John William Baier's _Compendium of Positive Theology_ Edited by C. F. W. Walther Published by: St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1877 [Translator's Preface. These are the major loci or topics of John William Baier's _Compendium of Positive Theology_ as edited by Dr. C. F. W. Walther. These should be seen as the broad outline of Baier-Walther's dogmatics, but please don't assume that this is all. Each locus usually includes copious explanatory notes and citations from patristics and other Lutheran dogmaticians. Chapter Fifteen On the political magistrates. 1. Another state, which has a place in the church, is the state of those, who, being powerful in civil power, preside over others and to such an extent that they have been entrusted with the care of the public welfare, and they are commonly called magistrates. 2. The efficient cause of the office of magistrate both in itself, and as far as they are borne and administered by a certain person, is the Triune God and Christ according to his human nature. 3. The office of magistrate is entrusted to certain persons by God either immediately and with no arbitrary works of humans interceding, or mediately or by interceding plans of humans and their voluntary works, either through election, or through succession, or through legitimate occupation. 4. The power and office of magistrates it directed towards everything that the health of the republic depends on, to things both civil and sacred, however those are dealt with in different ways. 5. Civil things in themselves are subordinate to the power of the magistrate, so that he is able to admonish and to arrange all things for his judgement, and he does these things in accordance with natural and divine law. 6. However, that which pertains to sacred things, indeed the dogmas of faith in themselves are not under the power of the magistrate, also from those divinely written actions, which are common to all Christians, the magistrates themselves are to observe and cultivate, those which are truly appropriate to the ministry to the church, he not to claim those to himself but leave them to the church. However just as they are accustomed to reckon with the sacred things all the rest, which are appointed to the worship of God and they will do them either for the conservation of true religion or for the renewal of true religion when it is collapsed. Thus it is known, that those things in their way are named as under the power of the magistrate. 7. The duty itself of the magistrate is customarily discussed in terms of legislating, judging and punishing. 8. Especially, as far as the care of sacred things is concerned, it pertains to the magistrate, to establish suitable servants of the church, to erect and preserve schools and churches, to provide for ministers an honest support; to institute visitations and councils, to write and guard ecclesiastical laws; to dispense ecclesiastical property; to preserve ecclesiastical discipline; to inquire into heretics, and likewise into inferior servants of the churches and schools and other individuals of whatever similar kinds there may be and, to compel them to stand for judgement; to punish those convicted of heresy or crimes; to abrogate heretics and idolatrous cults which are manifest and condemned by the church, and, so that the church is purged from them, to care etc. 9. However the magistrate, in those sacred things which are under civil power, ought to make use of the council of the honorable doctors and pastors of the church. 10. Because the Christian magistrate, besides the legislative and judicial power, also has an avenging power, or by punishing the contentious, it is certain that this power extends also to the capital punishment of criminals. 11. Also a magistrate is able to wage war against the unjust power of the enemy which tries to subdue the innocent and the whole republic, repelling the enemy and guarding both religion and liberty and possessions. 12. However the magistrate is to be carefully warned, 1. that he should not approach war, as long as more mild means are possible, nor 2. to war to fill up his desires, but only for the cause of the public welfare and tranquility, and finally 3. not to wage war unless by means of legitimate modes and means. 13. A correlate to the supreme magistrate are his subjects and by this name all are understood that is contained in the republic, not however that they are the same as the magistrate, nor is the difference between lay and clergy abolished. 14. And indeed subjects are obligated to apply to the magistrates honor, obedience, tribute, and requests for the welfare of those same magistrates. 15. The nearer end of the civil magistrate is the public welfare, the ultimate is the glory of God. 16. It is possible to define a magistrate as abstractly conceived, that it is a public office, ordained by God, in which certain persons legitimately called and equipped with power about things civil and likewise sacred in the republic, bring forth laws, exercise justice and punish transgressors, defend the republic against external enemies, for the cause of the public welfare. 17. It is possible to define a magistrate concretely, that it is a person or a group of persons divinely called and equipped with power about civil and sacred things to make laws, to exercise judgment and to punish the contentious, and then to defend civil society, for the cause of the public welfare. -------------------------------------------------------------- This text was translated by Rev. Theodore Mayes and is copy- righted material, (c)1996, but is free for non-commercial use or distribution, and especially for use on Project Wittenberg. Please direct any comments or suggestions to: Rev. Robert E. Smith of the Walther Library at Concordia Theological Seminary. E-mail: smithre@mail.ctsfw.edu Surface Mail: 66000 N. Clinton St., Ft. Wayne, IN 46825 USA Phone: (260) 452-3149 Fax: (260) 452-2126 --------------------------------------------------------------