the Turks. This is clear from the article that is condemned in the bull of Pope Leo, that is, article 34.157 Theodorus Bibliander seems to agree with Luther in Chronologia, table 13, where he says: “Urban, that most cruel tornado, driven by an evil spirit to indulge in homicide, started a war to regain Judea.”
However, it must be observed that Luther does not say that the war against the Turks was unlawful because he thinks that every war in general is unlawful, for in the assertio of his article he recommends war against the Pontiff who, he says, is a most Turkish Turk, and neither does he judge in this way because he thinks that Christians have no just cause, since it is evident to everybody that the Turks occupied the lands of the Christians without any right. Every day they want to occupy more land, and it is also evident that the Turks want to eliminate all religion and to see to it that men convert from Christianity to Islam. Finally, it is evident that ancient Pontiffs such as Urban II, Paschal II, Eugene III,158 and many others, together with general councils such as the Lateran, the Council of Lyon, the Council of Vienne, and others, declared a general war against the Muslims; and St. Bernard and other holy men in public speeches stirred the peoples to that war, and they strengthened their speech with miracles, as blessed Bernard himself indicates modestly at the beginning of book 1 of De consideratione. Luther does not deny any of these things, but there are three other reasons why he thought that it was not lawful to fight against the Turks.
First, because the will of God seems to be that we should be punished by the Turks as by a divine punishment, and it is not lawful for us to resist God’s will. That this is indeed God’s will he proves in the assertio of article 34, where he argues that experience shows that so far the war against the Turks has not given any benefit to the Christians.
But this first reason has little value, for even if God’s will is that our sin be punished through the Turks, nevertheless it is not His will that we should not resist the Turks; indeed His will is for us to resist, which is proved from the final cause. For God does not allow the Turks to rage against us so that we may die but so that we may convert, for we are led to converting when we try to resist the Turks who are assaulting us; and by resisting we suffer, and by suffering we recognize our weakness, and hence we turn to God with our whole heart and we beg Him for help. Therefore, from the final cause for which God allows the Turks to rage against us it clearly follows that God wants us to resist the Turks. Moreover, the war of the Turks is a divine punishment just like plague, famine, heresy, the flames of sin, and such, but nobody is so foolish as to think that one should not seek a remedy against the plague, or that we should not cultivate the land so as not to die by starvation, or that we should not resist heresy.
Furthermore, it is not true, as Luther says, that experience shows that the war against the Turks brought us nothing good. Not to mention many reported victories over the Turks, it is certainly the case that when the armies first were brought into the promised land, it was a great success that Jerusalem was reconquered by our troops and that the Christians ruled for eighty-eight years. And they were reconquering more and more land until contentions started to arise among the Christian princes themselves, to such an extent that the Turks now occupy a great deal of land because of the disagreements in our camp rather than because of their own military valor, and the chief cause of such disagreements was Luther himself. For as is clear from Johann Cochlaeus’s De actis et scriptis Lutheri concerning the year 1526, the Hungarians were destroyed because the Germans, whom the king of Hungary had called upon for help, preferred to obey Luther, who was then preaching against the war with the Turks, rather than to think of what the common good would require.159 At least the war has this advantage, that the Turks are prevented from being as harmful as they would like to be, for if we had not fought them until now, they would have taken everything a long time ago.
His second reason is that tribulation and persecution are more useful to the Church than victory and peace; hence in Sermo de matrimonio he condemns the practice of the Church to pray for peace and quiet, when one should rather pray for tribulations. But while tribulation and persecution certainly are useful, they are dangerous and one should not so much seek them as tolerate them when it cannot be otherwise. Hence in Matthew 6 we are commanded to pray “and lead us not into temptation,”160 and in 1 Timothy 2 the apostle orders us to pray for kings, that we may lead a quiet and peaceful life, and blessed Augustine in book 10 of the Confessiones, chapter 28, says that sorrows have to be tolerated, neither loved nor desired nor sought.
The third reason, and the one that seems to have been the chief one, is hatred against the Pontiff, for sometimes Luther attacked the Pontiff with so much hatred that clearly he wished to see the Turks occupy all the kingdoms of Christendom, if the name of the Pontiff could at least be wiped out in this way. And it is not guesswork that this was his wish and desire; we gather it from his own words, for in his address An den christlichen Adel deutscher Nation, chapter 25, he says that there is no better government anywhere than among the Turks, who are governed by the laws of the Koran, and there is no worse government than among the Christians, who are ruled by canon and civil law. And in the assertio of article 34 he says that the Pontiff and his followers are much worse and more cruel than the Turks, and it is foolish to fight against the Turks alongside those who are even worse than they are, and in an epistle against two imperial mandates he says: “I beg all the pious Christians not to obey in any way, not to serve in the army and not to hold anything against the Turks, since the Turks are ten times more prudent and honest than our princes.” With these words what else is he trying to suggest but that we must assist the Turks against the Christians?
But this opinion contains so much absurdity and impiety that Luther himself, once his ardor cooled somewhat, wrote the plain contrary, for this is what he says in his report on the Saxon visitation: “Some preachers cry with temerity that we must not resist the Turks. Such speech is seditious and must neither be uttered nor permitted. The authorities are then obliged to resist the Turks, who not only want to pillage the lands and violate and kill the women and children, but also to abrogate and destroy the laws of the land, the worship of God, and every good regulation. Therefore the princes must especially fight, etc.”; and in the same book: “It would be far more tolerable for a good man to see his sons killed than soaked in Muslim customs, since the Turks know or regard no honesty at all.” These are his words.
It does not pertain to the magistrate to judge in matters of religion
The fifth question follows, concerning the duty of the political magistrate in the cause of religion. In this regard there are three errors. The first is the error of those who attribute too much to the magistrates, such as Brenz in Prolegomena; Melanchthon in Loci, chapter on the magistrate; and others, who want kings to be not only the protectors and defenders of religion, but also its judges and teachers. For they say that to judge controversies of faith, to preside over general councils, to appoint ministers and pastors, and to carry out other similar duties pertain to kings as chief members of the Church. We discussed this error a great deal in the Controversiae, on the judge of controversies, the Supreme Pontiff, and the councils, where we showed that kings have the first place among Christians as Christian men, that is, as citizens of the earthly city, but not as fellow citizens among the saints and servants of God, nor as members of the Church. For in this last respect the bishops have the first place, and the chief is the Supreme Pontiff, second the priests, third the deacons and the other ecclesiastical ministers, and last the laymen, among whom also kings and princes are numbered.
Hence when Chrysostom addresses the deacons in his homily 83 on Matthew, he says: “If any commander, the consul himself, he who is adorned with the crown, acts impiously, repress and punish him, for you have a greater authority than he.” And Gelasius in his epistle to Emperor Anastasius says: “O my most loving son, know that even if you preside over humankind because of your excellence in earthly matters, nevertheless you lower your head devoutly in front of those who preside over divine
