LQTHEB
440
LUTHER
there was an active study of Holy Writ" (♦Kamp-
Bchulte, op. cit., I, 22). Protestant writers of repute
have abandoned the legend altogether (K5hler, *^Ka-
tholizismus u. Reformation", Giessen, 1905; Walther,
- Die deutschen Bibelilbersetzungen des Mittelalters/'
Brunswick, 1892; Geffken, Der Bilderkatechismus des fOnfzehnten Jahrhunderts ", Leipzig, 1855; Grimm, Kurzgefasste Gesch. der luther. BibelQber- setzung", Jena, 1884; Thudichum, Die deutsche Reformation", I, Leipzig, 1907, 225-235; "Cam- bridge History: The Reformation", II, 164; Dob- BchQtz, "Der deutsche Rundschau" CIV, 61-75; Maurenbrecher, "Studien u. Skizzen", 221; Kolde, op. cit., 161; Kropatscheck, "Das Schriftprincip der luther. Kirche", 163 sq.). Parenthetical mention must be made of the tact that the denunciation heaped on Luther's novice-master b^ Mathesius, Ratzeberger, and Jiirgens, and copied with uncritical docility by their transcribers — ^for subjecting him to the most abject menial duties and treating him with outrageous indignitv — rests on no evidence. These writers are "evidently led by hearsav, and fol- low the early legendary stories that have been spun about the person of the reformer" (Oerger, op. cit., 80). The nameless novice-master, whom even Lu- ther designates as "an excellent num, and without doubt even under the damned cowl, a true Christian" (Beard, op. cit., 151), must "have been a worthy representative of his order" (Oerger, dp. cit.).
Luther was ordained to the priestnood in 1507. The precise date is uncertain. A strange oversight, runnm^ through three centuries, placed the date of his ordmation and first Mass on the same day, 2 May, an impossible coincidence. KostUn, who repeated it (Luther's Leben, 1, 1883, 6^) drops the date altogether in his latest edition. Oerger (op. cit., 90) fixes on 27 February. This allows the unprecedented interval of more than two months to elapse oetween the ordination and first Mass. Could he have deferred his first Mass on account of the morbid scrupulosity, which played
jnich a part in the later periods of his monastic life?
'*' There is no reason to doubt that Luther's monastic career thus far was exemplary, tranquil, happy; his heart at rest, his mind undisturbed, his soul at peace. The metaphysical disquisitions, psychological disser- tations, pietistic maundering about his interior con- flicts, his theological wrestlings, his torturing ascet- icism, his chafing under monastic conditions, can have little more than an academic, possibly a psycho-
« pathic value. They lack all basis of verinable data. unfortunately Lutner himself in his self-revelation can hardly be taken as a safe guide. Moreover, with an array of evidence, thoroughness of research, full- ness of knowledge, and unrivalled mastery of monas- ticism. scholasticism, and mysticism, Denifle has re- moved it from the domain of debatable ground to that of verifiable certainty (*Lutheru. Luthorthum, Mainz, 1904). " What Adolf Hausrath has done in an essay for the Protestant side, was accentuated and con- toned with all possible penetration by Denifle; the voung Luther according to his self-revelation is un- historical; he was not the discontented Augustinian, nagged by the monastic life, perpetually tortured by his conscience, fasting, praying, mortified, and ema- ciated — no, he was happy in the monastery, he found peace there, to which ne turned his back only later" (Kdhler, op. cit., 68-69).
During the winter of 1508-1509 he was sent to the University of Wittenbei^, then in its infancy ^founded 2 July, 1502), with an enrolment of one hundred and seventy-nine students. The town itself w^as a poor insignificant place, with but three hundred and nfty- six taxable properties, and accredited the most bibu- lous town of the most bibulous province (Saxony) of Germany (Beard, op. cit., 168). While teaching phi- losophy and dialectics he also continued his theoiO|;- ical studies. On 9 March, 1509, under the deanship
of Staupitz, he became Baccalaureus Biblicus in the
theoloflpcal course, as a stepping-stone to the doctor-
ate. His recall to Erfurt occurred the same year.
His mission to Rome, extending over an estimated period of five months, one of wmch he spent in the city of Rome, which played so important a part in his early biographies, and even now is far from a negli- gible factor in Reformation research, occurred in 151 1 , or, as some contend, 1510. Its true object has thus far baffled all satisfactory investigation. Mathesius makes him go from Wittenberg on "monastic busi- ness"; Melanchthon attributes it to a "monkish squabble"; Cochlseus, and he is in the main followed by Catholic investigators, makes him appear as the delegated representative of seven allied Augustinian inonasteries to voice a protest against some innova- tions of Staupitz, but as deserting his clients and siding with Staupitz (♦Paulus in " Histor. Jahresbuch ", XVI, 73; XXII, 110-113; XXIV, 72-74; ♦"Hist. pol. Blat- ter", CXLII, 738). Protestants say he was sent to Rome as the advocate of Staupitz (Kosthn-Kawerau, I, 89-05; Kawerau^"Von Luther's Romfahrt", Halle, 1901; Else, "Luther's Reise nach Rom", Breslau, 1889; Hausrath, "Martin Luther's Romfahrt", Beriiu, 1894^. Luther himself expressly states that it was a pilgrimage in fulfilment ot a vow to make a general confession in the Eternal City (Bindseil, "Colloquia", III, 169; Jtligens, "Luther von seiner Geburt", II, Leipzig, 1846, 271). The outcome of the mission, fike its object, still remains shrouded in mystery (Kolde, op. cit., 241). What was the effect of this Roman visit on his spiritual life or theological thought? Did "this visit turn his reverence for Rome into loathing"? Did he find it "a sink of iniquitv, its priests infidels, the papal courtiers men of shsmaeless lives? " (Lindsav, "Luther and the German Reformation", New York, 1900). "He returned from Rome as strong in the faith as he went to visit it. In a certain sense his so- journ in Rome even strengthened his religious con- victions" (Hausratii, op. cit., 98). "In his letters of those years he never mentions having been in Rome. In his conference with Cardinal Cajetan, in his dispu- tations with Dr. Eck, in his letters to Pope Leo, nay, in his tremendous broadside of invective and accusa- tion against all thinss Romish, in his ' Address to the German Nation ana Nobility', there occurs not one unmistakable reference to his having been in Rome. By every rule of evidence we are bound to hold that when the most furious assailant Rome has ever known described from a distance of ten years upwards the in- cidents of a journey through Italy to Home, the few touches of light in his picture are more trustworthy than its black breadths of shade" (Bayne, "Martin Luther", I, 234). His whole Roman experience as exprened in later life is open to question. " We can reuly cjuestion the importance attached to remarks which in a great measure date from the last years of his life, when he was really a changed man.' Much that he relates as personal experience is manifestly the product of an easily explained self-delusion " (Haus- rath, op. cit., 79). One of the incidents of the Roman mission, which at one time was considered a pivotal point in his career, and was calculated to impart an inspirational character to the leading doctrine of the Reformation, and is still detailed by his biographers, was his supposed experience while climbing the Scala Santa. According to it (Kostlin - Kawerau, I, 98, 749), while Luther was in the act of climbing the stairs on his knees, the thought suddenly flashed through his mind: "The just shall live by faith", whereupon he immediately discontinued his pious devotion. The story rests on an autograph insertion of his son Paul in a Bible, now in possession of the librar>' of Rudolstadt. In it he claims that his father told him the incident. Its historic value may be gauged by the considerations that it is the personal recollections of an immature lad (b. 28 Jan., 1533) recorded twenty years
