Reforming the Art of Dying by Austra Reinis

Author:Austra Reinis [Reinis, Austra]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, General
ISBN: 9781351905718
Google: pKqoDQAAQBAJ
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2016-12-05T16:19:46+00:00

Euangelisch lere vnd vermanung / eines sterbenden menschen … [1523]

When you are lying on your deathbed, the devil will assault your faith, or will send to you messengers from the Pope, in order that they turn you from holy scripture to human laws, teachings and superstitions. [This they will do] in the name of the holy Christian church, of whom they are truly enemies.1

The Euangelisch lere, published by Wolffgang Stoeckel in Leipzig in 1523, advises the dying Lutheran how to speak to the priest who has come to hear his confession and to administer last rites. What circumstances might have led a Lutheran to call for a priest? Leipzig in June and July of 1519 had witnessed the first public debate over the Reformation, in which Johannes Eck, Andreas Bodenstein von Karlstadt and Martin Luther had participated. The evangelical movement began to gain ground, especially among merchants and artisans. In the Johanniskirche Stephan Schonbach and Sebastian Froschel began preaching in 1522 and 1523, respectively. Andreas Bodenschatz preached at the Cistercian convent of St George in 1523–24.2 At the same time, the university and clergy remained loyal to Rome, as did the territorial ruler, Duke George the Bearded. In 1522 the latter prohibited the printing and sale of Luther’s writings in Leipzig and in 1523 he expelled the evangelical preacher Sebastian Froschel.3 Notwithstanding such measures, Lutheran sentiment in Leipzig remained strong.4 As the entries under 1522 and 1523 in Helmut Claus’ bibliography of Leipzig publications demonstrate, printers continued to print books by Luther and his supporters.5

The Euangelisch lere is a publication belonging to this period. It suggests that at least some Lutherans may have wished to spare their families the shame associated with having a relative buried as a heretic in unconsecrated ground. Craig Koslofsky reports that beginning in the late 1520s Leipzigers who sympathized with the Reformation began to refuse deathbed communion, final confession and extreme unction. On 24 August 1529 Duke George responded by ordering that the provost and the council should ‘not permit . burial among the gathering of the faithful of any persons who died without the sacraments’.6

The pamphlet Euangelisch lere suggests that the threat of being refused a decent burial on account of one’s evangelical convictions may have existed from the very beginning of the Lutheran movement. If this was the case, then a desire for honourable burial on the part of at least some Lutherans would likely have led this author to propose that a Lutheran might request the traditional last rites, providing that in his heart he interpreted these rites in a Lutheran way.

Instruction in the Lutheran way of understanding last rites is the principal purpose of the Euangelisch lere. Nevertheless, the pamphlet seems to have a secondary, broader purpose as well: to teach Lutherans how to live according to their evangelical convictions while avoiding confrontation and harassment by hostile authorities. This secondary purpose is evident in several rubrics which do not expressly speak to the deathbed situation, among them ‘When there is a feast day’ and ‘On Sundays’.

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