The Conservative Reformation and Its Theology - Saint Mary ...

there given as the authentic Confession in antithesis to all the editions of it
in which there were variations large or small.
In the Convention of the Evangelical (Lutheran) Princes at
Naumberg in 1561, among whom were two of the original signers, this
edition was declared to be authentic, and was again solemnly subscribed,
and the seals of the signers appended. Nothing could seem to be more
certainly fixed than that this original edition of Melanchthon presented the
Confession in its most perfect form, just as it was actually delivered ill the
Diet. But unhappy causes, connected largely with Melanchthon's later
attempts to produce unity by skilful phrases and skilful concealments, led
to a most groundless suspicion, that even in the original edition there might
be variations from the very letter of the Confession as actually delivered.
That there were any changes in meaning was not even in those times of
morbid jealousy pretended, but a strong anxiety was felt to secure a copy
of the Confession perfectly corresponding in words, in letters, and in
points, with the original. The original of the Latin had been taken by
Charles with him, but the German original was still supposed to be in the
archives at Mentz. Joachim II., in 1566, directed Coelestinus and Zochius
to make a copy from the Mentz original. Their copy was inserted in the
Brandenburg Body of Doctrine in 1572.
In 1576, Augustus of Saxony obtained from the Elector of Mentz a
copy of the same document, and from this the Augsburg Confession as it
appears in the Book of Concord was printed. Wherever the Book of
Concord was received, Melanchthon's original edition of the German was
displaced, though the corresponding edition of the Latin has been retained.
Thus, half a century after its universal recognition, the first edition of the
Augsburg Confession in German gave way to what was believed to be a
true transcript of the original.
Two hundred years after the delivery of the Confession, a discovery
was communicated to the theological world by Pfaff, which has reinstated
Melanchthon's original edition. Pfaff discovered that the document in the
archives at Mentz was