Sixth Chapter the Creeds of the Evangelical Lutheran Church

§ 46. The Form of Concord, Concluded (part 2 of 2)

Page 59 of 136

OPPOSITION AND DEFENSE..⁶⁶⁴

The Formula gave rise to much controversy. It was assailed from different quarters by discontented Lutherans and Philippists,⁶⁶⁵ Calvinists,⁶⁶⁶ and Romanists.⁶⁶⁷

The chief objection was to the new dogma of ubiquity.

The Lutherans attacked, according to their stand-point, either the concessions to the Swabian scheme of absolute ubiquity, or the absence of a direct condemnation of Melanchthon and other heretics, or the rejection of the Flacian theory of original sin, or the condemnation of Synergism. The last point could be made very plausible, since the chief authors of the Formula, Andreæ, Chemnitz, and Selnecker, had at first been decided synergists. Chytræus remained true at least to his love and admiration for Melanchthon, which subjected him to the suspicion of Crypto-Philippism and Calvinism.⁶⁶⁸

The Reformed, led by Ursinus (chief author of the Heidelberg Catechism), justly complained of the misrepresentations and unfair condemnation of their doctrine under the indiscriminate charge of sacramentarianism,⁶⁶⁹ and explained the qualified sense in which the Reformed signed the Augsburg Confession in the sense of its author, with wholesome strictures on the unprotestant overestimate of the authority of Luther. They exposed with rigid logic the doctrinal contradiction between Arts. II. and XI., quoted Luther's views on predestination against the Formula, and refuted with clear and strong arguments the new dogma of ubiquity, which is contrary to the Scriptures, the oecumenical creeds, and sound reason, and destructive of the very nature of the sacrament as a communion of the body of Christ; for if the body is omnipresent, and there can be but one omnipresence, it must be present like God himself, i.e. like a spirit, every where whole and complete, without parts and members, and thus the lineaments and concrete image of Christ are lost. Sadeel pointed out the palpable inconsistency between the hyperphysical and ultrasupernatural outfit of Christ's body for the eucharistic presence, on the one hand, and the emphasizing of a corporeal presence and oral manducation on the other, as if this were the main thing in the sacrament, while the communion of the believing soul with the person of Christ was almost lost sight of.⁶⁷⁰

Strange to say, the Roman Catholics were just as decidedly opposed to ubiquity, though otherwise much nearer the Lutheran doctrine of the sacraments. Bellarmin, the greatest controversialist of Rome, exposes the absurdity of a dogma which would destroy the human nature of Christ, and involve the presence of his body in uteris omnium feminarum, imo etiam virorum, and the presence extra uterum from the moment of conception, and in utero after the nativity. In his polemic work against Protestantism he urges five arguments against ubiquity,⁶⁷¹ viz.: (1.) It abolishes the sacramental character of the eucharist. (2.) It leads to the Calvinistic spiritual presence and spiritual eating by faith—the very error of the sacramentarians which this Lutheran dogma was to overthrow.⁶⁷² (3.) It destroys the specific effect of the eucharist, and makes it useless. (4) It is refuted by the other Lutheran doctrine which confines the presence to the time of the use of the sacrament.⁶⁷³ (5.) It is a makeshift to evade the power of priestly consecration which creates the eucharistic presence.⁶⁷⁴

Outside of Germany and Switzerland the Formula of Concord excited little or only passing polemical interest. Queen Elizabeth endeavored to prevent its adoption because it condemned the Reformed doctrine, and threatened to split and weaken the Protestants in their opposition to the united power of Rome. She sent delegates to a convention of Reformed Princes and delegates held at Frankfort-on-the-Main, Sept 1577.⁶⁷⁵ The Anglican divines of the sixteenth century rejected ubiquity as decidedly as the Continental Calvinists.⁶⁷⁶ Evangelical Episcopalians hold the Reformed view of the sacraments; and as to modern Anglo-Catholic and Ritualistic Episcopalians, they greatly prefer the Romish or Greek dogma of transubstantiation to the Lutheran consubstantiation.⁶⁷⁷

The attacks upon the Formula, especially those proceeding from Lutherans and the Palatinate divines, could not be ignored in silence. Chemnitz, Selnecker, and Kirchner, by order of the three electoral patrons of the work, convened at Erfurt,⁶⁷⁸ Oct. 23,1581 (afterwards at Braunschweig and Quedlinburg), and prepared, with much labor and trouble, an elaborate 'Apology,' called the 'Erfurt Book,' in four parts.⁶⁷⁹ It called forth new attacks, which it is unnecessary here to follow.

LATER FORTUNES.

During the palmy period of Lutheran scholasticism the Formula of Concord stood in high authority among Lutherans, and was even regarded as inspired.⁶⁸⁰ Its first centennial (1680) was celebrated with considerable enthusiasm.⁶⁸¹ But at the close of another century it was dead and buried. The Pietists, and afterwards the Rationalists, rebelled against symbololatry and lifeless orthodoxy. One stone after another was taken down from the old temple, until it was left a venerable ruin. Those very countries where subscription to creeds had been most rigorously enforced, suffered most from the neological revolution.

Then followed a period of patient research and independent criticism, which led to a more impartial estimate. Planck, the ablest Lutheran historian of the Formula, with complete mastery of the sources, followed the leading actors into all the ramifications and recesses of their psychological motives, political intrigues, and theological passions, and represents the work as the fabrication of a theological triumvirate, which upon the whole did more harm than good, and which produced endless confusion and controversy.⁶⁸² Köllner, another learned and impartial Lutheran, concedes to it higher merit for the past, but no dogmatic significance for the present, except in the article on predestination.⁶⁸³ Heppe, the indefatigable historian of the German post-Reformation period, from a vast amount of authentic information, carries out the one-sided idea that the Lutheranism of the Formula is an apostasy from the normal development of German Protestantism, by which he means progressive, semi-Reformed, unionistic Melanchthonianism.⁶⁸⁴ Even Kahnis thinks that the Lutheran theology of the future must be built on the Melanchthonian elements which were condemned by the Formula.⁶⁸⁵

With the modern revival of orthodoxy, the Formula enjoyed a partial resurrection among Lutherans of the high sacramentarian type, who regard it as the model of pure doctrine and the best summary of the Bible. By this class of divines it is all the more highly esteemed, since they make doctrine the corner-stone of the Church and the indispensable condition of Christian fellowship. In America, too, the Formula has recently found at least one able and scholarly advocate in the person of Dr. Krauth, of Philadelphia.⁶⁸⁶

Yet the great body of the Lutheran Church will never return to the former veneration for this symbol. History never repeats itself. Each age must produce its own theology. Even modern Lutheran orthodoxy in its ablest champions is by no means in full harmony with the Formula, but departs from its anthropology and Christology, and makes concessions to Melanchthon and the Reformed theology, or attempts a new solution of the mighty problems which were once regarded as finally settled.⁶⁸⁷

AN IMPARTIAL ESTIMATE.

The Formula of Concord is, next to the Augsburg Confession, the most important theological standard of the Lutheran Church, but differs from it as the sectarian symbol of Lutheranism, while the other is its catholic symbol. Hence its authority is confined to that communion, and is recognized only by a section of it. It is both conclusive and exclusive, a Formula of Concord and a Formula of Discord, the end of controversy and the beginning of controversy. It completed the separation of the Lutheran and Reformed Churches, it contracted the territory and the theology of Lutheranism, and sowed in it the seed of discord by endeavoring to settle too much, and yet leaving unsettled some of the most characteristic dogmas. It is invaluable as a theological document, but a partial failure as a symbol, just because it contains too much theology and too little charity. It closes the productive period of the Lutheran reformation and opens the era of scholastic formalism.

The Formula is the fullest embodiment of genuine Lutheran orthodoxy, as distinct from other denominations. It represents one of the leading doctrinal types of Christendom. It is for the Lutheran system what the Decrees of Trent are for the Roman Catholic, the Canons of Dort for the Calvinistic. It sums up the results of the theological controversies of a whole generation with great learning, ability, discrimination, acumen, and, we may add, with comparative moderation. It is quite probable that Luther himself would have heartily indorsed it, with the exception, perhaps, of a part of the eleventh article. The Formula itself claims to be merely a repetition and explication of the genuine sense of the Augsburg Confession, and disclaims originality in the substance of doctrine.⁶⁸⁸ But there were two diverging tendencies proceeding from the same source. The author of the Confession himself understood and explained it differently, and the Formula added new dogmas which he never entertained. It excludes, indeed, certain extravagances of the Flacian wing of Lutheranism, but, upon the whole, it is a condemnation of Philippism and a triumph of exclusive Lutheranism.⁶⁸⁹

The spirit of Melanchthon could be silenced, but not destroyed, for it meant theological progress and Christian union. It revived from time to time in various forms, in Calixtus, Spener, Zinzendorf, Neander, and other great and good men, who blessed the Lutheran Church by protesting against bigotry and the overestimate of intellectual orthodoxy, by insisting on personal, practical piety, by widening the horizon of truth, and extending the hand of fellowship to other sections of Christ's kingdom. The minority which at first refused the Formula became a vast majority, and even the recent reaction of Lutheran confessionalism against rationalism, latitudinarianism, and unionism will be unable to undo the work of history, and to restore the Lutheran scholasticism and exclusivism of the seventeenth century. The Lutheran Church is greater and wider than Luther and Melanchthon, and, by its own principle of the absolute supremacy of the Bible as a rule of faith, it is bound to follow the onward march of Biblical learning.

The great length of this section may be justified by the intrinsic importance of the Formula Concordiæ, and the scarcity of reliable information in English works.⁶⁹⁰

Notes

664
See lists of controversial works for and against the Formula of Concord in Walch, Feuerlin, and Köllner. Comp. also Hutter, Conc. conc. Ch. XXXVII. (p. 958), Ch. XLI. (p. 976), Ch. XLV. (p. 1033), and Ch. XLV. (p. 1038); Heppe, Vol. IV. pp. 270 sqq.; and G. Frank, Vol. I. pp. 251-266. Hutter sees in the general attack of 'the devil and his organs, the heretics,' against the Formula, a clear proof that it was composed instinctu Spiritus Sancti, and is in full harmony with the infallible Word of God (p. 976).
665
The rigidly orthodox Heshusius and the Helmstädt divines (in the Quedlinburg Colloquium, 1583), Christopher Irenæus (an exiled Flacianist, formerly court chaplain at Weimar, 1581), Ambrosius Wolff (or Cyriacus Herdesianus, of Nuremberg, 1580), the Bremen preachers (1581), the Anhalt theologians (1580, 1581), and the Margrave of Baden (in the Stafford Book, 1599).
666
Ursinus (in connection with Zanchius, Tossanus, and other deposed Heidelberg Professors, who, under John Casimir and during the rule of Lutheranism in Heidelberg, founded and conducted a flourishing theological school at Neustadt an der Hardt, 1576 to 1583): Admonitio Christiana de libro Concordiæ (or Christliche Erinnerung vom Concordienbuch), Neostadadii in Palatinatu, Latin and German, 1581 (also in Urs. Opera, Heidelberg, 1612, Vol. II. pp.486 sqq.). It consists of twelve chapters, and is very able. Extract in Sudhoff, Olevianus und Ursinus, pp. 432-452; comp. Schweizer in Herzog, Vol. X. pp. 263-265. Ursinus and some of his pupils defended this work against the Lutheran 'Apology,' in Defensio Admonitionis Neost. contra Apologiæ Erfordensis sophismata, Neost. 1584. Beza wrote Refutatio dogmatis de ficticia carnis Christi omnipræsentia; Dansæus an Examen of Chemnitz's book De duabus in Christo naturis, Genev. 1581; Sadeel, a very able tract, De veritate humanæ naturæ Christi, 1585 (in his Opera, Genev. 1592). Of later Reformed writings must be mentioned the Emdensche Buch (1591), and especially Hospinian's Concordia discors (1607), which called forth Hutter's Concordia concors (1614).
667
The ablest Roman assailant was Robert Bellarmin: Judicium de libro quem Lutherani vocant Concordiæ, Ingolst. 1587, 1589, etc. (in his Opera, Col. Ag. 1620, Vol. VII. p. 576). Against him Hoe ab Hoenegg wrote Apol. contra R. B. impium et stolidum judicium, Fref. 1605. Bellarmin also repeatedly notices the Christology of the Formula in his great controversial work against Protestantism. See below.
668
See Schütz, Vita Chytræi, and Heppe, Vol. IV. pp. 395 sqq.
669
This complaint the Erfurt Apology of the Formula of Concord admitted to be just, at least in part. The Formula makes no distinction between Zwingli and Calvin; condemns Zwingli's 'allæosis' (by which he meant only to guard against a confusio and æquatio naturarum) as a mask of the devil; charges the Reformed generally with a Nestorian separation of the two natures in Christ, and a denial of all communion between them; with childish literalism concerning the right hand of God and the throne of glory; with shutting Christ up in heaven, as if he had no more to do with us, etc.
670
Dorner, in his History of Christology (Vol. II. pp. 718-750), gives an admirable and impartial summary of the Reformed argument. Dr. Kahnis, of Leipzig, from his Lutheran standpoint, thus fairly and liberally characterizes the Reformed opposition to the Form of Concord (Luth. Dogm. Vol. II. p. 590): 'Die Reformirten vertraten den Standpunkt des Verstandes, welcher zwischen Endlichem und Unendlichem abstract(?) scheidend (finitum non est capax infiniti) der menschlichen Natur Christi keinen Antheil an den göttlichen Eigenschaften einräumt; den Standpunkt der Realität, welcher in der Betrachtung der Person Christi, von dem Wandel auf Erden ausgehead, der rein menschlichen Entwicklung Christi freien Raum schaffen will; den Standpunkt des Praktischen, der bei den sicheren Thatsachen der persönlichen Vereinigung Beruhigung fasste, ohne sich in gnostisch-scholastische Theorien verspinnen zu wollen.'
671
Lib. III. de Sacramento Eucharistiæ, cap. 17. Comp. also cap. 7, and Lib. III. de Christo (where he refers to the views of Luther, Brentius, Wigand, Heshusius, and Chemnitz on ubiquity).
672
His reasoning is curious: 'Quod est ubique, non potest moveri, nec transire de loco ad locum; ergo licet corpus Christi sit in pane, tamen non manducatur, cum panis manducatur, quia non movetur, nec transit cum pane e manu ad os, et ab ore ad stomachmn; nam etiam antea erat in ore et in stomacho, priusquam panis eo veniret. . . . Sequitur aut esse inanem cænam Domini, aut saltem spiritualiter sumi per energiam et per fidem, et solum a piis, qui habent fidem, et hoc est, quod volunt Calvinistæ.'
673
'Si enim corpus Christi ubique est, erit etiam ante usum in vane.
674
Bellarmin (De Sacr. Euch. Lib. III. c. 7), after quoting Augustine against the sententia ubiquistarum Lutheranorum, thus defines the Roman view: 'Nos fatemur Christi corpus non esse ubique diffusum; et ubicunque est, habere suam formam et partium situm, ac dispositionem; quamvis hæc figura, forma, dispositio partium in cælo conspiciatur, ubi locum replet; in Sacramento autem sit quidem, sed non repleat locum, nec videri a nobis possit.'
675
Comp. on Elizabeth's action and the Convent of Frankfort, Hutter's Concordia concors, Cap. XVI. and XVII. (pp. 513-523); Planck, Vol. VI. pp. 591-611; Heppe, Vol. IV. pp. 5 sqq., 16 sqq., and 72 sqq.
676
Cranmer was at first inclined to the Lutheran, theory, but gave it up afterwards. His fellow-Reformers held the Zwinglian or Calvinistic view. Bishop Hooper thus speaks of ubiquity: 'Such as say that heaven and the right hand of God is in the articles of our faith taken for God's power and might, which is every where, they do wrong to the Scripture and unto the articles of our faith. They make a confusion of the Scripture, and leave nothing certain. They darken the simple and plain verity thereof with intolerable sophisms. They make heaven hell, and hell heaven, turn upside down and pervert the order of God. If the heaven and God's right hand, whither our Saviour's body is ascended, be every where, and noteth no certain place, as these uncertain men teach, I will believe no ascension. What needeth it?—seeing Christ's body is every where with his Godhead. I will interpret this article of my creed thus: Christus ascendit ad dextram Patris. Patris dextra est ubique: ergo Christus ascendit ad ubique. See what erroneous doctrine followeth their imaginations!' Early Writings of John Hooper, D.D., Lord Bishop of Gloucester and Worcester, Martyr, 1555; ed. by the Parker Society, Cambridge, 1843, p.66. The 'Declaration of Christ and his Office,' from which this passage is taken, was first published at Zürich. 1547, in the early stage of the ubiquitarian controversy. See also the Remains of Archbishop Grindal, Camb. 1843, p. 46.
677
Comp. the eucharistic works of Pusey (1855), Philip Freeman (1862), Thomas L. Vogan (1871), and John Harrison (against Pusey, 1871).
678
In the Gasthof zum grünen Weinfasse. This gave rise to some joke and mockery.
679
The first part was directed against the Neustadt Admonition of Ursinus and his colleagues, the second against the Bremen pastors, the third against Irenæus, the fourth against Wolf. Timothy Kirchner, of the Palatinate, prepared the first three parts, Selnecker and Chemnitz the last. They were published singly, and then jointly at Dresden, 1584, and distributed by the Elector Augustus among all the churches of Saxony. See Hutter, pp. 978 sqq. and 1038 sqq. (De Apol. Libri Concord. et de Colloquio Quedlinburgensi); Heppe, Vol. IV. pp. 284-311.
680
Hutter (Conc. conc. p. 976), Deutschmann, and others, who called it theopneustos.
681
Anton, 1.c. Ch. X. Erste Concordien-Jubelfreude, pp. 134 sqq. J. G. Walch, in his Introd. 1732, represents the last stage of orthodox veneration before the revolution of sentiment took place.
682
See his judgment, Vol. VI. pp. 690 sqq.; 816 sqq. and passim. Planck's history is, even more than Hospinian's Concordia discors, a chronique scandaleuse of Lutheran pugnacity and bigotry in the second half of the sixteenth century.
683
Symb. Vol. I. p. 596: 'Die Concordienformel hat dogmatisch nur insofern noch Werth, als sie mit den früheren Symbolen übereinstimmt. . . . Allein die Lehre von der Prädestination ausgenommen, kann ihr für das Dogma wie für die äusseren Verhältnisse der Kirche nur der wenigste eigenthümliche Werth unter allen Symbolen der Kirche zugestanden werden. Eigenthümlich ist nur die Ausbildung und mehr systematische Gestaltung des Lehrbegriffs der Kirche als eines Systems.' This is too low an estimate of the whole document, and too high an estimate of Art. XI.
684
In his numerous works, so often quoted.
685
Dogm. Vol. II. p. 517: 'Man darf, . . mit Zuversicht aussprechen, dass die Zukunft der theologischen Forschung an dem Fortschreiten auf dem von Melanchthon eingeschlagenen Wege hängt.'
686
Dr. Krauth calls the Formula 'the amplest and clearest confession in which the Christian Church has ever embodied her faith,' and he goes so far as to say: 'But for the Formula of Concord, it may be questioned whether Protestantism could have been saved to the world' (Conservative Reform. p. 302). And this in full view of the independent Protestantism in Switzerland, France, Holland. England, and Scotland, which materially differs from the distinctive theology of this book, and was in vain condemned by it!
687
We can simply allude to the internal differences of the Erlangen, Leipzig, and Rostock schools of Lutherans; to Luthardt on the freedom of the will; to Thomasius on the Kenosis; to Kahnis on the Lord's Supper, inspiration, and the canon of the Scripture; to the Hofmann and Philippi controversy on the atonement; to Hengstenberg's articles on justification and the Epistle of James; to the disputes on the millenarian question; and to the controversy on Church government and the relation of the ministry to the general priesthood of believers, in which Huschke, Stahl, Kliefoth, Vilmar, and Löhe take High-Church ground against the Low-Church views of Höfling, Harless, Diedrich, etc. Some of these controversies, especially the question of the ministerial office (Amtsfrage), are also disturbing the peace of the orthodox Lutherans in America, and divide them into hostile synods (the Missouri Synod versus the Grabau Synod, Iowa Synod, and portions of the General Council, not to mention several subdivisions). The eschatological controversy separates the Iowa Synod from Grabau and the Missourians, who denounce millenarianism as a heresy. The smallest doctrinal difference among orthodox Lutherans in America is considered sufficient to justify the formation of a new synod with close-communion principles. And yet all these Lutherans adopt the Formula Concordiæ as the highest standard of pure Scripture orthodoxy. Is this Concordia concors, or Concordia discors?
688
See the Preface. An able argument for this agreement is presented by Prof. Thomasius, of Erlangen, in his Das Bekenntniss der evangelisch-lutherischen Kirche in der Consequent seines Princips, Nürnberg, 1848. He develops the doctrines of the Formula from Luther's doctrine of justification by faith as the organic life-principle of the Lutheran Church. But the Lutheran doctrine of the eucharist with the communicatio idiomatum and ubiquity of the body have—as the creeds of the Reformed churches prove—no necessary connection with justification by faith; and on these points, which constitute the peculiar features of the Formula, the author of the Augsburg Confession himself represented, even before Luther's death, a different line of development.
689
Andreæ, in a letter to Heshusius and Wigand, of July 24, 1576, giving an account of the results of the Torgau Convention (quoted by Heppe, Vol. III. p. 111), thus characteristically sets forth the object of the whole movement in which he and the Elector Augustus were the chief leaders: 'Hoc enim sancte vobis affirmare et polliceri ausim, Illust. Electorem Saxoniæ in hoc unice intentum, ut Lutheri Doctrina partim obscurata, partim vitiata, partim aperte vel occulte damnata, pura et sincera in scholis et Ecclesiis restituatur, adeoque Lutherus, hoc est Christus, cuius fidelis minister Lutherus fuit, vivat. Quid vultis amplius? Nihil hic fucatum, nihil palliatum, nihil tectum est, sed juxta spiritum Lutheri, qui Christi est.' And Chemnitz wrote, June 29, 1576: 'Mentio librorum Philippi expuncta est, et responsione hoc in parte retulimus nos ad Lichtenbergense decretmn.' Some zealots, like Heshusius, desired that Melanchthon should be condemned, by name, in the Formula, but Andreæ thought it better 'to cover the shame of Noah,' and to be silent about the apostasy of the Lutheran Solomon. Dr. Krauth, too, says (Conservative Reform. p. 327): 'The Book of Concord treats Melanchthon as the Bible treats Solomon. It opens wide the view of his wisdom and glory, and draws the veil over the record of his sadder days.' In the Formula itself he is nowhere named, but in the Preface to the 'Book of Concord' his writings are spoken of as 'utilia neque repudianda ac damnanda, quatenus cum ea norma, quæ Concordiæ libro expressa est, per omnia consentiunt.'
690
There is no full and satisfactory account of the history and character of the Form of Concord in the English language, except in Dr. Krauth's Conservative Reformation and its Theology, pp. 288-328; and this, in accordance with the aim of this learned and able author, is apologetic and polemic rather than historical. Dr. Shedd, in his valuable History of Christian Doctrine (Vol. II. p. 458), devotes only a few lines to it. Dr. Fisher, in his excellent work on the Reformation (N. Y. 1873), disposes of it in a foot-note (p. 481). In Dr. Blunt's Dictionary of Sects, etc. (London, 1874), it has no place among the Protestant Confessions, and the brief allusion to it sub 'Lutherans,' p. 269, only exposes the ignorance of the writer. The doctrines of the Form of Concord are frequently, though mostly polemically, noticed in Dr. Hodge's Systematic Theology (N.Y. 1873, 3 vols.).

Philip Schaff, The Creeds of Christendom, Volume 1: The History of Creeds (1877). Public domain. Text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library.

Notes

664

See lists of controversial works for and against the Formula of Concord in Walch, Feuerlin, and Köllner. Comp. also Hutter, Conc. conc. Ch. XXXVII. (p. 958), Ch. XLI. (p. 976), Ch. XLV. (p. 1033), and Ch. XLV. (p. 1038); Heppe, Vol. IV. pp. 270 sqq.; and G. Frank, Vol. I. pp. 251-266. Hutter sees in the general attack of 'the devil and his organs, the heretics,' against the Formula, a clear proof that it was composed instinctu Spiritus Sancti, and is in full harmony with the infallible Word of God (p. 976).

665

The rigidly orthodox Heshusius and the Helmstädt divines (in the Quedlinburg Colloquium, 1583), Christopher Irenæus (an exiled Flacianist, formerly court chaplain at Weimar, 1581), Ambrosius Wolff (or Cyriacus Herdesianus, of Nuremberg, 1580), the Bremen preachers (1581), the Anhalt theologians (1580, 1581), and the Margrave of Baden (in the Stafford Book, 1599).

666

Ursinus (in connection with Zanchius, Tossanus, and other deposed Heidelberg Professors, who, under John Casimir and during the rule of Lutheranism in Heidelberg, founded and conducted a flourishing theological school at Neustadt an der Hardt, 1576 to 1583): Admonitio Christiana de libro Concordiæ (or Christliche Erinnerung vom Concordienbuch), Neostadadii in Palatinatu, Latin and German, 1581 (also in Urs. Opera, Heidelberg, 1612, Vol. II. pp.486 sqq.). It consists of twelve chapters, and is very able. Extract in Sudhoff, Olevianus und Ursinus, pp. 432-452; comp. Schweizer in Herzog, Vol. X. pp. 263-265. Ursinus and some of his pupils defended this work against the Lutheran 'Apology,' in Defensio Admonitionis Neost. contra Apologiæ Erfordensis sophismata, Neost. 1584. Beza wrote Refutatio dogmatis de ficticia carnis Christi omnipræsentia; Dansæus an Examen of Chemnitz's book De duabus in Christo naturis, Genev. 1581; Sadeel, a very able tract, De veritate humanæ naturæ Christi, 1585 (in his Opera, Genev. 1592). Of later Reformed writings must be mentioned the Emdensche Buch (1591), and especially Hospinian's Concordia discors (1607), which called forth Hutter's Concordia concors (1614).

667

The ablest Roman assailant was Robert Bellarmin: Judicium de libro quem Lutherani vocant Concordiæ, Ingolst. 1587, 1589, etc. (in his Opera, Col. Ag. 1620, Vol. VII. p. 576). Against him Hoe ab Hoenegg wrote Apol. contra R. B. impium et stolidum judicium, Fref. 1605. Bellarmin also repeatedly notices the Christology of the Formula in his great controversial work against Protestantism. See below.

668

See Schütz, Vita Chytræi, and Heppe, Vol. IV. pp. 395 sqq.

669

This complaint the Erfurt Apology of the Formula of Concord admitted to be just, at least in part. The Formula makes no distinction between Zwingli and Calvin; condemns Zwingli's 'allæosis' (by which he meant only to guard against a confusio and æquatio naturarum) as a mask of the devil; charges the Reformed generally with a Nestorian separation of the two natures in Christ, and a denial of all communion between them; with childish literalism concerning the right hand of God and the throne of glory; with shutting Christ up in heaven, as if he had no more to do with us, etc.

670

Dorner, in his History of Christology (Vol. II. pp. 718-750), gives an admirable and impartial summary of the Reformed argument. Dr. Kahnis, of Leipzig, from his Lutheran standpoint, thus fairly and liberally characterizes the Reformed opposition to the Form of Concord (Luth. Dogm. Vol. II. p. 590): 'Die Reformirten vertraten den Standpunkt des Verstandes, welcher zwischen Endlichem und Unendlichem abstract(?) scheidend (finitum non est capax infiniti) der menschlichen Natur Christi keinen Antheil an den göttlichen Eigenschaften einräumt; den Standpunkt der Realität, welcher in der Betrachtung der Person Christi, von dem Wandel auf Erden ausgehead, der rein menschlichen Entwicklung Christi freien Raum schaffen will; den Standpunkt des Praktischen, der bei den sicheren Thatsachen der persönlichen Vereinigung Beruhigung fasste, ohne sich in gnostisch-scholastische Theorien verspinnen zu wollen.'

671

Lib. III. de Sacramento Eucharistiæ, cap. 17. Comp. also cap. 7, and Lib. III. de Christo (where he refers to the views of Luther, Brentius, Wigand, Heshusius, and Chemnitz on ubiquity).

672

His reasoning is curious: 'Quod est ubique, non potest moveri, nec transire de loco ad locum; ergo licet corpus Christi sit in pane, tamen non manducatur, cum panis manducatur, quia non movetur, nec transit cum pane e manu ad os, et ab ore ad stomachmn; nam etiam antea erat in ore et in stomacho, priusquam panis eo veniret. . . . Sequitur aut esse inanem cænam Domini, aut saltem spiritualiter sumi per energiam et per fidem, et solum a piis, qui habent fidem, et hoc est, quod volunt Calvinistæ.'

673

'Si enim corpus Christi ubique est, erit etiam ante usum in vane.

674

Bellarmin (De Sacr. Euch. Lib. III. c. 7), after quoting Augustine against the sententia ubiquistarum Lutheranorum, thus defines the Roman view: 'Nos fatemur Christi corpus non esse ubique diffusum; et ubicunque est, habere suam formam et partium situm, ac dispositionem; quamvis hæc figura, forma, dispositio partium in cælo conspiciatur, ubi locum replet; in Sacramento autem sit quidem, sed non repleat locum, nec videri a nobis possit.'

675

Comp. on Elizabeth's action and the Convent of Frankfort, Hutter's Concordia concors, Cap. XVI. and XVII. (pp. 513-523); Planck, Vol. VI. pp. 591-611; Heppe, Vol. IV. pp. 5 sqq., 16 sqq., and 72 sqq.

676

Cranmer was at first inclined to the Lutheran, theory, but gave it up afterwards. His fellow-Reformers held the Zwinglian or Calvinistic view. Bishop Hooper thus speaks of ubiquity: 'Such as say that heaven and the right hand of God is in the articles of our faith taken for God's power and might, which is every where, they do wrong to the Scripture and unto the articles of our faith. They make a confusion of the Scripture, and leave nothing certain. They darken the simple and plain verity thereof with intolerable sophisms. They make heaven hell, and hell heaven, turn upside down and pervert the order of God. If the heaven and God's right hand, whither our Saviour's body is ascended, be every where, and noteth no certain place, as these uncertain men teach, I will believe no ascension. What needeth it?—seeing Christ's body is every where with his Godhead. I will interpret this article of my creed thus: Christus ascendit ad dextram Patris. Patris dextra est ubique: ergo Christus ascendit ad ubique. See what erroneous doctrine followeth their imaginations!' Early Writings of John Hooper, D.D., Lord Bishop of Gloucester and Worcester, Martyr, 1555; ed. by the Parker Society, Cambridge, 1843, p.66. The 'Declaration of Christ and his Office,' from which this passage is taken, was first published at Zürich. 1547, in the early stage of the ubiquitarian controversy. See also the Remains of Archbishop Grindal, Camb. 1843, p. 46.

677

Comp. the eucharistic works of Pusey (1855), Philip Freeman (1862), Thomas L. Vogan (1871), and John Harrison (against Pusey, 1871).

678

In the Gasthof zum grünen Weinfasse. This gave rise to some joke and mockery.

679

The first part was directed against the Neustadt Admonition of Ursinus and his colleagues, the second against the Bremen pastors, the third against Irenæus, the fourth against Wolf. Timothy Kirchner, of the Palatinate, prepared the first three parts, Selnecker and Chemnitz the last. They were published singly, and then jointly at Dresden, 1584, and distributed by the Elector Augustus among all the churches of Saxony. See Hutter, pp. 978 sqq. and 1038 sqq. (De Apol. Libri Concord. et de Colloquio Quedlinburgensi); Heppe, Vol. IV. pp. 284-311.

680

Hutter (Conc. conc. p. 976), Deutschmann, and others, who called it theopneustos.

681

Anton, 1.c. Ch. X. Erste Concordien-Jubelfreude, pp. 134 sqq. J. G. Walch, in his Introd. 1732, represents the last stage of orthodox veneration before the revolution of sentiment took place.

682

See his judgment, Vol. VI. pp. 690 sqq.; 816 sqq. and passim. Planck's history is, even more than Hospinian's Concordia discors, a chronique scandaleuse of Lutheran pugnacity and bigotry in the second half of the sixteenth century.

683

Symb. Vol. I. p. 596: 'Die Concordienformel hat dogmatisch nur insofern noch Werth, als sie mit den früheren Symbolen übereinstimmt. . . . Allein die Lehre von der Prädestination ausgenommen, kann ihr für das Dogma wie für die äusseren Verhältnisse der Kirche nur der wenigste eigenthümliche Werth unter allen Symbolen der Kirche zugestanden werden. Eigenthümlich ist nur die Ausbildung und mehr systematische Gestaltung des Lehrbegriffs der Kirche als eines Systems.' This is too low an estimate of the whole document, and too high an estimate of Art. XI.

684

In his numerous works, so often quoted.

685

Dogm. Vol. II. p. 517: 'Man darf, . . mit Zuversicht aussprechen, dass die Zukunft der theologischen Forschung an dem Fortschreiten auf dem von Melanchthon eingeschlagenen Wege hängt.'

686

Dr. Krauth calls the Formula 'the amplest and clearest confession in which the Christian Church has ever embodied her faith,' and he goes so far as to say: 'But for the Formula of Concord, it may be questioned whether Protestantism could have been saved to the world' (Conservative Reform. p. 302). And this in full view of the independent Protestantism in Switzerland, France, Holland. England, and Scotland, which materially differs from the distinctive theology of this book, and was in vain condemned by it!

687

We can simply allude to the internal differences of the Erlangen, Leipzig, and Rostock schools of Lutherans; to Luthardt on the freedom of the will; to Thomasius on the Kenosis; to Kahnis on the Lord's Supper, inspiration, and the canon of the Scripture; to the Hofmann and Philippi controversy on the atonement; to Hengstenberg's articles on justification and the Epistle of James; to the disputes on the millenarian question; and to the controversy on Church government and the relation of the ministry to the general priesthood of believers, in which Huschke, Stahl, Kliefoth, Vilmar, and Löhe take High-Church ground against the Low-Church views of Höfling, Harless, Diedrich, etc. Some of these controversies, especially the question of the ministerial office (Amtsfrage), are also disturbing the peace of the orthodox Lutherans in America, and divide them into hostile synods (the Missouri Synod versus the Grabau Synod, Iowa Synod, and portions of the General Council, not to mention several subdivisions). The eschatological controversy separates the Iowa Synod from Grabau and the Missourians, who denounce millenarianism as a heresy. The smallest doctrinal difference among orthodox Lutherans in America is considered sufficient to justify the formation of a new synod with close-communion principles. And yet all these Lutherans adopt the Formula Concordiæ as the highest standard of pure Scripture orthodoxy. Is this Concordia concors, or Concordia discors?

688

See the Preface. An able argument for this agreement is presented by Prof. Thomasius, of Erlangen, in his Das Bekenntniss der evangelisch-lutherischen Kirche in der Consequent seines Princips, Nürnberg, 1848. He develops the doctrines of the Formula from Luther's doctrine of justification by faith as the organic life-principle of the Lutheran Church. But the Lutheran doctrine of the eucharist with the communicatio idiomatum and ubiquity of the body have—as the creeds of the Reformed churches prove—no necessary connection with justification by faith; and on these points, which constitute the peculiar features of the Formula, the author of the Augsburg Confession himself represented, even before Luther's death, a different line of development.

689

Andreæ, in a letter to Heshusius and Wigand, of July 24, 1576, giving an account of the results of the Torgau Convention (quoted by Heppe, Vol. III. p. 111), thus characteristically sets forth the object of the whole movement in which he and the Elector Augustus were the chief leaders: 'Hoc enim sancte vobis affirmare et polliceri ausim, Illust. Electorem Saxoniæ in hoc unice intentum, ut Lutheri Doctrina partim obscurata, partim vitiata, partim aperte vel occulte damnata, pura et sincera in scholis et Ecclesiis restituatur, adeoque Lutherus, hoc est Christus, cuius fidelis minister Lutherus fuit, vivat. Quid vultis amplius? Nihil hic fucatum, nihil palliatum, nihil tectum est, sed juxta spiritum Lutheri, qui Christi est.' And Chemnitz wrote, June 29, 1576: 'Mentio librorum Philippi expuncta est, et responsione hoc in parte retulimus nos ad Lichtenbergense decretmn.' Some zealots, like Heshusius, desired that Melanchthon should be condemned, by name, in the Formula, but Andreæ thought it better 'to cover the shame of Noah,' and to be silent about the apostasy of the Lutheran Solomon. Dr. Krauth, too, says (Conservative Reform. p. 327): 'The Book of Concord treats Melanchthon as the Bible treats Solomon. It opens wide the view of his wisdom and glory, and draws the veil over the record of his sadder days.' In the Formula itself he is nowhere named, but in the Preface to the 'Book of Concord' his writings are spoken of as 'utilia neque repudianda ac damnanda, quatenus cum ea norma, quæ Concordiæ libro expressa est, per omnia consentiunt.'

690

There is no full and satisfactory account of the history and character of the Form of Concord in the English language, except in Dr. Krauth's Conservative Reformation and its Theology, pp. 288-328; and this, in accordance with the aim of this learned and able author, is apologetic and polemic rather than historical. Dr. Shedd, in his valuable History of Christian Doctrine (Vol. II. p. 458), devotes only a few lines to it. Dr. Fisher, in his excellent work on the Reformation (N. Y. 1873), disposes of it in a foot-note (p. 481). In Dr. Blunt's Dictionary of Sects, etc. (London, 1874), it has no place among the Protestant Confessions, and the brief allusion to it sub 'Lutherans,' p. 269, only exposes the ignorance of the writer. The doctrines of the Form of Concord are frequently, though mostly polemically, noticed in Dr. Hodge's Systematic Theology (N.Y. 1873, 3 vols.).