# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1846 03 21_S58
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

had been, had done good service in similar cases, and he added: If you want it, I will fetch it. Luther said yes, and Aurifaber hurried quickly to the countess, but first called to Jonas and Cölius, who were in the room below, that they should hurry upstairs to Luther, which they did, and rubbed him with warm cloths, which brought him relief, so that he soon said: "He felt better."

Meanwhile Count Albrecht of Mansfeld came with Aurifaber and brought the proposed remedy, which he administered to him himself. When the count asked: How is it, dear Doctor? he answered: There is no danger, gracious lord, it is beginning to improve. The count therefore departed again, hoping that there would be no danger, but he left one of his councillors, Conrad von Wolframsdorf, along with Jonas, Cölius, Aurifaber, and Ambrosius, Luther's servant, with him. At his request, a second spoonful of that medicine mixed in wine was given to him, of which the aforementioned count's councillor first took a spoonful himself, so that Luther would be less wary of it. All this took place over the course of half an hour.

He then lay down on the couch in the room and said: "If I could slumber for half an hour, I hope it would get better." He then slept gently for an hour and a half, while his friends and his two sons remained with him. When the clock struck ten, he awoke, was surprised that they were keeping watch over him, and said: "See, are you still sitting up? Won't you go to bed?" to which those present replied: No, Doctor, now it is our turn to watch and wait upon you. He then rose alone, and as he stepped over the threshold into his bedchamber, he said: "God's will be done, I am going to bed"; and then, in Latin, as he often did: "Into your hands I commend my spirit; you have redeemed me, O Lord, faithful God." Ps. 31:5.

After he had lain down in his bed, which was well warmed, he gave his hand to all who had followed him, wished them a good night, and said, as he had already done several times before: "Dr. Jonas, and M. Cölius, and the rest of you, pray for our Lord God and his Gospel, that it may go well with him, for the Council of Trent and the wretched pope are dealing harshly with him in their wrath" — by which he once again made known his unceasing care for the Church of Christ and his untiring faithfulness in urging prayer for her. After this he had a gentle, sound sleep for three hours, until the clock struck one.

Then Luther awoke again, called his servant Ambrosius, and told him to heat the room, though it had already been kept warm the whole night through. Jonas asked him whether he felt weak again, to which he answered: "Ah, Lord God, how great is my pain! Ah, dear Doctor Jonas, I think I shall remain here in Eisleben (since here I was born and baptized)." Then Jonas and his servant comforted him and said: Ah, reverend father, God, our heavenly Father,
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will help, through Christ, whom you have preached. Luther then rose from his bed, went alone and without help once more out of his chamber into the room, and, as he stepped over the threshold, spoke in Latin the same words he had said the evening before when going to bed: "Into your hands I commend my spirit; you have redeemed me, O Lord, faithful God."

After he had walked back and forth a little in the room, he lay down on a couch there, which became his deathbed, and complained that something pressed very hard on his chest, but that it still spared his heart. He now desired to be rubbed with warm cloths, saying that being kept warm helped him well. While this was happening, upon receiving word, Luther's landlord, the town clerk Joh. Alb. Drachstedt, together with his wife, two physicians named Wild and Ludwig, and finally Count Albrecht of Mansfeld and his consort hurried to the scene; the latter labored without ceasing to revive him with all manner of restoratives she had brought along.

But despite all the efforts of those standing by, no improvement came, and Luther said: "Dear God, I am in great pain and distress; I am passing away; I shall surely remain here in Eisleben now." Then Jonas and Cölius comforted him and said: Reverend father, call upon your Lord Jesus Christ, our High Priest, the one Mediator; you have broken into a great, good sweat — God will grant grace, so that it will get better. "Yes," Luther replied, "it is a cold, deathly sweat; I shall give up my spirit, for the sickness is increasing."

Thereupon he began to pray and said: "O my heavenly Father, one God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, you God of all comfort, I thank you for revealing to me your dear Son Jesus Christ, whom I have preached and confessed, whom I have loved and praised, whom the wretched pope and all the godless disgrace, persecute, and blaspheme. I beseech you, my Lord Jesus Christ, let my little soul* be commended to you. O heavenly Father, though I must now leave this body and be torn away out of this life, yet I know for certain that I shall remain with you forever, and that no one can tear me out of your hands."

*) He undoubtedly said "little soul" out of deep humility before God, as if to say: What a poor creature I am before you, you great, infinite, eternal Majesty.

He further said, in Latin: "For God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." John 3:16. Likewise the words: "We have a God who helps, and the Lord GOD, by whom we escape death." Ps. 68:20.

After Luther had taken, for the last time, one more spoonful of a very strengthening medicine, he said once again: "I am passing away; I shall give up my spirit," and repeated three times, very quickly, the words: "Into your hands I commend my spirit; you have redeemed me, O Lord, faithful God." Ps. 31:5.

When he had thus commended his spirit into the hands of God, his heavenly Father, he began to grow still; they shook him, rubbed him, and the countess, as well as the physicians, applied all manner of restorative waters to him; they called to him, but he closed his eyes and did not answer. As he lay thus still, Jonas and Cölius at last called to him in a loud voice: Reverend father, will you die steadfastly holding to Christ and the doctrine as you have preached it? Then once more he answered with a clear and loud "Yes!" and this was his last word, with which he closed and sealed his doctrine and his faith; for after this word he turned onto his right side and began to sleep for nearly a quarter of an hour, so that some of those standing by drew hope again; but the physicians and others did not trust this sleep, and repeatedly held a light under his face, and behold, he grew ever more strikingly pale, his feet and nose grew cold, he drew one more deep yet gentle breath, and with that gave up his spirit, quietly and with the greatest patience, so that no one could perceive in him any restlessness, agony, or pain of death, but he fell asleep peacefully and gently in the Lord, as Simeon sings, and Aurifaber closed his eyes. —

So died Dr. Martin Luther, in his native town of Eisleben, after an illness of only two hours, on February 18, 1546, in the morning at about 3 o'clock. The time of his pilgrimage had lasted 62 years, 14 weeks, 1 day, and 4 hours. He died in the presence of his two younger sons and twelve other persons, who stood mourning and weeping at his deathbed and are trustworthy witnesses of his last hours, for the precise account of which we are especially indebted to three among them, namely Jonas, Cölius, and Aurifaber — in which God's hand is plainly to be seen, since it not only had all of this recorded most exactly at once, but has also kept it uncorrupted for 300 years; surely a rare example, indeed unique of its kind.

Such a death Luther had often wished for himself. Thus Dr. Bugenhagen testifies the following in the funeral sermon held for him: "I still recall how, when the reverend, our dear father Dr. Martinus Luther, saw certain persons fall sweetly asleep in the confession of Christ, he would say: Grant me, O God, that I too may fall asleep just as sweetly in the bosom of Christ, and that my body not be tormented with long death-pains — yet let God's will be done." Cölius reports of him in his funeral sermon that "he had prayed, if it should please God, that he might not have to suffer long upon a sickbed"; and Dr. Weller writes: "I remember well that I often heard much said of the man of God, Dr. Luther: that he feared and dreaded nothing less than a swift and sudden death, inasmuch as those who are taken away by a sudden death need not long dispute with the