Author: David Wendel

 

Here we might add what Luther said in 1528 in his Vom Abendmahl Christi, Bekenntnis … “So we must say that Matthew and Mark have placed after the New Supper what took place after the old Supper and is to be located there. For they were not greatly concerned about the order but were satisfied if they wrote history and truth. Luke, however, who wrote after them, states that the reason for his writing was that many others had written such accounts without regard to the order of events, and that he, therefore, had resolved to write them in proper order.” (47–48)

*For additional information, source material, and details, please visit:  Reading the Word of God – Introduction 

 

 

[Luther continues in his exposition of John chapters 1 and 2]: “But we have to reckon, as all the histories do, that Christ was baptized in the thirtieth year of His life, that He began to preach a er His baptism and preached for three full years. e remaining time that followed the third year and was the beginning of the fourth, beginning with either the Festival of the Circumcision or Epiphany Day and continuing until Easter (which can be reckoned as almost a half year), He continued to preach, because He preached three and a half years (though it fell a little short of that time). So it could easily have been that when Christ was thirty years old and after He had been baptized, that in the first year of His activity and at the first Easter [Passover] of that period He did this, but it is a matter of no importance. When discrepancies occur in the Holy Scriptures and we cannot harmonize them, let it pass, it does not endanger the article of the Christian faith, because all the evangelists agree in this that Christ died for our sins. As for the rest, concerning His acts and miracles they observe no particular order, because they often place what took place later at an earlier date.” (46)

*For additional information, source material, and details, please visit:  Reading the Word of God – Introduction 

 

 

*For additional information, source material, and details, please visit:  Reading the Word of God – Introduction 

 

 

Luther was not unaware of the difficulties that arise when parallel passages in the Gospels are compared with each other. So in the Lenten Postil, of 1525, he discusses the order of time in the three temptations of our Lord. He makes this statement: “The order in which these temptations came to Christ cannot be determined with certainty, for the evangelists do not agree. What Matthew places in the middle, Luke places at the end, and what he places in the middle, Matthew places at the end, as though he  placed little importance on the order. If we want to preach about it or discuss it, the order of Luke would be the best, for it makes a fine sequence that the devil first attacks through need and misfortune and, when this does not bring results, follows with fortune and honor. Finally, when this is all in vain, he strikes out with all force with errors, lies, and other spiritual deceits. But because they do not occur thus in our daily experience, but, as it happens, a Christian is tempted now with the last, now with the first, Matthew did not pay much attention to the order, as would be fitting for a preacher. And perhaps Christ was so tempted during the forty days that the devil did not observe any particular order but came today with the one temptation, tomorrow with the other, after ten days again with the first and so on as it happened to take place.” (45)

*For additional information, source material, and details, please visit:  Reading the Word of God – Introduction 

 

 

In his Enarratio Capitis Noni Esaiae, of 1543-44 (printed 1546), [Luther] confesses: “ I am much displeased with myself and I hate myself because I know that all that Scripture says concerning Christ is true, that there is nothing besides it that can be greater, more important, sweeter or joyful, and that it should intoxicate me with the highest joy because I see that Scripture is consonant in all and through all and agrees with itself in such a measure that it is impossible to doubt the truth and certainty of such a weighty matter in any detail—and yet I am hindered by the malice of my esh and I am ‘bound by the law of sin’ that I cannot let this favor permeate into all my limbs and bones and even into my marrow as I should like.”

*For additional information, source material, and details, please visit:  Reading the Word of God – Introduction 

 

 

Here (II Samuel 23:2, ‘The Spirit of the Lord spake by me, and His word was in my tongue’) it becomes too marvelous and soars too high for me. God grant that I may at least partially attain to it, for he here begins to speak of the Holy Triune essence of the divine Godhead. First he mentions the Holy Ghost; to Him he ascribes all that the prophets foretell. It is these and similar statements to which St. Peter refers in the II Epistle 1:21, ‘For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of men, etc … ’Therefore we sing in the Creed, concerning the Holy Ghost, ‘Who spake by the Prophets.’ So we refer all of Scripture to the Holy Ghost.” In the same way he refers to Dan. 7:13, 14. “So it is the Spirit who speaks through Daniel, for such secret thing no one could know if the Holy Ghost had not revealed it through the prophets as we have frequently said before, that Holy Scripture has been spoken by the Holy Ghost.” (36–37)

*For additional information, source material, and details, please visit:  Reading the Word of God – Introduction 

 

 

*For additional information, source material, and details, please visit:  Reading the Word of God – Introduction 

 

 

*For additional information, source material, and details, please visit:  Reading the Word of God – Introduction 

 

 

From the year 1534 we note this declaration: “As Moses is the source from which all the holy prophets and apostles have drawn the divine knowledge and power of redemption and of the way of salvation through the inspiration, (beneficio) of the Holy Ghost, so we cannot arrange our labors better or more correctly than if we lead the students and scholars to the same source and seed of divine wisdom, which the Holy Ghost has sown through Moses, in such a manner that no reason nor strength of human understanding can acknowledge or understand it apart from the support of the Holy Ghost.” (34)

*For additional information, source material, and details, please visit:  Reading the Word of God – Introduction 

 

 

In [Luther’s] Sermon on the Christian Armor, of 1532, we read: “When the devil has succeeded in bringing matters so far that we surrender one article to him, he is victorious, and it is just as bad as though all of them and Christ himself were already lost. Afterward he can unsettle and withdraw others because they are all intertwined and bound together like a golden chain, so that if one link be broken, the whole chain is broken, and it pulls apart. And there is no article that cannot be overthrown if it once comes to pass that reason intrudes and tries to speculate and learns to turn and twist the Scripture so that it does agree with its conclusions. at penetrates like a sweet poison.” (34)

*For additional information, source material, and details, please visit:  Reading the Word of God – Introduction