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 | Works of Martin Luter: With Introductions and Notes, Vol. II |  |
The passage is chapter 31, Filiis vel nepotibus. It provides that in case the income of endowments bequeathed to the Church is misused, and appeals to the bishop and archbishop fail to correct the misuse, the heirs of the testator may appeal to the royal courts. Luther wishes this principle applied to the annates.
i.e., Promises to bestow on certain persons livings not yet vacant. Complaint of the evils arising out of the practice was continually heard from the year 1416. For the complaints made at Worms (1521), see WREDE, op. cit., II, 710.
Rules for the transaction of papal business, including such matters as appointments and the like. At Worms (1521) the Estates complain that these rules are made to the advantage of the "courtesans" and the disadvantage of the Germans. (WREDE, op. cit., II, pp. 675f.)
The local Church authorities, here equivalent to "the bishops." On use of term see Realencyk., XIV, 424.
The sign of the episcopal office; as regards archbishops, the pallium; see above, p. 89, and note.
The first of the ecumenical councils (A. D. 325). The decree to which Luther here refers is cannon IV of that Council. Cf. KOHLER,L. Und die Kg., pp. 139 ff.
"Exemption" was the practice by which monastic houses were withdrawn from the jurisdiction of the bishops and made directly subject to the pope. The practice seems to have originated in the X Century with the famous monastery of Cluny (918), but it was almost universal in the case of the houses of the mendicant orders. The bishops made it a constant subject of complaint, and the Lateran Council (Dec. 19, 1516) passed a decree abolishing all monastic exemptions, though the decree does not seem to have been effective. See CREIGHTON, History of the Papacy, V, 266.
The papal interference in the conduct of the local Church courts was as flagrant as in the appointments, of which Luther has heretofore spoken. At Worms (1521) it was complained that cases were cited to Rome as a court of first instance, and the demand was made that a regular course of appeals should be re-established. WREDE, op. cit., I, 672,718.
The reference is Canon V of the Council of Sardica (A. D. 343), incorporated in the cannon law as a cannon of Nicaea (Pt. II, qu. 6, c.5). See KOHLER, L. Und die Kg., 151.
i.e., Appealed to Rome for decision. This is the subject of the first of the 102 Gravamina of 1521 )WREDE, op. cit., II 672).
The judges in the bishops' courts. The complaint is that they interfere with the administration of justice by citing into their courts cases which properly belong in the lay courts, and enforce their verdicts (usually fines) by means of ecclesiastical censures. The charges against these courts are specified in the Gravamina of 1521, Nos. 73-100 (WREDE, op. cit., II 694-703).
The signaturae gratiae and the signaturae justitiae were the bureaus through which the pope regulated those matters of administration which belonged to his own special prerogative.
i.e., The cases in which a priest was forbidden to give absolution. The reference here is to cases in which only the pope could absolve. Cf. The XCV Theses, Vol. I, p. 30.
A papal bull published annually at Rome on Holy Thursday. It was directed against heretics, but to the condemnation of the heretics and their heresies was added a list of offenses which could received absolution only from the pope, or by his authorization. In 1522 Luther translated this bull into German as a New Year present for the pope. (Weimar Ed., VIII, 691). On Luther's earlier utterances concerning it, see KOHLER, L. u. die Kg., pp. 59 ff.
The breve is a papal decree, of equal authority with the bull, but differing from it in form, and usually dealing with matters of smaller importance.
Cf. Luther's earlier statement to the same effect in A Discussion of Confession, Vol. I, pp. 96.f.
In the cannon law, Decretal. Greg. Lib. I, tit. 6, cap. 4. The decretal forbids the bestowing of the pallium (see above, p. 89, note 3) on an archbishop elect, until he shall first have sworn allegiance to the Holy See.
The induction of Church officials into office. The term was used particularly of the greater offices -- those of bishop and abbot. These offices carried with them the enjoyment of certain incomes, and the possession of certain temporal powers. For this reason the right of investiture was a bone of contention between popes and emperors during the Middle Ages.
The German Empire was regarded during the Middle Ages as a continuation of the Roman Empire. (See below, p. 153.) The right to crown an emperor was held to be the prerogative of the pope; until the pope bestowed the imperial crown, the emperor bore the title, "King of the Romans."
In the treatise, Resolutio Lutheriana super propositione XIII, de potestate papae (1520). Weimar Ed., II, pp. 217 ff.; Erl. Ed., op. var. Arg., III, pp. 293 ff.
A decree of Pope Clement V of 1313, incorporated subsequently in the canon law, Clement. lib. ii, tit. II, cap. 2.
A forged document of the VIII Century, professing to come from the hand of the Emperor Constantine (306-337). The Donation conveyed to the pope title to the city of Rome (the capital had been removed to Constantinople), certain lands in Italy and "the islands of the sea." It was used by the popes of the Middle Ages to support their claims to worldly power, and its genuineness was not disputed. In 1440, however, Laurentius Valla, an Italian humanist, published a work in which he proved that the Donation was a forgery. This work was republished in Germany by Ulrich von Hutten in 1517, and seems to have come to Luther's attention in the early part of 1520, just before the composition of the present treatise (Cf. ENDERS II, 332). Luther subsequently (1537) issued an annotated translation of the text of the Donation (Erl. Ed., XXV, pp. 176 ff.).
The papal claim to temporal sovereignty over this little kingdom, which comprised the island of Sicily and certain territories in Southern Italy, goes back to the XI Century, and was steadily asserted during the whole of the later Middle Ages. It was one of the questions at issue in the conflict between the Emperor Frederick II (1200-1260) and the popes, and played an important part in the history of the stormy times which followed the fall of the Hobenstaufen. The popes claimed the right to award the kingdom to a ruler who would swear allegiance to the Holy See. The right to the kingdom was at this time contested between the royal houses of France and of Spain, of which latter house the Emperor Charles V was the head.
The popes claimed temporal sovereignty over a strip territory in Italy, beginning at Rome and stretching in a northeasterly direction across the peninsula to a point on the Adriatic south of Venice, including the cities and lands which Luther mentions. This formed the so-called "States of the Church." The attempt to consolidated the States and make the papal sovereignty effective involved Popes Alexander VI (1492-1503) and Julius II (1503-1513) in war and entangled them in political alliances with the European powers and petty Italian states. It resulted at last in actual war between Pope Clement VII and the Emperor Charles V (1526-1527). See Cambridge Modern History, I, 104-143; 219-252, and literature cited pp. 706-713; 727 f.
The kissing of the pope's feet was a part of the "adoration" which he claimed as his right. See above, p. 108.
The three paragraphs enclosed in brackets were added by Luther to the 2nd edition; see Introduction, p. 59.
The holy places of Rome had long been favorite objects of pilgrimage, and the practice had been zealously fostered by the popes through the institution of the "golden" or "jubilee years." Cf. Vol. I, p. 18, and below, p. 114.
Cf. Hutten's saying in Vadiscus: "Three things there are which those who go to Rome usually bring home with them, a bad conscience, a ruined stomach and an empty purse." (ed. BOCKING, IV, p. 169.) Vol., II. - 8
The "golden" or "jubilee years" were the years when special rewards were attached to worship at the shrines of Rome. The custom was instituted by Boniface VIII in 1300, and it was the intention to make every hundredth year a jubilee. In 1343 the interval between jubilees was fixed at fifty, in 1389 at thirty-three, in 1473 at twenty-five years. Cf. Vol. I, p. 18.
Cf. The statements in the Treatise on Baptism and theDiscussion of Confession, Vol. I, pp. 68 ff., 98.
The houses, or monasteries, of the mendicant or "begging" orders -- the "friars." The members of these orders were sworn to support themselves on the alms of the faithful.
The three leading mendicant orders were the Franciscan (the Minorities, or "little brothers"), founded by St. Francis of Assisi (died 1226), the Dominican (the "preaching brothers"), founded by St. Dominic (died 1221), and the Augustinians Hermits, to which Luther himself belonged, and which claimed foundation by St. Augustine (died 430).
The interference of the friars in the duties of the parish clergy was a continual subject of complaint through this period.
By the middle of the XV Century there were eight distinct sects within the Franciscan order alone (See Realencyk., Vi, pp. 212 ff.), and Luther had himself taken part in a vigorous dispute between two parties in the Augustinian order.
St. Agnes the Martyr, put to death in the beginning of the IV Century, one of the favorite saints of the Middle Ages. See SCHAFER, L. als Kirchenhistoriker, p. 235.
The celebrated Church Father (died 420). The passages referred to are in Migne, XXII, 656, and XXVI, 562.
Or "community" (Gemeine). Cf. The Papacy at Rome, Vol. I, p. 345, note 4. See also Dass eine christl. Gemeine Recht und Mach habe, etc. Weimar Ed. XI, pp. 408 ff.
The first absolute prohibition of marriage to the clergy is contained in a decree of Pope Siricius and dated 385. See H. C. LEA, History of Sacerdotal Celibacy, 3d ed. (1907), I, pp. 59 ff.
The priests of the Greek Church are required to marry, and the controversy over celibacy was involved in the division between the Greek and Roman Churches.
The court-jester was allowed unusual freedom of speech. See "Prefatory Letter" above, p. 62.
The laws governing marriage were entirely the laws of the Church. The canon law prohibited marriage of blood-relatives as far as the seventh degree of consanguinity. In 1204 the prohibition was restricted to the first four degrees; lawful marriage within these degrees was possible only by dispensation, which was not all too difficult to secure, especially by those who were will willing to pay for it (see above, p. 96). The relation of god-parents to god-children was also held to establish a "spiritual consanguinity" which might serve as a bar to lawful marriage. See BENRATH, p. 103, note 74, and in the Babylonian Captivity, below, p. 265.
This Luther actually did. When he burned the papal bull of excommunication (Dec. 10, 1520) a copy of the canon law was also given to the flames.
"Irregularity" is the condition of any member of a monastic order who has violated the prescriptions of the order and been deprived, in consequence, of the benefits enjoyed by those who live under the regula, viz., the rule of the order.
The three kinds of masses are really but one thing, viz., masses for the dead, celebrated on certain fixed days in each year, in consideration of the enjoyment of certain incomes, received either out of bequeathed endowments or from the heirs of the supposed beneficiaries.
Luther means the saint's-days and minor religious holidays. See also the Discourse on Good Works, Vol. I, pp. 240 f.
Kirchweihen, i.e., the anniversary celebration of the consecration of a church. These days had become feast days for the parish, and were observed in anything but a spiritual fashion.
Letters entitling their holder to the benefits of the masses founded by the sodalities or confraternities. See Benrath, p. 103.
Die wilden Kapellen und Feldkirchen, i.e., churches which are built in the country, where there are no congregations.
A little town in East Prussia, where was displayed a sacramental wafer, said to have been miraculously preserved from a fire which destroyed the church in 1383. It was alleged that at certain times this wafer exuded drops of blood, reverenced as the blood of Christ, and many miracles were said to have been performed by it. Wilsnack early became a favorite resort for pilgrims. In 1412 the archbishop of Prague, at the instigation of John Hus, forbade the Bohemians to go there. Despite the protests of the Universities of Leipzig and Erfurt, Pope Eugenius IV in 1446 granted special indulgences for this pilgrimage, and the popularity of the shrine was undiminished until the time the Reformation. Cf. Realencyk, xxi, pp. 347 ff.
In Meckleburg, where another relic of "the Holy Blood" was displayed after 1491. Cf. Benrath, pp. 104 f.
The "Holy Coat of Trier" was believed by the credulous to be the seamless coat of Christ, which the soldiers did not rend. It was first exhibited in 1512, but was said to have been presented to the cathedral church of Trier by the Empress Helena, mother of Constantine the Great.
Pilgrimage to the Grimmenthal in Meiningen began in 1449. An image of the Virgin, declared to have been miraculously created, was displayed there, and was alleged to work wonderful cures, especially of syphilis.
The "Fair Virgin (die schone Maria) of Regensburg" was an image of the Virgin similar to that exhibited in the Grimmenthal. The shrine was opened March 45, 1519, and within a month 50,000 pilgrims are said to have worshipped there. (Weimar Ed., VI, 447, note 1). For another explanation see Benrath, p. 105.
The pilgrimages were a source of large revenue, derived from the sale of medals which were worn as amulets, the fees for masses at the shrines, and the free-will offerings of the pilgrims. A large part of this revenue accrued to the bishop of the diocese, though the popes never overlooked the profits which the sale of indulgences for worship at these shrines could produce. In the Gravamina of 1521 complaint is made that the bishops demand at least 25 to 33 per cent of the offerings made at shrines of pilgrimage (WREDE, op. cit., II, 687).
The possession of a saint gave a church a certain reputation and distinction, which was sufficiently coveted to make local Church authorities willing to pay roundly for the canonization of a departed bishop or other local dignitary. Cf. Hutten's Vadiscus (Bocking, IV, 232).
Archbishop of Florence (died 1459). He was canonized, May 31, 1523, by Pope Hadrian VI. When Luther wrote this the process of canonization had already begun.
"Lead," the leaden seal attached to the bull; "hide", the parchment on which it is written; "the string," the ribbon or silken cord from which the seals depend; "wax," the seal holding the cord to the parchment.
Botschaften, interpreted by Benrath (p. 105), Clemen (I, 406, note) and Weimar Ed. (VI, 406, note 1) as a reference to the stationarii. They were wandering beggars who, for an alms, would enroll the contributor in the list of beneficiaries of their patron saint, an alleged insurance against disease, accident, etc. They were classified according to the names of their patron saints, St. Anthony, St. Hurbert, St. Valentine, etc. Protest against their operations were raised at the Diets of Worms (1521) and Nurnberg (1523). Included in these protests are the terminarii, i.e., the collectors of alms sent out by the mendicant orders. See WREDE, op. cit., II, 678, 688, III, 651, and Benrath, loc. cit.
Wallbruder, the professional pilgrims who spent their lives in wandering from one place of pilgrimage to another and subsisted on the alms of the faithful.
In the Babylonian Captivity (below, pp. 291 f.) Luther definitely excludes penance from the number of sacraments, but see also p. 177.
The sodalities ("fraternities," "confraternities"), still an important institution in the Roman Church, flourished especially in the XVI Century. They are associations for devotional purposes. The members of the sodalities are obligated to the recitation of certain prayers and the attendance upon certain masses at stipulated times. By virtue of membership in the association each member is believed to participate in the benefits accruing from these "good works" of all the members. In the case of most of the sodalities membership entitled the member to the enjoyment of certain indulgences. In 1520 Wittenberg boasted of 20 fraternities, Cologne of 80, Hamburg of more than 100 (Realencyk., III, 437). In 1519 Degenhard Peffinnger, of Wittenberg, was a member of 8 such fraternities in his home city, and of 27 in other places. For Luther's view of the sodalities see above, pp. 8, 26 ff. On the whole subject see Benrath, pp. 106 f.; KOLDE in Realencyk., III, pp. 434 ff.; LEA, Hist. Of Conf. And Indulg., III, pp. 470 ff.
The excesses committed at the feasts of the religious societies were often a public scandal. See LEA, Hist. of Conf. and Indulg, III, pp. 437 ff.
"Faculties" were extraordinary powers, usually for the granting of indulgences and of absolution in "reserved cases" (see above, p. 105, note 3). They were bestowed by the pope and could be revoked by him at any time. Sometimes they were given to local Church officials, but were usually held by the legates or commissaries sent from Rome. Complaints were made at the Diet of Worms (1520) and Nurnberg (1523) that the papal commissaries and legates interfered with the ordinary methods of ecclesiastical jurisdiction and appointment. See WREDE, op. cit., II, 673, III, 653.
Wladislav I forced the Sultan to sue for peace in 1443. At the instigation of the papal legate, Cardinal Caesarini, who represented that the treaty had not been approved by the pope, and absolved the king from the fulfillment of its conditions he renewed the war in 1444. At the battle of Varna, Nov. 10th, 1444, the Hungarians were decisively defeated, and Wladislav and Caesarini both killed. See CREIGHTON, Hist. of the Papacy, III, 67.
John Hus and Jerome of Prague were convicted of heresy by the Council of Constance and burned at the stake, the former July 6th, 1415, the latter May 30th, 1416. Hus had come to Constance under the safe-conduct of the Emperor Sigismund. Luther is in error when he assumes that Jerome had a similar safe-conduct. In September, 1415, the Council passed a decree which asserted that "either by natural, divine or human law was any promise to be observed to the prejudice of the catholic faith." On the whole matter of the safe-conduct and its violation see LEA, Hist. of the Inquisition in the M.A., II, pp. 453 ff.
The League of Cambray, negotiated in 1508 for war against Venice. In 1510 Venice made terms with the pope and detached him from the alliance, and the result was war between the pope and the King of France. See Cambridge Modern History, I, pp. 130 ff., and literature there cited.
i.e., The Hussites. After the martyrdom of Hus his followers maintained for a time a strong organization in Bohemia, and resisted with arms all attempts to force them into conformity with the Roman Church. The Council of Basel succeeded (1434) in reconciling the more moderate party among the Bohemians (the Calixtines) by allowing the administration of the cup to the laity. The more extreme party, however, refused to subscribe the Compactata of Basel. Though they soon ceased to be a factor in the political situation, they remained outside the Church and perpetuated the teachings of Hus in sectarian organizations. The most important of these, the so-called Bohemian Brethren, had extended into Poland and Prussia before Luther's time. See Realencyk., III, 465-467.
One of the chief points of controversy between the Roman Church and the Hussites. The Roman Church administered to the laity only the bread, the Hussites used both elements. See below, pp. 178 f.
Luther had not yet reached the conviction that the administration of the cup to the laity was a necessity, but see the argument in the Babylonian Captivity, below, pp. 178 ff.
The Bohemian Brethren, who are here distinguished from the Hussites, Cf. Realencyk., III, 452, 49.
St. Thomas Aquinas, the great Dominican theologian of the XIII. Century (1225-74), whose influence is still dominant in Roman theology.
The view of the sacramental presence adopted by William of Occam. For Luther's own view at this time, see below, pp. 187 ff.
i.e., If they did not believe in the real presence of the body and blood of Christ in the Lord's Supper.
The philosophy of Aristotle dominated the mediaeval universities. It not only provided the forms in which theological and religious truth came to expression, but it was the basis of all scientific study in every department. The man who did not know Aristotle was an ignoramus.
Duns Scotus, died 1308. In the XV and XVI Centuries he was regarded as the rival of Thomas Aquinas for first place among the theological teachers of the Church.
i.e., "The chamber of his heart." Boniface VIII (1294-1303) had decreed, Romanus Pontifex jura omnia in scrinio pectories sui censetur habere," "the Roman pontiff has all laws in the chamber of his heart." This decree was received into the canon law (c. I, de const. in VI to (I, 2)).
Doctores decretorum, "Doctor of Decrees," an academic degree occasionally given to professors of Canon Law doctor scrinii papalis, "Doctor of the Papal Heart."
The introduction of Roman law into Germany, as the accepted law of the empire, had begun in the XII Century. With the decay of the feudal system and the increasing desire of the rulers to provide their government with some effective legal system, its application became more widespread, until by the end of the XV Century it was the accepted system of the empire. The attempt to apply this ancient law to conditions utterly different from those of the time when it was formulated, and the continual conflict between the Roman law, the feudal customs and the remnants of Germanic legal ideas, naturally gave rise to a state of affairs which Luther could justly speak of as "a wilderness."
"Sentences" (Sententiae, libri sententiarum) was the title of the text-books in theology. Theological instruction was largely by war of comment on the most famous book of Sentences, that of Peter Lombard.
Charles the Great, King of the Franks, was crowned Roman Emperor by Pope Leo III in the year 800 AD. He was a German, but regarded himself successor to the line of emperors who had ruled at Rome. The fiction was fostered by the popes, and the German kings, after receiving the papal coronation, were called Roman Emperors. From this came the name of the German Empire of the Middle Ages, "the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation." The popes of the later Middle Ages claimed that the bestowal of the imperial dignity lay in the power of the pope, and Pope Clement V (1313) even claimed that in the event of a vacancy the pope was the possessor of the imperial power (cf. above, p. 109). On the whole subject see BRYCE, Holy Roman Empire, 2d ed. (1904), and literature there cited.
Luther is characteristically careless about his chronology. By the "Turkish Empire" he means the Mohammedan power.
| Works of Martin Luter: With Introductions and Notes, Vol. II | |