Worship Wars in Early Lutheranism

-- JO SEPH HERL Worship Wars in Early Lutheranism Choir, Congregation,and Three Centuries of Conflict OXJ.ORD TINIVERSITY PRESS 20O4 LUTHER AND THE LTTURGY IN WITTENBERG orders, an order for daily prayer and prefacesto three hymnals and wvo collec- tions of polyphonic hymn settings,the referencesto congregationalsinging can be counted on the fingers of one hand: once in the Formulamissae, incidentally in the AdmonitionConcerningthe Sauamert, obliquely in the Torgau dedicationsermon, and in passingin the GermanMass when he directed that the Creed be sung by the people' He apparently never mentioned it in connection with the spiritual priest- hood, asBuszin and others have asserted.We must therefore conclude that the idea that Luther consideredthe only permissible liturgy to be one sung by the entire congregationcannot be substantiated. + The Origins of Luther's Flymn Tunes This topic is peripheral to the main point of this book, but it has been the subject of so much confusion that it seemsworthwhile to consider it here. It is almost an axiom in the popular imagination that Luther, in order to further congregational singing and make his hymns more attractive to the people, used or adapted preexisting secular melodies, even drinking songs.The well-known question .,'why shouldthe devil have all the good fsng5?"-2ttributed in Bartlett'sFamiliar euota- tionsto English preacherRowland }Jill (1744-1833)-is frequentlyattributed to Luther.61The origin of this attribution may have been Friedrich Blume's influen- tial 1931 book Die evangelischeKirchenmusik, in which he stated "Lurher 'the believed devil does not need to have all lovely tunes solely for himself"'62 (Jnfortu- nately, Blume gave no citation for the quotation. The second edition of Blume's book, which appearedin 1965 with an English translationin 7974, conrinued to ar- tribute the idea to Lurher but omitted the quotation.63 BecauseLuther's works areso voluminous, comprising not only publishedwrit- ings and letters but also transcriptions of dinner table conversations,it is scarcely possibleto state categorically that Luther never uttered or wrote these words. But other scholarshave looked for them and failed to find them.6aRecently, a new tool has appeared,with the 727-volume Weimar edition of Luther's works now avail- able as a searchableonline database.A searchconducted on keywords in the fore- going quotation yielded nothing.6s It therefore seems higtrly likely that such a statementis not to be found in Luther's works. In truth, of all Luther's hymns, only one, vom Himmel hoch,da komm ich her,is known to have had a secularorigin.66 He altered it from the popular song(not drinking song) /r[ kumm ausfrembden landen her. But he wrote it for the annual children'sChristmas pageant, not for use in a church service.At first the original seculartune was used,but Luther apparentlyhad secondthoughts about thl, as he wrote a new tune for the 1545 hymnal. It is Luther'snew tune that appearsin rnodern hymnals. Most often, when Luther wrote a hymn using a preexisting melody, the melody was a Gregorianchant. But over 20 percentof his hymns arebased on, or written in the form of, popular religioussong (what would be akin to religious 21 ril/ORSHIP twARS IN EARLY LUTHERANISM is rewritten from SanctaMaria Christmas carols today). Cott derVaterwolm uns bei Sanctuspettus won unspey' Nine ste uns bei or th. appa..nt older form of the text pise, of its characteristiclast line ny-r* are in the foim of the so called because Kyrie eleison or KYrieleis: Christ ist erstanden Dies sind die heilgen zehn Gebot Gelobetseist du, JesuChrist Gott sei gelobet und gebenedeiet der den Tod JesusChristus unserHeiland, Mensch. willst du leben seliglich Mitten wir im Leben sind Nun bitten wir den Heiligen Geist (Jnser grosseSiinde und schwereMissetat6T sung in churches before Many of the models for these hymns had already been continuing a tradition' not Luther's time. In making use of the models, Luther was justi{ication for the argument that breaking new ground. There is in any caseno catering to the tastesof the Luther attempted to promote congregationalsinging by nlasses. + Conclusion and desirable' He encour- Martin Luther regarded congregational singing as useful of the choral liturgy' In agecl it in his own congt.g1rlott, but not at the expense liturgy and his desire for the Luther's theology there is no con{lict between a choral as a congregational ser- people to sing. Tne cerman Mass of 1526,widely regarded mostly a choral nrass' r,r1.., describes what was at the time of its publication ".t.r"lly continued to sing It was not well received, and the congregation in Wittenberg the principal service in wit- poorly for years. The choral mass in Latin remained tenberg throughout Luther's lifetime' 22.

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