According to _De Servo Arbitrio_ God's majesty and His mysterious
judgments and ways must not be searched, nor should speculations
concerning them be made the guide of our faith and life. Luther says:
"Of God or of the will of God proclaimed and revealed, and offered to
us, and which we meditate upon, we must treat in a different way than of
God in so far as He is not proclaimed, not revealed, and not offered to
us, and is not the object of our meditations. For in so far as God hides
Himself, and desires not to be known of us, we have nothing to do with
Him. Here the saying truly applies, 'What is above us does not concern
us.'" (E. 221, St. L. 1794.) "We say, as we have done before, that one
must not discuss the secret will of [divine] majesty, and that man's
temerity, which, due to continual perverseness, disregards necessary
matters and always attacks and encounters this [secret will], should be
called away and withdrawn from occupying itself with scrutinizing those
secrets of divine majesty which it is impossible to approach; for it
dwells 'in the light which no man can approach unto,' as Paul testifies,
1 Tim. 6, 16." (E. 227; St. L. 1801.) This statement, that God's majesty
must not be investigated, says Luther, "is not our invention, but an
injunction confirmed by Holy Scripture. For Paul says Rom. 9, 19-21:
'Why doth God yet find fault? For who hath resisted His will? Nay but, O
man, who art thou that repliest against God?... Hath not the potter
power,' etc.? And before him Isaiah, chapter 58, 2: 'Yet they seek Me
daily, and delight to know My ways, as a nation that did righteousness,
and forsook not the ordinance of their God. They ask of Me the
ordinances of justice; they take delight in approaching to God,' These
words, I take it, show abundantly that it is unlawful for men to
scrutinize the will of majesty." (E. 228; St. L. 1803.)
Instead of searching the Scriptures, as they are commanded to do, men
unlawfully crave to investigate the hidden judgments of God. We read:
"But we are nowhere more irreverent and rash than when we invade and
argue these very mysteries and judgments which are unsearchable.
Meanwhile we imagine that we are exercising incredible reverence in
searching the Holy Scriptures, which God has commanded us to search.
Here we do not search, but where He has forbidden us to search, there we
do nothing but search with perpetual temerity, not to say blasphemy. Or
is it not such a search when we rashly endeavor to make that wholly free
foreknowledge of God accord with our liberty, and are ready to detract
from the prescience of God, if it does not allow us liberty, or if it
induces necessity, to say with the murmurers and blasphemers, 'Why doth
He find fault? Who shall resist His will? What is become of the most
merciful God? What of Him who wills not the death of the sinner? Has He
made men that He might delight Himself with their torments?' and the
like, which will be howled out forever among the devils and the damned."
(E. 266, St. L. 1848.)
God's unknowable will is not and cannot be our guide. Luther: "The
_Diatribe_ beguiles herself through her ignorance, making no distinction
between the proclaimed and the hidden God, that is between the Word of
God and God Himself. God does many things which He has not shown us in
His Word. He also wills many things concerning which He has not shown us
in His Word that He wills them. For instance, He does not will the death
of a sinner namely, according to His Word, but He wills it according to
His inscrutable will. Now, our business is to look at His Word,
disregarding the inscrutable will; for we must be directed by the Word,
not by that inscrutable will (_nobis spectandum est Verbum
relinquendaque illa voluntas imperscrutabilis; Verbo enim nos dirigi,
non voluntate illa inscrutabili oportet_). Indeed, who could direct
himself by that inscrutable and unknowable will? It is enough merely to
know that there is such an inscrutable will in God; but what, why, and
how far it wills, that is altogether unlawful for us to inquire into, to
wish [to know], and to trouble or occupy ourselves with; on the
contrary, we should fear and adore it." (E. 222; St. L. 1795)
Instead of investigating the mysteries of divine majesty, men ought to
concern themselves with God's revelation in the Gospel. Luther: "But let
her [human temerity] occupy herself with the incarnate God or, as Paul
says, with Jesus Crucified, in whom are hidden all the treasures of
wisdom and knowledge. For through Him she has abundantly what she ought
to know and not to know. It is the incarnate God, then, who speaks here
[Matt. 23]: 'I would, and thou wouldest not.' The incarnate God, I say,
was sent for this purpose, that He might will, speak, do, suffer, and
offer to all men all things which are necessary to salvation, although
He offends very many who, being either abandoned or hardened by that
secret will of His majesty, do not receive Him who wills, speaks, works,
offers, even as John says: 'The light shineth in darkness, and the
darkness comprehendeth it not;' and again: 'He came unto His own and His
own received Him not.'" (E. 227f., St. L. 1802.)