Oh, that Luther!

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Ivan

Pastor
“Whenever the devil harasses you, seek the company of men or drink more, or joke and talk nonsense, or do some other merry thing. Sometimes we must drink more, sport, recreate ourselves, and even sin a little to spite the devil, so that we leave him no place for troubling our consciences with trifles. We are conquered if we try too conscientiously not to sin at all. So when the devil says to you: do not drink, answer him: I will drink, and right freely, just because you tell me not to.” --- Martin Luther

What do you think of this quote from Luther?
 
It appears to be authentic, as best I can tell at this point.

Everyone's thoughts?

-----Added 5/21/2009 at 06:19:09 EST-----

He was a very smart man! Now, where's my brandy....:cool:

I was going to give you a "thanks" but the button was gone with your post.
HMMM?!?!

Anyway, thanks! :lol:
 
We need a June Cleaver type to look askance with her head tilted to the right and one hand on her hip saying 'Luther!'
 
I wonder what my fellow SBC brethren would think if they knew I looked favorably on this quote! I mean other then those who are here....
 
I remember watching this old movie about Luther wherein he said that we need to joke and laugh in order to drive the devil away. I used to think that that was perhaps a misrepresentation of Luther but now, I'm beginning to wonder.
 
I think it could be taken in a way that renders it rather similar to what Lewis said in his Preface to Paradise Lost:

If Mr. Eliot disdains the eagles and trumpets of epic poetry because the fashion of this world passes away, I honour him. But if he goes on to draw the conclusion that all poetry should have the penitential qualities of his own best work, I believe he is mistaken. As long as we live in merry middle earth it is necessary to have middle things. If the round table is abolished, for every one who rises to the level of Galahad, a hundred will drop plumb down to that of Mordred. Mr. Eliot may succeed in persuading the reading youth of England to have done with robes of purple and pavements of marble. But he will not therefore find them walking in sackcloth on floors of mud –he will only find them in smart, ugly suits walking on rubberoid. It has all been tried before. The older Puritans took away the maypoles and the mince-pies: but they did not bring in the millennium, they only brought in the Restoration. Galahad must not make common cause with Mordred, for it is always Mordred who gains, and he who loses by such alliance.

We may take "sin" as in ignore a scruple, rather than as "break a commandment".
 
Sounds like Luther in his later years, his bad physical health and love of alcohol made him very short-tempered and extremely harsh in his writings and comments. Just read what he had to say about the Jews. His wife Katharina tried to help him but he even pushed her off when she told him that she thought that he was becoming very rude and bad tempered. It is always a reminder that Great man can still fall.
 
"Sin Boldly"

-Martin Luther

:p

now the quote in context.. :)

“If you are a preacher of grace, then preach a true and not a fictitious grace; if grace is true, you must bear a true and not a fictitious sin. God does not save people who are only fictitious sinners. Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly, for he is victorious over sin, death, and the world. As long as we are here [in this world] we have to sin. This life is not the dwelling place of righteousness, but, as Peter says, we look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. It is enough that by the riches of God’s glory we have come to know the Lamb that takes away the sin of the world. No sin will separate us from the Lamb, even though we commit fornication and murder a thousand times a day. Do you think that the purchase price that was paid for the redemption of our sins by so great a Lamb is too small? Pray boldly—you too are a mighty sinner.”[23]

Luther's "sin boldly"
 
Those of us who have read Luthers works know that he had a knack for using hyperboles and exaggerating things. I still remember reading bondage of the will the first time and being shocked how the called Erasmus an idiot over and over again. Erasmus was probably one the prime scholars of his time and you had little monk calling him a fool! Oh that Luther!
 
Both of those quotes by him are priceless. I'm sure he nipped many self-righteous people.
 
The closest I could come was in the Table Talk, transcriptions by Luther's students of his banter and repartee over beer.

I will have none of Moses with his law, for he is an enemy to my Lord and Saviour Christ. If Moses will go to law with me, I will give him his dispatch, and say: Here stands Christ.

At the day of judgment Moses will doubtless look upon me, and say: Thou didst understand me rightly, and didst well distinguish between me and the law of faith; therefore we are now friends.

We must reject the law when it seeks to affright the conscience, and when we feel God’s anger against our sins, then we must eat, drink, and be cheerful, to spite the devil. But human wisdom is more inclined to understand the law of Moses, than the law of the Gospel. Old Adam will not out.

Together with the law, Satan torments the conscience by picturing Christ before our eyes, as an angry and stern judge, saying: God is an enemy to sinners, for he is a just God; thou art a sinner, therefore God is thy enemy. Hereat is the conscience dejected, beaten down, and taken captive. Now he that can make a true difference in this case, will say: Devil! thou art deceived, it is not so as thou pretendest; for God is not an enemy to all sinners, but only to the ungodly and impenitent sinners and persecutors of his Word. For even as sin is two-fold, even so is righteousness two-fold.

Table Talk "Of the Law and the Gospel"
 
“If you are a preacher of grace, then preach a true and not a fictitious grace; if grace is true, you must bear a true and not a fictitious sin. God does not save people who are only fictitious sinners. Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly, for he is victorious over sin, death, and the world. As long as we are here [in this world] we have to sin. This life is not the dwelling place of righteousness, but, as Peter says, we look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. It is enough that by the riches of God’s glory we have come to know the Lamb that takes away the sin of the world. No sin will separate us from the Lamb, even though we commit fornication and murder a thousand times a day. Do you think that the purchase price that was paid for the redemption of our sins by so great a Lamb is too small? Pray boldly—you too are a mighty sinner.”[23] [emphasis mine]

Luther's "sin boldly"

In terms of the "already/not yet" schema, it seems to me that Luther places too much emphasis on the "not yet" in this quote. :2cents:
 
I agree with the general sentiment of the quote, but it is definitely overstated. "and even sin a little"?!?!?! What was he thinking? :doh:
 
If one is combating an Epicurian view of life (outside of Christ, of course) or an attitude of monastic denial (something he knew well) then this quote is reasonable... in moderation. As already noted, Luther did tend to go a bit overboard in his diatribes at times, but the underlining principle of freedom in Christ and the end of guilt (within a healthy context of prayerful relationship with the Lord) is a good one.

Theognome
 
If you want an even more difficult Luther quote, Ivan, how about this one:

No. 1472: Christ Reproached as Adulterer Between April 7 and May 1, 1532

[Martin Luther said,] “Christ was an adulterer for the first time with the woman at the well, for it was said, ‘Nobody knows what he’s doing with her’ [John 4:27]. Again [he was an adulterer] with Magdalene, and still again with the adulterous woman in John 8 [:2–11], whom he let off so easily. So the good Christ had to become an adulterer before he died.

Martin Luther, vol. 54, Luther's Works, Vol. 54 : Table Talk, ed. Jaroslav Jan Pelikan, Hilton C. Oswald and Helmut T. Lehmann, Luther's Works (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1999, c1967), 54:154.

The editor's notes are helpful here: "This entry has been cited against Luther, among others by Arnold Lunn in The Revolt Against Reason (New York: Sheed & Ward, 1951), pp. 45, 257, 258. What Luther meant might have been made clearer if John Schlaginhaufen had indicated the context of the Reformer’s remarks. The probable context is suggested in a sermon of 1536 (WA 41, 647) in which Luther asserted that Christ was reproached by the world as a glutton, a winebibber, and even an adulterer."

As has already been noted the Tabletalk is a difficult source of Luther quotes for a few reasons . . .

* Luther "liked" his beer and could wax somewhat out of bounds when given to drink.
* The students who record his tabletalk do not provide adequate context for many of his sayings, this one for example.
* The students who represent these comments were also drinking at the time.
 
If you want an even more difficult Luther quote, Ivan, how about this one:

No. 1472: Christ Reproached as Adulterer Between April 7 and May 1, 1532
[Martin Luther said,] “Christ was an adulterer for the first time with the woman at the well, for it was said, ‘Nobody knows what he’s doing with her’ [John 4:27]. Again [he was an adulterer] with Magdalene, and still again with the adulterous woman in John 8 [:2–11], whom he let off so easily. So the good Christ had to become an adulterer before he died.

Martin Luther, vol. 54, Luther's Works, Vol. 54 : Table Talk, ed. Jaroslav Jan Pelikan, Hilton C. Oswald and Helmut T. Lehmann, Luther's Works (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1999, c1967), 54:154.

This blog seems to be helpful in giving some background information about the quote. Based on what I read there is a lot of mystery as to the context of the quote.

Beggars All: Reformation And Apologetics: Luther Said: Christ Committed Adultery?


Well how does one respond to this? The quote is indeed outrageous. First, The quote has no context. One does not know what exactly Luther had in mind. Was he kidding? Was he summarizing someone else's argument? Was he using hyperbole? It's really hard to say. If taken literally, it certainly is at odds with his other statements about Christ. Thus, even though one can't know exactly why he said this, we can put our Columbo hats on and have a strong assurance he didn't mean it literally.


The editors of Luther's Works include a footnote for this comment of Luther's, and they offer the following speculation:

"This entry has been cited against Luther, among others by Arnold Lunn in The Revolt Against Reason (New York: Sheed & Ward, 1951), pp. 45, 257, 258. What Luther meant might have been made clearer if John Schlaginhaufen had indicated the context of the Reformer’s remarks. The probable context is suggested in a sermon of 1536 (WA 41, 647) in which Luther asserted that Christ was reproached by the world as a glutton, a winebibber, and even an adulterer."
 
If the didactic/third use of the law is minimized then . . . :think:

Unless he really means something else . . . :scratch:
 
:think: Regardless if the quotation is true or not, we do not follow Luther for He is not the Author of Our Faith. Luther was not a super Christian. He was a man, like all of us. Even if the above quotations are true, who will question Luthers work to the church? No one. :cheers2:
 
It seems to me that it is most natural to take Luther's words with a kind of ellipsis. Christ became an adulterer ... in the popular estimation.
 
It seems to me that it is most natural to take Luther's words with a kind of ellipsis. Christ became an adulterer ... in the popular estimation.

Or, at the very least, unless contextual evidence is brought forth to the contrary, we can in a spirit of Christian charity and "hoping the best" assume of this great teacher of the gospel that he meant it in this (or some other proper) manner. We owe him the benefit of the doubt, unless we have reason to so doubt.
 
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