Martin Luther
On war against Islamic reign of terror
1528
(On war against the Turk)
Vom Kriege wider die Türken, 1528
(WA 30 II, 107-148)
Luther’s preface
Count of Katzenellenbogen, Ziegenhain and Nidda, My gracious lord.
Grace and peace in
Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior. Serene, highborn Prince,
gracious Lord.
Certain
persons have been begging me for the past five years to write about war against
the Turks, and encourage our people and stir them up to it, and now that the
Turk is actually approaching, my friends are compelling me to do this duty,
especially since there are some stupid preachers among us Germans (as I am
sorry to hear) who are making the people believe that we ought not and must not
fight against the Turks. Some are even so crazy as to say that it is not proper
for Christians to bear the temporal sword or to be rulers; also because our
German people are such a wild and uncivilized folk that there are some who want
the Turk to come and rule. All the blame for this wicked error among the people
is laid on Luther and must be called “the fruit of my Gospel,” just as I must
bear the blame for the rebellion, and for everything bad that happens anywhere
in the world.
My
accusers know better, but God and His Word to the contrary, they pretend not to
know better, and seek occasion to speak evil of the Holy Ghost and of the truth
that is openly confessed, so that they may earn the reward of hell and never
receive repentance or the forgiveness of their sins.
Therefore
it is necessary for me to write of these things for my own sake and the
Gospel’s sake and to enter our defense; not because of the blasphemers,
however. They are not good enough to make it worthwhile to say a single word of
defense to them, for to them the Gospel must always be a stench and a savor of
death unto death, as they have deserved by their willful blasphemy. But I must
write in order that innocent consciences may not any longer be deceived by
these slandermongers, and made suspicious of me or my
doctrine, and may not be deceived into believing that we must not fight against
the Turks. I have thought best to publish this little book under the name of
your Grace, who are a famous and mighty prince, so that it may be the better
received and the more diligently read. Thus, if it came to a discussion of a
campaign against the Turks, the princes and lords would readily recall it. I
commend your Grace to our merciful God’s grace and favor, that He may keep your
Grace against all error and against the craft of the devil, and illumine and
strengthen your Grace for a blessed reign.
Your Grace’s devoted Martin
Luther Wittenberg, October 9, 1528
The two kingdoms
Pope Leo the Tenth, in the bull
in which he put me under the ban, condemned, among other statements, the
following one. I had said that “to fight against the Turk is the same thing as
resisting God, who visits our sin upon us with this rod.” From this article
they may get it, who say that I prevent and dissuade from war against the Turk.
I still confess freely that this article is mine and that I put it forth and
defended it at the time; and if things in the world were in the same state now
that they were in then, I would still have to put it forth and defend it. But
it is not fair to forget how things then stood in the world, and what my grounds
and reasons were, and still keep my words and apply them to another situation
where those grounds and reasons do not exist. With this kind of art, who could
not make the Gospel a pack of lies or pretend that it contradicted itself?
This
was the state of things at that time – no one had taught, no one had heard, and
no one knew anything about temporal government, whence it came, what its office
and work was, or how it ought to serve God. The most learned men (I shall not
name them) held temporal government for a heathen, human, ungodly thing, as
though it were perilous to salvation to be in the ranks of the rulers.
Therefore, the priests and monks had so driven kings and princes into the
corner, as to persuade them that, to serve God, they must undertake other
works, such as hearing mass, saying prayers, endowing masses, etc. In a word,
princes and lords who wanted to be pious men held their rank and office as of
no value and did not consider it a service of God. They became really priests
and monks, except that they did not wear tonsures and cowls. If they would
serve God, they must go to church. All the lords then living would have to
testify to this, for they knew it by experience. My gracious lord, Duke
Frederick, of blessed memory, was so glad when I first wrote On Temporal
Government, that he had the little book copied out and put in a special
binding, and was happy that he could see what his position was before God.
Thus
the pope and the clergy were, at that time, all in all, over all, and through
all, like God in the world, and the temporal rulers were in darkness, oppressed
and unknown. But the pope and his crowd wanted to be Christians, too, and
therefore pretended to make war on the Turk. Over those two points the
discussion arose, for I was then working on doctrine that concerned Christians
and the conscience, and had as yet written nothing about the temporal rulers.
The papists, therefore, called me a flatterer of the princes, because I was
dealing only with the spiritual class, and not with the temporal; just as they
call me seditious, now that I have written in such glorification of temporal
government as no teacher has done since the days of the apostles, except,
perhaps,
Counsels or binding commands
Among the points of Christian
doctrine, I discussed what Christ says, in Matthew, viz., that a Christian
shall not resist evil, but endure all things, let the coat go and the cloak,
let them be taken from him, offer the other cheek, etc. Of this the pope, with
his universities and cloister-schools, had made “an advice,” not a commandment,
and not a rule that a Christian must keep; thus they had perverted Christ’s
word, spread false doctrine throughout the world, and deceived Christians.
Since, therefore, they wanted to be Christians, nay, the best Christians in the
world, and yet fight against the Turk, endure no evil, and suffer neither
compulsion nor wrong, I opposed them with this saying of Christ that Christians
shall not resist evil, but suffer all things and let all things go. Upon this I
based the article that Pope Leo condemned. He did it the more gladly because I
took the rogue’s-cloak off the Roman knavery.
For
the popes had never seriously intended to make war on the Turk, but used the
Turkish war as a conjurer’s hat, playing around in it, and robbing
It
did not please me, either, that the Christians and the princes were driven,
urged, and irritated into attacking the Turk and making war on him, before they
amended their own ways and lived like true Christians. These two points, or either separately, were enough reason to dissuade
from war. For I shall never advise a heathen or a Turk, let
alone a Christian, to attack another or begin war. That is nothing else
than advising bloodshed and destruction, and it brings no good fortune in the
end, as I have written in the book On Soldiers; and it never does any good when
one knave punishes another without first becoming good himself.
Misuse of the Christian name
But what moved me most of all was
this. They undertook to fight against the Turk under the name of Christ, and
taught men and stirred them up to do this, as though our people were an army of
Christians against the Turks, who were enemies of Christ; and this is straight
against Christ’s doctrine and name. It is against His doctrine, because He says
that Christians shall not resist evil, shall not fight or quarrel, not take
revenge or insist on rights. It is against His name, because in such an army
there are scarcely five Christians, and perhaps worse people in the eyes of God
than are the Turks; and yet they would all bear the name of Christ. This is the
greatest of all sins and one that no Turk commits, for Christ’s name is used
for sin and shame and thus dishonored. This would be especially so if the pope
and the bishops were in the war, for they would put the greatest shame and
dishonor on Christ’s name, since they are called to fight against the devil
with the Word of God and with prayer, and would be deserting their calling and
office and fighting with the sword against flesh and blood. This they are not
commanded, but forbidden to do.
O
how gladly would Christ receive me at the Last Judgment, if when summoned to
the spiritual office, to preach and care for souls, I had left it and busied
myself with fighting and with the temporal sword! And how should Christ come to
it that He or His have anything to do with the sword and go to war, and kill
men’s bodies, when He glories in it that He has come to save the world, not to
kill people? For His work is to deal with the Gospel and by His Spirit to
redeem men from sin and death, nay, to help them from this world to everlasting
life. According to John
I
say this not because I would teach that worldly rulers ought not
be Christians, or that a Christian cannot bear the sword and serve God in
temporal government. Would God they were all Christians,
or that no one could be a prince unless he were a Christian! Things would be
better than they now are and the Turk would not be so powerful. But what I
would do is keep the callings and offices distinct and apart, so that everyone
can see to what he is called, and fulfill the duties of his office faithfully
and with the heart, in the service of God. Of this I have written more than
enough elsewhere, especially in the books On Soldiers and On Temporal
Government. For Paul will not suffer it that in the Church, where all should be
Christians, one assume another’s office ( Romans 12:4
and Corinthians 12:15), but exhorts every member to his own work, so that no
disorder arise, but everything be done in an orderly way. How much less, then,
is the disorder to be tolerated that arises when a Christian leaves his office
and takes upon him a temporal office, or when a bishop or pastor leaves his
office and takes upon him the office of a prince or judge; or, on the other
hand, when a prince takes up the office of a bishop and lets his princely
office go? Even today this shameful disorder rages and rules
in the whole papacy, contrary to their own canons and laws.
Inquire
of experience how well we have succeeded hitherto with the Turkish war, though
we have fought as Christians until we have lost Rhodes and almost all of
Confusion of Christianity and politics
How many wars, think you, have
there been against the Turk in which we would not have received heavy losses,
if the bishops and clergy were there? How pitifully the fine king Lassla, with his bishops was beaten by the Turk at
I
have heard of fine soldiers who have thought that the king of France, when he
was defeated and captured by the emperor before Pavia, had all of his bad
fortune because he had the pope’s, or as they boastfully call them, the
Church’s, people with him. For after they came to his camp with a great cry of
Ecclesia, ecclesia! “Church, Church!” there was no more good fortune there.
This is what the soldiers say, though perhaps they do not know the reason for
it, viz., that is not right for the pope, who wants to be a Christian, and the
highest and best Christian preacher at that, to lead a church army, or army of
Christians. For the Church ought not strive or fight with the sword; it has
other enemies than flesh and blood, their name is the wicked devils in the air;
therefore it has other weapons and swords and other wars, so that it has enough
to do, and cannot mix in the wars of the emperor or princes, for the Scriptures
say that there shall be no good fortune where men are disobedient to God.
Again,
if I were a soldier and saw in the field a priests’ banner, or banner of the
cross, even though it were a crucifix I should run as though the devil were
chasing me; and even if they won a victory, by God’s decree, I should not take
any part in the booty or the rejoicing. Even the wicked iron-eater, Pope
Julius, who was half devil, did not succeed, but had to call at last on the
Emperor Maximilian and let him take charge of the game, despite the fact that
Julius had more money, arms, and people. I think, too, that this latest pope,
Clement, whom people held almost a god of war, succeeded well with his fighting
until he lost Rome and all its wealth to a few ill-armed soldiers. The
conclusion is this: Christ will teach them to understand my article, that
Christians shall not make war, and the condemned article must take its revenge,
for it is said of Christians and will be uncondemned
and right and true; although they do not care and do not believe it, but rush
on more and more, hardened and unrepentant, and go to destruction. To this I
say Amen, Amen.
It
is true, indeed, that since they have temporal lordship and wealth, they ought
to make out of it the same contributions to the emperor, kings, or princes that
other holdings properly make, and render the same services that others are
expected to render. Nay, these “goods of the Church,” as they call them, ought
above all others to serve and help in the protection of the needy and the
welfare of all classes, for they are given for that purpose, not in order that
a bishop may forget his office and use them for war or battle. If the banner of
Emperor Charles or of a prince is in the field, then let everyone run boldly
and gladly to the banner to which his allegiance is sworn; but if the banner of
a bishop, cardinal, or pope is there, then run the other way, and say “I do not
know this coin; if it were a prayer book, or the Holy Scriptures preached in
the Church, I would rally to it.”
Facing two fronts
Now before I exhort or urge to
war against the Turk, hear me, for God’s sake, while I first teach you how to
fight with a good conscience. For although, if I wanted to give way to the old
Adam, I could keep quiet and look on while the Turk revenged me upon the
tyrants who persecute the Gospel and subject me to all kinds of pain, and paid
them back for it, nevertheless, I shall not do this, but rather serve both
friends and enemies, so that my sun may rise on both bad and good, and my rain
fall on the thankful and unthankful.
In
the first place, it is certain that the Turk has no right or command to begin
war and to attack lands that are not his. Therefore, his war is nothing else
than outrage and robbery, with which God is punishing the world, as He often
does through wicked knaves, and sometimes through godly people. For he does not
fight from necessity or to protect his land in peace, as the right kind of a
ruler does, but like a pirate or highwayman, he seeks to rob and damage other
lands, who are doing and have done nothing to him. He is God’s rod and the
devil’s servant; there is no doubt about that.
In
the second place, it must be known that the man, whoever he is, who is going to
make war against the Turk, must be sure that he has a commission from God and
is doing right. He must not plunge in for the sake of revenge or have some
other mad notion or reason. He must be sure of this, so that, win or lose, he may be in a state of salvation and in a godly
occupation.
There
are two of these men, and there ought to be only two: the one is named
Christian, the other Emperor Charles.
The first front – penance and prayer
Christian should be first, with
his army. For since the Turk is the rod of the wrath of the Lord our God and
the servant of the raging devil, the first thing to be done is to smite the
devil, his lord, and take the rod out of God’s hand, so that the Turk may be
found in his own strength only, all by himself, without the devil’s help and
without God’s hand. This should be done by Sir Christian, that is, the pious,
holy, dear body of Christians. They are the people who have the arms for this
war and know what to do with them. If the Turk’s god, the devil, is not first
beaten, there is reason to fear that the Turk will not be so easy to beat. Now
the devil is a spirit, who cannot be beaten with armor, guns, horses, and men,
and God’s wrath cannot be allayed by them, as it is written in Psalm 33:17 -
18, “The Lord hath no pleasure in the strength of the horse, neither delighteth he in any man’s legs; the Lord delighteth in them that fear him and wait for his
goodness.” Christian weapons and power must do it.
Here
you ask, “Who are the Christians and where does one find them?” Answer: They
are not many, but they are everywhere, though they are spread out thin and live
far apart, under good and bad princes. Christendom must continue to the end, as
the article of the Creed says, “I believe one holy Christian Church.” But if
that is true, it must be possible to find them. Every pastor and preacher ought
to exhort his people most diligently to repentance and to prayer. They ought to
drive men to repentance by showing our great and numberless sins and our
ingratitude, by which we have earned God’s wrath and disfavor, so that He
justly gives us into the hands of the devil and the Turk. That this preaching
may work the more strongly, they ought to cite examples and sayings out of the
Scriptures, such as the Flood, Sodom and Gomorrah, and the children of Israel,
and show how cruelly and how often God punished the world, and its lands and
peoples; and they ought to make it plain that it is no wonder, since we sin
more heavily than they did, if we are punished worse than they.
Instructions for penance
and prayer
Verily, this fight must be begun
with repentance, and we must reform our lives, or we shall fight in vain; as
the prophet Jeremiah says in the chapter, “I will speak at one time against a
kingdom to pluck it up, destroy it, and scatter it; but if that people against
which I speak repent, I will repent me of the evil that I thought to do it;
again I speak of a kingdom and people to plant and build it, but if it do evil
in my sight, and hear not my voice, I will repent me of the good that I had
said I would do it.
Therefore,
speak to them of
Along
with these must be cited the words and illustrations of Scripture in which God
makes it known how well He is pleased with true repentance or amendment, made
in faith and reliance on His Word – such as, in the Old Testament the examples
of Kings David, Ahab, Mannasseh, and the like; in the
New Testament of St. Peter, the malefactor, the publican in the Gospel, and so
forth. Although I know that to the scholars and saints, who need no repentance,
this advice of mine will be laughable and that they hold it for a simple and
common thing which they have long since got beyond; nevertheless, I have not
been willing to omit for the sake of myself and sinners like myself, who need
both repentance and exhortation to repentance every day. In spite of it, we
remain all too lazy and lax, and have not, with those “ninety and nine just
persons,” got so far over the hill as they permit themselves to think they
have.
After
people have been thus taught and exhorted to confess their sin and amend their
ways, they should then be exhorted with the utmost diligence to prayer, and
shown how such prayer pleases God, how He has commanded it and promised to hear
it, and that no one ought to think lightly of his own praying, or have doubts
about it, but be sure, with firm faith, that it will be heard; all of which has
been published by us in many tracts. For the man who doubts, or prays at a
venture, would do better to let it alone, because such prayer is merely a
tempting of God and only makes things worse. Therefore, I would advise against
processions, f112 which are a heathenish and useless practice, for they are
pomp and show rather than prayer. It might, indeed, be of some use to have the
people, especially the young people, sing the Litany at mass or vespers or in
the church after the sermon, provided that everyone, at home, by himself, conconstantly raised to Christ at least a sigh of the heart
for grace to lead a better life and for help against the Turk. I am not
speaking of much long praying, but of frequent brief sighs, in one or two
words, such as “O help us, dear God the Father; have mercy on us, dear Lord
Jesus Christ!” or the like.
Lo,
this kind of preaching will strike the Christians and find them out, and there
will be Christians who will accept it and act according to it; it matters not
if you do not know who they are. The tyrants and bishops may also be exhorted
to desist from their raging and persecution against the Word of God and not to
hinder our prayer; but if they do not desist, we must not cease to pray, but
keep on, and take the chance that they will have the benefit of our prayer and
be preserved along with us, or that we shall pay for their raging and be ruined
along with them. They are so perverse and blind that if God gave good fortune
against the Turk, they would ascribe it to their holiness and merit and boast
of it against us. On the other hand, if things turned out badly, they would
ascribe it to no one but us, and lay the blame on us, disregarding the
shameful, openly sinful, and wicked life, which they not only lead, but defend;
for they cannot teach rightly a single point about the way to pray, and they
are worse than the Turks. Ah, well. We must leave that to God’s judgment!
In
this exhortation to prayer, also, we must introduce sayings and examples from
the Scriptures, in which it is shown how strong and mighty a man’s prayer has
sometimes been; for example, Elijah’s prayer, which St. James praises; the
prayers of Elisha and other prophets; of Kings David, Solomon, Asa, Jehoshaphat, Jesis,
Hezekiah, etc.; the story of how God promised Abraham that He would spare the
land of Sodom and Gomorrah for the sake of five righteous men; for the prayer
of righteous men can do much if it be persistent, says St. James in his
Epistle. They are to be informed, besides, that they shall be careful not to
anger God by not praying, and not to fall under His judgment, in Ezekiel 13:5,
where God says, “Ye have not set yourselves against me, and opposed yourselves
as a wall before the house of Israel, to stand against the battle in the day of
the Lord”; and in Ezekiel 22, “I sought a man among them who would be a wall,
and stand against me for the land, that I should not destroy it, but I found
none. Therefore I poured my wrath upon them and consumed them with the fire of
my anger and paid them as they deserved, saith the
Lord.”
Penance and prayer against Gods wrath
From this it is easy to see that
God would have men set themselves in the way of his wrath and keep it off, and
that He is greatly angered if this is not done. That is what I meant when I
spoke above about taking the rod out of God’s hands. Let him fast who will. Let
him go down on his knees and bow and fall to the ground, if he is in earnest;
for the bowing and kneeling that has been practiced hitherto in the chapters
and monasteries was not in earnest; it was, and still is, mere apery. It is not
for nothing that I exhort pastors and preachers to impress this upon the
people, for I see plainly that it rests entirely with the preachers whether the
people shall amend their ways and pray, or not. Little will be accomplished by
preaching in which men call Luther names and blaspheme, and let repentance and
prayer alone; but where God’s Word is spoken, it is not without fruit. They,
however, must preach as though they were preaching to saints who had learned
all that there was to know about repentance and faith, and therefore had to
talk about something higher.
We
should have been moved to this prayer against the Turk by the great need of our
time, for the Turk, as has been said, is the servant of the devil, who not only
ruins land and people with the sword, as we shall hear later, but also lays
waste the Christian Faith and our dear Lord Jesus Christ. For although some
praise his government because he allows everyone to believe what he will so
long as he remains the temporal lord, yet this praise is not true, for he does
not allow Christians to come together in public, and no one can openly confess
Christ or preach or teach against Mohammed.
What
kind of freedom of belief is it when no one is allowed to preach or confess
Christ, and yet our salvation depends on that confession as Paul says, “To
confess with the lips saves,” and Christ has strictly commanded to confess and
teach His Gospel.
Since,
therefore, faith must be kept quiet and held secret among this barbarous and
wild people and under this severe rule, how can it at last exist or remain,
when there is need for so much trouble and labor, in places where it is
preached most faithfully and diligently? Therefore, it happens, and must
happen, that those Christians who are captured or otherwise get into Turkey
fall away and become altogether Turkish, and it is very seldom that one remains
true to his faith, for they lack the living bread of souls and see the free and
fleshly life of the Turks and are obliged to adapt themselves to it.
How
can one injure Christ more than with these two things; namely, force and wiles?
With force, they prevent preaching and suppress the Word.
With
wiles, they daily put wicked and dangerous examples before men’s eyes and draw
men to them. If we then would not lose our Lord Jesus Christ, His Word and
faith, we must pray against the Turks as against other enemies of our salvation
and of all good. Nay, as we pray against the devil himself.
Islam – the faith of
the Muslims
In this connection, the people
should be told of all the dissolute life and ways that the Turk practices, so
that they may the better feel the need of prayer. To be sure, it has often
disgusted me and still does, that neither our great lords nor our scholars have
been at any pains to give us any certain knowledge about the life of the Turks
in the two classes, spiritual and temporal; and yet he has come so near to us.
For it is said that they too have chapters and monasteries. Some indeed have
invented outrageous lies about the Turks in order to stir up us Germans against
them, but there is no need for lies; the truth is all too great. I will tell my
dear Christians a few things, so far as I know the real truth, so that they may
the better be moved and stirred up to pray earnestly against the enemy of
Christ our Lord.
I
have some pieces of Mohammed’s Koran which might be called in German a book of
sermons or doctrines of the kind that we call pope’s decretals.
When I have time, I must put it into German so that every man may see what a
foul and shameful book it is. f116 In the first place, he praises Christ and
Mary very much as those who alone were without sin, and yet he believes nothing
more of Christ than that he is a holy prophet, like Jeremiah or Jonah, and
denies that he is God’s Son and true God. Besides, he does not believe that
Christ is the Savior of the world, Who died for our
sins, but that He preached to His own time, and completed His work before His
death, just like any other prophet.
Islam denies Christ
On the other hand, he praises and
exalts himself highly and boasts that he has talked with God and the angels,
and that since Christ’s office of prophet is now complete, it has been
commanded to him to bring the world to his faith and if the world is not
willing, to compel it or punish it with the sword; and there is much
glorification of the sword in it. Therefore, the Turks think their Mohammed
much higher and greater than Christ, for the office of Christ has ended and
Mohammed’s office is still in force.
From
this anyone can easily observe that Mohammed is a destroyer of our Lord Christ
and His kingdom, and if anyone denies concerning Christ, that He is God’s Son
and has died for us, and still lives and reigns at the right hand of God, what
has he left of Christ? Father, Son, Holy Ghost, Baptism, the Sacrament, Gospel,
Faith and all Christian doctrine and life are gone, and there is left, instead
of Christ, nothing more than Mohammed with his doctrine of works and especially
of the sword. That is the chief doctrine of the Turkish faith in which all
abominations, all errors, all devils are piled up in one heap.
And
yet, the world acts as though it were snowing pupils of the Turkish faith, for
it pleases the reason extraordinarily well that Christ should not be God, as
the Jews also believe, and especially is Reason pleased with the thought that
men are to rule and bear the sword and get up in the world; then the devil
pushes it along. Thus a faith is patched together out of the faith of Jews,
Christians and heathen. He gets it from the Christians when he praises Christ
and Mary and the apostles and other saints. He gets it from the Jews that
people are not to drink wine, are to fast the certain times of the year, wash
like the Nazarites, and eat off the ground, and go on
with such holy works as part of our monks do and hope for everlasting life at
the Judgment Day, for, holy people that they are, they believe in the
resurrection of the dead, though few of the papists believe in it.
What
pious Christian heart would not be horrified at this enemy of Christ, since we
see that the Turk allows no article of our faith to stand, except the single
one about the resurrection of the dead? Then Christ is no redeemer, savior, or
king; there is no forgiveness of sins, no grace, no Holy Ghost.
Why
should I say much? In the article that Christ is to be beneath Mohammed, and
less than he, everything is destroyed. Who would not rather be dead than live
under such a government, where he must say nothing about his Christ, and hear
and see such blasphemy and abomination against Him? Yet it takes such a
powerful hold, when it wins a land, that people even
submit to it willingly. Therefore, let everyone pray who can pray that this
abomination may not become lord over us and that we may not be punished with
this terrible rod of God’s anger.
Islam rules with arms
In the second place, the Turk’s
Koran, or creed, teaches him to destroy not only the Christian faith, but also
the whole temporal government. His Mohammed, as has been said, commands that
ruling is to be done by the sword, and in his Koran the sword is the commonest
and noblest work.
Thus
the Turk is, in truth, nothing but a murderer or highwayman, as his deeds show
before men’s eyes. St. Augustine calls other kingdoms, too, great robbery;
Psalm 76:4 also calls them “fastnesses of robbers,” f118 because it is but seldom
that an empire has come up except by robbery, force, and wrong; or at the very
least, it is often seized and possessed by wicked people without any justice,
so that the Scriptures, in Genesis 10:9, call the first prince upon earth,
Nimrod, a mighty hunter. But never has any kingdom come up and become so mighty
by murder and robbery as that of the Turk; and he murders and robs every day,
for it is commanded in their law, as a good and divine work, that they shall
rob and murder, devour and destroy more and more those that are round about
them; and they do this, and think that they are doing God service. Their
government, therefore, is not a regular rulership,
like others, for the maintenance of peace, the protection of the good, and the
punishment of the wicked, but a rod of anger and a punishment of God upon the
unbelieving world, as has been said. The work of murdering and robbing pleases
the flesh in any case, because it enables men to gain high place and subject
everyone’s life and goods to themselves; how much more must the flesh be
pleased when this is a commandment, as though God would have it so and it
pleased Him well! Therefore among the Turks, too, they are held the best who
are diligent to increase the Turkish kingdom and who are constantly murdering
and robbing round about them.
This
second thing must follow out of the first; for Christ says, in John
All
fanatics, as a rule, when the spirit of lies has taken possession of them and
led them away from the true faith, have been unable to stop there, but have
followed the lie with murder and taken up the sword, as a sign that they were
children of the father of all lies and murder. Thus we read how the Arians
became murderers and one of the greatest bishops of Alexandria, Lucius by name, drove the orthodox out of the city, and
went into the ship and held a naked sword in his own hand until the orthodox
were all on board and had to go away; and these tender, holy bishops committed
many other murders even at that time, which is almost twelve hundred years ago.
Again, in the time of
Muhammad and the pope are tied together
And what shall I say of the most Holy
Father, the pope? Is it not true that he and his bishops have become worldly
lords, have fallen away from the Gospel, led by the spirit of lies, and embraced
their own human doctrine, and thus have practiced murder, down to the present
hour? Read the histories of the time and you find that the principal business
of popes and bishops has been to set emperors, kings, princes, lands, and
people against one another, even themselves to fight and help in the work of
murder and bloodshed. Why so? Because the spirit of lies
never acts any other way.
After
he has made his disciples teachers of lies and deceivers, he has no rest until
he makes them murderers, robbers, and blood-dogs. For who has ordered them to
bear the sword, to make war, and to urge men on and stir them up to murder and
war, when their duty was to attend to preaching and prayer?
They
call me and mine seditious, but when have I ever coveted the sword or urged men
to take it, and not rather taught and kept peace and obedience, except that I
have instructed and exhorted the regular temporal rulers to do their duty and
maintain peace and justice? By its fruits one shall know the tree. I and mine
keep and teach peace; the pope, with his followers, makes war, murders, robs,
and that not only his enemies; but he burns, condemns, and persecutes the
innocent, the pious, the orthodox, as a true
Antichrist. For he does this, “sitting in the
Both
shall go down to hell, even though it may take the Last Day to send them there;
and I hope it will not be long.
Summing
up what has been said: Where the spirit of lies is, there is also the spirit of
murder, though he may not get to work or may be hindered. If he is hindered, he
still laughs and is jubilant when murder is done, and at least consents to it,
for he holds it right. But good Christians do not rejoice over any murder, not
even over the misfortunes of their enemies. Since, then, Mohammed’s Koran is
such a great spirit of lies that it leaves almost nothing of Christian truth
remaining, how could it have any other result than that it should become a
great and mighty murderer, with both lies and murders under the show of truth
and righteousness. As, therefore, lies destroy the spiritual order of faith and
truth, so murder destroys all temporal order instituted by God; for where
murder and robbery are practiced, it is impossible that there should be a fine,
praiseworthy temporal government, since they cannot think more highly of peace
than of war and murder, or attend to the pursuits of peace, as one can see in
soldiers. Therefore, the Turks do not regard the work of agriculture highly.
Islam despises women and marriage
The third point is that
Mohammed’s Koran thinks nothing of marriage, but permits everyone to take wives
as he will. Therefore, it is customary among the Turks for one man to have ten
or twenty wives and to desert or sell any of them that he will, when he will,
so that in
Thus
the marriage of the Turks closely resembles the chaste life that the soldiers
live with their harlots; for the Turks are soldiers and must act like soldiers;
Mars and Venus, say the poets, must be together.
Some Muslims are all right
These three points I have wanted
to mention. I am sure of them from the Koran of the Turks. What I have heard beside
I will not bring forward, because I cannot be sure about it. Suppose, then,
that there are some Christians among the Turks; suppose that some of them are
monks; suppose that some are honorable laymen; even then, what good can there
be in the government and the whole Turkish way of life, when according to their
Koran these three things rule among them; namely, lying, murder, and disregard
of marriage, and besides, everyone must keep Christian truth quiet and dare not
rebuke or try to reform these three points, but must look on and consent to
them, as I fear, at least so far as to be silent? How can there be a more
horrible, dangerous, terrible imprisonment than a life under such a government?
Lies destroy the spiritual estate, murder the
temporal, disregard of marriage the estate of matrimony. Now take out of the
world veram religionem, veram politiam, veram oeconomiam, i.e., true
spiritual life, true temporal government, and true conduct of the home; what is
left in the world, but flesh, world and devil? A life there is like the life of
the “good fellows” who keep house with harlots.
It
is said, indeed, that the Turks are, among themselves, faithful and friendly
and careful to tell the truth. I believe that, and I think that they probably
have more fine virtues in them than that. No man is so bad that there is not
something good in him. Now and then a woman of the streets has good qualities
that scarcely ten honorable matrons have. So the devil would have a cloak and
be a fair angel, an angel of light; therefore he hides behind certain works, that are works of the light. Murderers and robbers
are more faithful and friendly to each other than neighbors are, nay, more so
than many Christians. For if the devil keeps the three things – lies, murder,
and disregard of marriage – as the real foundation of hell, he can easily
tolerate, nay, help, that fleshly love and faithfulness shall be built upon it,
as precious stones (though they are nothing but hay and straw), though he knows
well that nothing of them will remain through the fire. f123 On the other hand,
where true faith, true government, true marriage are, he tries earnestly that
little love and fidelity may appear and little be shown, so that he can put the
foundation to shame and have it despised.
What
is more, when the Turks go into battle their war-cry is no other word than
“Allah! Allah!” and they shout it till heaven and earth
resound. But in the Arabic language Allah means God, and is a corruption
of the Hebrew Eloha. For they have taught in the Koran
that they shall boast constantly with these words, “There is no God but God.” All that is really a device of the devil. For what is it to
say, “There is no God but God” without distinguishing one God from another? The
devil, too, is a god and they honor him with this word; of that there is no
doubt. In just the same way the pope’s soldiers cry “Ecclesia! Ecclesia!” To be sure: the devil’s ecclesia! Therefore I
believe that the Turks’ Allah does more in war than they themselves. He gives
them courage and wiles, guides sword and fist, horse and man. What do you
think, then, of the holy people who can call upon God in battle, and yet
destroy Christ and all God’s words and works, as you have heard?
Prohibition agains pictures
It is part of the Turks’ holiness,
also, that they tolerate no images or pictures and are even holier than our
destroyers of images. For our destroyers tolerate, and are glad to have, images
on gulden, groschen, rings, and ornaments; but the
Turk tolerates none of them and stamps nothing but letters on his coins. He is
entirely Muenzerian, too, for he overthrows all
rulers and tolerates no gradations of government, such as princes, counts,
lords, nobles and other feudatories; but he alone is lord over all in his own
land, and what he gives out is only pay, never property or rights of rulership. He is also a papist; for he believes that he
will become holy and be saved by works, and thinks it no sin to overthrow
Christ, lay government waste, and destroy marriage. All these things the pope also
works at, though in other ways, with hypocrisy, while the Turk uses force and
the sword. In a word, as has been said, it is the very dregs of all
abominations and errors.
All
this I have wanted to tell to the first man, namely, the community of Christians,
so that he may know and see how much need there is for prayer, and how we must
first smite the Turk’s Allah, that is, his god, the devil, and strike down his
power and godhead; otherwise, I fear, the sword will accomplish little. For
this man is not to fight in a bodily way with the Turk, as the pope and his
followers teach, nor resist him with the fist, but recognize the Turk as God’s
rod and anger, which Christians must either suffer, if God visits their sins
upon them, or fight against and drive away with repentance, tears, and prayer.
He who despises this counsel, let him despise it; I want to see what damage he
will do the Turk.
The secular government
The second man whose place it is
to fight against the Turk is Emperor Charles, or whoever is emperor; for the
Turk attacks his subjects and his empire, and it is his duty, as a regular
ruler appointed by God, to defend his own. I repeat it here, that I would not
urge anyone or tell anyone to fight against the Turk unless the first method,
mentioned above, had been followed, and men had first repented and been
reconciled to God, etc. If anyone will go to war besides, let him take his
risk. It is not proper for me to say anything more about it beyond telling
everyone his duty and instructing his conscience.
I
see clearly that kings and princes are taking such a silly and careless
attitude toward the Turk that I fear they are despising God and the Turk too
greatly, or do not know, perhaps, that the Turk is such a mighty lord that no
kingdom or land, whatever it is, is strong enough to resist him alone, unless
God will do a miracle. Now I cannot expect any miracle or special grace of God
for
But
enough has been said about that for those who will listen. We would now speak
of the emperor.
In
the first place, if there is to be war against the Turk, it should be fought at
the emperor’s command, under his banner, and in his name. Then everyone can assure
his own conscience that he is obeying the ordinance of God, since we know that
the emperor is our true overlord and head, and he who
obeys him, in such a case, obeys God also, while he who disobeys him disobeys
God also. If he dies in this obedience, he dies in a good state, and if he has
previously repented and believes on Christ, he is saved. These things, I
suppose, everyone knows better than I can teach him, and would to God they knew
them as well as they think they do. Yet we will say something more about them.
In
the second place, this banner and obedience of the emperor ought to be true and
simple. The emperor should seek nothing else than simply to perform the work
and duty of his office, which is to protect his subjects; and those under his
banner should seek simply the work and duty of obedience. By this simplicity
you should understand that there is to be no fighting of the Turk for the
reasons for which the emperors and princes have heretofore been urged to war,
such as the winning of great honor, glory, and wealth, the increasing of lands,
or wrath and revengefulness and other things of the kind; for by these things
men seek only their own self- interest, and therefore we have had no good
fortune heretofore, either in fighting or planning to fight against the Turk.
Therefore
the urging and inciting, with which the emperor and the princes have heretofore
been stirred up to fight against the Turk, ought to cease.
He
has been urged, as head of Christendom, as protector of the Church and defender
of the faith, to wipe out the faith of the Turk, and the urging and exhorting
have been based on the wickedness and vice of the Turks. Not so! The emperor is
not head of Christendom or protector of the Gospel or of the faith. The Church
and the faith must have another protector than emperor and kings. They are
usually the worst enemies of Christendom and of the faith, as Psalm 2:2 says and the Church constantly laments. With that kind of
urging and exhorting things are only made worse and God is the more deeply
angered, because that interferes with His honor and His work, and would ascribe
it to men, which is idolatry and blasphemy.
The authorities should not interfere in peoples faith
And if the emperor were to
destroy the unbelievers and non-Christians, he would have to begin with the
pope, bishops, and clergy and perhaps not spare us, or himself; for there is
enough horrible idolatry in his own empire to make it unnecessary for him to
fight the Turks for this cause. Among us there are Turks, Jews, heathen,
non-Christians, all too many of them, proving it with public false doctrine and
with offensive, shameful lives. Let the Turk believe and live as he will, just
as one lets the papacy and other false Christians live. The emperor’s sword has
nothing to do with the faith; it belongs to physical, worldly things, if God is
not to become angry with us. If we pervert His order and throw it into
confusion, He, too, becomes perverse and throws us into confusion and all
misfortune, as it is written, “With the perverse thou art perverse.” We can
perceive and grasp this by means of the fortune we have heretofore had against
the Turk. Think of all the heartbreak and misery that have been caused by the cruciata, by the indulgences and crusading-taxes, with
which Christians have been stirred up to take the sword and fight the Turk,
when they ought to have been fighting the devil and unbelief with the Word and
with prayer.
This
is what should be done. The emperor and the princes should be exhorted
concerning their office and their bounden duty to give serious and constant
thought to governing their subjects in peace and to protecting them against the
Turk. This would be their duty whether they themselves were Christians or not,
though it would be very good if they were Christians. But since it is
uncertain, and remains so, that they are Christians, and it is certain that
they are emperors and princes, that is, that they have God’s command to protect
their subjects and are in duty bound to do so, therefore we must let the
uncertain go and hold to the certain, urge them with continual preaching and
exhortation, and lay it heavily upon their consciences, that it is their duty
to God not to let their subjects be so pitiably ruined, and that they are doing
a great and notable sin when they do not think of their office and use all
their power to bring counsel and help to those who should live, with body and
goods, under their protection and who are bound to them with oaths of homage.
For
I think (so far as I have yet observed the matter in our diets) that neither
emperor nor princes believe themselves that they are emperor and princes. For
they act as though it lay with their own judgment and pleasure whether they
would rescue and protect their subjects from the power of the Turk or not; and
the princes neither care nor think that they are bound and obligated before God
to counsel and help the emperor in this matter with body and goods. Everyone of
them lets it go as though it were no affair of his and as though he were forced
neither by command or necessity, but it were left to his own free choice to do
it or leave it.
Responsible for the authorities continuation
They are just like the common
people who do not think it their duty to God and the world, when they have
bright sons, to put them to school and have them study; but everyone thinks he
has free power to raise his son as he pleases, no matter what God’s word and
ordinance are. Nay, the councilmen in the cities and almost all the rulers act
in the same way, and let the schools go to nothing, as though they had no
responsibility for them, and had an indulgence besides. No one remembers that
God earnestly commands, and will have it so, that bright children shall be
raised to His praise and for His work, which cannot be done without the
schools. On the contrary everyone is in a hurry to have his children making a
living, as though God and Christendom needed no pastors, preachers, carers for souls, and the worldly rulers no chancellors,
counselors, or secretaries. But of this another time.
The pen must remain empress, or God will show us something else.
Emperor,
kings, and princes act the same way. They do not consider that God’s
commandment makes it necessary to protect their subjects; it is to lie in their
own free choice to do it, if the notion sometime takes them, or they have
leisure for it. Dear fellow, let us all do that! Let none of us look to that
which is commanded him and which God orders him to do, but let all our actions
and duties be matters of our own free will, and God will give us good fortune
and His grace, and we shall be plagued by the Turk here in time, and by the
devil yonder in eternity.
Perhaps,
then, a worthless prattler – I should say a legate – will come from Rome and
exhort the estates of the empire and stir them up against the Turk, telling
them how the enemy of the Christian faith has done such great harm to
Christendom and that the emperor, as guardian of the Church and defender of the
faith, should do so and so; as though they themselves were great friends of the
Christian faith! But I say to him: You are a base-born knave, you impotent
chatterer! For this way you accomplish nothing except to make the emperor feel
that he should do a good Christian work that he is not commanded to do; and that
rests with his free choice; his conscience is not touched at all by that, and
he is not reminded of the necessary duty, laid upon him by God, but the whole
thing is referred to his free will.
This
is the way that a legate ought to deal with the estates of the empire at the
diet. He should hold God’s commandment before them and make of it an
unavoidable necessity, and say: “Dear lords, emperor, and princes, if you would
be emperor and princes, act as emperor and princes, or the Turk will teach you
with God’s wrath and disfavor.
A
good orator can here see well what I would like to say, if I were learned in
the art of oratory, and what a legate should aim at and expound at the diet, if
he would discharge his office honestly and faithfully.
The authorities should protect our body and earthly
life
For this reason I said above that
Charles, or the emperor should be the man to fight against the Turk, and that
the fighting should be done under his banner. “O, that
is easy! Everybody knew it long ago. Luther is not telling us anything new, but
only worn-out old stuff.” Nay, dear fellow, the emperor must truly see himself
with other eyes than heretofore, and you must see his banner with other eyes.
You and I are talking about the same emperor and the same banner, but you are
not talking about the eyes that I am talking about. You must see on the banner
the commandment of God that says, “Protect the good; punish the bad.” Tell me
how many there are who can read this on the emperor’s
banner, or who seriously believe it. Do you not think that their consciences
would terrify them, if they saw this banner and had to own that they were greatly
guilty before God on account of their failure to give help and protection to
their faithful subjects? Dear fellow, a banner is not simply a piece of silk;
there are letters on it, and on him who reads the letters luxury and banqueting
should pall.
That
it has been regarded heretofore as a mere piece of silk, is easy to prove, for
otherwise the emperor would long ago have set it up, the princes would have
followed it, and the Turk would not have become so mighty. But because the
princes called it with their mouths the emperor’s banner, and were disobedient
to it with their fists, and held it by their deeds a mere piece of silk, those
things have come to the pass that we now see with our own eyes. God grant that
we are not, all of us, too late, I with my exhortation and the lords with their
banner; and that it may not happen to us as it did to the children of Israel
who would not fight against the Amorites when God first commanded them;
afterwards, when they would have fought, they were beaten, because God would
not be with them. Nevertheless, no one should despair; repentance and right
conduct always find grace.
After
emperor and princes remember that, by God’s commandment, they owe their
subjects this protection, they should be exhorted not to be presumptuous and
undertake this work defiantly, or in reliance on their own might or planning;
for there are many princes who say, “I have right and authority, therefore I
will do it!” Then they pitch in, with pride and boasting of their might, and
meet defeat at last; for if they did not feel their power, the matter of right
would have small enough effect on them, as is proved in other cases, in which
they pay no heed to right. It is not enough, then, for you to know that God has
committed this or that to you; you should also do it with fear and humility,
for God commands no one to do anything by his own wisdom or strength, but He,
too, will have a part in it and be feared. Nay, He will do it through us, and
will therefore have us pray to Him, and not become presumptuous or forget His
help, as the Psalter says, “The Lord hath pleasure in those that fear Him and
wait for His kindness.” Otherwise we should persuade ourselves that we could do
things and did not need God’s help, and take to
ourselves the victory and the honor that belong to Him.
Therefore
an emperor or prince ought to learn well that verse of the Psalter, in Psalm
44:6-7, “I rely not upon my bow, and my sword helps me not, but thou helpest us from our enemies and puttest
to shame them that hate us,” and also the rest of what that Psalm says; and
Psalm 60:10-12, “Lord God, thou goest not out with
our host; give us aid in our need, for man’s help is vain; with God we will do
deeds; he shall tread down our enemies.”
These and like sayings have had to be fulfilled by many kings and
great princes, from the beginning to the present day. They have become
examples, though they had God’s commandment and authority and right.
Emperor
and princes, therefore, should not let these sayings become a jest. Read here
the apt illustration given in Judges
If
these two things are present, God’s commandment and our humility, then there is
no danger or need, so far as this second man, the emperor, is concerned; we are
strong enough for the whole world and must have good fortune and success. But
if we have not good fortune, it is certainly because one of the two things is
lacking; we are going to war either without God’s commandment, or in our own
presumption, or the first soldier, the Christian, is not there with his
prayers. It is not necessary here to warn against seeking honor or booty in
war; for he who fights in humility and obedience to God’s command, with his
mind fixed solely upon the simple duty of protecting and defending his
subjects, will forget honor and booty; nay, they will come to him, without his
seeking, more richly and gloriously than he can wish.
Here
someone will say, “Where shall we find pious fighting-men, who will act this
way?” Answer: The Gospel is preached to all the world,
and yet very few believe; nevertheless Christendom believes and abides.
Therefore
I am writing this instruction with no hope that it will be accepted by all;
indeed, most people will laugh and scoff at me. For me it is enough if, with
this book, I shall be able to instruct some princes and their subjects; even
though they may be very few in number, that does not
matter to me; there will be victory and good fortune enough. And would to God
that I had instructed only the emperor, or him who is
to conduct the war in his name and at his command; I would then be of good
hope. It has often happened, indeed, it usually happens,
God gives a whole land and kingdom good fortune and success through one single
man; just as, on the other hand, through one knave at court He brings a whole
land into all sorts of distress and misery; as Solomon says, in Ecclesiastes,
“A single knave does great harm.”
Thus
we read of Naaman, the captain of the king of
I
say this in order that it may not frighten us, or move us in any way, if the
great majority are unbelieving and fight under the
emperor’s banner with an unchristian mind. We must remember, too, that Abraham,
all by himself, was able to do much ( Genesis 14:1 and
17:1). It is certain, also, that among the Turks, who are the army of the
devil, there is not one who is a Christian or has an
humble and a right heart. In 1 Kings 14:1, the godly Jonathan said, “It is not
hard for God to give victory by many or by few,” and himself inflicted on the
Philistines a great slaughter such as Saul could not, with his whole army. It
does not matter, therefore, if the crowd is not good, provided only that the
head and some of the chief men are upright; it would be good, of course, if all
were upright, but that is scarcely possible.
The limit of the duty of obedience
Moreover, I hear it said that
there are those in
In
the first place, these people are faithless and guilty of perjury to their
rulers, to whom they have taken oaths and done homage; and this is in God’s
sight a great sin that does not go unpunished. On account of such perjury the
good king Zedekiah had to perish miserably, because he did not keep the oath
that he gave to the heathen emperor at
In
the second place, beside all that, such faithless, disloyal, perjured folk
commit a still more horrible sin. They make themselves partakers of all the
abominations and wickedness of the Turks; for he who willingly goes over to the
Turks makes himself their comrade and an accomplice in all their doings. Now we
have heard above what kind of man the Turk is, viz., a destroyer, enemy, and
blasphemer of our Lord Jesus Christ, who instead of the Gospel and faith, sets
up his shameful Mohammed and all kinds of lies, ruins all temporal government
and home-life, or marriage, and, since his warfare is nothing but murder and
bloodshed, is a tool of the devil himself.
See,
then! He who consorts with the Turk must be partaker of this terrible
abomination and brings down on his own head all the murder, all the blood that
the Turk has shed, and all the lies and vices with which he has damaged
Christ’s Kingdom and led souls astray. It is miserable enough if one is forced
to be under this blood-dog and devil against his own will, and see and hear
these abominations, and put up with them as the godly Lot had to do in Sodom,
as St. Peter writes; it is not necessary to seek them of one’s own accord, or
desire them.
Nay,
a man ought far rather die twice over in war, obedient
to his overlord, than have, like a poor Lot, to be brought by force into such
In
the third place, it is to be impressed by the preachers on the people that, if
they do go over to the Turks, they will not have bettered themselves and their
hopes and intentions will not be realized. For it is the Turk’s way not to let
any who are anything or have anything stay in the place where they live, but to
put them far back in another land, where they are sold and must be servants.
Thus they fulfill the proverb “Running out of the rain and falling in the
water”; and “Lifting the plate and breaking the dish.” Bad becomes worse; it
scarcely serves them wrong. For the Turk is a true man of war, who has other
ways of treating land and people, both in getting them and keeping them, than
our emperor, kings, and princes have. He does not trust and believe these
disloyal people and has the force to do as he will; thus he has not the same
need of people that our princes have.
The
preachers and pastors, I say, must impress this upon such disloyal people, with
constant admonition and warning, for it is the truth, and it is needed. But if
there are some who despise this exhortation and will not be moved by it, let
them go on to the devil, as St. Paul had to let the Greeks, and St. Peter the
Jews go; the others should not mind. Indeed, if it were to come to war, I would
rather that none of these were under the emperor’s banner, or stayed under it,
but were all on the Turk’s side; they would be beaten all the sooner and in
battle they would do the Turk more harm than good, for they are out of favor
with God, the devil, and the world, and are surely, all of them, condemned to
hell. It is good to fight against such people, who are plainly and surely
damned both by God and the world.
There
are many depraved and abandoned and wicked men; but anyone with any sense will
without doubt, heed such exhortation and be moved to stay in his obedience, and
not throw his soul so carelessly into hell to the devil, but rather fight with
all his might under his overlord, even though, in so doing, he is slain by the
Turks.
But
you say again, “If the pope is as bad as the Turk – and you yourself call him
Antichrist, together with his clergy and his followers – then the Turk is as
godly as the pope, for he acknowledges the four Gospels and Moses, together
with the prophets; must we not, then, fight the pope as well as the Turk, or,
perhaps, rather than the Turk?” Answer: I cannot deny that the Turk holds the
four Gospels to be divine and true, as well as the prophets, and also speaks
very highly of Christ and His mother, but at the same time, he believes that
his Mohammed is above Christ and that Christ is not God, as has been said above.
We Christians acknowledge the Old Testament as divine Scripture, but now that
it is fulfilled and is, as St. Peter says, in Acts 15:10, too hard without
God’s grace, it is abolished and no longer binds us.
The relation between
the Koran and the Bible
Just so Mohammed treats the
Gospel; he declares that it is indeed true, but has long since served its
purpose; also that it is too hard to keep, especially on the points where
Christ says that one is to leave all for His sake, love God with the whole heart,
and the like.
Therefore
God has had to give another new law, one that is not so hard and that the world
can keep, and this law is the Koran. But if anyone asks why he does no miracles
to confirm this new law, he says that that is unnecessary and of no use, for
people had many miracles before, when Moses’ law and the Gospel arose, and did
not believe. Therefore his Koran did not need to be confirmed by wasted
miracles, but by the sword, which is more effective than miracles. Thus it has
been, and still is the case among the Turks, that everything is done with the
sword, instead of with miracles.
On
the other hand, the pope is not much more godly than
Mohammed and resembles him extraordinarily; for he, too, praises the Gospel
with his lips, but holds that many things in it are too hard, and these things
are the very ones that Mohammed and the Turks also consider too hard, such as
those contained in Matthew 5:20. Therefore he interprets them, and makes of
them consilia, i.e., “counsels,” which no one is
bound to keep unless he desires to do so, as has been shamelessly taught at
Paris, and in other universities, foundations, and monasteries. Therefore, too,
he does not rule with the Gospel, or Word of God, but has made a new law and a
Koran, viz., his decretals, and enforces them with
the ban, as the Turk enforces his Koran with the sword; he even calls the ban
his spiritual sword, though only the Word of God is that and should be called
that ( Ephesians 6:17). Nevertheless, he uses the
temporal sword also, when he can, or, at least, calls upon it, and urges and
stirs up others to use it. And I am confident that if the pope could use the
temporal sword as mightily as the Turk, he would perhaps lack the will to do so
even less than the Turk and, indeed, they have often tried it.
Italian weddings – homosexual relationships
God visits them with the same
plague, too, and smites them with blindness, so that it happens to them as
For
I hear one horrible thing after another about what an open and glorious Sodom
Turkey is, and everybody who has looked around a little in Rome and Italy knows
very well how God there revenges and punishes the prohibition of marriage, so
that Sodom and Gomorrah, which God overwhelmed in days of old with fire and
brimstone, must seem a mere jest compared with these abominations. On this one
account, therefore, I would regret the rule of the Turk; nay, it would be
intolerable in
Not crusade, but armed defence
“What are we to do, then? Are we
to fight against the pope, as well as the Turk, since the one is as godly as
the other?” Answer: Treat the one like the other and no one is wronged; like
sin should receive like punishment. I mean that this way. If the pope and his
followers were to attack the empire with the sword, as the Turk does, he should
receive the same treatment as the Turk; and this is what was done to him by the
army of Emperor Charles before
Against
the papacy, however, because of its errors and wicked ways, the first man, Sir
Christian, has been aroused, and he attacks it boldly with prayer and the Word
of God; and he has wounded it, too, so that they feel it and rage. But no
raging helps; the axe is laid to the tree and the tree must be uprooted, unless
it bears different fruit. I see clearly that they have no notion of reforming,
but the farther things go, the more stubborn they become and want to butt their
way through, and boast, “All or nothing, bishop or drudge!” I consider them so
godly that, unless they reform or turn from their shameful ways, both they
themselves and the whole world admit that it is not to be endured, and that
they should betake themselves to their comrade and brother, the holy Turk. Ah
well! May our heavenly Father quickly hear their own prayer and grant that, as
they say, they may be “all or nothing, bishop or drudge.” Amen! They will have
it so. Amen! So let it be, let it come true, as God pleases!
But
you say further: “How can the Emperor Charles fight against the Turk in these
days, when he has against him such hindrances and such treachery from kings,
princes, the Venetians, indeed from almost everybody?” Answer: What a man
cannot lift, he must let lie. If we can do no more, we must let our Lord Jesus
Christ counsel and aid us, by His coming, which cannot be far off. For the
world has come to its end; the Roman Empire is almost gone and torn to bits; it
stands as the kingdom of the Jews stood when Christ’s birth was near; the Jews
had scarcely anything of their kingdom, Herod was the token of farewell. And
so, I think, now that the Roman Empire is almost gone, Christ’s coming is at
the door, and the Turk is the Empire’s token of farewell, a parting gift to the
Roman Empire; and just as Herod and the Jews hated each other, though both made
common cause against Christ, so Turk and papacy hate each other, but make
common cause against Christ and His kingdom.
Nevertheless,
what the emperor can do for his subjects against the Turk,
that he should do, so that even though he cannot entirely prevent the
abomination, he may yet try to protect and rescue his subjects by checking the
Turk and holding him off. To this protection the emperor should be moved not
only by his bounden duty, his office, and the command of God, nor only by the
unchristian and vile government that the Turk brings in, as has been said
above, but also by the misery and wretchedness that comes to his subjects. They
know better than I, beyond all doubt, how cruelly the Turk treats those whom he
carries away captive. He treats them like cattle, dragging, towing, driving
those that can go along, and killing out of hand those that cannot go, whether
they are young or old.
All
this and the like more ought to move all the princes, and the whole empire, to
forget their own cases and contentions, or let them rest for awhile, and unite,
in all earnest, to help the wretched; so that things may not go as they went
with Constantinople and Greece. They quarreled with one another and looked
after their own affairs, until the Turk overwhelmed both of them together, as
he has already come very near doing to us in a similar case. But if this is not
to be, and our unrepentant life makes us unworthy of any grace or counsel or
support, we must put up with it and suffer under the devil; but that does not
excuse those who could help and do not.
I
wish it to be clearly understood, however, by what I have said,
that it was not for nothing that I called Emperor Charles the man who ought to
go to war against the Turk. As for other kings, princes, and rulers who despise
Emperor Charles, or are not his subjects, or are not obedient, I leave them to
take their own chances. They shall do nothing by my advice or admonition; what
I have written here has been for Emperor Charles and his subjects; the others
do not concern me. For I well know the pride of some kings and princes who
would be glad if not Emperor Charles, but they, were to be the heroes and
masters to win honor against the Turk. I grant them the honor, but if they are
beaten in trying to get it, it will be their own fault. Why do they not conduct
themselves humbly toward the true head and the regularly appointed ruler. The rebellion among the peasants has been punished,
but if the rebellion among the princes and lords were also to be punished, I
believe that there would be very few princes and lords left. God grant that it
may not be the Turk who inflicts the punishment! Amen.
Efficient attack as prevention
Finally, I would have it
understood as my kind and faithful advice that, if it comes to the point of war
against the Turk, we shall arm and prepare, and not hold the Turk too cheap,
acting as we Germans usually do, and coming on the field with twenty or thirty
thousand men. And even though a success is granted us and we win a victory, we
have no staying-power, but sit down again and carouse until another necessity
arises. To be sure, I am not qualified to give instruction on this point, and
they themselves know, or ought to know, more about it than I, nevertheless,
when I see people acting so childishly, I must think either that the princes
and our Germans do not know or believe the strength and power of the Turk, or
have no serious purpose to fight against the Turk, but just as the pope has
robbed Germany of money under the pretense of the Turkish war and by
indulgences, so they, too, following the pope’s example, would swindle us out
of money.
My
advice, therefore, is not to set the armed preparation so low and not to offer
our poor Germans to slaughter. If we are not going to make an adequate, honest
resistance that will have some staying-power, it were far better not to begin a
war, but to give up lands and people to the Turk in time, without useless
bloodshed, rather than have him win anyhow in an easy battle and with shameful
bloodshed, as happened in Hungary with King Lewis. Fighting against the Turk is
not like fighting against the King of France, or the Venetians, or the pope; he
is a different kind of warrior; he has people and money in abundance; he beat
the Sultan twice in succession, and that took people. Why, dear sir, his people
are under arms all the time, so that he can quickly bring together three or
four hundred thousand men; if we were to cut off a hundred thousand, he would
soon be back again with as many men as before. He has staying-power.
There
is, therefore, nothing at all in trying to meet him with fifty or sixty
thousand men unless we have an equal or a greater number in reserve. Only count
up his lands, dear sir. He has
I
say this because I fear that my Germans do not know it or believe it, and
think, perhaps, that they are strong enough by themselves, and take the Turk
for such a lord as the king of France, whom they would easily withstand. But I shall
be without blame, and shall not have laden my tongue and pen with blood, if a
king measures himself with the Turk all alone, for it is tempting God when
anyone sets out with a smaller force against a stronger king, as Christ also
shows in the Gospel of Luke, especially since our princes are not the kind of
people for whom a divine miracle is to be expected. The king of
I
do not say this in order to scare off the kings from war against the Turk, but
as an admonition to make wise and serious preparation, and not to go at this
matter in so childish and sleepy a way, for I would like, if possible, to
prevent useless bloodshed and lost wars. It would be serious preparation, if
our princes were to wind their own affairs in a ball and put their heads and
hearts, hands and feet, together, and make one body out of the great crowd from
which one could make another army, if one battle were lost, and not, as
heretofore, let single kings and princes set upon him – yesterday the king of
Hungary, tomorrow the king of Bohemia, day after tomorrow the king of Poland –
until the Turk devours them one after another and nothing is accomplished by
it, except that our people are betrayed and slaughtered and blood is shed
needlessly.
For
if our kings and princes were to agree, and stand by one another and help one
another, and the Christian man were to pray for them, I should be undismayed
and of good hope; the Turk would leave his raging and find in Emperor Charles a
man who was his equal. Failing that, if things are to go as they now go, and no
one is in agreement with another or loyal to another,
and everyone wants to be his own man and takes the field with a beggarly array,
I must let it go at that. Of course I will gladly help pray, but it will be a
weak prayer, for I can have little faith that it will be heard, bemuse of the
childish, presumptuous, and shortsighted way in which such great enterprises
are undertaken, knowing that it is tempting God and that He can have no
pleasure in it.
Serious warning
What do our dear lords do? They
take it for a mere jest. It is a fact that the Turk is at our throat, and even
if he does not will to march against us this year, yet he is there, armed and
ready any hour to attack us, when he will, and yet our princes discuss,
meanwhile, how they can harass Luther and the Gospel. It is the Turk! Against
it force must be used! It must be put out! That is what they are doing right
now at
God
give you honor, you faithless heads of your poor people! What devil bids you
occupy yourselves so violently with spiritual things, which are not committed
to you, and be so lax and slothful in dealing with things that God has
committed to you and that concern you and your poor people, now in the greatest
and most pressing need, and thus be only hindering all those whose intentions
are good and who would gladly do their part? Yes, go on singing and hearing the
Mass of the Holy Spirit! He has great pleasure in it and will be very gracious
to you disobedient, refractory fellows, because you let those things alone that
he has committed to you, and work at what he has forbidden you! Yes, the Evil
Spirit may hear you!
With
this I have cleared my conscience. This book shall be my witness concerning the
measure and the manner in which I advise war against the Turk. If any will
proceed otherwise, let him proceed, win or lose. I shall not enjoy his victory
and not pay for his defeat, but shall be innocent of all the blood that will be
shed in vain. I know that this book will not make the Turk a gracious lord to
me, if it comes before him; nevertheless, I have wished to tell my Germans the
truth, so far as I know it, and give faithful counsel and service to the
grateful and the ungrateful alike. If it helps, it helps; if it helps not, then
may our dear Lord Jesus Christ help, and come down from heaven with the Last
Judgment, and smite both Turk and pope to the earth, together with all tyrants
and all the godless, and deliver us from all sins and from all evil. Amen.