***<\/span><\/p>\n
\nI will be presenting certain little-known facts about Luther\u2019s Mariology. Catholics would contend that Luther was more biblical and traditional on this score (hence, more correct and \u201corthodox\u201d from the historic Catholic standpoint) than virtually all present-day Lutherans.<\/span><\/p>\nAs for Protestant \u201csuppression\u201d of Luther\u2019s Mariology, I will cite just two examples from countless ones that could easily be brought forth. In the standard reference work, The Theology of Martin Luther<\/span>, by Paul Althaus (tr. Robert C. Schultz, Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1966), a work of 464 profusely-documented pages, no section on Mary appears at all, though there are sections on topics such as, for example, \u201cThe People of God,\u201d \u201cThe Church as the Community of Saints,\u201d \u201cThe Office of the Ministry,\u201d etc., thus showing that the work is rather wide-ranging. Mary cannot even be found in the Index of Names. The closest it gets is \u201cVirgin Birth, dogma of\u201d (p. 464). The author writes in his preface:<\/p>\nMy purpose in this book is . . . to present a comprehensive overview of the basic elements of Luther\u2019s theological work . . .<\/span>
\n
\n<\/span>It is my intention that this book systematically present and interpret Luther\u2019s teaching.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\nPerhaps the key to the omission might be located in the following words:
\n<\/span><\/p>\n. . . Luther\u2019s understanding of the gospel remains a vital reality in spite of everything in his theology which reflects the conditions of his times and which we cannot use.\u00a0(Preface to German edition, v-vi)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
It is neither my intention nor purpose to cast aspersions upon professor Althaus\u2019s generally excellent and helpful research. My point is only that current-day Lutherans and Protestants in general emphasize Mariology far less than the \u201cProtestant Reformers\u201d did (Luther, perhaps, above all). I don\u2019t see that this is even arguable. Whether one holds that this reality is a desirable or undesirable change (which is another question: one of theology, orthodoxy, creeds, and confessions), it exists nonetheless.<\/p>\n
To assert it as a rather obvious sociological fact (that is, obvious once one is a bit acquainted with the historical background of the development of Protestant thought) is not necessarily to take any particular position on the Mariological disputes in theology. Not all research on these issues has to have polemics and defense of one\u2019s own particular position on theology or history as its motivation.<\/p>\n
A similar situation can be found in Williston Walker\u2019s book, John Calvin: The Organiser of Reformed Protestantism<\/span> (New York: Schocken Books, 1969). In this comprehensive treatment of Calvin\u2019s life and theology (nearly 500 pages), one discovers a single (rather casual) reference to Mary.<\/p>\nII. Have Catholic Apologists Exaggerated the Mariology of Luther and Other Early Protestant Leaders?<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
***<\/div>\n
In 1962 Roman Catholic author Walter Tappolet compiled an astonishing compilation of texts from Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, and Bullinger called, The Reformers in Praise of Mary<\/span>. By going through sermons, devotional material and theological treatises, he documented an enduring orthodoxy of the Mariology of the Reformers.\u00a0(Jaroslav Pelikan, Mary Through The Ages<\/span>, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1996, 158, referencing Walter Tappolet, ed., Das Marienlob der Reformatoren<\/span> [Tubingen: Katzman Verlag, 1962] )<\/p><\/blockquote>\nDr. Pelikan noted the vigorous opposition of early Protestants to idolatry and excesses of the communion of saints. But Pelikan maintains that that is not the entire picture of early Protestant Mariology:<\/p>\n
. . . it would be a mistake, and one which many interpretations of the Reformation both friendly and hostile have all too easily fallen, to emphasize these negative and polemical aspects of its Mariology at the expense of the positive place the Protestant Reformers assigned to her in their theology. (24) They repeated . . . the central content of the orthodox confession of the first five centuries of Christian history. (25)\u00a0(Pelikan, ibid<\/span>., 157)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nPelikan\u2019s opinions are echoed by evangelical David Wright:<\/p>\n
. . . the Churches that look back to the Reformers have on the whole been less affirmative about Mary than most of the Reformers themselves.\u00a0(Chosen by God: Mary in Evangelical Perspective<\/span>, London: Marshall Pickering, 1989, 123)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nLikewise, Catholic writer William J. Cole observes:<\/p>\n
[Luther\u2019s] custom of preaching Marian sermons on the Marian feasts continued in the Lutheran Church a hundred years after his death. Following the example of Luther other great songwriters of the Reformation glorified the greatness of Mary\u2019s divine maternity. This lasting piety towards the Mother of God found an outlet in piety so that generally the celebrated pictures of the Madonna and her statues from the Middle Ages were retained in Lutheran churches. According to Heiler, it was only the spirit of the Enlightenment with its lack of understanding of the mystery of the Incarnation, which in the 18th century began the work of destruction.\u00a0(\u201cWas Luther a Devotee of Mary?,\u201d Marian Studies<\/span>, 21, 1970, 101-102)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n. . . the Reformer preached more about Mary than Catholic priests do in this era of the Church\u2019s history.\u00a0(Ibid<\/span>., 182)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
\n<\/span>The Catholic scholar Thomas A. O\u2019Meara stated:<\/span>
\n
\n<\/span><\/p>\nIt was the times with their changes in intellectual and cultural outlook, it was the very history of the Reform with its forgetfulness of the fullness of its Lutheran and Calvinist inheritance, which caused a Christian religion to come into existence without any place for Christ\u2019s Mother. We should remember that this was not the view of the Reformers, nor is it intrinsic to Protestantism.\u00a0(Mary in Protestant and Catholic Theology<\/span>, New York: Sheed & Ward, 1966, 137)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nDavid Wright (who freely and vigorously criticizes various aspects of Catholic Mariology) applies the belief in Mary\u2019s perpetual virginity to the early Protestant leaders generally, noting:<\/p>\n
. . . the long-established universal belief in Mary\u2019s perpetual virginity, which was endorsed by all the Reformers virtually without qualification.\u00a0(Wright, ibid<\/span>., 169)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nWright observes, furthermore, that:<\/p>\n
. . . the English Reformers probably to a man shared [the] conviction of Mary\u2019s perpetual virginity.\u00a0(Ibid<\/span>., 172)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nHe states that Hugh Latimer, Miles Coverdale, Robert Barnes, and Thomas Cranmer all accepted the doctrine of Mary\u2019s perpetual virginity, and that Cranmer thought it was proven from Scripture. Hugh Latimer also strongly held to Mary\u2019s immaculate conception. [Wright, ibid<\/span>., 174] Many, if not most Protestants today deny the perpetual virginity of Mary, but it was standard belief among the leaders of early Protestantism (and even later prominent figures such as John Wesley).<\/p>\nThe famous Swiss Protestant theologian Karl Barth wrote:<\/p>\n
As Christians and theologians, we do not reject the description of Mary as the \u201cMother of God,\u201d but in spite of its being overloaded by the so-called Mariology of the Roman Catholic Church, we affirm and approve of it as a legitimate expression of Christological truth. . . . The description of Mary as the \u201cMother of God\u201d was and is sensible, permissible and necessary as an auxiliary Christological proposition.\u00a0(Church Dogmatics<\/span>, I, 2, Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1963, 138)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nThe Protestant Reformed scholar Max Thurian observed:<\/p>\n
Whatever may be the position theologically that one may take today on the subject of Mariology, one is not able to call to one\u2019s aid \u201creformed tradition\u201d unless one does it with the greatest care . . . the Marian doctrine of the Reformers is consonant with the great tradition of the Church in all the essentials and with that of the Fathers of the first centuries in particular . . .<\/p>\n
In regard to the Marian doctrine of the Reformers, we have already seen how unanimous they are in all that concerns Mary\u2019s holiness and perpetual virginity. Whatever the theological position which we may hold today, in regard to the Immaculate Conception and Assumption of Mary it is right to know, perhaps to our great surprise, that these two Catholic dogmas were accepted by certain Reformers, not of course in their present form but certainly in the form that was current in their day.\u00a0(Mary: Mother of all Christians<\/span>, tr. Neville B. Cryer, New York: Herder & Herder, 1963, 77, 197)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nThe well-known Lutheran theologian Friedrich Heiler thought that the Marian doctrines were greatly minimized or abandoned by later Protestants because of:<\/p>\n
. . . the spirit of the enlightenment with its lack of understanding of mystery, and especially of the mystery of the Incarnation, which in the 18th century began the work of destruction.\u00a0( \u201cDie Gottesmutter im Glauben und Beten der Jahrhunderte,\u201d Hochkirche<\/span> 13 [1931], 200)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nAnother Lutheran scholar, Basilea Schlink, believes that:<\/p>\n
. . . the majority of us have drifted away from the proper attitude towards her, which Martin Luther had indicated to us on the basis of Holy Scripture \u2026 [partially due to the rise of Rationalism which] has lost the sense of the sacred. In Rationalism man sought to comprehend everything, and that which he could not comprehend he rejected. Because Rationalism accepted only that which could be explained rationally, Church festivals in honor of Mary and everything else reminiscent of her were done away with in the Protestant Church. All biblical relationship to the Mother Mary was lost, and we are still suffering from this heritage.<\/p>\n
When Martin Luther bids us to praise the Mother Mary, declaring that she can never be praised enough as the noblest lady and, after Christ, the fairest gem in Christendom, I must confess that for many years I was one of those who had not done so, although Scripture says that henceforth all generations would call Mary blessed [Luke 1:48]. I had not taken my place among these generations.\u00a0(Mary, the Mother of Jesus<\/span>, London: Marshall Pickering, 1986, 114-115)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nAnd the Anglican A. Lancashire states:<\/p>\n
A rejection of Mariology must inevitably lead to a rejection of orthodox Christology. \u2026 Devotion to Mary, far from leading men away from Christ, draws the Church into a deeper recognition of the mystery of God\u2019s loving activity directed towards man in Christ.\u00a0(Born of the Virgin Mary<\/span>, London: The Faith Press, 1962, 142-143)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nTo give the reader unacquainted with this line of inquiry a flavor of the robust early Protestant Marian piety, I will cite the words of one of the major Protestant \u201cReformers,\u201d Heinrich Bullinger (1504-1575), successor to Zwingli and author of the Second Helvetic Confession:<\/p>\n
In Mary everything is extraordinary and all the more glorious as it has sprung from pure faith and burning love of God. . . . the most unique and the noblest member of the Christian community . . . The Virgin Mary . . . completely sanctified by the grace and blood of her only Son and abundantly endowed by the gift of the Holy Spirit and preferred to all . . . now lives happily with Christ in heaven and is called and remains ever-Virgin and Mother of God.\u00a0(in Hilda Graef, Mary: A History of Doctrine and Devotion<\/span>, combined edition of volumes 1 & 2, London: Sheed & Ward, 1965, vol. 2, 14-15)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nWhat pre-eminence in the eyes of God the Virgin Mary had on account of her piety, her faith, her purity, her saintliness and all her virtues, so that she can hardly be compared with any of the other saints, but should by rights be rather elevated above all of them, appears very clearly in the first chapters of the gospels of St. Matthew and St. Luke, and particularly in her Magnificat . . . If Mary really is the Mother of the Lord, . . . then it is altogether just that she should be named by the Fathers of the Church theotokos<\/span>, that is to say Mother of God. Nestorius denied that in the most infamous manner . . . She . . . surpasses with distinction all women.\u00a0(in Thurian, ibid<\/span>., 89 \/ Uber die Selige Jungfrau<\/span>, May 18, 1558)<\/p>\nElijah was transported body and soul in a chariot of fire; he was not buried in any Church bearing his name, but mounted up to heaven, so that . . .we might know what immortality and recompense God prepares for his faithful prophets and for his most outstanding and incomparable creatures . . . It is for this reason, we believe, that the pure and immaculate embodiment of the Mother of God, the Virgin Mary, the Temple of the Holy Spirit, that is to say her saintly body, was carried up to heaven by the angels.\u00a0(in Thurian, ibid<\/span>., 197-198 \/ De origine erroris<\/span>, 16, written in 1568)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nZurich during Zwingli\u2019s tenure continued to observe the Feast of the Assumption on August 15th (Acts of the Council in March 1526 and March 1530; see Thurian, ibid<\/span>., p. 186).<\/p>\nProtestant author Peter Toon offers a strikingly wistful reflection:<\/p>\n
I must confess that I am deeply impressed by the way in which some of my favorite writers \u2014 Bernard, Francis de Sales, Anselm, and moderns like Hans Urs von\u00a0Balthasar \u2014 have both a profound love for our Lord and a special love for Mary. Take for example this extract from a prayer of Anselm: \u201cSurely Jesus, Son of God, and Mary His Mother, you both want, and it is only right, that whatever you love, we should love too. So, good Son, I ask you through the love you have for your Mother, that as she truly loves you and you her, you will grant that I may truly love her. Good Mother, I ask you by the love you have for your Son, that, as He truly loves you and you Him, you will grant that I may love Him truly.\u201d . . . I ask myself: Why cannot I pray in this manner? Is there something lacking in my theological and spiritual appreciation that prevents me from regarding Mary in this way? And as yet I have found no satisfactory answers to my questions . . . In the joyful celebration of Mary, we hear, confess and believe the truth that God has taken the initiative for our salvation. Mary is a continuing witness to the divine initiative. She expressed sola gratia, \u2018by grace alone\u2019, in a dynamic and compelling way.\u00a0(\u201cAppreciating Mary Today,\u201d in Chosen by God: Mary in Evangelical Perspective<\/span>, edited by David F. Wright, London: Marshall Pickering, 1989, 225-226)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nElliot Miller, of the evangelical Christian Research Institute (founded by the eminent cult researcher, the late Dr. Walter Martin), confesses:<\/p>\n
. . . it is regrettably true that some Protestants?no doubt in reaction to Catholic excesses?have almost forgotten Mary. This is no more the will of God than it would be for Christians to ignore Moses, John the Baptist, or the apostles Paul, Peter, and John. . . . In other words, while Mary is not exalted above every other created being in the Bible, she is one of the most important figures found in it. \u2018Blessed among women,\u2019 she is the preeminent feminine model of faith and obedience; worthy of honor and admiration.\u00a0(\u201cThe Mary of Roman Catholicism,\u201d Christian Research Journal<\/span>, Summer 1990: 9-15; Fall 1990: 27-33; quote from p. 33)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nEvangelical Protestant John De Satge makes a remarkable statement on Mary from a Protestant perspective:<\/p>\n
. . . a proper relationship with our Lord\u2019s Mother safeguards the conditions essential for evangelical religion, the heart of which is to know Christ as your Savior . . . If evangelical religion is not to be merely metaphor or sentiment or coziness, it must say things about the Savior which mean that though He is fully human and our Brother, He is a great deal more besides. And those are the very things that lead us to call His Mother the Mother of God. The things which Catholics say about Mary safeguard the things which Evangelicals say about her Son . . . Proper Marian devotion, on the contrary, opens up further reaches of experience to the searching and the succor of the Gospel . . . Once the Catholic Church has reordered its house, the time for protest is past and the evangelical should go home as soon as may be. I believe that, in Marian matters at least, that point has been reached. The task before those who believe as I do is to help our fellow-heirs of the Reformation appreciate that which they had previously denied . . . It seems to me that our Lady stands in the life of her Son\u2019s people as a gracious hostess, making one free of large rooms which hitherto had been closed or dark and forbidding. She is supremely fitted to do this, being wholly one of us and wholly yielded to God, the Mother of God who through grace is the daughter of her Son. May evangelicals who rejoice in her Son\u2019s Gospel take their proper share in calling her \u201cblessed,\u201d who accepted so fully that grace by which they live.\u00a0(\u201cThe Evangelical Mary,\u201d in Mary\u2019s Place in Christian Dialogue<\/span>, edited by Alberic Stacpoole, Slough, England: St. Paul Publications, 1982, 25-33)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nThomas Howard writes about Mary eloquently, from a Catholic perspective (this was written in the year before he was received into the Church, as an Anglican):<\/p>\n
A parsimonious notion of God\u2019s glory has been one result of the revulsion felt by so many over the honour paid to Mary, as though to say, If God alone is all-glorious, then no one else is glorious at all. No exaltation may be admitted for any other creature, since this would endanger the exclusive prerogative of God.<\/p>\n
But this is to imagine a paltry court. What king surrounds himself with warped, dwarfish, worthless creatures? The more glorious the king, the more glorious are the titles and honors he bestows . . . He is a very great king, to have figures of such immense dignity in his train, or even better, to have raised them to such dignity. These great lords and ladies, mantled and crowned with the highest possible honor and rank are, precisely, his vassals. This glittering array is his court! All glory to him and, in him, glory and honor to these others.<\/p>\n
We know all this from reading about the courts of great kings in our own history. We also know it of God, who is attended by creatures of such burning splendor that we can scarcely imagine them: angels, archangels, virtues, thrones, dominations, princedoms, powers, and then the terrible cherubim, and finally the seraphim themselves . . .<\/p>\n
There is one whose dignity is shared by no other. She is a woman, the humblest of them all. No empress, prophetess, or conqueror she, only the handmaid of the Lord. But in her exaltation we see the divine magnanimity, which has regarded the lowliness of His handmaiden and has exalted the humble and meek . . . \u2018Magnificat!\u2019 she sings, and \u2018Hail!\u2019 we answer, in the joyful courtesies of heaven.<\/p>\n
The Christian piety that has been afraid almost to name, much less to hail, the Virgin and to join the angel Gabriel and Elisabeth in according blessing and exaltation to her is a piety that has impoverished itself. Stalwart for the glory of God alone, it has been afraid to see the amplitude of that glory, which brims and overflows and splashes outward in a surging golden tide, gilding everything that it touches . . .<\/p>\n
We are taught by Scripture that nothing may be worshiped but God alone. The ancient Church has always taught this, reserving for God alone the honor known as \u2018latria\u2019. But, below this worship paid to the Most High, there is a whole scale of exultation and exaltation that rejoices in the plenitude of the divine glory and leaps to hail every creature in whom that glory is seen.<\/p>\n
A Christian devotion afraid to join the angel of God in hailing the Virgin as highly exalted is a devotion cramped either by ignorance or fear.(Evangelical is Not Enough<\/span>, Nashville: Nelson, 1984, 87-89)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nOne of my favorite utterances from Martin Luther about Mary nicely complements the words of Thomas Howard:<\/p>\n
She became the Mother of God, in which work so many and such great good things are bestowed on her as pass man\u2019s understanding. For on this there follows all honor, all blessedness, and her unique place in the whole of mankind, among which she has no equal, namely, that she had a child by the Father in heaven, and such a Child . . . Hence men have crowded all her glory into a single word, calling her the Mother of God . . . None can say of her nor announce to her greater things, even though he had as many tongues as the earth possesses flowers and blades of grass: the sky, stars; and the sea, grains of sand. It needs to be pondered in the heart what it means to be the Mother of God.\u00a0<\/span>(Commentary on the Magnificat, 1521; in Luther\u2019s Works<\/span>, Pelikan et al, vol. 21, 326)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nSome important recent books on Mary by Protestant Christians are Mary for all Christians<\/span>, by John Macquarrie (Anglican); Down to Earth: The New Protestant Vision of the Virgin Mary<\/span>, by John de Satge (Evangelical); A Protestant Pastor Looks at Mar<\/span>y, by Charles Dickson (Lutheran), Five for Sorrow, Ten for Joy<\/span>, by Neville Ward (Methodist), I Sing of a Maiden<\/span>, by Roger Greenacre (Anglican), Wallington, England: Ecumenical Society of the Blessed Virgin Mary, 1992, and The One Mediator, the Saints, and Mary<\/span>, edited by H. George Anderson, et al, Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress Press, 1992 (especially Eric W. Gritsch, \u201cThe Views of Luther and Lutheranism on the Veneration of Mary,\u201d pp. 235-241, and Gerhard O. Forde, \u201cIs the Invocation of Saints an Adiaphoron?,\u201d pp. 327-338).<\/p>\nIII. Lutheran Scholar Arthur Carl Piepkorn: Luther\u2019s \u201cLife-Long\u201d Belief in the Immaculate Conception<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n***<\/div>\n
In his footnotes 24 and 25 for his chapter 11 of Mary Through the Ages<\/span> (as seen in the citation above), Jaroslav Pelikan recommends three works of Protestants about Mary, including Wright\u2019s, and one from a Lutheran scholar as a source for the view that Luther always accepted the Immaculate Conception:<\/p>\n24. For contemporary efforts at a restatement of this positive place, see Heiko Augustinus Oberman, The Virgin Mary in Evangelical Perspective<\/span> (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1971); and David Wright, Chosen by God: Mary in Evangelical Perspective<\/span> (London: Marshall Pickering, 1989).<\/p>\n25. A splendid and learned summary, which like so many of his studies, could have become a full-length book, is the work of my late colleague and friend, Arthur Carl Piepkorn, \u201cMary\u2019s Place within the people of God according to Non-Roman Catholics,\u201d Marian Studies<\/span> 18 (1967): 46-83.<\/p><\/blockquote>\nThe latter source was listed in my book, A Biblical Defense of Catholicism<\/span> (p. 206: footnote 219). The exact quote (which I only summarized), reads:<\/p>\n. . . Martin Luther\u2019s personal adherence to the Immaculate Conception of the Mother of God (barring two lapses) seems to have been life-long . . .\u00a0(p. 76)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
IV. The Mariology of the Lutheran Confessions<\/span><\/div>\n***<\/div>\n
Jaroslav Pelikan further states:<\/p>\n
Even in the only confessional statement of faith by him that was officially adopted by the Lutheran church and incorporated into the official collection of the Book of Concord of 1580 . . . \u2013 the Smalcald Articles<\/span> of 1537, the Latin text contained the words (which did not, however, appear in the German version): \u201cfrom Mary, pure, holy, and Ever-Virgin [ex Maria pura, sancta, Semper Virgine<\/span>].\u201d\u00a0(Pelikan, Mary Through The Ages<\/span>, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1996, 159; footnote #32: Smalcald Articles, I,4, in Die Bekenntnisschriften der evangelisch-lutherischen Kirche<\/span>, Gottingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1952, 414)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nSince the German editions of this work omitted the Marian reference (why, I wonder?), I was curious to see what route the English translations took. The version of the Book of Concord<\/span> in my own library was translated and edited by Theodore G. Tappert, in collaboration with Jaroslav Pelikan, Robert H. Fischer, and Arthur C. Piepkorn (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House \/ Muhlenberg Press, 1959). The phrase indeed appears on pages 291-292:<\/p>\n4. That the Son became man in this manner: he was conceived by the Holy Spirit, without the cooperation of man, and was born of the pure, holy, and virgin\u00a0Mary.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
The Formula of Concord<\/span> (1577), binding on Lutherans, translated in this edition by Arthur C. Piepkorn, states in the Solid Declaration, Article VIII: The Person of Christ, section 9 (p. 595):<\/p>\nOn account of this personal union and communion of the natures, Mary, the most blessed virgin, did not conceive a mere, ordinary human being, but a human being who is truly the Son of the most high God, as the angel testifies. He demonstrated his divine majesty even in his mother\u2019s womb in that he was born of a virgin without violating her virginity. Therefore she is truly the mother of God and yet remained a virgin.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Likewise, in its Epitome, Article VIII: The Person of Christ, section 7 (page 488):<\/p>\n
Therefore we believe, teach, and confess that Mary conceived and bore not only a plain, ordinary, mere man but the veritable Son of God; for this reason she is rightly called, and truly is, the mother of God.\u00a0(footnote 5: Against the views ascribed to Nestorius it was asserted that Mary is theotokos<\/span>)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nFurthermore, additional striking Marian statements occur in the Apology of the Augsburg Confession<\/span>, written by Luther\u2019s successor Philip Melanchthon and published in May, 1531 \u2013 itself also part of the official confession of faith of Lutheranism. The editors of the version I have write: \u201cThe translation which follows is made from the Latin original. Variants in the German version, a very free translation which has been called a \u2018pious paraphrase,\u2019 are not included\u201d (page 98):<\/p>\nGranted that blessed Mary prays for the church, does she receive souls in death, does she overcome death, does she give life? What does Christ do if blessed Mary does all this? Even though she is worthy of the highest honors, she does not want to be put on the same level as Christ but to have her example considered and followed. The fact of the matter is that in popular estimation the blessed Virgin has completely replaced Christ.\u00a0(Article XXI: Invocation of Saints; pp. 232-233)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Note that Melanchthon decries the \u201cpopular estimation\u201d of Mary and corrupt practices. Indeed these occurred, and continue to in some bizarre, fringe, heterodox circles (one can certainly argue about the extent<\/span> of such corruptions in the Middle Ages and currently). He does not cite an official Catholic document which would contradict the above, for one simple reason: none exists. Orthodox Catholics agree with this statement (then and now, and always).<\/p>\nV. Did Luther \u201cMinimize\u201d or Reject Various Aspects of Traditional Mariology in His Later Years?<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n***<\/div>\n
In some minor respects the sentiment of the title above is true, but not as a generalization. I have often noted, in my papers about Luther, his tendency to contradict himself or vacillate, and the difficulty of constructing a coherent account of his beliefs. Luther\u2019s thought was the very antithesis of the systematic and orderly teaching of, say, John Calvin. This is a problem for all<\/span> students of Luther. And this is precisely why I cited a man like Arthur Carl Piepkorn, who is an expert on the subject, and thus can serve as an authoritative source for my claims, made in layman\u2019s (as opposed to scholarly or academic) papers of popular-level Catholic apologetics. And I cite people like Jaroslav Pelikan, the editor of the 55-volume set of Luther\u2019s works in English.<\/p>\nJaroslav Pelikan noted that the perpetual virginity of Mary was Luther\u2019s lifelong belief (in Pelikan & Helmut T. Lehmann, eds., Luther\u2019s Works<\/span>, St. Louis: Concordia Pub. House [vols. 1-30], Philadelphia: Fortress Press [vols. 31-55]: 1955, vol. 22, 214-215):<\/p>\nLuther . . . does not even consider the possibility that Mary might have had other children than Jesus. This is consistent with his lifelong acceptance of the idea of the perpetual virginity of Mary.<\/p>\n
Throughout his life and theological development, Luther continued to ascribe the title [Mother of God<\/span> \/ Theotokos<\/span>] to her.\u00a0(Luther\u2019s Works<\/span>, vol. 21, 346)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nCatholic Biographer Hartmann Grisar concurs:<\/p>\n
Luther always believed in the virginity of Mary, even post partum<\/span>, as affirmed in the Apostles\u2019 Creed, though afterwards he denied her power of intercession, as well as that of the saints in general, resorting to many misinterpretations and combated, as extreme and pagan, the extraordinary veneration which the Catholic Church showed towards Mary.\u00a0<\/span>(Martin Luther: His Life and Work<\/span>, Westminster, MD: Newman Press, 1950, 210)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n
VI. The Immaculate Conception: Theological Misunderstandings<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n***<\/p>\n
The Catholic teaching on the Immaculate Conception (explicitly developed from the time of Duns Scotus, who died in 1308) has nothing whatever to do with any of Christ\u2019s ancestors, excepting His mother, the Blessed Virgin Mary. Mary alone<\/span> (and no one else, including her own mother) was preserved from original sin by a pure act of grace on God\u2019s part. If she had merely been born into a line which had long since been rendered immune from original sin, there would be no need for God to do a further (unique, extraordinary) miracle, which is exactly what the Immaculate Conception is<\/span>.\u00a0<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n Mother Mary, like us, was born in sin of sinful parents, but the Holy Spirit covered her, sanctified and purified her so that this child was born of flesh and blood, but not with sinful flesh and blood. The Holy Spirit permitted the Virgin Mary to remain a true, natural human being of flesh and blood, just as we. However, he warded off sin from her flesh and blood so that she became the mother of a pure child, not poisoned by sin as we are. For in that moment when she conceived, she was a holy mother filled with the Holy Spirit and her fruit is a holy pure fruit, at once God and truly man, in one person.\u00a0<\/span><\/span>(Sermons of Martin Luther<\/span>, Vol. 3, edited by John Nicholas Lenker, Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Books, 1996, 291)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nIf Luther ever held the view that Mary was purged of sin some time prior to the Annunciation (in several places he states that the removal of sin occurred at her conception<\/span>), then he espoused a position similar to that of St. Thomas Aquinas, and still quite different from that of the majority of Protestants today, who hold that Mary was a sinner like the rest of us (but \u2013 despite that \u2013 a pretty nice lady, and source of much tender sentimentality at Christmas-time, and profits for Hallmark and American Greetings, and people in China who make Nativity Scenes). St. Thomas wrote: (Summa Theologiae<\/span> III:27:4):<\/span><\/p>\nI answer that, God so prepares and endows those, whom He chooses for some\u00a0<\/span>particular office, that they are rendered capable of fulfilling it, according to 2 Cor. 3:6: \u2018(Who) hath made us fit ministers of the New Testament.\u2019 Now the Blessed Virgin was chosen by God to be His Mother. Therefore there can be no doubt that God, by His grace, made her worthy of that office, according to the words spoken to her by the angel (Lk. 1:30,31): \u2018Thou hast found grace with God: behold thou shalt conceive,\u2019 etc. But she would not have been worthy to be the Mother of God, if she had ever sinned. First, because the honor of the parents reflects on the child, according to Prov. 17:6: \u2018The glory of children are their fathers\u2019: and consequently, on the other hand, the Mother\u2019s shame would have reflected on her Son. Secondly, because of the singular affinity between her and Christ, who took flesh from her: and it is written (2 Cor. 6:15): \u2018What concord hath Christ with Belial?\u2019 Thirdly, because of the singular manner in which the Son of God, who is the \u2018Divine Wisdom\u2019 (1 Cor. 1:24) dwelt in her, not only in her soul but in her womb. And it is written (Wis. 1:4): \u2018Wisdom will not enter into a malicious soul, nor dwell in a body subject to sins.\u2019<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\u201cWe must therefore confess simply that the Blessed Virgin committed no actual sin,
\nneither mortal nor venial; so that what is written (Cant 4:7) is fulfilled: \u2018Thou art all fair, O my love, and there is not a spot in thee,\u2019 etc. \u201c<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
See also: Marcus Hodges, O.P., Why Did St. Thomas Aquinas Reject the Doctrine of the Immaculate Conception?, Wallington, England: Ecumenical Society of the Blessed Virgin Mary, 1992.<\/p>\n
Secondly, Catholic theologians hold that the Immaculate Conception of Mary was not absolutely necessary<\/span> (i.e., it didn\u2019t necessarily have to occur for the Incarnation to take place), but only supremely fitting and appropriate for the sublime role of Theotokos<\/span> (and, of course, true in fact). The Protestant \u201cReformer\u201d Zwingli showed a correct understanding of this aspect:<\/p>\n. . . God sanctified his mother: for it was fitting<\/span> that such a holy Son should have a likewise holy mother.\u00a0(Annotations in Luke<\/span>; cited in Thurian, ibid<\/span>., 23; emphasis added)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nMary does not make Jesus God, and sinless, by her own sinlessness. He is sinless because He is God \u2014 sinlessness being one of the immutable and inherent, intrinsic characteristics of God (whereas Mary is sinless only by God\u2019s grace, not inherently or necessarily at all). Mary contributed to the body of Jesus but she didn\u2019t determine His Divine Nature, just as mothers and fathers procreate and bring about a new person with a body, but have no place in creating their souls, which is a direct supernatural creation by God.<\/p>\n
Martin Luther \u201cpraised\u201d Mary and said that she should be honored in his very last sermon at Wittenberg. He understood the difference between veneration and worship, just as Catholics do (and he also strongly criticized excesses in Marian devotion, just as Catholics also do; particularly in Vatican II). He didn\u2019t feel compelled to create the absolute (and quite unbiblical) silly dichotomy that characterizes present-day Reformed thought and much of Protestantism, generally speaking \u2014 where no creature can ever be given honor, lest this immediately be an assault upon God and idolatry.<\/span><\/p>\nIn many respects, Luther\u2019s Mariology is far closer to Catholic and patristic thought than to present-day Protestant thought. He took a position on perpetual virginity similar to that which the Orthodox take on the Immaculate Conception: one may hold it and not be considered heretical in so doing, but it is not binding. He also <\/span>disavowed prayers to Mary.<\/span>
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\n<\/span><\/p>\nVII. Immaculate Conception: Scholarly Opinion Concerning Luther\u2019s Beliefs<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n***
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Catholics are not interested in whitewashing or distorting Luther\u2019s views, but in presenting facts and rejoicing when there is refreshing agreement to be had. Thus, Thomas A. O\u2019Meara, O.P., in his book, Mary in Protestant and Catholic Theology<\/span> (New York: Sheed & Ward, 1966), observes:<\/span><\/p>\nIn works on Luther\u2019s Mariology a false picture has occasionally been given because the principle of Luther\u2019s mariological evolution has not been kept in the foreground. We are told that Luther accepted the Assumption and yet forbade the singing of the Salve Regina<\/span>; that he preached of Mary as immaculately conceived and also as a sinner. The time element, the dating of Luther\u2019s remarks, is all-important. Luther\u2019s Marian theological evolution in the years 1513-1527 has its own coherence, but the reformer\u2019s thought is defintely changing, and not always in the same direction.\u00a0<\/span>(p. 114)<\/span>
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\n<\/span>During any discussion of Luther and the Blessed Virgin we must keep uppermost in our minds that there was development in his ideas, a change more or less drastic in each aspect of Marian theology. This development had its beginning in Catholicism; it passes through contradictions, struggles, and uncertainties, and terminates in a new Marian viewpoint, one which Luther decided was Christocentric, biblical, unexaggerated, and edifying.\u00a0<\/span>(p. 113)<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nO\u2019Meara recounts several utterances of Luther on the topic of Mary\u2019s sinlessness. and then comments upon the same sermon I have cited as my primary \u201cproof text\u201d:<\/span><\/p>\n
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