Another less known reformer was Erasmus. After the eastern Catholic Church had been driven west by an expanding Islam, a knowledge of the more ancient Greek Scriptures began to appear in Europe. But the Roman Church, by law, only allowed the reading of its Latin Bible translated by Jerome. Erasmus, as an important Greek scholar dared to say the Latin Bibles were neither ancient or pure. Erasmus also dared to say everyone should be able to read the Bible for themselves. As soon as Erasmus Greek New Testament was available, Martin Luther did translated it into German.

My first research included on this page evaluates the work of Erasmus. While being an important reformer, Erasmus never left the Roman church. Because of this there were great debates between Luther and Erasmus. I have included some of their dialogue in the next few sections. Finally, I include a research paper that was the result of studying the evidence for the source of our New Testament. It asks the question, Did our New Testament come about as a gift of the Roman Catholic Church, or do we have it today because it was "inspired" and "preserved" by God? Following this paper I include the research of some modern Roman Catholic apologists: James Akin and Tom Jensen.

In the final section I have placed my own research into Mormon authority and sources of revelation and scripture. After my article I included some source articles from their own 1992 Encyclopedia on Mormonism. Each article from this source is complete even including their own bibliographies.

INTRODUCTION TO ERASMUS AND THE REFORMATION

This title presupposes a content which would demonstrate Erasmus’ work as a reformer. There is confusion today about who the real Erasmus was when it came to the reformation. Some are confused about Erasmus religious writings and only view him as a humanist. Others Protestant and Catholic alike view Erasmus work as being counter to the Protestant Reformation. These authors must use a narrow portion of his works depicting only his opposition to Luther. Most Protestants see Erasmus as a Pre-Reformer. My research will examine his time, education, his scholarly work as it impacted Catholics and reformers, and the impact of his works as they reflected his day and ours.

ERASMUS’ TIMES

Erasmus lived in a very confusing time. On the one hand knowledge was beginning to explode through Gutenberg’s improvement to the printing industry, but on the other hand religious intolerance and bigotry made this a very dangerous century. A narrow consideration of Erasmus’ work will only add to that confusion. Erasmus managed to straddle a line that on the one hand made him an effective reformer of Catholic practice but on the other did not go so far as to actually depart from the Catholic church. Gonzalez includes this telling quotation from Erasmus himself “I detest dissension, because it goes against the teachings of Christ and against a secret inclination of nature. I doubt that either side in the dispute can be suppressed without grave loss. It is clear that many of the reforms for which Luther calls are urgently needed. My only wish is that now that I am old I be allowed to enjoy the results of my efforts. But both sides reproach me and seek to coerce me. Some claim that since I do not attack Luther I agree with him, while the Lutherans declare that I am a coward who has forsaken the gospel.”

ERASMUS A PRE-REFORMER
Some Protestant historians see Erasmus as a part of a list they call pre-reformers. There is evidence that Erasmus felt he could accomplish more in his reformation goals by remaining within the Roman Catholic church. The evidence of this can be seen in his early letter to Luther and in other Roman Catholic reports that Erasmus had become too Lutheran. My research will examine Erasmus contributions focusing on evidence of Erasmus the Reformer.

BIOGRAPHY
Gonzales says Desiderius Erasmus was born out of wedlock to a Roman Catholic priest near Rotterdam in 1466. Craig Thompson says his earliest education was at Gouda from which he went to Cathedral school at Utrecht, and then St. Lebwin’s at Deventer. His teachers were members of a lay community, the Brothers of the Common Life. This group defined the Christian life as “above all decent, moderate, and balanced.” The training Erasmus received here marked him by leading him to believe obedience was more important than doctrinal purity. He believed in a modern form of devotion which emphasized the role of the human spirit. The Brothers believed human passion must be subjected to the rule of reason because there is harmony in learning religion, reason and revelation. The evidence of his early training can be seen in his later years when Erasmus was being pressured to take sides in the reformation.

ERASMUS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF PARIS
Erasmus studied at the University of Paris from 1495 to 1498. He did not like the “arid scholasticism” at the University of Paris. Erasmus began writing letters which was a lifetime work, and coaching other students such as Lord Mountjoy who in the following year invited him to England. In England Erasmus met John Colet whose use of the tools of the enlightenment for Christian purposes was the focus of a study he was presenting on Paul’s epistles. Humanists in the enlightenment had a desire to return to classical times from antiquity which they believed were superior to the scholasticism of the middle ages.

ERASMUS’ GREEK STUDY

Erasmus determined to apply humanism to religion as a new scholarship to enhance the understanding of Holy Scripture. In Erasmus’ time the Latin Vulgate, translated by Jerome enjoyed the prestige of being the official Roman Catholic Bible, but Jerome himself was aware of its problems telling Pope Damascus that “there were almost as many versions as manuscripts.”

ERASMUS AND TEXTUAL CRITICISM
People in Erasmus’ century wanted to get closer to the original documents of Christianity. This included Biblical texts and the writings of early church fathers. In 1500 Erasmus went back to Paris where he began a systematic study of ancient Greek. As Erasmus Greek skills grew he was able to compare ancient Greek texts with the texts from Jerome’s Latin texts. Erasmus realized the Greek were older and more authoritative than the Latin. As he compared the Greek with the Latin he was able to see that Jerome’s historic Latin Vulgate was in need of “correcting.” His work of comparing and evaluating ancient texts was the beginning of the science of textual criticism.

NEED FOR NEW BASIS FOR THEOLOGY
Erasmus believed theology should be based on Scripture. He believed no genuine theology should be based on Jerome’s flawed Latin New Testament. At that time there few Greek texts of the New Testament available for study. Because of the heightened need for a credible source for theology, it became Erasmus’ goal to first restore a Greek text of the New Testament using the best Greek texts available in his day. He also began “correcting” other works of St. Jerome which he described as “corrupt, mutilated and confused.”

ERASMUS’ EARLY WRITINGS
In 1501 Erasmus began writing his Enchiridion which focused his interest in the early church fathers. He began to study Origen, Ambrose, Augustine as well as Jerome. Erasmus wrote a commentary on St. Paul using both Greek and Latin. This exercise rooted Erasmus in the finest Pauline texts. While Luther and Erasmus would not agree on Erasmus’ interpretation of Pauline texts, Erasmus contribution to the reformation can be seen in his choosing to research foundational ancient sources as the original authoritative documents of Christianity. Erasmus believed only these foundational texts should be the source for reformed theology.

In 1509 Erasmus began a work called In Praise of Folly in London. Here he used wit and irony to say outrageous things to the Roman Catholic Church. He attacked religious superstition, theologians, monks, and Roman authorities who he said disfigured religion with conceit and unchristian lives.

ERASMUS’ GREEK NEW TESTAMENT

The first major product to come from Gutenberg’s new technology was of course Jerome’s Latin Vulgate in 1450 and 1456. The first Hebrew texts were printed in 1488. The first Greek Bible was contained in the Spanish 1514 Complutensian Polyglot. This very large multiple volume work included Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek and Latin texts. The first four volumes contained the Old Testament which had the Hebrew, the Vulgate and the Septuagint in three columns side by side. Volume five contained a Greek New Testament. Metzger has not been able to determine which source Greek manuscripts the Complutensian scholars had available to them. Because they also included the Vulgate Rome seemed to have aided them. But the reformation was still in need of a reliable, affordable Greek New Testament.

Johann Froben, a well known publisher approached Erasmus before the Complutensian Polyglot was published to hire him “sensing the market was ready for an edition of the Greek New Testament,” and wishing “to capitalize upon that demand” before the competing text was printed he began negotiations to hire Erasmus to manage the project.

Erasmus traveled to Basle in July of 1515 hoping to find a library of Greek manuscripts that he could compare and then send the best example on to the printer. He had already been working on his own Latin New Testament translation for years. Froben wanted to begin printing by October. This didn’t seem like a major barrier since the Latin text was ready and all Erasmus had to do was forward the best Greek manuscript he could find over to the printer. Erasmus became angry when he arrived at the library because he could not even find a single complete Greek manuscript.

ERASMUS GREEK TEXT - TEXTUS RECEPTUS

Erasmus only had August and September to get a Greek text of the New Testament over to Froben’s printer. All of the manuscripts he found had problems. Instead of waiting until he could obtain the proper manuscripts, Metzger says Erasmus just began editing, repairing, cutting and pasting the several manuscripts he was able to find in order to get a printer’s copy on time.

For most of the text Erasmus relied on two inferior manuscripts from the monastery library at Basle. However these manuscripts were not ancient. They only date from the twelfth century. When Erasmus got the Book of Revelation his twelfth century manuscript was missing its final leaf which contained the last six verses. For these final six verses and for other sections where Erasmus was in doubt about his text he simply inserted his own Greek translation of the Latin Vulgate.

Erasmus John 18 Greek Latin

Metzger comments on Erasmus’ work by saying “as would be expected in such a procedure here and there in Erasmus’ self-made Greek text are readings which have never been found in any known Greek manuscripts - but which are still perpetuated today in printings of the so called Textus Receptus of the Greek New Testament.”

By October 2, 1515 Erasmus had “precipitated” rather than “edited” a thousand page folio volume. By the next March 1, 1516 the printing was completed. Metzger says Erasmus’ Greek New Testament received mixed reviews. Because of the haste it contained hundreds of typographical errors. One reviewer said it was the most flawed book I know.

Froben was happy because the 3,300 books he printed all sold well. Erasmus edited his first edition bringing it back to the printer again in 1519 for a second edition of 3,300 copies which again sold quickly. Luther got one of this second edition from which he translated the New Testament into German.

Many Roman Catholics saw Erasmus’ Latin version as a “presumptuous innovation” and they received it with hostility. Erasmus’ New Testament was annotated and the subject of some of those notes took aim at some of the corrupt lives of many contemporary priests. The bookstores at Cambridge and Oxford universities were not allowed to sell Erasmus New Testament.

Some of the criticism leveled at Erasmus’ New Testament dealt with his failure to include an important doctrinal passage from the Vulgate which the scholars working on the Complutensian Polyglot included. This passage was the Trinitarian statement that concluded 1 John 5:7-8. Stunica, one of the editors of the Complutensian Polyglot, challenged Erasmus because it was missing. Erasmus replied that if anyone could find a single Greek manuscript that contained this passage that he would include that passage in his next edition. Metzger says a Franciscan friar probably took Erasmus up on his promise and either found or manufactured a manuscript that contained the passage. When Erasmus printed his third edition in 1522 it contained this addition.

The loyal Roman Catholics who studied this new Greek text, were frustrated because it was combined with a Latin version which disagreed with Jerome’s historic version. For the previous thousand years the Latin version of Jerome had enormous prestige as the official Bible of the Roman Church. Erasmus claimed his Greek text represented an older more authoritative New Testament than Jerome’s which after all was itself only a translation and not the primary text. Erasmus Latin text was an improvement because it was more closely aligned with the more authoritative Greek.

After the publication of Erasmus’ Greek New Testament, a flood gate was opened for Greek scholars. Greek scholars could now use Erasmus’ Greek text to evaluate their Vulgate Bibles. They could also begin translating the New Testament into their own native tongues. This of course is exactly what happened.

ERASMUS' INTRODUCTION TO HIS GREEK NEW TESTAMENT

In his introduction to his 1516 Greek New Testament Erasmus wrote “I disagree very much with those who are unwilling that Holy Scripture, translated into vulgar tongue, be read by the uneducated, as if Christ taught such intricate doctrines that they could scarcely be understood by very few theologians, or as if the strength of the Christian religion consisted in mens’ ignorance of it.” Later he added “I wish that even the lowliest women read the Gospels and the Pauline Epistles.”

ERASMUS AND HERMENEUTICS

Roman Catholics were never overly concerned over having a credible system of hermeneutics because whenever there is a major dispute a papal council or a pope determined truth. During the enlightenment however there was sudden desire to return to ancient Christian sources for truth. Authority could be seen shifting from the pope to Holy Scripture. This raised a need for a criteria for evaluating scholarly research methods upon which scholars could agree.

When Erasmus first studied under John Colet in 1498 he learned about the historical philological approach to understanding Scripture. The hermeneutic Roman Catholics used was the flawed allegorical hermeneutic that can be traced back to Alexandria Egypt. It also assumed that hidden in Bible texts were layers of symbolic mystical truth that students had to evaluate in order to understand their meaning.

Collet was one of the first to reject both the mystical and the allegorical hermeneutic. While neither Calvin or Luther would agree with the way Erasmus applied hermeneutics to the New Testament, Erasmus’ writings affirmed Collet’s method and paved the way for later reformers who declared there can only be a single meaning for a text. Luther wrote that allegory is a sort of beautiful harlot who proves herself specially seductive to idle men. Calvin declared the Roman method of foisting numerous meanings into a passage was of Satan.

The importance of the need for a hermeneutical reformation can not be overstated. At that time there was a crisis in hermeneutics. Early in the next century a very influential scholar named William Ames [1576-1633] said “there is only one meaning for every place in Scripture. Otherwise the meaning of Scripture would be unclear and uncertain, there would be no meaning at all, for anything which does not mean one thing surely means nothing.” Ames became very popular among later Puritans and his textbook was used at Harvard influencing leaders for decades.

LUTHER’S OPPOSITION TO ERASMUS

Luther did not like the way Erasmus interpreted Paul. He did not like Erasmus’ teaching about God’s grace. In March 1517 Luther wrote to John Lang “my opinion of Erasmus decreases from day to day .... I fear that he does not promote the cause of Christ and God’s grace sufficiently. For him human considerations have an absolute preponderance over divine.”

Luther dedicated attention to Erasmus in his treatise titled On the Bondage of the Will in 1525.

“It is fundamentally necessary and healthy for Christians to acknowledge that God foreknows nothing uncertainly, but that He foresees, purposes, and does all things according to His own immutable, eternal and infallible will. This bombshell knocks "free-will" flat, and utterly shatters it; so that those who want to assert it must either deny my bombshell, or pretend not to notice it, or find some other way of dodging it. Surely it was you, my good Erasmus, who a moment ago asserted that God is by nature just, and kindness itself? If this is true, does it not follow that He is immutably just and kind? that, as His nature remains unchanged to all eternity, so do His justice and kindness? And what is said of His justice and kindness must be said also of His knowledge, His wisdom, His goodness, His will, and the other Divine attributes. But if it is religious, godly and wholesome, to affirm these things of God, as you do, what has come over you, that now you should contradict yourself by affirming that it is irreligious, idle and vain to say that God foreknows by necessity? You insist that we should learn the immutability of God's will, while forbidding us to know the immutably of His foreknowledge! Do you suppose that He does not will what He foreknows, or that He does not foreknow what He wills? If he wills what He foreknows, His will is eternal and changeless, because His nature is so. From which it follows, by resistless logic, that all we do, however it may appear to us to be done freely and optionally, is in reality done necessarily and immutably in respect of God's will. For the will of God is effective and cannot be impeded, since power belongs to God's nature; and His wisdom is such that He cannot be deceived. Since, then His will is not impeded, what is done cannot but be done where, when, how, as far as, and by whom, He foresees and wills....”

ROMAN CATHOLIC OPPOSITION TO ERASMUS Some Franciscans responded to Erasmus’ work by saying he laid the egg that Luther hatched. Luther made use of Erasmus’ Greek New Testament, textual criticism and hermeneutic. Luther used Erasmus 1519 Greek New Testament for translating the New Testament into German. While it is clear Erasmus opposed Luther’s extreme remedy of leaving the Roman church, both agreed on the excesses of Rome, and the need for a Greek New Testament as the only authority and basis for theology.

Martin Dorp wrote to Erasmus to criticize him for “his extremity” in correcting the Vulgate text of Holy Scripture. With Erasmus dedication to avoid extreme measures, this charge of being extreme must have hurt. Erasmus says it was his goal to admonish not cause pain to benefit and not vex and to reform but not oppose. The 1909 Roman Catholic Encyclopedia limited his good work to being a German humanist and educator “It cannot be denied that Erasmus was a potent factor in the educational movement of his time. As the foremost of the German humanists, he labored constantly and effectually for the spread of the new learning, which imparted to the education of the Renaissance period its content and spirit. By his intercourse with scholars and students, his published satires on existing institutions and methods, and especially his work in editing and translating the Greek and Latin authors, he gave a powerful impulse to the study of the classics. But his more direct contributions to education are marked by the inconsistency which appears in his whole career.”

THE COUNCIL OF TRENT The Catholic Encyclopedia says, "The nineteenth ecumenical council opened at Trent on 13 December, 1545, and closed there on 4 December, 1563. Its main object was the definitive determination of the doctrines of the Church in answer to the heresies of the Protestants; a further object was the execution of a thorough reform of the inner life of the Church by removing the numerous abuses that had developed in it." [J.P. KIRSCH,Council of Trent, Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume XV, Robert Appleton Company, 1912, Nihil Obstat, October 1, 1912. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York].

IMPORTANT DECREES FROM TRENT

SESSION THE FOURTH
Celebrated on the eighth day of the month of April, in the year MDXLVI.

DECREE CONCERNING THE CANONICAL SCRIPTURES
The sacred and holy, ecumenical, and general Synod of Trent,--lawfully assembled in the Holy Ghost, the Same three legates of the Apostolic Sec presiding therein,--keeping this [Page 18] always in view, that, errors being removed, the purity itself of the Gospel be preserved in the Church; which (Gospel), before promised through the prophets in the holy Scriptures, our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, first promulgated with His own mouth, and then commanded to be preached by His Apostles to every creature, as the fountain of all, both saving truth, and moral discipline; and seeing clearly that this truth and discipline are contained in the written books, and the unwritten traditions which, received by the Apostles from the mouth of Christ himself, or from the Apostles themselves, the Holy Ghost dictating, have come down even unto us, transmitted as it were from hand to hand; (the Synod) following the examples of the orthodox Fathers, receives and venerates with an equal affection of piety, and reverence, all the books both of the Old and of the New Testament--seeing that one God is the author of both --as also the said traditions, as well those appertaining to faith as to morals, as having been dictated, either by Christ's own word of mouth, or by the Holy Ghost, and preserved in the Catholic Church by a continuous succession.
And it has thought it meet that a list of the sacred books be inserted in this decree, lest a doubt may arise in any one's mind, which are the books that are received by this Synod. They are as set down here below: of the Old Testament: the five books of Moses, to wit, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy; Josue, Judges, Ruth, four books of Kings, two of Paralipomenon, the first book of Esdras, and the second which is entitled Nehemias; Tobias, Judith, Esther, Job, the Davidical Psalter, consisting of a hundred and fifty psalms; the Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, the Canticle of Canticles, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Isaias, Jeremias, with Baruch; Ezechiel, Daniel; the twelve minor prophets, to wit, Osee, Joel, Amos, Abdias, Jonas, Micheas, Nahum, Habacuc, Sophonias, Aggaeus, Zacharias, Malachias; two books of the Machabees, the first and the second. Of the New Testament: the four Gospels, according [Page 19] to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John; the Acts of the Apostles written by Luke the Evangelist; fourteen epistles of Paul the apostle, (one) to the Romans, two to the Corinthians, (one) to the Galatians, to the Ephesians, to the Philippians, to the Colossians, two to the Thessalonians, two to Timothy, (one) to Titus, to Philemon, to the Hebrews; two of Peter the apostle, three of John the apostle, one of the apostle James, one of Jude the apostle, and the Apocalypse of John the apostle.
But if any one receive not, as sacred and canonical, the said books entire with all their parts, as they have been used to be read in the Catholic Church, and as they are contained in the old Latin vulgate edition; and knowingly and deliberately contemn the traditions aforesaid; let him be anathema. Let all, therefore, understand, in what order, and in what manner, the said Synod, after having laid the foundation of the Confession of faith, will proceed, and what testimonies and authorities it will mainly use in confirming dogmas, and in restoring morals in the Church.
DECREE CONCERNING THE EDITION, AND THE USE, OF THE SACRED BOOKS
Moreover, the same sacred and holy Synod,--considering that no small utility may accrue to the Church of God, if it be made known which out of all the Latin editions, now in circulation, of the sacred books, is to be held as authentic,--ordains and declares, that the said old and vulgate edition, which, by the lengthened usage of so many years, has been approved of in the Church, be, in public lectures, disputations, sermons and expositions, held as authentic; and that no one is to dare, or presume to reject it under any pretext whatever.
Furthermore, in order to restrain petulant spirits, It decrees, that no one, relying on his own skill, shall,--in matters of faith, and of morals pertaining to the edification of Christian doctrine, --wresting the sacred Scripture to his own senses, presume to interpret the said sacred Scripture contrary to that sense which holy mother Church,--whose it is to judge of the true sense and interpretation of the holy Scriptures,--hath held and doth hold; [Page 20] or even contrary to the unanimous consent of the Fathers; even though such interpretations were never (intended) to be at any time published. Contraveners shall be made known by their Ordinaries, and be punished with the penalties by law established.
And wishing, as is just, to impose a restraint, in this matter, also on printers, who now without restraint,--thinking, that is, that whatsoever they please is allowed them,--print, without the license of ecclesiastical superiors, the said books of sacred Scripture, and the notes and comments upon them of all persons indifferently, with the press ofttimes unnamed, often even fictitious, and what is more grievous still, without the author's name; and also keep for indiscriminate sale books of this kind printed elsewhere; (this Synod) ordains and decrees, that, henceforth, the sacred Scripture, and especially the said old and vulgate edition, be printed in the most correct manner possible; and that it shall not be lawful for any one to print, or cause to be printed, any books whatever, on sacred matters, without the name of the author; nor to sell them in future, or even to keep them, unless they shall have been first examined, and approved of, by the Ordinary; under pain of the anathema and fine imposed in a canon of the last Council of Lateran: and, if they be Regulars, besides this examination and approval, they shall be bound to obtain a license also from their own superiors, who shall have examined the books according to the form of their own statutes.
As to those who lend, or circulate them in manuscript, without their having been first examined, and approved of, they shall be subjected to the same penalties as printers: and they who shall have them in their possession or shall read them, shall, unless they discover the authors, be themselves regarded as the authors. And the said approbation of books of this kind shall be given in writing; and for this end it shall appear authentically at the beginning of the book, whether the book be written, or printed; and all this, that is, both the approbation and the examination, shall be done gratis, that so what ought to be approved, may be approved, and what ought to be condemned, may be condemned.
Besides the above, wishing to repress that temerity, by which the words and sentences of sacred Scripture are turned and [Page 21] twisted to all sorts of profane uses, to wit, to things scurrilous, fabulous, vain, to flatteries, detractions, superstitions, impious and diabolical incantations, sorceries, and defamatory libels; (the Synod) commands and enjoins, for the doing away with this kind of irreverence and contempt, and that no one may hence forth dare in any way to apply the words of sacred Scripture to these and such like purposes; that all men of this description, profaners and violators of the word of God, be by the bishops restrained by the penalties of law, and others of their own appointment.
INDICTION OF THE NEXT SESSION
Likewise, this sacred and holy Synod resolves and decrees, that the next ensuing Session be held and celebrated on the Thursday after the next most sacred festival of Pentecost.
http://history.hanover.edu/texts/trent/ct04.html 2/22/03 9:04 AM
April 8, 1546

SIXTH SESSION ~ JUSTIFICATION BY FAITH ALONE

A Sixth Session Canon on Justification reads, "If anyone says that justifying faith is nothing else than confidence in divine mercy, which remits sins for Christ's sake, or that it is this confidence alone that justifies us, LET HIM BE ANATHEMA" (Canons Concerning Justification, Canon 12)." "If anyone says that the Catholic doctrine of justification as set forth by the holy council in the present decree, derogates in some respect from the glory of God or the merits of our Lord Jesus Christ, and does not rather illustrate the truth of our faith and no less the glory of God and of Christ Jesus, LET HIM BE ANATHEMA" (Canons Concerning Justification, Canon 33)."

SEVENTH SESSION ~ REGENERATIONAL BAPTISM

A Seventh Session Canon on Baptism reads, "If anyone says that baptism is optional, that is, not necessary for salvation, LET HIM BE ANATHEMA" (Canons on Baptism, Canon 5)."

THIRTEENTH SESSION ~ TRANSUBSTANTIATION

The Thirteenth Session on Sacrament reads, "If anyone denies that in the sacrament of the most Holy Eucharist are contained truly, really and substantially the body and blood together with the soul and divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ, and consequently the whole Christ, but says that He is in it only as in a sign, or figure or force, LET HIM BE ANATHEMA" (Canons on the Most Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist, Canon 1)."

FOURTEENTH SESSION ~ PENNANCE

The Fourteenth Session on Penance reads, "If anyone says that in the Catholic Church penance is not truly and properly a sacrament instituted by Christ the Lord for reconciling the faithful of God as often as they fall into sin after baptism, LET HIM BE ANATHEMA" (Canons Concerning the Most Holy Sacrament of Penance, Canon 1)."

"If anyone denies that sacramental confession was instituted by divine law or is necessary to salvation; or says that the manner of confessing secretly to a priest alone, which the Catholic Church has always observed from the beginning and still observes, is at variance with the institution and command of Christ and is a human contrivance, LET HIM BE ANATHEMA" (Canons Concerning the Most Holy Sacrament of Penance, Canon 7).""If anyone says that the confession of all sins as it is observed in the Church is impossible and is a human tradition to be abolished by pious people; or that each and all of the faithful of Christ or either sex are not bound thereto once a year in accordance with the constitution of the great Lateran Council, and that for this reason the faithful of Christ are to be persuaded not to confess during Lent, LET HIM BE ANATHEMA" (Canons Concerning the Most Holy Sacrament of Penance, Canon 8)."

TWENTY-SECOND SESSION

The Twenty-second Session on the Mass reads, "If anyone says that in the mass a true and real sacrifice is not offered to God; or that to be offered is nothing else than that Christ is given to us to eat, LET HIM BE ANATHEMA" (Canons on the Sacrifice of the Mass, Canon 1)."

TWENTY-FIFTH SESSION ~ PURGATORY

The Twenty-fifth Session on Purgatory reads, "Since the Catholic Church, instructed by the Holy Ghost, has, following the sacred writings and the ancient tradition of the Fathers, taught in sacred councils and very recently in this ecumenical council that there is a purgatory, and that the souls there detained are aided by the suffrages of the faithful and chiefly by the acceptable sacrifice of the altar, the holy council commands the bishops that they strive diligently to the end that the sound doctrine of purgatory, transmitted by the Fathers and sacred councils, be believed and maintained by the faithful of Christ, and be everywhere taught and preached."

TWENTY-FIFTH SESSION ON RELICS AND SAINTS

The Twenty-fifth Session on Relics and Saints reads, "The holy council commands all bishops and others who hold the office of teaching and have charge of the cura animarum, that in accordance with the usage of the Catholic and Apostolic Church, received from the primitive times of the Christian religion, and with the unanimous teaching of the holy Fathers and the decrees of sacred councils, they above all instruct the faithful diligently in matters relating to intercession and invocation of the saints, the veneration of relics, and the legitimate use of images, teaching them that the saints who reign together with Christ offer up their prayers to God for men, that it is good and beneficial suppliantly to invoke them and to have recourse to their prayers, assistance and support in order to obtain favors from God through His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, who alone is our redeemer and savior; and that they think impiously who deny that the saints who enjoy eternal happiness in heaven are to be invoked, or who assert that they do not pray for men, or that our invocation of them to pray for each of us individually is idolatry, or that it is opposed to the word of God and inconsistent with the honor of the one mediator of God and men, Jesus Christ, or that it is foolish to pray vocally or mentally to those who reign in heaven." [http://www.wayoflife.org/fbns/trent.htm, Sept. 25, 2002].

COUNCIL OF TRENT PLACES ERASMUS’ BOOKS
ON FORBIDDEN LIST

The 1909 Catholic Encyclopedia quotes a papal legate saying “the poison of Erasmus has much more dangerous than Luther, who by his notorious satirical and insulting letters has injured his own teaching.” The 1995 Encyclopedia of Catholicism however places Erasmus in a much more positive tone “despite influencing the early Reformers, Erasmus himself remained a devout Catholic, opposed the Reformation, and challenged Luther on free will and predestination in On the Freedom of the Will (De Libero Arbitrio, 1524). He attempted unsuccessfully to urge tolerance in an atmosphere of growing religious violence, which led both Protestants and Catholics to accuse him of cowardice. Counter reformers contemporary to him viewed Erasmus as a part of the cause of the Protestant revolt, eventually placing his work on the Index of Forbidden Books.” Modern Roman Catholic apologists quite Erasmus as an ally in trying to win back some of the tens of millions of Catholics who moved their membership into Protestant churches.

ERASMUS’ DEATH
When Erasmus died in 1536 he probably did not realize fully the resource he had been to the Protestant Reformation. Neither did the Roman church who waited more than twenty years after his death to ban his writing.

ERASMUS’ 1519 LETTER TO LUTHER

I will close with Erasmus opening lines of his 1519 letter to Martin Luther “Best Greetings, most beloved brother in Christ. Your letter was most welcome to me, displaying a shrewd wit and breathing a Christian spirit. I could never find words to express what commotions your books have brought about here. They cannot even now eradicate from their minds the most false suspicion that your works were composed with my aid, and that I am the standard bearer of this party, as they call it.”

Erasmus reveals himself guardedly in a very treacherous day “there are persons in England, and they in the highest positions, who think very well of your writings. Here too, there are people ... who favor your followers. As for me I keep myself as far as possible neutral, the better to assist the new flowering of good learning.” Communication seemed to break down between these important reformers after this.

SUMMARY

Erasmus was not a twenty first century man and as such he is difficult to understand. Today everyone is so individualistic. Erasmus allowed himself in the end to be defined by his loyalty to the Roman Catholic Church. This decision made his three great contributions to the reformation contradictions.

1. Erasmus’ emphasis that there only be one meaning to a text was impressive, but in his life Erasmus chose to remain loyal to an authoritarian pope who does not depend on hermeneutical study of Scripture to define truth.

2. Erasmus’ dedication to using only the most ancient sources of Christianity as an authoritative source of truth for theology is impressive, but Erasmus himself decided to remain with a flawed human pope who mediated truth and dictated theology.

3. Erasmus’ teaching that the ancient Greek texts were more authoritative than Jerome’s Vulgate was on the one hand an excellent reform. His Greek text was an enormous improvement in 1516 over Jerome’s Vulgate. But the flawed texts and methods Erasmus permitted himself to use in the production of his Greek New Testament were at odds with his own values as a Reformer.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Bainton, Roland H. Erasmus of Christendom, New York, Scribner, 1969.
Daniel-Rops, Henri, The Protestant Reformation, New York, Doubleday Image Books, 1963, vol. 1-2. Nihil Obstat: Johannes M. T. Burton, S. T. D., L. S. S., Censor Deputatus. Imprimatur: E. Morrogh Bernard, Vic. Gen. Westimonasterii, June 2, 1961.
Erasmus, Desiderius Encyclopedia Britannica, London, 27th ed., vol. 8, 678.
Erickson, Millard, Christian Theology, Grand Rapids, Baker 1996.
Gonzales, Justo The Story of Christianity The Early Church to the Dawn of the Reformation. Vol 1, San Francisco, Harper, 1984, 358.
Gonzales, Justo Erasmus to Laurinus, February 1, 1523, cited, The Story of Christianity The Reformation to the Present Day. Vol. 2, San Francisco, Harper, 1985,13.
Huizing, Johan Erasmus and the Age of the Reformation With a Selection From the Letters of Erasmus, New York, Harper, 1957.
Kaiser, Walter C. Toward an Exegetical Theology, Grand Rapids, Baker, 1981, 60-61.
Kaiser, Walter and Silva, Moises, An Introduction to Biblical Hermenuetics: The Search for Meaning, Grand Rapids, Zondervan, 1994.
Keating, Karl Catholicism & Fundamentalism: The Attack on Romanism by Bible Christians, San Francisco, Ignatius Press, 1988.
Kuykendall, Michael, Handbook For P2141: Tools For Theological Research, Vancouver, Golden Gate Baptist Seminary, 1998.
Luther, Martin. On the Bondage of the Will, J.I. Packer, O. R. Johnson, trans. Revell, Fleming H. Co. 1991. Can be read online at http://www.reformedreader.org/bow.htm, 3-16-01.
McBrien, Richard P. Catholicism: Study Edition, San Francisco, Harper Row, 1981.
McCarthy, James G. The Gospel According to Rome: Comparing Catholic Tradition and the Word of God, Eugene Oregon, Harvest House, 1995.
Metzger, Bruce M. The Text of the New Testament: It’s Transmission, Corruption and Restoration, New York, Oxford University, 1968, 72, 75-76.
Meyers, W. David Desiderius Erasmus, Encyclopedia of Catholicism, San Fransico, Harper, 1995.
Olin, John C. Christian Humanism and the Reformation Desiderius Erasmus Selected Writings and Letters, New York, Harper, 1965.
Orr, James, The International Standard, Bible Encyclopedia, Grand Rapids, Eerdmans, 1984.
Rhenanus, Beatus. The Life of Erasmus, New York, Harper, 1965.
Romain, Philip St. Catholic Answers to Fundamentalists’ Questions, Liguori MI, Liguori Publications, 1984.
Sauer, Joseph Desiderius Erasmus, The Catholic Encyclopedia, New York, Appleton Co. 1909.
Thompson, Craig R. Ten Colloquies Erasmus, Indianapolis, Bobbs Merrill Co. 1957, xvii
Walton, Robert C. Chronological and Background Charts of Church History, Grand Rapids, MI Zondervan, 1986, 31

MARTIN LUTHER TO NICOLAS ARMSDOFF
CONCERNING ERASMUS OF ROTTERDAM

Grace and peace in Christ.
I THANK you, my excellent friend, that you give me so candidly your opinion on my book. I care not at all that the Papists are offended: I did not write on their account, for they are not worth my writing or speaking in Consideration of them any more. God has given them up to a reprobate mind; so that they even fight against that, which they know to be the truth.
My cause was heard at Augsberg, before the emperor Charles, and the whole world, and found to be irreprehensible, and to contain sound doctrine. Moreover, my Confession and Apology are made public, and set in the open light throughout the world. By these, I have answered an infinity of my adversaries' books, and all the lies of the Papists past, present and to come!
I have confessed Christ before this wicked and adulterous generation, and I doubt not but that He will also confess me before His Father, and the holy angels. My light is set on a candlestick! - Let him that seeth it, see it more clearly still; let him that is blind, be blinder still; let him that is just, be juster still; let him that is filthy, be filthier still; - their blood be upon themselves; - I am clean from their blood! I have declared to the unrighteous his unrighteousness, and he will not be converted; - let him therefore die in his sins; - I have saved my own soul! There is no need, therefore, that I should write, or care to write on their account, any farther. And as to your advice, that that grammarian or vocabularian whom you call the Erasmian plagiary should be held in contempt, and that Erasmus himself should rather be answered: know, that I have held him in sufficient contempt already: for I have not read one page of his writings. Jonas answered him once, although I was much against his doing it; and advised him, according to your opinion, to hold him in contempt. For I know the man well, from his skin to his heart, that he is not worthy of being spoken to, or dealt with, by any good man; such a hypocrite is he, and so full of reprobate envy and malevolence.
Moreover, you know my usual way of over throwing writers of this stamp - by holding them in silent contempt. For how many books of Eccius, Faber, Emser, Cochles, and many others, who seemed to be as mountains in labour, and about to bring forth I know not what wonders, have I myself, by my silence only, so utterly brought to nothing that no memory of them is left. Cato calls such pettifoggers, and allows all their pratings to pass by unnoticed: whereas, if he had at all considered them worthy of being noticed and answered, they might have procured to themselves a lasting fame. And there is a trite, but true proverb, -
Full well I know, that if with dung embroiled, Conqu'or or conquer'd, still I am besoiled. But here is my glorying. - Whatever could be brought against me from the Scriptures and from the fathers, has been produced and published: and now, all the glorying they have left, is in slanders, lies, and calumnies. And why should I envy them that, when they have no power or desire whatever to be renowned for any other virtues!
Your judgment of Erasmus I much admire: wherein you say plainly, that he has no other basis wherein to build his doctrine but the favour of men; and attribute to him, moreover, ignorance and malice. And if you could but convey this judgment of yours with conviction to the minds of men in general, you would in truth, like another stripling David, by this one blow, lay our boasting Goliath prostrate, and at the same time, eradicate the whole of his sect. For what is more vain, more fallacious, in all things, than the applause of men, especially in things spiritual! For, as the Psalms testify, "There is no help in them:" again, "All men are liars." If therefore Erasmus be nothing but vanity, and rest alone on vanity and a lie, what need is there to reply to him at all? He himself, together with all his vanity, will at length vanish like smoke, if we but treat him as I have treated those former scare-crows and pettifoggers, whom, by my silence only, I have committed to utter oblivion.
I at one time attributed to him a singular kind of inconsistency and vain-talking, for he seemed to treat on sacred and serious things with the greatest unconcern; and on the contrary, to pursue baubles, vanities, and things laughable and ridiculous with the utmost avidity; though an old man, and a theologian; and that, in an age, the most industrious and laborious. So that I really thought, that what I had heard many men of wisdom and gravity say, was true - that Erasmus was actually mad.
When I first wrote against his Diatribe, and was compelled to weigh his words, (as John says "try the Spirits,") being disgusted at his inconsiderateness in a subject of so much importance; in order that I might rouse up the cold and doltish disputer, I goaded him as if in a snoring sleep; calling him a disciple, at one time, of Epicurus, at another, of Lucian, and then again, declaring him to be of the opinion of the sceptics; supposing, that by these means he might, perhaps, be roused up to enter upon the subject with more feeling. But all was in vain. I only irritated the viper, so as to cause him at last to give birth to hisVIPERASPIS, an offspring worthy of, and exactly like, its parent. But however, he proudly omitted to say one single word to the subject point. So that, from that time, I have despaired of his theology altogether.
Now, however, I am quite of your opinion, that it was not inconsiderateness in him, but as you say, real ignorance and malice. For he was unacquainted with our doctrines, or the doctrines of Christianity; he knew them, but from policy would not know them. And though he may not understand, nor indeed can understand, those doctrines which are peculiar to our fraternity, and which we maintain against the synagogue of the Pope, yet he cannot be ignorant of those which are held in common by us and the church under the Pope; because, he writes on these very largely, or rather, laughs at them. - Such as, the Trinity of the Divine Persons, the Divinity and humanity of Christ, sin, the redemption of the human race, the resurrection of the dead, eternal life, and the like: he knows, I say, that these things are taught and believed even by many ungodly and false Christians. But the truth is, he hates all the doctrines together. Nay, there can be no doubt in the mind of a true believer, who has the Spirit in his nostrils, that his mind is alienated from, and utterly hates all religion together; and especially, the religion of Christ. Many proofs of this are scattered here and there. And it will come to pass by and by, that alike the mole, he will throw up some dirt, that will shew where and what he is, and prove his own destruction.
He published lately, among his other works, his CATECHISM, a production evidently of Satanic subtlety. For, with a purpose full of craft, he designs to take children and youths at the outset, and to infect them with his poisons, that they might not afterwards be eradicated from them; just as he himself, in Italy and at Rome, so sucked in his doctrines of sorcerers and of devils that now all remedy is too late. But who would bear with this method of bringing up children, or the weak in faith, which Erasmus proposes to us? The tender and unexperienced mind is to be formed at first by certain, plain, and necessary principles, which it may firmly believe. Because, it is necessary that every one who would learn, should believe: for what will he ever learn, who either doubts himself, or is taught to doubt?
But this new chatechist of ours, aims only at rendering his catechumens, and the doctrines of faith, suspicious. For at the very outset, laying aside all solid foundation, he does nothing but set before them those heresies and offences of opinions, by which the Church has been troubled from the beginning. So that in fact, he would make it appear, that there has been nothing certain in the Christian religion. And if an unexperienced mind be from the very beginning poisoned by principles and questions of this kind, what else can it be expected to think of or do, but, either to withdraw itself secretly from, or, if it dare, to hold the Christian religion in utter detestation, as a pest to mankind?
He imagines however, all the while, that no one will discover the craft of this design. As though we had not in the Scriptures numberless examples of these bug-bears of the devil. It was thus the serpent dealt with Eve. He first entangled her in doubts, and brought her to suspect the reality of the precept of God concerning the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and when he had brought her to a stand-still of doubt, overthrew and destroyed her. - Unless Erasmus considers this to be a mere fable also!
It is with the same serpent-like attack that he creeps upon, and deceives, simple souls; saying - 'How is it, that there have been so many sects and errors in this one true religion, (as it is believed to be?) How is it, that there have been so many creeds? Why, in the Apostles' Creed, is the Father called God, the Son not God, but Lord, and the Spirit neither God nor Lord, but Holy?' And so on. - Who I would ask troubles unexperienced souls, whom he undertakes to instruct, with questions like these, but the devil himself? Who would dare to speak thus upon a creed of faith, but the very mouth and instrument of the devil? - Here you have the Plot, the Execution, and the catastrophic End, of a soul-murdering tragedy!
But behold, I am here almost carried into a refutation of his catechism; whereas, I merely intended to shew you, why I thought it better not to answer this viper at all:- because, he will most effectually refute himself in the minds of all godly and good men.
The like game also he played on the apostle Paul, in his preface to the Romans; (to say nothing about his paraphrases, or his mad vagaries [paraphroneses,] to use his own term;) where he speaks of the praises of Paul in that way, that no simple reader whatever who is unacquainted with rhetoric, could be more effectually drawn away, and beaten off, from reading and studying Paul: so confused, intricate, self-contradictory, diverse, and disgusting, does he represent him to be: so that, the reader must of necessity believe the epistle to be the production of some mad man: so far is it from possibility, that he should consider it to be profitable.
And among the rest of his sharp-razor cuts, he could not receive, without venting his spleen, even this:- 'that Peter should call Christ Man, and say nothing of His Godhead.' - A notable annotation truly! And most appropriately applicable to the passage!
And then as to his METHOD,with all its twistings and windings, what is it but a holding up Christ, and every thing done by Him, to derision? Who could gather any thing from this Method but a disgust at, nay a hatred of, attending to a religion so confused and perplexed, and perhaps after all, merely fabulous? Who, moreover, ever spoke in so much disdain and contempt (not to say enmity) of the apostle and evangelist John, who, among Christians is held to be of the highest authority after Christ? - 'He merely scolds little children except it be when he considers a man to be a dolt or a logger-head.' - Christians ever speak of the Apostles with reverence and fear: whereas, this fellow would teach us to speak of them with profane pride and contempt. And this is the first step towards speaking profanely of God Himself, whose the Apostles are. Nay, it is the same as saying in contempt of the Holy Spirit, (whose the words of the Apostles are,) that He merely scolds little children!
Numberless things of this kind are to be found in Erasmus; or rather, this is his whole character in theology. And this many others have observed before me, and still do observe daily more and more:
nor does he cease to go on and to publish daily his annotations more and more grossly, for his "judgment now for a long time lingereth not," and his "damnation slumbereth not."
This is also a notable instance of the piety of Erasmus! - In his letter upon 'Christian philosophy,' which is published with his New Testament, and used in common throughout all the churches, when he had propounded the question, - 'Why Christ, so great a teacher, descended from heaven, when there are many things taught even among the heathens which are precisely the same, if not more perfect;' - he answers, 'Christ came (which I doubt not but he believed most Erasmianly) from heaven, that He might exemplify those things more perfectly and more fully than any of the saints before Him!' Thus, this miserable renewer of all things, Christ , (for so He reproaches the Lord of glory) has lost the glory of a Redeemer, and becomes only one more holy than others. - This sentiment could not be expressed in ignorance, but must have been designed and willful; because, even those who do not truly believe, know, and every where confess, that Christ descended from heaven to redeem us men from sin and death.
This was the sentiment that first alienated my mind from Erasmus. From that moment, I began to suspect him of being a plain Democritus or Epicurus, and a crafty derider of Christ: for he every where intimates to his fellow Epicureans, his hatred against Christ: though he does it in words so figurative and insidious, that he leaves himself a clue for raging most furiously against those Christians, who, from being offended at his suspicious and double meaning words, will not interpret them as standing in favour of their Christ. - As though Erasmus himself had an all-free prerogative throughout the world, of speaking on divine things with obliquity and craft, and had all men so under his thumb, that they must interpret all his obliquities and crafty manoeuvres, as having an upright and honest intent!
Why does he not rather speak openly and plainly? Why does he always deal in these crafty and ensnaring figures of speech? So great a rhetorician and theologian ought not only to know, but to act according to, that which Fabius says, 'An ambiguous word should be avoided as a rock.' Where it happens now and then inadvertently, it may be pardoned: but where it is sought for designedly and purposely, it deserves no pardon whatever, but justly merits the abhorrence of every one. For to what does this hateful double-tongued way of speaking tend? It only furnishes an opportunityof disseminating and fostering in safety the seeds of every heresy, under the cover of words and letters that have a shew of Christian faith. And thus, while religion is believed to be taught and defended, it is, in reality, utterly destroyed, and subverted from its foundation before it is understood.
Wherefore, all are perfectly in the right who interpret his suspicions and insidious words against himself. Nor is any notice to be taken of him when he cries out calumny! calumny! because his words are not fairly and candidly interpreted. Why does he himself ever avoid fair words, and designedly express himself in those which are unfair? For it is an unheard-of kind of tyranny to wish to have the whole human race so under his thumb, that they should be compelled to understand fairly what he says insidiously and dangerously, and thus cede to him the prerogative of expressing himself insidiously. No! Let him rather be reduced to order, and commanded to bow to the whole human race; that is, by abstaining from that profane and double-tongued vertibility of speech and vain-talking, and by avoiding, as Paul saith, "profane and vain babblings." For this it was, that even the public laws of the Roman empire condemned this manner of speaking, and punished it thus. - They commanded, 'that the words of him who should speak obscurely, when he could speak more plainly, should be interpreted against himself.' And Christ also, condemned that wicked servant who excused himself by an evasion; and interpreting his own words against himself, said, "Out of thine own mouth will I judge thee, thou wicked servant." For if in religion, in laws, and in all weighty matters, we should be allowed to express ourselves ambiguously and insidiously, what could follow but that utter confusion of Babel, where no one could understand another! This would be, to learn the language of eloquence, and in so doing, to lose the language of nature!
Moreover, if this licence should prevail, I might 'conveniently' interpret all that the whole herd of heretics ever said, nay all that the devil himself ever did or said, or could say or do, to all eternity:Where then would be the power of refuting the heretics and the devil? Where would be that wisdom of the Lord Christ, which all the adversaries shall not be able to resist? What would become of logic, the instructor of teaching rightly? What would become of rhetoric, the faculty of persuading? Nothing would be taught, nothing would be learned, no persuasion could be carried home, no consolation would be given, no fear would be wrought: because, nothing would be spoken or heard that was certain.
When, therefore, Erasmus lightly and ridiculously says of John the Evangelist, 'that he merely scolds babes,' he is to be adjudged immediately a disciple of Epicurus or Democritus, and to be addressed thus - Learn to speak of Majesty with more reverence. Some noted jesters have, indeed, sometimes spoken of princes thus irreverently, and fool-like, but not always with impunity. But if any one else of a sound mind and judgment had done the same, he might, perhaps, have lost his head, for the crime of insulted majesty. Thus, when Erasmus says, 'Peter addresses Christ as Man, and says nothing of His Divinity,' he is to be condemned of Arianism and heresy: because, he could have omitted this insidious observation altogether, in a matter where the divine Majesty is eminently concerned, or have spoken more reverently: for the words plainly imply, that the Arians do not like that Christ should be called God, but consider it better that He should be called man only. And how conveniently soever they may be interpreted in favour of the Divinity of Christ; yet, as they stand and are read according to their plain meaning, especially since their author is suspicious, they offend Christian minds: because, they have not one plain meaning, and may be more easily understood to favour the Arians, than the orthodox.
Hence Jerome, writing of the Arians of his time who taught in the same artful way, says, 'Their priests say one thing, and their people understand another.' In like manner, there was no necessity for observing to Christians on that passage, that Peter did not call Christ, God; though in truth he did not omit to call Christ, God. Nor is it enough to pretend, 'that he called Him man only, on account of the common multitude:' for though he did call Him Man, yet, he did not therefore omit to call Him God, except that he did not pronounce these three letters, GOD:but this Erasmus rigidly deems was necessary: by so doing, however, he does nothing here, as well as in every other place, but lay snares, without any cause whatever, to entrap the inexperienced, and to render our religion suspicious.
That Carpisian, whoever he was, justly condemns him as a favourer of the Arians in his preface to Hilary, where he has said, 'We dare to call the Holy Spirit, God, which the ancients did not dare to do.' And when, having been faithfully admonished, he ought to have acknowledged his high-flown figures of speech, and his Arianisms, and to have corrected them, he not only did not do that, but even inveighed against the admonition, as a calumny proceeding from Satan, and laughed at the Divinity twofold more than ever - such a confidence has he in his pliability of speech, and his circumlocutive evasions. Nevertheless, he very seriously confesses the Trinity, and would not by any means whatever be thought to deny the Trinity of the God-head, but only wishes to say, that the curiosity (which he afterwards requests will be 'conveniently interpreted' diligence) of the moderns, has received and dared many things from the Scriptures which the ancients dared not. - As though the Christian religion rested on the authority of men: (for this is what he would persuade us to.) And what is this, but considering all religion together to be a mere fable! Here, although the Carpisian be in many things of no weight whatever, and ever an enemy to Luther, yet Erasmus, from an unheard-of pride, thinks all men together to be mere stocks and stones; who neither understand any subject, nor see through the meaning of any words. Read that observation of his, and say, if you do not discover the incarnate devil! This observation fixes in me a determination (let others do as they please) not to believe Erasmus, even if he should openly confess in plain words, - that Christ is God. But I would address to him that sophistical saying of Chrysippus, 'If you lie, you lie even when you speak the truth.' For what need was there, if he in verity believed that the Holy Spirit is God, to say, 'We dare to call the Holy Spirit, God, which the ancients did not dare to do?' What need was there to use this vertible word 'dare,' that it might apply both to the praise and dispraise of these same moderns, when we received this doctrine from the ancients, and did not 'dare' to receive it first?
But however, it is a stark lie, to say, that the ancients did not first 'dare' to call the Holy Spirit, God:- unless by ancients, according to one of his very beautiful figures of speech, he means Democritus and Epicurus: or unless, he means God, materially, that is, these three letters, GOD! But to what purpose is all this hateful manoeuvering, but to make of a gnat an elephant, as a stumbling-block to the unexperienced, and to intimate, that the Christian religion is a nothing it all! and that, for no other reason, than because these three Letters, GOD, are not written in every place, where he considers they ought to have been written!
In the same manner his fathers, the Arians, made numberless quibbles, because these letters HOMOUSIOS, and INNASCIBILIS, were not found in the Sacred Writings: considering it nothing to the purpose, that the same thing could be solidly proved in substance. And where the name God was written, they were ready with their gloss to elude the truth, by contending, that it did not mean God in reality, but God by appellation. So that, you can do nothing with these vipers, whether you speak to them by the Scriptures, or without the Scriptures. This is the way of the malice of Satan. When he cannot deny the fact, he turns to demanding certain particular terms, which he himself prescribes. And thus the devil himself may say, even to Christ - Although Thou speakest the truth, yet since Thou dost not speak it in the terms which I think requisite, Thou sayest nothing at all: and I wish the truth to be spoken in no words whatever. - This is like Marcolfus, who wished to be hung upon a tree chosen by himself, and yet wished to choose no tree at all. But of this elsewhere, if the Lord shall give me leisure, and length of life. For it is my determination to leave behind me my true and faithful testimony concerning Erasmus: and thus, to expose Luther to be bitten and stung by these vipers, but not to be utterly torn in pieces and destroyed! -
I now return to my observation upon my libertywhich I have asserted; giving it as my sentiments, that the tyranny of Erasmus which he would exercise by means of circumlocutive evasions, is not to be borne, but that he is to be judged openly, out of his own mouth. Where he speaks as an Arian, let him be judged an Arian; where he speaks as a Lucian, let him be judged a Lucian; where he speaks as a Gentile, let him be judged a Gentile; unless he repent and cease to defend such ways of expressing himself.
For instance. In one of his epistles on the Incarnation of the Son of God, he uses a most abominable term, calling it 'the intercourse of God with the Virgin' - here he is to be judged, a horrible blasphemer of God and the Virgin! Nor does it make him at all better, his afterwards expounding 'intercourse' as applying to the form of the Christian doctrine. Why did he not speak of the form of Christian doctrine? For he well knew, that by this word, 'intercourse,' Christians could not but be greatly offended - and let him be judged ungodly who would not be offended at a term so abominably obscene in a matter so sacred: knowing that, an ambiguous expression of such a nature, is always taken in its worst sense, even though we benot ignorant, that the term may have another meaning. If it take place from inadvertency, it may be pardoned: if from design and willfulness, it is to be condemned, as I said, without mercy. For to hold a doctrine of faith is arduous, and a divine work, even when delivered in proper, evident, and certain words. How then shall it be held, if it be delivered in ambiguous, doubtful, and oblique words!
St. Augustine says, 'philosophers ought to speak freely on difficult points, fearing no offence: but we (says he) must speak to a certain rule.' And therefore, he blames the use of the term fortune, or fate, both in himself and others. For even though the person may by fortune mean the divine mind, the agent of all things, from which nature is known to be distinctly different, and thus may not think impiously, yet, says he, 'Let him hold his sentiment, but correct his expression.
And even to suppose that Augustine did not say this, and never had any certain rule according to which he expressed himself, yet nature will tell us, that every profession, sacred as well as profane, uses certain terms of its own, and avoids all ambiguities. For even common tradesmen, either reprove or condemn, or hold up to ridicule, the man who speaks of his own trade in the technical terms (as they are called) peculiar to the trade of another. With how much greater force will this apply to things sacred, where certain salvation, or eternal perdition is the consequence, and where all must be taught in certain and proper terms! Let us, if we must do it, trifle with ambiguities in other things that are of no moment, as nuts, apples, pence, and other things which are the toys of children and of fools: but in religion, and weighty matters of state, let us shun, with all possible care, an ambiguity, as we would shun death or the devil!
Our king of ambiguity, however, sits upon his ambiguous throne in security, and destroys us stupid Christians with a double destruction. First, it is his will, and it is a great pleasure to him, to offend us by his ambiguous words: and indeed he would not like it, if we stupid blocks were not offended. And next, when he sees that we are offended, and have run against his insidious figures of speech, and begin to exclaim against him, he then begins to triumph and rejoice that the desired prey has been caught in his snares. For now, having found an opportunity of displaying his rhetoric, he rushes upon us with all his powers and all his noise, tearing us, flogging us, crucifying us, and sending us farther than hell itself; saying, that we have understood his words calumniously, virulently, satanically; (using the worst terms he can find;) whereas, he never meant them to be so understood.
In the exercise of this wonderful tyranny, (and who would think that this Madam ambiguity could make so much ado, or who could suppose that any one would be so great a madman as to have so much confidence in a vain figure of speech?) he not only compels us to put up with his all-free prerogative of using ambiguities, but binds us down to the necessity of keeping silence. He plainly designs all the while, and wishes us to be offended, that he, and his herd of Epicureans with him, may have a laugh at us as fools: but on the other hand, he does not like to hear that we are offended, lest it should appear that we are true Christians. Thus must we suffer wounds without number, and yet, not utter a groan or a sigh!
We Christians, however, who are to judge, not meats and drinks only, but angels and the whole world, and who actually judge, even now, not only do not bear with this tyranny of ambiguities, but on the contrary, oppose to it our liberty of pronouncing a two-fold condemnation. The first is, as I have already observed, we condemn all the ambiguous expressions of Erasmus, and interpret them against himself: as Christ saith, "Out of thine own mouth will I judge thee, thou wicked servant." Again, "By thine own words shalt thou be condemned: for wherefore hast thou spoken against thine own soul?" "Thy blood be upon thine own head." The second condemnation is, we condemn and curse again and again his glosses and 'convenient interpretations,' by which, he not only does not correct his ungodly expressions, but even defends them: that is, he laughs at us twice as much in his after interpretations, as he does in his first expressions.
For example: He says, that by 'the intercourse of God with the Virgin' he does not mean a common intercourse, but another kind of marriage between God and the Virgin, where the angel Gabriel is the bridegroom, and the Holy Spirit performs the act of consummation. Only observe what this fellow, by his interpretation, would have us to hear and understand Christ to be. And he says these things, that he might defend the filthiness and obscenity of his expression in the face of offended Christians, and laugh at them all the while; and thus, he forces upon us this offensive term, when he knows very well, that this mystery of the most holy Incarnation, cannot be explained to the mind of man by all the obscene and ambiguous words of the whole world: but how it is understood by the Epicureans, I dare not, for horror, imagine. Why do we not call the conversation of God with Moses and the other prophets, 'intercourse' also, and make the angels bridegrooms, and the Holy Spirit the consummator of the act, or make of it something still more obscene? Moreover, here is the impious idea of sex introduced, to perfect this monstrous derision of saying, that God had 'intercourse with the Virgin;' - in order that, the whole might be made a fable, like that wherein Mars is said to have had intercourse with Rhea, and Jupiter with Semele; and that Christianity might be reduced to a level with one of the fabulous stories of old, and men represented as fools and pitiable madmen for believing such a story to be serious and true, not considering what turpitudes and obscenities were the objects of their faith and worship! And therefore, Christians, that stupid set of creatures, were to be admonished by means of figures like these, to begin to doubt, and then, from doubting to depart from the faith; that thus, religion might be utterly destroyed before any one could be aware of it.
This is the verification of that parable, Matt. xiii. where the enemy is represented as sowing tares in the night, and going his way. Thus, we Christians are sleeping in security: and even if we were not sleeping, those bewitching Syrens, by their honey of speech, would soon lull us to sleep, and bring a cloud of night over our eyes. In the meantime, are sown those tares of figurative and insidious words: and yet when Sacramentarians, Donatists, Arians, Anabaptists, Epicureans, &c. are sprung up, we ask - How is it that our Lord's field hath tares? They, however, who have sown them, are gone away; that is, they so paint and set themselves off by their 'convenient interpretations,' and withdraw themselves from sight, that they seem as if they had sown nothing but wheat. Thus the enemy slides away, and is off in safety, and crowned with honour and applause, and appears to be a friend, when he is in truth the greatest of enemies. This is the way with the strange woman, Prov. xxx. who, "when she has eaten, wipeth her mouth, and saith, I have done no wickedness!"
Thus have I replied to your letter, my friend Armsdorff, though perhaps I have been too long and tedious. But I wished to shew you, why I judged it best not to answer Erasmus any farther. I am moreover abundantly engaged in teaching, confirming, correcting, and governing my flock. And my work of translating the Bible, alone requires the devotion of my whole time: from which work, Satan with all his might endeavours to withdraw me, as he has done upon former occasions; that be might get me to leave the best things, to follow after those which are nothing but vain and empty vapours. For my Bondage of the Will proves to you how difficult a task it is to cope with that proteus Erasmus, on account of his vertibility and slipperiness of speech; in which alone is all his confidence. He never remains in one position, but, with the deepest craft, evades every blow, and is like an irritated hornet.
Whereas, miserable I, am compelled to stand my ground in one position, and that upon unequal ground, as "a sign to be spoken against." For whatever Luther writes, is condemned before ten years are at an end. Luther is the only one who writes from envy, from pride, from bitterness, and in a word, at the instigation of Satan himself; but all who write against him, write under the influence of the Holy Spirit!
Before my time, it required a great to-do, and an enormous expense, to canonize a dead monk. But now, there is no easier way for canonizing even living Neroes and Caligulas, than the declaration of hatred against Luther. Only let a man hate and bravely curse Luther, and that, immediately, makes him a saint, equal almost to our holy Lord, the servant of the servants of God. But who could ever believe that hatred against Luther would be attended with so much power and advantage? It fills the coffers of very beggars; nay, it introduces obscure moles and bats to the favour of princes and of kings; it procures prebendaries and dignities; it procures bishoprics; it procures the reputation of wisdom and of learning to the most consummate asses; it procures to petty teachers of grammar, the authority of writing books; nay, it procures the crown of victory and of glory, eternal in the heavens! Nay, happy are all who hate Luther, for they obtain, by that one vile and easy service, those great and mighty things, which none of the most excellent of men could ever obtain with all their wisdom and their virtues; no, not even Christ himself, with all His own miracles, and the miracles of His apostles and all His saints!
Thus are the Scriptures fulfilled. - Blessed are ye who persecute Luther, for yours is the kingdom of heaven! Blessed are ye who curse and say all manner of evil against Luther; rejoice and be exceeding glad in that day, for great is your reward in heaven; for so persecuted they the apostles, the holy bishops, John Huss, and others who were before Luther! - Wherefore, I feel more and more persuaded, that I shall act rightly by answering Erasmus no farther: but I will leave my testimony concerning him, even for his own sake, that he might hereafter be unburdened from that concern which, as he complains, is completely death to him: viz., that he is commonly called a Lutheran. But, as Christ liveth, they do him a great injury who call him a Lutheran, and I will defend him against his enemies for I can bear a true and faithful testimony, that he is no Lutheran, but Erasmus himself!
And if I could have my will, Erasmus should be exploded from our schools altogether: for if he be not pernicious, he is certainly useless: because he, in truth, discusses and teaches nothing. Nor is it at all advisable to accustom Christian youth to the diction of Erasmus: for they will learn to speak and think of nothing with gravity and seriousness, but only to laugh at all men as babblers and vain-talkers. In a word, they will learn nothing, but to play the fool! And from this levity and vanity they will, by, degrees, grow tired of religion, till at last they will abhor and profane it! Let him be left to the Papists only, who are worthy of such an apostle, and whose lips relish his dainties!
May our Lord Jesus Christ, whom, according to my faith, Peter did not omit to call GOD; by whose power I know, and am persuaded, that I have often been delivered from death, and by faith in whom I have undertaken and hitherto accomplished all these things which excite the wonder even of my enemies; may this same Jesus guard and deliver us unto the end - for He is the Lord our God! - To whom alone, with the Father and the Holy Spirit, be glory for ever and ever! Amen!
http://www.covenanter.org/Luther/Bondage/bowarmsd.htm 9/13/02 8:03 PM

MARTIN LUTHER'S JUDGMENT
OF ERASMUS OF ROTTERDAM

TO A CERTAIN FRIEND

MARTIN LUTHER TO NICOLAS ARMSDOFF

CONCERNING

ERASMUS OF ROTTERDAM

Grace and peace in Christ
I THANK you, my excellent friend, that you give me so candidly your opinion on my book. I care not at all that the Papists are offended: I did not write on their account, for they are not worth my writing or speaking in Consideration of them any more. God has given them up to a reprobate mind; so that they even fight against that, which they know to be the truth.
My cause was heard at Augsberg, before the emperor Charles, and the whole world, and found to be irreprehensible, and to contain sound doctrine. Moreover, my Confession and Apology are made public, and set in the open light throughout the world. By these, I have answered an infinity of my adversaries' books, and all the lies of the Papists past, present and to come!
I have confessed Christ before this wicked and adulterous generation, and I doubt not but that He will also confess me before His Father, and the holy angels. My light is set on a candlestick! - Let him that seeth it, see it more clearly still; let him that is blind, be blinder still; let him that is just, be juster still; let him that is filthy, be filthier still; - their blood be upon themselves; - I am clean from their blood! I have declared to the unrighteous his unrighteousness, and he will not be converted; - let him therefore die in his sins; - I have saved my own soul! There is no need, therefore, that I should write, or care to write on their account, any farther.
And as to your advice, that that grammarian or vocabularian whom you call the Erasmian plagiary should be held in contempt, and that Erasmus himself should rather be answered: know, that I have held him in sufficient contempt already: for I have not read one page of his writings. Jonas answered him once, although I was much against his doing it; and advised him, according to your opinion, to hold him in contempt. For I know the man well, from his skin to his heart, that he is not worthy of being spoken to, or dealt with, by any good man; such a hypocrite is he, and so full of reprobate envy and malevolence.
Moreover, you know my usual way of over throwing writers of this stamp - by holding them in silent contempt. For how many books of Eccius, Faber, Emser, Cochles, and many others, who seemed to be as mountains in labour, and about to bring forth I know not what wonders, have I myself, by my silence only, so utterly brought to nothing that no memory of them is left. Cato calls such pettifoggers, and allows all their pratings to pass by unnoticed: whereas, if he had at all considered them worthy of being noticed and answered, they might have procured to themselves a lasting fame. And there is a trite, but true proverb, -
Full well I know, that if with dung embroiled, Conqu'or or conquer'd, still I am besoiled.
But here is my glorying. - Whatever could be brought against me from the Scriptures and from the fathers, has been produced and published: and now, all the glorying they have left, is in slanders, lies, and calumnies. And why should I envy them that, when they have no power or desire whatever to be renowned for any other virtues!
Your judgment of Erasmus I much admire: wherein you say plainly, that he has no other basis wherein to build his doctrine but the favour of men; and attribute to him, moreover, ignorance and malice. And if you could but convey this judgment of yours with conviction to the minds of men in general, you would in truth, like another stripling David, by this one blow, lay our boasting Goliath prostrate, and at the same time, eradicate the whole of his sect. For what is more vain, more fallacious, in all things, than the applause of men, especially in things spiritual! For, as the Psalms testify, "There is no help in them:" again, "All men are liars." If therefore Erasmus be nothing but vanity, and rest alone on vanity and a lie, what need is there to reply to him at all? He himself, together with all his vanity, will at length vanish like smoke, if we but treat him as I have treated those former scare-crows and pettifoggers, whom, by my silence only, I have committed to utter oblivion.
I at one time attributed to him a singular kind of inconsistency and vain-talking, for he seemed to treat on sacred and serious things with the greatest unconcern; and on the contrary, to pursue baubles, vanities, and things laughable and ridiculous with the utmost avidity; though an old man, and a theologian; and that, in an age, the most industrious and laborious. So that I really thought, that what I had heard many men of wisdom and gravity say, was true - that Erasmus was actually mad.
When I first wrote against his Diatribe, and was compelled to weigh his words, (as John says "try the Spirits,") being disgusted at his inconsiderateness in a subject of so much importance; in order that I might rouse up the cold and doltish disputer, I goaded him as if in a snoring sleep; calling him a disciple, at one time, of Epicurus, at another, of Lucian, and then again, declaring him to be of the opinion of the sceptics; supposing, that by these means he might, perhaps, be roused up to enter upon the subject with more feeling. But all was in vain. I only irritated the viper, so as to cause him at last to give birth to hisVIPERASPIS, an offspring worthy of, and exactly like, its parent. But however, he proudly omitted to say one single word to the subject point. So that, from that time, I have despaired of his theology altogether.
Now, however, I am quite of your opinion, that it was not inconsiderateness in him, but as you say, real ignorance and malice. For he was unacquainted with our doctrines, or the doctrines of Christianity; he knew them, but from policy would not know them. And though he may not understand, nor indeed can understand, those doctrines which are peculiar to our fraternity, and which we maintain against the synagogue of the Pope, yet he cannot be ignorant of those which are held in common by us and the church under the Pope; because, he writes on these very largely, or rather, laughs at them. - Such as, the Trinity of the Divine Persons, the Divinity and humanity of Christ, sin, the redemption of the human race, the resurrection of the dead, eternal life, and the like: he knows, I say, that these things are taught and believed even by many ungodly and false Christians. But the truth is, he hates all the doctrines together. Nay, there can be no doubt in the mind of a true believer, who has the Spirit in his nostrils, that his mind is alienated from, and utterly hates all religion together; and especially, the religion of Christ. Many proofs of this are scattered here and there. And it will come to pass by and by, that alike the mole, he will throw up some dirt, that will shew where and what he is, and prove his own destruction.
He published lately, among his other works, hisCATECHISM, a production evidently of Satanic subtlety. For, with a purpose full of craft, he designs to take children and youths at the outset, and to infect them with his poisons, that they might not afterwards be eradicated from them; just as he himself, in Italy and at Rome, so sucked in his doctrines of sorcerers and of devils that now all remedy is too late. But who would bear with this method of bringing up children, or the weak in faith, which Erasmus proposes to us? The tender and unexperienced mind is to be formed at first by certain, plain, and necessary principles, which it may firmly believe. Because, it is necessary that every one who would learn, should believe: for what will he ever learn, who either doubts himself, or is taught to doubt?
But this new chatechist of ours, aims only at rendering his catechumens, and the doctrines of faith, suspicious. For at the very outset, laying aside all solid foundation, he does nothing but set before them those heresies and offences of opinions, by which the Church has been troubled from the beginning. So that in fact, he would make it appear, that there has been nothing certain in the Christian religion. And if an unexperienced mind be from the very beginning poisoned by principles and questions of this kind, what else can it be expected to think of or do, but, either to withdraw itself secretly from, or, if it dare, to hold the Christian religion in utter detestation, as a pest to mankind?
He imagines however, all the while, that no one will discover the craft of this design. As though we had not in the Scriptures numberless examples of these bug-bears of the devil. It was thus the serpent dealt with Eve. He first entangled her in doubts, and brought her to suspect the reality of the precept of God concerning the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and when he had brought her to a stand-still of doubt, overthrew and destroyed her. - Unless Erasmus considers this to be a mere fable also!
It is with the same serpent-like attack that he creeps upon, and deceives, simple souls; saying - 'How is it, that there have been so many sects and errors in this one true religion, (as it is believed to be?) How is it, that there have been so many creeds? Why, in the Apostles' Creed, is the Father called God, the Son not God, but Lord, and the Spirit neither God nor Lord, but Holy?' And so on. - Who I would ask troubles unexperienced souls, whom he undertakes to instruct, with questions like these, but the devil himself? Who would dare to speak thus upon a creed of faith, but the very mouth and instrument of the devil? - Here you have the Plot, the Execution, and the catastrophic End, of a soul-murdering tragedy!
But behold, I am here almost carried into a refutation of his catechism; whereas, I merely intended to shew you, why I thought it better not to answer this viper at all:- because, he will most effectually refute himself in the minds of all godly and good men.
The like game also he played on the apostle Paul, in his preface to the Romans; (to say nothing about his paraphrases, or his mad vagaries [paraphroneses,] to use his own term;) where he speaks of the praises of Paul in that way, that no simple reader whatever who is unacquainted with rhetoric, could be more effectually drawn away, and beaten off, from reading and studying Paul: so confused, intricate, self-contradictory, diverse, and disgusting, does he represent him to be: so that, the reader must of necessity believe the epistle to be the production of some mad man: so far is it from possibility, that he should consider it to be profitable.
And among the rest of his sharp-razor cuts, he could not receive, without venting his spleen, even this:- 'that Peter should call Christ Man, and say nothing of His Godhead.' - A notable annotation truly! And most appropriately applicable to the passage!
And then as to his METHOD,with all its twistings and windings, what is it but a holding up Christ, and every thing done by Him, to derision? Who could gather any thing from this Method but a disgust at, nay a hatred of, attending to a religion so confused and perplexed, and perhaps after all, merely fabulous?
Who, moreover, ever spoke in so much disdain and contempt (not to say enmity) of the apostle and evangelist John, who, among Christians is held to be of the highest authority after Christ? - 'He merely scolds little children except it be when he considers a man to be a dolt or a logger-head.' - Christians ever speak of the Apostles with reverence and fear: whereas, this fellow would teach us to speak of them with profane pride and contempt. And this is the first step towards speaking profanely of God Himself, whose the Apostles are. Nay, it is the same as saying in contempt of the Holy Spirit, (whose the words of the Apostles are,) that He merely scolds little children!
Numberless things of this kind are to be found in Erasmus; or rather, this is his whole character in theology. And this many others have observed before me, and still do observe daily more and more:
nor does he cease to go on and to publish daily his annotations more and more grossly, for his "judgment now for a long time lingereth not," and his "damnation slumbereth not."
This is also a notable instance of the piety of Erasmus! - In his letter upon 'Christian philosophy,' which is published with his New Testament, and used in common throughout all the churches, when he had propounded the question, - 'Why Christ, so great a teacher, descended from heaven, when there are many things taught even among the heathens which are precisely the same, if not more perfect;' - he answers, 'Christ came (which I doubt not but he believed most Erasmianly) from heaven, that He might exemplify those things more perfectly and more fully than any of the saints before Him!'
Thus, this miserable renewer of all things, Christ , (for so He reproaches the Lord of glory) has lost the glory of a Redeemer, and becomes only one more holy than others. - This sentiment could not be expressed in ignorance, but must have been designed and willful; because, even those who do not truly believe, know, and every where confess, that Christ descended from heaven to redeem us men from sin and death.
This was the sentiment that first alienated my mind from Erasmus. From that moment, I began to suspect him of being a plain Democritus or Epicurus, and a crafty derider of Christ: for he every where intimates to his fellow Epicureans, his hatred against Christ: though he does it in words so figurative and insidious, that he leaves himself a clue for raging most furiously against those Christians, who, from being offended at his suspicious and double meaning words, will not interpret them as standing in favour of their Christ. - As though Erasmus himself had an all-free prerogative throughout the world, of speaking on divine things with obliquity and craft, and had all men so under his thumb, that they must interpret all his obliquities and crafty manoeuvres, as having an upright and honest intent!
Why does he not rather speak openly and plainly? Why does he always deal in these crafty and ensnaring figures of speech? So great a rhetorician and theologian ought not only to know, but to act according to, that which Fabius says, 'An ambiguous word should be avoided as a rock.' Where it happens now and then inadvertently, it may be pardoned: but where it is sought for designedly and purposely, it deserves no pardon whatever, but justly merits the abhorrence of every one. For to what does this hateful double-tongued way of speaking tend? It only furnishes an opportunityof disseminating and fostering in safety the seeds of every heresy, under the cover of words and letters that have a shew of Christian faith. And thus, while religion is believed to be taught and defended, it is, in reality, utterly destroyed, and subverted from its foundation before it is understood.
Wherefore, all are perfectly in the right who interpret his suspicions and insidious words against himself. Nor is any notice to be taken of him when he cries out calumny! calumny! because his words are not fairly and candidly interpreted. Why does he himself ever avoid fair words, and designedly express himself in those which are unfair? For it is an unheard-of kind of tyranny to wish to have the whole human race so under his thumb, that they should be compelled to understand fairly what he says insidiously and dangerously, and thus cede to him the prerogative of expressing himself insidiously. No! Let him rather be reduced to order, and commanded to bow to the whole human race; that is, by abstaining from that profane and double-tongued vertibility of speech and vain-talking, and by avoiding, as Paul saith, "profane and vain babblings."
For this it was, that even the public laws of the Roman empire condemned this manner of speaking, and punished it thus. - They commanded, 'that the words of him who should speak obscurely, when he could speak more plainly, should be interpreted against himself.' And Christ also, condemned that wicked servant who excused himself by an evasion; and interpreting his own words against himself, said, "Out of thine own mouth will I judge thee, thou wicked servant." For if in religion, in laws, and in all weighty matters, we should be allowed to express ourselves ambiguously and insidiously, what could follow but that utter confusion of Babel, where no one could understand another! This would be, to learn the language of eloquence, and in so doing, to lose the language of nature!
Moreover, if this licence should prevail, I might 'conveniently' interpret all that the whole herd of heretics ever said, nay all that the devil himself ever did or said, or could say or do, to all eternity:Where then would be the power of refuting the heretics and the devil? Where would be that wisdom of the Lord Christ, which all the adversaries shall not be able to resist? What would become of logic, the instructor of teaching rightly? What would become of rhetoric, the faculty of persuading? Nothing would be taught, nothing would be learned, no persuasion could be carried home, no consolation would be given, no fear would be wrought: because, nothing would be spoken or heard that was certain.
When, therefore, Erasmus lightly and ridiculously says of John the Evangelist, 'that he merely scolds babes,' he is to be adjudged immediately a disciple of Epicurus or Democritus, and to be addressed thus - Learn to speak of Majesty with more reverence. Some noted jesters have, indeed, sometimes spoken of princes thus irreverently, and fool-like, but not always with impunity. But if any one else of a sound mind and judgment had done the same, he might, perhaps, have lost his head, for the crime of insulted majesty.
Thus, when Erasmus says, 'Peter addresses Christ as Man, and says nothing of His Divinity,' he is to be condemned of Arianism and heresy: because, he could have omitted this insidious observation altogether, in a matter where the divine Majesty is eminently concerned, or have spoken more reverently: for the words plainly imply, that the Arians do not like that Christ should be called God, but consider it better that He should be called man only. And how conveniently soever they may be interpreted in favour of the Divinity of Christ; yet, as they stand and are read according to their plain meaning, especially since their author is suspicious, they offend Christian minds: because, they have not one plain meaning, and may be more easily understood to favour the Arians, than the orthodox.
Hence Jerome, writing of the Arians of his time who taught in the same artful way, says, 'Their priests say one thing, and their people understand another.' In like manner, there was no necessity for observing to Christians on that passage, that Peter did not call Christ, God; though in truth he did not omit to call Christ, God. Nor is it enough to pretend, 'that he called Him man only, on account of the common multitude:' for though he did call Him Man, yet, he did not therefore omit to call Him God, except that he did not pronounce these three letters, GOD:but this Erasmus rigidly deems was necessary: by so doing, however, he does nothing here, as well as in every other place, but lay snares, without any cause whatever, to entrap the inexperienced, and to render our religion suspicious.
That Carpisian, whoever he was, justly condemns him as a favourer of the Arians in his preface to Hilary, where he has said, 'We dare to call the Holy Spirit, God, which the ancients did not dare to do.' And when, having been faithfully admonished, he ought to have acknowledged his high-flown figures of speech, and his Arianisms, and to have corrected them, he not only did not do that, but even inveighed against the admonition, as a calumny proceeding from Satan, and laughed at the Divinity twofold more than ever - such a confidence has he in his pliability of speech, and his circumlocutive evasions. Nevertheless, he very seriously confesses the Trinity, and would not by any means whatever be thought to deny the Trinity of the God-head, but only wishes to say, that the curiosity (which he afterwards requests will be 'conveniently interpreted' diligence) of the moderns, has received and dared many things from the Scriptures which the ancients dared not. - As though the Christian religion rested on the authority of men: (for this is what he would persuade us to.) And what is this, but considering all religion together to be a mere fable!
Here, although the Carpisian be in many things of no weight whatever, and ever an enemy to Luther, yet Erasmus, from an unheard-of pride, thinks all men together to be mere stocks and stones; who neither understand any subject, nor see through the meaning of any words. Read that observation of his, and say, if you do not discover the incarnate devil! This observation fixes in me a determination (let others do as they please) not to believe Erasmus, even if he should openly confess in plain words, - that Christ is God. But I would address to him that sophistical saying of Chrysippus, 'If you lie, you lie even when you speak the truth.' For what need was there, if he in verity believed that the Holy Spirit is God, to say, 'We dare to call the Holy Spirit, God, which the ancients did not dare to do?' What need was there to use this vertible word 'dare,' that it might apply both to the praise and dispraise of these same moderns, when we received this doctrine from the ancients, and did not 'dare' to receive it first?
But however, it is a stark lie, to say, that the ancients did not first 'dare' to call the Holy Spirit, God:- unless by ancients, according to one of his very beautiful figures of speech, he means Democritus and Epicurus: or unless, he means God, materially, that is, these three letters, GOD! But to what purpose is all this hateful manoeuvering, but to make of a gnat an elephant, as a stumbling-block to the unexperienced, and to intimate, that the Christian religion is a nothing it all! and that, for no other reason, than because these three Letters, GOD, are not written in every place, where he considers they ought to have been written!
In the same manner his fathers, the Arians, made numberless quibbles, because these letters HOMOUSIOS, and INNASCIBILIS, were not found in the Sacred Writings: considering it nothing to the purpose, that the same thing could be solidly proved in substance. And where the name God was written, they were ready with their gloss to elude the truth, by contending, that it did not mean God in reality, but God by appellation. So that, you can do nothing with these vipers, whether you speak to them by the Scriptures, or without the Scriptures.
This is the way of the malice of Satan. When he cannot deny the fact, he turns to demanding certain particular terms, which he himself prescribes. And thus the devil himself may say, even to Christ - Although Thou speakest the truth, yet since Thou dost not speak it in the terms which I think requisite, Thou sayest nothing at all: and I wish the truth to be spoken in no words whatever. - This is like Marcolfus, who wished to be hung upon a tree chosen by himself, and yet wished to choose no tree at all. But of this elsewhere, if the Lord shall give me leisure, and length of life. For it is my determination to leave behind me my true and faithful testimony concerning Erasmus: and thus, to expose Luther to be bitten and stung by these vipers, but not to be utterly torn in pieces and destroyed! -
I now return to my observation upon my libertywhich I have asserted; giving it as my sentiments, that the tyranny of Erasmus which he would exercise by means of circumlocutive evasions, is not to be borne, but that he is to be judged openly, out of his own mouth. Where he speaks as an Arian, let him be judged an Arian; where he speaks as a Lucian, let him be judged a Lucian; where he speaks as a Gentile, let him be judged a Gentile; unless he repent and cease to defend such ways of expressing himself.
For instance. In one of his epistles on the Incarnation of the Son of God, he uses a most abominable term, calling it 'the intercourse of God with the Virgin' - here he is to be judged, a horrible blasphemer of God and the Virgin! Nor does it make him at all better, his afterwards expounding 'intercourse' as applying to the form of the Christian doctrine. Why did he not speak of the form of Christian doctrine? For he well knew, that by this word, 'intercourse,' Christians could not but be greatly offended - and let him be judged ungodly who would not be offended at a term so abominably obscene in a matter so sacred: knowing that, an ambiguous expression of such a nature, is always taken in its worst sense, even though we benot ignorant, that the term may have another meaning. If it take place from inadvertency, it may be pardoned: if from design and willfulness, it is to be condemned, as I said, without mercy. For to hold a doctrine of faith is arduous, and a divine work, even when delivered in proper, evident, and certain words. How then shall it be held, if it be delivered in ambiguous, doubtful, and oblique words!
St. Augustine says, 'philosophers ought to speak freely on difficult points, fearing no offence: but we (says he) must speak to a certain rule.' And therefore, he blames the use of the term fortune, or fate, both in himself and others. For even though the person may by fortune mean the divine mind, the agent of all things, from which nature is known to be distinctly different, and thus may not think impiously, yet, says he, 'Let him hold his sentiment, but correct his expression.
And even to suppose that Augustine did not say this, and never had any certain rule according to which he expressed himself, yet nature will tell us, that every profession, sacred as well as profane, uses certain terms of its own, and avoids all ambiguities. For even common tradesmen, either reprove or condemn, or hold up to ridicule, the man who speaks of his own trade in the technical terms (as they are called) peculiar to the trade of another. With how much greater force will this apply to things sacred, where certain salvation, or eternal perdition is the consequence, and where all must be taught in certain and proper terms! Let us, if we must do it, trifle with ambiguities in other things that are of no moment, as nuts, apples, pence, and other things which are the toys of children and of fools: but in religion, and weighty matters of state, let us shun, with all possible care, an ambiguity, as we would shun death or the devil!
Our king of ambiguity, however, sits upon his ambiguous throne in security, and destroys us stupid Christians with a double destruction. First, it is his will, and it is a great pleasure to him, to offend us by his ambiguous words: and indeed he would not like it, if we stupid blocks were not offended. And next, when he sees that we are offended, and have run against his insidious figures of speech, and begin to exclaim against him, he then begins to triumph and rejoice that the desired prey has been caught in his snares. For now, having found an opportunity of displaying his rhetoric, he rushes upon us with all his powers and all his noise, tearing us, flogging us, crucifying us, and sending us farther than hell itself; saying, that we have understood his words calumniously, virulently, satanically; (using the worst terms he can find;) whereas, he never meant them to be so understood.
In the exercise of this wonderful tyranny, (and who would think that this Madam ambiguity could make so much ado, or who could suppose that any one would be so great a madman as to have so much confidence in a vain figure of speech?) he not only compels us to put up with his all-free prerogative of using ambiguities, but binds us down to the necessity of keeping silence. He plainly designs all the while, and wishes us to be offended, that he, and his herd of Epicureans with him, may have a laugh at us as fools: but on the other hand, he does not like to hear that we are offended, lest it should appear that we are true Christians. Thus must we suffer wounds without number, and yet, not utter a groan or a sigh!
We Christians, however, who are to judge, not meats and drinks only, but angels and the whole world, and who actually judge, even now, not only do not bear with this tyranny of ambiguities, but on the contrary, oppose to it our liberty of pronouncing a two-fold condemnation. The first is, as I have already observed, we condemn all the ambiguous expressions of Erasmus, and interpret them against himself: as Christ saith, "Out of thine own mouth will I judge thee, thou wicked servant." Again, "By thine own words shalt thou be condemned: for wherefore hast thou spoken against thine own soul?" "Thy blood be upon thine own head." The second condemnation is, we condemn and curse again and again his glosses and 'convenient interpretations,' by which, he not only does not correct his ungodly expressions, but even defends them: that is, he laughs at us twice as much in his after interpretations, as he does in his first expressions.
For example: He says, that by 'the intercourse of God with the Virgin' he does not mean a common intercourse, but another kind of marriage between God and the Virgin, where the angel Gabriel is the bridegroom, and the Holy Spirit performs the act of consummation. Only observe what this fellow, by his interpretation, would have us to hear and understand Christ to be. And he says these things, that he might defend the filthiness and obscenity of his expression in the face of offended Christians, and laugh at them all the while; and thus, he forces upon us this offensive term, when he knows very well, that this mystery of the most holy Incarnation, cannot be explained to the mind of man by all the obscene and ambiguous words of the whole world: but how it is understood by the Epicureans, I dare not, for horror, imagine. Why do we not call the conversation of God with Moses and the other prophets, 'intercourse' also, and make the angels bridegrooms, and the Holy Spirit the consummator of the act, or make of it something still more obscene? Moreover, here is the impious idea of sex introduced, to perfect this monstrous derision of saying, that God had 'intercourse with the Virgin;' - in order that, the whole might be made a fable, like that wherein Mars is said to have had intercourse with Rhea, and Jupiter with Semele; and that Christianity might be reduced to a level with one of the fabulous stories of old, and men represented as fools and pitiable madmen for believing such a story to be serious and true, not considering what turpitudes and obscenities were the objects of their faith and worship! And therefore, Christians, that stupid set of creatures, were to be admonished by means of figures like these, to begin to doubt, and then, from doubting to depart from the faith; that thus, religion might be utterly destroyed before any one could be aware of it.
This is the verification of that parable, Matt. xiii. where the enemy is represented as sowing tares in the night, and going his way. Thus, we Christians are sleeping in security: and even if we were not sleeping, those bewitching Syrens, by their honey of speech, would soon lull us to sleep, and bring a cloud of night over our eyes. In the meantime, are sown those tares of figurative and insidious words: and yet when Sacramentarians, Donatists, Arians, Anabaptists, Epicureans, &c. are sprung up, we ask - How is it that our Lord's field hath tares? They, however, who have sown them, are gone away; that is, they so paint and set themselves off by their 'convenient interpretations,' and withdraw themselves from sight, that they seem as if they had sown nothing but wheat. Thus the enemy slides away, and is off in safety, and crowned with honour and applause, and appears to be a friend, when he is in truth the greatest of enemies. This is the way with the strange woman, Prov. xxx. who, "when she has eaten, wipeth her mouth, and saith, I have done no wickedness!"
Thus have I replied to your letter, my friend Armsdorff, though perhaps I have been too long and tedious. But I wished to shew you, why I judged it best not to answer Erasmus any farther. I am moreover abundantly engaged in teaching, confirming, correcting, and governing my flock. And my work of translating the Bible, alone requires the devotion of my whole time: from which work, Satan with all his might endeavours to withdraw me, as he has done upon former occasions; that be might get me to leave the best things, to follow after those which are nothing but vain and empty vapours. For my Bondage of the Will proves to you how difficult a task it is to cope with that proteus Erasmus, on account of his vertibility and slipperiness of speech; in which alone is all his confidence. He never remains in one position, but, with the deepest craft, evades every blow, and is like an irritated hornet.
Whereas, miserable I, am compelled to stand my ground in one position, and that upon unequal ground, as "a sign to be spoken against." For whatever Luther writes, is condemned before ten years are at an end. Luther is the only one who writes from envy, from pride, from bitterness, and in a word, at the instigation of Satan himself; but all who write against him, write under the influence of the Holy Spirit!
Before my time, it required a great to-do, and an enormous expense, to canonize a dead monk. But now, there is no easier way for canonizing even living Neroes and Caligulas, than the declaration of hatred against Luther. Only let a man hate and bravely curse Luther, and that, immediately, makes him a saint, equal almost to our holy Lord, the servant of the servants of God. But who could ever believe that hatred against Luther would be attended with so much power and advantage? It fills the coffers of very beggars; nay, it introduces obscure moles and bats to the favour of princes and of kings; it procures prebendaries and dignities; it procures bishoprics; it procures the reputation of wisdom and of learning to the most consummate asses; it procures to petty teachers of grammar, the authority of writing books; nay, it procures the crown of victory and of glory, eternal in the heavens! Nay, happy are all who hate Luther, for they obtain, by that one vile and easy service, those great and mighty things, which none of the most excellent of men could ever obtain with all their wisdom and their virtues; no, not even Christ himself, with all His own miracles, and the miracles of His apostles and all His saints!
Thus are the Scriptures fulfilled. - Blessed are ye who persecute Luther, for yours is the kingdom of heaven! Blessed are ye who curse and say all manner of evil against Luther; rejoice and be exceeding glad in that day, for great is your reward in heaven; for so persecuted they the apostles, the holy bishops, John Huss, and others who were before Luther! - Wherefore, I feel more and more persuaded, that I shall act rightly by answering Erasmus no farther: but I will leave my testimony concerning him, even for his own sake, that he might hereafter be unburdened from that concern which, as he complains, is completely death to him: viz., that he is commonly called a Lutheran. But, as Christ liveth, they do him a great injury who call him a Lutheran, and I will defend him against his enemies for I can bear a true and faithful testimony, that he is no Lutheran, but Erasmus himself!
And if I could have my will, Erasmus should be exploded from our schools altogether: for if he be not pernicious, he is certainly useless: because he, in truth, discusses and teaches nothing. Nor is it at all advisable to accustom Christian youth to the diction of Erasmus: for they will learn to speak and think of nothing with gravity and seriousness, but only to laugh at all men as babblers and vain-talkers. In a word, they will learn nothing, but to play the fool! And from this levity and vanity they will, by, degrees, grow tired of religion, till at last they will abhor and profane it! Let him be left to the Papists only, who are worthy of such an apostle, and whose lips relish his dainties!
May our Lord Jesus Christ, whom, according to my faith, Peter did not omit to call GOD; by whose power I know, and am persuaded, that I have often been delivered from death, and by faith in whom I have undertaken and hitherto accomplished all these things which excite the wonder even of my enemies; may this same Jesus guard and deliver us unto the end - for He is the Lord our God! - To whom alone, with the Father and the Holy Spirit, be glory for ever and ever! Amen!

Bondage of the Will

by Martin Luther, 1483-1546
Author: Luther, Martin, 1483-1546
Martin Luther on the Bondage of the Will to the Venerable Mister Erasmus of Rotterdam 1525

The Significance of the Issue

It is not irreligious, wasteful, or superficial, but essentially healthy and necessary, for a Christian to know whether or not his will has anything to do in matters pertaining to salvation. Indeed, let me tell you, this is the hinge on which our discussion turns, the crucial issue between us; our aim is, simply, to investigate what ability "free will" has, in what respect it is the subject of divine action and how it stands related to the grace of God. If we know nothing of these things, we shall know nothing whatsoever of Christianity, and shall be in worse than the heathen! He who does not admit this should acknowledge that he is not a Christian; and he who ridicules or derides it should realize that he is the greatest enemy of Christianity. For if I am ignorant in the nature, extent and limits of what I can and must do in relationship to God, I shall be equally ignorant and uncertain of the nature, extent and limits of what God can and will do in me - though God, in fact, works everything in everyone. Now, if I am ignorant of the works and powers of God, I am ignorant of God himself; and if I do not know God, I cannot worship, praise, give thanks or serve Him, for I do not know how much I should attribute to myself and how much to Him. We need, therefore, to have in mind a clear-cut distinction between God's power and ours, and God's work and ours, if we would live a godly life.
There are two parts to Christianity
This problem [the knowledge of what we contribute to our salvation] is one half of the whole sum of Christianity, since on it both knowledge of oneself and the knowledge and glory of God quite vitally depend. That is why we cannot permit you, my dear Erasmus, to call such knowledge "irreverent," "inquisitive," and "vain." The other half of the sum of Christianity is concerned with whether God's foreknowledge is uncertain, and whether everything we do could be done any other way.
Since God's foreknowledge is not uncertain, "free-will" is non-existent
It is fundamentally necessary and healthy for Christians to acknowledge that God foreknows nothing uncertainly, but that He foresees, purposes, and does all things according to His own immutable, eternal and infallible will. This bombshell knocks "free-will" flat, and utterly shatters it; so that those who want to assert it must either deny my bombshell, or pretend not to notice it, or find some other way of dodging it. Surely it was you, my good Erasmus, who a moment ago asserted that God is by nature just, and kindness itself? If this is true, does it not follow that He is immutably just and kind? that, as His nature remains unchanged to all eternity, so do His justice and kindness? And what is said of His justice and kindness must be said also of His knowledge, His wisdom, His goodness, His will, and the other Divine attributes. But if it is religious, godly and wholesome, to affirm these things of God, as you do, what has come over you, that now you should contradict yourself by affirming that it is irreligious, idle and vain to say that God foreknows by necessity? You insist that we should learn the immutability of God's will, while forbidding us to know the immutably of His foreknowledge! Do you suppose that He does not will what He foreknows, or that He does not foreknow what He wills? If he wills what He foreknows, His will is eternal and changeless, because His nature is so. From which it follows, by resistless logic, that all we do, however it may appear to us to be done freely and optionally, is in reality done necessarily and immutably in respect of God's will. For the will of God is effective and cannot be impeded, since power belongs to God's nature; and His wisdom is such that He cannot be deceived. Since, then His will is not impeded, what is done cannot but be done where, when, how, as far as, and by whom, He foresees and wills...
Necessarily does not mean Compulsorily
I could wish, indeed, that a better term was available for our discussion than the accepted one, necessity, which cannot accurately be used of either man's will or God's. Its meaning is too harsh, and foreign to the subject; for it suggests some sort of compulsion, and something that is against one's will, which is no part of the view under debate. This will, whether it be God's or man's does what it does, good or bad, under no compulsion, but just as it wants or pleases, as if totally free. Yet the will of God, which rules over our mutable will, is changeless and sure - as Boetius sings, "Immovable Thyself, Thou movement giv'st to all;" and our will, principally because of its corruption, can do no good of itself. The reader's understanding, therefore, must supply what the word itself fails to convey, from his knowledge of the intended signification - the immutable will of God on the one hand, and the impotence of our corrupt will on the other. Some have called it necessity of immutability, but the phrase is both grammatically and theologically defective.
The importance of knowing that God necessitates all things
I would also point out, not only how true these things are (I shall discuss that more fully from Scripture on a later page), but also how godly, reverent and necessary it is to know them. For where they are not known, there can be no faith, nor any worship of God. To lack this knowledge is really to be ignorant of God - and salvation is notoriously incompatible with such ignorance. For if you hesitate to believe, or are too proud to acknowledge, that God foreknows and wills all things, not contingently, but necessarily and immutably, how can you believe, trust and rely on His promises? When He makes promises, you ought to be out of doubt that He knows, and can and will perform, what He promises; otherwise, you will be accounting Him neither true nor faithful, which is unbelief, and the height of irreverence, and a denial of the most high God! And how can you be thus sure and certain, unless you know that certainly, infallibly, immutably and necessarily, He knows, wills and will perform what He promises? Not only should we be sure that God wills, and will execute His will, necessarily and immutably; we should glory in the fact, as Paul does in Romans 3:4 - "Let God be true, but every man a liar", and again, "Not that the word of God has failed," and in another place, "The foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal, the Lord knoweth them that are His." In Titus 1:2 he says: "Which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began"... If, then, we are taught and believe that we ought to be ignorant of the necessary foreknowledge of God and the necessity of events, Christian faith is utterly destroyed, and the promises of God and the whole gospel fall to the ground completely; for the Christian's chief and only comfort in every adversity lies in knowing that God does not lie, but brings all things to pass immutably, and that His will cannot be resisted, altered or impeded.
A will which has no power without grace is not free
You describe the power of "free-will" as small, and wholly ineffective apart from the grace of God. Agreed? Now then, I ask you: If God's grace is wanting, if it is taken away from that small power, what can it do? It is ineffective, you say, and can do nothing good. So it will not do what God or His grace wills. Why? Because we have now taken God's grace away from it, and what the grace of God does not do is not good. Hence it follows that "free-will" without God's grace is not free at all, but is the permanent prisoner and bonds

GOLDEN GATE BAPTIST THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY

ERASMUS THE REFORMER

L1112 CHURCH HISTORY 1517-2000

ERASMUS 1466 ~ 1536

INTRODUCTION TO SOLA SCRIPTURA