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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 September 2013
The encounter between the human mind and the outside world is the essence of speculation. The dramatic element in the encounter has been provided by man's assertion that mind is capable of comprehending and ordering the world about him. This same “epistemological presumptuousness,” which we associate instinctively with the spectacular successes of the natural sciences, has also been implicit in the enterprise of political theory. Here, too, the claim is that the human intellect can understand all of the complex interrelationships of a political order. In some ways this claim is even more assertive than that of the natural scientist. The theorist seeks not only to analyze and explain certain phenomena, but to prescribe more satisfactory patterns.
Given the complexity of the subject matter of politics and the finite character of the human mind, it is not surprising that the ideas of political theorists lend themselves to diverse interpretations at the hands of later commentators. Disagreement in interpretation, however, can take one of two forms: it may turn on a question concerning a particular idea, meaning, or emphasis; or it may find the interpreters taking diametrically opposed positions concerning the basic tendency of a given set of political ideas.
1 The following are representative of those writers who see in Luther's writings various liberal or democratic ideas: Mackinnon, James, Luther and the Reformation, 4 vols. (London 1925–1930), Vol. 2, pp. 93–97, 331Google Scholar; Elert, Werner, Morphologie des Luthertums, 2 vols. (Munich, 1932), Vol. 2, p. 296Google Scholar; McNeill, John T., “Natural Law in the Thought of Luther,” Church History, Vol. 11, pp. 211–28 (Sept., 1941)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Representative of those who link Luther to absolutism are: Acton, Lord, Essays on Freedom and Power, ed. Himmelfarb, Gertrude (Boston, 1948), pp. 69, 94–96Google Scholar; Figgis, John Neville, Studies of Political Thought from Gerson to Grotius, 1414–1625, 2nd ed. (Cambridge, 1931)Google Scholar, Lecture III; Mesnard, Pierre, L' essor de la philosophie politique au XVIe siècle, 2nd ed. (Paris, 1952), pp. 229–35Google Scholar; Troeltsch, Ernst, The Social Teachings of the Christian Churches, trans. Wyon, Olive, 2 Vols. (London, 1931), Vol. 1, p. 532Google Scholar.
2 Reformation Writings of Martin Luther, ed. Woolf, Bertram Lee (London, 1952), Vol. 1, p. 345Google Scholar. Only the first volume has thus far appeared. Hereinafter this will be cited as Woolf, Vol. 1.
3 Grimm, Harold J., “Luther's Conception of Territorial and National Loyalty,” Church History, Vol. 17, pp. 79–94, at p. 82 (June, 1948)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Substantially the same point is made by Allen, John W., A History of Political Thought in the Sixteenth Century, 2nd ed. (London, 1941), p. 15Google Scholar; and by Smith, Preserved, Life and Letters of Martin Luther, 2nd ed. (Boston and New York, 1914), pp. 214, 228Google Scholar; and Mackinnon, op. cit., Vol. 2, p. 229. Ernest G. Schwiebert has argued that Luther wrote essentially as a theologian, but that his political ideas derived largely from mediaeval sources. See “The Medieval Patterns in Luther's Views of the State,” Church History, Vol. 12, pp. 98–117 (June, 1943)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
4 Works of Martin Luther, ed. Jacobs, Charles M., 6 vols. (Philadelphia, 1915–1932), Vol. 5, p. 81Google Scholar. Hereinafter this will be cited as Works.
5 “… cuique suum arbitrium petendi utendique relinqueretur, Biout in baptismo et potentia relinquitur. At nunc cogit singulis annis unam speciem accipi eadem tyrannide …” D. Martin Luther Werke (Weimar Ausgabe, 1888-), Vol. 6, p. 507Google Scholar; Woolf. Vol. 1, pp. 223–24.
6 Woolf, Vol. 1, pp. 127–28, 162.
7 Ibid., p. 224.
8 Luther had read and admired Gerson, D'Ailly, and Dietrich of Niem. He does not appear to have been acquainted with the conciliarist side of Occam's thought. For a general discussion of these matters see Mackinnon, op. cit., Vol. 1, pp. 20–21, 135; Vol. 2, pp. 228–29.
9 Woolf, Vol. 1, pp. 224–25; Works, Vol. 1, p. 391Google Scholar; Luther's Correspondence and Other Contemporary Letters, ed. Smith, Preserved and Jacobs, Charles M., 2 vols. (Philadelphia, 1918), Vol. 1, p. 156Google Scholar.
10 Woolf, Vol. 1, p. 121.
11 Ibid. p. 123; Werke (Weimar Ausgabe), Vol. 2, pp. 447–49Google Scholar.
12 For a further discussion see Bainton, Roland H., Here I Stand. A Life of Martin Luther, Mentor edition (New York, 1955), pp. 115–16Google Scholar; Schwiebert, Ernest G., Luther and His Times (St. Louis, 1950), pp. 464 ff.Google Scholar
13 Woolf, Vol. 1, pp. 122, 167.
14 In this connection Luther's letter to John, Elector of Saxony, was significant: “There is no fear of God and no discipline any longer, for the papal ban is abolished and everyone does what he will …. But now the enforced rule of the Pope and the clergy is at an end in your Grace's dominions, and all the monasteries and foundations fall into your Grace's hands as the ruler, the duty and difficulty of setting these things in order comes with them.” Smith and Jacobs, op. cit., Vol. 2, p. 383. On several occasions Luther was to lament the release of the rulers from papal controls. See Works, Vol. 4, pp. 287–89Google Scholar.
15 Luther's long apprenticeship in scholasticism is discussed in Mackinnon, op. cit., Vol. 1, pp. 10–27, 50 ff.
16 Woolf, Vol. 1, pp. 225, 227–29; Smith and Jacobs, op. cit., Vol. 1, pp. 60, 64, 78, 150, 169–70, 359.
17 Luther's distinction between Scripture and the Word of God is analyzed by Davies, Rupert E., The Problem of Authority in the Continental Reformers (London, 1946), pp. 31 ff.Google Scholar; and by Troeltsch, op. cit., Vol. 2, p. 486. In connection with Luther's quest for the “original” meaning of Scripture, it might be added that he was aided by contemporary humanist scholars, such as Reuchlin and Erasmus, who were seeking to recapture the true meaning of Scripture by means of philological researches.
18 Woolf, Vol. 1, pp. 227–29. These sentiments were underlined in Luther's Letter to the Christian Reader (1522): “… when I compare scholastic with sacred theology, that is with Holy Scripture, it seems full of impiety and vanity and dangerous in all ways to be put before Christian monks not forearmed with the armor of God.” Luther then turned admiringly to Tauler and the Theologia Germanica and raised the hope that under the influence of the mystics “there will not be left in our earth a Thomist or an Albertist, a Scotist or an Occamist, but only simple sons of God and their Christian brothers. Only let not those who batten on literary dainties revolt against the rustic diction, nor despise the coarse coverings and cheap garments of our tabernacle, for within is all the glory of the king's daughter. Certainly if we cannot get learned and eloquent piety, let us at least prefer an unlearned and infantile piety to an impiety which is both eloquent and infantile.” Smith and Jacobs, op. cit., Vol. 2, pp. 135–36. Augustine, Compare, Epistle 138, 4–5Google Scholar.
19 Woolf, Vol. 1, p. 303.
20 Ibid., pp. 318, 114.
21 Ibid., p. 113.
22 Works, Vol. 2, p. 262Google Scholar.
23 Ibid., Vol. 1, p. 349.
24 Woolf, Vol. 1, pp. 115, 247, 249, 318, 367; Works, Vol. 3, pp. 326–28Google Scholar.
25 Woolf, Vol. 1, pp. 115, 117, 181; Works, Vol. 4, pp. 79, 82Google Scholar.
26 Woolf, Vol. 1, p. 120; Works, Vol. 4, pp. 76–77Google Scholar.
27 Woolf, Vol. 1, pp. 119–20.
28 Works, Vol. 1, pp. 349–57Google Scholar.
29 Compare, Works, Vol. 1, p. 361Google Scholar; Vol. 4, p. 75; Vol. 5, pp. 27–87; Vol. 6, p. 148. Luther's theory of the Church has been discussed by Holl, Karl, “Luther,” Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Kirchengeschichte (Tübingen, 1923), Vol. 1, pp. 288 ff.Google Scholar; Troeltsch, op. cit., Vol. 1, pp. 477–94; Mueller, William A., Church and State in Luther and Calvin (Nashville, 1954), pp. 5–35Google Scholar; Pauck, Wilhelm, “The Idea of the Church in Christian History,” Church History, Vol. 21, pp. 191–213CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at pp. 208–10 (Sept., 1952); Spitz, Lewis W., “Luther's Ecclesiology and His Concept of the Prince as Notbischof,” Church History, Vol. 22, pp. 113–41 (June, 1953)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; McNeill, John T., “The Church in Sixteenth Century Reformed Theology,” Journal of Religion, Vol. 22, pp. 251–69 (July, 1942)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
30 This aspect of Augustine is brilliantly described in Cochrane, Charles Norris, Christianity and Classical Culture (New York, 1944), pp. 359 ffGoogle Scholar. Also see the remarks of Voegelin, Eric, The New Science of Politics (Chicago, 1952), pp. 81–84Google Scholar.
31 De civitate Dei, XX. See also the remarks of Scholz, Heinrich, Glaube und Unglaube in der Weltgeschichte (Leipzig, 1911), pp. 109 ff.Google Scholar
32 The concept of ordo is most extensively discussed by Augustine, in De civitate Dei, XIX, 11–18Google Scholar. Pertinent in this connection are: Barrow, R. H., Introduction to Saint Augustine, The City of God (London, 1950), pp. 220–60Google Scholar; SirBarker, Ernest, “St. Augustine's Theory of Society,” in Essays on Government, 2nd ed. (Oxford, 1951), pp. 245–48Google Scholar; Gilson, Étienne, Introduction à l'étude de Saint Augustin, 3rd ed. (Paris, 1949), pp. 237–38Google Scholar.
33 De civitate Dei, XIX, 24Google Scholar.
34 Works, Vol. 6, p. 186Google Scholar.
35 Ibid., Vol. 5, pp. 81–82.
36 Ibid., Vol. 4, p. 23. On this same point see: Vol. 3, pp. 231–33; Vol. 4, pp. 28, 248–53, 266–69, 299 ff.; Vol. 5, p. 38; Vol. 6, p. 460.
37 Woolf, Vol. 1, p. 117; Mesnard, op. cit., pp. 204–17.
38 There is a recent discussion of this problem in Spitz, op. cit., pp. 118 ff., and see the references cited there. In addition there are some interesting remarks in Meinecke, Friedrich, “Luther über christliches Gemeinwesen und christlichen Staat,” Historische Zeitschrift, Vol. 121, pp. 1–22 (1920)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
39 Woolf, Vol. 1, p. 114.
40 Ibid., pp. 114–15, 129–30, 141, 147, 226–27, 232, 275.
41 Ibid., p. 167.
42 Works, Vol. 3, p. 235Google Scholar; Vol. 4, pp. 289–91.
43 Woolf, Vol. 1, p. 298. It is true that Luther occasionally praised customary law, but a close examination of the context of the argument shows that he was contending that customary laws were better adapted to local conditions than imperial laws, and not that customary laws were salutary restraints. McNeill, “Natural Law in the Thought of Luther,” loc. cit., has underlined the role of natural law and reason in Luther's writings, but again the context was one where Luther was asserting that natural law and reason or equity allowed the ruler to override existing laws or customs. Natural law, in other words, played a liberating as well as a restraining role in Luther's thought. See Woolf, Vol. 1, p. 187; Works, Vol. 6, pp. 272–73Google Scholar. One of the few occasions wherein Luther cited Aquinas for support involved an argument in favor of an unlimited secular power in times of emergency. See Works, Vol. 3, p. 263Google Scholar.
44 Works, Vol. 3, p. 234Google Scholar.
45 Ibid., pp. 235–36.
46 Woolf, Vol. 1, pp. 357–58; Works, Vol. 3, p. 235Google Scholar; Vol. 4, pp. 240–41; Werke (Weimar Ausgabe), Vol. 1, pp. 640–43Google Scholar.
47 Works, Vol. 3, pp. 248, 239–42Google Scholar; Vol. 6, pp. 447 ff.; Woolf, Vol. 1, pp. 234, 357, 368–70, 378–79.
48 Works, Vol. 4, p. 220Google Scholar; Smith and Jacobs, op. cit., Vol. 2, p. 320.
49 Works, Vol. 6, p. 460Google Scholar; Vol. 3, pp. 231–32; Vol. 4, pp. 23, 28; Smith and Jacobs, op. cit., Vol. 2, p. 492.
50 Works, Vol. 1, p. 271Google Scholar; Vol. 3, pp. 255–56.
51 Ibid., Vol. 1, pp. 262–64; Vol. 3, pp. 211–12; Vol. 4, pp. 226–28. Some commentators have made a great deal of the joint declaration of 1531, wherein Luther sanctioned resistance to the Emperor. But when this is measured against the main body of his writings, its evidential value is small. Moreover, it would seem that the declaration was largely the work of Melanchthon. Luther affixed his own signature only after a great deal of agony and self-searching. A year previously he had warned against resisting the Emperor. See Mackinnon, op. cit., Vol. 4, pp. 25–27.
52 Figgis, op. cit., pp. 55–61.
53 Werke (Weimar Ausgabe), Vol. 18, p. 389Google Scholar.
54 Tillich has remarked that “Christian pessimism with respect to human nature has helped a great deal to bring about the alliance between Christianity and authority.” “The Gospel and the State,” Crozer Quarterly, Vol. 15, pp. 251–61, at p. 258 (Oct., 1938)Google Scholar.
55 Works, Vol. 4, pp. 16–22Google Scholar.
56 Ibid., Vol. 4, pp. 240, 308; Vol. 5, pp. 43 ff.
