Jakob Böhme (1575-1624)

[JM]

Was Bohme a confessional Lutheran?

[Tofferer]

I'd say no given what is written here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jakob_Böhme


Hopefully other will know more and can offer better insight. I can only provide a quick reference.

[Till]

Was Bohme a confessional Lutheran?

Was any 16th century Lutheran not a confessional Lutheran? What are the criteria of being a confessional Lutheran?

[BigNorsk]

http://www.rotten.com/library/bio/mad-science/jakob-bohme/

Goes a bit more into detail. His image of God doesn't come from the bible. Nor his image of creation. Nor it would appear, a lot of other things.


Marv

[JM]

Thanks Marv, are their any confessional mystic Protestants?

[JM]

Why does it double up my posts?

[JM]

This posting system is the pits.

[JM]

doh!

[BabyLutheran]

Marv, oh Marv, can you hear me? lol

[BigNorsk]

I don't know about mystical confessinal Lutherans. Sounds like an oxymoron to me.

Marv

[JM]

Luther wrote aboutTheologia Germanica (http://www.passtheword.org/DIALOGS-FROM-THE-PAST/theogrm1.htm) [mystical work] "no book except the Bible and St. Augustine has come to my attention, from which I have learned more things about God, Christ, man, and all things."

[JM]

I don't know about mystical confessinal Lutherans. Sounds like an oxymoron to me.

Marv

From what I've read so far, Luther was a mystic. It seems he had a toe in Germanic Dominican side of the pool. He didn't like the Eastern Orthodox view [Dionysian] and was critical of the Romanic, so I just thought I'd ask about mysticism and the confession.

Thanks for the help.

j

[DaRev]

From what I've read so far, Luther was a mystic. It seems he had a toe in Germanic Dominican side of the pool. He didn't like the Eastern Orthodox view [Dionysian] and was critical of the Romanic, so I just thought I'd ask about mysticism and the confession.

Thanks for the help.

j

I don't know that I would say Luther was a mystic, but he may have been influenced by German mysticism.

[DailyBlessings]

The confessional label is actually a fairly recent theological trend. Most historical Lutherans adhered to the confessions, to some extent, but in Bohme's time no one used the term in a categorical way. Renewed interest in the Augsburg Confessions sprung up around the same time that Lutherans started studying Luther himself, in the mid eighteenth century, and the actual "confessional movement" was a child of the 1960's.

As to the second question, I know for a fact that there are many mystic theologians who regard themselves as confessional, though being oriented toward liberal thought they don't regard any human document as "doctrine" in quite the way that conservative Lutherans tend to. Luther himself was certainly mystical in comparison to other Catholics at the time, though he adhered to rigid standards of reasoning and Scriptural authenticity. Even there... well, I don't know if I would dare to go into a modern LCMS church and call James an "epistle of straw".

[BigNorsk]

Actually I have run into confessional Lutheran ministers who do not even consider James to be scripture, so I think you could do the epistle of straw without problem, especially if you actually use it as Luther used it to compare it to such books as Romans.

Marv

[LutheranMafia]

Luther called James an epistle of straw?

[DaRev]

Luther called James an epistle of straw?

Luther, like many of the early Church fathers, was not all that fond of the Antilogomena. But I don't believe he ever suggested that it was not canonical.

[BigNorsk]

Luther called James an epistle of straw?

Yes, and you probably would agree with him.

I believe it's only in his original preface to the New Testament, but it might have been in a couple. Anyway here it is.


In a word, St. John’s Gospel (http://www.godrules.net/library/topics/topic843.htm) and his first Epistle (http://www.godrules.net/library/topics/topic656.htm), St. Paul’s Epistles (http://www.godrules.net/library/topics/topic656.htm), especially Romans, Galatians and Ephesians, and St. Peter’s first Epistle (http://www.godrules.net/library/topics/topic656.htm) are the books that show you Christ (http://www.godrules.net/library/topics/topic353.htm) and teach (http://www.godrules.net/library/topics/topic1855.htm) you all that it is necessary and good for you to know, even though you were never to see or hear any other book or doctrine (http://www.godrules.net/library/topics/topic584.htm). Therefore St. James’ Epistle (http://www.godrules.net/library/topics/topic656.htm) is really an epistle (http://www.godrules.net/library/topics/topic656.htm) of straw, compared to them; for it has nothing of the nature (http://www.godrules.net/library/topics/topic1310.htm) of the Gospel (http://www.godrules.net/library/topics/topic843.htm) about it. But more of this in other prefaces.


So what you see is that his epistle of straw statement is a comparative one. Who could disagree with say if you were to say take Romans and compare it to James. Which one teaches about the Christian faith the strongest and broadest? Well Romans of course. James is a pretty narrow focus and it's mostly dealing with those who are committing an error of thinking faith is simply the acknowledgement of a truth, not something that controls you.

If you look up Luther's prefaces especially concerning James and bit of context you need to know is that the Roman Catholic Church at the time was teaching that James of the 12 Apostles was the author. And this was part of the source of doubts about the book, because that James was martyred before the book of James was around.

It is believed to be authored by James the brother of Jesus, patriarch of the church in Jerusalem.

And you can take brother in whatever sense you want, but evidently it fell out of favor in the Roman Church to talk about James the brother of Jesus for at least awhile.

Marv

[DaRev]

If you look up Luther's prefaces especially concerning James and bit of context you need to know is that the Roman Catholic Church at the time was teaching that James of the 12 Apostles was the author. And this was part of the source of doubts about the book, because that James was martyred before the book of James was around.

It is believed to be authored by James the brother of Jesus, patriarch of the church in Jerusalem.

Just a FYI... There were two Apostles named James. James the Elder (aka James the Greater) was the brother of John and a son of Zebedee. He was martyred very early. The second one was James the Less (aka James the Younger), the son of Alphaeus, who many thought was the author of the epistle of James. But it was most likely written by James the brother of Jesus, aka James the Just, who was also the first bishop in the Christian Church.