish them merely to warn people against these errors and to lead them into the Bible so that they obtain an understanding of it and then let my books disappear.” [W 6, 616]
Bible: “(Heretics)
are not so pious as to compare passages; but they tear a bit here and bit there
out of the context; and when they have a word or two, they fall to babbling
before the people, so that the people do not see what else and what more
Scripture says on the matter.” [W 45,
555] John 14:16
Bible: “When
inexperienced souls take to allegorizing, they cannot hold to a sure meaning of
Scripture; and if my affair with the pope had not kept me with the simple text
of the Bible, I would have become an idle prattler of allegories.” [W 25, 142]
Isaiah 13:21f.
Bible: “But who derives any benefit from [the helpful German translation of the Bible into the language of the people]? The world, ungrateful for everything, spurns it. No one thanks God for this treasure.” [W-T 2, No. 2628b]
Books: “First of all, the library should contain Holy Scripture in Latin, Greek, Hebrew, German, and in whatever other languages it may be available. Then there should be the best and oldest commentators, if I could find them, in Greek, Hebrew, and Latin. Then books that aid us in acquiring the languages, such as the poets and orators, no matter whether heathen or Christian, Greek or Latin; for these are the books from which one must learn grammar. Then should come books about the liberal arts and all the other arts; and finally also books of law and of medicine, though here, too, a judicious choice of texts is necessary.
Among the chief books, however, should be chronicles and histories, in whatever language they may be had. For they are of wondrous value for understanding and guiding the course of the world, and especially for noting the wonderful works of God.” [W 15, 51f.]
Books: “For all other writings should point to Scripture, as John pointed to Christ when he said: ‘He must increase, but I must decrease’ (John 3:30)…We must let the prophets and apostles sit at the desk, while we sit here at their feet, listen to what they say, and do not tell them what they are to hear…
I am comforting
myself with the thought that in the course of time my books, too, will lie
forgotten in the dust, especially if, through God’s grace, I have written
something good [quoting in Latin: I
shall not be better than my fathers.].
The other kinds of books will be more likely to endure. For if men found it possible to let the Bible
itself lie forgotten and to forget also the fathers and the councils,… then the prospect is good that when the curiosity of this
age has been satisfied, my books, too, will not long endure, especially since
it has now begun to rain and snow books and masters…” [W 50, 657ff.] 1 Kings 19:4
Catechism: “Choose whatever form you think best, and adhere to it forever. When you preach among the learned and judicious, you may show your art and set these things forth with as many flourishes and turn them as skillfully as you wish; but among the young adhere to one and the same fixed form and manner, and teach them, first of all, the text of the Ten Commandments, the Creed, the Lord’s Prayer, etc., so that they can say it after you word for word and commit it to memory.
But those who are unwilling to learn it should be told that they deny Christ and are no Christians…” [W 30 I, 264f.]
Catechism: “[speaking with some sarcasm] Our preachers and hearers know it to a T. They are ashamed of this simple doctrine. Noblemen and rustics say: Oh, our minister can preach nothing but the Ten Commandments, the Creed, and the Lord’s Prayer. He is forever strumming the same string. Because of this judgment of their hearers, preaches apply themselves to ‘higher’ matters, postponing and neglecting the fundamentals.” [W-T 2, No. 2554b.]
Catholic Church: “I do believe that many were saved under the papacy. In the agony of death a crucifix was held before them, and they were told: Do you believe on the Christ whose image this is and who was crucified for you? Fix your hope on Him, and you will be preserved; for He is the One who poured out His blood for you.” [W-T 2, No. 1644]
Chasteness: “Moses has written much of the natural fluxes of man and woman, both while awake and asleep. Of this matter no one dare now speak publicly, so very much purer have our ears become than the mouth of the Holy Spirit. We are ashamed where there is no need for shame and are not ashamed where there is cause for it.” [W 10 I, 1, 692f.]
Chasteness: “In
order to maintain their chastity they should strengthen their hearts against
the fury of the flesh by reading and meditating on the psalms and the Word of
God. When you feel the flame, take a
psalm or a chapter or two from the Bible and read. When the flame has been
quieted, pray. But if it is not
promptly checked, bear it patiently and courageously for a year or two or more,
and continue with your prayer. But if
you can no longer bear and overcome the ardent desires of the flesh, then pray
to God to give you a wife, with whom you may live in delight and true love… But
miserable penalties cling to [those who have given free rein to their evil
lusts]. Or if they rushed into marriage
in blind haste, they found unfit and contrary wives; and it served them
right.” [W 43, 377] Gen. 25:19f.]
Children: “Not
in vain has [the Lord] said: Thou shalt honor
thy parents. He does not say: Thou shalt love them, although this also
should be done. But honor is higher than
mere love and includes a certain fear which unites with love and moves a person
to fear offending the parents more than he fears being punished. Just so the honor we pay a sanctuary is mixed
with certain fear… A proverb of
Children: “One should punish children and pupils in such a way that the apple always lies beside the rod.” [W-T 3, No. 3566b]
Christ: “[Christ]
tells us clearly that Moses with all his stories and figures points to Him,
refers to Him, and means Him in the sense that He is the Center from which the
entire circle has been drawn and towards which it looks and that whoever
directs himself to this Center belongs in the circle. For Christ is the central spot of the circle;
and when viewed aright, all stories in Holy Scripture refer to Christ.” [W 47, 66]
John 3:14
Christ: “[The devil’s] bride, Madam Vixen, sharp reason, is of real service to him in this matter. It seeks various escapes and shifts against this article and can twist itself in masterly fashion in order not to be taken captive by God’s Word.” [W 45, 543]
Christ: “To be
sure, humanity and divinity are not naturally one Being. Yet they exist in the one and indivisible
Person in such a way that one cannot separate them from each other. Just so sugar water is water; but it is so
mixed with sugar that no one can now separate the sugar and the water from each
other, although they really have different natures by themselves. The illustration is not perfect.” [W 33, 232]
John 6:57
Christ: “All the saints have served God by their suffering and have set a good example by it, but not one of them shed a drop of blood or sweat for us… This only Christ did.” [W 45, 60f.]
Christ: “Here,
then, all saints and all their merits are utterly excluded so that nothing is
to rate in the presence of God except Christ.
That is why Jews, Turks, and the pope, who despise this Son of God with
His suffering, death, and resurrection and propose to come to God in a
different way, stand condemned.” [W 20,
362] Exodus 3:1-6
Christ: “If a
malefactor were being executed for having killed the child of a prince or a
king, you may feel secure and sing and play as long as you think that you are
entirely innocent. But if you were
assailed and convinced that it was you who moved the malefactor to commit the
act, then the entire world would be too narrow for you, especially if your good conscience were also to forsake you.” [W 2, 138]
Matt. 21:1-9
Christ: “For
without the comfort derived from a true knowledge of God, a heart cannot be at
rest, particularly when the severe trials come on, so that one is obliged to
surrender body and life, to struggle with sins and conscience, and to look
forward to the future sentence in another world.” [W 52, 621]
Matt. 11:25-30
Christendom: “Then [the devil] thought: Wait! If I cannot reach my goal through the cross and the Word, I shall try to do so through honor, possessions, and money. I shall give you so much of these that I dare say that in enjoying them you will forget Scripture. This strategy succeeded best for him. By means of it he finally moved the pope, the cardinals, and the bishops to seize the kingdom of this world and to let go of Christ with His Word…
So what the black
devil was unable to achieve with the sword and the angelic one with the Book
and the Scriptures, the god of this world finally brought about by saying: If you will fall down before me and worship
me, I shall give all this to you; for it is mine.” [W 45, 40]
Matt. 4:1-11
The Christian: “A
Christian is a man who, while sleeping, waking, standing, or walking, is at any
and every moment so minded in his heart that he says: I believe in God, the Father of our Lord
Jesus Christ, who has shed His blood for me for the forgiveness of sins. This he believes
without ceasing; nor could he be a Christian unless he so believed every single
moment.” [W 44, 771] Gen. 49:11-12
The Christian: “Whoever
would be a Christian should be careful to stop his reasoning and attach himself
solely to the Word which the lips of Christ speak. For the articles of our faith sound so
ridiculous and foolish to reason and appear to be so false that if reason is at
hand to judge and decide, it cannot believe them but promptly leaves them, goes
wrong, and considers them simply worthless.”
[W 33, 151] John 6:47
The Christian: “For
everything that is done after one has come to faith is done for the sake of
others.” [W 15, 707] Matt. 9:1-8