Luther’s conception of the believer in the political realm is complicated. There is room in Luther’s socio-political views advocating for Christian compliance to the government because of his emphasis on order and obedience wedded to the divine right of kings. For instance, early in his Lecture on Galatians (1535), Luther writes about obedience to the civic law and its administrators, “In society, on the other hand, obedience to the Law must be strictly required. There let nothing be known about the Gospel, conscience, grace, the forgiveness of sins, heavenly righteousness, or Christ Himself; but let there be knowledge only of Moses, of the Law and its works,” (LW 26:116). These themes are picked up and reinforced in the harsh rhetoric of the three texts of 1525, Admonition to Peace: A Reply to the Twelve Articles of the Peasants in Swabia, Against the Robbing and Murdering Hordes of Peasants, and An Open letter on the Harsh Book Against the Peasants. These texts underscore Luther’s resistance toward certain forms of civil disobedience; he abhors disorder and chaos, relegating it to the realm of the devil. Writing in Admonition to Peace, Luther warns, “Beware of the illusion that you are winning freedom for your body when you are really losing your body, property, and soul for all eternity. God’s wrath is there; fear it, I advise you! The devil has sent false prophets among you; beware of them!” (LW 46:28). In Luther’s socio-political landscape, rebellion in any form is anathema; here, those who have chosen such a path have jettisoned faith, the gospel, and God’s will and are deserving of full punishment. In Against the Robbing and Murderous Hordes of Peasants, Luther exhorts the rulers immersed in this war against the peasants, to punish (nearly without restraint) the rebellious peasants, I will not oppose a ruler who, even though he does not tolerate the gospel will smite and punish these peasants without first offering to submit the case to judgment. He is within his rights, since the peasants are not contending any longer for the gospel, but have become faithless, perjured, disobedient, rebellious murderers, robbers, and blasphemers, whom even a heathen ruler has the right and authority to punish,” (LW 46:52).
However, six years later, in Martin Luther’s Warning to His Dear German People (1531), Luther advocates for resistance against authorities of both church and state when either oversteps their proper boundaries using civic law and armed force to determine what one believes, “…if war breaks out…I will not reprove those who defend themselves against the murderous and bloodthirsty papists, nor let anyone else rebuke them as being seditious, but I will accept their action and let it pass as self-defense,” (LW 47:19); further, he writes, “To act contrary to law is not rebellion; otherwise, every violation of the law would be rebellion. No, he is an insurrectionist who refuses to submit to government and law, who attacks and fights against them, and attempts to overthrow them with a view to making himself ruler and establishing the law, as Münzer did; that is the true definition of a rebel. …In accordance with this definition, self-defense against the bloodhounds cannot be rebellious,” (LW 47:20). And in a Table Talk record by Anthony Lauterbach, dated April 1538, Luther responded to a question about the permissibility to “defend oneself if the emperor takes up arms against us.” According to Lauterbach, Luther replied, “‘This is not a theological matter but a legal one. If the emperor undertakes war he will be a tyrant and will oppose our ministry and religion, and then he will also oppose our civil and domestic life. Here there is no question whether it’s permissible to fight for one’s faith. On the contrary, it’s necessary to fight for one’s children and family. If I’m able, I’ll write an admonition to the whole world in defense of such people.” At times it seems Luther is in tension with Luther.
This tension is exacerbated when his socio-political treatises are compared as individual entities divorced from his reformational insights articulated in earlier treatises, specifically The Freedom of a Christian. It is the contention of this paper that The Freedom of a Christian is fundamental to the development of the Reformer’s evolving socio-political views. It frames the believer’s liberation in union with God by faith and corresponding service to the neighbor as the working out of faith in the “law of love,” a controlling theme in all his socio-political treatises. This seeming tension is further exacerbated when the discussion about Christian resistance against temporal authority forgets Luther’s profound emphasis on the well-being of the neighbor that is not only deeds done in the temporal realm, but is, for the believer, a matter of the spiritual realm, the concern of God and thus the concern of faith working itself out in the “law of love,” specifically as temporal authority threatens the lively hood of the Tribus Hierarchiis, instituted by God to maintain and keep order and peace for both the believer and her neighbor in the world.
Thus, it is the goal of this paper to bring The Freedom of a Christian in a dialogue with Martin Luther's later socio-political works, Martin Luther's Warning to His Dear German People (1531) and the Circular Disputation on the Right of Resistance against the Emperor (1539), to establish a clear path unfolding within Luther’s socio-political treatises. Luther's highly nuanced position advocating for Christian resistance against temporal authority adheres to the paradox of Christian existence, “A Christian person is a free lord above everything and subject to no one; a Christian person is a devoted-peer servant of everything and subject to everyone,” (WA 7:21), and is wedded to the concept of “counter-insurrection" in defense of the divinely gifted Tribus Hierarchiis. In this way, Luther's conception of Christian freedom and responsibility does not betray his characteristic concern about chaos and disorder and allows for Christian socio-political resistance while staying within the confines of faith working itself out in the “law of love.”
This paper brings The Freedom of a Christian in dialogue with Martin Luther's later socio-political works, Martin Luther's Warning to His Dear German People (1531) and the Circular Disputation on the Right of Resistance against the Emperor (1539), to establish a clear path unfolding within Luther’s socio-political treatises. Luther's highly nuanced position advocating for Christian resistance against temporal authority adheres to the paradox of Christian existence, “A Christian person is a free lord above everything and subject to no one; a Christian person is a devoted-peer servant of everything and subject to everyone,” and is wedded to the concept of “counter-insurrection" in defense of the divinely gifted Tribus Hierarchiis. In this way, Luther's conception of Christian freedom and responsibility does not betray his characteristic concern about chaos and disorder and allows for Christian socio-political resistance while staying within the confines of faith working itself out in the “law of love.”