the mystical theology of valentin weigel - DataSpace at Princeton ...

made clear, would result in dismissal from one’s post, or even exile, 72 and so Weigel duly
subscribed (though with private regret). 73 In the end, two thirds of German Lutherans
accepted the Formula Concordiae, falling short of the goal of complete Lutheran unity
but generating a large body of people committed to its doctrine and acknowledging its
force; Weigel’s signature would have been one amongst more than 8,000. 74
The process of confessionalization described here implies a new configuration of
this-worldly authority in relation to otherworldly authority, as Weigel notes with
displeasure with reference to his own era. However, balancing immanence and
transcendence is a challenge for Christianity as a whole, whose main object of worship is,
after all, the immanent/transcendent God-Man. 75 Whether there should be an earthly
church, and if so, how it ought to be organized, are questions caught up in this same
tension between immanence and transcendence, for although Christ’s physical body
departed the Earth at his Ascension, the descent of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost put a halo
over the dispensing of pastoral care to earthly assemblies (ekklesia), no matter how strong
the impulse of devout Christians to flee the corrupt world. Christ’s injunction to drink his
72 Inge Mager, "Aufnahme und Ablehnung des Konkordienbuches in Nord-, Mittel- und Ostdeutschland,"
in Bekenntnis und Einheit der Kirche: Studien zum Konkordienbuch, (Stuttgart: Calwer Verlag, 1980), 274-
275. Schreiner observes that the secular and religious leaders of the 16 th century likely did not view the
obligatory subscription to confessional documents as a measure designed to restrict freedom, but rather as a
way to generate both religious and political consensus: “eine religiös und rechtlich qualifizierte
Treuebindung gegenüber Gott und dem weltichen Herrscher.” Schreiner, 355.
73 Weigel, Dialogus, 59f.
74 Schmidt, Konfessionalisierung, 13. “Elector Ludwig of the Palatinate [was brought] into concert with the
other two leading Evangelical princes of the German Empire, the electors of Saxony and Brandenburg,
August and Joachim II. These three, joined by eighty other princely and municipal governments, led 8,188
theologians into subscription of the Formula of Concord by 1580.” Robert Kolb and Timothy J Wengert, ,
The Book of Concord: The Confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, ed. Robert Kolb and Timothy
J Wengert, trans. Charles et al Arand (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2000), 2.
75 The tension between immanence and transcendence can be seen in the heresies that have dogged the
church since the very beginning of the its history. A number of the heresies of the early Church were about
how the Incarnation was to be understood, given the difficulty of comprehending how Christ could be both
human and divine. The temptation was to deny or relativize either one of these natures, where docetism was
anathemized for denying Christ’s humanity and Arianism for denying his divinity. An overview of the
Christological debates in the early church can be found in Rowan Williams, “Jesus Christus II: Alte Kirche,”
Vol. 16, in Theologische Realenzyklopädie (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1986).
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