Historical Introductions to the Symbolical Books of the Evangelical Lutheran Church

287. Scripture Sole Standard and Rule

From the high estimation in which Luther was held by the Formula of Concord it has falsely been inferred that this Confession accords Luther the "highest authority" as Hase says, or considers him "the regulative and almost infallible expounder" of the Bible, as Schaff asserts. (Creeds 1, 313.) But according to the Formula the supreme arbiter and only final rule in all matters of religion is the inspired Word of God; and absolutely all human teachers and books, including Luther and the Lutheran symbols, are subject to its verdict. When, after Luther's death, God permitted doctrinal controversies to distract the Church, His purpose, no doubt, being also to have her fully realize not only that Luther's doctrine is in complete harmony with Scripture, but, in addition, that in matters of faith and doctrine not Luther, not the Church, not the symbols, nor any other human authority but His Word alone is the sole rule and norm. The Formula certainly learned this lesson well. In its opening paragraph we read: "We believe, teach, and confess that the sole rule and standard according to which both all doctrines and all teachers should be estimated and judged are the prophetic and apostolic Scriptures of the Old and the New Testament alone… Other writings, however, of ancient or modern teachers, whatever name they bear must not be regarded as equal to the Holy Scriptures, but all of them together be subjected to them." (777, 1.) And in this, too, the Formula was conscious of being in agreement with Luther. Luther himself, it declares, "has expressly drawn this distinction namely, that the Word of God alone should be and remain the only standard and rule of doctrine, to which the writings of no man should be regarded as equal, but to which everything should be subjected." (853, 9.) Scripture is, and always must remain, the only norma normans, the standard that rules everything, – such was the attitude of the Formula of Concord.

Accordingly, the proof proper for the truth of any doctrinal statement is taken by the Formula neither from the Lutheran symbols nor the writings of Luther, but from the Word of God. And the only reason why the promoters and framers of the Formula were determined to restore the unadulterated teaching of Luther was because, in the controversies following his death, they had thoroughly convinced themselves that, on the one hand, the doctrines proclaimed by Luther were nothing but the purest gold mined from the shafts of God's Word, and that, on the other hand, the various deviations from Luther's teaching, which had caused the dissensions, were aberrations not only from the original Lutheran Confessions, but also from Holy Scripture. The thirty years of theological discussion had satisfied the Lutherans that to adhere to the Bible was tantamount to adhering to the teaching of Luther, and vice versa. Accordingly, the Formula also declared it as its object to prove that the doctrines it presented were in harmony with the Bible, as well as with the teaching of Luther and the Augsburg Confession. (856, 19.) This agreement with the Word of God and the preceding Lutheran symbols constitutes the Formula a Lutheran confession, which no one who is a true Lutheran can reject or, for doctrinal reasons, refuse to accept.

288. Formula Benefited Lutheran Church

It has frequently been asserted that the Formula of Concord greatly damaged Lutheranism, causing bitter controversies, and driving many Lutherans into the fold of Calvinism, e. g., in the Palatinate (1583), in Anhalt, in Hesse, and in Brandenburg (1613). Richard says: "The Formula of Concord was the cause of the most bitter controversies, dissensions, and alienations. The position taken by the adherents of the Formula of Concord that this document is the true historical and logical explanation of the older confessions and is therefore the test and touchstone of Lutheranism, had the effect, as one extreme generates a counter-extreme, of driving many individual Lutherans and many Lutheran churches into the Calvinistic fold, as that fold was represented in Germany by the Heidelberg Catechism as the chief confession of faith." (516.)

But this entire view is founded on indifferentism and unionism flowing from the false principle that quality must be sacrificed to quantity, eternal truth to temporal peace and unity to external progress and temporary success. Viewed in the light of God's Word, error is the centrifugal force and the real cause of dissension and separations among Christians, while divine truth always acts as a centripetal or a truly unifying power. The Formula therefore, standing clearly as it does for divine truth only, cannot be charged with causing dissension and breeding trouble among Christians. It settled many controversies and healed dissensions, but produced none. True, the Formula was condemned by many, but with no greater justice and for no other reasons than those for which the truths of God's Word have always been assailed by their enemies.

Nor is the statement correct that the Formula of Concord drove loyal Lutherans out of their own churches into Calvinistic folds. It clearly stated what, according to God's Word and their old confessions, Lutherans always will believe, teach, and confess, as also what they always must reject as false and detrimental to the cause of the Church of Christ; however, in so doing, it did not drive Lutherans into the ranks of the Calvinists, but drove masked Calvinists out of the ranks of loyal Lutherans into those folds to which they really belonged. Indeed, the Formula failed to make true Lutherans of all the errorists; but neither did the Augsburg Confession succeed in making friends and Lutherans of all Papists, nor the Bible, in making Christians of all unbelievers. However, by clearly stating its position in thesis and antithesis, the Formula did succeed in bringing about a wholesome separation, ridding the Lutheran Church of antagonistic spirits, unsound tendencies, and false doctrines. In fact, it saved the Church from slow, but sure poisoning at the hands of the Crypto-Calvinists; it restored purity, unity, morale, courage, and hope when she was demoralized, distracted, and disfigured by many dissensions and corruptions. Whatever, by adopting the Formula of Concord the Lutheran Church therefore may have lost in extension, it won in intention; what it lost in numbers, it won in unity, solidity, and firmness in the truth.

True, the Formula of Concord completely foiled Melanchthon's plan of a union between the Lutheran and Reformed churches on the basis of the Variata of 1540, – a fact which more than anything else roused the ire of Philippists and Calvinists. But that was an ungodly union, contrary to the Word of God; a union involving a denial of essential Christian truths; a union incompatible with the spirit of Lutheranism, which cannot survive where faith is gagged and open confession of the truth is smothered; a union in which Calvinism, engrafted on Lutheranism, would have reduced the latter to a mere feeder of a foreign life. However, though it shattered the ungodly plans of the Philippists and Calvinists, the Formula did not in the least destroy the hope of, or block the way for, a truly Christian agreement. On the contrary, it formulated the only true basis for such a union, which it also realized among the Lutherans. And if the Lutheran and Reformed churches will ever unite in a true and godly manner it must be done on the basis of the truths set forth by the Formula.

289. Necessity of Formula of Concord

Several Lutheran states, as related above, declined to accept the Formula of Concord, giving as their reason for such action that there was no need of a new confession. The fact, however, that the Formula was adopted by the great majority of Lutheran princes, professors, preachers, and congregations proves conclusively that they were of a different opinion. A new confession was necessary, not indeed because new truths had been discovered which called for confessional coining or formulation, but because the old doctrines, assailed by errorists, were in need of vindication, and the Lutheran Church, distracted by prolonged theological warfare, was sorely in need of being restored to unity, peace, and stability. The question-marks suspended everywhere in Germany after Luther's death were: Is Lutheranism to die or live? Are its old standards and doctrines to be scrapped or vindicated? Is the Church of Luther to remain, or to be transformed into a unionistic or Reformed body? Is it to retain its unity, or will it become a house divided against itself and infested with all manner of sects?

Evidently, then, if the Lutheran Church was not to go down ingloriously, a new confession was needed which would not only clear the religious and theological atmosphere, but restore confidence, hope, and normalcy. A confession was needed which would bring out clearly the truths for which Lutherans must firmly stand if they would be true to God, true to His Word, true to their Church, true to themselves, and true to their traditions. A confession was needed which would draw exactly, clearly, and unmistakably the lines which separate Lutherans, not only from Romanists, but also from Zwinglians, Calvinists, Crypto-Calvinists, unionists, and the advocates of other errors and unsound tendencies. Being essentially the Church of the pure Word and Sacrament, the only way for the Lutheran Church to maintain her identity and independence was to settle her controversies not by evading or compromising the doctrinal issues involved, but by honestly facing and definitely deciding them in accordance with her principles: the Word of God and the old confessions. Particularly with respect to the doctrine of the Lord's Supper, Melanchthon by constantly altering the Augsburg Confession, had muddied the water to such an extent that the adoption of the Augustana was no longer a clear test of Lutheran orthodoxy and loyalty. Even Calvin, and the German Reformed generally subscribed to it, "in the sense," they said, "in which Melanchthon has explained it." The result was a corruption of Lutheranism and a pernicious Calvinistic propaganda in Lutheran territories. A new confession was the only means of ending the confusion and checking the invasion.

290. Formula Fully Met Requirements

The Formula of Concord was just such a confession as the situation called for. The Preface to the Apology of the Book of Concord, signed by Kirchner, Selneccer, and Chemnitz, remarks that the purpose of the Formula was "to establish and propagate unity in the Lutheran churches and schools, and to check the Sacramentarian leaven and other corruptions and sects." This purpose was fully attained by the Formula. It maintained and vindicated the old Lutheran symbols. It cleared our Church from all manner of foreign spirits which threatened to transform its very character. It settled the controversies by rendering a clear and correct decision on all doctrinal questions involved. It unified our Church when she was threatened with hopeless division, anarchy, and utter ruin. It surrounded her with a wall of fire against all her enemies. It made her a most uncomfortable place for such opponents of Lutheranism as Crypto-Calvinists, unionists, etc. It infused her with confidence, self-consciousness, conviction, a clear knowledge of her own position over against the errors of other churches and sects, and last, but not least, with a most remarkable vitality.

Wherever and whenever, in the course of time, the Formula of Concord was ignored, despised, or rejected, the Lutheran Church fell an easy prey to unionism and sectarianism; but wherever and whenever the Formula was held in high esteem, Lutheranism flourished and its enemies were confounded. Says Schaff: "Outside of Germany the Lutheran Church is stunted in its normal growth, or undergoes with the change of language and nationality, an ecclesiastical transformation. This is the case with the great majority of Anglicized and Americanized Lutherans, who adopt Reformed views on the Sacraments, the observance of Sunday, church discipline, and other points." But the fact is that, since Schaff wrote the above, the Lutheran Church developed and flourished nowhere as in America, owing chiefly to the return of American Lutherans to their confessions, including the Formula of Concord. The Formula of Concord fully supplied the dire need created by the controversies after Luther's death; and, despite many subsequent controversies, also in America, down to the present day, no further confessional deliverances have been necessary, and most likely such will not be needed in the future either.

The Formula of Concord, therefore, must ever be regarded as a great blessing of God. "But for the Formula of Concord," says Krauth, "it may be questioned whether Protestantism could have been saved to the world. It staunched the wounds at which Lutheranism was bleeding to death; and crises were at hand in history in which Lutheranism was essential to the salvation of the Reformatory interest in Europe. The Thirty Years' War, the war of martyrs, which saved our modern world, lay indeed in the future of another century, yet it was fought and settled in the Cloister of Bergen. But for the pen of the peaceful triumvirate, the sword of Gustavus had not been drawn. Intestine treachery and division in the Church of the Reformation would have done what the arts and arms of Rome failed to do. But the miracle of restoration was wrought. From being the most distracted Church on earth, the Lutheran Church had become the most stable. The blossom put forth at Augsburg, despite the storm, the mildew, and the worm, had ripened into the full round fruit of the amplest and clearest Confession in which the Christian Church has ever embodied her faith." (Schmauk, 830.)

291. Formula Attacked and Defended

Drawing accurately and deeply, as it did, the lines of demarcation between Lutheranism, on the one hand, and Calvinism, Philippism, etc., on the other, and thus also putting an end to the Calvinistic propaganda successfully carried on for decades within the Lutheran Church, the Formula of Concord was bound to become a rock of offense and to meet with opposition on the part of all enemies of genuine Lutheranism within as well as without the Lutheran Church. Both Romanists and Calvinists had long ago accustomed themselves to viewing the Lutheran Church as moribund and merely to be preyed upon by others. Accordingly, when, contrary to all expectations, our Church, united by the Formula, rose once more to her pristine power and glory, it roused the envy and inflamed the ire and rage of her enemies. Numerous protests against the Formula, emanating chiefly from Reformed and Crypto-Calvinistic sources, were lodged with Elector August and other Lutheran princes. Even Queen Elizabeth of England sent a deputation urging the Elector not to allow the promulgation of the new confession. John Casimir of the Palatinate, also at the instigation of the English queen, endeavored to organize the Reformed in order to prevent its adoption. Also later on the Calvinists insisted that a general council (of course, participated in by Calvinists and Crypto-Calvinists) should have been held to decide on its formal and final adoption!

Numerous attacks on the Formula of Concord were published 1578, 1579, 1581, and later, some of them anonymously. They were directed chiefly against its doctrine of the real presence in the Lord's Supper, the majesty of the human nature of Christ, and eternal election, particularly its refusal to solve, either in a synergistic or in a Calvinistic manner, the mystery presented to human reason in the teaching of the Bible that God alone is the cause of man's salvation, while man alone is the cause of his damnation. In a letter to Beza, Ursinus, the chief author of the Heidelberg Catechism, shrewdly advised the Reformed to continue accepting the Augsburg Confession, but to agitate against the Formula. He himself led the Reformed attacks by publishing, 1581, "Admonitio Christiana de Libro Concordiae, Christian Admonition Concerning the Book of Concord," also called "Admonitio Neostadiensis, Neustadt Admonition." Its charges were refuted in the "Apology or Defense of the Christian Book of Concord —Apologia oder Verantwortung des christlichen Konkordienbuchs, in welcher die wahre christliche Lehre, so im Konkordienbuch verfasst, mit gutem Grunde heiliger, goettlicher Schrift verteidiget, die Verkehrung aber und Kalumnien, so von unruhigen Leuten wider gedachtes christliche Buch ausgesprenget, widerlegt worden," 1583 (1582). Having been prepared by command of the Lutheran electors, and composed by Kirchner, Selneccer, and Chemnitz, and before its publication also submitted to other theologians for their approval, this guardedly written Apology, also called the Erfurt Book, gained considerable authority and influence.

The Preface of this Erfurt Book enumerates, besides the Christian Admonition of Ursinus and the Neustadt theologians, the following writings published against the Formula of Concord: 1. Opinion and Apology (Bedencken und Apologie) of Some Anhalt Theologians; 2. Defense (Verantwortung) of the Bremen Preachers; Christian Irenaeus on Original Sin; Nova Novorum ("ein famos Libell"); other libelli, satyrae et pasquilli; Calumniae et Scurrilia Convitia of Brother Nass (Bruder Nass); and the history of the Augsburg Confession by Ambrosius Wolf, in which the author asserts that from the beginning the doctrine of Zwingli and Calvin predominated in all Protestant churches. The theologians of Neustadt, Bremen, and Anhalt replied to the Erfurt Apology; which, in turn, called forth counter-replies from the Lutherans. Beza wrote: Refutation of the Dogma Concerning the Fictitious Omnipresence of the Flesh of Christ. In 1607 Hospinian published his Concordia Discors," [tr. note: sic on punctuation] to which Hutter replied in his Concordia Concors. The papal detractors of the Formula were led by the Jesuit Cardinal Bellarmin, who in 1589 published his Judgment of the Book of Concord.

292. Modern Strictures on Formula of Concord

Down to the present day the Formula of Concord has been assailed particularly by unionistic and Reformed opponents of true Lutheranism. Schaff criticizes: "Religion was confounded with theology, piety with orthodoxy, and orthodoxy with an exclusive confessionalism." (1, 259.) However, the subjects treated in the Formula are the most vital doctrines of the Christian religion: concerning sin and grace, the person and work of Christ, justification and faith, the means of grace, – truths without which neither Christian theology nor Christian religion can remain; "Here, then," says Schmauk, "is the one symbol of the ages which treats almost exclusively of Christ – of His work, His presence, His person. Here is the Christ-symbol of the Lutheran Church. One might almost say that the Formula of Concord is a developed witness of Luther's explanation of the Second and Third Articles of the Apostles' Creed, meeting the modern errors of Protestantism, those cropping up from the sixteenth to the twentieth century, in a really modern way." (751.) Tschackert also designates the assertion that the authors of the Formula of Concord "abandoned Luther's idea of faith and established a dead scholasticism" as an unjust charge. (478.) Indeed, it may be questioned whether the doctrine of grace, the real heart of Christianity, would have been saved to the Church without the Formula.

R. Seeberg speaks of the "ossification of Lutheran theology" caused by the Formula of Concord, and Tschackert charges it with transforming the Gospel into a "doctrine." (571.) But what else is the Gospel of Christ than the divine doctrine or statement and proclamation of the truth that we are saved, not by our own works, but by grace and faith alone, for the sake of Christ and His merits? The Formula of Concord truly says: "The Gospel is properly a doctrine which teaches what man should believe, that he may obtain forgiveness of sins with God, namely, that the Son of God, our Lord Christ, has taken upon Himself and borne the curse of the Law, has expiated and paid for all our sins, through whom alone we again enter into favor with God, obtain forgiveness of sins by faith, are delivered from death and all the punishments of sins, and eternally saved." (959, 20.) Says Schmauk: "The Formula of Concord was … the very substance of the Gospel and of the Augsburg Confession, kneaded through the experience of the first generation of Protestantism, by incessant and agonizing conflict, and coming forth from that experience as a true and tried teaching, a standard recognized by many." (821.) The Formula of Concord is truly Scriptural, not only because all its doctrines are derived from the Bible, but also because the burden of the Scriptures, the doctrine of justification, is the burden also of all its expositions the living breath, as it were, pervading all its articles.