# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1851 03 18_S115
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

115

That in the 10th Article of the Augsb. Confession it is not the doctrine of the Roman but of the Reformed Church that is rejected, is shown, first, so plainly by the very content of the Article itself, that one cannot comprehend how this could be doubtful to any man. As is well known, the Papists do not deny the presence of the body and blood of Christ in the Holy Supper, but the presence of the bread and wine; inasmuch as they assert, contrary to Holy Scripture, that by the priestly consecration the earthly elements are conjured away and changed into the body and blood of the Lord. When, therefore, it says in the tenth Article, as indicated above: "Of the Supper — are present and are there distributed — Therefore the opposing doctrine is also rejected," there are thereby plainly rejected not the Papists, but those who deny the presence of the body and blood of Christ under the form of the visible elements and the distribution of those heavenly goods to all guests at the Supper, worthy and unworthy, that is — the Reformed. There have indeed been Reformed who, in order to whitewash the rent that had arisen, have wished to maintain that they were not meant in that formula of rejection; none, however, so far as is known to us, has been so bold as to twist those words: "Therefore the opposing doctrine is also rejected," into an anathema against the papistic doctrine; the Reformed teachers Hospinian and Heidegger, for example, say at least, though this also is contrary to the truth, that by those words only the gross sacramentarian enthusiasts, such as Anabaptists, Schwenkfeldians, etc., were rejected.

A second proof is furnished us by the so-called Torgau Articles, which Luther drew up by command of the Elector of Saxony and from which Melanchthon extracted and compiled the Augsburg Conf. In these Articles it says, namely, in the passage underlying the tenth Article of the Augsb. Confession: "That there be truly present in the bread and wine the true body and blood of Christ, according to the words: This is my body, this is my blood; and that they be not bread and wine alone, as the adversary now pretends." — Can it occur to any one to understand the Papists by this adversary, which recognizes "bread and wine alone" in the holy Supper? —

A third proof that in the tenth Article of our Augsb. Conf. not the doctrine of the Papists but that of the Reformed is condemned, is that the Papists themselves approved this Article and only complained of a defective presentation. For thus runs the judgment of the papistic theologians then present at Augsburg: "The tenth (Article of the A. C.) is right, provided that it be taught therewith how the manner of the bread and wine ceases and is changed into the true body and blood of Christ." (See: Vertheidigung des evangelischen Augapfels of the year 1673, page 92.) Johannes a Daventria writes expressly: In this Article there is nothing that could give offense. For it agrees with the Gospel and the universal Church. He also condemns the Oecolampadians, Zwinglians, and the whole shameless crowd of the Anabaptists." (Exeges. Aug. Conf. aut. B. Menzero p. 444.) May it be supposed that the Papists, with whom our people at Augsburg negotiated orally upon every point, did not know whether they were meant by that formula of rejection, or that they interpreted it in the best sense out of love to us Lutherans? It will hopefully occur to no reasonable reader to think either of the two, just as little as the thought that the Lutherans would have left the Papists in their error.

A fourth proof is that Melanchthon, precisely at the time of the drawing up of the Augsb. C., very decidedly rejected the Zwinglian doctrine and, in spite of all the efforts of Landgrave Philip of Hesse, did not receive the Zwinglians into churchly fellowship for a common confession and for joint subscription *), wherefore Zwingli and the four so-called Upper-German cities of Zwinglian sentiments, Strassburg, Constance, Memmingen and Lindau, the last with Bucer at their head, presented two separate confessions to the Emperor. Therefore the honest, precious authors of the Formula of Concord write in the seventh Article of the same: "The Sacramentarians separated and parted themselves entirely from the Augsb. Conf. right at the beginning, when the Confession was first presented at Augsburg in the year 1530 and delivered to the Emperor, and presented their own confession." (Repetition, Article 7.)

*) We communicated the relevant opinion of Melanchthon and Brentius of the year 1530 already in the 14th number of the previous volume. We add here, that Melanchthon's sentiment at that time toward the Zwinglian doctrine may be clearly recognized, only three more passages from three letters of Melanchthon from that time; the first is taken from a letter written at Augsburg to Bucer [who was just then staying there] on the 23rd of July 1530, and runs as follows: "Zwinglius has sent a confession, in which he truly does not wish to be regarded as teaching otherwise than we merely in words. It seems that it is rather a Swiss than a Christian spirit that has impelled him to write such a defiant confession." [See: Luthers Werke. Tom, XVII, 2416.) The other passage is taken from a letter of Melanchthon to Martin Görlitz, preacher at Brunswick; it is as follows: "As concerns the Zwinglian rabble, you should be of good courage; I have myself found out, when their chief ringleaders were together at Marburg, that they have no Christian doctrine, but only philosophize and juggle in a childish and ridiculous way; therefore they will not stand. For every plant that is not of God shall be rooted up. Though they dispute 600 years, they will bring forth nothing more than this alone: ""The flesh profiteth nothing"". And these words they drag by force to the flesh of Christ. What my opinion is, you may see from my little book on the sayings of the Fathers: I would rather die than hold with them, and say that the body of Christ must and can be only in One place. Therefore be sure to reprove them boldly, publicly and otherwise, when and where occasion offers." (Ibid. p. 2128.) The third passage is taken from a letter of Melanchthon which he likewise sent from Augsburg to Luther; therein it says: "Zwinglius has sent hither a printed confession; one might say outright that he is quite mad. Concerning original sin, concerning the use of the Sacraments, he plainly warms over the old errors again. Of the ceremonies he speaks quite barbarously; he would gladly have them all abolished. His cause concerning the Supper he pushes hard." (Ibid. XVI. p. 1202. See: Melanchthons Briefe, edited by Manlius, p. 161.)

The fifth, irrefutable proof is finally this, that the Reformed not only themselves have innumerable times declared their disagreement with the tenth Article of the Augsb. Conf., but have also admitted that they themselves were rejected in this Article. Thus writes, for example, Heinrich Altingius: "By the antithesis (opposite) of this Article those are rejected who teach otherwise concerning the holy Supper than the Augsb. Conf.; but thereby are designated the teachers of the churches in Switzerland and in Upper Germany, especially of the four cities, Strassburg, Constance, Memmingen and Lindau, which delivered to the Emperor a separate Confession through Capito and Bucer." (Exeges. log. Aug. Conf. p. 74.)

We ask now, with what face could the "Friedensbote" cry out into the world that in the Augsb. Conf. the difference of doctrine between the Reformed and Luth. Church was deliberately passed over in silence, in order that under its cloak a Zwinglian and Calvinist also might hide? With what face has it dared, in defiance of historical truth and of plain evidence, to assert that the Augsb. Confession was prepared by the faithful confessors as an instrument for the most wretched mixing of religions and faiths? Does the "Friedensbote" not fear him who is the enemy of all lies, should it not then at least be ashamed to be put to shame before men by its so easily discovered falsifications, and fear to harm rather than benefit the cause of its Union thereby? May God grant that the nameless and masked senders-out of the "Friedensbote" may at least blush behind their visors and amend. But we beg the dear Lutheran readers that they will not let it vex them that we trouble them with these dry historical corrections. Let them consider how important it is that those be met with earnestness who now, in favor of a false Union, falsify the history of the Church and its conflicts and so seek to create a confusion that must turn out to the highest ruin of the Church. Let them consider that it is not the writers of the Friedensbote alone who now practice this sad art, but even men who wish to be counted among the learned. We hope that our testimony will not be in vain and will accomplish at least so much that these gentlemen will in future be somewhat better on their guard when it pleases them to make acknowledged, faithful servants of God their predecessors.

Address
delivered at the dedication, held on the 29th of August 1850, of the new building of the Lutheran Preachers' Seminary at Fort Wayne
called the "Wolterhaus"
by Dr. W. Sihler, Director of the Seminary. *)

*) Sent in at request.

"Not unto us, O LORD, not unto us, but unto thy name give glory, for thy mercy and for thy truth's sake," — so must all the children of men fitly say, when they have accomplished things great or small, which serve especially also to the use and benefit of the holy Church, for the LORD alone put such a work into the hearts of its beginners; the LORD alone brought the