Master Philipp's Legacy

Philipp Melanchthon (1497-1560) was Luther's right hand man from 1519, when he first came to Wittenberg to teach Greek and the Classics, until Luther's death in 1546. Melanchthon was the son of an armorer born February 16th 1497 in Bretten, which is now in the German state of Baden but was the then in the Electoral Palatine. His father Georg Schwartzerdt had moved from Heidelberg to Bretten some years earlier, but he was to die when Philipp was only 11. He sent to live in Pforzheim, with a distant relative, Elisabeth Reuter, the sister of the Humanist Johannes Reuchlin. At some point, Melanchthon, like many a classicist of that era, Hellenized his name from Schwartzerdt to its Greek equivalent, thus acquiring his familiar handle. From the grammar school at Pforzheim, Melanchthon went to Tübingen University, then, on the recommendation of Reuchlin, he was appointed to the chair of Greek at Wittenberg. This was a relatively new University in Electoral Saxony that had opened in 1504 whose star Professor was an up-and-coming Biblical theologian, Martin Luther, who was having a bit of a spat with the Dominicans, and the Pope over indulgences.

Luther and Melanchthon soon became friends as well as colleagues, and after the Heidelberg Disputation of 1519 they worked together on promoting the Protestant Reformation. Luther was the ideas man - boisterous, outspoken, and argumentative - whilst Melanchthon was irenic, logical, and organized who came along gave order to Luther's ideas. The first major fruit of their collaboration was the "Loci Communes" of 1521, the first Protestant systematic theology. This was subsequently revised several times, with the 1535 edition being dedicated to Henry VIII of England and becoming the first Protestant textbook to be used at Cambridge University, as well as deeply influencing a later English monarch, Elizabeth I, who memorized large chunks of it as part of her education.

Despite his theological involvement, Melanchthon never became a member of the theological faculty at Wittenberg, and was not ordained. His marriage to Katherina Krapp in 1520 made him part of the burgher elite in that small city. Melanchthon's status as a layman, and his friendships with the Elector and other influential figures gave him a measure of protection from punitive action by hostile princes, and this enabled him to represent the Lutheran cause at Augsburg, whilst Luther, who was under the Imperial bann, had to wait for news nearby. He both wrote and presented the original version of the Augsburg Confession, and also wrote the Apology (Defense) for the Augsburg Confession to answer the Roman Catholic rebuttal of the Confession.

Melanchthon also had an influence in shaping the English Reformation. When representatives of the Church of England met with the Saxon Evangelicals is 1536, the result was the creation of the Wittenberg Articles of 1536. These, and the Thirteen Articles that followed in 1539, very much bear the stamp of Melanchthon's theology, and they set in chain the line of development that culminated in the Thirty-nine Articles of the Church of England. Melanchthon also had a hand in the development of Reformed theology in that he worked with Martin Bucer (1491-1551) to produce the Wittenberg Concord which tried to bridge the gap between Lutheran and Reformed on the doctrine of the Lord's Supper, and produced the 'real, spiritual presence' understanding of the Lord's Supper that was to become characteristic of German Reformed theology, and of Calvinism. He was frequently called in as the theological consultant, and had lengthy correspondences with such Reformed figures as Heinrich Bullinger, John Calvin, and Thomas Cranmer.

At the end of the 1530s, he made some amendments to the Augsburg Confession (the so-called "Variata") in the hopes of producing a unified Protestant Confession - an action that was roundly criticized after his death by the Gneiso-Lutherans. The Variata was widely accepted in its own time, and in many of the debates of the 1540s and the 1550s it was this text and not the Unaltered Augsburg Confession of 1530 that formed the basis of the Lutheran case. Melanchthon also continued teaching Classics, and refining the Loci Communes, but on the whole the early 1540s seem to have been a time when he stepped back from theological debate. On the other hand, he did become involved with the practicalities of Reform thanks to the short-lived Reformation in Köln, where Archbishop Hermann von Weid was trying to reform his diocese. Here he again worked with Martin Bucer (1491-1551,) to produce a draft Church Order called "A Simple and Pious Consultation" which contained not just the form of service but also the regulations by which the reformed diocese was to be administered. Although the Reformation did not stick in Köln, with von Weid being deposed by the Emperor in 1546, the 'Consultation' was translated into English, and formed one of the source texts for the first (Anglican) Book of Common Prayer published in 1549. It also reemerged in the 19th century as one of the sources for various Lutheran Orders, and for the (German) Reformed Church in the United States' 'Mercersburg Liturgy.'

The last thirteen years of Melanchthon's life were clouded by controversy. This started when he tried to take a mediating position over the Augsburg Interim of 1547, which was imposed after the defeat of the Protestant League of Schmalkald. He maintained that it was legitimate to accept some Roman Catholic ceremonies provided the core doctrine of Justification by Grace through Faith could be maintained. Although this first interim was soon replaced with that of Leipzig, his preparedness to compromise had cost him a lot of political capital. Old friends such as Johannes Brenz began to oppose some of his theological positions, and an internal dispute arose among the German Evangelical between the Philippists, and the Gneiso-Lutherans which was to last long after Melanchthon's death in April 1560.

One bright spot in Melanchthon last decade was a bright young pupil called Zacharias Baer, who like his teacher soon Hellenized his name to Ursinus. He was a great favourite of Melanchthon's and lived with him for seven years whilst he studied at the University of Wittenberg. The relationship only ended with the older man's death, and Melanchthon's memory was always golden to Ursinus. After Melanchthon's death, Ursinus moved first to Breslau, then to Zurich where he studied under Bullinger, and finally to Heidelberg where he produced both the famous catechism, and a commentary which, in its opening chapter references his teacher's 'Loci Communes.' Although thought of today as a Reformed document, the Heidelberg Catechism was intended as a commentary on the Augsburg Variata, and owes a define debt to his master Melanchthon as well as Jan Laski and Bullinger. Ursinus' Catechism also reached England where it supplemented the official, but clumsy Nowell Catechism from the 1570s until the English Commonwealth in the 1650s, and was a compulsory text at Oxford University for many years.

In a career that stretched forty years Melanchthon influenced the three major Reformation traditions - Lutheran, Anglican, and Reformed traditions. Sadly, his unifying influence was not sufficient to overcome the centrifugal tendencies of mid-1500s debate. As a reconciler and a promoter of peace, Melanchthon's spirit was often appealed to by the Anglican High Churchmen and Latitudinarian of the 1600s, and he was something of a 'patron saint' to the Unionists and Evangelisch of the 1800s, so much so that many an 'Evangelisch' church in the nineteenth century had the twin portraits of Luther and Melanchthon plaster up on the Sunday School wall. +PDR