140 THE GERMAN REFORMATION. A. D. 1517 To 1530.
Nicolaus Lyra to understand the Psalter from the times of the writer. Afterward he learned to appreciate him. He followed Augustin, the Glossa ordinaria, and especially the Quincuplex Psalterium of Faber Stapulensis (Paris, 1508 and 1513). He far surpassed himself in his later comments on the Psalms.? It was only by degrees that he emancipated himself from the traditional exegesis, and approached the only sound and safe method of grammatico-historical interpretation of Scripture from the natural meaning of the words, the situation of the writer and the analogy of his teaching, viewed in the light of the Scriptures as a whole. He never gave up altogether the scholalistic and allegorizing method of utilizing exegesis for dogmatic and devotional purposes, but he assigned it a subordinate place. “ Allegories,” he said, “may be used to teach the ignorant common people, who need to have the same thing impressed in various forms.” He measured the Scriptures by his favorite doctrine of justification by faith, and hence depreciated important books, especially the Epistle of James and the Apocalypse. But when his dogmatic conviction required it, he laid too much stress on the letter, as in the eucharistic controversy.
From the Psalms he proceeded to the Epistles of Paul. Here he had an opportunity to expound his ideas of sin and grace, the difference between the letter and the spirit, between the law and the gospel, and to answer the great practical question, how a sinner may be justified before a holy God and obtain pardon and peace. He first lectured on Romans and explained the difference between the righteousness of faith and the righteousness of works. He never published a work on Romans except a preface which contains a masterly description of faith. His lectures on
Church of England. Comp. e.g. Dr. Neale and Dr. Littledale’s Commentary on the Psalms from primitive and medicval writers. London, fourth ed., 1884, 4 vols. The celebrated Baptist preacher, Spurgeon, has written a commentary on the Psalms, in seven volumes, which is likewise full of allegorizing interpretation, but mostly derived from older Protestant and Puritan sources.
1 Hence the saying: “Si Lyra nonlyrasset, Iutherus non saltasset.”
3 Ed. by Dr. Bertheau in the fourth vol. of the Weimar ed. (1886).
§ 28. LUTHER AND MYSTICISM. 141
Galatians he began October 27th, 1516, and resumed them repeatedly. They appeared first in Latin, September, 1519, and in a revised edition, 1523, with a preface of Melanchthon.'’ They are the most popular and effective of his commentaries, and were often published in different languages. John Bunyan was greatly benefited by them. Their chief value is that they bring us into living contact with the central idea of the epistle, namely, evangelical freedom in Christ, which he reproduced and adapted in the very spirit of Paul. Luther always had a special preference for this anti-Judaic Epistle and called it his sweetheart or his wife.”
These exegetical lectures made a deep impression. They were thoroughly evangelical, without being anti-catholic. They reached the heart and conscience as well as the head. They substituted a living theology clothed with flesh and blood for the skeleton theology of scholasticism. They were delivered with the energy of intense conviction and the freshness of personal experience. The genius of the lecturer flashed from his deep dark eyes which seem to have struck every observer. ‘This monk,” said Dr. Pollich, “will revolutionize the whole scholastic teaching.” Christopher Scheurl commended Luther to the friendship of Dr. Eck (his later opponent) in January, 1517, as “a divine who explained the epistles of the man of Tarsus with wonderful genius.” Melanchthon afterward expressed a general judgment when he said that Christ and the Apostles were brought out again as from the darkness and filth of prison.
§ 28. Luther and Mysticism. The Theologia Germamea.
In 1516 Luther read the sermons of Tauler, the mystic revival preacher of Strassburg (who died in 1361), and discovered the
1See the first ed. in the Weimar ed. of his works, vol. II. 486-618. This commentary of 1519 must be distinguished from the larger work of 1535 which has the same title, but rests on different lectures.
* In December, 1531: “ Epistola ad Galatas ist meine Epistola, der ich mich vertraut habe, meine Kethe von Bora?’ Weimar ed. II. 487. Melanchthon called Luther’s commentary the thread of Theseus in the labyrinth of N. T. exegesis.