Works of Martin Luther, with introductions and

notes/Volume 1/Translators' Note

< Works of Mart in Lut her, wit h int roduct ions and not es‎| Volume 1

TRANSLATORS' NOTE

The languages from which t he following t ranslat ions have been made are t he Lat in and t he German,
—t he Lat in of t he German Universit ies, t he German of t he people, and bot h dist inct ively Lut her's. In
t he Lat in t here is added t o t he imperfect ion of t he form, when measured by classical st andards, t he
difficult y of expressing in an old language t he new t hought s of t he Reformat ion. German was
regarded even by Gibbon, t wo hundred and fift y years lat er, as a barbarous idiom. Lut her, especially in
his earlier writ ings, st ruggled t o give form t o a language and t o express t he highest t hought s in it .
Where Lut her t hus st ruggled wit h t wo languages, it is evident t hat t hey have no easy t ask who
at t empt t o reproduce t he t wo in a t hird.

Modern Germans find it convenient t o read Lut her's German in a modernized t ext , somet imes rat her
hast ily and uncrit ically const ruct ed, and alt oget her unsafe as a basis for t ranslat ion. Where t he
Germans have had t o modify, a t ranslat or meet s double difficult ies. It may be puzzling for him t o
know Lut her's exact meaning; it is even more puzzling t o find t he exact English equivalent .

In order t o overcome t hese difficult ies, in part at least , and present a t ranslat ion bot h accurat e and
readable, t he present group of t ranslat ors have not simply dist ribut ed t he work among t hemselves,
but have t oget her revised each t ranslat ion as it was made. The original t ranslat or, at a meet ing of
t he group, has submit t ed his work t o t he rest for crit icism and correct ion, amount ing at t imes t o
ret ranslat ion. No doubt ful point , whet her in sense or in sound, has been passed by unchallenged.

Even wit h such care, t he t ranslat ion is not perfect . In places a variant reading is possible, a variant
int erpret at ion plausible. We can only claim t hat an honest effort has been made t o be bot h accurat e
and clear, and submit t he result of our labors t o a fair and scholarly crit icism. Crit ics can hardly be
more severe t han we have been t o one anot her. If t hey find errors, it may be t hat we have seen
t hem, and preferred t he seeming error t o t he suggest ed correct ion; if not , we can accept crit icism
from ot hers as gracefully as from each ot her.
The sources from which our t ranslat ions have been made are t he best t ext s available in each case.
In general, t hese are found in t he W e ima r E d it io n (D . M a r t in L ut he r s W e r k e . K r it is c he
Ge s a mmt a us g a b e . Weimar. Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger, 1883 ff.), so far as t his is complet ed.
A more complet e and fairly sat isfact ory edit ion is t hat known as t he E r l a ng e n E d it io n, in which
t he German and Lat in works are published in separat e series, 1826 ff. The t ext of t he B e r l in
E d it io n (L ut he r s W e r k e , he r a us g e g e b e n v o n P f a r r e r D . D r. Buchwald, et c., Berlin, C.
A. Schwet schke und Sohn, t hird edit ion, 1905, t en volumes) is modernized, and where it has been
used it has been carefully compared wit h t he more crit ical t ext s. The t wo edit ions of Walch—t he
original, published 1740–1753, in t went y-four volumes, at Halle, and t he modern edit ion, known as
t he St . L o uis , Mo., edit ion, 1880 ff.—are ent irely German, and somewhat modernized. For our
purpose t hey could be used only as helps in t he int erpret at ion, and not as st andard t ext s for
t ranslat ion. A very convenient and sat isfact ory crit ical t ext of select ed t reat ises is t o be found in
Otto Clemen, L ut he r s W e r k e in A us w a hl , Bonn, 4 vols., of which t wo volumes appeared in
1912.
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This work is a t ranslat ion and has a separat e copyright st at us t o t he applicable copyright
prot ect ions of t he original cont ent .

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