Theological Origins of Modernity

the contradictions of premodernity 153
Luther, by contrast, focuses on the impact of God’s word in generating this
certainty. In this respect his thought is more Stoic than Augustinian. For
the Stoics one was struck by an undeniable and irresistible impression that
actually shaped the soul in an irreversible manner. Th e Stoics called this
experience a turning around, a metabolê, or conversio. 74 For Luther this is
the experience in which Scripture takes hold of a man and speaks directly
to and through him. In this moment, the Christian like the Stoic is turned
around and redirected. He is turned around, however, not by an undeniable
sense impression but by the overpowering experience of the word of
God. Conversion thus depends not on reason but on divine will that grasps
and possesses the Christian. Scripture thus saves, but it saves only when
God grasps us with it, that is, only when grace takes such possession of us
that nothing can change our conviction, when we “cannot do otherwise,”
and cannot even want to do otherwise.
Scripture for Luther is thus not a text to be interpreted, or human
speech, but the word of God. And the divine words are not mere drops of
meaning that fi ll up the human mind but the irresistible hand of God that
takes hold of us and transforms us. Th e language of Scripture is thus not a
form of discourse that has to be interpreted by humanity, as Erasmus had
imagined, but God himself working his will in and through us. In Luther’s
view, to suggest that the truth of Scripture can be revealed only if one abjures
judgment and engages in a broad-based discussion with others about
its meaning is thus to miss the decisive point of Christian religion. Only
someone who has not been grasped by God could believe such a thing.
Luther thus rebukes Erasmus with his famous claim that “the Holy Spirit
is not a skeptic.” 75 God in other words does not reason with Christians but
takes possession of them and uses them for his own ends.
Erasmus suggested that a Christian should adopt a skeptical stance because
he had doubts about how to interpret Scripture. Luther discounts
this view because in his mind a real Christian simply cannot doubt. Moreover,
doubts are not something that need or ought to be managed by discussion
and consensus; they must be experienced in the depths of one’s
soul, because they are the prelude to faith. Luther knew this from personal
experience: “I myself was off ended more than once, and brought to the
very depth and abyss of despair, so that I wished I had never been created
a man, before I realized how salutary that despair was, and how near to
grace.” 76 Th e path to faith for Luther passes through the abyss of despair.
To argue that humans must suspend judgment on matters of this sort as
Erasmus suggests is thus to abandon Christ.
In his response to Erasmus, Luther emphasizes God’s complete freedom