Heidelberg Catechism Project

I just today received my copy of the Commentary on Luther’s Catechism Volume 1, The Law, by Albrecht Peters. The volume retails for $42.99. I find that a bit expensive given that multiple volumes in this series are expected. I wanted to better understand the early Reformation history of the catechisms leading up to the Heidelberg Catechism, so I “bit the bullet” so to speak and received my copy promptly. As an aside, because of the influence of Luther’s Small Catechism in the West calls the Reformed Church of Transylvania (Erdely), my Hungarian Reformed connections made me zealous to review this work.

This book is published by the Concordia Publishing House of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, the United States’ largest orthodox Lutheran body. While the LCMS is committed to the use of the English Standard Version in its publications, this work is an English translation of the original German work so the Biblical quotations are translations, not quotations of any particular English translation.

The LCMS editors were upfront about an important issue. Peters’ views on higher criticism do not conform to LCMS standards expected of their own teachers. Readers are warned about this imperfection, but yet the work was published because these blemishes are outweighed by the overall value of Peters’ work. I was impressed by their honesty in this regard and likewise impressed that they went ahead with the publication of this series.

Multiple volumes are yet to be published. This volume will focus on the Law and its place in catechesis. Other volumes will deal with the Lord’s Prayer, the Creed, the Sacraments, and the Table of Duties, etc. following Luther’s Small Catechism.  These volumes are not however confined in their comments to the text of the Smaller Catechism itself.  Instead they interact with Luther’s Large Catechism, sermons, and other documents of the time which will better inform our understanding not only of Luther, but the Christian Faith itself. As such, it is a commentary on Luther’s catechetics as a whole in light of the needs and concerns of the Church of the Reformation and at large.

Before beginning to discuss the law, Peters discusses catechesis in general and it’s place in Christian history. The phrase ‘to catechise’ was first was used to describe the instruction received by adults about to be baptized. His discussion then mentions the transition which occurred as infant baptism became the norm and in many ways the process of catechesis became a duty of parents/sponsors instead of the clergy and catechists alone. It is at the point of catechesis in the home that becomes especially important as we’ll see later in the catechesis of the church serving as a body of knowledge of public import.

In the Preface, Peters provides a very needed explanation of the Lutheran (and Reformation) teaching of the two kingdoms in his discussion of the catechism. Peters outlines Luther’s views of the catechism not only as an ecclesiastical document but also as a public document and the basis for social order. Obviously this is a concept lost in modern America where a distortion of the two kingdoms doctrine has born it’s antinomian fruit in the stillborn doctrine of the so-called “separation of church and state.” Luther and the Reformers had no such promiscuous view.

Luther’s passion for the catechism is not a narcissistic fascination with his own prose. For Luther, the “catechism” is  not his own creation at all. It is the common summation of the Christian Faith passed from generation to generation. The catechism, then, is the  received epitome of the Christian faith – the Ten Commandments, Creed, Lord’s Prayer and teaching on the Sacraments, and the rule of the Christian life summarized in the Table of Duties.  For those who cannot read and for those for whom (in those days) access to the Bible was prohibitively expensive, the catechism becomes the “Layman’s Bible” that can be continually carried and instantly retrieved from the heart. The catechism – not primarily Luther’s words, but the texts of Scripture especially – become a daily resource for prayer and rule for the faithful. The knowledge of the catechism at once suffices to guide the otherwise uninstructed so they may live the Christian Life, the foundation upon which further instruction in the Word builds, and the rule by which further teaching is judged as an authentic witness to the Truth.

Luther’s work as a catechist reflected the emergency situation he found himself in. While Rome aggrandized itself with material wealth, the populace languished in spiritual poverty. In the midst of a supposedly Christian land, many were dying in the  bondage of idolatry and ignorance. The path Luther charted in the publication of the Small Catechism reflects this urgency and quest for simple yet sufficient tools to remedy the dire spiritual situation of the people.

This was not, however, the method first proposed by Luther himself for a “good catechism” in the preface to the German Mass, his sermonic method in Wittenburg, or in his work on Christian Liberty as Peters shows on pp. 36-40. It is at this point that one seeking connections between Luther’s work as a catechist and the provenance of the Heidelberg Catechism will be readily rewarded.  For in these early works of Luther a method is proposed and displayed for presenting the essentials of the Christian faith according to this plan: Law and Gospel, love, and patient endurance. Peters calls this an “anthropological-psychological” approach and describes Luther’s work in the Small and Large Catechism as more oriented to a salvation-history approach though the anthropological-psychological element is present in a subdued fashion. It is in the catechetical works of Melancthon’s Saxon Visitation Articles and Ursinus’ Heidelberg Catechism where Luther’s original agenda for catechesis is implemented more fully. To be sure, there is wisdom in beginning with the abbreviated catechism and moving on to the expanded one. For that reason a variety of editions of the Heidelberg Catechism, for example, offer suggestions to that end.

The discussion of the ordering of the elements in Luther’s Catechism sheds light on the structure of the Heidelberg as well. Luther’s placing of the Ten Commandments, Creed and Lord’s Prayer in that order is relatively unique. Is this order Luther’s statement that the Law of God is related primarily to initial justification instead of a pattern for the Christian life? That case can be made. Is it therefore a denial of the “Third Use of the Law”, i.e. the Decalogue as a pattern informing the holy life? Or must one “step outside the box” so to speak and see these three elements all pointing to the same Gospel core – the crucified and resurrected Christ? That case has also been made by later catechists in the Lutheran tradition Peters shows. So that later generations would have no question as to where the framers of the Heidelberg Catechism stood on the issue, the Heidelberg essentially “Has Luther’s cake and eats it too!” In other words, the catechism gives due regard to the Law in its use of convicting us of sin (Lord’s Day 2) when it quotes our Lord’s “Summary of the Law”. Later though, the Heidelberg clearly endorses the Third Use of the Law as a pattern for the life of gratitude inspired and enabled by divine grace (Lord’s Days 34 through 44). In this way the Heidelberg opposes neither use of the Law implicit in Lutheran catechesis but endorses both approaches in their proper relationship to justification by grace through faith.

It is after these prefaces that the commentary turns towards a discussion of the Decalogue itself and the Peters’ commitment to the documentary hypothesis regarding the origin of the Pentateuch (Hexateuch in Von Rad’s terminology) becomes obvious. Peters describes the Law of Moses in a way that might be summarized as “Clan Ethos Infused with Yahweh Worship”. This rather sophisticated highbrow rhetoric of German Scholarship sounds good to Peters. For the average reader it needs to be interpreted: in reality it’s like saying the Old Testament is nothing more than the “Code of the Hills gets Religion”. For Documentary Theorists the code is rather like Melchizedek though not quite so holy – it emerges from nowhere with uncertain lineage and uncertain future but shows up just in time for the show. It’s the baptized status quo! As the LCMS warning makes clear, this is not very satisfactory at all. It is based on the assumption that the commandments of the Pentateuch emerged over many centuries and were put in their present form at some late date into this codifed “amalgamation” (p 61) that was really NOT given by God at a particular point in time. Rather it was the process of a religious evolutionary process. I think Concordia would have been better served had they included at least an appendix on the orthodox view instead of letting these statements go “unchallenged”. When Peters is speaking of Luther, he’s excellent. When he’s rehashing Von Rad, he’s annoying!

Moving on, Peters discusses an enigma: the relative absence of the Decalogue from Christian catechesis until the Reformation when the Commandments were used routinely in the synagogue. Pages 67ff have a good discussion on this point that it well worth reviewing. The progress towards the Decalogue’s reintroduction into the routine program of catechesis is traced through Irenaeus to Augustine and then to Thomas and ultimately, for our purposes, Luther.

To be continued…