Morgendämmerung, oder, Wie man mit dem Hammer theologirt.
Nescire autem quid ante quam natus sis acciderit id es semper esse puerum.
Orandum est ut sit mens sana in corpore sano.
Homo sum humani nihil a me alienum puto.
Semper idem sed non eodem modo.

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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)

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09 November 2012

What's An Armistice? Veterans Day / St Martin's Day 2012.

Here is what the world knows about it, I hope. 11 November was originally Armistice Day, from the armistice that ended hostilities in the First World War on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, GMT (or UTC), in 1918. Later, with another and even worse World War having been fought despite a War to End All Wars, in 1954 Congress changed the observance to include all veterans, hence Veterans Day.

What's An Armistice?

The English word armistice is transliterated from the Latin armistitium, which literally means a stopping of arms. It's a truce, a cessation of hostilities. Now, if you're one of those getting shot at, that's a good thing -- but, it's not a comprehensive social and political solution to what led to the hostilities, and not even necessarily permanent, let alone that universal aspiration of beauty pageant contestants, world peace. Which means, hostilities may well resume at some point. And always have.

Here is what the world probably does not know or care about. 11 November is the feast day of St Martin of Tours, who is the patron saint of, guess what, soldiers! Hmm.

Who Is St Martin of Tours and Why Is He Patron Of Soldiers?

Martin was born a pagan around 316 in what is now Hungary, and was what is now called a military brat. Then as now, military families move a lot, and Martin grew up where his father was stationed, at Ticinum, which is now Pavia, Italy. His father was a tribune, which is roughly equivalent to a modern colonel, in the crack Roman unit the Imperial Horse Guard (equites singulari Augusti). Being a military kid, he was named Martin, from Mars, the Roman god of war.

The year of his birth, 316, was also the year it became legal to be a Christian in the Roman Empire, but it was a decidedly minority religion, and in the army the cult of Mithras was common. When Martin was ten, he ticked off his parents by starting to go to church and taking instruction as a catechumen (you know, the Sunday School, mid-week, etc of the time). However in 331 at 15 he joined the army, as sons of senior officers did, in a provincial cavalry unit (ala, or wing) and about 334 was stationed at Samarobriva, the Roman name for Amiens, in northern France.

One day, by the city gate of Amiens, he passed a man freezing on the road, tore his military issue cloak in half and gave half to him. That night, he had a dream seeing Jesus wearing the half a cloak. This shook him up, and he got baptised that year, 334, at 18. He remained in the army, but in 336 when it looked like the army and the local Gauls were about to engage at Worms, he declared he was a soldier of Christ and could not fight. He was thrown in the brig (military jail) and charged with cowardice. He offered to be in the front lines but unarmed, and the army was going to do just that with him, but the Gauls made peace with Rome and the battle did not happen.

After that Martin was discharged from the service. He went to Tours, and began to study with the renowned, even in his own time, St Hilary. Hilary was a convert too. who vigourously opposed the Arian "Christianity" of the Visigoths and was elected by the faithful of Poitiers as their first bishop (they did that then), married with a daughter and all (they did that then too). Martin set about combating the Arian heresy too, which about did the church in at the time, thinking he was God's soldier now.

He and Hilary were both forced into exile by persecution. Martin lived as a hermit but when Hilary was restored in 361 Martin joined him. He started a monastery in nearby Liguge, which is still there as the now Benedictine (of course) St Martin's Abbey, from which he preached Christianity all around the area. Later, the people of Tours made him their third bishop when the old one died in 371 and he was finally persuaded to accept. From there he soldiered on to preach the true Gospel in Gaul, and, to get away from the attention of his office, he established another monastery, Marmoutier, which also later became Benedictine, on the other side of the River Loire in Tours, about 372, which lasted until the French Revolution in 1799 and is largely in ruins now.

A good insight into Martin is this: uncompromising as he was in preaching the true doctrine, when Priscillian, bishop of Avila in Spain, and his followers were brought before the Emperor on charges of false doctrine, heresy, stemming from their severe asceticism, the penalty was beheading, but Martin, though he was quite opposed to Priscillian, hurried to Trier, where the Imperial court held forth at the time, not Rome, to protest the sentence as both unjust and an unjust imposition of civil power in a church matter. The Emperor relented, then beheaded them in 385 after Martin left. This was the first time ever that a Christian executed another Christian for heresy, and Martin was absolutely disconsolate after he heard the news.

We should remember that 385 is just five years since the Imperial Edict of Thessalonica defined what is and is not the Catholic Church and made the Catholic Church the state religion. Hence, heresy is a state offence punishable by the Empire.

Martin died 8 November 397 and was buried 11 November, which became his feast day, though the date of death is the usual practice. He was widely venerated for centuries, which I will not go into except for this, soon after his death it became the custom to begin a 40 day fast in preparation for Christmas, the quadragesima sancti Martini or St Martin's Fast, with his feast day being the last non-fasting day until Christmas. This eventually shortened into what we know as Advent now. More on that in the "Advent" post coming up.

An Armistice on St Martin's Day 1918.

So, 11 November, feast of the patron of soldiers for centuries, date of Armistice Day, now Veterans Day? Hmm. Coincidence, or one of those little things that pokes through from what is beyond the surface? Wanna know something else just a little too co-incidental? The military campaign that led to the armistice is the Hundred Days Offensive, aka the Grand Offensive, from 8 August to 11 November 1918. Guess where the Hundred Days Offensive started. With the Battle of Amiens, where the Roman officer Martin had given the freezing beggar the cloak. Hmm.

The armistice of 11 November 1918 turned out to be just that, a cessation of hostilities. What was fought as The War to End All Wars would become World War One, as hostilities resumed in an even worse World War Two. Along with the millions of lives lost, millions more lives were forever changed, and, something changed in what might be called the spirit of Man too. The great sense in the age leading into these cataclysms that Man was on an upward spiral of progress toward an enlightened future lay rotting like the wreck of that great expression of the age the RMS (Royal Mail Steamer) Titanic.

The "Titans" had lost, but unlike the mythological battle, who the victorious Olympians were, or if there even were victors or Olympians, was not clear. The old world order, and its certainties both temporal and eternal, were gone. Man began to speak of life as absurd, and the search for "meaning" was on, amid an apparently essentially meaningless existence. One could simply accept that life is absurd and meaningless; one could understand that meaning is something Man, or each man, creates for himself; one could deny the whole thing and remain irrelevant and inauthentic in either a religious faith or, equally, in holding on to the secular faith in the progress and perfectibility of Man.

The resolution? Well, 94 years later in 2012 hostilities continue amid the arrangements worked out nearly a century ago following the War to End All Wars in Southeast Europe, the Middle East and the Asian subcontinent.

So the Twelve Titans. So the Twelve Olympians, who this time apparently aren't going to show up. If Genesis isn't witness to Man as fallen, the world history of Man surely is. A history filled with the universal intuition that Man is less than he is meant to be or can be, filled with however many religious, philosophical, social and political programmes to accomplish his fulfillment -- and filled with the dashing of all of them.

There's twelve something else who had something to say about that. The Twelve Apostles. They got told to go into the world with the message that Man just isn't going to get himself out of his self-constructed mess, that God has seen that and became Man in Jesus to die to pay for all that and rise again, so that Man can by the gift and power of God repent of his own self-destructive efforts and start over, be reborn in faith in the One God has sent, that because of Him one can be washed clean by being covered in his sacrificial blood, and even amid the brokenness of this world live in partial experience of that which is beyond it, dying with him to rise with him. That message continues to-day as God calls and feeds Man in the church wherever his Word is properly preached and his Sacraments properly administered.

Interesting that in that context, 11 November, St Martin's Day, in 1483 was the day that Mr and Mrs Luther brought their day old baby boy to be baptised, and following the traditional custom he was given the name of the saint of the day -- Martin Luther, who too would devote his life to preaching the true Gospel against false doctrine and corruption from state control of the church.

Conclusion.

So on 11 November, Armistice Day now Veterans Day and also St Martin's Day, as we rightly remember and celebrate in gratitude those who have served to preserve and defend our temporal freedom, let us also remember that armistice is the best we can do, the hostilities cease for a while only to resume, and let us remember and celebrate in gratitude Him who gained our true spiritual freedom for now and all eternity, who gives peace not as the world gives peace, but for real and for ever.

Pacem relinquo vobis, pacem meam do vobis. Peace I leave thee, my peace I give thee. (John 14:27, used in the liturgy after the Agnus Dei before Communion)

Here is the Collect from the mass propers for the feast of St Martin of Tours:

Lord God of hosts, who clothed Your servant Martin the soldier with the spirit of sacrifice, and set him as a bishop in Your Church to be a defender of the catholic faith: Give us grace to follow in his holy steps, that at the last we may be found clothed with righteousness in the dwellings of peace; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God now and forever.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

I really enjoy your posts, because they are filled with so much interesting information. I thought, maybe those of your readers who have strong ties to Europe, might be interested in why the tradition was born to roast a goose on St. Martin’s Day. As it turns out, when the people of Tours came to his home in 371 to try to bring him to Tours by force, in order to making Bishop, he fled his home and hid in the goose shed. The geese, of course, as is their nature, raised a ruckus, and Martin was found, brought to Tours and made Bishop. Ever since, the geese have borne the punishment for their betrayal.

Although this is not related to St. Martin, it is related to the 9th of November. It is also the anniversary of Kristallnacht, when, in 1938, Germany officially began the public persecution of the Jews. I am stunned that almost nowhere in any news media is this day remembered. To their credit, Fox News did.

Peace and Joy!
George A. Marquart

Past Elder said...

I do take up the goose thing but in my Advent post, along with the St Martin's Fast etc. Kristallnacht is only one of several significant events in German history before and since on 9 November, and is no more important than the others. Always good to hear from you!

Anonymous said...

As I am sure you are aware, the 9th of November is particularly significant for Germany; it is, in fact, referred to as the “Schicksalstag”, “the fated day.” Beside the tragic event I referred to, three other historical events fell on that date in 1918, 1923, and 1989 respectively: the German Revolution that removed the monarchy, the “Bier Putsch”, and the opening of the Berlin Wall.

How do you judge whether an event is of more or less importance? Kristallnacht was the precursor for the death of close to 6 million Jews – for those who lived through that night and the following horrors there are probably few more important days. I saw my first Jew in Vienna in the summer of 1942, walking in the street, wearing a yellow star. It was not until many years later that I learned that he was walking in the street because Jews were not allowed to use the sidewalk. On the 9th of October of that year (missed it by a month), Vienna was declared “judenrein”. To me, Kristallnacht ranks right up there in importance.

Sorry I preempted you about the goose dinner.

Peace and Joy!
George A. Marquart

Past Elder said...

No problem on the goose, brother! Nor am I saying Kristallnacht is of any less importance, but rather that it should not be singled out re 9 November. There are even more things associated with that date, the 48ers for example. And Nazi Germany murdered millions more domestically than the 6 million Jews. And our ally Soviet Russia millions more than that. About whom we hear nothing. Where is their "never again"? 9 November is for all events equally.

Past Elder said...

No problem on the goose, brother! Nor am I saying Kristallnacht is of any less importance, but rather that it should not be singled out re 9 November. There are even more things associated with that date, the 48ers for example. And Nazi Germany murdered millions more domestically than the 6 million Jews. And our ally Soviet Russia millions more than that. About whom we hear nothing. Where is their "never again"? 9 November is for all events equally.

Anonymous said...

Dear Past Elder:
At least for the millions who perished in the Soviet Union, there is a “Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Political Repressions” which is observed on 30 October every year – unfortunately with more and more opposition from the state. When I was at the memorial to the victims of the Gulag on Dzerzhinsky Square around midnight on 22August 2001, when martial law was first lifted after the fall of the Soviet Union., I could not find words, so “the Spirit himself interceded for me with groans that words cannot express.” These groans were in thanks to God that this monster had finally been brought down, and for the members of my own family, who had suffered in the Gulags, as well as for the millions whom I could not possibly have known, but about whom I had read and been told about by survivors. So if we want to hear, we can hear and acknowledge those who remember the mentally handicapped, the gypsies, the Jews and any other people who were repressed.

In all of this my concern is not so much that one event is more important than another, but that both the German and Russian (officially they were Soviet, but I cannot agree with the myth of Good Russians/Bad Soviets, as if the character of the people changed overnight) atrocities were committed in countries that were supposed to be Christian. It is, in my opinion, fundamentally a long term failure of the Church to proclaim the Gospel. It’s “Lord of the Flies” with grown-ups and real life. That’s why I think Kristallnacht is more important than the fall of the German monarchy, or the Wall, or whatever else happened on that day.

Peace and Joy!
George A. Marquart