Lutheran Theological Review, Vol. 37 — The Use of “The Wittenberg Reformation” (1545) on the Question of Episcopacy

I read with interest the essay printed in the recent Lutheran Theological Review, Vol. 37, “Some Remarks on Episcopacy from a Lutheran Perspective,” where the author, Dr. Juhana Pohjola, writes:

“When the reformers could not gain episcopal support, other solutions had to be sought. It is important to note that centralized priestly ordinations began in Wittenberg only in 1535. The reformers had waited this long for the bishops to join. Even after this, the aim was to preserve the episcopal order, a goal clearly expressed in a document signed by the entire faculty in the Wittenberg Reformation in 1545: “Therefore, there must be bishops as a degree [gradus] above other priests.” [Note: “Ideo volunt Episcopos esse, tamquam gradum supra reliquos presbyteros.” Corpus Reformatorum, 5:579; The Wittenberg Reformation (1545), trans. John R. Stephenson (St. Catharines: Concordia Lutheran Theological Seminary, 2016), 26.]

The influence of this essay within the confessional Lutheran world is already apparent from the recent communique of the International Lutheran Council, of which the author is chairman, regarding a reconsideration of the episcopacy, which reads: “Among other conclusions, Chairman Pohjola ultimately suggests that ‘the office of the bishop is biblical and apostolic’ (in that it is included in the one divinely instituted office of the ministry) and that it is further ‘presupposed and desired by the Lutheran Confessions.’” This communique implies that what is biblical, apostolic and presupposed by the Lutheran Confessions with regard to the office of bishop is also the ranking, the grade(s) above parish pastor, which the essay calls “the ministry of oversight,” a gift [of God?] of a distinctive nature. (https://ilcouncil.org/2025/12/11/ilc-chairman-encourages-deeper-discussion-of-episcopacy/).

Philip Melanchthon, the actual author of both the German and Latin texts of “The Wittenberg Reformation,” composed the treatise at the request of Elector John Frederick of Saxony in response to an imperial decree calling for reform proposals ahead of a planned general council of the Church. Thus, the target audience was Rome. The document outlined Wittenberg’s vision for church reform in the German lands and beyond, and emphasized five key elements of proper church governance: pure doctrine, correct sacramental practice, preservation of the preaching office, church discipline, and the establishment of good schools.

Although Melanchthon was the sole author, the text was signed by Martin Luther and other leading Wittenberg theologians (Bugenhagen, Cruciger, Major), affirming the faculty’s doctrinal unity. Melanchthon also prepared the Latin translation, reinforcing the document’s intended use as a formal statement of Lutheran reform principles. The treatise serves as a theological commentary on the Augsburg Confession and reflects mature Lutheran ecclesiology on the eve of Luther’s death in 1546.

I am concern about a specific textual and argumentative point in the LTR article, where “The Wittenberg Reformation” is cited in support of the thesis that the Reformers held bishops to be necessary “as a degree [gradus] above other priests.” (LTR 37, p. 36)

I have provided an Appendix with the source documents at this location:

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/v570yaarfu9vks88rpkhh/AG8nOMCYiEMssPj_myFwvKY?rlkey=nv9vwc2eihc9bcu6e7iptkp8f&dl=0

Recognizing the influence of the 2016 English edition of the 1545 document, translated and annotated by Dr. John Stephenson, I am addressing the point at issue from the primary text in the Corpus Reformatorum (CR), including its apparatus, rather than from any secondary editorial interpretation.

Specifically, I note that in the 2016 English edition (pp. 26–27) the disputed sentence is translated as an unqualified assertion (“There must therefore be bishops …”), and the editorial footnote remarks: “Even so, I did not expect ever to find such a strong statement as the sentence referenced above.” This reaction confirms that Stephenson is reading the line as the authors’ own voice. On the pages in question, however, there is no acknowledgement on Stephenson’s part of the CR apparatus footnote that classifies the relevant paragraph beginning “Darüber spricht man weiter” as objectiones adversariorum.

My concern is narrow, I submit, but determinative: the paragraph containing “Darum müssen Bischöffe …” / “Ideo volunt Episcopos esse …” is explicitly identified in the critical apparatus as “objections raised by the opponents” (objectiones adversariorum), not as the Wittenberg theologians’ own confessional assertion. That classification appears in the apparatus footnote (printed below the German text, in Latin): “Haec omnia sunt objectiones adversariorum, quae recitare incoeperam verbis: Darüber spricht man weiter.” (“All these things are objections of the opponents, which I [Melanchthon] had begun to recount with the words: ‘About this one says further.’”)

The issue: If that footnote is granted its natural force, then the sentence “There must therefore be bishops as a degree above other priests,” cannot be adduced as the Reformers’ confession. Rather, the paragraph functions as a rhetorical foil—presenting the opponents’ reasoning (including the desire to retain the existing Romanist episcopal polity, i.e., “powers” in the Latin text)—so that the Wittenberg theologians might answer this objection by distinguishing the divinely instituted preaching office (Predigtamt) from unnecessary human ordinances and arrangements of oversight. Thus, while extra-parochial oversight of the ministry may be ordered in Christian freedom, which fact the Reformers never denied and even encouraged, we must oppose any claim that episcopal polity per se is necessary or that the Church lacks legitimacy without it, or even that the church is bound to this polity as a criterion of catholicity, since extra-confessional documents do not have confessional force (binding consciences where the Scriptures and Confessions do not). Such a claim turns a human arrangement into a matter of necessity (“must be”) and thereby burdens consciences—precisely the circumstance in which the Formula of Concord teaches that Christian freedom must be defended and coercion opposed.

It is also noteworthy that the 2016 English edition translates, “Darüber spricht man weiter/Postea vero quaeritur” as “We [now] speak further on this matter,” when the German subject is “man,” that is, “one speaks” (singular), and the Latin reads: “Then, indeed, the question arises” or “But then, the question is raised.” This Latin phase appears in Cicero's speeches, particularly in In Verrem, as a rhetorical transition, where it introduces an argumentative pivot, precisely what Melanchthon is doing here. Why does the recent English edition change the subject to the plural “we,” which misleads the reader into attributing the paragraph to the Reformers?

Even setting aside the apparatus note and the mistranslation, reading this paragraph as the Wittenbergers’ own assertion renders the section “On the Preaching Office and Episcopal Government” internally incoherent. If the grading/ranking of office-bearers is itself de iure divino, for there is no other sort of necessity in the Christian Church, then the treatise’s governing distinction—between what is dominical/apostolic and necessary, and what is ordered de iure humano, and, therefore, unnecessary—is emptied of content: one must then say what “human ordering” remains, and the text’s argument no longer makes sense.

Melanchthon declares: “One must observe the difference between that preaching office, which is God's ordinance and work, and the ordering of bishops, which is, in part, an human ordinance.” (p. 595) After demonstrating that the one thing necessary in the church is the divinely established preaching office of the pure Word and unadulterated Sacraments of Christ, and that Christ needs nothing more than those spiritual gifts to preserve his church, it does not follow logically that the same theologians should declare, nevertheless, that “there must be bishops.” Indeed, the Lutherans were surrounded by bishops, tyrannical bishops, who persecuted and even murdered faithful shepherds of souls, which this treatise points out as counter-argument. Allow me to expand on this.

Consider the foil carefully, which is clearly a caveat to the Lutheran position. Melanchthon provided it here so that the reader should understand the opponents’ perspective without misrepresentation. The foil goes beyond what Melanchthon had just confessed and summed up from the Scriptures (“Und in Summa . . . Das ist in gemein geredt vom Predigtampt,” p. 597), asks a further question regarding what is not Scriptural doctrine as such, and poses a “nevertheless,” a clear challenge to the Lutheran doctrine, making necessary what is neither commanded nor forbidden:

“About this one says further: among these shepherds of souls there must nevertheless be an order; they do not all have the same gifts; they cannot all be judges in difficult articles of doctrine; they cannot all order and maintain the courts. And since in this wretched nature various failings occur again and again, there must be certain special places and persons where one knows where to seek counsel—likewise those who have oversight over others; and those same places must be so provided with persons and support that, as far as human prudence can foresee, there may be a stable order. Therefore bishops must be—as a degree above other priests—and these must have an appointed government and require many persons: for ordination, for instruction of the ordinands, for visitation, for judging, for counselling, for writing, for legations, for synods and councils. As one sees that Athanasius, Basil, Ambrose, Augustine had much to do to preserve their own and foreign churches in right doctrine against all sorts of heretics; for this work they needed many persons and had to send them out. If now the present form of the episcopate were torn apart, a barbarism and a devastation would follow which no one could see any end of, since worldly authorities and princes are burdened with other matters, and few esteem the church or think upon doctrine.” (my literal translation)

Allow me to paraphrase:

“But doesn't there have to be: 1) an order or ranking, 2) places and designated persons, 3) those with oversight of others, 4) an infrastructure and bureaucracy at those places, for stability? Indeed, bishops have to exist, as a grade above other priests, with a government and many persons (more bureaucracy). Why? 1) ordination, 2) instruction of the ordinands, 3) visitation, 4) judging, 5) counselling, 6) writing, 7) legations (official communiques), 8) synods and councils. Otherwise, without an order above other priests, as it now exists in the Roman church, barbarism and desolation would necessarily follow.”

What follows this objectiones adversariorum in the faculty treatise is not a ringing affirmation of those notions of episcopal necessity, but the critical Evangelical rebuttal of the foil (Antwort, Responsio), which begins with an unequivocal “we.” Nowhere in the answer, that is, in the text of the treatise that follows this foil do the Lutheran theologians declare that there must be bishops. While they were not desirous of disorder and wished that the existing bishops and all their delegations would actually fulfil their offices in accord with the Word of God, they were not holding their breath, so to speak. After all, the existing division in Christendom was not the fault of God or of those faithful priests preaching his truth for the salvation of souls, but of the existing bishops themselves, who were persecutors, tyrants, and murderers. “If the bishops continue with persecution of Christian doctrine, as they have done up to now, then we priests and teachers can make no unity with them.” (p. 598) Take note that it is the persecuted parish priests and teachers of the Gospel themselves (“we who are in the Evangelical Ministry”) that judge the false doctrine of the bishops and, therefore, separate from them, for in the end God will judge.

The whole section that follows Melanchthon’s foil is a careful consideration in six points of the circumstances in which the Lutherans, for the sake of outward unity in the Church, would be willing to submit to an existing Romanist bishop and what his doctrine and his activities should have to be in order to find Lutherans willing to submit. “And in sum: for Christian concord and unity there is no other way than this alone—that the bishops plant right doctrine and the Christian use of the Sacraments, and that we then be subject to them as church-prelates, which we offer ourselves to do.” (p. 598) For all intents and purposes, then, the Lutherans were saying that the existing Roman bishops would have to become essentially Lutheran in doctrine and practice for the Lutherans to be subject to them in Christian freedom, but not that the Lutherans must have bishops. Their focus was the advancement of the Reformation in the remaining territories.

“If a Christian wholesome reformation were brought into effect, it is most necessary that the episcopal election should henceforth be held in such a way that such bishops are chosen whom one regards not only as suited for worldly government, but also as having a fair understanding of Christian doctrine, and who do not despise church-government, but recognize the right episcopal offices and have a good will toward it.”

“If, then, they remain persecutors of the holy Gospel as they have been up to now and still are, then we must let God be Judge, and these dealings are in vain. For we shall not deny the holy Gospel, nor let the ministerium evangelii fall, and we shall hope and wait for protection and help from our Savior Christ.” (p. 603)

If the Roman Catholic territories with their bishops were to become Lutheran in teaching and practice, and were still of a mind to maintain the episcopacy, then bishops ought to be chosen on different criteria. The right episcopal offices are those given by God, namely, the Predigtamt, which itself preserves the church by the Word of God.

“How the high wise rulers order worldly kingdoms with ranks of persons, order of election and succession, appointment of cities, with laws, courts, etc … So in the church wise men have had much greater trouble and labour to order rank of persons … to set up bishoprics and administer the churches well … which has succeeded very unequally, for those bishops have become destroyers of the church for many hundreds of years …

God established a bishopric with Aaron … which had many an unfit bishop. Before that [from Adam to Moses] for over two thousand years … there was no established bishopric. In Judaism the true prophets and preachers of God were persecuted by the high bishops …

Paul says that the Lord Christ gives gifts to his church, so that Christ therefore sends and preserves these preachers, so that a unanimous, certain doctrine of the church may remain, as it also remained in the true church from Adam until this time …

Here St. Paul clearly testifies that through Christ the right preaching office in the church is preserved … and this promise is often repeated to all Christians for great comfort, so that we know that God will preserve his church, doctrine, and preaching office. For if it were built on human prudence, diligence, power and protection, it would have a weak foundation and would soon be utterly ruined together with the cities and kingdoms that are destroyed.” (pp. 595-96)

It is inconceivable that these authors in the middle of their argument against the necessity of the episcopacy in view of God’s providential care of Christ’s Church, should have confessed with the Romanists: “If now the present form of the episcopate were torn apart, a barbarism and a devastation would follow which no one could see any end of.” Indeed, the spiritual prosperity of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of the last five centuries, which in the circumstance has either had or not had the formal episcopacy, belies that claim. For many Lutheran synods today there would be no continuity in returning to the episcopal form of church rule. Though the church is free to have it, the church does not need the formal episcopacy as a grade above the Predigtamt, because God does not need it, as He has proved. God may govern his church by other structures and arrangements, or without any at all, by the preaching and teaching of the pure Word of God alone, which He has done.

This internal incoherence is also confirmed by a backward-looking confessional control, since this treatise is a commentary on the existing Symbols. Augsburg Confession XXVIII distinguishes the divine ministry of Word and Sacrament from humanly ordered polity and jurisdiction, denying that bishops possess by divine right the power to command ceremonies or to bind consciences apart from the Gospel. Indeed, the Latin text provides the consistent Lutheran understanding of the office of bishop, which coincides with New Testament teaching regarding the office of presbyter/overseer: nulla iurisdictio competit Episcopis, ut Episcopis, hoc est, his quibus est commissum ministerium verbi et sacramentorum, nisi remittere peccata. (According to the Gospel, or as they say, by divine right, no jurisdiction belongs to bishops as bishops—i.e., to those entrusted with the ministry of Word and Sacraments—except the remission of sins.”) Note well: All those entrusted with the ministry of Word and Sacraments are already bishops by divine right, which is the true gift of God (Ephesian 4:1). Any further ranking of them is a human arrangement, which is, by definition, unnecessary, for if those with human ranking above the presbyters fail to do their duty, then those who are truly bishops by divine right must do it themselves (ordain, judge doctrine, separate from errorists and heretics, carry out church discipline, etc.), as the history of the church has demonstrated. Nothing in AC XXVIII anticipates a “strong statement” that bishops as a grade above presbyters are necessary by divine right or otherwise; indeed, the very sort of necessity asserted in the objectiones adversariorum not surprisingly runs contrary to the article’s controlling distinction and argument.

Melanchthon’s own subscription to the Schmalkald Articles (1537) strengthens the coherence argument. There he speaks of papal “superiority over the bishops” as something that could be conceded iure humano for the sake of peace, on the condition that the Gospel be allowed—precisely the category AC XXVIII assigns to polity, not to the divine essence of the ministry:

“I, Philippus Melanchthon, hold these presented articles to be right and Christian. Regarding the Pope, however, I hold that if he were to allow the Gospel, for the sake of peace and common unity among those Christians who are already under him and those who might be in the future, his superiority over the bishops, which he otherwise holds by human right (iure humano), should also be granted by us.”

I submit: If papal superiority itself is not biblical and apostolic, but of human right, at what rank above the parish priests does the necessary, biblical and apostolic authority of bishops begin? Clearly, it is not within the authority of the Reformers to grant (von uns zugelassen sei) in Christian freedom what is already presupposed as necessary, biblical and apostolic, i.e., what “must be.”

The “Treatise on the Power and Primacy of the Pope” makes two points that matter directly here:

1) The distinction between “bishop” and “pastor/elder” is treated as a matter of human arrangement (Jerome is cited),

2) When bishops become enemies of the Gospel or refuse to ordain, “the churches retain their own right” to elect and ordain ministers, thus upholding the authority to appoint elders (Titus 1:5) with or without bishops, thus qualifying them as unnecessary.

Furthermore, in the 1543 Loci Communes Melanchthon asks:

“Is the church bound to the bishops and their colleges, which are said to hold the office of the ministry? Likewise, is [the church] bound to a regular succession of bishops and colleges? I reply: The church is bound to the very Gospel of God, because, in order that it may be proclaimed in the ministry, God raises up some men from time to time who teach correctly, as it says in Ephesians 4, even if, among these, some have more light, others less. But when the ministers or bishops or colleges or others teach things which are in conflict with the Gospel and the doctrine of the apostles, it is necessary to follow the rule of Paul: “If any one teach another Gospel, let him be accursed” [Gal. 1:8]. From this rule we can judge that the church is not bound to certain titles or a regular succession. For when those who hold the power of orders err, they must not be heeded. This statement is correct but unwelcome to political people who see disputes arising thence [and] therefore, with an eye on rulers and human states, transform the church by imitation into a kingdom.” (p. 132)

There is an even broader question of coherence in that Martin Chemnitz was in Wittenberg at the time of this faculty publication, under the tutelage and as the very protege of Melanchthon. Chemnitz, who later lectured in Wittenberg on Melanchthon’s Loci, years later published his own Loci Theologici (1592). In his treatment of Melancthon’s locus on the Church (XII) Chemnitz includes a similar expression of “the arguments by which the papalists try to prove their opinion regarding the authority and succession of bishops,” which the Lutherans had long since rejected, which sounds very much like the objectiones adversariorum of “The Wittenberg Reformation”:

“They [the opponents] use the simile of civil governments: ‘Just as no organized society or government among men can stand unless there are interpretations of the laws, opinions, and mandates with reference to place and office which have validity and authority, so since the church is certainly a community established with the divine and thus the best order, and since many controversies have arisen which of necessity require some decision; therefore, so that intolerable confusion is not brought into the church and that out of disagreement and arrogance and constant contradiction we do not produce schisms by which the church is disturbed and ultimately overturned, but that there might be an end to the contentions, it is imperative that we establish and retain in the church the authority of the orderly succession, so that to those who are in this orderly succession we can refer controversies, whenever and wherever they arise, and thus hear the leaders and obey them.’”

Chemnitz responds by not giving the papalist opinion the time of day:

“But the explanation of this argument concerning the difference between the church and the civil state has been dealt with at length and with such clarity in the Loci which discuss the kingdom of Christ and the kingdoms of the world, I think it superfluous to add anything more.” (Loci Theologici, II, p. 709)

In answer to the decree of the Council of Trent: “CANON VI. – If any one saith, that in the Catholic Church there is not a hierarchy by divine ordination instituted, consisting of bishops, priests, and ministers; let him be anathema,” Chemnitz, in his “Examination of the Council of Trent” (Part II, Section IV, p. 699ff), provides a thorough examination of the claim of the necessity of a graded episcopacy as biblical and apostolic—which had been rejected by the Church already in the time of Jerome—which the Lutherans had always rejected, even as they later rejected the corresponding article of the Augsburg Interim (Concerning the Supreme Bishop and Other Bishops): “But [Christ] has willed that they should be true bishops in their churches and dioceses by divine right, and that all Christians should be obedient to the supreme bishop, and each one to his own bishop in particular, as the Apostle says (Heb. 13): ‘Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls.’”

Chemnitz sums up the matter: “This is truly a strange artifice, that when they need to speak about the power of bishops, they make no mention whatever of the ministry of the Word and sacraments, but, after mentioning the anointing with chrism, and ordination, they add by a general conclusion that the bishops are able also to do many other things, namely maintain horses and dogs, if not harlots, exercise royal dominion, and similar episcopal duties. They pronounce the anathema if anyone holds that the power to ordain is held by the bishops in common with the presbyters . . .” (Examen, II, p.704)

Stephenson’s editorial surprise (“strong statement”) helps explain how a secondary, interpretive conclusion could become “received” in certain circles. But that reception does not alter the textual classification in CR or the faculty argument’s internal coherence. Where Stephenson’s editorial framing conflicts with a categorical classification in the CR apparatus, the proper procedure is to follow the critical edition’s apparatus unless a superior textual witness is produced and shown to overturn CR’s reading. Therefore, Stephenson’s editorial inference cannot be treated as authoritative over against the CR apparatus classification, and must be rejected.

Consequently, the Wittenberg Reformation’s “there must therefore be bishops” cannot be taken as Wittenberg’s programmatic Lutheran directive toward a mandatory episcopal polity. Such a claim ignores the textual apparatus of the primary source, the context of the sentence, and the entire text of the faculty treatise. Such a reading is incoherent, both in reference to the treatise’s argument, and within the body of Lutheran confessional and theological writings from that time from these very authors, and from those who followed them. It is really to base an argument for the necessity of grades of bishops on Roman Catholic, Tridentine, Interim theology and to raise a misreading of the 1545 faculty publication to confessional status.

It is true that we ought not to oppose the human arrangement of ecclesiastical oversight among those who bear the Office of the Ministry by divine right, those who are already genuinely bishops according to the Word of God. This arrangement, however, while commendable and potentially beneficial, is always established in Christian freedom by human right and utterly contingent upon a prior confessional association, which itself is de iure humano. Any particular arrangement, whether it be an episcopacy, a superintendency, an elected praesidium and subordinate offices, or whatever else the church might devise, no matter what its pedigree in church history, must not be described as biblical, apostolic and necessary. On the other hand, if there really must be bishops, then there must be bishops. Then the failure of the early Lutherans to retain or re-establish the episcopacy in all the Lutheran lands and territories was not just unfortunate, but deficient and unacceptable. If there really must be bishops as a grade above the presbyters, then a large segment of the Lutheran Church has subsisted for centuries with a defective polity, not pleasing to God. That, however, is not the faith and confession of the Evangelical Lutheran Church.

Pastor Gerhard Maag

Spring, 2026