# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_December 1861_S368
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

368 Report on the Law.

...false teaching and shameful deed," of the year 1539: "For we too, who are now made holy through grace, nevertheless live in a sinful body, and must let ourselves, for the sake of such remaining sin, be punished, terrified, put to death, and offered up by the Law, even into the grave; so that the Law in this life, before and after, must ever be lex occidens, damnans, accusans (a killing, condemning, accusing law), as St. Paul and many of our books teach so abundantly." (Luther's Works, Erlangen Edition XXXII, 72; Walch's Edition XX, 2070.)

Further Luther writes in his "Exposition of the Chief Sum of God's Commandment" of the year 1524, on the words "That no law is given to the righteous" (1 Timothy 1), as follows: "Thus it remains, as St. Paul says, that the Law stands over the unrighteous, to restrain and terrify them, until they know that they must have something else and better, so that the Law's due may be satisfied and they may be rid of it. Then you say: If that is how it is, then no one on earth is righteous, for even St. Paul himself first sternly commands Timothy and says: As I have exhorted, etc., and shortly after: I charge you with this commandment. There, indeed, is a commandment, which he moreover calls commanding and charging. Indeed, how full is all of Scripture, Old and New Testament, of such commandments! Are then Paul and Timothy, or the Christians, not godly? Or what does he mean when he says: No law is given to the righteous, and yet goes on to give it to himself? According to the Spirit the believer is righteous, without any sin, and needs no law at all; according to the flesh he still has sin, etc. Therefore take for yourself a godly Christian who has a pure heart, a good conscience, and an unfeigned faith; he will have to speak thus: Although I have a pure heart, a good conscience, an upright faith, yet my flesh, my tongue, my fist are not pure — that is, the old rogue that hangs about my neck is still unclean. The faith that leads us up to God in heaven will suffer no law. There the heart has as much as one could ever ask: a joyful courage, delight in the good, a friendly and submissive heart that submits itself to everyone; there all is pure and upright. But outwardly the flesh does not yet want to follow; all sorts of filth and evil desire still cling to it — care for sustenance, fear of death, greed, anger, and hatred: the filth always remains alongside faith, so that it must fight and sweep against it. Because such a thing is still present, Scripture reckons us, in this respect, equal to the unrighteous and to sinners, in that we must have just as much law according to the flesh as they do, to restrain the flesh's desire and to subdue it. Yet this too happens with delight, out of the Spirit, not with vexation and unwillingness. For herein lies the distinction between the two: both are restrained by the Law, but those who are in the Spirit have a willing, joyful heart; the others do not. Therefore it is granted to the former and not imputed, although still...