# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1846 06 27_S85
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Der Lutheraner.

"God's Word and Luther's teaching shall not pass away, now nor ever."

Edited by C. F. W. Walther.

Volume 2.

St. Louis, Mo., June 27, 1846.

No. 22.

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

Holy Absolution
Vindicated against the Slanders of the Methodists.
(Conclusion.)

Two objections still remain which the Methodists raise against the doctrine of holy absolution and against its use in the Lutheran Church, which we must now finally answer.

First, it is objected against us that many unconverted, carnal hearts comfort themselves with the absolution they have received even in the midst of their service to sin, and thereby only become the more secure and hardened. To this we can answer briefly with the well-known proverb: Abusus non tollit usum, that is, abuse does not abolish proper use. The holy apostle Paul did not on that account cease to preach loudly that Christ lets his greatest grace fall precisely upon the most unworthy sinners, although carnal hearts accused him for this of holding to the principle, "Let us do evil, that good may come" (Romans 3:8); he taught, indeed, that where sin abounded, grace abounded much more, although some drew from this the conclusion that one should continue in sin so that grace might become all the more abundant (Romans 5:20; 6:1). So then, let hypocrites go on twisting the sweet preaching of grace into an excuse for wantonness — for their sake the troubled hearts must not be deprived of the full pasture of the Gospel. Moreover, it is well known how earnestly truly Lutheran preachers have always contended, and still contend, against the abuse of holy absolution, and that they teach that every absolution, even though it is granted (as is proper) without any stated condition, always includes within itself the condition of repentance.*)

*) "That the aforesaid absolution is conditional — it is so, as is also any public sermon; and every absolution, both public and private, has the condition of faith, for without faith it does not absolve, and is therefore not a false key. For faith does not build upon our worthiness, but consists only in this, that one accepts the absolution and says Yes to it." Luther's Works, vol. XXI, 424.

Without dwelling any longer on this objection, we turn to the consideration of the last one. Mr. Mulfinger and Mr. Nast finally maintain, namely, that biblical and church history testify against the claim that the power to absolve was ever exercised in the Church of God. The former writes: "That no such power of absolution in God's stead was ever vested in the apostles or in the first ministers of the church, we have the proof that neither the apostles nor the early church, in its purest and best days, used it or claimed it." The latter, after having offered a sort of history of the origin of private confession, writes: "The more the actual public church penance ceased (in the fifth century), the more the clergy gave themselves the appearance as though God had directly authorized them to forgive sins."

If truth were always on the side of those who display the greatest boldness in their assertions, then we would of course, as always, have to yield the field to the Methodist gentlemen here too without further ado. But since, as is well known, it is not the assertion but the proof that decides the matter, we ask our readers to note the following.

First, the Lutheran Church also teaches that confession, although we already find its practice in Scripture,*) is nevertheless only a free human ordinance: it is therefore not to be understood why Mr. Nast, since he wishes to present the history of the origin of absolution, speaks not of absolution but of confession. Either Mr. Nast himself was not clear on the matter, or he wished, for the sake of his argument, to produce obscurity and confusion in his readers.

*) Matthew 3:5–6: "Then went out to him" — that is, to John the Baptist — "Jerusalem, and all Judaea, and all the region round about Jordan, and were baptized of him in Jordan, confessing" (making confession of) "their sins."

Second, it must be considered that the Lutherans themselves by no means claim that the manner in which absolution is administered by them was commanded by God himself and has therefore always been the practice in the Church of God. We Lutherans know full well that it is indeed no commandment of God that even those who have committed no public sins and have not offended the church, or who do not have a particularly severely afflicted conscience, must regularly make use of the comfort of absolution; we know further that it is certainly not commanded by God that one must, every single time one wishes to go to the holy Supper, first be absolved by a minister of Christ; we know finally that it is still far less God's commandment that every such absolution must be preceded by a confession naming one's sins specifically. All this, we do not deny, is form and manner, and therefore belongs among the human ordinances which the church itself has the right and authority to establish and, according to circumstances, to alter. If, therefore, Messrs. Mulfinger and Nast cannot find the manner of applying absolution now current in the Lutheran Church in the biblical and church history of the early period of the Christian church, this should not surprise them. We have never claimed that the Lutheran Church's manner of using the keys of the kingdom of heaven has always been in use and was commanded by God. We say only this much, that the Church of God on earth has always had, and still has, the power to forgive sinners their sins in the name of the Lord, and that its forgiveness has been, and still is, valid and effective in heaven as well.

We now wish to prove this also from biblical and church history.

In the Old Testament, believers indeed had to rely for the most part solely on the general promises; yet we read that the prophets, too, at times appropriated the general promises of grace to particular individuals specifically and pronounced them to them — that is, that they absolved them.*)

*) Cf. Luther, who writes thus: "One must allow room for the comforting, free Gospel, that it may be spoken both to each individual person and to many. But what else is absolution than the Gospel spoken to a single person, who thereby receives comfort concerning his known sin?" Works, Halle ed., XVI, 2178.

When, for example, David reported to the prophet Nathan with the words, "I have sinned against the LORD," the latter immediately absolved him and said, "The LORD also hath put away thy sin; thou shalt not die" (2 Samuel 12:13). Turning now to the New Testament, we find in it not only that Christ absolved a number of sinners (Luke 5:20–26; 7:48–49),