Luther: "Christ is not found in church doctrine, but in your love for each other"

 

Social media has been steadily producing Martin Luther memes, and not all of them are accurate. The meme above certainly sounds like something Luther said. In the exact form in the picture above, I doubt theses sentences were either exactly written by Luther or presented by Luther in this order.

Perhaps all the elements can be located somewhere in Luther's vast written corpus.  For instance, my cursory search determined that the later half of the last line can be found in the Ninety-Five Theses: "Christians are to be taught that the pope, in granting indulgences, needs and thus desires their devout prayer more than their money."  Other than that, I'm not going to invest the time to discover who cobbled these ideas together from Luther's writings (the "sack of potatoes" line though does intrigue me). 

So where does this quote come from? 

The first line was uttered by a fictional representation of Martin Luther from the 2003 movie. Much thanks to the website, script-o-rama for the transcription of the following lines: "He isn't found in the bones of saints... but here, in your love for each other, in your love for one another... in His sacraments, and in God's holy word."

The second line appears to have originated from a documentary from Rick Steves Europe. This appears to be where the entirety of both lines comes from. See particularly, this link to a section of the video, including a transcript.  This video transcript also featuring Rick Steves includes some of the quote.

Debunked Luther: No One Can Give Himself Faith, It is a Gift of God"

Here's a Martin Luther quote found on a Facebook page dedicated to Martin Luther and the Reformation (shared from another FB page)-

Is this something Martin Luther wrote?   I don't think so. Is it something he believed? Yes. 

Documentation

From a cursory search, I found no instances of the exact "no one can give himself faith, it is a gift of God" attributed meaningfully to Luther.  The exact form of the quote though can be found in the writings of Soren Kierkegaard. In his Journals and Notebooks he states, 

Conclusion

It's within the realm of possibility that some sort of English Luther quote in this exact form exists, but I did not locate anything in this exact English form meaningfully attributed to Luther. If the quote was taken from Kierkegard "But no one can give himself faith, it is a gift of God I must pray for," notice the addition of the words, "I must pray for." In the context of Kierkegaard's remarks. he makes a concession that salvation has an aspect of human contribution. Kierkegaard follows up the comment by asking: is the desire to pray for faith also a gift of God? His point is that in some sense there must be a place for human contribution in salvation, however small, if not, the conclusion is "fatalistic election."  

Would Luther agree with Kierkegard? Granted, they were from different time periods with different concerns, however, I think Luther would oppose Kierkegard on the point. In his Preface to Romans (cf. LW 35:371), Luther states: 

Faith is a work of God in us, which changes us and brings us to birth anew from God (cf. John 1). It kills the old Adam, makes us completely different people in heart, mind, senses, and all our powers, and brings the Holy Spirit with it. What a living, creative, active powerful thing is faith! It is impossible that faith ever stop doing good. Faith doesn't ask whether good works are to be done, but, before it is asked, it has done them. It is always active. Whoever doesn't do such works is without faith; he gropes and searches about him for faith and good works but doesn't know what faith or good works are. Even so, he chatters on with a great many words about faith and good works.

Faith is a living, unshakeable confidence in God's grace; it is so certain, that someone would die a thousand times for it. This kind of trust in and knowledge of God's grace makes a person joyful, confident, and happy with regard to God and all creatures. This is what the Holy Spirit does by faith. Through faith, a person will do good to everyone without coercion, willingly and happily; he will serve everyone, suffer everything for the love and praise of God, who has shown him such grace. It is as impossible to separate works from faith as burning and shining from fire. Therefore be on guard against your own false ideas and against the chatterers who think they are clever enough to make judgements about faith and good works but who are in reality the biggest fools. Ask God to work faith in you; otherwise you will remain eternally without faith, no matter what you try to do or fabricate.

Now justice is just such a faith. It is called God's justice or that justice which is valid in God's sight, because it is God who gives it and reckons it as justice for the sake of Christ our Mediator. It influences a person to give to everyone what he owes him. Through faith a person becomes sinless and eager for God's commands. Thus he gives God the honor due him and pays him what he owes him. He serves people willingly with the means available to him. In this way he pays everyone his due. Neither nature nor free will nor our own powers can bring about such a justice, for even as no one can give himself faith, so too he cannot remove unbelief. How can he then take away even the smallest sin? Therefore everything which takes place outside faith or in unbelief is lie, hypocrisy and sin (Romans 14), no matter how smoothly it may seem to go.

From these paragraphs, it is possible to extrapolate the sentiment that faith is a gift of God. Some years back I did an entry on Luther believing faith is the gift of God.  

Debunked Luther: "For feelings come and feelings go, and feelings are deceiving; My warrant is the Word of God, Nought else is worth believing..."

Back in 2015 I looked at a poem attributed to Martin Luther. I have since determined its probable origin. Based on my findings presented below, I do not believe this poem was written by Luther:

"For feelings come and feelings go, and feelings are deceiving;

My warrant is the Word of God, Nought else is worth believing.

Though all my heart should feel condemned, For want of some sweet token,

There is One greater than my heart, Whose Word cannot be broken.

I'll trust in God's unchanging Word, ‘till soul and body sever;

For though all things shall pass away, His Word shall stand forever."~(Martin Luther)

A quick Google search reveals how far this quote has traveled, and a text search of the Internet Archive shows extensive use.  A Google Books search demonstrates how often it has been published, particularly in the 21st century. Well-known names have cited it: Norman Geisler used a snippet of it in his book, Christian Apologetics. Alistair Begg published it. D. James Kennedy's 1985 book refers to a portion of it. 

The words of this poem are sometimes cited as a hymn: God's Word Shall Stand Forever, "attributed to Luther." Since I first wrote about this poem in 2015, I've noticed many more links to it being a hymn / song. See for instance the incorporation of the poem into a song, here and here. The musical arrangement appears to be by someone named Faye Lopez. 

Documentation
Most often, "Martin Luther" is cited as the author of this poem. Careful people have cited, "attributed to Martin Luther." Neither of these are helpful in locating the source! After searching multiple uses of the poem through the decades, the oldest use I could locate is from 1929. Interestingly, an author other than Luther is cited, "W.M. Czamanske." I believe he is the author of this poem.

Who was he? Was he the W.M. Czamanske the Lutheran minister mentioned here? It appears he had a knack for poetry. In this periodical, he presents another rhyming Luther poem: 

In the same magazine, he offers a number of poems. There was also a Wm. Czamanske that authored a number of hymns. Was this the same person? The Evangelical Lutheran Hymnary Handbook states,

Czamanske, William Martin, 1873-1964

CZAMANSKE, William Martin (1873- ), was born August 26, 1873, at Granville, Wisconsin. He was graduated from Concordia College, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in 1894, and from Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, in 1898. Ordained and installed as pastor July 31, 1898, he served successively Lutheran churches, near Madelia, Minnesota, 1898-1902; West Henrietta, New York, 1902-1904; Rochester, New York, 1904 to 1910; and Sheboygan, Wisconsin, 1910-1951, when he entered retirement. He has contributed poems to the Lutheran Witness, Sunday School Times, Etude, Expositor, Northwestern Lutheran, and other church publications. He served as member of a subcommittee of the Committee on Hymnology and Liturgics for the Synodical Conference of North America, which edited The Lutheran Hymnal.

tr. 186, 392

The periodical the poem originally appeared in (cited above) was The Sunday School Times. From this early use from the Sunday School Times, the quote begins to multiply.  For instance, in 1939, we find the following:

The poem continues to be cited through the decades. It would be interesting to see the full version of this snippet view from the 1943 Lutheran Witness to see if Czamanske submitted it. Note this shorter version also from 1943 which is in the same format (and citation) as the Lutheran Witness

This book from 1956 attributes the quote to Luther, via Moody Monthly: 

See also this same text from 1951, and its exact use in 1968. 

I came across shorter versions that hint part of it originated in the late 1800's - early 1900's:

Martin Luther was once asked, "Do you feel as if your sins were forgiven?" "No," he returned, stoutly. "I don't feel that they are forgiven, but I know that they are, because God says so in his Word. [source]

In some early instances, the one asking Luther is Satan. Note the part of this paragraph from 1889:

Martin Luther, in one of his conflicts with the devil, was asked by the arch-enemy if he felt his sins forgiven. "No," said the great reformer, "I don't feel that they are forgiven, but I know they are, because God says so in His Word." Paul did not say, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt feel saved;" but, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved." No one can feel that his sins are forgiven. Ask that man whose debt was paid by his brother, "Do you feel that your debt is paid?" "No," is the reply, "I don't feel that it is paid; I know from this receipt that it is paid, and I feel happy because I know it is paid." So with you, dear reader. You must first believe in God's love to you as revealed at the Cross of Calvary, and then you will feel happy, because you shall know that you are saved. [source]

It appears that part of the core of this quote has been around at least 100 years.  It does sound suspiciously like a rewording of a Table Talk entry, but in my brief search of the extant English versions I didn't come across anything.

Conclusion

My conclusion: Luther did not write this rhyming poem. Based on the usage I searched out, the original author was probably W.M. Czamanske. He appears to have had a poetical nature. If in fact he was a Lutheran minister, it would make sense why the theology echoed Luther. Rev. Czamanske did live to 1964, so perhaps saw that his poem was being utilized by others. I think he would be amazed to see how extensively his poem has been cited and that his words became Luther's words!   

Addendum #1

Indeed, the sentiment of the quote could be demonstrated to be something Luther believed. Consider how easily it would have been for someone to read this old English Table Talk statement and summarize it in the one of the forms above:

That the Forgiveness of sins must pass through all things.
The law doth justify in no state, calling and art; impossible it is that every thing should go on in a straight line according to the Law, as we see in the grammar which is taught in schools; no rule is so common, which hath not an exception. Therefore, the forgiveness of Sins is needful through life, and is held out in all arts and sciences. The forgiveness of sins is declared only in God's Word, and there we must seek it; for it is grounded on God's promises. God forgiveth thee thy sins, not because thou feelest them and art sorry, for that doth sin itself produce, and can deserve nothing; but he forgiveth thy sins because he is merciful, and because he hath promised to forgive for Christ's sake, his dearly beloved Son, and caused his word to be applied to thee: namely, “Be of good cheer, thy sins are forgiven thee.”

Addendum #2

"So now turn from your conscience and its feeling to Christ who is not able to deceive; my heart and Satan however, who will drive me to sin are liars... You should not believe your conscience and your feelings more than the word which the Lord who receives sinners preaches to you... Therefore you are able to fight with your conscience by saying: You lie; Christ speaks truth and you do not." WA 27, 223 (cf. Paul Althaus, The Theology of Martin Luther, p. 59).

Addendum #3

I found a book citing my 2015 blog entry in regard to the poem: Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community. I know nothing about this book or author, but that she took the time to track down the source of Luther's poem is sometimes a good indication of the research put into the book.