Collected Works of Martin Luther

by Martin Luther

  I would that I could handle the text now before us in a manner becoming its depth and dignity, for it embraces all that is glorious in the whole Scripture, containing in it the curse of God on Satan and the destruction of the seed of the serpent by the seed of the woman. The former part of the text is wholly figurative. God speaks to the serpent, but it is manifest that the serpent alone is not here to be understood as addressed by God. For these are not the words of God as a Creator, as were those words above, when he said unto the beasts of the earth, “Be fruitful and multiply;” nor when he said to the earth itself, “Let the earth bring forth grass, and herbs, and trees, yielding seed after their kind.” They are words of divine threatening and a declaration of mind and will, such words as God never speaks to an irrational creature, but to an intelligent creature only.

  God does indeed address the “serpent” by name, but he is all the while especially speaking to Satan, who ruled in the serpent, and by the serpent deceived the first parents of mankind. Nevertheless as, on account of the sin of man, the lord of the whole creation, all animals and all trees perished in the flood, just as the subjects of a nation are often punished on account of the misdeeds of their prince, so it befell the serpent. That animal also was punished because of the sin of the devil, who had abused the serpent in making use of it to work so mighty an evil as the sin of the fall. God however intends, figuratively, to be represented under this punishment of the serpent, the deluging punishment of Satan.

  The obscurity which lies in this figurative representation has been the reason why this text, which ought to be most clearly known and understood by all, has never to my knowledge been explained by any one with sufficient diligence and clearness. And I have often wondered what the fathers and the bishops could have been about, who, when occupied in the government of churches and in the condemnation of heretics, did not feel that they had a still more important duty to perform in devoting themselves with greater diligence to the explanation of such passages of the Scriptures as these. Such bishops and fathers possess nothing more than the name, for they may with more truth be called destroyers than watchmen or guardians of the churches. I am now speaking of those of our fathers and bishops who really excelled in holiness of life and doctrine. Even among these not one is found to have explained the text before us in any manner becoming its great dignity. Perhaps those various engagements which generally beset the rulers of churches too deeply involve them to leave them time for the purpose.

  The disgrace of our more recent divines is notorious. They have even shamefully corrupted this whole passage, and out of the neuter pronoun ipsum they have made the feminine, ipsa, which, with the most open wickedness, they have thus wrested, and have applied it to the Virgin Mary, “She shall bruise thy head,” verse 15. I can pardon Lyra, who was as it appears a good man, but he conceded too much to the authority of the fathers, and hence he suffered himself to be drawn aside by Augustine, to the most weak and foolish allegorizings, which system Gregory also follows in his “Morals,” maintaining that by the woman in this part of the sacred record ought to be understood the inferior power of reason, as by the man, the superior power of reason; and by her seed, the operation of good; but by the seed of the devil, his evil suggestions.

  But what need, I pray you, friendly reader, is there of all such darkness of the most absurd allegories in all this clear light of the truth? But grant that we might with any propriety divide reason into two qualities or powers, the superior and the inferior. With how much greater propriety may we term that the inferior power of reason which is adapted to the government of domestic and political affairs, and not that which is concerned in swine-like pleasure and gratification? calling that the superior power of reason by which we contemplate those things which are separate from economy or polity, and which pertain unto religion, the solemn things of the Word, in which we do nothing operatively, but only contemplate and learn? Although we thus speak upon these things what have they to do after all with the sacred text before us? Do they not altogether encumber and keep out of sight its real sense, and substitute a spurious sense in its stead, a sense which is not only useless but pernicious? For what can reason do or what light can it give in the divine matter of religion?

  There is also a further absurdity in this mode of interpretation, by which Eve is made to be the inferior power of reason. For it is perfectly evident that Eve was not inferior to her husband Adam in any sense whatever; that is, neither in body nor in soul. It is from this ridiculous mode of interpretation that all those profane disputations concerning free-will have arisen, and concerning the doctrine “that reason always prays for the best,” etc., until all theology is lost in philosophy and sophistical absurdities.

  Wherefore let us, casting away all such pernicious and absurd follies, enter upon a new road of interpretation, caring naught for having disregarded the footsteps of those who have gone before us. For we have the Holy Spirit as our guide, not setting before us in Moses a heap of absurd allegories, but teaching us through him the mightiest truths and the mightiest things which took place between God the Creator and man the sinner, and Satan the author of sin.

  First of all then let us settle it as a fact that the serpent here spoken of by God was a natural and real serpent, but a serpent besieged and occupied by Satan, who spoke through and by that serpent. Let us next consider it to be a truth, that those things which God spoke to the serpent are not to be understood as having been spoken to the serpent abstractedly as a brute animal, but that the person immediately spoken to was Satan, to whom God was all the while more expressly speaking. By this manner of interpretation, I am sure that I retain the plain and simple historical and literal meaning, and a meaning in accordance with the whole passage; by which meaning, as divinely intended, the serpent remains a serpent though occupied and possessed by Satan, the woman remains a woman, and Adam remains Adam, all which is proved by what follows in the sacred narrative. For it is not an inferior power of reason and a superior power of reason, who begat Cain and Abel, as recorded in the following chapter, but Adam and Eve, that is, the first parents of mankind, who fell by sin into death and became subject to the dominion of Satan.

  When therefore God says to the serpent, “Thou art cursed above all cattle and above every beast of the field, upon thy belly shalt thou go,” the divine meaning is not that which Augustine gives, and which his disciples follow. They understand that by “belly” is to be allegorically understood pride. But the divine mind in the passage is, that as Satan abused the serpent in effecting the sin of the fall, so the serpent is compelled of God to bear a part of the punishment of that sin and therefore is thus cursed above all cattle, that it might be the most hateful of all the beasts of the field. At the beginning of the creation it was not so; but now through the divine curse, such a nature has been imparted to the serpent, that the creature which before the curse was the most delightful and the sweetest of all creatures, is now hated and dreaded above every other animal of the creation. Hence we find by experience that we have a natural abhorrence of serpents, and that serpents as naturally dread and flee from us. Thus the serpent is indeed made to bear this curse as part of the punishment of sin.

  These words however are not spoken unto the serpent only, God is dealing all the time with Satan in the serpent. It is on Satan that this sentence is pronounced, as his final judgment. It is Satan that is here placed before God’s tribunal.

  For God here speaks to the serpent in far different language from that which he used toward Adam and Eve, when he called them back in love from their sin. His language then was, “Where art thou?” “Who told thee that thou wast naked?” All these particulars indicate the love of God towards the whole human race; showing forth that God will seek after man and will call him back after he has sinned, that he may reason with him and hear what he has to say. All this was a sure announcement of grace. For although these words of God, spoken to Adam and Eve, were legal and judicial words; yet they set before them a hope by no mean
s obscure, that they should not be condemned for ever.

  But with the serpent and Satan God by no means dealt so mercifully. He did not call Satan to him and say, “Why hast thou done this?” He pronounced upon him at once the sentence of judgment; and that too, in the most awful words, “Because thou hast done this.” As if he had said, Thou, Satan, hadst sinned before this and hadst been condemned, when thou didst fall from heaven; and now to that sin thou hast added this one. Thou hast by the abuse of the serpent hurled man into sin also. Therefore in the first place the serpent shall bear this punishment; that whereas before it partook of that blessing which all other beasts also enjoyed; now it alone shall remain under my curse.

  From all these circumstances it must follow as a manifest consequence, that the serpent before the sin of the fall was the most beautiful creature among the beasts which God had made, and most delightful to man; as are at this day kids, and lambs, and kittens to us, and also that it moved with its head erect; and moreover that it now creeps upon the ground is not a property of its original nature, but the consequence of the divine curse. Just in the same manner as they are the consequences of the curse, that the woman conceives in uncleanness, brings forth in sorrow, and nurses and trains her offspring with toils and griefs. Were there no curse the whole process of creation would be most pure and holy; the giving birth to children most easy and delightful, and the training up of children the highest pleasure. Sin therefore has not only utterly corrupted nature itself, but most basely defiled it.

  And yet the human reasoners even of our day dare to affirm that the original properties of nature have remained essentially sound and whole, even in devils. But if the serpent, which Satan had abused to effect the sin of the fall, bore such a punishment on account of that sin; that whereas before it was the most beautiful of all creatures, it now on a sudden crawled on the ground upon its belly and drew after it its viperous tail before the eyes of Adam, and thus all on a sudden became an object of hatred and of dread; how can we doubt that the same was the utterly changed case with the man, who was the very one who had committed the sin and had imbibed into his very nature the poison of Satan? As therefore the Egyptians beheld not without the greatest amazement the rod thrown down by Moses suddenly changed into a serpent, just so in paradise, immediately upon God’s uttering this word of the curse, the serpent was changed from a form the most beautiful into an object the most disgusting and revolting.

  And to this same curse pertains that which God moreover said, “And dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life.” The allegorists explain this, as meaning that Satan would render men given up to the love of earthly things one with himself by deceiving them. But as I have said, God is here speaking to the serpent as such and cursing the serpent, causing it to bear its punishment of the sin of the fall. For there are other beasts which also feed upon the earth, but the serpent eats the earth as its curse; that whereas before it had a certain peculiar gift of subtlety and of beauty, and of food also, which it enjoyed in common with man, it now bore as its punishment that the nature of its food was changed.

  It is the glory of sheep, of oxen and of other beasts, that they feed on herbs and even on the fruits of trees, and also that they produce various things useful for the food of man, such as butter, milk, their own flesh, etc. The serpent also possessed this glory of his feeding in common with the other beasts. But now he is cast out from this society, and as it were from this common table and common feasting on account of the sin of the fall, so that he is not permitted to feed upon even the most useless herb; nor on apples, or pears, or nuts, on which even the mice feed. These he dare not taste. He eats the crude earth only. These are not my words, but the words of Moses; and they teach us that the nature of the serpent is entirely changed and wholly different from what it originally was.

  And though I have said, and it is true, that it is to the serpent that God here speaks, and yet so speaks, that his words are directed all the time more expressly against Satan, as the following part of the narrative will still more plainly show; yet I am by no means satisfied that those things spoken, which rightly apply to the nature of the serpent, should be transferred allegorically, as intended to be spoken to Satan, like Augustine transfers them and is followed by Lyra. For the serpent and Satan were intimately connected in the sin of the fall, though Satan was the principal actor and the serpent only the instrument. And therefore it is that they are made alike partakers of the punishment. The serpent however bears a corporal punishment only. But for Satan, the author and agent of the whole, a different judgment is prepared, even that judgment concerning which Christ speaks, John 16:11, when he says, “Because the prince of this world is judged.” The description of this judgment will now shortly follow, as recorded by Moses in the succeeding verses.

  Wherefore when many say that the devil, like the serpent, no longer walks erect and that he has lost his original form and stature, the things they say are true; but they are quite inappropriate here and have nothing to do with the right interpretation of the passage now in question. And when I said above, that the serpent before the curse of God upon it moved in an erect posture, I do not wish to be understood to mean that it moved in an upright position as man, but with its neck and head erect, as a stag or a peacock. To crawl on its belly therefore after the curse, was the divine judgment on the serpent.

  That which now follows belongs expressly to Satan only. And the things here recorded of him by Moses paint forth his judgment in far more true colors than any of those foolish and out-of-place descriptions of the allegorists. They moreover set before us this strong consolation, that the devil is now so situated that he cannot attack and harm us at his liberty, as he wishes to do and would do, if the Seed of the woman stood not directly in his way.

  II. V. 15a. And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed.

  These are the things which are spoken expressly and properly to Satan. And they contain his judgment. While in these same words of his judgment, there is set before the godly their strong consolation. The things above spoken are historical, as I have said, and apply to the serpent, which because through the abuse of Satan it aided in effecting the sin of Adam and Eve, bears as his part of the punishment his ejection from the common life, as it were, and from the society of the other animals of the creation; being made so different from them that he dares not eat the same food nor live in any way like them.

  The present passage might also be allegorically interpreted. But the allegories used would be far less appropriate, and they would not stand firm in the defense of the truth. For the facts of the case are these: Satan on account of his sin was cast out of heaven and condemned; and no longer goes about in his original form as an ox or a hind does, but creeps on the ground; which may signify that he does not attack the godly by open force, but uses wiles and devices for their harm and destruction; which devices nevertheless the godly when they look into the Word see and understand; and by them they perceive how vast his deformity is, and hence dread and abhor him. And certainly his creeping on the ground, and not walking upright, may well indicate that his tyrannical power is broken and destroyed, so that he cannot do so much harm to the Church as he otherwise would do. These allegories, we repeat, may be used in the interpretation of the present text; but they do not explain the meaning of Moses, and therefore they are improper.

  Wherefore, when we speak of Satan, let us ever follow the other testimonies of Scripture upon the subject; for they are proper, certain and sure; such for instance as the following: “The devil was a murderer from the beginning, and standeth not in the truth, because there is no truth in him;” and also, “When he speaketh a lie he speaketh of his own,” John 8:44; and again, “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about seeking whom he may devour,” 1 Pet. 5:8; and also, where Christ says, “The prince of this world is judged,” John 16:11.

  In a word, who does not plainly see that the testimony of the present passage applies properl
y to Satan; and that it is to him that the Son of God is here opposed, expressly to prevent him from making any attack upon us with open violence, as if he had no certain Antagonist! The Church therefore, under this protection, is perfectly safe. And not only is Satan deprived of the power of attacking the Church with any open violence, but his power and desire of harming anything or person else are also destroyed. Were it not so, he would not suffer a single tree to grow to maturity. He would impede and crush all things that spring forth in the earth; and would prevent, not the birth of men only, but the bringing forth of beasts; and would destroy the safety of everything. This insatiable desire to harm and to destroy is fully manifest from his inability to attack by open violence, and from his doing whatever he does by the means of craft, guile and snare.

  We should here moreover carefully observe that these things are not spoken by God for the devil’s sake. For God does not deign to condemn Satan on his own account, by these his words; but he deems it sufficient to leave Satan to be condemned by his own conscience. All that God speaks to Satan, he speaks for the sake of Adam and Eve; that they may hear this judgment of God upon him and may comfort themselves, by thus hearing and seeing that God is the adversary to the nature of him, who had inflicted such a wound on man. For out of these very words of God to Satan, there begin to shine forth grace and mercy; yea, out of the very midst of that anger, which sin and disobedience had so righteously kindled. It is here in the very midst of the heaviest threatenings, that the mind of the Father discloses itself; of a Father, not so angry as to cast away his Son, but holding out salvation, yea, promising victory over that enemy, who had thus deceived and conquered human nature.