The New Book of Concord

dialog: A Journal of Theology • Volume 40, Number 1 • Spring 2001 64 Ecumenic and Ecumenical Perspectives The New Book of Concord Edited by Robert Kolb & Timothy J. Wengert. Translated by Charles Arand et. al. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2000. EDITOR’S NOTE: The publication of the new Book of Concord is a historic moment. On the cusp of the new century we have new access to our confessional roots, critically analyzed and constructively presented. English speaking Lutherans throughout the world owe a debt of gratitude to editors Timothy Wengert and Robert Kolb. Here “Ecumenic and Ecumenical Perspectives” presents an open forum to greet this important new publication. Put together by Ernest Simmons, this forum includes reviews by Susan Hedahl, Paul Lutter, Ralph Quere, Michael Aune, James Nestingen, and a co-editor response by Robert Kolb. My thanks to the authors. - Ted Peters, editor Proclamation and The Book of Concord Prior to writing this review, I have read two books in the past month. Both offered an interesting counterpoint to the reality of this latest edition of the Book of Concord. The first book is by Serene Jones, Feminist Theory and Christian Theology: Cartographies of Grace, (Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 2000) and the second by John Shelby Spong, Why Christianity Must Change or Die (San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1998). Part of Jones’ work offers an excellent feminist critique of Lutheranism’s fix on salvation by grace through faith; and she asks how contemporary feminists can inhabit this doctrine today. Spong posits a radical renewal of Christianity in a number of ways, including a close look at how theologies of different times and places reflect a too localized view of God and faith. Taken together, the books offer a significant set of lenses through which to view this latest published expression of our historical Lutheran faith perspective. As a homiletician I am always asking myself questions similar to those of Jones and Spong as I struggle with my students in working through that very pragmatic, contextual question: “How is this going to preach today?” As I prepared this review, I was fascinated by the variety of ways I have used and referenced the collected works of the Book of Concord over the years. In an overall way, this latest edition, used as a homiletical/theological resource, certainly bridges some of the distance created by the centuries. At different points, the wording is more contemporary in tone, the footnotes add a rich, substantial resource to the work, and the reconfiguration of some sections adds more self-interpretative examples of the initial uses and intentions of the earliest documents. The introductions to different parts are rich in information historically, contextually and theologically. Last year, I used the Book of Concord as the primary resource for a course on preaching the catechism. The class used the Tappert edition at that time, beginning with an oral reading of the entire catechism--certainly an intended Ecumenic and Ecumenical Perspectives • The New Book of Concord pedagogical device for catechetical materials. The interpretive gap that revealed itself for students between doctrinal materials assembled close to five hundred years ago and the contemporary setting caused significant classroom response, sometimes strife! The section on the “household code” in the earlier edition is an example of the disjuncture students experienced theologically and existentially. When I teach this course again, based on this latest edition, the addition of both the marriage and baptismal services will certainly add a more significant emphasis to the household or “family” sense of the catechism compared to its other contents in the Tappert edition. However, one can reasonably ask, What does this reinforce in today’s environment? Preaching students must now deal with these additions hermeneutically in contemporary life, together with the earlier household codes, with a clear sense that while they enlighten historically, they can also serve to further distance the documents from contemporary experience and theological struggle. The hierarchical view of male over female and the consequent summons to marital obedience for the female marriage partner based on this view certainly reflected Luther’s day and theology; it also seems significantly unhelpful in today’s world. I have also been struck in the catechetical materials by the change from the more scholastic question, “What does this mean?’ to the broader “What is this?” While the change may seem insignificant in some ways, homiletically it opens up the possibility for preaching and responding beyond the cognitive level alone. During a recent trip to Wittenberg, Germany this year, a visit to the Melanchthon home revealed a poignant and charming list that Melanchthon had written out just prior to his death. As he struggled with the evidences of his own mortality and tried to rationalize the inevitable, at the top of his list of reasons as to why death would come as a relief, he had noted in Latin that he would escape the rabicus theologicus, the rabid theologians of his day! But the BC’s collection of mostly Melanchthon leaves one wondering who could top the theological acumen of Melanchthon’s rhetorical, theological and argumentative skills? This latest edition also coincided with an autumn seminary STM course at Gettysburg Lutheran Seminary on the rhetoric of Luther and Melanchthon. Indeed, the class participants found that this edition has accomplished some much needed work in clarifying and highlighting Melanchthon’s work on the collected documents, focusing well on the incredible linguistic and rhetorical expertise of a reformer who has often been overlooked in the rush to appreciate Luther. As I read through this edition, as a homiletics instructor, I was reminded again of the ways I have referenced this collection; Melanchthon’s discussion of Lutheran preaching topics (Article XV: Human Traditions in the Church), the cameo presentation of the 65 Means of Grace in the Smalcald Articles, Section 4; the kaleidoscopic views of “preaching” and ‘“teaching,” and how those apply today to increasingly pluralistic views of mission and culture; references to the Apology of the Augsburg Confession as a means of discussing the import of the Law/ Gospel dynamic, the look at human life in community as the catechism describes it five hundred years ago, and how that compares to life in community today; the ways women and children were viewed in these works, the brilliant rhetorical work of Melancthon. All of these have been both presented again in ways both familiar and arrestingly dissimilar. The decades long work on this latest edition is commendable. This edition is, must be!!, a labor of love. How its doctrines, context and thinking continue to find expression in the pulpit is adequately summed up in the return to Luther’s catechetical question, “What is this?” Time will tell. - Susan Hedahl Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg Gettysburg, Pennsylvania 66 dialog: A Journal of Theology • Volume 40, Number 1 • Spring 2001 The Book of Concord and the Parish This essay considers this fresh translation from the vantage point of the parish. Of what value will this new translation be in teaching, and preaching the gospel so that we might confess the faith anew? How might we engage this new translation in the parish? What do these newly translated Lutheran confessional writings have to do with the many matters before us as the Church in the 21st century? I first reflected on these questions late this last summer, as I brought this edition of the Book of Concord into the community and congregation that I serve. Bethel Lutheran Church is set within an agricultural community. In the midst of constant reminders that farmers and their crops are increasingly devalued, the Holy Spirit gathers the people of God so that they might hear the Word and receive the sacraments. As this gathering around Word and sacraments is central to the life of all God’s people, it is so also with the people of God here in this place, to be reminded who they are and who God is in Jesus Christ for them. As with many other people in many other locales, the people of God in this place struggle to remember who they are in Christ and what that means for their everyday lives, lives in which they repeatedly hear from the broader global community that there is no hope for them to survive. In such a context, people are often given to believing only what they can see, meaning that while believing that their salvation comes as a gift from God in Christ alone, the salvation of their community and everything therein will have to come from them, through their hands and hard work alone. Or, perhaps God is at work in their daily lives, but in the form of a silent partner who speaks only when spoken to, and who works when invited in to do so. While the people of God in this place are faithful, aware that everything they have is by the grace of God, knowing that it is God who brings forth what they need to produce a crop, that God in Christ is at the heart of all that they are and all that they do, there is also a predominant worldview that looks for more tangible signs of God’s activity in Christ for them. In absence of such signs—apart from the Word and sacraments—the people of God, wherever they are, are bound to go shopping for other gods. Gathered around a table almost every week in a room off the fellowship hall in the church I serve—the only church in the community—were a group of six to eight people from the community who were also members of the congregation I serve. Our work together during this gathering for much of this fall had been to study the life and times of Martin Luther. The importance of such a study was to know more about who we are as Lutherans by knowing more about who Martin Luther was and what he was doing. At the same time, those engaged in the study were seeking to understand who we are as people of God, and what God in Christ was doing in our lives by looking at how God in Christ was at work in the life of Martin Luther. We decided that we would begin and end the class by reading something that Martin Luther had written and then discuss it. (The class had suggested this because they knew that this was something I often did in teaching, and they enjoyed it as well.) I thought that it might be interesting to have us read together something they were already acquainted with, namely something from the Small Catechism. We began with the First Commandment and its explanation that each member of the group had memorized in their youth. As a member of the group read this aloud from a Catechism they had used since their youth, I picked up a copy of the new translation of the Book of Concord and read along. Then I read from the new translation. I must admit that I was not at all sure what to expect in the conversation that would follow. How were we going to plumb the depths of this commandment and its explanation? No sooner had I began to open my mouth, when an astute member of the study group opened heir mouth and said, “What we’re reading here is a little different than the Ten Commandments in the Bible, isn’t it, pastor?” This embarked us on a conversation the substance of which was found in one of the footnotes of the Small Catechism—found in both old and new translations, although more clearly stated in the latter. This observation was articulated 67 Ecumenic and Ecumenical Perspectives • The New Book of Concord by the group in this way, “We can understand this better now.” This sent us then into the Bible to read the accounts from Exodus and Deuteronomy, to compare and contrast them with what we were reading in the Catechism. What we experienced in regard to this new translation of the Book of Concord was that the newly revised footnotes and expanded features such as the “Biographical Index” are prepared in order that this book might be used in many and various ways within the parish setting Another important realization in our encounter with this book is that this is a new translation. When I was in seminary, my advisor, an Old Testament professor, reminded my Hebrew class “translation is interpretation.” This is helpful to keep in mind as we think together about the new Book of Concord and the ways in which it helps us to teach and confess the faith anew. Let us return to the class in which I taught the First Commandment and its meaning. In the former translation, the commandment and its explanation is written thus: “’You shall have no other gods.’ What does this mean? Answer: We should fear, love, and trust in God above all things.”(342) The new translation of the explanation reads thus, “You are to have no other gods. What is this? Answer: We are to fear, love, and trust God above all things.”(351) The language used in each of these conveys conflicting understandings of who God is and what he does in the life of faith. Moreover, each paints a different picture of the Christian’s work in the commandment. In the former, it seems that the subject of the commandment is the Christian, “You shall,” making the action of “fear, love and trust…above all things” our activity alone. Thus, the object of our “fear, love and trust…above all things” is God. Compare this with the new translation, “You are,” “We are.” In both the commandment and the explanation, the translation suggests that the Christian is the recipient and God is the actor. What is God doing? God is at work creating “fear, love and trust…above all things” in us. How is this possible that there will be “no others gods before me” in the Christian life? How is it possible that God will create “fear love and trust [in God alone] above all things”? This is possible only by the saving work of Jesus Christ for us, in which we are set free from our bondage to the power of sin, death, and the Devil. In Christ, our whole reality is turned upside down, and we are made new. “So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!” (2 Cor. 5:17) Through this new creation in Christ alone, the commandments become freedoms for us. When I presented this to the participants in our first class together, people were freer to express the gods that come between God and us because they had heard these commandments anew. They understood that at the heart of our relationship with God is Jesus Christ. They heard anew that they do not have to go out to find God; rather, God comes to us and for us fully in Jesus Christ. They heard anew that no matter who says differently, they are children of God, baptized into the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. This is but a microscopic look into the benefits of the new Book of Concord for use in the parish. Apart from an adult forum or evening class among the faithful, how else might this new translation benefit the work of the gospel in parishes? The possibilities are endless and are limited only by one’s theological imagination. - Paul E. Lutter Bethel Lutheran Church Porter, Minnesota The Book of Concord and Sacramental Doctrine I decided to focus my attention in this marvelous new translation of the Book of Concord on some details of sacramental doctrine, especially as they relate to the doctrine of justification. Something is always “lost in the translation.” Hopefully these remarks and Robert Kolb’s responses will help clarify and amplify some things in the translation. One of the important contributions of the Kolb-Wengert edi- 68 dialog: A Journal of Theology • Volume 40, Number 1 • Spring 2001 tion of the Book of Concord comes in the sacramental materials. The addition of Luther’s 1526 baptismal rite in the Baptismal Booklet gives helpful background to the important theme of the benefits of Baptism (FBC 373ff. par. 8, 13, 14, 29, 30). The controverted ceremonies added to the Lutheran Book of Worship rite are reinforced and balanced by Luther’s introductory remarks (372.5), as well as his inclusion of the sign of the cross and the christening robe. More puzzling to moderns and post-moderns will be the description of the infant “possessed by the devil and a child of sin and wrath” and the exorcism (372.2 and 374.15). The 1960 Augsburg translation of the Small Catechism corrected Luther’s second answer in a Melanchthonian direction: “In Baptism God forgives sins….” The FBC is more literal than the 1960 translation as well as clearer than Theodore Tappert’s “[Baptism] effects forgiveness. Timothy Wengert translates, “[Baptism] brings about [wirket] forgiveness….” On the other hand, in James Schaaf ’s translation of the Large Catechism, the more literal “effects” is used for Wirk (rendered opus in the Latin translation). An important advance over the Jaroslav Pelikan translation of the Apology in the Tappert edition is the Charles Arand translation of the beneficia which he renders “benefits.” Pelikan’s translation, “blessings,” (BC 187.4 and 262.72) misses the connection with the Augsburg Confession (BC 59.30) which Eric Gritsch, like Tappert, rightly renders: “to remember Christ is to remember his benefits.” The footnote helpfully points to the theme of Melanchthon’s 1521 Loci, “to know Christ is to know this benefits,” which links Melanchthon’s doctrine of justification to eucharistic benefits. Gritsch’s rendering of the previous phrase, “recall [rather than “remember,” as in Tappert] his benefits” is more accurate. Moreover, using what is now the more secular term, as in “benefits package,” is a wise choice, rather than “blessings.” It also parallels Luther’s term, Nutz, in his discussion of the “power, effect, benefit, fruit, and purpose of baptism is that it saves” (FBC 459.24; cf. 468.20). A final complaint: after rightly rendering beneficia “benefits” re absolution and the mass, Arand translates the theme of Melanchthon’s 1521 Loci “to know Christ [is] to know the blessings of Christ” (FBC 137.101) as did Pelikan, thus masking the connection between Melanchthon’s view of justification in Art, IV and his and Luther’s views of the sacraments. One place where both the meaning and the parallels are nicely clarified is in the translation of poenitentia/Busse as “repentance.” This is done consistently in the Catechisms, the Augustana and its Apology, and the Smalcald Articles where the Reformer’s understanding of repenting is meant. Arand notes that it may be translated “penance” where the Roman Catholic sacrament is meant (FBC 188, note 283). Many non-Lutheran historians of theology and doctrine identify the Lutheran understanding of Christ’s presence in the eucharist with the label “consubstantiation,” the position of significant late medieval nominalist theologians. Most Lutheran theologians reject this oversimplified identification. (On a multiple choice quiz with only three answers, most Lutherans would choose consubstantiation over transubstantiation or symbolism, unless they explained the latter in Tillichian terms.) Melanchthon employed substantialiter in the Apology (translated “substantially” by Pelikan and Ahrens) and in the negotiations with Bucer in the 1530s leading up to the Wittenberg Concord of 1536. I am puzzled why Kolb follows the A. C. Piepkorn translation, “essentially,” both in the Wittenberg Concord as cited by the Formula (FBC 595.14) and in the Formula Article VII. Moreover, the Latin version of the Formula renders wesentlich as substantialiter. Continuity with the Apology and the Wittenberg Concord would better be seen if “substantially” had been used in the Epitome (FBC 505.6) and the Solid Declaration (FBC 594.8) rather than “essentially.” At least a footnote should have pointed to the Latin text of the Wittenberg Concord and the Latin of the Formula. One could of course make the case that the formulators were trying to distinguish themselves from Catholic as well as Calvinist understandings of substantia, but some rationale would be helpful. Ecumenic and Ecumenical Perspectives • The New Book of Concord For Melanchthon, the use of substantia in the Apology may be like his citation of the Roman and Greek liturgies to bolster his defense of Christ’s bodily presence in the sacrament (FBC 184.2). Or it may be like Melanchthon’s use of the Lateran IV definition of transubstantiation, that the body and blood of Christ are present sub speciebus panis et vini. Melanchthon asserts Christ’s true body and blood are truly present “under the form of bread and wine” (FBC 44.1). Perhaps his use of substantialiter in the Apology and unter der Gestalt in the Augsburg Confession reflects Melanchthon’s so-called studied ambiguity. Whether or not this is so, the continuity of substantialiter needs to be acknowledged. It was good to see the consistent translating of propter Christum in the Latin of the Augsburg Confession IV and V and the Apology IV and XII as “on account of Christ” or “because of Christ” (FBC 41.3 and 206.116) rather than the occasional “for Christ’s sake” in the Tappert edition (BC 31.3 and 123.114). It is not obvious why Kolb alternated between “because of him” (FBC 495.5) and “for Christ’s sake” (496.9) . The only use of “on account of” I found was for the infused love and virtues, falsely understood to be the basis of justification (497.15). As in the Epitome, also in the Solid Declaration Kolb uses “for the sake of Christ’s obedience alone” (563.4) or “because of Christ’s righteousness” (564.17), but the latter is used much more frequently. It is not clear why Kolb consistently avoids Piepkorn’s rendering “on account of Christ,” although his use of “because of Christ” is quiet defensible. The only problem is that the English reader will not see the parallels with Melanchthon’s Apology that were evident in the Tappert edition. Like the German text of the Augsburg Confession and subsequently the Formula of Concord, in the Smalcald Articles (FBC 325.1) Luther uses um Christi willen (“for Christ’s sake”) in Article XIII on justification. This is also the standard phrase in the German editions of Melanchthon’s Loci. On the one hand, this supports the translations of the German texts, “for Christ’s sake.” On the other hand, since in Melanchthon’s Loci and Augustana there is a clear equivalence between um Christi willen and propter Christum, “on account of Christ” should not be avoided in the Formula. At minimum, these connections should be footnoted. For me, the most significant change in the new text comes from the second (“quarto”) edition of the Apology of September 1531 which had made, with Luther’s input, some significant clarifications of the first edition. I have been most fascinated by Article IV on justification (BC 129.159ff; FBC 145.159ff ). Melanchthon’s rewriting and reorganizing of these several pages (up to his “Response to the Arguments of Opponents,” par. 183ff.) clarifies the structure of the section, nuánces his argument, and reveals ---with the help 69 of a footnote---his otherwise almost hidden syllogism (FBC 147, note 137). - Ralph W. Quere Wartburg Theological Seminary Dubuque, Iowa The Book of Concord and Worship Should the appearance of a new edition of The Book of Concord matter to those who study and interpret the church’s worship? Presumably, it should, but why, exactly? This is a difficult question to which to respond, especially in this time of the highly-touted liturgical consensus with its purported clarifications of Christian ritual structures and proposals for a particular vision of church as principal agent of Word and sacrament. Such a vision is less beholden, it would seem, to denominational or confessional peculiarities and particularities. And yet an incontrovertible anthropological reality remains [and makes this new edition timely], and it is this-- there is still such a thing as Lutheran worship or, more accurately, Lutherans who worship--and who, in doing so, often make sense of what they encounter and experience with interpretive categories that can be loosely labeled “confessional.” A new edition of The Book of Concord, therefore, should provide us with a vantage point to explore 70 dialog: A Journal of Theology • Volume 40, Number 1 • Spring 2001 more fully and to examine once again what we think being “confessional” in our liturgical practice might indeed be. We know from our own history as Lutherans in this country that a term such as “confessional” can be understood in a variety of ways. One could, for example, look to the confessions and note their affirmations of the primacy of baptism and the centrality of Holy Communion in the church’s worship. Another approach emphasizes something called “confessional integrity.” Thus, some critics of liturgical change regard the inclusion of features which have not been traditionally part of Lutheran practice such as a Great Thanksgiving or the use of language such as “eucharist” as a kind of doctrinal slippage or indifference. For others, however, such practices and terminology are indicative of moving in directions that take seriously the implications of the apostolicity and catholicity of the Lutheran movement. A third way to think about what being confessional in our liturgical practice might mean is to think in terms of the sort of meanings that are being articulated and expressed. Are these “normative” or “official”? That is, is what is articulated and expressed what the tradition claims? So, The Book of Concord would be examined for what these claims are--e.g., that worship is “the righteousness of faith in the heart and the fruits of faith,” “reasonable service,” “faith is that worship which receives the benefits God offers,” “to know no other consolation or confidence than in God,” “proper worship is to hear and discuss God’s Word and to offer praise, song, and prayer to God.” Or, one could think of what meanings are by considering what meanings do. They represent the world, create cultural entities, direct us to do certain things, evoke certain feelings, and so forth. To use the Lutheran Confessions in this way--as an interpreter of our experience of faith--is reminiscent of a nineteenth-century approach developed by the theologians of the Erlangen school. This school was, in the words of Claude Welch, “a distinctive Lutheran theological program and perspective” that emphasized a particular experience of sin and regeneration,” an experience both personally and communally mediated in Christ. For these Erlangeners, the confessions of the church expressed what they called the Tatbestand of Christianity--that actual state of affairs that makes us believers and places us in relationship to God, not as isolated individuals but in relation to humanity as well. We could also make use of the Confessions as a way to “check” the content of what is said and done in worship--what is said about God, Christ, faith, church, grace, revelation, etc. We could trace any of these topics in The Book of Concord and also in the liturgies currently being used [or, that have been used by Lutherans in the past]. This “check” or interpretive benchmark can be both critical as well as constructive. For instance, we could mount a critique of certain interpretive “favorites” in liturgical-theological writing these days--favorites such as “transformation” or the muchvaunted missional rhetoric that has assumed an omnipresent status rivaling that of God Almighty. Constructive use of the confessions could also benefit theological inquiry in the areas of theological anthropology, Christology, and ecclesiology. What would we learn, for example, about what it means to be a particular kind of person who trusts solely in God because of Jesus Christ? We might also learn something again of the balance between doctrine and doxology. On the one hand, we could move beyond the well-worn definitions of doctrine as a list of items to which we give our assent, toward an understanding which regards doctrines as indissolubly connected with the church’s core practice of worship, in which occurs the mediation of God’s salvific action in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. A final comment--when I wanted to compare some statements about worship in Article IV of the “Apology of the Augsburg Confession” in the Tappert edition with this new edition, I could not find them because this present translation uses the octavo edition of September 1531 rather than the quarto edition of April or early May 1531. For instance, in the Tappert edition, we find such statements that “the service and worship of the Gospel is to receive good things from God” (IV, 310). However, in this new edition, this paragraph from the quarto edition is omitted. Similarly, in “Apology” IV, 228, where the Tappert edition Ecumenic and Ecumenical Perspectives • The New Book of Concord has: “God wants us to believe him and to accept blessings from him; this he declares to be true worship” the new edition does not include this statement. But while the present translation might represent a sharpening of the defense of the Evangelical faith, I, for one, will miss these statements about worship from the Tappert edition. However, what this new edition of The Book of Concord has to say about the church’s worship is still a powerful reminder of what Evelyn Underhill noted many years ago as this event’s essential content and mood: it mirrors the loving heart of God and expresses our loving confidence in the Divine generosity. - Michael B. Aune Pacific Luthern Theological Seminary & the Graduate Theological Union Berkeley, California The Book of Concord: A Historical/Confessional Perspective A deeply troubling irony dogs this new edition of the Book of Concord: its editors have produced the historically most sophisticated translation of the Lutheran confessions ever available to English speakers just at a time when American Lutheranism, caught up in the mechanics of interpretation, seems least inclined to join in the confessing that give the documents their value. It is to be hoped that the outstanding technical achievement will register in equally compelling interpretation, but as usual, such a hope can hardly find credit in sight. Generally, American translations of the confessions have been brought forth by an intensified awareness of a troublesome third party. The first two parties are the traditional priorities: the text, the witness of the Lutheran confessional heritage as it has been shaped in conversation with Scripture; and the context, the particular situation in which the church is called to hand over the gospel. In the US, ever since Lutheran immigration began, the disturbing third party has been the corrosive forces of the American melting pot. This force is a deeply ingrained, ferociously militant cultural intolerance that makes individual rights its measure while steadily eroding alternative visions entrenched in key points of historic witnesses like the Lutheran confessions, such as the justification of the godless, the freedom of the gospel, the doctrine of vocation, the bondage of the will, the real presence and the like. So the Henkels, who published the first English translation at their press in Newmarket, VA, Friedrich Bente of Concordia Seminary in St. Louis, Henry Eyster Jacobs and later Theodore Tappert at the Lutheran Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, though in different circumstances and to their own degrees, all went to their work ea- 71 gerly seeking to hand on the text to the context undiminished by the forces of acculturation. The current editors, while certainly aware of the precarious position of the Lutheran witness in America, have had somewhat more modest intentions. Since l959, when the Tappert edition was first published, there have been some significant scholarly and linguistic developments. As Tim Wengert spells them out in an article in Lutheran Quarterly, “Reflections on Confessing the Faith in the New English Translation of The Book of Concord,” (14, 1 [2000], pp. 1-21) these include a more relational quality to theological language as well as a concern for inclusiveness. Wengert notes the relational dimension in justification both through and by faith, emphasizing the Spirit’s work through faith and the gift granted in life by faith in Christ Jesus. He also notes an expansion of the term Stand or Stande from estate or estates, an obsolete English usage, to “walk” or “walks of life,” again moving from a static, structural to a more relational translation. Using the New Revised Standard Version of Scripture, the new translation has similarly sought to broaden out particularly male terminology in more inclusive ways. Honoring these relational concerns, the editors have also sought to preserve the historical anchoring of the confessional texts. They have done this by paying particular attention to the style of the various documents, recognizing the different historical circumstances from which they emerged, and also by taking over the now established 72 dialog: A Journal of Theology • Volume 40, Number 1 • Spring 2001 critical texts as a basis for the translations. While general readers will not notice a pronounced difference between Tappert and the new edition, the net effect of the editors’ labors is to provide the best-attested original texts, out of the Latin and German, in language that has an idiomatic English taste to it. Sometimes, as in the Small Catechism, the correctness of the words comes at some expense to the music, but the language is there and so, with a little imagination, is the movement. Given the quality of the work overall, the new edition should stand--as Tappert did in the previous generation--for several decades. But technical work, no matter how careful, will not defuse the power of the American third party. The Constitution, an elitist male document if there ever was one, so loads the balance in favor of individual rights that public documents--no matter what their historical precedence or truthfulness may be--are immediately reduced to matters of opinion. What Charles Saunders Pierce called “the argument from tenacity,” rudimentary self-assertion that says “it’s right because I say so,” becomes the common coin. Attempting to fight this, both the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America have abandoned the open-endedness of confessing, imposing extra-biblical, extra-confessional standards as normative. In the process, they have become authoritarian. In Missouri, moving to the right, the synod guarantees not only interpretation of the confession but authenticity of the sacrament; the ELCA, moving to the left, celebrates its claims to inclusiveness while giving the churchwide secretary, with the support of the bishops, the last word in all interpretation. In the end, there is no difference--the Inquisitors, who can hardly be called grand, just wear different suits. Kolb and Wengert on the other hand offer a concrete sign of hope. American Lutheranism sooner or later lost the generations of theologians that followed after Theodore Tappert, Martin Heinecken, Edgar Carlson, Robert Fischer and their equivalents. The next age class, just going into retirement, for the most part rejected a past they perceived as parochial; the generation behind them has generally found legitimacy not as much in the church as in the AAR-SBL. Now another class of theologians has come to the fore, maybe not as flashy, but much more inclined to recognize the dignity of the ordinary. They understand that the vocation of a theologian, historical or otherwise, is not to take captives but to free the understanding for witness and that the final test of that freedom is confessing, handing over the gospel of Christ Jesus in the midst of everyday life. Going by conventions, assemblies, and theological agendas, it may look for all the world as though American Lutherans have finally become simply Americans, a sentimental streak concealing the mean right hand. Yet there remain some still, small voices--maybe enough to stir God’s memory. - James Nestingen Luther Seminary St. Paul, Minnesota The Book of Concord: Co-Editor Response When Tim Wengert posed the rhetorical question, “Don’t you think we need a new translation of the Book of Concord?” in the summer of 1991, as we were working together at the Herzog August Bibliothek in Wolfenbüttel, on ground once tread by Martin Chemnitz, Nikolaus Selnecker, and Jakob Andreae, my immediate answer was, “No!” I had used the book as a college, seminary, and graduate student for more than a decade and had taught courses on the Lutheran confessions for a decade and a half at that point. With a Bekentnisschriften at hand I had always felt well-served by Theodore Tappert’s effort. But Tim showed me a few passages which were indeed not clearly--or even falsely--translated. As we talked about the needs of students at the end of the twentieth century, he finally had little difficulty in persuading me that an improved English text, with more extensive notes and introduc- Ecumenic and Ecumenical Perspectives • The New Book of Concord tions reflecting new scholarship, would benefit Lutherans and the entire church. It would do so because it would cultivate the confessing spirit of Augsburg and the ability to give testimony to the biblical message out of the richness of our way of confessing the faith. A new English Book of Concord was a project worth investing six years in. That it took nine years simply indicates that we had no idea of the magnitude of the task when we set our goal for the festival of the Reformation in the year of Melanchthon’s five-hundredth birthday as the date of publication. Thirteen years of friendship had prepared the two of us to embark on a common project that would benefit from our friendship’s ability to squabble fiercely when we had differing views of the meaning of a passage or even of the best English expression for an idea we understood in the same way. Wengert describes some of the challenges we faced as we worked to polish the translation in his article “Reflections on Confessing the Faith in the New English Translation of The Book of Concord,” (Lutheran Quarterly 14,1 [2000]: 1-20), but only the two of us know the joyous travail of the search for solutions to those challenges. Much satisfaction also came from being able to enlist in the task long-time friends and colleagues to translate--Jim Schaaf, who could not stay to share the pleasure of seeing the book appear, Eric Gritsch, Chuck Arand, Bill Russell, Jane Strohl--and to review and assess--Scott Hendrix, Phil Krey, and Kurt Hendel, as well as Bob Bertram, who carefully reflected on every paragraph and gave us a great deal of helpful advice in the final stage of the project. All of them contributed far more than can be adequately described or appreciated. Our interaction with them taught Tim and me very much and enhanced the final product immeasurably. Another valuable member of the team came onto the field late in the game. Sean Burke, Wengert’s student in Philadelphia, may be the North American who knows the text of the book best at this point in time, for he created the biblical and topical indices. His tireless work over several months will serve all readers well. Tim himself came up with the idea of following a new German model for indexing and fashioned the biographical index. It provides thumbnail sketches of all the people in this book, a great help for all who use it. There were other decisions to make. “The Book of Concord” or “the Lutheran confessional writings”? Tappert had decided to follow the example of German scholars in the Bekenntnisschriften of 1930 and use the original versions of each document instead of the 1580 German text of the Book of Concord. We veered in its direction, for instance, re-introducing the baptismal booklet and the marriage booklet in the Small Catechism, as found in the Book of Concord, but we did not completely abandon Tappert’s “first edition” principle. We decided initially to use the original April 1531 edition of the 73 Apology. When Chuck Arand found out about the recent German discussion of the use of the Apology in the sixteenth century, he suggested that we follow the lead of German scholars and adopt the second edition as our text. I was still holding out for the German translation of Justus Jonas, called in my student days a “paraphrase” because it departed at some points from the first edition Latin text. But the decision was made to translate the second edition, of September 1531. It introduced changes into the April 1531 edition, most of them suggested by Luther, and was simply accepted by the Lutheran reading public of the sixteenth century (as every updated version of a publication is accepted). What we discovered as we worked further is that the Jonas “paraphrase” is in fact largely a quite faithful translation of the second Latin edition. With our decision in favor of this edition, we had returned close to the Book of Concord’s German text. Particularly in the new translation of the Apology readers see the result of our decision to indicate all additions to or revisions in original texts in italics. Professor Aune’s regret that some of the helpful material in the first edition of the Apology is lost through the use of the second edition is well-taken. Readers will have to refer to the Tappert translation for the English of the April 1531 text when it differs from the second edition. If the only reaction we got to the new translation were Pastor Lutter’s members’ “We can under- 74 dialog: A Journal of Theology • Volume 40, Number 1 • Spring 2001 stand this better now,” it would be enough. That much would make the countless hours invested in learning and searching and checking worthwhile. For his observation that our parishioners are struggling to remember who they are in Christ and that they are bound to go shopping for other gods describes the world in which we confess the faith. To re-fresh, recall, and strengthen their appreciation for our way of living as confessors of Jesus Christ was indeed Tim’s and my first and foremost goal. To equip us all for sharing ecumenically and evangelistically what Melanchthon, Luther, and the Concordists wanted to teach and confess is the reason we took up the task. Pastor Lutter’s comments remind me of Bible classes and study groups I have led in wrestling with the texts of Luther’s catechisms, and the Augsburg Confession, and even, once, the Smalcald Articles. These experiences confirm that the Book of Concord contains rich fare for those struggling to bring their faith into the hurly-burly of daily life. Precisely with Luther’s “Household Chart of Some Bible Passages for all kinds of holy orders and walks of life,” his table of Christian callings, we have an instrument that assists us in translating his concept of the believer’s calling to serve God in the context of the responsibilities of the various situations of real life. Professor Hedahl is correct in observing that Luther’s culture and ours are separated by some deep divides. Those differences are also apparent when we speak of field and livestock in the first article or the fifth petition as Luther celebrated the blessings of the everyday. But the Household Chart enables us to teach the faith according to Luther’s intention, using the Ten Commandments as the explanation for why we need a Savior (second use of the law, if you will) and the Creed as the gospel’s answer to that need. The reformer so designed the Small Catechism that ethical instruction then concludes the little textbook in the Household Chart--rather than forcing us to combine and perhaps confuse the uses of the law, however you parse them, at the beginning, in the Decalog. To give that instruction within the context of Luther’s understanding of the responsibilities and callings of every human situation, within the rich tapestry of human life as God designed it, can only help our cultivation of the Christian life. Of course, “We can understand this better now.” is in fact not the only factor that makes the editors think the effort was worthwhile. We did get even better acquainted with people whose thought had engaged us for some years before we began this project--Luther, Melanchthon, Andreae, Chemnitz, Chytraeus, Selnecker, and Musculus. We came to appreciate even more than we had before what Professor Hedahl correctly describes as Melanchthon’s “rhetorical, theological, and argumentative skills,” his “incredible linguistic and rhetorical expertise.” Engagement with the texts created by each of them drives the reader more deeply into the biblical witness itself. We not only became better ac- quainted with their thought. We got new glimpses of how they practiced the art of theology. For instance, as we discussed whether to retain the Latin phrases in the Formula of Concord (Tappert had translated them into English obscuring the Concordists’ use of a second language.), Tim recognized that these phrases interrupted the original German text because Chemnitz, Andreae, and company were still thinking in a world in which Latin was the technical language of theologians. German expressions for certain concepts had not yet been developed as the Concordists were writing. The Latin creeps back into the English text in the new translation. That Hedehl affirms our hope that the new volume helps answer the question, “How is this going to preach today?” is also a delight. For Lutherans do believe that theology is for proclamation--certainly Wittenberg theology at least--and for confessing. Perhaps the foremost of the homiletical tools offered by the authors of the Book’s documents is Luther’s direct question posed to the biblical text or the dilemmas of human life. Wengert contends that Luther learned this from his first born child, not quite three years old as Luther composed the catechisms –“What is that?” We had also counted on a new translation provoking discussion about new renderings or new observations in the notes, just the kind Professor Quere raises. Some of the new expressions arise out of our sense of style, a sense we did not always share precisely. The rendition of um Christi willen and Ecumenic and Ecumenical Perspectives • The New Book of Concord propter Christum was indeed such an instance, and in different contexts one rendering or the other simply sounded better in English to us. Why “benefits” turned back to the old “blessings” in one instance escapes our memory. Ralph’s implicit observation about Melanchthon’s intent in using substantialiter in 1530 and 1531 as a hand outstretched in Rome’s direction is correct, but the use of the term becomes problematic when the more spiritualizing view of Martin Bucer finds expression through it in the Wittenberg concord of 1536. Those who wrote the Formula of Concord had gone through a refining of the language defining sacramental teaching because of Melanchthon’s own rethinking of how best to express Christ’s presence in the Supper. Different accents had crept into Lutheran usage over the course of a half-century. Nonetheless, it is true that a footnote discussing the twists and turns of the debate over the Lord’s body and blood in the Sacrament could have helped at the point that wesentlich is translated “essentially.” Professor Aune rightly observes that The Book of Concord speaks to a wide range of areas of church life, including liturgical practice. The Concordists, like the reformers, understood that the teaching of the church permeates its entire life. The Book of Concord collects three documents from the ancient church and seven more from the sixteenth century, and the historical conditions of their composition are apparent. But they do still give us guidance and assistance in the development of pastoral care, liturgy, ecclesiastical organization, and other areas as well for our teaching and preaching. Aune also reminds us that different readers will find support for different conclusions in the text of the new translation. That is as it must be. For The Book of Concord stands as a hermeneutical guide for Lutherans and as an invitation to address its confession of the faith to the new situations in which God calls us to proclaim the message of salvation in Jesus Christ anew. That invitation inevitably should provoke healthy and hearty engagement with our world, and we will not always agree as the text calls forth our response. To paraphrase Pastor Lutter’s question only slightly, “How can this new translation benefit the work of the gospel in the whole 75 church, in parishes and in theological dialogue, in Lutheran churches and all others as well?” Indeed, he is right: the possibilities are endless. In the first decades of the twenty-first century all parts of Christendom will be searching for ways in which to make the gospel of Jesus Christ speak clearly to peoples around the world. In such a situation, it becomes ever more important that Lutherans understand the richness of their heritage. The God-given ecumenical responsibility of all Lutherans at the beginning of the twenty-first century is to confess the faith delivered to us with all the theological imagination placed at our disposal. May the gospel of Jesus Christ have its way in restoring the fullness of humanity to the broken sinners of our world through the Lord’s death and resurrection. The Book of Concord is an excellent place to begin mining its treasures for lifechanging testimony to the love of God for us in Christ. - Robert Kolb Concordia Seminary St. Louis, Missouri