§ TT. LUTHER’S MARRIAGE. 1528. 455
II. The biographies of Katharina von Bora by WAtcH (1752), Best (1843), HOFMANN (1845), MEURER (1854). UHLHorn: KX. v. B., in Herzog?, vol. 11. 564-567. Koéstirn: Leben Luthers, I. 766-772; 11. 488 sqq., 605 sqq.; his small biography, Am. ed. (Scribner’s), pp. 325-335, and 535 sqq. BryscuiaG: Luther’s Hausstand in seiner reform. Bedeutung. Barmen, 1888.
III. Burk: Spiegel edler Pfarrfrauen. Stuttgart, 3d ed. 1885. W. BAuR (Gen. Superintendent of the Prussian Rhine Province): Das deutsche evangelische Pfarrhaus, seine Griindung, seine Entfaltung und sein Bestand. Bremen, 1877, 3d ed. 1884.
Amidst the disturbances and terrors of the Peasants’ War, in full view of his personal danger, and in expectation of the approaching end of the world, Luther surprised his friends and encouraged his foes by his sudden marriage with a poor fugitive nun. He wrote to his friend Link: “ Suddenly, and while I was occupied with far other thoughts, the Lord has plunged me into marriage.”
The manner was highly characteristic, neither saint-lke nor sinner-like, but eminently Luther-like. By taking to himself a wife, he wished to please his father, to tease the Pope, and to vex the Devil. Beneath was a deeper and nobler motive, to rescue the oldest ordinance of God on earth from the tyranny of Rome, and to vindicate by his own example the right of ministers to the benefit of this ordinance. Under this view, his marriage is a public event of far-reaching consequence. It created the home life of the evangelical clergy.
He had long before been convinced that vows of perpetual celibacy are unscriptural and unnatural. He held that God has created man for marriage, and that those who oppose it must either be ashamed of their manhood, or pretend to be wiser than God. He did not object to the marriage of Carlstadt, Jonas, Bugenhagen, and other priests and monks. But he himself seemed resolved to remain single, and continued to live in the convent. He was now over forty years of age ; eight years had elapsed since he opened the controversy with Rome in the Ninety-Five Theses; and, although a man of
456 THE GERMAN REFORMATION. A.D. 1517 τὸ 15380.
powerful passions, he had strictly kept his monastic and clerical vow. His enemies charged him with drinking beer, playing the lute, leading a worldly life, but never dared to dispute his chastity till after his marriage. As late as Nov. 30, 1524, he wrote to Spalatin: ‘I shall never take a wife, as I feel at present. Not that I am insensible to my flesh or sex (for I am neither wood nor stone); but my mind is averse to wedlock, because I daily expect the death of a heretic.” 1 But on April 10, 1525, he wrote to the same friend: “ Why do you not get married? 1 find so many reasons for urging others to marry, that I shall soon be brought to it myself, notwithstanding that enemies never cease to condemn the married state, and our little wiseacres (sapientulz) ridicule it every day.”? He got tired of his monastic seclusion; the convent was nearly emptied, and its resources cut off; his bed, as Melanchthon tells us, was not properly made for months, and was mildewed with perspiration; he lived of the plainest food; he worked himself nearly to death; he felt the need of a helpmate.
In April, 1528, nine nuns escaped from the convent of Nimptsch near Grimma, fled to Wittenberg, and appealed to Luther for protection and aid. Among them was Catharina von Bora,? a virgin of noble birth, but poor, fifteen years younger than Luther,‘ not remarkable for beauty or culture, but healthy, strong, frank, intelligent, and high-minded. In looking at the portraits of Dr. and Mrs. Luther in their honeymoon, we must remember that they were painted by Cranach, and not by Raphael or Titian.
1 De Wette, II. 570. 2 Tbid., II. 648,
8 Also spelled Bore or Boren.
4 She was born Jan. 29, 1499, and was in the convent from 1509.
5 Erasmus, in a letter of 1525, ascribed to Catharina from hearsay extraordinary beauty: ‘‘ Lutherus duzxit uxorem, puellam mire venustam, ex clara familia Borne, sed ut narrant indotatam, que ante annos complures vestalis esse desierat.’’ Michelet (Life of Luther, ch. V.), probably misled by this letter, calls her “(ἃ young girl of remarkable beauty.’’