HARVARD THEOLOGICAL REVIEW 60 (1967), 145-61

OLD TESTAMENT PROMISSIO AND

LUTHER'S NEW HERMENEUTIC
JAMES S. PREUS
HARVARD DIVINITY SCHOOL

I
In the main stream of contemporary Luther scholarship, there
is broad agreement that the emergence of "reformation theology"
is organically related to, if not constituted by, a new biblical
hermeneutic.1
Furthermore, in the search for the "sources of Luther's theol-
ogy," historians have to be, and are, frequently reminded that
Luther may have gotten some of his key ideas from the Bible —
however important Augustine, Bernard, Occam, Biel or Staupitz
may have been for his theological formation.2
Accepting these two assertions, I wish to question the adequacy
of the current interpretation of Luther's hermeneutical develop-
ment, and to indicate the direction in which I believe the herme-
neutical changes evident in Luther's earliest exegetical writing
(the Dictata super psalterium, 1513-15) can help make better
sense of the well-known theological innovations which appear in
his writings of the 1520's.
To begin with, the major interpreters of the "new hermeneutic"
— particularly Gerhard Ebeling — have not taken sufficient ac-
count of the simple fact that Luther's first Bible course dealt
with an Old Testament book, not a New Testament one. More-
over, profound revisions occurred in Luther's approach to his
1
The writings of GERHARD EBELING, especially Die Anfänge von Luthers Her-
meneutik, Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche 48 (1951), 172-230, dominate this
area of Luther research. For earlier literature, see i72f., n.5 of the article cited,
and bibliography in EBELING, Evangelische Evangelienauslegung (München, 1942).
Cf. also idem, Hermeneutik, in RGG* III, 242-62; Luthers Auslegung des 14.(15·)
Psalms in der ersten Psalmenvorlesung im Vergleich mit der exegetischen Tradi-
tion, ZThK 50 (1953)1 280-339; Luthers Auslegung des 44·(45·) Psalms, in
Lutherforschung Heute, ed. V. Vajta (Berlin, 1958), 32-48; Luthers Psalterdruck
vom Jahre 1513, ZThK 50 (1953), 43-99; The New Hermeneutics and the Young
Luther, Theology Today 21 (1964), 34-46.
2
J. PELIKAN, Luther the Expositor (St. Louis, 1959), 42.
146 HARVARD THEOLOGICAL REVIEW
Old Testament text in the two-year course of his lectures on
Psalms, and these changes have by and large been ignored. An
awareness of these shifts would, I think, put us in a better posi-
tion to understand the genesis of the later theology of Luther.
In this study, I shall also argue that neglected elements of new-
ness in Luther's thought can be detected and traced by an exam-
ination of how the notion of promissio begins to assume a major
role in both the hermeneutical and the theological formulations
of the Dictata.

II
Nothing is more agreed upon, and nothing seems safer in
current interpretation of the young Luther, than the assertion
that his intense christological orientation is the key to his devel-
opment, both hermeneutical and theological.3
The centrality of Christ in Luther's first Psalms-lectures is
abundantly clear from the beginning, in the "Preface of Jesus
Christ" which introduces this ponderous document. As Ebeling
has pointed out, Luther here takes the unprecedented step of
having Christ himself step forward to identify himself, via his
New Testament self-witness, as the subject-matter and speaker
of the whole Psalter.4
In this remarkable preface, Luther also insists that Christ is
the "literal sense" of the Psalms; examples are given for the
exegesis of the first three psalms which show how unequivocally
Luther means this.5 Luther explains that by "literal" he does
8
As EBELING stated it in Evangelienauslegung, 280, the uniqueness of Luther's
exegesis in the Dictata is "not that the book of Psalms is christological generally,
and that the OT was exegeted from the NT, but that with such energy and con-
centration an exclusively christological exegesis was established as a fundamental
hermeneutical principle." Cf. EBELING'S succinct statement, "Christ is the text,"
Die Anfänge, 225.
* EBELING, Luthers Psalterdruck, 82. For the Praefatto Ihesu Christi, see WA
SS/i, 6-11.
5
Psalm 1: "The letter is that the Lord Jesus did not yield to the favorite
pursuits of the Jews and of the perverse and adulterous generation which were
current in his time" (55/1,8.12-10.2); Psalm 2: "The letter concerns the fury of
the Jews and Gentiles against Christ in his passion" (55/i,io.6f.) ; Psalm 3:
" 'Lord, how they [my enemies] are multiplied, is ad literam a complaint of Christ
about his enemies the Jews" (55/1,10.10-12.). Luther insists, "Omnis prophetia et
omnis propheta de Christo domino debet intelligi, nisi ubi manifestis verbis ap-
pareat de alio loqui" (55/i,6.25f.).
 LUTHER: O.T. PROMISSIO 147
not mean "historical" (that is the "Jewish" misunderstanding)
but "prophetic."6 The true, the only sensus of the Psalter is
the sensus Christi.7
Next, Christ as the literal sense of the Psalms-text is the basis
for Luther's extraordinary concentration on the sensus tropolog­
ica— the traditional "moral" sense. Here also Luther is seen
to be unique, as over against the tradition, with his assertion
that tropology is the tcsensus ultimatus" of Scripture,8 and with
his well-known axiom that Christ, tropologically understood, is
faith. This means, in short, that faith is "conformitas Christi":
faith is the situation in which the history and fate of Christ is
laid on the believer by God. The iustitia which literaliter desig­
nates Jesus Christ becomes tropologice ours as faith.9 In faith,
the Christian is concretely brought under the judgment and
mercy of God, who kills and makes alive.10
Without further elaboration, one can see that by way of this
hermeneutical schema faith gets its fundamental definition and
structure in closest possible identity with the crucified and risen
Christ. Faith is, as it were, the Christ-event extended by God's
power to encompass and to effect the spiritual death and resur­
rection of the believer as well.
We shall not pursue this profound theme further. Rather, our
β
Luther singles out for attack "carnal" interpreters who "Sicut Iudei applicantes
semper Psalmos ad veteres hystorias extra Christum" (55/1,2.iof.), and seems to
have the 14th-century Franciscan Nicholas of Lyra in mind when he objects: ". . .
quidam nimis multos psalmos exponunt non prophetice sed hystorice, secuti quos-
dam Rabim hebraeos falsigraphos . . ." (55/1,8.3-5). Luther here follows in the
footsteps of FABER STAPULENSIS, whose 1509 Psalms-commentary Luther used in
preparing his own. FABER objects to the Jews who make David more a historian
than a prophet ("historicum potius faceré quam prophetam") (Quincuplex psalter-
ium, Praefatio).
7
55/i,8.6f, with reference to 2 Cor. 2:16.
8
3>335-2if. Tropology is called the sensus Primarius, 3,531.34.
9
3,466.26f. ". . . Iustitia dei . . . Tropologice est fides Christi Ro.i. 'Revelatur
enim Iustitia Dei in euangelio ex fide in fidem., " Cf. 3,200.i8f. and 458.9-11. It
is in this Christ-faith nexus, according to EBELING, that we find the "Urform" of
the reformation doctrine of justification (Hermeneutik, 251).
10
For a full, and still the best, treatment of the intimate relationship of Christ
and faith, see ERICH VOGELSANG, Die Anfänge von Luthers Christologie (Berlin und
Leipzig, 1929). Luther states the hermeneutical rule as follows: ". . . deus facit
omnes sanctos suos conformes fieri imagini filii sui. . . ." (3,46.3 2f.) ; cf. EBELING'S
discussion, Die Anfänge, 226, where this passage is cited. Readily available for
English readers is WILHELM PAUCK'S excellent introduction to Luther: Lectures
on Romans (LCC vol. 15, Philadelphia, 1961) ; see especially p. xxxiii.
148 HARVARD THEOLOGICAL REVIEW
problem arises from what is missing here: what does not intrude
at all in such a picture is the question of the Old Testament text
which Luther is supposed to be exegeting. Is this Old Testament
exegegis? According to the picture we are given in the literature,
the Old Testament text, together with its historical situation and
its own witness, is no more than a shadow and figure of the
theological res which is found only in the New Testament, in
Christ.
But this, I contend, does not do justice to a quite different set
of ideas which begin to appear later in the course of these lec-
tures. The hermeneutical principles which we see laid down in
the Praefatio Ihesu Christi are supposed to provide critical
clues — the seeds — of reformation theology. It is necessary,
I think, to introduce evidence which will revise this judgment.

Ill
The shift in hermeneutical perspective which I shall indicate
briefly here u involves Luther's discovery of the Old Testament
as religiously and theologically relevant — not just because it
is inspired signum or figura of the New Testament, a kind of
New Testament in disguise which is "really" about Christ and
the Church, but because it stands as still-authentic testimony
and promise, arousing the expectatio and petitio of those who live
before the advent of Christ and long for his coming.
Put another way: in Luther's treatment of the Psalms, the
Psalmist (throughout presumed to be David) ceases to function
so much as a privileged seer among a "carnal" Israel who, as
the Spirit's mouthpiece, imparts veiled information about Christ
and the Church for the edification of (only) his future Christian
readers.12 The psalmist gradually begins to be noticed as an
historical figure in his own right, living prior to the fulfillment of
U
I hope to treat this more fully in a book-length study, now in preparation,
which will set Luther's development within the medieval hermeneutical tradition
in which he was trained.
M
In the preface to his scholia, Luther elevates David to a unique position even
among the prophets, pointing out that he alone among them claims (in 2 Reg.
23:2) that the Spirit has spoken through him (55/2,27.8-10). Luther here follows
Faber.
 LUTHER: O.T. PROMISSIO 149
God's promises, struggling to keep faith amidst all the contraria
of his existence.
That such a development in fact takes place in the course of
the Dictata can be indicated quite simply. In brief compass, we
shall investigate Luther's handling of seven psalms which the
whole medieval tradition, including Luther, designates as the
penitential psalms.13 These are useful for our purpose because
they belong to a single class of psalms, which one could expect
to be dealt with in roughly the same way, since they are being
read in one hermeneutical situation by the Christian, i.e., as
preparation for confession. Thus, if a change appears in the
basic approach to these particular psalms, we have a right to
suspect that broader hermeneutical changes have occurred which
will show up elsewhere.
It should be kept in mind, as we examine these psalms, that a
span of about two years separates the exegesis of the first and
the last of them.14
Psalm 6. — In line with his radicalization of christological
exegesis of the Psalms, Luther here departs from the tradition
(Faber Stapulensis excepted) by making this Psalm an "oratio
Christi" — a prayer of Christ himself.15 Luther's modern editors
note that in most of the tradition the speaker is either the church,
or the individual Christian penitent, or both.16
Luther of course agrees with the tradition that Christ does
not share our culpa, but takes upon himself our pena, suffering
everything sine peccato.11

"According to the Vulgate numbering, which is used throughout this study,

these are Pss. 6, 31, 37, 50, 101, 129 and 142.
14
For chronological information I depend on VOGELSANG in his introduction to
Der junge Luther {Luthers Werke in Auswahl, ed. O. Clemen; vol. 5, Berlin, 1955) ;
according to VOGELSANG, p. 40, the Psalms-course began Aug. 16, 1513, and ran
until Oct. 20, 1515, and the time-span from the exegesis of Ps. 6 to that of Ps. 142
would be from autumn, 1513, to late summer, 1515.
16
55Λ,38.3-6: "Oratio Christi pro suis passionibus et peccatis membrorum
suorum ut mediatoris inter deum patrem et homines." The editors provide FABER'S
comparable description, 55/1,39.13-15: "Propheta in spiritu inducit Christum
patrem orantem, ea quae membrorum sunt sua facientem et poenitentiam suam
patri offerentem."
19
SS/i^Ç-ïS-ao, with examples.
1T
5S/i,38-i3-i5: " . . . in isto Psalmo nulla fit confessio peccati, sed tantum
questio penarum, ideo principaliter sunt verba Christi, qui sine peccato in multis
tarnen passionibus fuit. . . ." Thus, the fact that sins are not being confessed in
150 HARVARD THEOLOGICAL REVIEW
Of note here is that the Old Testament writer himself, and
the meaning of the words to and for him, are conspicuously
absent from the horizon of the exegesis. The whole subject-
matter of the interpretation is Christ and the Christian penitent,
as far as possible in "tropologica!" identity.
Psalm 31. — Here, the approach to the Psalm is more simply
traditional: the subject is "the method of true penitence."18
Christological exegesis plays no role, but neither — on the other
hand — does the Old Testament situation. In accordance with
the title of the Psalm {David Eruditio), Luther interprets it as
a discourse on Christian spiritual understanding:
To know that the son of God is incarnate for our salvation, and that
outside of him all are in sins: that is what this eruditio is, this
intellectus, which no one knows except through the Holy Spirit.19

David, removed from his own time, speaks here as a Christian

theologian to Christians, and his meaning is explicated by gloss-
ing with the words of Christ and St. Paul, as recorded in the
New Testament.
Psalm 37.— Luther now returns (for the last time in the
penitential psalms) to a partial christological orientation, sum-
marizing the psalm as a "lament and complaint of our Mediator
in his passion."20 What Christ is doing here is remembering
and confessing our sins pro nobis to God, and asking for our
liberatio. We are taught thereby that, in order to use this Psalm
rightly, we must pray it not "in ourselves," but "in Christ."21

the psalm makes the christological starting-point convenient, and not really as
radical as EBELING suggests (The New Hermeneutics, 40).
18
3,171.26: "de modo vere poenitendi. . . ."
"3,172.24-27: "Scire ergo filium dei esse incarnatum pro salute nostra et extra
eum omnes esse in peccatis, hec est eruditio ista, intellectus iste: quod nemo nisi
per spiritum sanctum cognovit."
20
3,211.8f.: "Planctus et querela mediatoris nostri in passione propter peccata
nostra constituti."
21
3,211.15-22: "Quia secundum apostolum Christus factus est pro nobis male-
dictum Gal. 3 [ : i 3 ] et peccatum 2. Cor. [5:21] et peccata nostra ipse tulit Esaie
53 E · ^ ] , ideo hic psalmus in persona eius dicitur, in quo commémorât et con-
fitetur pro nobis Deo patri peccata nostra et querit liberationem sui (i.e. nostram
per ipsum et in ipso). Ideo quicunque vult ilium psalmum fructuose orare, debet
eum non in se, sed in Christo orare et tanquam eum audire orantem, et sic ei
suum adiungere affectum et dicere Amen."
 LUTHER: O.T. PROMISSIO 151
Luther's attention here is on the most intimate possible identity
between Christ and his church, between head and members, even
in the very act of repentance. In this "tropologica!" identity,
Christ does not share our guilt; nevertheless, his pena signifies
our culpa.22 The "historical David," it hardly need be added, is
outside the scope of the exegesis, and is without any theological
significance whatever.
Psalm 50. — This psalm is summarized by Luther as "the
best possible eruditio and example for penitents and those who
wish to confess." 23 For the first time, the Old Testament situa-
tion is at least mentioned — namely, David's repentance over
the Bathsheba affair. Yet, Luther observes, even though the hys-
toria is about David, "nevertheless, according to the prophetic
sense (propheticum sensum) it ought to be taken [as having
been spoken] in the person of human nature (i.e., the church of
Christ). . . ." 24 Which means, in effect, that the history is an
allegory or figura of the psalm's "real" meaning. The psalm is
"not properly about David, but propketice spoken in the person
of the church," whereby David, having seized the occasion from
his actual situation to make a "prophetic" utterance, speaks as
"part of the church."25
In the approach to these first four penitential psalms, then,
we detect no departure from the presuppositions of Luther's
preface, namely, that the text is about Christ, the church, and
(tropologically) faith.
Now we cross a 50-psalm gap — chronologically, more than
a year. And changes are immediately evident.
Psalm 101. — Luther does not treat this throughout as a
penitential psalm, although he acknowledges the propriety of
28
3,212.341*.: ". . . pena eius nostram culpam significat. . . ." This and the text
given in the preceding note provide clear examples of the hermeneutical presupposi-
tion of tropology: Christ and his passion are causally significative of our own
spiritual existence.
28
3,284.2: "Optima penitencium et confiten volentium eruditio et exemplum."
24
3,284.27-29: "Potest quidem psalmus iste secundum hystoriam in persona
David intelligi. Tarnen secundum propheticum sensum debet accipi in persona
nature humane (i.e. ecclesie Christi)."
25
3,291.22-24: "Patet itaque psalmum istum proprie non de David, sed in
persona Ecclesie prophetice factum esse: a David velut parte Ecclesie, sumpta oc-
casione ex hystoria, que in titulo nominatur." (The title referred to is "Ad vic-
toriam psalmus David," 3,284.4.)
152 HARVARD THEOLOGICAL REVIEW
the church's decision to assign it as such.26 In his "Summary"
of the psalm (a part of the printed edition which he prepared for
his students in the summer of 1513), Luther had labeled this
"a prayer of the pauper when he was anxious" about the reality
of God's presence and help.27 Who is the "pauper"? In his
later gloss on the word, presumably made approximately at the
time of his classroom treatment of the psalm in the spring of
151s,28 he explains it as "the people before the advent of
Christ."29 Their prayer is an anxious petition for the coming
of Messiah.30
"Tropologically" it is the same kind of prayer: a prayer of
the Christian for Christ's spiritual advent in the situation of
temptation.31 An anagogical (eschatological) application is also
made in the same vein: Christ will be called upon to rise up
against the Antichrist.32
For the first time, then, the "literal" sense of the text is
allowed to conform to the historical order of things: attention
is focused on the people "ante adventum Christi." The psalmist's
own history and word emerge from below the hermeneutical
horizon to become a new basis for theological and religious
interpretation. The theme is the longing for the advent of Christ,
who in three analogous situations is not yet present in the de-
sired way. The psalmist's word now becomes his own word; it
is not put (propketice) into the mouth of Christ or the church,
so that either Christ or else David as "pars ecclesiae" is the
speaker, as in Ps. 50.
28
4,152.3of.: ". . . recte pro penitentibus psalmus iste orandus deputatur. . . ."
w
4,1414L: 'Oratio pauperis cum anxius fuerit. . . ." This summary is the
traditional one for this psalm.
28
According to VOGELSANG'S chronology, p. 40 in the work cited above, n.14.
50
4,141.4f.: "Oratio pauperis populi ante adventum Christi, cum anxius fuerit.
. . ." (The italicized words belong to the early, printed text; the rest is the later
gloss.) Luther makes a similar adjustment in his approach to Ps. 122, where the
printed summary reads: "Oratio fidelis populi ad Deum pro opprobrio divitum et
superborum" (4,407.19), and the later marginal gloss adds: "Est autem iterum
petitio adventus Christi in carnem" {ibid. 32).
80
4,141.18-21: "Et est oratio populi fidelis adventum Christi postulantis, qualis
fuit tempore Herodis, quando et secundum carnem ab eo vexabatur, et simul per
scribas, legis corruptores, multo peius vastabatur in vera intelligentia spirituali."
81
4,141.25-27: "Tropologice autem est oratio pro adventu spirituali Christi,
quando anima a demonibus oppressa viciis, etiam foris in carne a mundo vexatur."
82
4,141.27-30: "Sic erit et circa finem mundi in adventu secundo . . . ut tunc
exurgere postuletur dominus Ihesus et misereatur Zion, maxime tempore Anti-
christ!. . . ."
 LUTHER: O.T. PROMISSIO 153
Christ, rather than being the "prophetic-literal" sense, i.e.,
the point of departure for a "spiritual" exegesis, is instead the
goal or telos of the whole exegesis. And the applicatio now
springs not from our likeness to Christ, but from our likeness to
the Old Testament speaker, with whom we share the anticipation
of the Coming One.
Psalm I2Ç. — This is treated by Luther as a penitential psalm
without the introduction of Christ as the speaker.33 Like Ps. ιοί,
it is again a petitio for the coming of Christ in flesh,34 and there­
fore of the Old Testament people for redemption from sins.
"But," adds Luther, "because everyone who is in sin is still
under the law, therefore moraliter this is a prayer for any sins." 3 δ
Thus, again, a petitio is made prior to, and for, Christ's advent.
And although the psalmist is viewed as a "prophet" who sees
the redemption already accomplished in Christ, nevertheless the
hermeneutical standpoint, and the point of contact for theological
interpretation, is taken from the Old Testament, pre-advent
situation.
Secondly, and also revealing, is the analogy drawn here be­
tween the Old Testament man "sub lege" and the Christian man
"in peccato." Luther has again detected something in the situa­
tion of the Israelite which is relevant to his own religious situa­
tion. For the Old Testament believer to be under the law and
asking for Christ is the same as for the Christian to be in sin
and asking forgiveness.
Psalm 142. — The same new approach appears here, indicating
a real shift from the earlier hermeneutical perspective. We find
this striking gloss on the printed title ("A Psalm of David") :
This psalm in the spirit and in the prophetic sense is the voice of
the people of the faithful synagogue . . . anxiously seeking the
advent of Christ in the flesh. . . . 3 e
88
4,418.20: "Petitio veniae pro peccatis . . . in persona populi fidelis."
84
4,418.35-37.
85
4,418.35-419.18: "Est autem expressa petitio redemptionis populi a peccatis.
. . . Ideo primo intelligitur de redemptione per Christum facta toti generi humano.
Sed quia omnis, qui est in peccato, est adhuc sub lege, ideo moraliter est oratio
pro quibuscunque peccatis."
88
4,443.18-21: "Iste psalmus in spiritu et prophetico sensu est vox populi
fidelis synagoge . . . petentis . . . anxie Christi adventum in carnem. . . ." (Italics
mine).
 1S4 HARVARD THEOLOGICAL REVIEW
This approach, Luther adds with apparent satisfaction, makes
understanding the psalm "easy."37
Again, another parallel has appeared between the Old and
New Testament people: the signal of this is "the faithful
synagogue," a speaker which appears with increasing frequency
in the latter portion of Luther's Dictata.38 The "faithful syna-
gogue," the corporate people of God, await and pray for the
advent of Christ; together with them, and in like fashion,
Christians also send their prayers toward God "in the union and
communion of the saints." 39 This, Luther says, is how to under-
stand the psalm "moraliter" This moral application also includes
the individual who "ardently desires grace" in the face of
temptation.40
What, in summary, does this sketch suggest?
i. In the course of these lectures, there is a noticeable shift
in the basic material for exegesis — in the text, or "literal sense"
— from Christ and the church (i.e., from the New Testament)
to the Old Testament, pre-advent situation, especially as a situa-
tion of petition for and expectation of the future.
2. We are told in the preface material that the "literal" — the
true and proper — sense of all the psalms is the "prophetic"
one.41 But if we now compare Ps. 50 with Ps. 142, we see a
fundamental change in the meaning of "prophetic." In the
former psalm, David's word is prophetic because he speaks "in
87
4,443.2if.: ". . . et sic facilis est psalmus intellectu." Easier, certainly, than
the intellectus described above, n.19.
88
Luther seems to have introduced the term to distinguish his meaning from
the traditional "populus fidelis," which simply referred to the Church. For
Luther's use of "faithful synagogue," cf. 4,78.34; 301.19Î 346.15; 349-37Î 364-28;
373-26; 399.24; 407.29; 443.19. I checked the text of nine medieval psalms-com-
mentaries against five places in which Luther uses this designation, "faithful syna-
gogue," and found no occurrence of it. It therefore appears to be an important
innovation on Luther's part.
89
4,443.26-2 9: "Et nota, quod moraliter hune et omnes psalmos orare debes
tanquam cum omnibus fidelibus devote orantibus eundem, ut seil, optes cum illis
tuam quoque coram deo orationem venire et sic in unione et communione sanc-
torum." (Italics mine).
40
4,443.22-26: ". . . quia ecclesia ipsum députât pro poenitentibus, ideo moral-
iter intelligitur de adventu Christi in animam spirituali per gratiam. . . . Igitur
pone nominen, qui exemplum martyrum intuens et sanctos preteriti temporis,
pressus confusione nimis ardenter desideret gratiam."
41
See above, n.6.
 LUTHER: O.T. PROMISSIO 155
42
the person of the Church," or as "part of the Church." But in
Ps. 142, the "prophetic" speaker is the "faithful synagogue"
awaiting Christ's first advent; the voice of the Old Testament
people, speaking as themselves, is heard.
But this comes much closer to what we would understand as
"historical" exegesis. And hence a quite radical change in her-
meneutical assumptions has taken place, when we recall that,
in his Preface, Luther (in the tradition of Faber Stapulensis)
had set a qualitative opposition between "prophetic" and
"historical" interpretation. The question is: has this opposition
collapsed? And if it has collapsed, the hermeneutical nexus of
Christ-faith has been undermined; there is something crucial
about Old Testament faith which has caught Luther's theological
interest.
3. As the speaker of the Psalms changes (from Christ to the
"faithful synagogue," for example), so does the applicatio. In
the earlier exegesis, there was an identification of Christ and
Christian believer over against the generally "carnal" Israelite,
who either did not appear at all on the horizon of interpretation,
or else (as in Ps. 50) prophesied and theologized as an on-the-
scene New Testament theologian, and hence as a radically
"special person" elevated in prophetic isolation from among his
contemporaries.43 In the later exegesis, by contrast, there is a
communion of the whole people of God — the "communio sanc-
torum"— in their expectation and petition for Christ, and an
accompanying tendency to broaden the Old Testament speaker
to include, as it were, a "faithful remnant."44 At first, the
penitent was instructed to identify himself with the vicariously
penitent Christ, in word and in affectu (Ps. 37); later, he is to
42
See above, n.25. This was consistent with the meaning of "prophetic" in
Luther's preface.
48
We borrow the term "special person" from BONAVENTURA, who distinguishes
such persons from the ordinary Israelites. The former understood the Law "spiri-
tually," so that for them it agreed with the Gospel (III Sent, d.40 q.i and q.2
concl.2). H. A. OBERMAN has suggested the term "exegetical mysticism" for this
medieval view of prophecy, which he finds represented clearly in James Perez of
Valencia; see OBERMAN, "Simul Gemitus et Raptus": Luther und die Mystik (paper
read before the 3d International Congress for Luther Research, Järvenpää, Finland,
Aug. 11-16, 1966; mimeographed and to be published), the text around n.89.
"Luther introduces the idea of the remnant (reliquie) at 4,346.23f. and
408.24-29.
156 HARVARD THEOLOGICAL REVIEW
identify himself with the petitioner of the "faithful synagogue"
in his (real!) sin, temptation and expectation (as in Ps. 142).
4. Finally, a structural schema of multiple exegesis appears
at Ps. 101 which is quite different from the traditional fourfold
sense (literal or historical, allegorical, tropological and ana-
gogical). Luther's scheme is built on three comings of Christ —
in flesh, in the soul and eschatologically. The common goal (and
therefore the ultimate res) of the exegesis is always Christ's
advent.
The fourfold scheme, by contrast, is conceived in such a way
that the historical Christ-event — the res and Veritas of the Old
Testament signa and figurae — in turn itself becomes a signum
of Church and sacraments (allegory), of individual Christian
life (tropology) and of the visto dei (anagoge). Luther, in say-
ing that Christ, tropologically, is faith, was thus not yet making
any fundamental change in this hermeneutical structure.
Nor was it difficult for him (and others before him) simply
to eliminate the Old Testament text from theological considera-
tion, on grounds that Christ was its Veritas anyway, and to
assert that Christ is already the sensus literalis of the Psalms.
Now, in the "three-advent" scheme introduced in Ps. 101,
the Old Testament plays a quite different role. It can still be
said that Christ is its Veritas — but something entirely different
is now meant: not that the Old Testament words in some hidden,
mystical way are advance descriptions and even the very words
of the historical Jesus, but that the Old Testament words — as
"old" — promise, pray for, point to the Christ who is not yet
here.
As a time of expectation and petition for God's future redemp-
tive deed, the Old Testament is being brought into a real histori-
cal (rather than merely an interpretive) relation to the New
Testament; its own history, witness and faith are becoming
relevant for Christian interpretation, because Christ remains as
one whose real coming is still anticipated.

IV
In Ps. 101, we have seen a scheme of multiple exegesis which
is different from the old fourfold method. We now turn to an-
 LUTHER: O.T. PROMISSIO 157
other place in the later part of Luther's Dictata where such a
scheme is programmatically laid out and where, for the first time,
it is explicitly anchored on a dual foundation: promise and
advent.45
The text is Luther's scholium on Ps. 113:1: "Not to us, Lord,
not to us, but to your name give glory."46 Luther interprets
this text in terms of three advents of Christ, and grounds each
of them in a specific biblical promise. The following quotations
will make the overall pattern clear:
Just as the advent of Christ in the flesh has been given out of the
sheer mercy of the promising God . . . still, it is necessary that there
be preparation and a disposition to receive him, as was done in the
whole Old Testament through the line of Christ. Now, it was mercy
that God promised his son, but it was his truth and fidelity that he
presented him, as in the last chapter of Micah: "He will give truth
to Jacob, and mercy to Abraham." 47
So also the spiritual advent comes through grace, and the future
[advent] through glory . . . out of the sheer promise of the merci-
ful God. For he promises as follows for the spiritual advent: "Ask

"The spiritual advent of Christ is an important theme in the preaching of

Bernard of Clairvaux, for whom Luther retained the utmost respect. See
BERNARD'S seven sermons In adventu Domini (PL 183,35-56). Bernard grounds
the spiritual advent in election on the one hand, and on the requirement of prae-
paratio in humüitate on the other. Thus, "médius [adventus] occultus est, in quo
soli eum in seipsis vident electi" (Serm. 5 n.i; PL 183,50 D) ; cf. ibid, n.3; 51 D:
". . . Christum Dei Verbum recipiant singuli electorum." The only references to
the promise in these sermons pertain to the eschatological advent (Serm. 4 nn.i
and 5). Jn. 14:23 is the basic text which Bernard uses to instruct his hearers in
preparation, which Bernard describes as follows: "Diligit enim animam quae in
conspectu ejus, et sine intermissione, considérât, et sine simulatione dijudicat
semetipsam. Idque judicium nonnisi propter nos a nobis exigit, quia si nosmetipsos
judicaverimus, non utique judicabimur" (Serm. 3 n.7; 47 A f.).
46
4,261.250. The text: "Non nobis, domine, non nobis, sed nomini tuo da
gloriam." Luther's famous scholion on this passage is of critical importance for
understanding the relation of Luther to the nominalist tradition regarding the
question of meritum de congruo, to which Luther here refers favorably: cf. OBER-
MAN, "Facientibus quod in se est Deus non denegat gratiam." Robert Holcot, O.P.
and the Beginnings of Luther's Theology, HTR 55 (1962), 317-42, esp. 337ft. Here,
we treat only the hermeneutical implications.
47
4,261.25-31: "Sicut adventus Christi in carnem ex mera misericordia dei
promittentis datus, . . . nihilominus tarnen preparationem et dispositionem opor-
tuit fieri ad eum suscipiendum, sicut factum est in toto veteri testamento per
lineam Christi. Nam quod promisit deus fìlium suum, fuit misericordia, quod
autem exhibuit, fuit Veritas et fidelitas eius, sicut Miche ultimo [7:20]: 'dabis
veritatem Iacob et misericordiam Abraam. . . / "
158 HARVARD THEOLOGICAL REVIEW
and you shall receive, seek and you shall find, knock and it shall be
opened to you. . . ." 48
And so for the future advent he promises, "that we may live justly
and soberly and piously in this age, expecting a blessed hope." 49
Finally, summing up, Luther writes:
Hence, just as the law was afigureand preparation of the people for
receiving Christ, so our doing what is in us {factio quantum in nobis
est) disposes us to grace. And the whole time of grace is preparation
for future glory and the second advent.50
The following characteristics of this comprehensive scheme
are noteworthy:
i. The text is interpreted "christologically," but in a way to-
tally different from what we found in Luther's Preface and in
the early penitential psalms, whereby the text is "literally" about
Christ already present, or even Christ himself speaking. Here,
Christ is the one who is promised and awaited, so that in all
times, God's word to his people is the promise: God comes to
man in Christ, and faith in clinging to that word.
2. Furthermore, Christ in this schema does not fall into line
with other historical events as the sign of something else (e.g.,
of our humility or penitence), as in the earlier exegesis; rather,
he is the goal, the One toward whose coming the text always
points, because He is the One to whom history always points as
its end and goal. This fits with Luther's notion that Christ pre-
eminently and ultimately "is," while we and all else only
"signify."51 Christ is the "finis omnium et res significata
[rather than significans] per omnes res."52 This could not be
48
4,261.39-262.3: "Ita et spirituale adventus est per gratiam et futurus per
gloriam . . . ex mera promissione miserentis dei. Promisit enim pro spirituali
adventu sic: 'petite et accipietis, quaerite et invenietis, pulsate et aperietur vobis.
. . . ' " [ M t . 7:7].
49
4,262.71.: "Sic pro adventu futuro promisit, 'ut juste et sobrie et pie vivamus
in hoc seculo, expectantes beatam spem. ' " [Tit. 2:121.].
50
4,262.13-16: "Unde sicut lex figura fuit et preparatio populi ad Christum
suscipiendum, ita nostra factio quantum in nobis est, disponit nos ad gratiam.
Atque totum tempus gratie preparatio est ad futuram gloriam et adventum secun-
dum."
61
3 J368.2 2-24: "Christus est finis omnium et centrum, in quem omnia respiciunt
et monstrant, ac si dicerent: Ecce iste est, qui est; nos autem non sumus, sed
significamus tantum."
62
3,375.32f.
 LUTHER: O.T. PROMISSIO 159
true either in the traditional fourfold exegesis or in Luther's
earlier method, whereby Christ, tropologically, is ( = signifies)
our faith, humility, obedience, etc. We have, I think, located
one of the points at which the traditional hermeneutical assump­
tions are breaking down: at a later time, long after he had
rejected the fourfold hermeneutic altogether, Luther recalls
that he came to some understanding of Christ once he under­
stood that "allegory" was not what Christ signifies, but what
He is.5S
3. Attention has been turned now to finding some Old Testa­
ment warrant for "christological" interpretation. In his preface,
Luther had simply imported the New Testament for that purpose,
arguing that if the Old Testament could be understood in some
nonchristological way, then Christ died in vain.54 The logic
there was that what had already happened in Christ justified
reading the Old Testament as "literally" about him. It was not
necessary for the interpreter to think himself into a pre-advent
situation, since the "prophet" himself did not really belong to
that situation, or speak to it, when he spoke.
By contrast, the present promise-advent scheme needs some
textual support within the Old Testament itself, since the inter­
preter has now placed himself (and the Old Testament author)
in a pre-advent situation, in which one can be related to Christ
only as a future, promised thing. Thus, we find Luther arguing
in different fashion: because unfulfilled promises remain out­
standing in the Old Testament, we are allowed — indeed, "com­
55
pelled"— to find their fulfillment in the New Testament;
otherwise, the faith of Israel would have proved to be in vain.
4. Whereas in the tropological exegesis (which presupposes
Christ as the literal sense of the text) attention is invited to the
identity of Christ and the believer (in imitatio Christi, e.g.,
58
WA TR 1,136.15-17 (1532): "Per epistolam ad Romanos veni ad cognitionem
aliquam Christi. Ibi videbam allegorias non esse, quid Christus significarci, sed
quid Christus esset," cited by Κ. BAUER, Die Wittenberger Universitätstheologie
und die Anfänge der deutschen Reformation (Tübingen, 1928), 23.
64
SS/1,6.26-28.
55
4,408.24-26: "Omnis Scriptura prophetarum primo de Apostolis intelligitur,
quia sic cogit promissio dei, qui promisit populum Israel exaltare super omnes
gentes. . . ."
160 HARVARD THEOLOGICAL REVIEW
obedience and humility,56 or — to use a favorite expression of
Regin Prenter and others57 — in conformitas Christi, wherein
God conforms us to Christ), now the identity between the Old
Testament faithful and us comes into focus: all live expectantly
under the promises of Christ's coming. And all are threatened
and tempted to despair of his coming.
This shift is theologically significant because Luther is now
free to develop a notion of faith as expectation, trust and hope
in the sheer promising Word — now that the Old Testament peo-
ple have become his model, rather than Christ, who, according
to the medieval tradition, does not have either faith or hope.58
In a surprising way, the faith of the Old Testament people
begins to emerge as a model for Christian faith. The Old Testa-
ment struggle against desperatio, in face of all the contraria of
Israel's historical existence, is taking on fundamental religious
significance for Luther's own faith and theology as a Christian.59
His understanding of the Church is also being affected: it is not
yet what it will be, but, like the "faithful synagogue," should
function in the world as a testimony and promise of the future
which God will bring.60
58
Cf. 3,i55.2of.: ". . . incarnatio tropologice sumpta . . . est nihil aliud nisi
obedientia in opere, sicut divinitas in carne." For humility, see 3,171.221.
'"Spiritus Creator, tr. J. M. Jensen (Philadelphia, 1953), 9 ~ " et passim. Schol-
ars who view Luther's use of tropologica! interpretation as the gateway to the
reformation doctrine of justification are anxious to show the radical difference
between conformitas and the "medieval" idea of imitatio. Cf. also VOGELSANG,
p. 86 of the work cited above, n.io. It seems to me, however, that conformitas
is simply imitatio purged of Pelagian tendencies; rather than our actively imitating
Christ, God "imitates" his action in Christ by doing the same to us. This requires
no change in hermeneutical principles. BERNHARD LOHSE'S observation, regarding
the influence of Augustine on Luther already in the Dictata, is relevant to my
point: "Bei Augustin konnte Luther . . . manches über die Bedeutung Jesu Christi
als des Exempels des göttlichen Gnadenwirkens lernen" (Die Bedeutung Augustine
für den jungen Luther, Kerygma und Dogma 11 [1965], 133).
58
Cf. THOMAS AQUINAS, Summa Theologiae III q.7 a.3 and 4. As one who in
his divinity is a comprehensor, Christ is not a mere viator; he has the fullness of
grace and love, but not fides or spes.
59
There is insufficient space to elaborate on this claim here, but see, e.g., 4,399.-
30-400.5, in the course of which Luther says that every Christian striving to make
spiritual progress ought to think and speak "as if (ac si) he were in the syna-
gogue," as long as he has not yet received all God's promises.
80
E.g., 4,402.19-403.22.
 LUTHER: O.T. PROMISSIO 161

V
The foregoing should suffice to raise serious questions regard-
ing the current interpretation of the young Luther. It must be
asked: can one give an adequate account of "the new herme-
neutic" without investigating the emergence of the Old Testa-
ment as the real subject-matter of the exegesis, as this occurs
in the later Dictata? Furthermore, can the centrality of "Word"
and "faith" — along with "Christ" — in Luther's later theology
be explained as a smooth outgrowth of a hermeneutical nexus
\ i n which Christ tropologically signifies faith? The answer to
both of these questions is, I think, "no." One must turn to the
development of the notion of the word of promise (an Old Testa-
ment word), and to the kind of faith it engenders (Old Testament
faith) ; there lie crucial but so far unexamined clues to what is
later "lo^ emerge as "reformation theology."
 ^ s
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