or secular people, and at the same time about the branches which are severed from the Church, that is, the heretics, all of which things can be subsumed in a disputation on the political magistrate.
This entire disputation is contained in six questions. First, we must deal with political authority itself, then with its duty in political matters, and third with its duty in matters of religion.
On the first point there are two questions. The first is whether this authority is good and therefore lawful for Christians, and the second whether it can be lost through sin.
On the second point there are two questions. First, on the duty of the magistrate in preserving the commonwealth from the citizens’ wickedness through laws and sentences both civil and penal, that is, whether it is lawful for Christians to make laws, administer justice, and punish the guilty with the sword, which are the acts proper to the magistrate. The second, on the duty of the magistrate in protecting the commonwealth from external enemies, that is, whether it is lawful for Christians to wage wars, and to this we add—almost as a corollary, because of Luther—whether it is lawful to fight against the Turks.1
On the third point there are two further questions. The first is whether the care of religion pertains to the magistrate or whether he can allow everybody to believe what they want. The second question is whether the magistrate must punish the heretics sentenced and condemned by the Church in their writings and in their possessions and in their persons, even to the point of punishing them with death.
The first question, whether the political authority is good and lawful for Christians, is proposed2
Among the chief heretical beliefs of the Anabaptists and Antitrinitarians of our time there is one that says that it is not lawful for Christians to hold magistracy and that among Christians there must not be power of capital punishment, etc., in any government, tribunal, or court. The ministers in Transylvania who oppose the trinity and the incarnation and infant baptism declared in 1568 in Alba Julia the differences between the true Christ and the false Christ, and the seventh difference is that the false Christ has in His Church kings, princes, magistrates, and swords; the true Christ cannot allow anything like this in His Church.3
Their arguments are these, or certainly can be these: first, from Scripture, Matthew 17: “And when they were come to Capernaum, they that received tribute money came to Peter, and said, Doth not your master pay tribute? etc.”4 And Luke 22: “The kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them; and they that exercise authority upon them are called benefactors,”5 Romans 13: “Owe no man any thing, but to love one another,”6 1 Corinthians 7: “Ye are bought with a price; be not ye the servants of men,”7 2 [1] Corinthians 8: “One Lord,”8 Ephesians 4: “One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God.”9
Second, arguments from examples: very many princes abuse their authority, and not only are they not useful to the commonwealth, but they are indeed a nuisance, as is clear at the very beginning of the world in the case of Cain (Genesis 4) and of the sons of God (Genesis 6) who took different wives and were corrupted by every evil, and because of them the flood followed. The same in the case of Nimrod, Pharaoh, Nebuchadnezzar, Saul, Rehoboam, and others: indeed, after the division of the kingdom, of all the kings of Israel not one was good.
Third, arguments from the final cause, for the Jews were allowed a magistrate because of the imperfection of the time: the Jews were all children and therefore had to be ruled by somebody else, as is clear from Galatians 4. But we are perfect men, and “our anointing teacheth us of all things,” to keep with the biblical language.
Fourth, arguments from the efficient cause, for this authority was introduced by God, but it was usurped by men in a tyrannical way: Who made Nimrod king? Who Nebuchadnezzar? Who Alexander? Who Julius Caesar? Who the others? This is the reason why that pirate who replied to Alexander, “I am called a pirate because I go around in a small boat, you are called an emperor because you plunder the world with a big fleet,” is praised (Augustine, De civitate Dei, book 4, chapter 4, from Cicero, De republica, book 3).10
Fifth, arguments from the origin, for God created man free, and subjection was introduced through sin; therefore once we are freed from sin through Christ, we must be freed also from subjection. The antecedent is clear, as in Genesis 1 it is not said “have dominion over men,” but “have dominion over the fish of the sea.”11 Likewise the woman is now subjected to the man only by a political subjection, but this was introduced through sin, as is clear from Genesis 3 “[thy husband] shall rule over thee.”12 Moreover, before the flood the first one who founded a city and started a political kingdom was Cain, as Augustine deduced in book 15 of De civitate Dei, chapter 1, out of Genesis 4; and after the flood the first was Nimrod (Genesis 10).
Finally, the Fathers clearly teach this. Augustine in De civitate Dei, book 19, chapter 15, says that God, having made man a rational creature, in His image, did not want him to dominate except over irrational creatures, not over another man but over beasts. Hence the first just men were made shepherds of flocks rather than kings of men, so that God could demonstrate from this what the order of the creatures required and what the punishment of sins demanded. Gregory in his Moralia, book 21, chapter 11 [15], says that nature made all men equals; but through varying degrees of merits, a secret dispensation places some after some others. Indeed that very difference which arose from vice has been rightly ordered by the divine counsels so that, since not every man walks the path of life in the same manner, one may be ruled by another; and he says similar things in De cura pastorali, part 2, chapter 6.
Not only all Catholics, especially blessed Thomas in Opusculum 20, and all philosophers detest this heresy, but also Philip Melanchthon in Loci communes, the chapter on the civil magistrate, and John Calvin in book 4 of his Institutiones, chapter 20, most aggressively and broadly oppose it, and so does Luther himself in De visitatio Saxonica,13 although the Anabaptists took as a pretext his own words in De Babylonica captivitate ecclesiae, the chapter on baptism.14 We will refute this heresy with five arguments, for the principles of our adversaries are that many: first, from the Scriptures; second, from the examples of saints; third, from the final or necessary cause; fourth, from the efficient cause; and fifth, from origin.
The political magistrate is defended by Scripture
As to the first argument, the Scripture of the Old Testament is full of testimonies. In Exodus 22 the judges of the people are called gods by God himself and likewise in Psalm 81: “God standeth in the congregation of the mighty; he judgeth among the gods.”15 Jehoshaphat explains the rationale of this word in 2 Paralipomena16 19, where he says that judges administer not men’s but God’s justice, that is, they judge in place of God; similarly in Deuteronomy 1 Moses warns the judges of the people to judge justly since judgment is of God. And Christ in John 10: “if he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the Scripture cannot be broken; Say ye of him, whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world... etc.,”17 where Christ means to say if God calls the princes gods, since to them has been given the divine order to judge in His place, why not with all the more reason, etc., for what others say, that all those to whom God has spoken are called gods, does not make sense. If therefore the princes are called gods, since they hold God’s place, the office of the prince cannot be blamed, unless the office of God Himself is blamed.
Moreover, in Deuteronomy 17 Moses lays out the laws for the future king, and
