Thursday, November 8, 2007
Luther and a bipartite man
Central to Luther's thought on the Christian and the Sword is the division between spiritual and temporal government and a corresponding division between the "true believer" and the pagan. To what degree are these distinctions helpful? To what degree to are they necessary?
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Unfortunately, Luther's profile of the "true believer" is extremely idealistic and as such, it is hard to derive immediate applications from his work. The distinction, however, between the Christian and the non-Christian is very important even as it is. It enables Luther to engage in a discussion of worldly authority which would otherwise be impossible. Without this distinction, Luther's arguments would no longer have any merit at all because the idea of a difference between Christian and secular authority is foundational to his hypotheses.
If Luther were to engage in a discussion on authority without making these distinctions, his work would most likely not differ between that of a secular author. This distinction is what distinguishes Luther from Machiavelli or any other secular political theorist. Based on these facts, these distinctions are absolutely necessary to Luther's writings and without them Luther would be no more than another political philosopher.
In his treatise on secular government, Martin Luther makes a distinction between a spiritual government and a temporal government. A spiritual governing, he says is ruled by God's laws and as a result, there is no need for police officers, jails or guns. When they feel wronged, they turn the other cheek and thus the need for law enforcement vanishes. A temporal government is a government set up to constrain the wicked. Most if not all governments nowadays are of the temporal kind.
Luther's distinctions does not help his reader to understand the need for secular law because he does not define his term correctly. According to Luther, there would be no need for a secular law if the entire state were made of Christians because they would obey all of the laws all the time. As you can can see, this is quite absurd. I feel quite confident to call myself a Christian, yet I would by no means claim to obey all the law all the time. Just ask my parents. No one, even the purest of Christians can do this.
Nate, I think that Luther is dealing in ideals here. Ideally the Christian would always act in such a way as to make laws unnecessary. In reality there are true Christians that still struggle with sin and to an extent are held to the laws of men. Because he is dealing with ideals his governments that he proposes will be ideals too. How this may change his purpose I cannot yet say, did he intend this to be a practical guide for Christian princes on how to properly rule their kingdom or an ideal to strive toward even if practically impossible?
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