Past Elder : A Small Milestone

VDMA

Verbum domini manet in aeternum. The word of the Lord endures forever.
1 Peter 1:24-25, quoting Isaiah 40:6,8. Motto of the Lutheran Reformation.

Fayth onely justifieth before God. Robert Barnes, DD The Supplication, fourth essay. London: Daye, 1572.

Lord if Thou straightly mark our iniquity, who is able to abide Thy judgement? Wherefore I trust in no work that I ever did, but only in the death of Jesus Christ. I do not doubt, but through Him to inherit the kingdom of heaven. Robert Barnes, DD, before he was burnt alive for "heresy", 30 July 1540.

What is Luther? The doctrine is not mine, nor have I been crucified for anyone. Martin Luther, Dr. theol. (1522)

22 June 2007

A Small Milestone

I was recently asked to, and approved by the voters to, serve on my parish's Stewardship Committee. We had our first meeting last night. I joined LCMS and my parish last year, though we had been attending for a year or so before that instead of our WELS parish. So it was really good to be asked to serve and be able to serve in the life of our parish. And really good to go and do it.

There are a few passages in Luther's works which really stand out for me. One of them is in "To the Christian Nobility of the German Nation", where in the context of canonising saints, setting up shrines and having pilgimages, he says:

And let every man stay in his own parish; there he will find more than in all the shrines even if they were all rolled into one. In your own parish you will find baptism, the sacrament, preaching, and your neighbour, and these things are greater than all the saints in heaven, for all of them were made saints by God's word and sacrament.

What a beautiful gift to participate in that!

(The text is from Three Treatises. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1970. p. 77. I guess a little income from pilgrimages to a shrine to our first pastor of blessed memory to boost receipts is out of the question, huh.)

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A Beggar's Daily Portion

We are beggars. This is true.

Those are Luther's last words, written, as he could not speak, the first in German, the last in Latin.

So how does a beggar get his daily food? Here's how.

Luther lays it out in the Small Catechism, Section Two, Daily Prayers. You can read these Daily Prayers from the Small Catechism online right away, and print PDFs in full and for free, here. We beggars find there what we need for devotional prayer -- the Sign of the Cross, the Creed, the Our Father, a short prayer for morning and evening, and for before and after meals. None of it original with Luther. Nothing in "Lutheranism" is.

The following links give basic sources for our faith. Most are online, and all available in print as well from Concordia Publishing House.

For beggars who are pastors, formerly "priests", Luther notes in the Large Catechism that they are relieved of the useless and burdensome babbling of the seven canonical hours in their personal prayer, and encourages them to drop that altogether for morning, noon, and evening reading from the Catechism or Bible, and the Our Father.

Food For A Beggar's Daily Portion.

The Small Catechism with Explanation. The Small Catechism is itself the handbook of our faith. You can read it online here, and get the app for your phone. The book, ePub or Kindle versions of the Small Catechism also have an Explanation and Appendices that are great for study. Sie können auf Deutsch hier lesen.

The Lutheran Study Bible. You'll want a Bible of course, and this is the best study Bible around hands down. If if isn't in the budget right away, don't hesitate to get the Concordia ESV Pew Bible. You can read the Bible in the English Standard Version here, oder die Lutherbibel hier, or the Clementine Vulgate here.

The Augsburg Confession. This is the primary specifically Lutheran statement of the Christian faith. You can read it online here. It and the Small Catechism are also included in Concordia, aka The Book of Concord, the defining statements, or confessions, of our faith. You can read the 1921 Bente edition online in English, German or Latin here. Or get the more recent Readers Edition The Book of Concord. You can get Readers Edition The Augsburg Confession from it separately.

God Grant It, daily readings through the church year from the sermons of C.F.W. Walther, the first president of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, and

Portals of Prayer, an LCMS devotional quarterly. There is nothing better than the short daily readings and Scripture verses in these two for the "whatever your devotion may suggest" part.

The Lutheran Hymnal. TLH embodies the common worship of the pure Christian Church of all ages, and we beggars, past, present and future, pray as one as well as individually.

But don't make a burden or a law about these books. It is not necessary to learn everything at once, but one thing after another, so you don't get overwhelmed.

Further material is in the Reference Book List below in the sidebar.

The Food of Word and Sacrament.

And go to Divine Service every Sunday, that's your food too, and Divine Office if you are lucky enough to be in a parish that does it! Right in your own parish you find Baptism, the Sacrament, preaching, and your neighbour; this is greater than all the saints in heaven, as they were themselves made saints by Word and Sacrament.

Das sage ich aber für mich: Ich bin auch ein Doktor ... und muß ein Kind und Schüler des Katechismus bleiben, und bleib es auch gerne.

Our churches are falsely accused of abolishing the Mass. The Mass is held among us and celebrated with the highest reverence. Nearly all the usual ceremonies are also preserved, except that the parts sung in Latin are interspersed here and there with German hymns. These have been added to teach the people. For ceremonies are needed for this reason alone, that the uneducated be taught what they need to know about Christ.

Therefore, since the Mass among us follows the example of the Church, taken from the Scripture and the Fathers, we are confident that it cannot be disapproved. This is especially so because we keep the public ceremonies, which are for the most part similar to those previously in use. Only the number of Masses differs.

... we keep many traditions that are leading to good order (1Cor. 14:40) in the Church, such as the order of Scripture lessons in the Mass and the chief holy days. At the same time, we warn people that such observances do not justify us before God ...

from The Augsburg Confession, Articles XXIV & XXVI.

Past Elder Blogoral Calendar

Calendar Of Annually Revised Posts.
Scroll down to Blog Archive to find links.

Advent.
Hell Yes There's A Santa Claus. (6 Dec)
O What's an Antiphon? (17 Dec)
Christmas / Navidad / Weinachten. (25 Dec)
The 12 Days of Christmas.
Happy Whatever Day This Is. (1 Jan)
Wilhelm Löhe. (2 Jan)
Epiphany / Theophany / Los Tres Reyes. (6 Jan)
Roman Empire/Church, East/West/Holy. (16 Jan)
- founding day of the Roman Empire
Candlemas. (2 Feb)
A Love Story For St Valentine's Day. (14 Feb)
The Confession of St Peter. On Chairs Too. (22 Feb)
Readin', Writin', and Absolute Multitude. (25 Feb)
- founding day of The University of Iowa
The Transfiguration of Jesus.
What's A Septuagesima? Gesimatide.
What's A Quadragesima? Lent / Fastenzeit.
Divine Service -- What's That and Why Bother? (12 Mar)
- the real feast of St Gregory the Great, not 3 Sep
Divine Office -- What's That and Why Bother? (21 Mar)
- the real feast of St Benedict, not 11 July
The Annunciation / Lady Day. (25 Mar)
Palmarum and Holy Week.
Maundy Thursday / Gründonnerstag.
Good Friday / Karfreitag.
Easter Vigil / Osternacht.
Pascha / Easter / Counting the Omer.
Paschaltide / Quinquagesima paschalis.
The Founding of the City, 21 April.
May Day, May Day!
CFW Walther. (7 May)
Pentecost / Shavuot / Pfingstfest.
Armed Forces Week And Day.
Memorial Day Is Not All Saints Day. (30 May)
St Boniface, OSB. (5 June)
When In Rome ...
The Nativity of St John the Baptist. (24 June)
The Augsburg Confession. (25 June)
The Fourth of July.
A Different St Nicholas -- and Alexandra, Passion-Bearers. (17 July)
Robert Barnes. (30 July)
The Dormitory of Mary. (15 August)
On St Bernard, Sacred Heads, ATMs and Other Stuff. (19 Aug)
St Monica and Vatican II For Lutherans. (27 Aug)
- Vatican II's Monica feast day, the real one is 4 May

Augustine and Happy Birthday, Western Catholic Church. (6 Sep)

Arminius. Herman the German. Us.

Temples, Taxes, Vespasian and Now.
Holy Crap Day. (14 Sep)
The Divine Setting. An Essay on the Lifted Cross.
It's Fall, What Happened to the High Holydays and Sukkoth?
St Michael's Day / Michaelmas / Michaelistag. (29 Sep)
Jerome. (30 Sep)

Hold Fast to Hype. (11 Oct)
Boethius, Terence, Wheel of Fortune. (23 Oct)
Reformation Day etc / Reformationstag usw. (31 Oct)
Election Day.
What's An Armistice? Veterans Day/St Martin's Day. (11 Nov)
Thanksgiving. (19 Nov)
A Thanksgiving That Lasts An Eternity.

We Are Beggars. This Is True.

Which are Luther's last words, written as he could not speak, the first words in German and the last in Latin, 18 February 1546.

In a letter of 9 July 1537, Luther wrote that he really wasn't all that big on a plan to collect his works in a series of volumes, that he would rather see them consumed as Saturn, in Greek mythology, consumed his children, except maybe De servo arbitrio and the Catechism.

De servo arbitrio is a theological treatise, therefore in Latin, of 1525. The title is usually known in English as "On the Bondage of the Will". It more literally translates as "On (or concerning, or of) Bound Decision (or choice)". Both the title and the work itself counter Erasmus' treatise De libero arbitrio, or Of Free Will, of 1524.

Which is the whole thing, or nothing -- what is it to be saved, what is salvation anyway, and how does it come about?

Here is a link to an online posting of the first English translation, by Henry Cole in 1823, who literally translates the title as "On the Enslaved Will".

I'm glad the Saturn urge didn't prevail, though, because "Babylonian Captivity" (1520), the work that set an initially sympathetic Erasmus off against Luther, and the House (1542, 1549) and Church (1527) Postils (sermons on the lectionary -- the real one -- readings; homilies) I put right up there with "Bondage" and the Catechism (meaning both the large and small ones).

Hey, the Hauspostille are from after he wrote that letter anyway.

Not to mention, though Luther would mention it, that it is not about Luther or his writings, but the faith of Christ, which we hold with one heart is accurately stated in the Book of Concord, Concordia in Latin, which Luther never saw, complied 34 years after his death, and of whose contents he wrote only the Catechisms and the Smalcald Articles.

18 February 2011.

Reference Book List

* Indicates Those On MELL, My Essential Lutheran Library.

Study Bibles.

* The Lutheran Study Bible.
St Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 2009.

Pentateuch & Haftorahs, 2nd Ed., JH Hertz.
London: Soncino Press, 1992. 1960. 1937.

The Jerusalem Bible, Alexander Jones gen. ed.
Garden City NY: Doubleday, 1966.

Luther.

Three Treatises (Martin Luther), 2nd Rev Ed.
Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1970.
(The 1520 treatises.)

Luther's Small Catechism with Explanation (1943)
St Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1943. 1965.

* Luther's Small Catechism with Explanation (1991)
St Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1991. 2005, 2008.
(The 2008 version uses the ESV and the Concordia Reader's Edition BOC in the Explanation, neither of which existed when the volume came out it 1991, and the new illustrations from 2005. The first version is still in print too and uses the NIV and the Tappert BOC in the Explanation, with the new illustrations.)

Complete Sermons of Martin Luther (7 vols.)
Grand Rapids MI: Baker Books, 2000.
(Actually the complete Church and House Postils)

Others.

* Concordia: The Lutheran Confessions, 2 ed.
St Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 2006.

* The Augsburg Confession.
St Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 2006.
(Booklet of the AC from Concordia)

* Law and Gospel. A Reader's Edition. CFW Walther.
St Louis: Concordia Pulishing House, 2010.

The Reformation Essays of Dr Robert Barnes.
Eugene OR: Wipf and Stock, 2007.

The Apostolic Fathers, Jack Sparks ed.
Nashville: Nelson, 1978.

Devotional.

* God Grant It. Daily Devotions from CFW Walther.
St Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 2006.

To Live With Christ. Bo Giertz.
St Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 2009.

* Portals of Prayer.
St Louis: Concordia Publishing House, quarterly periodical.

Judaism.

Jewish Literacy. Rabbi Joseph Telushkin.
New York: William Morrow & Company, 1991.

The Authorised Daily Prayer Book, 2. Ed.
London: Eyre and Spottiswoode Ltd, 1962.
The "Singer Siddur".

The Holy Scriptures.
Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1955. 1917.

Liturgical.

* The Lutheran Hymnal.
St Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1941.

Lutheran Service Book.
St Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 2006.

Saint Joseph Daily Missal.
New York: Catholic Book Publishing Co., 1950.

Manual of Prayers.
Baltimore: John Murphy Company, 1916. 1888.
Imprimatur by James Cardinal Gibbons.

Bible Translations.

Holy Bible. Concordia ESV Deluxe Reference Edition.
St Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 2003.

Biblia Vulgata, 5. Ed. Colunga-Turrado.
Madrid: Biblioteca de Autores Cristianos, 1977.

Die Heilige Schrift.
Stuttgart: Privilegierte Württembergische Bibelanstalt, 1899. (Martin Luther's translation.)

There is a general book list in About Me.

What's That Stuff Under the Banner?

1. This is a parody of Nietzsche's Götzen-Dämmerung, oder, Wie man mit dem Hammer philosophirt, meaning Twilight of the Idols, or, How to Philosophise with a Hammer. It means Dawn, or, How One Theologises with a Hammer.

2. The line comes from Marcus Tullius Cicero's work Orator ad M Brutus, About the Orator, Also Dedicated to Brutus, Chapter 34, section 120, and means Not to know what happened before you were born is to be forever a child.

3. The line comes from Decimus Junius Juvenalis' Satire Ten, line 356, and means You should pray for a sound mind in a sound body, asking, he goes on to say, for a strong heart that sees long life as the least thing giving the ability to endure anything, that has neither wrath nor desire, and would prefer the hard labours of Hecules to the self-indulgent pleasures and luxuries of Sardanapalus, the decadent Assyrian king of legend.

4. It's a line from Heauton Timorumenos, which in Greek means The Self-Tormentor, Act One, scene 1, line 25, by Publius Terentius Afer, whom you may know as Terence. It means I am human, I think of nothing human as alien to me. Despite the Greek title the play itself is in Latin. Roman education included Greek.

5. The line is a motto used by the Austrian (the part where he was born is now in the Ukraine) music theorist Heinrich Schenker. He may have based it on lines from either or both of Augustine's Confessions or Irenaeus' Against Heresies, that say God is always the same knowing in the same way things that are not the same nor in the same way. He saw tonality as the composing-out through structural levels in music of this divine attribute, for which the Nazis rejected him as having corrupted music theory with Jewish monotheism. He died in 1935 before Germany's annexation of Austria in 1938, but his wife Jeanette ended up in Theresienstadt, which the Nazis tried to make a showcase for how the camps weren't so bad (the same one from which Dr Viktor Frankl survived to give Man his greatest psychology, logotherapy), and died there four months to the day before the Soviet Army liberated the camp 8 May 1945.