Brian Hamilton

Disputation against Scholastic Theology

Luther’s Disputation against Scholastic Theology is full of seeming contradictions, but not ones impossible to make sense of within the context of the short document itself. They key, I’d say, is thesis 89: “Grace as a mediator is necessary to reconcile the law with the will.” Luther’s diatribes against the possibility of a ‘good law’ or of a naturally good will all come back to the fundamental point that both law and will rely on the grace of God for their goodness. This utter dependence on the grace of God does not negate the potential goodness of either law or will—although nothing that can be prescribed is good law (#83) and “not even in grace is it possible to fulfil the law perfectly” (#65)—but rather neither can be good ‘naturally,’ which is just to say without the grace of God. (Luther elsewhere begins “since the law is good…” [#87].) So just after insisting that “Condemned are all those who do the works of the law” (#79), Luther asserts that “Blessed are those who do the works of the grace of God” (#80, my emphasis).

Side note: there is a curious sort of perfectionism of the spirit at work in this text. Sin is applied liberally, to any act outside the grace of God. To have the grace of God is decidedly not another “work” (#57–58), but it is a prerequisite for every right work. There is no attempt, even a denunciation of the attempt, to distinguish better and worse in natural actions. Or perhaps more: the ‘worse’ is inevitable outside the grace of God (#21, #68-69). Can we distinguish better and worse in the context of grace? “We do not become righteous by doing righteous deeds but, having been made righteous, we do righteous deeds” (#40), yet there are imperfections even for those who have God’s grace. Of course, my question is not Luther’s in this text; the point here is that grace is a sine qua non of righteousness.

16 January 2007 |
tags: Martin Luther