# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_M rz 1855_S83
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Specimen and Prospectus etc. 83

works, and Luther has translated it here thus: "do great deeds," so that three different kinds of gifts are enumerated here altogether. — But must one now hold suspect the man who has such gifts, or condemn him as a false prophet on account of these gifts? By no means. For these gifts are in part necessary for the service of the Word, and in part they adorn and further it in a useful way. But Christ's meaning is this: these gifts, taken alone and by themselves, are not sufficiently certain marks, such that it must necessarily follow that whoever has them, his doctrine must be pure and sound, and that it would not be necessary still to weigh and examine the doctrine at length wherever this outward adornment is found. For Christ reminds us that such prophets, too, go about clothed in this adornment, this appearance and mask. If, then, one is to judge concerning doctrine, Christ's counsel is this: one should not look first and chiefly at that outward adornment, however glorious it may be, but must put that out of one's eyes and strip off the sheep's clothing, so that one may judge more easily and more rightly what their doctrine is like. For if the doctrine is pure and sound, then indeed those gifts further and adorn the office; but if the doctrine is corrupt, then that outward adornment is but a mask, and serves only to deceive the sheep. This, then, is the first point: just as one does not judge a tree by its leaves and blossoms, so one must also separate the sheep's clothing from the doctrine itself. —

But the other point is the true mark: "by their fruits shall ye know them." It is therefore certain that in order to judge concerning prophets or teachers, whether they be true or false, one must look to their fruits. The question then arises: what is to be understood here by fruits? Some explain it of conduct or of works. And indeed, if one understands this mark generally of all Christians, that is the right understanding, as we shall show later. The ancients, too, have in this sense referred the fruits to conduct and works. But when it is a matter of judging prophets or teachers, it is plain that even if their hypocrisy should in the end reveal itself in their works as well, their life and works must nevertheless be reckoned to the sheep's clothing and distinguished from the fruits. The simplest explanation, then, is this: just as the fruit of the Christian as a Christian is good works, so the fruit of the teacher as a teacher is the content or the character of his doctrine. And just as one recognizes from works, as from fruits, whether someone is an upright Christian or a hypocrite, so one must judge concerning true and false prophets by their fruits, that is, by the character of their doctrine. And this explanation is clearly furnished by the words of Luke. For whatever spirit a prophet has, his doctrine is fashioned accordingly. But we cannot see the spirit. How, then, shall we judge? Luke answers in verse 45: "A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth good things," etc. So then, according to what the prophet brings forth and says,