To say that the sixteenth century was a time of political turmoil is most certainly an understatement. Every level of society was affected by change, both good and bad. For example, the humanist renaissance of the fifteenth century revolutionized the academy and slowly changed the way in which scholars approached literature and education. Gutenberg’s invention of the printing press, in the fifteenth century, made it possible for treatises to be published rapidly, in great quantities, and distributed widely. From the mid-fifteenth century to the mid-sixteenth century, the Ottoman empire (a Muslim empire which was one of the most powerful empires of the time) was a real threat to the nations of eastern and southern Europe, already controlling much of the Balkan Peninsula. The end of the fifteenth century also saw Ferdinand and Isabella finally liberating Spain from Muslim kingdom, turning Spain into a world power that would eventually ally itself with the Papal states. In England, in the mid-fifteenth century, Henry VII won the war of the roses, and installed the Tudor dynasty. The emergence of nation-states (which saw the smaller Feudal Lords, whose dependence on their vassals meant that they were less prone towards tyranny, losing their strength to the more powerful Monarchs who were able to enforce their rule through their armies) and the expeditions designed to expand the power of these emerging countries, financed by various monarchs, led to conflict abroad, and social unrest at home.
Carlos M. N. Eire notes that “By 1515 Western Europe
was no longer an assemblage of various peoples linked by a common religion and
a common feudal sociopolitical structure. Europe was a collection of states,
each capable of going its own way, and each capable of fighting for itself and
its traditions, and capable of creating its own churches, in defiance of Rome.”[1] In
1517, as we know so well, Martin Luther nailed his 95 theses to the door of the
church at Wittenberg. The Protestant Reformation not only engendered important
debates on questions relating to the Christian religion, but also contributed
to debates concerning the relationship of Church and State, and their
respective roles in society. For example, the Reformers tended to agree that
whoever was presently in power had been established in their civil duties by
God Himself, thus, to attempt to overturn said leader was to oppose God. Many
of the Reformers (such as Melanchthon and Calvin[2])
taught that one of the responsibilities of the civil magistrate was to ensure
that right religion was practiced in their country. As such, the civil magistrate
became a powerful ally in the Reformation of the Church. In what follows, we
will look at how Martin Luther explains Christian submission to the civil
magistrate and the question of civil disobedience, in one of his most
well-known treatises on the subject. We will conclude by reflecting on how
their thoughts might be helpful today.
In this sociological, political, and religious context, Martin Luther wrote a treatise designed to discuss the relationship between Church and State: Temporal Authority: To What Extent it should be Obeyed. Based on a sermon Luther preached in 1522, this treatise was published in 1523, and addressed to John the Steadfast, the Duke of Saxony. The year is of some interest, for our purposes, as during the 1520s there were a number of important revolts. From 1522 to 1523, a group of German knights led a revolt against the Catholic church and the Holy Roman Empire; and then, from 1524 to 1525, there was a widespread revolt in German-speaking lands, which came to be called the Peasant’s War. The Peasant’s War supposedly called upon Protestant principles in order to gain freedom from the oppression of the nobility. The Peasant’s War was supported by some Protestant theologians, such as Huldrych Zwingli, but was condemned by other Protestant theologians, most notably, Martin Luther. Luther, in his treatise Temporal Authority, warns the Duke that the sound of revolt is in the air, and that changes in the way they rule might help them avoid this revolt.[3] This revolt changed nothing in the condition of the Peasants, except that some 100,000 peasants lost their lives.
Luther and the Two Kingdoms
In the treatise, Temporal Authority, Luther
seeks to articulate what he sees as the Christian understanding of the
authority of the civil magistrate, and the limits of his authority. The
treatise is divided into 3 main sections: (1) the divine imposition of temporal
authority for the good of mankind, (2) the limits of temporal authority, and
(3) advice concerning how a just ruler should use his power. He tacks on an
appendix providing advice on how to deal with the question of restitution.
Luther begins, in the first section, by providing the biblical basis for
the claim that the civil magistrate rightly holds the power to punish citizens
or to wage war (they hold the sword), and this by divine design from the
beginning of the world.[4] He
quotes Romans 13: 1-2 and 1 Peter 2:13-14, among other verses, to prove this
point. He then explains that all of humanity can be divided up into two basic
classes, “the first belonging to the kingdom of God, the second to the kingdom
of the world.”[5]
With this distinction in place, Luther notes that,
technically speaking, those in the Kingdom of God – true Christians –
need no temporal law or sword as they are under the law and sword of God.[6] On
the other hand, those in the Kingdom of the World – all non-believers –
as they are not under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, need some sort of rule
of law, and, therefore, God has placed them under the rule of the civil
government. “If this were not so, men would devour one another, seeing that the
whole world is evil and that among thousands there is scarcely a single true
Christian…For this reason God has ordained two governments: the spiritual…and
the temporal.”[7]
Civil government, then is a grace of God designed to restrain the evilness of
man. Luther suggests that it is of the temporal authority that Paul and Peter
speak in the verses mentioned above.[8]
These two governments are necessary, for the spiritual alone points man
towards Christ for the salvation of his soul (and bears no sword that might punish
the wicked), whereas the temporal alone maintains peace in this world,
but cannot point man towards Christ, “Both must be permitted to remain; the one
to produce righteousness, the other to bring about external peace and prevent
evil deeds.”[9]
The Civil order and Christian Obedience to the Ruler
The question we wish to ask, here, is: “to what extent
the Christian is required, by God, to obey the civil magistrate—the temporal
authority?” This is a question that Luther asks in two different ways. In the
first part of his treatise, Luther asks: If Christians do not need the
temporal sword, then why must they be submitted to the temporal governments (as
Paul and Peter say via divine inspiration)? His answer? For the good of
others.[10]
“Since a true Christian lives and labors on earth not
for himself alone but for his neighbor, he does by the very nature of his
spirit even what he himself has no need of, but is needful and useful to his
neighbor. Because the sword is most beneficial and necessary for the whole
world in order to preserve peace, punish sin, and restrain the wicked, the
Christian submits most willingly to the rule of the sword, pays his taxes,
honors those in authority, serves, helps, and does all he can to assist the
governing authority, that it may continue to function and be held in honor and
fear…Just as he performs all other works of love which he himself does not
need—he does not visit the sick in order that he himself may be made well, or
feed others because he himself needs food—so he serves the governing authority
not because he needs it but for the sake of others, that they may be protected
and that the wicked may not become worse.”[11]
Luther suggests that Christians
submit to the ruling temporal authorities not for their own good (the Christian
is not inclined to break the law, for the Holy Spirit works in the Christian to
point them towards the highest standard of morality—love of God and love of
their neighbor), but for the good of their non-Christian neighbours:
that the civil government might be preserved in its integrity in order to
continue to maintain the peace, punish the evildoer, and protect the weak.
Furthermore, suggests Luther, the Christian also submits to the governing
authorities as a model for their non-Christian neighbours,[12]
so that those who would be inclined to rebel (because they do not have the
leading of the Holy Spirit) would follow the example of the Christian in
seeking the good of their neighbors, and of all in their society. Humans are
naturally rebellious, we hate being under someone’s thumb, and yet, God saw fit
to make man, as Aristotle says in his Politics, a political animal. In
other words, to form societies in which some govern, and others are governed,
is both natural to man and a natural necessity. It is, suggests Luther, a good
(on the same level as food and wine) given to man by God, “If it is God’s work
and creation, then it is good, so good that everyone can use it in a Christian
and salutary way…Under ‘everything created by God’ you must include not simply
food and drink, clothing and shoes, but also authority and subjection,
protection and punishment.”[13]
And yet, the civil magistrate is
often—more often than not—neither Christian nor inclined to obey God or truly
pursue justice. In fact, history demonstrates that those most inclined to lead,
also happen to be those most inclined to oppress. As even a cursory look at the
15th and 16th century demonstrates, this is not news to
Luther. In fact, one of the questions he asks is, “whether a Christian too may
bear the temporal sword and punish the wicked.”[14]
It is a given that most civil magistrates are not only non-Christian, but that
they are also unjust.[15] When
most magistrates are unjust, and when the magistrate is required to bear the
temporal sword, is there room for a Christian magistrate? The answer, of
course, is yes. However, for Luther (Paul and Peter would have concurred), the
chances that we will actually live in a state which is governed by a just ruler
are fairly slim. The fact that it is almost a certitude that the Christian will
live in a state governed by an unjust ruler, with unjust laws, should be kept
in mind as we ask these questions. Peter and Paul are not saying that we are to
obey the government only when they are just. They aren’t, we know that, and yet
we must submit to them. Luther suggests as much when, having brought up the
possibility that the government may not provide justice towards the Christian,
he says, “If it fails to do this, he [the Christian] should permit himself to be
despoiled and slandered; he should not resist evil, as Christ’s words say.”[16]
The Christian Living Under an Unjust Ruler
What, then, is the Christian to do
when living under an oppressive regime, under an unjust ruler, subjected to
unjust laws? Part of the response to this question is found in the first
section, where Luther suggests that “No Christian shall wield or invoke the
sword for himself and his cause. In behalf of another, however, he may and
should wield it and invoke it to restrain wickedness and to defend godliness.”[17]
In other words, the Christian wrongly wields the sword to defend himself, but
is morally constrained to wield the sword to defend others. Does this mean that
civil disobedience, unrest, and perhaps even armed rebellion, are possible
options for the Christian? In a sense, yes; but we must go to the second
section of Luther’s treatise to see why and when.
In the second section of this
treatise, Luther examines the extent of the authority of temporal or civil government.
He explains that “The temporal government has laws which extend no further than
to life and property and external affairs on earth…Therefore, where the
temporal authority presumes to prescribe laws for the soul, it encroaches upon
God’s government and only misleads souls and destroys them.”[18]
So, the authority of the temporal government extends to everything
related to human life on earth: the body, personal or civil property, and all
external affairs;[19]
and, this, by divine decree.
The authority of God’s government extends over everything, but delegates authority to
the temporal government in all the areas just mentioned. This entails, for
Luther, that the temporal government has no authority over the soul. What does
this mean? For Luther, the civil government has neither “right”, nor
“authority”, nor even the “ability” to tell a human person what they can or
cannot believe or think. Luther goes on to provide a number of arguments to
demonstrate this point. He concludes that “Even if their subjects were in
error, it would be much easier simply to let them err than to compel them to
lie and to utter what is not in their hearts.”[20]
This implies, for Luther, that if the civil authority oversteps its bounds (by which
he means: they are telling us what we must believe, or what books we are
allowed to read[21]),
the Christian is morally required to disobey the magistrate. In fact, Luther
says, “if you fail to withstand him, if you give in to him and let him take
away your faith and your books, you have truly denied God.”[22]
Therefore, the Christian must neither abandon his faith in God nor surrender
his Bible, even if the tyrant (for, let’s be honest, that is what such a person
would be) tells the Christian to deny God and surrender his Bible, or die.
So, if the civil magistrate tries to tell me what to
believe, I have no obligation to obey. That is, I have no obligation to change
my beliefs. In fact, in the case that I am a Christian, I am morally obligated
to maintain my beliefs, and to confess Christ, even to death. However, this
says nothing of what most people today would consider “civil disobedience”.
That is, this type of “disobedience” can be engaged in even if I obey the civil
authorities in all other matters (such as social distancing, wearing a mask,
quarantine, or even restricting my attendance to church services for periods of
time). So, what about actually “doing something”, such as engaging in public
demonstrations, unrest, revolts, or sedition?
In part three, Luther directly addresses the question
of when it is right to resist an unjust civil leader. This comes up under the
overarching issue of whether a Christian magistrate may declare war on another
country, another magistrate, or against his King or overlord; and whether his
subjects are required to follow his lead.[23] In
relation to civil magistrates, and those who have authority over them (such as
their Monarch), Luther clearly states, “To act here as a Christian, I say, a
prince should not go to war against his overlord—king, emperor, or other liege
lord—but let him who takes, take. For the governing authority must not be
resisted by force, but only by confession of the truth.”[24] Civil
leaders must not, therefore, resist those who are in power over them, except by
pointing towards justice and truth.[25]
If those who are in power over us wish to take something from us (life,
property, or other terrestrial good), even unjustly, let them take it. For,
after all, Luther constantly reminds the Christian, we are not of this world,
and our riches, our life, and our honor is not worldly. Note, if a Christian
civil leader should not resist an unjust overlord, such resistance is even less
permissible for the Christian subjects of said civil leader.
In relation to the subjects of a civil magistrate who
has declared war, “subjects are in duty bound to follow, and to devote their
life and property, for in such a case one must risk his goods and himself for
the sake of others.”[26]
Christians can, and in the case that it is a just war, are morally required to,
support their magistrate in his declaration of war. What to do, however, if we
think the magistrate is wrong? What if the ruler has unjustly declared war on
another? The Christian need not follow, and, in fact, must not.[27]
However, if the subject is uncertain as to whether or
not the Magistrate is right, they should follow their leader. “So long as they
do not know, and cannot with all possible diligence find out, they may obey him
without peril to their souls.”[28]
Luther then makes a statement which could be seen as a principle whenever we
are forced to ask whether or not to obey our civil magistrate on subjects where
we have difficulty discerning what is right, “It is all the same to God whether
he deprives you of life and property by a just or by an unjust lord. You are
His creature and He can do with you as He wills, just so your conscience is
clear.”[29]
In sum, Johnson’s conclusions concerning Luther’s view of civil disobedience or
revolt appears to be correct, “But what if the ruler is manifestly a bad
ruler?...The answer cannot be armed resistance, because persons not in
sovereign authority cannot justly take the sword on their own authority.
Private individuals may disobey and accept punishment, flee to another
political community, or, if uncertain as to the justice of the ruler’s
government, ‘obey without peril to their souls’ (Luther 1962: 126). The ruler’s
fate is in God’s hands.”[30]
As we conclude, there are a couple more points worth
mentioning from the third part of Luther's treatise. First of all, Luther
distinguishes between a just ruler and a tyrant based upon how they rule their
people. The just ruler seeks the good of his people, the tyrant thinks only of
his own good and his own profit. The tyrant says, “The land and people belong
to me, I will do what best pleases me.”[31]
This is a fairly typical understanding of the good ruler versus the tyrant,
which Luther inherited from Western thought.[32] Secondly,
the just ruler seeks to rule with justice, being neither overbearing nor overly
lenient (though if one is to err, it is better to err in the latter). For
Luther, then, a tyrant thinks only of his own benefit, and does not pursue
justice; the just ruler thinks primarily of the benefit of his people, and
sacrifices his own profit for their good. Even here, it is the role of the just
civil magistrate to oppose the unjust civil leader; it is not the role of the
people to rise up against their leader.[33]
[1]Carlos
M. N. Eire, Reformations: The Early Modern World, 1450-1650 (New Haven
and London: Yale University Press, 2016), 18.
[2]John
Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, t. 4, ch. 20, 9, trans. Henry
Beveridge (Peabody, Mass: Hendrickson Publishers, 2012), 975.
[3]Martin
Luther, Temporal Authority: To What Extent It Should be Obeyed, in
Timothy F. Lull, ed., Martin Luther’s Basic Theological Writings, 2nd
ed. (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2005), 452.
[4]Luther,
Temporal Authority, 433. It is worth noting that this is a modification
of the Roman theory of the 2 swords, in which, according to some medieval theologians,
the two swords (the spiritual and the temporal) are given to the Pope, and the Pope
then bestows the temporal sword on whichever political leaders they see fit. Note
how, in the Roman papal approach, the 2 swords belong to the church, and the
church has the right to establish or depose of kings. In the approach that
Luther (and other Reformers) presents, the temporal sword belongs to the civil
authorities from the beginning of time, not through the mediation of the
church. The impact on politics should be obvious. Cf. Jacques Leclercq, L’État ou
la Politique, vol. 2 of Leçons de droit naturel, 4e ed. (Louvain :
Société d’étude morale, sociales et juridiques, 1958), 157fn1.
[5]Luther, Temporal Authority,
435. James Turner Johnson has noted that this distinction,
“was passed on to Luther and his contemporaries as part of their common
intellectual heritage from the Middle Ages. (James Turner Johnson, “Aquinas and
Luther on War and Peace: Sovereign Authority and the Use of Armed Force”, The
Journal of Religious Ethics, vol. 31, no. 1 (Spring, 2003), 13.
[6]Luther,
Temporal Authority, 435.
[7]Luther,
Temporal Authority, 436.
[8]Luther,
Temporal Authority, 436.
[9]Luther,
Temporal Authority, 437. Johnson notes that Luther, in fact, agrees with
Aquinas on this point, “Luther’s advocacy of the ‘one sword’ position was in
fact in line with the conclusion reached in the thirteenth century and reflected
in Aquinas’s understanding of authority for just war. (Johnson, Aquinas and
Luther on War and Peace, 15.)”
[10]Note how
this answer echoes the reasons, given by Philip Melanchthon in his 1521 Loci
Communes, to similar questions. There, he says that Christians are to obey
the prince, both a prince acting in the best interest of his people and a
tyrant, “because of love.” As he says, “For love obligates us to all kinds of
civil responsibilities. (Philip Melanchthon, CommonPlaces: Loci Communes
1521, trans. and ed. Christian Preus (Saint Louis, MO: Concordia Publishing
House, 2014), 187.)”
[11]Luther, Temporal
Authority, 438.
[12]Luther, Temporal
Authority, 438.
[13]Luther, Temporal
Authority, 441.
[14]Luther, Temporal
Authority, 439.
[15]He later says
as much, “the temporal lords are supposed to govern lands and people outwardly.
This they leave undone…Besides this, there is no justice, integrity, or truth
to be found among them. They behave worse than any thief or scoundrel, and
their temporal rule has sunk quite as low as that of the Spiritual tyrants.
(Luther, Temporal Authority, 447.)” Or, again, “You must know that since
the beginning of the world a wise prince is a mighty rare bird, and an upright
prince even rarer. They are generally the biggest fools or the worst scoundrels
on earth; therefore, one must constantly expect the worst from them and look
for little good, especially in divine matters which concern the salvation of
souls. (Luther, Temporal Authority, 449-450.)” Or, again, “For there are
very few princes who are not regarded as fools or scoundrels; that is because
they show themselves to be so. (Luther, Temporal Authority, 451.)”
[16]Luther, Temporal
Authority, 443.
[17]Luther, Temporal
Authority, 443. It seems that Luther is here speaking not of the Temporal
Sword given to the magistrate, but to that for which the Temporal Sword is to
be used: to avenge those who have been unjustly treated, justice. It is the
magistrate that has the God-given responsibility to wield this sword, not the
individual.
[18]Luther, Temporal
Authority, 445.
[19]Later he
repeats this point, “But with respect to body, property, and honor he [the civil
authority] has indeed to do these things [i.e. – judge, kill, condemn,
imprison, or impose laws], for such matters are under his authority. (Luther, Temporal
Authority, 448.)”
[20]Luther, Temporal
Authority, 447. The application of this comment to contemporary conspiracy
theorists should be obvious!
[21]Luther, Temporal
Authority, 449. The example he gives of a situation in which a Christian is
morally required to disobey their authority is if the civil authority requires
the Christian to turn over their Bibles.
[22]Luther, Temporal
Authority, 449.
[23]Luther, Temporal
Authority, 456.
[24]Luther, Temporal
Authority, 456.
[25]A perfect
analogy between the political order of Luther’s time and contemporary Canada or
the States may not be possible. However, if we were to try to establish some
sort of analogy, we might say that the Mayors of towns, or the regional
representatives (at both the provincial and federal levels), are relatively
equivalent to the lower princes or civil leaders that Luther says should not resist
their King/Monarch except by pointing towards the truth. This analogy is
complicated, however, by the fact that in some forms of democracy, the citizens
technically employ the civil leader (who is the servant, rather than the ruler,
of the people). In this case, we need to go to philosophers such as
Jean-Jacques Rousseau to understand what “civil rule” of a country entails.
Interestingly enough, civil unrest and disobedience
is strictly impossible in such a situation. Leclercq notes that in a Liberal Democracy,
the individual citizens “abandoning their freedom to the community find it
again in the community, as they are the community; but the community cannot, on
the other hand, remove this freedom. The people cannot give themselves to a
sovereign; they are themselves the sovereign and the only possible sovereign.
(Leclercq, EP, 158. My translation.)” Leclercq quotes Rousseau to the
effect that in this form of political rule, it is, in fact, impossible for the
people to impose upon themselves a law which they cannot break, and there can
be no fundamental and necessary law, not even the social contract (Leclerq, EP,
158). In relation to civil disobedience, if obedience to a sovereign is only
necessary insomuch as they wield their power and enforce the laws in a
legitimate manner, it follows that “For a power to be legitimate, only one
condition is required: the will of the people; for it to cease to be
legitimate, only one condition is required: that the people change their will.
(Leclerq, EP, 158. My translation.)” As such, insomuch as the civil leader
enacts the will of the people, the power is legitimate, and obedience is
required (in fact, disobedience would be incoherent. In this case, disobedience
would be to act against one’s own will, as “the people” is composed of all “citizens”,
and legitimate power is the will of the people). Insomuch as the civil leader
does not enact the will of the people, it is the civil leader who is no longer
obeying “the Sovereign”, as the people are Sovereign (in this case, we also
wouldn’t really speak of “civil disobedience”, as the people are Sovereign,
and, so, cannot disobey themselves. At best, this would be a case of the civil
leader engaging in civil disobedience.).
There is,
of course, the difficulty of “knowing” the will of the people. The will of an
individual citizen, or of a small group of citizens (a minority group), would
not be the will of the people. The will of the people would be what the
majority of citizens desire. Thus, the necessity of politicians to establish,
through voting, representation, polls, etc., what the people desire. Now, this
is where it gets interesting, in such a system, not only would the civil leader
not have the right to “disobey the sovereign (the people)”, but the individual
citizen also would not have the right to “disobey the sovereign (the people)”.
Any individual citizen who does not obey the will of the people (which alone
has legitimate power), would be engaged in civil disobedience. Here, then, we
find an appropriate analogy with what Luther is suggesting. Applied to a
Liberal Democracy, Luther’s claim would be that “no individual citizen should
disobey the will of the people”. Thus, in a Liberal Democracy, if even 60% of
the population desire some policy, then to disobey that policy is to engage in
civil disobedience. Applying Luther’s thought to a Liberal Democracy, he appears
to be saying that Christians should not disobey the will of the people, except
in relation to their beliefs, and the possession of their Scriptures. Can we
even truly speak of tyranny in such a government?
[26]Luther, Temporal
Authority, 456.
[27]Luther, Temporal
Authority, 457.
[28]Luther, Temporal
Authority, 457.
[29]Luther, Temporal
Authority, 457.
[30]Johnson, Aquinas
and Luther on War and Peace, 17.
[31]Luther, Temporal
Authority, 453.
[32]We find the
same claims in Calvin, Aquinas, etc.
[33]As noted
above, in order to be applicable in other forms of government Luther’s claims
will need to be nuanced. Cf. fn.25.
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