ABSTRACT
In the spring of 1515 Staupitz had once again been in the north of Germany visiting his mother in Dabrun, near Wittenberg, where his family owned land. From Dabrun he went to visit the friary at Wittenberg and from there accompanied the leading friars of the Order to Gotha for the chapter meeting of the reformed Augustinians from 29 April to 1 May 1515. Besler came from Nuremberg, Lang and Luther from Wittenberg. The friary at Gotha had been in existence since 1258, when the friars took over the building from the Cistercian nuns. Staupitz’s humanist friend Mutianus who lived at Gotha was apparently present, at least occasionally, at their sessions. Staupitz, who was now in his fifth term as vicar general of the Reformed Congregation, presided, although he let Luther preach the solemn ceremonial sermon at the opening session before the assembled priors and select members of the Order. According to Chapter 32 of their Order’s statutes which Staupitz had printed in Nuremberg in 1504, a sermon was to be preached on the first full day of the chapter meeting, after the morning Mass with the invocation of the Holy Spirit, and before any elections took place. Probably in consultation with Staupitz, Luther based his sermon on Chapter 44 of the constitutions of the reformed friars in which the sin of detraction was designated as diabolic; and thus dutifully scolded the vice of detraction. However, in his zeal Luther went overboard with his extreme acerbity and use of scatological language: ‘A backbiter does nothing but chew with his teeth the excrements of other people and sniff at their filth like a swine. Thus, human faeces becomes the greatest pollutant, topped only by the devil’s shit [Teuffels Dreck]’.1 The chief backbiter is the devil himself whose name Luther referred to in humanist fashion in the three sacred languages: satan in Hebrew, diabolos in
1 On Luther’s ‘election sermon’, as Oberman calls it, and on the Order’s constitutions, see H.A. Oberman, ‘Teufelsdreck: Eschatology and Scatology in the “Old” Luther’, SCJ, 19 (1988), p. 442; reprinted in H.A. Oberman, The Impact of the Reformation (Grand Rapids, MI, 1994), pp. 51-68. Oberman was able to use unpublished material in preparation for vol. 5 of the critical edition of Staupitz’s works, ‘in press’ in 1988 (see his n. 21), but which
did not appear until 2001. For Luther’s elaborate use of (pseudo?)-Bernardine material in
his sermon, see WA 1. 49, 38ff.; T. Bell, Divus Bernhardus; Bernard von Clairvaux in
Greek, and detractor in Latin. Luther had apparently spoken to Staupitz’s satisfaction; the latter had suffered under recent attacks from the extremists among the reformed friars. While Luther’s sermon was perceived as ‘sharp’, probably in the sense of ‘aggressive’, Staupitz himself was perceived as irenic according to Mutianus who spoke of him as the ‘most welcome peacemaker’.2 Luther’s sermon evidently had made an impression as he was subsequently elected as the district vicar for almost a dozen reformed friaries in the territory of Meissen and Thuringia, for a three-year term. Among the friaries were those of Erfurt and Wittenberg, where the Order’s study programmes were located, now also supervised by Luther. At the same meeting, a representative was to be chosen who would travel to the next general chapter meeting in Rome. It had been intended that Friar Nicholas Besler should be that man. He, however, adamantly refused because of the bad experience he had encountered several years before, when he was threatened with excommunication and imprisonment, while he had tried to do business there on behalf of his superior Staupitz in 1505/06 (see pp. 81-4). Instead, Besler was appointed district vicar of the reformed friaries in southern Germany. After the chapter meeting Staupitz had the honour of preaching to the general population on 3 May (Luther had preached only to the insiders, the friars). Unfortunately, Staupitz’s sermon is not extant.3
