1. This epistle is read today because the festival of Holy Trinity,
or of the three persons of the Godhead--which is the prime, great,
incomprehensible and chief article of faith--is observed on this day.
The object of its observance is that, by the Word of God, this truth
of the Godhead may be preserved among Christians, enabling them to
know God as he would be known. For although Paul does not treat of
that article in this epistle, but touches on it only in a few words
in the conclusion, nevertheless he would teach that in our attempts
to comprehend God we must not speculate and judge according to human
wisdom, but in the light of the Word of God alone. For these divine
truths are too far above the reach of reason ever to be comprehended
and explored by the understanding of man.
2. And although I have, on other occasions, taught and written on
this article fully and frequently enough, still I must say a few
words in general concerning it here. True, it is not choice German,
nor has it a pleasing sound, when we designate God by the word
"Dreifaltigkeit" (nor is the Latin, Trinitas, more elegant); but
since we have no better term, we must employ these. For, as I have
said, this article is so far above the power of the human mind to
grasp, or the tongue to express, that God, as the Father of his
children, will pardon us when we stammer and lisp as best we can, if
only our faith be pure and right. By this term, however, we would say
that we believe the divine majesty to be three distinct persons of
one true essence.
3. This is the revelation and knowledge Christians have of God: they
not only know him to be one true God, who is independent of and over
all creatures, and that there can be no more than this one true God,
but they know also what this one true God in his essential,
inscrutable essence is.
4. The reason and wisdom of man may go so far as to reach the
conclusion, although feebly, that there must be one eternal divine
being, who has created and who preserves and governs all things. Man
sees such a beautiful and wonderful creation in the heavens and on
the earth, one so wonderfully, regularly and securely preserved and
ordered, that he must say: It is impossible that this came into
existence by mere chance, or that it originated and controls itself;
there must have been a Creator and Lord from whom all these things
proceed and by whom they are governed. Thus God may be known by his
creatures, as St. Paul says: "For the invisible things of him since
the creation of the world are clearly seen, being perceived through
the things that are made, even his everlasting power and divinity."
Rom 1, 20. This is (a posteriori) the knowledge that we have when we
contemplate God from without, in his works and government; as one,
looking upon a castle or house from without, would draw conclusions
as to its lord or keeper.
5. But from within (a priori) no human wisdom has been able to
conceive what God is in himself, or in his internal essence. Neither
can anyone know or give information of it except it be revealed to
him by the Holy Spirit. For no one knoweth, as Paul says (1 Cor 2,
11), the things of man save the spirit of man which is in him; even
so the things of God none knoweth save the Spirit of God. From
without, I may see what you do, but what your intentions are and what
you think, I cannot see. Again, neither can you know what I think
except I enable you to understand it by word or sign. Much less can
we know what God, in his own inner and secret essence is, until the
Holy Spirit, who searcheth and knoweth all things, yea, the deep
things of God--as Paul says above--reveals it to us: as he does in
the declaration of this article, in which he teaches us the existence
in the divine majesty of the one undivided essence, but in such
manner that there is, first, the person which is called the Father;
and of him exists the second person called the Son, born from
eternity; and proceeding from both these is the third, namely, the
Holy Spirit. These three persons are not distinct from each other, as
individual brothers or sisters are, but they have being in one and
the same eternal, undivided and indivisible essence.
6. This, I say, is not discovered or attained to by human reason. It
is revealed from heaven above. Therefore, only Christians can
intelligently speak of what the Godhead essentially is, and of his
outward manifestation to his creatures, and his will toward men
concerning their salvation. For all this is imparted to them by the
Holy Spirit, who reveals and proclaims it through the Word.
7. Those who have no such revelation, and who judge according to
their own wisdom, such as the Jews, Turks and heathen, must consider
the Christian's declaration the greatest error and rankest heresy;
they must say that we Christians are mad and foolish in imagining
that there are three Gods, when, according to all reason--yea, even
according to the Word of God--there can be but one God. It would not
be reasonable, they will say, that there should be more than one
householder over the same house, more than one lord or sovereign over
the same government; much less reasonably should more than one God
reign over heaven and earth. They imagine that thus with their wisdom
they have completely overthrown our faith and exposed it to the
derision and scorn of all the world. As if we were all blockheads and
egregious fools and could not see their logic as well as they! But,
thank God, we have understanding equal to theirs, and can argue as
convincingly, or more so, than they with their Alkoran and Talmud,
that there is but the one God.
8. Further, we know, from the testimony of Holy Writ, that we cannot
expound the mystery of these divine things by the speculations of
reason and a pretense of great wisdom. To explain this, as well as
all the articles of our faith, we must have a knowledge higher than
any to which the understanding of man can attain. That knowledge of
God which the heathen can perceive by reason or deduce from rational
premises is but a small part of the knowledge that we should possess.
The heathen Aristotle in his best book concludes from a passage in
the wisest pagan poet, Homer: There can be no good government in
which there is more than one lord; it results as where more than one
master or mistress attempts to direct the household servants. So must
there be but one lord and regent in every government. This is all
rightly true. God has implanted such light and understanding in human
nature for the purpose of giving a conception and an illustration of
his divine office, the only Lord and Maker of all creatures. But,
even knowing this, we have not yet searched out or fathomed the
exalted, eternal, divine Godhead essence. For even though I have
learned that there is an only divine majesty, who governs all things,
I do not thereby know the inner workings of this divine essence
himself; this no one can tell me, except, as we have said, in so far
as God himself reveals it in his Word.
9. Now we Christians have the Scriptures, which we know to be the
Word of God. The Jews also have them, from whose fathers they have
descended to us. From these, and from no other source, we have
obtained all that is known of God and divine works, from the
beginning of the world. Even among the Turks and the heathen, all
their knowledge of God--excepting what is manifestly fable and
fiction--came from the Scriptures. And our knowledge is confirmed and
proven by great miracles, even to the present day. These Scriptures
declare, concerning this article, that there is no God or divine
being save this one alone. They not only manifest him to us from
without, but they lead us into his inner essence, and show us that in
him there are three persons; not three Gods or three different kinds
of divinity, but the same undivided, divine essence.
10. Such a revelation is radiantly shed forth from the greatest of
God's works, the declaration of his divine counsel and will. In that
counsel and will it was decreed from all eternity, and, accordingly,
was proclaimed in his promises, that his Son should become man and
die to reconcile man to God. For in our dreadful fall into sin and
death eternal, there was no way to save us excepting through an
eternal person who had power over sin and death to destroy them, and
to give us righteousness and everlasting life instead. This no angel
or other creature could do; it must needs be done of God himself.
Now, it could not be done by the person of the Father, who was to be
reconciled, but it must be done by a second person, with whom this
counsel was determined and through whom and for whose sake the
reconciliation was to be brought about.
11. Here there are, therefore, two distinct persons, one of whom
becomes reconciled, and the other is sent to reconcile and becomes
man. The former is called the Father, being first in that he did not
have his origin in any other; the latter is called the Son, being
born of the Father from eternity. To this the Scriptures attest, for
they make mention of God's Son; as, for instance, in Psalm 2, 7:
"Thou art my son; this day have I begotten thee;" and again,
Galatians 4, 4: "But when the fulness of the time came, God sent
forth his Son," etc. From this it necessarily follows that the Son,
who is spoken of as a person, must be distinct from the person of the
Father.
12. Again, in the same manner, the Spirit of God is specifically and
distinctively mentioned as a person sent or proceeding from God the
Father and the Son: for instance, God says in Joel 2, 28: "I will
pour out my Spirit upon all flesh," etc. Here a spirit is poured out
who is God's, or a divine spirit, and who must be of the same
essence, otherwise he could not say, "my Spirit;" and yet he must be
a person other than he who sent him or who pours out. Again, because
when he was sent he manifested himself, and appeared in his descent
in a visible form, like that of a dove or tongues of fire, he must be
distinct in person from both the Father and the Son.
13. But in this article of faith, in which we say that the Son of God
became man and that he was of the same nature as we ourselves are, in
order that he might redeem us from sin and death and give us eternal
life without any merit or worthiness of our own, we give Jews and
Turks no less occasion for laughter and mockery than when we speak of
the three persons. For this is a more absurd assertion by far, in the
estimation of human reason, which speculates in its Jewish and
Turkish--yea, heathenish--teachings, on this wise: God is an only,
almighty Lord of all, who has created all men and given them the law
according to which they are to live; accordingly it follows that he
will be merciful to the good and obedient, but will condemn and
punish the disobedient. Therefore, he who does good works and guards
himself against sin, God will reward. These are nothing but
heathenish conclusions drawn from earthly, worldly experience and
observation, as if God's government must be conducted on the same
principles as that of a father among his children and domestics; for
those are considered good rulers and masters who make a distinction
with regard to their own interests.
14. Such heathen ideas of wisdom, holiness and service of God are
taught and practiced by the Pope. And so we believed, myself and
others, while we were under him, not knowing any better; otherwise we
would have done and taught differently. And, in fact, he who has not
this revelation and Word of God, can neither believe nor teach other
than pagan doctrine. With such a faith, how much better were we than
the heathen and Turks? Yea, how could we guard ourselves against any
deception and lying nonsense that might be offered as good works and
as service of God? Then we had to follow every impostor who came with
his cowl and cord, as if Christ were represented in him; and we
thought that in the observance of these things we would be saved. So
the whole world was filled with naught but false service of
God--which the Scriptures properly call idolatry--the product of
human wisdom, which is so easily deceived by that which pretends to
be a good work and to be obedience to God. For human wisdom knows no
better; and how could it know better without the revelation? Even
when the revelation was proclaimed, human wisdom would not heed it,
but despised it and followed its own fancies. Hence it continued to
be hidden and incomprehensible to such wisdom, as Saint Paul says:
"For who hath known the mind of the Lord?"
15. But to us this counsel and mind of God in giving his Son to take
upon himself our flesh, is revealed and declared. For from the Word
of God we have the knowledge that no man of himself can be righteous
before God; that our whole life and all our deeds are under wrath and
condemnation, because we are wholly born in sin and by nature are
disobedient to God; but if we would be delivered from sin and be
saved, we must believe on this mediator, the Son of God, who has
taken our sin and death upon himself, by his own blood and death
rendering satisfaction, and has by his resurrection, delivered us. In
this truth we will abide, regardless of the ridicule heaped upon us
because of such faith, by heathen wisdom, which teaches that God
rewards the pious. We understand that quite as well, if not better,
than heathenism does. But in these mysteries we need a higher wisdom
than our own minds have devised or can devise, a wisdom given to us
by grace alone, through divine revelation.
16. For it is not our intention thus to pry into the counsel,
thoughts and ways of God with our understanding and opinions, and to
be his counselors, as they do who meddle in the affairs that are the
prerogative of the Godhead, and who even dare, in the face of this
passage of Saint Paul, to refuse to receive or learn of God, but
would impart to him that for which he must recompense again. And thus
they make gods after their own fancy, as many gods as they have
thoughts; so that every shabby monastic cowl or self-appointed work,
in their estimation, accomplishes as much and passes for as much as
God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, in their eternal divine counsel,
determine and accomplish. And they continue to be nothing but wearers
of cowls and instructors in works, which works even they can do who
know nothing of God and are manifestly scoundrels. And even though
they have long been occupied with these things, they still do not
know how matters stand between themselves and God. And it will ever
be true as Saint Paul says: "For who hath known the mind of the Lord,
or who hath been his counselor?"
17. For your own theories--which are no more than what anyone can
arrive at, conjecture or conceive in his own mind, without divine
revelation--are not a knowledge of the mind of God. And what does it
avail if you are not able to say more than that God is merciful to
the good and will punish the wicked? Who will assure you that you are
good and that you are pleasing to God with your papistic, Turkish
monkery and holiness? Is it all that is necessary to assert: God will
reward with heaven such as are faithful to the order? No, dear
brother, mere presumption, or an expression of your opinion, will not
suffice here. I could do that as well as you. Indeed, each may devise
his own peculiar idea; one a black, and another a gray monk's cowl.
But we should hear and know what God's counsel is, what is his will
and mind. This none can tell you by his own understanding, and no
book on earth can teach it except the Scriptures. These God himself
has given, and they make known to us that he has sent his Son into
the world to redeem us from sin and the wrath of God, and that
whosoever believes in him should have everlasting life.