[This paper was written for my Reformation and Enlightenment class at Capital University, where I am seeking a minor degree in religion.]
Jesse Harmon
RELIG 321
April 19, 2012
Martin Luther and the Lord’s Prayer
“O
Almighty God, in your unmerited goodness to us and through the merit and
mediation of your only beloved Son, Jesus Christ, you have permitted and even
commanded and taught us to regard you and call upon you as one Father of us
all.” Martin Luther wrote these
words in his Personal Prayer Book,
published in 1522 (Luther 44). This
paper will be discussing Martin Luther’s view on the Lord’s Prayer, as well as
discussing how he came to these conclusions through the use of Scripture
readings. Even though all seven
petitions will be discussed, we will be delving into the fifth petition, which
is the petition of sin and forgiveness.
Also to be discussed will be several ultimate examples of forgiveness. The two primary sources used in this
paper will be a sermon given by Martin Luther called “An Exposition of the Lord’s Prayer,” published in 1519 (known
hereafter as the “sermon,”) and the Personal
Prayer Book. The Personal Prayer Book is a small book
published by Luther just days after returning to Wittenberg from hiding in
Wartburg. This book is printed in
a diary format that was common among the time (Tunseth 25).
The
Lord’s Prayer, or sometimes called the Model Prayer (Golloday 157), is an easy
and short prayer that Jesus offered to his disciples after they asked him about
prayer. Jesus states that one
should not “sound trumpets” or pray loudly. One should not use long sophisticated phrases or, as Jesus
called it, empty phrases, when praying as to impress people. Instead, one should go to a quiet area
and pray quietly. In the gospel of
Luke, an unnamed disciple asked Jesus how to pray. Jesus then gave a more intimate and smaller form of the
Lord’s Prayer than what Matthew had in his gospel. There are only about sixty-seven words in the prayer, making
it very easy to memorize if used with a poetic meter. Jesus does not give long exaggerated words, but instead
makes it very simple and easy to remember (we will be looking at the format of
the Lord’s Prayer near the end of this paper). We should be careful, however, not to take “simple” as meaning
being “dumbed down” or “shallow.”
That wasn’t the point of Jesus giving such easy words in the
prayer. The point was to make it
simple to memorize, and to make it easy to come up with your own version of it if
needed (Golloway 158). The Lord’s
Prayer is to be memorized in Lutheran Catechism classes, along with Luther’s
explanations in The Small Catechism.
The
first line of the Lord’s Prayer is not a petition. It is an address to God. Luther states that the word father is intimate, warm, and friendly (Luther 22). Other words such as God, Lord, and
Judge are too harsh in a situation like this. This prayer is to bring peace and comfort to those who are
praying it. Luther states that
since this prayer is said directly by Jesus, it is a necessity to pray it. Throughout his sermon, Martin Luther
gave “modern-day” explanations of each petition using new words and
phrases. Luther uses the following
words to describe the “Our Father,” section of the Lord’s Prayer. “Our Father, you are in heaven, while
I, your poor child, am in misery on earth, far away from you surrounded by many
perils, in need and want among devils, the greatest enemies and in such
danger,” (Luther 23). These little
phrases really help explain what Luther is trying to say in not only his
sermon, but also in later articles and resources he published.
Those who are
praying should notice the use of plural possessive forms in this prayer (our Father), giving a sense of community
to those who pray this prayer.
Luther tells us to pray this prayer from the heart, and not to “count
the beads…while [the] mind wanders far from the confession of [the] lips,”
(Luther 23), for God said in the book of Isaiah 29:13, “’These
people come near me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but their
hearts are far from me. Their
worship of me is made up only of rules taught by men,’” (Bible Across America
1238) (this scripture is also
quoted in the gospel of Matthew 15:6-9).
The
first petition of the Lord’s Prayer is, “Hallowed be thy name.” This states that God’s name is holy
unto itself. To hallow something
is to hold something sacred (Schramm 128), or something regarded as holy
(Simcox 44). In Luther’s Personal Prayer Book, he states to God,
“In this wretched vale of tears your holy name is sadly profaned, blasphemed,
and reviled in so many ways. In so
many instances it is regarded without honor to you and is often misused in
sinning, so that to live a disgraceful life might well be regarded as the same
as disgracing and dishonoring your holy name,” (Tunseth 45).
Here, Luther is trying to say that God is everything, and man in
nothing. In his sermon, Luther
states that humans use God’s name to justify war, sinning, and breaking the
second commandment, which is, “You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your
God, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name,” (Bible
Across America 142). Using God’s name to justify these things is taking his
name in vain according to Luther.
One of the more interesting things that Luther stated in his sermon is
that, “if anyone were to hallow God’s name perfectly, then we [wouldn’t] need
the Lord’s Prayer,” because we would be sinless (Luther 33).
“Thy
kingdom come,” is the second petition.
According to Luther, this petition humbles us (Luther 37). As mentioned before, Luther “rewrote”
the petitions to help people understand what they are saying. “O dear Father…I confess and am sorry
that I have dishonored your name so often and that in my arrogance I still
defile your name by honoring my own,” (Luther 35-36). The fourth commandment states, “You shall honor your father
and your mother,” (McCain 452).
Luther stated that to honor your own name is to honor your father and
mother since your last name is generally your family name. It is a commandment to honor your
father and mother (or your own name), but you should not honor your name more than
you honor God’s name.
The
third petition is “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” Whose will needs to be done? God’s will, according to this
petition. Luther states in the Personal Prayer Book that compared to
God’s will, the will of humans is never good and always evil (Tunseth 48). Martin Luther states in his sermon
several things about this petition.
First, he discusses the meaning of the petition. Luther states that without a teacher,
people must learn to not follow their own wills. In fact, people need to run counter to their own will
because it is usually the will of God.
However, we are sinners who cannot do God’s will, for it is difficult
for us to surrender our own wills (Luther 44).
Martin
Luther gives a great example of this.
King David wanted to build God a temple, but God refused David for doing
it. God said to David, “You are not to build a house for my name, because you are a
warrior and have shed blood,” (Bible Across America 814). After this, God set Solomon on the
throne to build the temple.
The
“daily bread” mentioned in the fourth petition (“Give us this day our daily
bread), could have several meanings.
The first meaning is obvious; God wants us to be fed and stay healthy. During ancient times when the people of
Moses were wandering the wilderness, God provided manna to keep the people
fed. Could the “daily bread”
mentioned in this petition have something to do with being fed by God? This could be possible, but it doesn’t
seem to fit the theme of the Lord’s Prayer. According to the old outdated food pyramid, humans should
generally eat 6-11 servings of bread per day (1 slice of bread is a serving) ("Pyramid
Servings: How Much? How Many?"). It seems that bread signifies life. Jesus broke bread during the Last
Supper and gave it to his disciples.
It would make more sense to see the “daily bread” as the Word of
God. The Word, mentioned in the
first chapter of the Gospel of John, is Jesus. “In the beginning was the Word, and Word was with God [Jesus
is God], and the Word was God [Jesus is the Word]. He was with God in the beginning,” (Bible Across America
1844). According to the fourth
petition, we need Jesus everyday to get through our lives, since Jesus is the
Word, and the Word is the bread of life.
We are reminded that Jesus is the bread in Luke 22:19, “[He] took bread,
gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to [his disciples] saying, ‘This is my
body given for you; do this in remembrance of me,’” (Bible Across America
1834).
Luther,
who is explaining the fourth petition in his own words, says, “Oh
Father…comfort me, a poor and miserable wretch. I cannot bear your hand and yet I know that it works to my
damnation if I do not bear it.
Therefore, strengthen me, my father, lest I despair,” (Luther 51).
The fifth petition
states, “And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass
against us.” Luther states simply
that we cannot lie to God. He
knows what we want before we pray.
Matthew 6:8 states, “…your Father knows what you
need before you ask him,” (Bible Across America 1667). Ironically, this verse is just one
phrase before the start of what is known as the Lord’s Prayer in the Bible,
which is Matthew 6:9-13. What does
this petition mean? According to
Luther’s Small Catechism, it means
that we should pray that God not hold our sins against us if we forgive others
for their sins toward us.
A
very good example of forgiving someone is the assassination attempt of Pope
John Paul II (1920-2005). On May
13, 1981, Pope John Paul II was struck with a bullet while traveling in St.
Peter’s Square in the “Pope Mobile.”
Mehmet Ali Agca had in fact shot him twice
(Tanner). Three months after the
shooting, the Pope visited his attacker in jail to discuss the situation. Even though the Pope never revealed the
conversation between the two, one can only guess that the Pope prayed with his
attacker, and forgave him. This is
a prime example of someone forgiving someone’s trespasses against them.
Another
great example of forgiveness is the story of Nelson Mandela. In 1962, Mandela was arrested for
organizing a national worker’s strike.
He was sent to prison for five years, but was sent back to trial in
1963. This trial led him to be
sent to prison for life, for which he spent nearly 20 years. While still in prison, he somehow
managed to earn a bachelor of law degree, and in 1981, an international
campaign was set up to help release Mandela from prison. Mandela refused to recant his beliefs
on armed struggle. However, when
former President P.W. Botha of South Africa had a stroke in 1990, his replacement, Fredrick Willem de Klerk released Mandela. President de Klerk released
Mandela. In 1994, after a series
of negotiations with President Klerk, Mandela was elected the first black
president of South Africa (“bio”).
Mandela tried to unify South Africa and encourage forgiveness among the
people. Mandela could have held a
grudge against the people who put in him prison in the first place, but instead
he decided the best thing to do was to forgive them and encourage other people
to forgive others.
Matthew 18:21-22 says, “Peter came
to Jesus and asked, ‘Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he
sins against me? Up to seven
times?’ Jesus answered, ‘I tell
you not seven times, but seventy-seven times,” (Bible Across America
1698). Jesus didn’t specifically
mean we should forgive someone only seventy-seven times, and then not forgive
them the seventy-eighth time. He
was saying we should always forgive
someone, no matter what he or she does to us or to God. Martin Luther says in his sermon that, “Christ
does not say, ‘because of your sins you must fast this much or pray this much
or donate this much or do this or that.’
Rather does he say, ‘if you would render satisfaction and atone for your
guilt and wipe out your sins, listen to my advice, yes, to my command. The only thing for you to do is to
forgive and to renew your heart…As long as you forgive, all will be well,”
(Luther 65).
The Old Testament story of Jacob and his twin brother, Esau,
found in Genesis 25-33, provides another example. Esau, the “manly man,” came in one day from the fields. He asked Jacob to make him some
food. Jacob, who was “Mr. Mom,”
sold Esau some beans in exchange for the larger inheritance. When their father, Isaac, was dying,
Isaac ordered two deer to be killed and eaten before dividing up the
inheritance. Jacob and their
mother deceived Isaac into giving Jacob the larger inheritance (which involved
filleting the flesh of the deer and putting it on Jacob’s hands). Jacob ended up having to run for his
life to a foreign land. Many years
passed before Jacob returned to his home, before God told Jacob to return to
his homeland. When he did, his
brother, Esau, came running at him and hugged and kissed him. Esau had forgiven his brother.
In 1543 Martin Luther made mention of the Judensau, or Jew Pig,
at Wittenberg. The Judensau is
usually a depiction of Jews in various disgusting activities involving
swine. These Judensau are
considered anti-Semitic. The Nazis
revived the Judensau in the late 1930s.
As we all know, the Nazis tragically exterminated millions of Jews in
the early part of the 20th century. A most surprising thing happened in 1988 when a debate began
on whether to remove the Judensau that is located at the Wittenberg church
because of the horrible nature the Jews faced fifty years before. Consequently, a bronze plaque was
placed in the pavement of the walkway memorializing the death and torture of
the Jews under the name of God (Lopez).
The Jewish community believes it’s very important to forgive someone
because God doesn’t forgive our sins until we forgive those who have sinned
against us (which sounds familiar) (Graubart). The Jewish community forgave the Germans by permitting them
to leave the sculpture up, but also installing a bronze plaque to memorialize
the millions of deaths the Jews faced under the Christians. This plaque also states that Germans
and Jews today are tolerant of each other and respectful of each other (Winkler). It’s very ironic that Martin Luther
seemed to have some very anti-Semitic views. He believed all Jews needed to be banished from Christian
society (Trachtenberg 219).
It’s very dangerous to assume that we are without sin. 1 John 1:8 states, “If we claim to be
without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful
and just and will forgive our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness,”
(Bible Across America 2151). Those
who do not worship fall into this sort of deceit. We as humans cannot recover knowing ourselves unless we know
God (Simcox 74). At the conclusion
of this paper, we will discuss the importance to reciting the Lord’s Prayer
regularly.
The sixth petition, “Lead us not into temptation,” is pretty
self-explanatory. We pray to God
to not let us fall back on our sins anymore. There are two types of temptations (or trials as Luther
calls it). The first temptation is
the “left hand” temptation, or the one that incites us to have anger, hatred,
and impatience. The most famous
story about impatience in the Bible is the when the people of Moses were
wandering the wilderness for forty years.
During those forty years, Moses’ patience was tested many times. Moses said in Exodus 16:8, “’You will
know that it was the Lord when he gives you meat to eat in the evening and all
the bread you want in the morning, because he has heard your grumbling against
him,’” (Bible Across America 134). The “right hand” temptation is one of unchastity, lust,
pride, and greed. These ideas come
from Psalm 91:7, which states that a thousand men may fall at the left hand,
but ten thousand fall at the right hand.
Later, in the Personal
Prayer Book (which was published after his excommunication from the
Catholic Church), Luther states that there are three temptations: of the flesh,
of the world, and of the devil. He
prays to God to help people not overeat (sin of gluttony), not get drunk, not sleep
too much, or be lazy: all of these are sins of the flesh. He prays to God to protect us from
seeking honor and power on the earth.
He even asks God to keep us from getting into positions of power. Does Luther pray that we should not
seek positions in government offices?
Shouldn’t there be some sort of hierarchy or order? Without some sort of government, there
would be anarchy. Luther was not
stating this. He was referring to
the honor and the “messiah” complex or the “god” complex that some people in
authority positions get when they have been in a position of power for a long
time.
Erwin Kurth, in his book called Catechetical Helps, wrote that temptation is a test put upon us by
God to prove and improve our strength.
“A weight is attached to a rope, not to break it, but to prove it. Pressure is applied to a boiler, not to
burst it, but to certify its power of resistance. Temptations are intended to do more than merely prove; they
are meant to improve,” (Kurth 129).
The very last petition, “but deliver us from evil,” sums up the
entire Lord’s Prayer. Luther says
in his sermon that, “we should pray for deliverance from evil so that trials
[or temptations] and sin may cease and that God’s will may be done, and his
kingdom come,” (Luther 76). In
Luther’s Personal Prayer Book, he
states, “Deliver us… in death and on Judgment Day, from your severe
condemnation,” (Tunseth 53). He
goes on to pray to God to protect us from sudden death, fire and flood,
lighting, hail, hunger, famine, war, and bloodshed. He asks God to protect us from plagues, pestilence, disease,
and other sicknesses.
It’s very important to say this prayer in church, since it’s
from Scripture, and that Jesus, who is God in the flesh, gave it to his
disciples to pray. The Lord’s
Prayer is God’s own way of showing us how to pray. These things give us a glimpse of what is in Jesus’ mind,
and how important they are compared to other things Jesus believes (Golloday
156). The entire Lord’s Prayer
seems to push you forward as you recite it (Schramm 133).
Our Father who art in
heaven,
hallowed
be thy name.
Thy
kingdom come.
Thy
will be done
on
earth as it is in heaven.
Give
us this day our daily bread,
and
forgive us our trespasses,
as
we forgive those who trespass against us,
and
lead us not into temptation,
but
deliver us from evil.
For
thine is the kingdom,
and
the power, and the glory,
for
ever and ever.
Amen.
Each
line seems to push you toward the next one, and finally ending with the word,
Amen, which means, “verily,” or, “Yes, Lord, let it be so.” It seems to have a poetic feel to it,
and is generally portrayed as an ancient poem. The meter is irregular, but if set correctly, it could be
sung.
One
should note that the final three lines of the Lord’s Prayer aren’t actually
petitions, since they didn’t come from Christ himself. These lines seem to come from 1
Chronicles 29:11, which says, “Yours, O Lord, is the greatness and the power
and the glory and the majesty and the splendor, for everything in heaven and
earth is yours,” (Bible Across America 816). A common theme in Chronicles is that God is portrayed as a
king (Harper Collins Study Bible 644), and this verse very clearly shows
this. The worshipping community
added this to the Lord’s Prayer.
We should be careful, however, not to dismiss this last portion (Simcox
104). It is a very valuable part
of the prayer, and even brings a nice refreshing ending to a prayer of
pleading.
The
Lord’s Prayer is simple, easy to memorize, and very important to the life of
Christians. As mentioned before,
Jesus himself gave this prayer to humans to recite, tweak, and pray to God. Martin Luther made this prayer much easier
to understand throughout his ministry.
Without him, who knows how we would be interpreting this Lord’s Prayer
today.
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