706 THE GERMAN REFORMATION. A.D. 1517 To 1530.
opposed to it, but the lawyers triumphed over the theological scruples, and the Elector of Saxony pledged the members for defensive measures against any and every aggressor, even the Emperor. At a new convent at Smalcald in March, 1531, the League was concluded in due form for six years. It embraced Electoral Saxony, Hesse, Liineburg, Anhalt, Mansfeld, and eleven cities. Out of this League ultimately arose the Smalcaldian war, which ended so disastrously for the Protestant princes, especially the Elector of Saxony and the Landgrave of Hesse (1547).
But for the present, war was prevented by the peace at Niirnberg, 1532. A renewed invasion of Sultan Suleiman with an army of three hundred thousand, in April, 15382, made conciliation a political and patriotic duty. The Em-. peror convened a Diet at Regensburg, April 17, which was transferred to Niirnberg; and there, on July 23, 1532, a temporary truce was concluded, and vigorous measures taken against the Turks, who were defeated by land and sea, and forced to retreat. The victorious Emperor went to Italy, and urged the Pope to convene the council; but the Pope was not yet ready, and found excuses for indefinite postponement.!
John the Constant died in the same year, of a stroke of apoplexy (Aug. 16, 1532), and was followed by his son John Frederick the Magnanimous, who in the Smalcaldian war lost his electoral dignity, but saved his evangelical faith.
§ 119. The Augsburg Confession.
I. Editions of the Augsb. Conf.: The best critical edition in the 26th vol. of the ‘‘ Corpus Reformatorum,” ed. BRETSCHNEIDER und BINDSEIL (1858), 776 pages. It gives the Invariata and the Variata, in Latin and German, with critical apparatus, list of MSS. and early editions, and the preceding documents: viz., the Articles of Visitation, the Marburg, the Schwabach, and the Torgau Articles.
1 Luther chastised the Pope with all his power of irony and sarcasm for his conduct in regard to a council, in his book Von den Conciliis und Kirchen, 1589 (Erl. ed. XXV. 219-388).
8 119. THE AUGSBURG CONFESSION. T07
The Confession in Latin or German, or both, is embodied in all the collections of Lutheran symbols by RECHENBERG, WALCH, WEBER, HASE, MEYER, FRANCKE, MULLER.
Separate modern editions by TwESTEN, TITTMANN, WEBER, WIG- GERS, FORSTEMANN, HARTER, etc.
English translation, with Latin text, in Scuarr, Creeds, III. 3-73; in English alone, in HENKEL, Book of Concord, 1854, and JAcoss, Book of Concord, Philad., 1882. The first English translation was made by RicHARD TAVERNER, London, 1536, the last, on the basis of this, by CHARLES P. KrAutH. (See B. M. SCHMUCKER: English Translations of the Augsb. Conf., Philad., 1887, 34 pp.)
On the literature compare KOLLNER: Symbolik der Lutherischen Kirche, Hamburg, 1837, pp. 150-152, with a full history of the Conf., pp. 153-396.
II. Histories and monographs: the works of CHYTR&ZUS, C@LESTIN, CYPRIAN, SALIG, PFAFF, FICKENSCHER, FORSTEMANN, etc., quoted in ὃ 117. Recent works: KOLLNER, 1887 (see above). RUDELBACH: Die Augsb. Conf. nach den Quellen, Dresden, 1841. G. PLitT: LHinleitung in die Augustana, Erlangen, 1867-68, 2 Parts; Die Apologie der Augustana, Erl., 1873. W.J. MANN: A Plea for the Augsburg Con- Session, Philadelphia, 1856. STucKENBERG: The History of the Augsb. Confession, Philad., 1869. ZOcKLER: Die Augsb. Conf., Frkf.-a.-M., 1870. Vi~MAR: Die Augsb. Confession erklart, Giitersloh, 1870. A brief account in ScHAFF: Creeds (4th ed. 1884), I. 225-242. On the Roman Catholic side see JANSSEN, III. 165-211, and L. Pastor: Die kirchlichen Reunionsbestrebungen wdhrend der Regierung Karls V., Freiburg, 1879, 22 sqq.
III. On special points: Luther’s relation to the Augsb. Conf. is discussed by RUCKERT, Jena, 1854; CALINICH, Leipz., 1861; KNAAKE, Berlin, 1863. The relation of the A. C. to the Marburg, Schwabach, and Torgau Articles is treated by Ep. ENGELHARDT in the “‘ Zeitschrift fiir hist. Theol.,’’ 1865, pp. 515-529; and by ΤῊ. BRIEGER in “ Kirchengesch. Studien,’ Leipzig, 1888, pp. 265-320.
The Augsburg Confession is the first and the most famous of evangelical confessions. It gave clear, full, systematic expression to the chief articles of faith for which Luther and his friends had been contending for thirteen years, since he raised his protest against the traffic in indulgences. By its intrinsic merits and historic connections, it has become the chief doctrinal standard of the Lutheran Church, which also bears the name of the “ Church of the Augsburg Confession.”