THE CONSULTATION OF LUTHER AND THE OTHER
PROTESTANT DOCTORS CONCERNING POLYGAMY
To
the most serene Prince and Lord Philip
Landgrave of Hesse, Count of Catzenlembogen, of Diets, of Ziegenhain, and
Nidda, our gracious Lord, we wish above all things the Grace of God through
Jesus Christ.
I.
We have been informed by Bucer, and in the instruction which your Highness gave
him, have read, the trouble of mind, and the uneasiness of conscience your
Highness is under at this present; and although it seemed to us very difficult
to speedily to answer the doubts proposed; nevertheless we would not permit the
said Bucer, who was urgent for his return to your Highness, to go away without
an answer in writing.
II.
It has been a subject of the greatest joy to us, and we have praised God, for
that he has recovered your Highness from a dangerous fit of sickness, and we
pray that he will long continue this blessing of perfect health both in body
and mind.
III.
Your Highness is not ignorant how great need our poor, miserable, little, and
abandoned Church stands in of virtuous Princes and Rulers to protect her; and
we doubt not but God will always supply her with some such, although from time
to time he threatens to deprive her of them, and proves her by sundry
temptations.
IV.
These things seem to us of greatest importance in the question which Bucer has
proposed to us: your Highness sufficiently of yourself comprehends the
difference there is betwixt acting an universal law, and using (for urgent
reasons and with God’s permission) a dispensation in a particular case: for it
is otherwise evident that no dispensations can take place against the first of
all laws, the divine law.
V.
We cannot at present advise to introduce publicly, and establish as a law in
the New Testament, that of the Old, which permitted to have more wives than
one. Your Highness is sensible, should any such thing be printed, that it would
be taken for a precept, whence infinite troubles and scandals would arise. We
beg your Highness to consider the dangers a man would be exposed unto, who
should be convicted of having brought into Germany such a law, which would
divide families, and involve them in endless strifes and disturbances.
VI.
As to the objection that may be made, that what is just in God’s sight ought
absolutely to be permitted, it must be answered in this manner. IF that which
is just before God, be besides commanded and circumstances, before it be permitted,
much be attended to; and to come to the question in hand: God hath instituted
marriage to be a society of two persons and no more, supposing nature were not
corrupted; and this is the sense of that text of Genesis, “There shall be two
in one flesh,” and this was observed at the beginning.
VII.
Lamech was the first that married many wives, and the Scripture witnesses that
this custom was introduced contrary to the first Institution.
VIII.
It nevertheless passed into custom among infidel nations; and we even find
afterwards, that Abraham and his posterity had many wives! It is also certain
from Deuteronomy, that the law of Moses permitted it afterwards, and that God
made an allowance for frail nature. Since it is then suitable to the creation
of men, and to the first establishment of their society, that each one be
content with one wife, it thence follows that the law enjoining it is
praiseworthy; that it ought to be received in the church; and no law contrary
thereto be introduced into it, because Jesus Christ has repeated in the
nineteenth chapter of St. Matthew that the text of Genesis, “There shall be two
in one flesh:” and brings to man’s remembrance what marriage ought to have been
before it degenerated from its purity.
IX.
In certain cases, however, there is room for dispensation. For example, if a
marriage man, detained captive in a distant country, should there take a second
wife, in order to preserve or recover his health, or that his own became
leprous, we see not how we could condemn, in these cases, such a man as, by the
advice of his Pastor, should take another wife, provided it were not with a
design of introducing a new law, but with an eye only to his own particular
necessities.
X.
Since then the introducing a new law, and the using a dispensation with respect
to the same law, are two very different things, we intreat your Highness to
take what follows into consideration.
In
the first place, above all things, care must be taken, that plurality of wives
be not introduced into the world by way of law, for every man to follow as he
thinks fit. In the second place, may it please your Highness to reflect on the
dismal scandal which would not fail to happen, if occasion be given to the
enemies of the Gospel to exclaim, that we are like the Anabaptists, who have
several wives at once, and the Turks, who take as many wives as they are able
to maintain.
XI.
In the third place, that the actions of Princes are more widely spread than
those of private men.
XII.
Fourthly, that inferiors are no sooner informed what their superiors do, but
they imagine they must do the same, and by that means licentiousness becomes
universal.
XIII.
Fifthly, that your Highness’s estates are filled with an untractable nobility,
for the most part very averse to the Gospel, on account of the hopes they are
in, as in other countries, of obtaining the benefices of cathedral churches,
the revenues whereof are very great. We know the impertinent discourses vented
by the most illustrious of your nobility, and it is easily seen how they and
the rest of your subjects would be disposed, in case your Highness should
authorize such a novelty.
XIV.
Sixthly, that your Highness, by the singular grace of God, hath a great
reputation in the empire and foreign countries; and it is to be feared lest the
execution of this project of a double marriage should greatly diminish this
esteem and respect. The concurrences of so many scandals obliges us to beseech
your highness to examine the thing with all the maturity of judgment God has
endowed you with.
XV.
With no less earnestness do we intreat your Highness, by all means, to avoid
fornication and adultery; and, to own the truth sincerely, we have a long time
been sensibly grieved to see your Highness abandoned to such impurities, which
might be followed by the effects of the divine vengeance, distempers, and many
others dangerous consequences.
XVI.
We also beg of your Highness not to entertain a notion; that the use of women
out of marriage is but a light and trifling fault, as the world is used to
imagine; since God hath often chastised impurity with the most severe
punishment: and that of the deluge is attributed to the adulteries of the great
ones: and the adultery of David has afforded a terrible instance of the divine
vengeance; and St. Paul repeats frequently, that God is not mocked with impunity,
and that adulterers shall not enter into the kingdom of God. For it is said, in
the second chapter of the first Epistle to Timothy, that obedience must be the
companion of faith, in order to avoid acting against conscience; and in the third
chapter of the first of St. John; if our heart condemn us not, we may call upon
the name of God with joy: and in the eighth chapter of the epistle to the Romans,
if by the spirit we mortify the desires of the flesh, we shall live; but, on the
contrary, we shall die, if we walk according to the flesh, that is, if we act
against our own consciences.
XVII.
We have related these passages, to the end that your Highness may consider seriously
that God looks not on the vice of impurity as a laughing matter, as it supposed
by those audacious libertines, we entertain heathenish notions on this subject.
We are pleased to find that your Highness is troubled with remorse of
conscience for these disorders. The management of the most important affairs in
the world is now incumbent on your Highness who is of a very delicate and
tender complexion; sleeps but little; and these reasons, which have obliged so
many prudent persons to manage their constitutions, are more than sufficient to
prevail with your Highness to imitate them.
XVIII.
We read of the incomparable Scanderbeg, who so frequently defeated the two most
powerful Emperors of the Turks, Amurat II. and Mahomet II., and while alive,
preserved Greece from their tyranny, that he often exhorted his soldiers to
chastity, and said to them, that there was nothing so hurtful to men of their
profession, as venereal pleasures. And if your Highness, after marrying a
second wife, were not to forsake those licentious disorders, the remedy
proposed would be to no purpose. Every one ought to be master of his own body
in external actions, and see, according to the expression of St. Paul, that his
members be the arms of justice. May it please your Highness, therefore, impartially
to examine the considerations of scandal, of labours, of care, of trouble, and
of distempers, which have been represented. And at the same time remember that
God has given you a numerous issue of such beautiful children of both sexes by
the Princess your wife, that you have reason to be satisfied therewith. How
many others, in marriage, are obliged, to the exercise and practice of
patience, from the motive only of avoiding scandal? We are far from urging on
your Highness to introduce so difficult a novelty into your family. By so doing,
we should draw upon ourselves not only the reproaches and persecution of those
of Hesse, but of all other people. The which would be so much the less
supportable to us, as God commands us in the ministry which we exercise, as
much as we are able, to regulate marriage, and all the other duties of human
life, according to the divine Institution, and maintain them in that state, and
remove all kind of scandal.
XIX.
It is now customary among wordlings, to lay the blame of every thing upon the
Preachers of the Gospel. The heart of man is equally fickle in the more elevated
and lower stations of life; and much have we to fear on that score.
XX.
As to what your Highness says, that it is not possible for you to abstain from
this impure life, we wish you were in a better state before God, that you lived
with a secure conscience, and laboured for the salvation of your own soul, and
the welfare of your subjects.
XXI.
But after all, if your Highness is fully resolved to marry a second wife, we
judge it ought to be done secretly, as we have said with respect to the dispensation
demanded on the same account, that is, that none but the person you shall wed, and
a few trusty persons, know of the matter, and they, too, obliged to secrecy
under the seal of confession. Hence no contradiction nor scandal of moment is
to be apprehended; for it is no extraordinary thing for Princes to keep
concubines; and though the vulgar should be scandalized thereat, the more
intelligent would doubt of the truth, and prudent persons would approve of this
moderate kind of life, preferably to adultery, and other brutal actions. There
is no need of being much concerned for that men will say, provided all goes
right with conscience. So far do we approve it, and in those circumstances only
by us specified; for the Gospel hath neither recalled nor forbid what was
permitted in the law of Moses with respect to marriage. Jesus Christ has not
changed the external economy, but added justice only, and life everlasting, for
reward. He teaches the true way of obeying God, and endeavours to repair the
corruption of nature.
XXII.
Your Highness hath therefore, in this writing, not only the approbation of us
all, in case of necessity, concerning what you desire, but also the reflections
we have made thereupon; we beseech you to weight them, as becoming a virtuous,
wise, and Christian Prince. We also beg of God to direct all for his glory and
your Highness’s salvation.
XIII.
As to your Highness’s thought of communicating this affair to the Emperor
before it be concluded, it seems to us that this Prince counts adultery among
the lesser sort of sins; and it is very much to be feared lest his faith being
of the same stamp with that of the Pope, the Cardinals, the Italians, the
Spaniards, the Saracens, he make light of your Highness’s proposal, and turn it
to his own advantage by amusing your Highness with vain words. We know he is
deceitful and perfidious, and has nothing of the German in him.
XXIV.
Your Highness sees, that he uses no sincere endeavour to redress the grievances
of Christendom; that he leaves the Turks unmolested, and labours for nothing
but to divide the empire, that he may raise up the house of Austria on its
ruins. It is therefore very much to be wished that no Christian Prince would
give into his pernicious schemes. May God preserve your Highness. We are most ready
to serve your Highness. Given at Wittemberg the Wednesday after the feast of
Saint Nicholas, 1539.
Your
Highness’s most humble, and most obedient subjects and servants,
MARTIN LUTHER.
PHILIP MELANCHTHON.
MARTIN BUTCER.
ANTHONY CORVIN.
ADAM
JOHN LENINGUE.
JUSTUS WINTFERTE.
DENIS MELANTHER.
I
George Nuspicher, Notary Imperial, bear testimony by this present act, written
and signed with my own hand, that I have transcribed this present copy from the
true original which is in Melanchthon’s own handwriting, and hath been
faithfully preserved to this present time, at the request of the most serene
Prince of Hesse; and have examined with the greatest exactness every line and
every word and collated them with the same original; and have found them
conformable thereunto, not only in the things themselves, but also in the signs
manual, and have delivered the present copy in five leaves of good paper, whereof
I bear witness.
GEORGE
NUSPICHER.
NOTARY. (Jacques Bénigne Bossuet, The History and the Variations of the
Protestant Churches, 2 vols. [2d ed.; Maynooth: Richard Coyne, 1836], 1:235-47)
The
Marriage Contract of Philip, Landgrave of Hesse, with Margaret de Saal.
In
the name of God, Amen.
Be
it known to all those, as well in general, who shall see, hear, or read this
public instrument, that in the year 1540, on Wednesday the fourth day of the
month of March, at two o’clock or thereabouts, in the afternoon, the thirteenth
year of the Indiction, and the twenty-first of the reign of the most puissant
and most victorious Emperor Charles V., our most gracious lord; the most serene
Prince and lord Philip Landgrave of Hesse, Count of Catznelenbogen, of Dietz,
of Ziegenhain, and Nidda, with some of his Highness’s Counsellors, on one side,
and the good and virtuous Lady Margaret de Saal with some of her relations, on
the other side, have appeared before me, Notary and witness underwritten in the
City of Rotenburg, in the caslte of the same city, with the design and will
publicly declared before me, Notary public and witness, to unite themselves by
marriage; and accordingly my most gracious Lord and Prince Philip the Landgrave
hath ordered this to be proposed by the Reverend Denis Melander preacher to his
Highness, much to the sense as follows:--“Whereas the eye of God searches all
things, and but little escapes the knowledge of men, his Highness declares that
his will is to be wed the said Lady Margaret de Saal, although the Princess his
wife be still living, and that this action may not be imputed to inconstancy or
curiosity: to avoid scandal and maintain the honour of the said Lady, and the
reputation of her kindred, his Highness makes oath here before God, and upon
his soul and conscience, that he takes her to wife through no levity, nor
curiosity, nor from any contempt of law, or superiors; but that he is obliged
to it by such important, such inevitable necessities of body and conscience,
that it is impossible for him to save either body or soul, without adding
another wife to his first. All which his Highness hath laid before many learned,
devout, prudent, and Christian preachers, and consulted them upon it. and these
great men, after examining the motives represented to them, have advised his
Highness to put his soul and conscience at ease by this double marriage. And
the same cause and the same necessity have obliged the most serene Princess,
Christina Duchess of Saxony, his Highness’s first lawful wife, out of her great
prudence and sincere devotion, for which she is so much to be commended, freely
to consent and admit of a partner, to the end, that the soul and body of her
most dear spouse may run no further risk, and the glory of God may be increased,
as the deed written with this Princess’s own hand sufficiently testifies. And
lest occasion of scandal be taken from its not being the custom to have two
wives, although this be Christian and lawful in the present case, his Highness
will not solemnize these nuptials in the ordinary way, that is, publicly before
many people, and with the wonted
ceremonies with the said Margaret de Saal; but both the one and the other will join
themselves in the wedlock, privately and without noise; in presence only of the
witnesses underwritten.”—After Melander had finished his discourse, the said
Philip and the said Margaret accepted of each other for husband and wife, and
promised mutual fidelity in the name of God. The said Prince hath required of
me, Notary underwritten, to draw him one of more collected copies of this
contract, and hath also promised, on the word and faith of a Prince, to me a
public person, to observe it inviolably, always and without alteration, in
presence of the Reverend and most learned masters Philip Melanchthon, Martin
Bucer, Denis Melander; and likewise in the presence of the illustrious and valiant
Eberhard de Than, counsellor of his electoral Highness of Saxony, Herman de Malsberg,
Herman de Hundelshausein, the Lord John Fegg of the Chancery, Rodulph Schenck;
and also in the presence of the most honourable and most virtuous Lady Anne of
the family of Milititz, widow of the late John de Saal, and mother of the
spouse, all in quality of requisite witnesses for the validity of the present
act.
And
I Balthasar Rand, of Fuld, Notary public imperial, who was present at the
discourse, instruction, marriage, espousals, and union aforesaid, with the said
witnesses, and hae heard and seen all that passed, have written and subscribed the
present contract, being requested so to do; and set to it the usual seal, for a
testimonial of the truth thereof.
BALTHASAR
RAND. (ibid., 247-51)