# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1852 05 11_S150
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

150

5. the orthography and punctuation indeed adapted to present rules, but peculiarities of language remaining altogether untouched, and

6. suitable indexes added to the whole.

If these principles did not find their full application in the homiletical division (Vols. 1 — 20), because a great part of it did not flow from Luther's pen, but was merely taken down from his oral delivery, yet connoisseurs will not fail to see that in the following 44 volumes more has been accomplished than was promised.

Apart from the fact that this edition is the first in 236 years which gives Luther's Latin writings in the original language, it is also, of all, the most complete and the first critical one, which restores the original text in its integrity. For the last Latin edition, of 1600 — 1612, does not contain even all the writings already printed at that time, namely neither the excellent Enerrationes in Genesin (which appeared in 1554 at Nürnberg in 4 volumes), nor the Enarrationes breves in psalmos XXV. priores et sequentes aliquot (published there in 1559 by the heirs of Veit Ditrich), nor the Latin letters of Luther already edited in 1525 by Obsopoeus, in 1549 by Flacius, and in 1556 by Aurifaber, — not to mention the great number of those Latin letters, opinions, prefaces and other writings which were first published in 1702 by Buddeus, in 1720 by Löscher, in 1740 by Schwarz, in 1765 by Riederer, in 1780 by Schütze, in 1814 by Strobel-Ranner, in 1825 by De Wette. The two larger writings first named here, however, the Erlangen edition has furnished in 12 volumes, as it will also in due time and in its proper place communicate the rest. Likewise it has already published one volume of the German writings lacking in the Walch edition, which two others will immediately follow, and later in their place the remainder.

The most indisputable advantage of this edition, however, is and remains in any case the restoration of the original, pure text according to the original editions printed at Wittenberg itself under Luther's eyes, with careful retention of all peculiarities of language, and with the sole accommodation of the orthography and punctuation to the present. It is well known that several Lutheran writings had already in the first Wittenberg collected edition suffered crypto-Calvinistic distortions of their text, and also later there crept, partly through the endeavor to make Luther's language more palatable to the 18th century, partly through carelessness in the treatment of the original printings and of the new texts, such a multitude of alterations, additions and omissions into almost all the collected editions, but chiefly into the Walch, that it would be incredible if the proof of it were not furnished in the notes of the Erlangen edition beneath the text. Whoever will take the trouble to count will find that in the first 18 German volumes of the second and third division alone not fewer than 10,404 variants of the Walch edition have been corrected according to the original printings. That a great part of them does not precisely disturb the sense of the original text must indeed be conceded, but it is just as undeniable that another great part really distorts or perverts it, as for example the words: schele for stählene, Genüge for Geusse, verkauft for vertäuft (as with a flood of sin), Hölle for helle, nämlich for niedlich, sein Gebet for fein gebet't, Zungen for Zeugen, die Verbrannten for Verbannten, Sünder for Kinder, Griechen for Juden, leiblich for lieblich, williglich for muthwilliglich, Glauben for Unglauben, ewig for einig, stehet for störet, ein Jeglicher for einiglich, immer for nimmer, eigen Thun for Eigenthum, Hand for Haut, greuliche for getreuliche, beschworne for beschorene Priester, Verderbung for Vergebung, heilig for heimlich, Morgens for Mordens, Füßen for süßen, würdiger for wüthiger, Trutzen for Truhen (chests), Kampf for Kopf, besser for beißen, güldenen for geliehenen, dänisch for dehnisch (extensible), Umweg for Unweg, Buch for Bauch, Beste for Böseste, etc.

In what sense Luther's language, as the peculiar stamp of his spirit, was left untouched is evident from the fact that not only form and expression, construction and word order are retained, but even the sound of the words is so exactly reproduced that neither a vowel nor a consonant which one hears in reading the original editions has been omitted, altered or added. We cite here by way of example some old forms

1. the nouns: Berden, Blixen, Dampniß, Fahr, Feihl, Geusse, Hau, Hulf, Höhmuth, Irrsal, Mennige, Reuel, Riege, Ruge, Scheuel, Thurst, Untucht, Urgicht, Verdieß. Widerspenst, Zumüssigung;

2. the adjectives: amächtig, dehnisch, geel, gewegen, lützel, schamlich, schellig, unordig, verachtig, willkörrig, with the comparative: baß, the numeral zwier and the preposition sonder;

3. the verbs: affenfenzen, auslauchen, befrieden, benügen, bewiegen, börnen, düren (and thüren), eugen, fachen, heuern, lebendigen, leuken, mennigen, russeln, tucken, tugen, vergichten, verjähen, vernichtigen, vertäufen, weißbörnen and the very obsolete wesen, together with the poetic imperatives: gang, stand, gann, zeuch, bis;

4. the adverbs: Aus den Bünden, Bedunks, fast (very), flechlich, feintlich (in a fine manner), ichtes, kaumet, nindert, sam (as if), strack, unesse, wecher, zewarten, together with the exclamation: wanne, wanne!

5. the vowel changes in: Aerbeit, Gottis, Sund, Ubel, Ubirkeit, wa, ahn, wogen (for wagen), etc.;

6. the use of the syllable vor for ver in: vordächtig, vordruckt, vorschlunden, vornichtigen, and of the syllable zur for zer and zuer- in zurtrennen, zurrutten, zurzählen, etc.;

7. the forms begunst and begonsten, embieten, empfallen, entpfahen, dorftist, schreib (as imperfect), Er instead of Herr, and so forth.

As further advantages of the Erlangen edition we may with right also emphasize that

1. the Bible passages, often cited falsely or incompletely in the original printings, and the confusions of names that occur, as for example Peter for Paul, Jeremiah for Hosea, and the like, are corrected in the text;

2. that the Hebrew and Greek words, printed in the older editions merely with Latin or German letters, are for the first time reproduced with their own characteristic characters, and

3. that the literary-historical introductions, the bibliographical survey of the original printings and the proof of their reprinting in the various older collections, are everywhere at once prefixed to each single writing, so that there is no need, as with the Walch edition, of laborious and often fruitless looking up. As regards in particular the bibliographical statement of the original printings, it must be welcomed all the more, since, as is well known, unfortunately no single library in Germany possesses a complete collection of these printings, indeed not even a catalogue exists in which they are clearly assembled and bibliographically distinguished. And yet the marks of difference of these original printings, as Riederer, Schwarz, Panzer, Veesenmeyer and others have already shown, often rest on such a typographical trifle of the title (as for example in an i without a dot), that one might easily take the emphasizing of them for pedantry, were there not also found, on closer examination, actual differences of text. It is therefore by no means a matter of indifference which original printing a new edition reproduces. The Erlangen edition shows this exactly in the case of every single writing.

If we now add the uncommon cheapness of this edition, in that the 64 volumes that have appeared up to now, obtained directly from the publisher, cost only 22 Thlr.,*) it is incomprehensible that in Germany, among 16 millions of Lutherans, barely over 400 copies are sold! Many may indeed take offense at its unpretentious exterior, without considering that an edition on larger and more splendid paper would also have cost incomparably more. Others the fear of its unforeseeable completion may have kept from buying, but we can assure them that it is precisely this reserve of the public which is what the one with great pecunia-

*) Compare herewith the preliminary remark of the editor.