Mat 7:12 | Luther | STEP | V.12. Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that mere should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets. With these words he now concludes his teaching, given in these three chapters, and gathers them all up in a little bundle in which one can find it all, and every one can put it in his bosom and keep it well; as if he said: Would you like to know what I have preached, and what Moses and all the prophets teach you? then I will tell you in a very few words, and state it so that you dare not complain of its being too long or hard to keep. For it is such a sermon that one can stretch out far and wide, and also make short; and all teaching and preaching flow out from it and spread themselves, and here they come together again. How could it be expressed more briefly and clearly than in these words? except that the world and our old Adam prevent us from catching his meaning and contrasting our life with this teaching; we let it go into one ear and out at the other. Were we always to hold it in contrast with our living and doing, we would not live so rudely and be so neglectful, but always have enough to do, and become our own masters and teach what we ought to do, so that we would not need to run after holy living and works, and would also not need many jurists and lawbooks for this purpose. For it is briefly stated and easily learned, if only we were diligent and earnest to do and live accordingly. Thus, that we may see it in plain illustrations, there is surely no one who would like to be robbed, and if he asks his own heart about it, he must say that he really would not like that. Why does he not then conclude that he should not rob another? As, if you see at market that everybody makes his goods as dear as he chooses, that he wants to give for thirty pennies what is not worth ten, and you ask him: My friend, would you like to be treated that way? then he cannot be so coarse and unreasonable, but must say: I would buy it at its market value, and what would be reasonable and right, so that I be not overreached. See, there is your heart that tells you truly how you would like to be treated, and your conscience that concludes that you should also do thus to others, and it can properly teach you how you are to deal with your neighbor in buying and selling and all sorts of dealing; all of which belongs to the seventh commandment: Thou shalt not steal. The same in regard to the other commandments: If you have a wife, daughter or maid, you would not like to have her disgraced or badly spoken about, but you want to have her honored and well treated and highly spoken of by everybody. Why then are you so perverse as to hanker after another man’s wife and yourself put her to shame; or to refrain from honoring her when you should do it, and to find pleasure in traducing and slandering? Also, you would not like to be injured by any one, or badly spoken of, or any thing of that kind; why do you not here yourself keep to the rule and measure that you demand and will have from others, and why do you soon judge, blame and condemn another if he does not do it to you, and yet will not yourself act according to your own rule? Thus go through all the commands of the second table, and you will find that this is the real stun of all the preaching that we can do; as he himself says here. Therefore it is well called a short sermon; but again, if we were to spread it out through all its applications, it is so far-reaching that there would be no end to it; for we cannot count up all that will be done upon earth till the last day; and he is a splendid master who can compress and embrace in a summary such a long, diffuse sermon, so that every one can take it home with him, and daily remind himself of it, as written in his own heart, yes, in all his living and doing (as we shall hear further on) and see where he has been wanting in his whole life. And I believe too that its force would be felt and its fruits realized if we would only accustom ourselves to remember it, and not be so very indolent and careless. For I do not think that any one is so coarse, or so wicked, if he would bear this in mind, that he would still shun it or take offense at it; and it is surely a wise device that Christ puts it in such a way that he takes no other illustration than ourselves, and he applies it in the closest possible way, laying it upon our heart, body and life, and all our members, so that no one need go far after it or spend much trouble or cost upon it; but he has laid the book in your own bosom, and besides so clear that you need no glasses to understand Moses and the law, so that you are your own Bible, master, doctor and preacher. He gives you such directions that you need only to look at them to find how the book reaches through all your doings, words, thoughts, heart, body and soul. Regulate yourself only according to that, and you will be wise and learned enough, above all jurists, art and books. So, to take a rough illustration, are you a mechanic, you find the Bible lying in your workshop, in your hand, in your heart, that teaches you and preaches to you how you are to deal with your neighbor. Look only at your tool, your needle, your thimble, your beer-cask, your wares, your scales, your yard-stick, and you read this motto written upon them; so that you cannot look in any direction that it does not stare at you, and no one thing is so small, with which you daily have to do, that does not constantly say this to you, if you will hear it, and there is no lack of preaching. For you have just as many preachers as you have dealings, wares, tools and other apparatus in your house and home. That is always calling to you: Dear friend, deal with me towards your neighbor just as you would like you neighbor to deal with you in his line of business. See, thus would this teaching be written upon everything that we look at, and enstamped upon our whole life, if we only had ears that were willing to hear and eyes that were willing to see; and it is so richly preached to us that no one can excuse himself as not knowing it or not having it sufficiently told and preached to him. But we are like the adders that stop their ears and become deaf if we attempt to charm them; we will not see or hear what is written in our own heart and thoughts, and we rush ahead recklessly: Ha, what do others concern me! I can do with my own what I choose, and sell my goods as dear as I can; who will hinder me, etc.? as Squires Skin-flint and Gag do at market; and if one rebukes and threatens them by the word of God, they merely laugh and ridicule and only harden themselves in their wickedness. But we do not preach to these, nor does Christ, and he will have nothing to do with them, and just as completely despises them as they do [him], and he will let them go to the devil. But those that want to be pious, and still fear God and think how they will live and act, must know that they are not to deal with and handle their property as they may wish, as though they were themselves masters of everything: but they are bound to do what is right and orderly, for which reason we have laws of the land and of the city. For so every one wishes to be dealt with by his neighbor; therefore he should do likewise, both taking and giving good wares. This is his seriously meant command, and he will not allow any liberty or arbitrariness to be made out of it, as if one could do it or not without sin; and he will insist upon it, however much the world may view it as an insult and despise it. If you do it not, he will deal with you according to your own measure, and it will come home to you, so that you will have no blessing in what you have gained contrary to this teaching, but all trouble and sorrow, and your children after you. For he will have his command kept, or there shall be no good or success enjoyed. Secondly, it is not only brought so close home (as now stated)that we must see it in everything that occurs; but it is also presented in such a way that one has to blush at his own conduct. For there is no one who would like to do a base act so that other people should see it, and no one is as ready to sin publicly before the people as if it occurred secretly, so that no one sees it. Thus Christ means to set us here as witnesses against ourselves, and to make us afraid of ourselves, so that if we do wrong our conscience will oppose us with this command, as a perpetual witness, and say: See, what are you doing? This you ought to sell at such a price, according to common fair usage; now you are asking too much. Also, these wares you would not like to take from some one else, as you are depreciating or misrepresenting them, etc. How you should be vexed if some one would give you for a gulden what would be worth hardly ten groschen? so that, if you have a drop of honest blood in your body, you ought to be ashamed of yourself. For if some one else would do it you would call him a thief and a scoundrel. Why, then, are you not ashamed of yourself, as not some one else but you yourself must thus blame yourself, condemned by your own conscience? But that is all very well for a hard, shameless forehead, that feels no disgrace before the people, before itself, still less before God. But if another does it to you then you can readily cry out: Is not this a sin and a shame, and cunningly stolen from the purse? You can easily see a thief and scoundrel in another; but the one who hides in your own breast, and whom you can easily catch and feel, him you will not see. O, how many such fellows there are in all trades and occupations, that live along securely, deceiving and cheating the people, wherever they can, and yet not willing to be counted thieves and scoundrels, if they only do it secretly and smartly. But if everybody was to give back what he has stolen and robbed in his business or trade, few people would retain anything; yet they live along as pious people, because they cannot be publicly criminated and punished, and they imagine too that they have not sinned; and if they look about themselves, every corner of the house and home is full of thievery, and God is witness that they do not have a gulden or two in the house that has not been stolen; and yet all this must not be called stealing. Yes, if it were only stealing, and not also murder besides, for with bad, injurious wares, food or drink, people are made weak and sick, etc., and not only robbed of their money, but also of their health, so that many a one eats and drinks, so that he afterwards must pine away and often die in consequence of it. My good friend, is not that just the same as if you were to break into his house or chest, or to strike him a deadly wound? — only it goes by a different name. If you were not so wicked and shameless, you should be ashamed of yourself when your conscience says this to you, and holds this saying before you so that you must reflect; yes, it would make you so fearful that you would not be able to stay anywhere on account of it. For it is a burden that is always oppressing and disturbing, yes is always condemning, as a perpetual witness against ourselves, so that it cannot possibly be borne. That would then soon teach you that you must quit plundering and stealing, and such things that you would not like to have done to you by some one else, etc. Thus accustom yourself then to look a little at this saying, and practice it upon yourself, then you will have a daily preacher in your heart, in whatever way you may be dealing with your neighbor; thereby you can readily learn to understand every commandment and the whole law, and to govern and conduct yourself in your intercourse with others, so that you may well decide accordingly what is right and wrong in the world. But do you say: How does he say that this is the law and the prophets? The Scriptures of the law and the prophets contain much more than this. For the Scriptures have the doctrine of faith and the promises, of which nothing is said here. Answer: Christ names here the law and the prophets in direct contrast with the gospel or the promise. For he is not preaching here about the important article, namely, concerning faith in Christ, but only of good works. For those are two different kinds of preaching; we must preach them both, but each in its proper time and place. That you see also clearly in the text, in the words where he says: Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, that do ye unto them likewise. Thereby he shows that his preaching now extends no further than to the dealings which people have with us and we with them, and says nothing about the grace of Christ which we receive from God. Therefore he now means to say: If one is to preach about good life and works, which we are to practice in dealing with our neighbor, then you will find in all the law and the prophets nothing else than what this saying teaches you. Therefore he uses the words: the people, and: that do ye to them, etc., to indicate that he is speaking only about the commandments of the second table. And this is the best in the saying, viz., that he does not say: Other people shall do it to you; but: Ye shall do it to other people. For every one would like others to do good to him, and there are many scoundrels and bad fellows who would have no objection to other people being good and doing good to them; but they will not do it to anybody: as now our peasants imagine it is wrong and great oppression that they are to give fair measure; and yet they can loudly cry and complain that they are robbed or are taxed. But these are nothing but vile reptiles. Some, however, are a little better, who say: I would take my turn and gladly do what I ought, if other people would first do it to me. But this saying puts it in this way. Do thou what thou wouldst have from another. Thou shalt begin, and be the first, if thou wilt that others should do it to thee; or, if they will not, do thou it nevertheless. For if thou wilt not be good, and do good, before thou seest it in another, nothing will come of it. If others will not, thou art none the less obliged to do it, according to the law, and what is acknowledged to be right, as thou wouldst be glad to have done to thee. He who wants to be good must not regard the example of other people; and it will not do for you to say: He deceived me, and I must befoul him again; but because you do not like it, do not do it to him, and begin with that which you wish to be done to you. Thus you may then influence other people through your example, so that they will do good again to you, even those who before did you harm. But if you do not do it yourself, you have as your reward that no one does good to you; and you are served right, before God and the people.

Matthew 7:12

_V.12. Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that mere should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.

With these words he now concludes his teaching, given in these three chapters, and gathers them all up in a little bundle in which one can find it all, and every one can put it in his bosom and keep it well; as if he said:

Would you like to know what I have preached, and what Moses and all the prophets teach you? then I will tell you in a very few words, and state it so that you dare not complain of its being too long or hard to keep. For it is such a sermon that one can stretch out far and wide, and also make short; and all teaching and preaching flow out from it and spread themselves, and here they come together again. How could it be expressed more briefly and clearly than in these words? except that the world and our old Adam prevent us from catching his meaning and contrasting our life with this teaching; we let it go into one ear and out at the other. Were we always to hold it in contrast with our living and doing, we would not live so rudely and be so neglectful, but always have enough to do, and become our own masters and teach what we ought to do, so that we would not need to run after holy living and works, and would also not need many jurists and lawbooks for this purpose. For it is briefly stated and easily learned, if only we were diligent and earnest to do and live accordingly.

Thus, that we may see it in plain illustrations, there is surely no one who would like to be robbed, and if he asks his own heart about it, he must say that he really would not like that. Why does he not then conclude that he should not rob another? As, if you see at market that everybody makes his goods as dear as he chooses, that he wants to give for thirty pennies what is not worth ten, and you ask him: My friend, would you like to be treated that way? then he cannot be so coarse and unreasonable, but must say: I would buy it at its market value, and what would be reasonable and right, so that I be not overreached. See, there is your heart that tells you truly how you would like to be treated, and your conscience that concludes that you should also do thus to others, and it can properly teach you how you are to deal with your neighbor in buying and selling and all sorts of dealing; all of which belongs to the seventh commandment: Thou shalt not steal.

The same in regard to the other commandments: If you have a wife, daughter or maid, you would not like to have her disgraced or badly spoken about, but you want to have her honored and well treated and highly spoken of by everybody. Why then are you so perverse as to hanker after another man’s wife and yourself put her to shame; or to refrain from honoring her when you should do it, and to find pleasure in traducing and slandering? Also, you would not like to be injured by any one, or badly spoken of, or any thing of that kind; why do you not here yourself keep to the rule and measure that you demand and will have from others, and why do you soon judge, blame and condemn another if he does not do it to you, and yet will not yourself act according to your own rule? Thus go through all the commands of the second table, and you will find that this is the real stun of all the preaching that we can do; as he himself says here.

Therefore it is well called a short sermon; but again, if we were to spread it out through all its applications, it is so far-reaching that there would be no end to it; for we cannot count up all that will be done upon earth till the last day; and he is a splendid master who can compress and embrace in a summary such a long, diffuse sermon, so that every one can take it home with him, and daily remind himself of it, as written in his own heart, yes, in all his living and doing (as we shall hear further on) and see where he has been wanting in his whole life.

And I believe too that its force would be felt and its fruits realized if we would only accustom ourselves to remember it, and not be so very indolent and careless. For I do not think that any one is so coarse, or so wicked, if he would bear this in mind, that he would still shun it or take offense at it; and it is surely a wise device that Christ puts it in such a way that he takes no other illustration than ourselves, and he applies it in the closest possible way, laying it upon our heart, body and life, and all our members, so that no one need go far after it or spend much trouble or cost upon it; but he has laid the book in your own bosom, and besides so clear that you need no glasses to understand Moses and the law, so that you are your own Bible, master, doctor and preacher. He gives you such directions that you need only to look at them to find how the book reaches through all your doings, words, thoughts, heart, body and soul. Regulate yourself only according to that, and you will be wise and learned enough, above all jurists, art and books.

So, to take a rough illustration, are you a mechanic, you find the Bible lying in your workshop, in your hand, in your heart, that teaches you and preaches to you how you are to deal with your neighbor. Look only at your tool, your needle, your thimble, your beer-cask, your wares, your scales, your yard-stick, and you read this motto written upon them; so that you cannot look in any direction that it does not stare at you, and no one thing is so small, with which you daily have to do, that does not constantly say this to you, if you will hear it, and there is no lack of preaching. For you have just as many preachers as you have dealings, wares, tools and other apparatus in your house and home. That is always calling to you:

Dear friend, deal with me towards your neighbor just as you would like you neighbor to deal with you in his line of business.

See, thus would this teaching be written upon everything that we look at, and enstamped upon our whole life, if we only had ears that were willing to hear and eyes that were willing to see; and it is so richly preached to us that no one can excuse himself as not knowing it or not having it sufficiently told and preached to him. But we are like the adders that stop their ears and become deaf if we attempt to charm them; we will not see or hear what is written in our own heart and thoughts, and we rush ahead recklessly: Ha, what do others concern me! I can do with my own what I choose, and sell my goods as dear as I can; who will hinder me, etc.? as Squires Skin-flint and Gag do at market; and if one rebukes and threatens them by the word of God, they merely laugh and ridicule and only harden themselves in their wickedness. But we do not preach to these, nor does Christ, and he will have nothing to do with them, and just as completely despises them as they do [him], and he will let them go to the devil.

But those that want to be pious, and still fear God and think how they will live and act, must know that they are not to deal with and handle their property as they may wish, as though they were themselves masters of everything: but they are bound to do what is right and orderly, for which reason we have laws of the land and of the city. For so every one wishes to be dealt with by his neighbor; therefore he should do likewise, both taking and giving good wares. This is his seriously meant command, and he will not allow any liberty or arbitrariness to be made out of it, as if one could do it or not without sin; and he will insist upon it, however much the world may view it as an insult and despise it. If you do it not, he will deal with you according to your own measure, and it will come home to you, so that you will have no blessing in what you have gained contrary to this teaching, but all trouble and sorrow, and your children after you. For he will have his command kept, or there shall be no good or success enjoyed.

Secondly, it is not only brought so close home (as now stated)that we must see it in everything that occurs; but it is also presented in such a way that one has to blush at his own conduct. For there is no one who would like to do a base act so that other people should see it, and no one is as ready to sin publicly before the people as if it occurred secretly, so that no one sees it. Thus Christ means to set us here as witnesses against ourselves, and to make us afraid of ourselves, so that if we do wrong our conscience will oppose us with this command, as a perpetual witness, and say: See, what are you doing? This you ought to sell at such a price, according to common fair usage; now you are asking too much. Also, these wares you would not like to take from some one else, as you are depreciating or misrepresenting them, etc. How you should be vexed if some one would give you for a gulden what would be worth hardly ten groschen? so that, if you have a drop of honest blood in your body, you ought to be ashamed of yourself. For if some one else would do it you would call him a thief and a scoundrel. Why, then, are you not ashamed of yourself, as not some one else but you yourself must thus blame yourself, condemned by your own conscience? But that is all very well for a hard, shameless forehead, that feels no disgrace before the people, before itself, still less before God. But if another does it to you then you can readily cry out: Is not this a sin and a shame, and cunningly stolen from the purse? You can easily see a thief and scoundrel in another; but the one who hides in your own breast, and whom you can easily catch and feel, him you will not see.

O, how many such fellows there are in all trades and occupations, that live along securely, deceiving and cheating the people, wherever they can, and yet not willing to be counted thieves and scoundrels, if they only do it secretly and smartly. But if everybody was to give back what he has stolen and robbed in his business or trade, few people would retain anything; yet they live along as pious people, because they cannot be publicly criminated and punished, and they imagine too that they have not sinned; and if they look about themselves, every corner of the house and home is full of thievery, and God is witness that they do not have a gulden or two in the house that has not been stolen; and yet all this must not be called stealing.

Yes, if it were only stealing, and not also murder besides, for with bad, injurious wares, food or drink, people are made weak and sick, etc., and not only robbed of their money, but also of their health, so that many a one eats and drinks, so that he afterwards must pine away and often die in consequence of it. My good friend, is not that just the same as if you were to break into his house or chest, or to strike him a deadly wound? — only it goes by a different name.

If you were not so wicked and shameless, you should be ashamed of yourself when your conscience says this to you, and holds this saying before you so that you must reflect; yes, it would make you so fearful that you would not be able to stay anywhere on account of it. For it is a burden that is always oppressing and disturbing, yes is always condemning, as a perpetual witness against ourselves, so that it cannot possibly be borne.

That would then soon teach you that you must quit plundering and stealing, and such things that you would not like to have done to you by some one else, etc. Thus accustom yourself then to look a little at this saying, and practice it upon yourself, then you will have a daily preacher in your heart, in whatever way you may be dealing with your neighbor; thereby you can readily learn to understand every commandment and the whole law, and to govern and conduct yourself in your intercourse with others, so that you may well decide accordingly what is right and wrong in the world.

But do you say: How does he say that this is the law and the prophets? The Scriptures of the law and the prophets contain much more than this. For the Scriptures have the doctrine of faith and the promises, of which nothing is said here. Answer: Christ names here the law and the prophets in direct contrast with the gospel or the promise. For he is not preaching here about the important article, namely, concerning faith in Christ, but only of good works. For those are two different kinds of preaching; we must preach them both, but each in its proper time and place. That you see also clearly in the text, in the words where he says: Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, that do ye unto them likewise. Thereby he shows that his preaching now extends no further than to the dealings which people have with us and we with them, and says nothing about the grace of Christ which we receive from God. Therefore he now means to say: If one is to preach about good life and works, which we are to practice in dealing with our neighbor, then you will find in all the law and the prophets nothing else than what this saying teaches you. Therefore he uses the words: the people, and: that do ye to them, etc., to indicate that he is speaking only about the commandments of the second table.

And this is the best in the saying, viz., that he does not say: Other people shall do it to you; but: Ye shall do it to other people. For every one would like others to do good to him, and there are many scoundrels and bad fellows who would have no objection to other people being good and doing good to them; but they will not do it to anybody: as now our peasants imagine it is wrong and great oppression that they are to give fair measure; and yet they can loudly cry and complain that they are robbed or are taxed. But these are nothing but vile reptiles. Some, however, are a little better, who say: I would take my turn and gladly do what I ought, if other people would first do it to me. But this saying puts it in this way. Do thou what thou wouldst have from another. Thou shalt begin, and be the first, if thou wilt that others should do it to thee; or, if they will not, do thou it nevertheless. For if thou wilt not be good, and do good, before thou seest it in another, nothing will come of it. If others will not, thou art none the less obliged to do it, according to the law, and what is acknowledged to be right, as thou wouldst be glad to have done to thee. He who wants to be good must not regard the example of other people; and it will not do for you to say: He deceived me, and I must befoul him again; but because you do not like it, do not do it to him, and begin with that which you wish to be done to you. Thus you may then influence other people through your example, so that they will do good again to you, even those who before did you harm. But if you do not do it yourself, you have as your reward that no one does good to you; and you are served right, before God and the people.