# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1846 03 21_S57
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Der Lutheraner.

"God's Word and Luther's teaching shall pass away neither now nor ever."

Edited by C. F. W. Walther.

Volume 2.

St. Louis, Mo., March 21, 1846.

No. 15.

Terms: Der Lutheraner appears once every two weeks, at a subscription price of one dollar for out-of-town subscribers, who must pay half of this in advance and bear the postage. — In St. Louis, each single issue is sold for 5 cents.

(Submitted by Pastor Keyl.)
The Tercentenary Commemoration of Luther's Death.
(Continued.)

Luther's Last Hours and Blessed End.

We now come to a consideration of his last day of life, his last hours, and his blessed end, as it is all recounted, in particular, in Dr. Jonas's letter to the Elector and in his and M. Cölius's report on Luther's death, as coming from faithful eyewitnesses. The former is found in Luther's Works only in Walch's edition, XXI, 274 ff., the latter in the same place, 280 ff., as well as in the Leipzig edition, XXI, 693, the Altenburg edition, VIII, 847, the Jena edition, VIII, 383 or 421, and the Wittenberg edition, XII, 460. The necessary supplements have for the most part been taken from J. G. Walter's Reports of the Last Deeds and Life-History of Luther.

During the three weeks that Luther stayed in Eisleben, he was in fairly good health, so that he was able to attend the negotiations for a settlement, preach four times, perform two ordinations, write several letters and essays, and otherwise attend to other business; he was able to take part in the midday and evening meals every day, and indeed particularly praised the food and drink, as it tasted so good to him in his native land. He was also able to sleep and rest fairly well every night, and his two sons, his friends, and the servants who slept with him in his chamber saw to it faithfully every evening that his bed was well warmed each time; to his friends Jonas and Cölius he cheerfully bade good night every evening, often with these words: "Pray for our Lord God, that it may go well with him in the matter of his Church. The Council of Trent is very wrathful." After he had taken part regularly in the negotiations the whole time, and indeed each time for one to one and a half hours, all present, especially also the princes and counts, asked him not to do this any longer, but to spare himself; accordingly, on Wednesday, February 17, he did not go for the first time into the larger lower room in which those meetings were held, but remained in his upper room and either lay on a couch, or walked back and forth, at times looking out the window and praying so fervently that those who were with him heard it.

In the evening before the meal he began to complain that something was pressing on his chest, though it had not yet reached his heart, and when, at his request, he was rubbed with warm cloths, he said the pressure eased somewhat; nevertheless he then went into the larger room for the evening meal, on which occasion he said: Being alone brings no joy; Eccles. 4:4. He still partook of food and drink as usual, and was cheerful in doing so. At this, his last evening meal, however, he also spoke at length on important matters concerning death and eternal life, and said, among other things: "Ah, dear God, twenty years is a short time; yet this little space of time renders the world desolate, when man and woman do not come together according to God's creation and ordinance; how truly all is vanity of creation (creatio): God gathers to himself a great part of his Christian Church out of little children. For I believe that when a child of one year dies, a thousand or two thousand children of that age always die with it. But when I, Doctor Martinus, sixty-three years old, die, I do not suppose that sixty or a hundred of you will die with me throughout the world; for the world is not growing old just now. Well then, we old men must live so long for this reason: that we may look the devil in the backside, and experience so much wickedness, faithlessness, and misery of the world, so that we may be witnesses that the devil has been so evil a spirit. The human race is like a sheepfold of slaughter-sheep." The second-to-last sentence Seckendorf has thoroughly defended against the slanders which Cochlaeus raised against it. For although these words were spoken somewhat freely, as among close friends, the expression, offensive to many, was nevertheless customary in Luther's time, and perhaps refers to some satanic apparition which he had had shortly before. But by that expression Luther meant to signify nothing other than the affliction of the children of God: that the longer they live, the more devilish wickedness and violence they must experience.

At that last evening meal, Luther also pondered this question, "whether in that future blessed and eternal assembly and church we shall also know one another"; and when his friends asked him to answer this important question, he replied: "How did it happen with Adam? He had never in his life seen Eve; he lay there and slept: yet when he awoke, he did not say, Where do you come from? What are you? but rather: This is flesh of my flesh, and bone taken from my bones. How did he know that the woman had not sprung from some stone? It happened because he was full of the Holy Spirit and was in true knowledge of God. To that knowledge and that image we shall be renewed again in Christ in that life, so that we shall know father, mother, and one another, and know one another's faces better than Adam and Eve did."

Not long after these words, Luther rose from the meal and went up alone to his room, and, as he always used to do, gave a good night to everyone he met on his way, extending his hand, down to the servants at the last. This happened at 8 o'clock. His two younger sons, Martinus and Paulus, and M. Cölius followed him, and he said his prayer at the window as usual, which J. Sickel, Dr. Jonas's famulus, recorded, and which reads thus: "Lord God, heavenly Father, I call upon you in the name of your dear Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, whom by your grace I have confessed and preached; grant, according to your promise, that for the honor of your name you would graciously hear me also in this: since, according to your great mercy and your gracious will, you have revealed to me the great apostasy and darkness of the pope before your holy day, which is not far off but at the door, and which is to follow upon the light of the Gospel and is now coming to pass in all the world — grant that you would graciously preserve the church of my beloved fatherland until the end, without apostasy, in pure truth and constancy of the right confession of your Word, so that the whole world may be convinced that you sent me for this purpose. Ah, dear Lord God. Amen. Amen!"

Meanwhile, when Cölius had gone back downstairs and Aurifaber had entered Luther's room, he said: "But I feel faint and anxious again, as before, about my chest." Then Aurifaber advised him to take scraped unicorn horn, which, for the young counts whose tutor he