Word. Faith wavers and changes; but the Word of God abides forever."[1] "The man who bases his baptism on his faith, is not only uncertain, but he is a godless and hypocritical Christian; for he puts his trust in what is not his own, viz., in a gift which God has given him, and not alone in the Word of God; just as another builds upon his strength, wisdom, power, holiness, which, nevertheless, are gifts which God has given us."[2] Even though at the time of baptism there be no faith, the baptism, nevertheless, is valid. For if at the time of marriage, a maiden be without love to the man whom she marries, when, two years later, she has learned to love her husband, there is no need of a new betrothal and a new marriage; the covenant previously made is sufficient.[3]
In harmony with the stress laid in this treatise upon the fact that baptism is a treasury of consolation offered to the faith of every individual baptised, is the great emphasis which Luther, in other places, was constrained to lay upon personal as distinguished from vicarious faith. Neither the faith of the sponsors, nor that of the Church, for which, according to Augustine, the sponsors speak, avails more than simply to bring the child to baptism, where it becomes an independent agent, with whom God now deals directly. Thus the Large Catechism declares: "We bring the child in the purpose and hope that it may believe, and we pray God to grant it faith, but we do not baptise it upon that, but solely upon the command of God."[4] Still more explicit is a sermon on the Third Sunday after Epiphany: "The words, Mark 16:16, Romans 1:17, and John 3:16, 18 are clear, to the effect that every one must believe for himself, and no one can be helped by the faith of any one else, but only by his own faith." "It is just as in the natural life, no one can be born for me, but I must be born myself. My mother may bring me to birth, but it is I who am born, and no one else." "Thus no one is saved by the faith of another, but solely by his own faith."[5]
The treatise is found in Weimar Ed., II, 724-737; Erlangen Ed., XXI, 229-244; St. Louis Ed., X, 2113-2126; Clemen and Leitzmann, Luthers Werke, I, (1912), 185-195.
HENRY E. JACOBS.
Mount Airy, Philadelphia.
- ↑ Erl. Ed., XXVI, 292.
- ↑ Ibid., 275.
- ↑ Ibid., 275.
- ↑ Book of Concord, English Translation, p. 473.
- ↑ Erl. Ed., XI, 63, 58; 2d Ed., XI, 65, 61. See discussion by writer in Lutheran Church Review, XVIII, 598-657, where passages cited may be found with full context translated, together with other statements of Luther and those who followed him, on the same subject.
