# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_Juli 1855_S202
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

202 Lutheran-Theological Pastors’ Library.

rather than being derived from their own context, from the words rightly understood, compared with one another, and carefully considered. And Lobechius*) speaks quite correctly of this when he says: “This is the correct understanding of the confession, which it derives from the unshakable foundation of Holy Scripture and from the pronouncement of the Holy Spirit himself, and which the confession itself explains in clear words, which the letter gives and whose meaning it shows, and which is also presented by the pure writings of our forefathers, especially those of the man of God Luther and of our churches in the Formula of Concord. . . Those act wrongly who wish to advise us to accept the above condition that the symbolic books be interpreted according to Scripture. For no foreign understanding of Scripture must be introduced into the Symbols; rather, the correct understanding contained in them must first be sought out, and afterward, once it has been found, it must be tested according to Scripture and judged as to whether it is true or erroneous.” (pp. 860–863.)

We could cite many more testimonies from the writings of our orthodox theologians to prove that, when we refuse to accede to the demand “to understand our good confessions according to the guidance of Scripture,” we are walking in the footsteps of the godly teachers of our church in former times; what has been cited, however, should already suffice to prove this. In conclusion, however, we declare that, enlightened and warned by church history, we can recognize in that demand nothing but a temptation to be unfaithful to the good confession to which we have sworn.

(To be continued.)

Lutheran-Theological Pastors’ Library.

(Continued.)

5. Having listed, with regard to the exegetical field, those writings whose study is intended to provide the ability to investigate the meaning of Scripture independently, we now proceed to present those works that contain the application of exegesis, or the results of our theologians’ study of Scripture, namely, the biblical commentaries produced by our church.

a. As regards, first of all, the works that contain continuous explanations of the text of the entire Holy Scripture of the Old and New Testaments, we are not in doubt for a moment when asked which work we must name as the one most immediately necessary for a Lutheran pastor; it is the so-called Weimar Bible Commentary in folio, which is also still cited here and there under the following titles

*) David Lobech was professor of theology at Rostock and died there in 1603.