The fact that the text of the three chief parts existed long before
Luther does not detract from the service which he rendered the
Catechism. Luther's work, moreover, consisted in this, 1. that he
brought about a general revival of the instruction in the Catechism of
the ancient Church; 2. that he completed it by adding the parts treating
of Baptism, Confession, and the Lord's Supper; 3. that he purged its
material from all manner of papal ballast; 4. that he eliminated the
Romish interpretation and adulteration in the interest of
work-righteousness; 5. that he refilled the ancient forms with their
genuine Evangelical and Scriptural meaning. Before Luther's time the
study of the Catechism had everywhere fallen into decay. There were but
few who knew its text, and when able to recite it, they did not
understand it. The soul of all Christian truths, the Gospel of God's
free pardon for Christ's sake, had departed. Concerning "the three parts
which have remained in Christendom from of old" Luther said that "little
of it had been taught and treated correctly." (CONC. TRIGL. 575, 6.)
In his _Warning to My Dear Germans,_ of 1531, he enlarges on the same
thought as follows; "Thanks to God, our Gospel has produced much and
great good. Formerly no one knew what was Gospel, what Christ, what
Baptism, what Confession, what Sacrament, what faith, what spirit, what
flesh, what good works, what the Ten Commandments, what the Lord's
Prayer, what praying, what suffering, what comfort, what civil
government, what matrimony, what parents, what children, what lords,
what servant, what mistress what maid, what devil, what angel, what
world, what life, what death, what sin, what right, what forgiveness of
sin, what God, what bishop, what pastor, what Church, what a Christian,
what the cross. Sum, we knew nothing of what a Christian should know.
Everything was obscured and suppressed by the papal asses. For in
Christian matters they are asses indeed, aye, great, coarse, unlearned
asses. For I also was one of them and know that in this I am speaking
the truth. And all pious hearts who were captive under the Pope, even as
I, will bear me out that they would fain have known one of these things,
yet were not able nor permitted to know it. We knew no better than that
the priests and monks alone were everything; on their works we based our
hope of salvation and not on Christ. Thanks to God, however, it has now
come to pass that man and woman, young and old, know the Catechism, and
how to believe, live, pray, suffer, and die; and that is indeed a
splendid instruction for consciences, teaching them how to be a
Christian and to know Christ." (W. 30, 3, 317.)
Thus Luther extols it as the great achievement of his day that now every
one knew the Catechism, whereas formerly Christian doctrine was unknown
or at least not understood aright. And this achievement is preeminently
a service which Luther rendered. He revived once more the ancient
catechetical parts of doctrine, placed them in the proper Biblical
light, permeated them with the Evangelical spirit, and explained them in
conformity with the understanding of the Gospel which he had gained
anew, stressing especially the _finis historiae_ (the divine purpose of
the historical facts of Christianity, as recorded in the Second
Article), the forgiveness of sins not by works of our own, but by grace,
for Christ's sake.