Thursday Theology #587
September 10, 2009
Topic: Those Ten Commandments - Conversation Continued
Colleagues,
First off, I did send last week's post to Pastor X. He responded, and then
I did likewise. For now, that's inter nos.
The feedback from y'all on Pastor X's proposed sermon series on the
decalogue has filled my inbasket. One was Jeff Anderson's "look what I found as a
different translation for that Luther citation." I've already posted that
to the listserve. Here are a couple more. Starting with a feisty one.
That announcement for the 10 Commandment Sermon Series should have been
issued on either 1 April or Halloween. Laughter or horror are the only
logical responses. [An Anglican priest in Canada with a Seminex M.Div. degree!]
Hi Ed,
Here's how I'd "fix" Pastor X's blurb about preaching on the 10
commandments.
"Anyone who knows the Ten Commandments perfectly knows the
entire
Scriptures."
--Martin Luther, The Large Catechism
Even for Martin Luther, that's a very large claim. But I
believe it is
true. It helps to realize that Luther isn't referring
to mere intellectual consent but rather to the total demand
of the Law to life and
how it is lived in community. In the commandments we
find a God who addresses us where we live, where we face real issues about
property, sex, and speech. To "know" these
commandments is to know the total demand God through his Law
makes of our lives as they are lived out in the world.
The commandments are guidelines for humanity in general.
However, their function is not just to keep society running
smoothly, but rather
to reveal us as a people who are, in our daily lives,
failing to meet the total demand that God makes through the
Law. We have the Ten Commandments because, just like
the ancient Israelites, we are in the bondage of slavery to,
as Luther put it, "sin, death, and the devil." The
commandments are a punitive list of "dos" and "don'ts"
because they are a stern reminder of who we aren't and how
we fail to be God's chosen people.
But this isn't why Luther
could say to "know" the Ten Commandments is to know
everything the Bible is about. This merely sets the stage.
The Bible contains plenty of examples of our failures. We
can look to each other and add to that list. Although
knowing the Commandments means knowing that we are guilty as
charged, this is not what's new in the Bible.
What's new in
the Bible is God's final Word on the problem of our
rebellion against Him. That final Word is one of mercy to
sinners on behalf of Jesus Christ, who died on the cross
bearing our sins and was raised from the dead by God. All of
our failures to fulfill the Commandments are wiped clean by
the body and blood of Christ, which is freely given to all.
Renewed by Christ, the Commandments find their fulfillment
in our new life trusting Christ.
Luther explains it best:
"When we have Christ, we will easily create new laws and judge everything
correctly, even more, we will make new
Decalogues". It is through Christ's death and resurrection
alone and only that we are able to perfectly know the
Commandments. This is why Luther could say
to "know" the Ten Commandments is to know everything the
Bible is about-- it requires Christ's death and resurrection
, and that Good News is everything the Bible is about.
Beginning Sunday, September 13, we will begin a new
sermon series at both services exploring how Christ's death
and resurrection heals our sins as revealed by the Ten
Commandments and its implication for living the
Christian life today. Jesus said that God's work for us is
to believe in His Messiah (John 6:29). I invite you to join
in worship, examining the life of discipleship viewed
through the lens of Christ's death and resurrection.
Peter Keyel
St Louis, MO
Then these responses to Jeff Anderson's discovery of an alternate
translation for Luther's "sticky wicket" sentence. Instead of "Anyone who knows the
Ten Commandments perfectly knows the
entire
Scriptures," Jeff found this alternative reading in the Triglotta, the old
LCMS edition of the Lutheran Confessions: "For it needs must be that
whoever knows the Ten Commandments perfectly must know all the Scriptures. . . ."
Yes, and yet if you read the larger context of the quote in question,
you get the same sense from Luther. He's really deriding pastors who think
they know the entire Scriptures. Either way, Pastor X missed the boat. [ELCA
pastor in Illinois]
Hallelujah!! Amen!! [Lay theologian in Pennsylvania. She keeps holding
my feet to the fire.]
Ed, Tiny extra note regarding that "Trigollata." Jary Pelikan told us
that it would be ideal for our younger children to sit on to raise them at
the table at mealtime. [Seminary classmate of mine from the 1950s. Retired
LCMS pastor in NY]
Once again, I think both sides are making too much of this. I would
agree that the Tappert and Kolb/Wengert translation can be misleading: one
might think that the text of the Ten Commandments is all you need to understand
Christian faith. (And this appeared to be how Pastor X misused this
quote.) Though the old Dau/Bente [=Triglotta] and newer Concordia translation is
therefore better, I would argue that both translations are in fact true (and
the German and Latin can be translated either way).
Let's read this in context: Luther is arguing against those who say they
know the Ten Commandments perfectly. They say they know them perfectly, well
they must then know all of the Scriptures, and be able to advise, help,
comfort, judge, decide every possible case in the entire world. Since they
obviously don't know all this, Luther is calling them back to the study of the
Ten Commandments, which are a summary of the Scriptures. Put the other way,
Luther can say that the entire Bible is commentary on the Ten Commandments.
So of course you can't understand the Ten Commandments without knowing the
cross, without knowing God's will to be gracious to thousands. Likewise you
cannot understand the cross without knowing God's commandments and
punishments to the third and fourth generations.
The problem is not with mistranslation, but forgetting that the Creed, the
Lord's Prayer, and the Sacraments are also necessary. TOGETHER they give a
brief summary of the Bible, of Christian faith, wisdom, and practice. [Ph.D.
student at Univ. of Virginia]
Good find by alert reader Jeff Anderson!
As I now have my dad's copy of the *Triglotta,* as well as *Tappert,* I
can follow along. It's interesting to compare the English translation each
provides of the German/Latin you quoted from the Triglotta.
Tappert: ***This much is certain: anyone who knows the Ten Commandments
perfectly knows the entire Scriptures. In all affairs and circumstances he can
counsel, help, comfort, judge, and make decisions in both spiritual and
temporal matters. He is qualified to sit in judgment upon all doctrines,
estates, persons, laws, and everything else in the world.
Triglotta: ***For it needs must be that whoever knows the Ten Commandments
perfectly must know all of Scriptures, so that, in all affairs and cases, he
can advise, help, comfort, judge, and decide both spiritual and temporal
matters, and is qualified to sit in judgment upon all doctrines, estates,
spirits, laws, and whatever else is in the world.
I can't help but wonder why the Tappert - and, apparently, the Kolb/Wengert
- translations omit the second "must" of the sentence.
(Just thinking outloud here!) Could it have to do with different
understandings/meanings of the word "must?" Example: A father takes his son into a
bar for his 18th birthday. There is a sign on the door that says, "Must be
21 to enter!" The father says to his son as they walk in, "All right! You
must be 21!"
Anyway, according to my Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary: *must*
...1 *a*. be commanded or requested to *b*: be urged to : ought
to by all means 2 : *be compelled by physical
necessity to : be required by immediate or future need or
purpose to *3 a :*be obliged to: be compelled by
social consideration to *b :* be required by
law, custom, or moral conscience to *c*: be determined
to *d :* be unreasonably or perversely
compelled to *4* *be logically inferred
or supposed to *5 : *be compelled by favor or by natural law
to *6 : *was or were presumably certain to
Naturally, the father and his son are thrown out on their ears. The "must"
of the sign was according to definition 1 a, while the father used it
according to definition 4. (There is kernel of truth behind this story, by the
way.)
Seems that Tappert sees fit to omit the "must" and so translates in the
sense of definition 4: ("This much is certain: any idiot can see that anyone
who knows the Ten Commandments - albeit perfect - already knows [i.e., 'must'
know] the entire Scripture."), while the Triglotta uses definition 1 a:
("You'd better believe that *in order to know* (or, *before you can know*) the
Ten Commandments perfectly, you have to/are obliged to ['must'] know all of
Scripture." Something like that.
In other words, Tappert seems to be saying that it's a foregone conclusion
that to know the Ten Commandments is to know the entire Scriptures (though
there is that pesky word "perfectly"), while the English of the Triglotta
following the German and Latin says it's a "command." Is there any way at
all that the German/Latin can be linguistically construed to say the former,
whether as the sentence stands or in context of the entire paragraph or even
preface? (I would doubt it.) Would love to hear the reasoning.
And then there's that 'so that' in the Triglotta that is absent in the
Tappert, which seems to put a different twist on the paragraph.
Finally it's interesting to note that it's the *Catechism *(i.e., the whole
ball of wax: 10Cs, Creed, Lord's Prayer, Baptism, Sacrament of the Altar),
and *not* the Ten Commandments alone "which is a compend and brief summary
of all the Holy Scripture" -- agreed to in both Tappert and Triglotta:
Tappert: What is the whole Psalter but meditations and exercises based on
the *First Commandment?[!]* Now, I know beyond a doubt that such lazy-bellies
and presumptuous fellows do not understand a single Psalm, much
less the entire Scriptures, yet they pretend to know and despise the
Catechism, which is a brief compend and summary of all the Holy Scripture.
Triglotta: And what, indeed, is the entire Psalter but thoughts and
exercises upon the First Commandment? Now I know of truth that such lazy
paunches and presumptuous spirits do not understand a single psalm, much less the
entire Scriptures; and yet they pretend to know and despise the Catechism,
which is a compend and brief summary of all the Scriptures.
(And don't forget the little bit in there about the Psalter being
"meditations and exercises based on the FIRST commandment, which opens up a whole
discussion.)
Richard W. D. Jungkuntz
(Thank you!) cubed. I was ready to turn in my union card and join the
Bruderhof gang who insist that the Sermon on the Mount is the way that Xns
must live until the eschaton happens. I knew that my problem was not with
Luther but our interpretation of him. So good to learn that it was a
translation error. How did such an event happen with our scholarship of the past 65
years? Once again it is the Gutenberg press -- electronic -- to our rescue.
[Lutheran military chaplain in California]
Cool! We all should have seen that one coming.
A couple of years ago I started writing an article to be called "The Nine
Commandments". It started with what the Lutheran Study Bible thankfully puts
before us as a sidebar inserted at Exodus 20. It lays out the Jewish, the
Roman Catholic/Lutheran, and the Reformed numbering of the commandments. The
Jewish numbering of the "Ten Words" (Decalogue) begins with first Gospel
Word, God bringing the people out of slavery in Egypt. Then follow nine
commandments. (I tell people there are only nine commandments, but before they get
their hopes up, adultery is still in there.) The Jews have this one right.
The commandments (all nine of those Words) make no sense without the first
Word, the Good News Word about the greatest thing God had done for the chosen
people up until that time. Speaking of timing, the Red Sea waters must
have been still on their minds seeing as it happened only fifty days earlier by
Jewish tradition, the original Pentecost festival. God gave no commands
until the people were filled with Good News in their own recent history. Now
THAT is the Word of the Lord. Thanks be to God!
[ELCA pastor in Florida]
[For this one, a caveat from EHS. There is a quantum difference between the
Good News of "I am the LORD your God who brought you out of the land of
Egypt," and the Good News of "God was in Christ reconciling the world unto
himself--not counting trespasses." If the word "Gospel" means what the NT says
it means, it cannot be used as it is in the sentence above "Decalogue begins
with first Gospel Word, God bringing the people out of slavery in Egypt."
That was indeed good news for the enslaved Israelites, but it wasn't Gospel.
In Lutheran lingo, God did it with the left hand. Soteriology
(right-handed stuff) it was not.
It was part one of God's legal (sic!) contract with Israel, clean contrry
to God's earlier promise/faith covenant with Ur-patriarch Abraham. Part two
was this: "You love me and keep my commandments, or else! And here are nine
specifics for what I have in mind. You blow your part and you get
visited." There was no rejoicing at Sinai after these specs were laid out. Au
contraire. The recorded first response: "If God keeps talking to us like this,
we're dead meat." Gospel it was not.
Nowhere does any NT writer--and weren't they all Israelites?--ever link the
word Gospel to Exodus/Sinai. That is a precedent to be followed. They
must have known something. So did Jeremiah already way back then (31:34) as he
specked out what was going to be "new" in God's new covenant. The new one
would offer what was totally absent in the Sinai contract, namely,
"forgiveness" for sinners, i.e., Gospel.
Exodus/Sinai was indeed a gift from God, but a gift that obligates. Gospel
is also a gift from God, but a gift that liberates from those very
unfulfilled obligations of the prior contract. Exodus/Sinai and Gospel are as
different as day and night. Or, shall we say, law and promise. What God has not
joined together, let us not do so either.]
