Walther as Theologian
For Franz Friday, here is Part I of Pieper’s “C.F.W. Walther as Theologian”
For Walther, the center of all Christian doctrine is the doctrine of justification, which is the doctrine that a person is justified before God and saved by grace through faith in Christ. All other doctrines serve this doctrine as requisites or flow from it as consequences. And since Walther always saw this doctrine endangered by individual errors too, he therefore fought all falsity with determination, conceding no compromises. To him, this doctrine was also the central point in the fight for the correct doctrine of the Church.1 Walther demonstrated how, for example, the teaching which claims that only members of a specific visible church are the only ones to receive salvation, as well as the pretense that the validity of absolution is dependent on the ordination of the officiant, overturns the doctrine of justification. He used the same proof in relation to the other false teachings which he battled, for example, Chiliasm, the physical effect of the sacraments, synergism, and so on. “The struggle against false doctrine,” he said, “first attains practical significance for the individual Christian when he sees how through the corruption of other articles of doctrine this doctrine [i.e. justification] cannot remain pure either.”2 Walther lived in this doctrine as a Christian as well as a theologian. Even his opponents admitted that he understood how to speak powerfully about this doctrine. Walther delivered the most lectures about this doctrine during the so-called Lutherstunden. Through both pinpointing the correct way, as well as the vivid portrayal of the usual errors, Walther instructed above all things at the theological seminary how this doctrine is properly preached. We do not believe we are suggesting too much when we say that after Luther and Chemnitz there is arguably no teacher of our church who attested to the doctrine of justification more vividly than Walther. Walther had Luther as his teacher in this doctrine too. He took the individual, brightly glimmering points of light which are found concerning this doctrine among the subsequent teachers and combined them into one bright beam.
As we set out to present Walther’s position on the doctrine of justification we first make reference to how Walther characterized the doctrine of justification with respect to its importance, etc. in general. Secondly we will make mention of and highlight the points which Walther especially accentuated in order to keep this doctrine intact against the errors of his time.
According to Walther, the doctrine of justification is what differentiates the Christian religion from all other so-called religions; it is the hallmark of the Christian religion. If we speak of justification, he says,3 then we are speaking of the Christian religion, for the doctrine of the Christian religion is really nothing other than the revelation of God about how one is justified and saved by the redemption which came about through Christ Jesus. All other religions show other ways which are said to lead to heaven (namely the way of works), only the Christian religion shows a different way to heaven through her doctrine of justification. With this doctrine she shows the world something unheard of and unimaginable: thoughts that were hidden in the heart of God before the foundation of the world. And in a different place4 he says that this doctrine is the heavenly sun of the Christian religion through which she differentiates herself from all other religions, just as the light does from the darkness. Therefore, whoever assaults the doctrine of justification encroaches on all doctrine, the entire Bible, and the entire Christian religion. Another way to salvation, and thus an entirely different religion is taught wherever this doctrine is falsified. Fighting for the doctrine of justification, the Bible, and the Christian religion are all one and the same. Without the doctrine of justification the entire Christian religion is like a clockwork without a spring. All other doctrines lose their meaning when the doctrine of justification is incorrect. When the cornerstone falls, the entire building collapses. In the same way, all of Christendom collapses where the doctrine of justification falls. The church then becomes a mere reformatory. As far as the understanding of the Scriptures is concerned: When theologians who do not properly understand the doctrine of justification handle and cite the Scriptures, they do not dwell in the Scriptures, instead they sit in front of a door that is closed to them. For without the doctrine of justification the Bible becomes for the people a book of ethics with all sorts of curiousancillary teachings.
Therefore the doctrine of justification is the “grandest chief article of the Christian faith.” “As long as someone has not come any further than thinking the doctrine of justification is also an important article, then he is still in the dark.” Without the doctrine of justification all praise of Christ, grace, and the Means of Grace are nothing. All teaching in the church must serve this article. That is not to say that one should or could teach only this doctrine. All revealed doctrines must be taught with utmost diligence. But even when one deals with hell, the goal must be to show the rescue from hell to those who are listening.
The awareness of the doctrine of justification is absolutely necessary for the salvation of the individual. Christians are people who live in the awareness of the doctrine of justification, that is, people who believe that God by grace forgives their sins for Christ’s sake. This awareness, this faith makes a person a Christian. “Upon this article,” Walther says, “rests all salvation, and therefore it is absolutely important for every Christian. It wouldn’t help a thing if one correctly knew all other doctrines, for example the holy Trinity, the person of Christ, etc., but would not know or believe this article.”5 This article is indeed the article with which the church stands or falls. “For what is the church? She is the sum of the believing Christians. Thus the church is present where Christ rules and governs in grace; but he rules inwardly in people by offering and administering them grace. Where he has conquered a heart his kingdom is present. Where therefore there are reborn, living Christians, there is his church. But now no person becomes a true, reborn Christian without this doctrine of justification. Every other doctrine can indeed make great Pharisees, but not Christians. One becomes a Christian only when the Holy Spirit reveals in the heart that one is truly redeemed by Christ, and has the forgiveness of sins, a reconciled heavenly father, righteousness valid before God, and can lie confidently even on one’s deathbed.”6 And in a different place Walther says, “Luther wasn’t exaggerating when he said that the church cannot stand for one hour without the article of justification. For the church is not some outward institution, rather it is the gathering of the believers. Where there are not believers there is also no church.”
