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The Apology of the Augsburg Confession was prepared by Philipp Melanchthon
Philipp Melanchthon

Philipp Melanchthon was a German professor and theologian, a significant character in the Protestant Reformation, a key leader of the Lutheran Reformation, and a friend and associate of Martin Luther....
 as a response to the Roman Catholic "Confutation of the Augsburg Confession" which was written to answer the Lutheran Augsburg Confession
Augsburg Confession

The Augsburg Confession, also known as the "Augustana" from its Latin name, Confessio Augustana, is the primary confession of faith of the Lutheran Church....
 after it was presented in 1530 at the Diet of Augsburg
Diet of Augsburg

The Diet of Augsburg were the meetings of the Reichstag of the Holy Roman Empire in the German city of Augsburg. There were many such sessions, but the three meetings during the Protestant Reformation and the ensuing religious wars between the Catholic emperor Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor and the Protestant Schmalkaldic League in the e...
. Melanchthon wrote this as a defense of the original Confession, and a refutation of this Confutation that Emperor Charles V
Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor

Charles V was ruler of the Holy Roman Empire from 1519 and, as Charles I of Spain, of the Spanish realms from 1516 until his abdication in 1556....
 had commissioned. The Book of Concord
Book of Concord

The Book of Concord or Concordia is the historic doctrine standard of the Lutheranism, consisting of ten creed documents recognized as authoritative in Lutheranism since the 16th century....
 includes it as a Lutheran confessional document.






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The Apology of the Augsburg Confession was prepared by Philipp Melanchthon
Philipp Melanchthon

Philipp Melanchthon was a German professor and theologian, a significant character in the Protestant Reformation, a key leader of the Lutheran Reformation, and a friend and associate of Martin Luther....
 as a response to the Roman Catholic "Confutation of the Augsburg Confession" which was written to answer the Lutheran Augsburg Confession
Augsburg Confession

The Augsburg Confession, also known as the "Augustana" from its Latin name, Confessio Augustana, is the primary confession of faith of the Lutheran Church....
 after it was presented in 1530 at the Diet of Augsburg
Diet of Augsburg

The Diet of Augsburg were the meetings of the Reichstag of the Holy Roman Empire in the German city of Augsburg. There were many such sessions, but the three meetings during the Protestant Reformation and the ensuing religious wars between the Catholic emperor Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor and the Protestant Schmalkaldic League in the e...
. Melanchthon wrote this as a defense of the original Confession, and a refutation of this Confutation that Emperor Charles V
Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor

Charles V was ruler of the Holy Roman Empire from 1519 and, as Charles I of Spain, of the Spanish realms from 1516 until his abdication in 1556....
 had commissioned. The Book of Concord
Book of Concord

The Book of Concord or Concordia is the historic doctrine standard of the Lutheranism, consisting of ten creed documents recognized as authoritative in Lutheranism since the 16th century....
 includes it as a Lutheran confessional document. It is the longest document in the Book of Concord
Book of Concord

The Book of Concord or Concordia is the historic doctrine standard of the Lutheranism, consisting of ten creed documents recognized as authoritative in Lutheranism since the 16th century....
 and offers the most detailed Lutheran response to the Roman Catholicism
Roman Catholic Church

The Roman Catholic Church, officially known as the Catholic Church is the world's largest Christianity Ecclesia , representing over half of all Christians and one-sixth of the world population....
, as well as the most detailed Lutheran explanation of the doctrine of justification.

Contents


The major sections of the Apology are listed below, along with the article of the Agusburg Confession that Melanchthon is defending.

1. Concerning Original Sin
Original sin

Original sin is, according to a doctrine in Christian theology, humanity's state of sin resulting from the Fall of Man. While the Old Testament and the New Testament, which frequently speak of the sinfulness of humans, do not contain the terms "original sin" or "ancestral sin", the doctrine expressed by these terms is claimed to be based on t...
 -- Article II

2. Concerning Justification
Justification (theology)

In Christian theology, justification is God's act of declaring or making a sinner righteousness before God. The concept of justification occurs in many books of the Old and New Testaments....
 -- Article IV

3. Concerning Love and the Fulfilling of the Law

4. Concerning the Church
Church Body

A local church is a Christian religious organization made up of a congregation, its members and clergy. They are organized more or less formally, with constitutions and by-laws, maintain offices, sometimes seek non-profit corporate status in the United States and often have state or regional structures....
 -- Articles VII and VIII

5. Concerning Repentance
Repentance

Repentance is a change of thought and action to correct a wrong and gain forgiveness from a person who is wronged. In religious contexts it usually refers to confession to God, ceasing sin against God, and resolving to live according to religious law....
 -- Article XII

6. Concerning Confession
Confession

The confession of one's sins is a religious practice important to many faiths, e.g., Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy....
 and Satisfaction
Absolution

Absolution is a traditional theological term for the forgiveness experienced in the traditional Churches in the Sacrament of Reconciliation....


7. Concerning the Number and Use of the Sacraments -- Article XIII

8. Concerning Human Traditions in the Church -- Article XV

9. Concerning the Invocation of Saints -- Article XXI

10. Concerning Both Kinds in the Lord's Supper
Eucharist

The Eucharist, also called Holy Communion or Lord's Supper and other names, is a Christianity sacrament commemorating, by consecrating bread and wine, the Last Supper, the final meal that Jesus Christ shared with his disciples before his arrest, and eventual crucifixion, when he gave them bread saying, "This is my body", and wine...
 -- Article XXII

11. Concerning the Marriage
Marriage

Marriage is a social, spirituality, or law union of individuals. This union may also be called matrimony, while the ceremony that marks its beginning is usually called a wedding and the married status created is sometimes called wedlock....
 of Priests -- Article XXIII

12. Concerning the Mass
Mass (liturgy)

The Mass is the Eucharistic celebration in the Latin liturgical rites of the Roman Catholic Church. The term is used also of similar celebrations in Old Catholic Churches, in the Anglo-Catholic tradition of Anglicanism, and in some largely High Church Lutheranism Lutheranism regions, including the Scandinavian and Baltic states countries....
 -- Article XXIV

13. Concerning Monastic Vows
Oath

An oath is either a promise or a statement of fact calling upon something or someone that the oath maker considers sacred, usually God, as a witness to the binding nature of the promise or the truth of the statement of fact....
 -- Article XXVII

14. Concerning Ecclesiastical Power -- Article XXVIII

He also refers to some of the other articles in the Augsburg Confession which did not require an extensive defense. These articles are I, III, XVI, XVII, XVIII, XIX, XX.

Textual Issues

The first edition of the Apology of the Augsburg Confession was published in Spring 1531. Melanchthon continued to revise it and issued a second edition in the Fall of 1531. Some scholars believe the second edition is the better edition of the Apology. The Lutheran Church's formal collection of confessions in the Book of Concord refer to the first edition of the Apology when it is quoted in the Solid Declaration of the Formula of Concord. The 1580 German edition of the Book of Concord used the translation of the Apology prepared by Justus Jonas
Justus Jonas

Justus Jonas was a Germany Protestant reformer.He was born at Nordhausen in Thuringia. His real name was Jodokus Koch, which he changed according to the common custom of German scholars in the sixteenth century, when at the University of Erfurt....
, who rendered it freely based on Melanchthon's further editing. The 1584 Latin edition of the Book of Concord uses the first edition of the Apology, following the decision made by the Luther estates and rulers at the Diet of Naumburg in 1560 to use only the first edition of the Augsburg Confession and the Apology of the Augsburg Confession.

Sources

  • Concordia Triglotta: Die symbolischen Bücher der evanglish-lutherischen Kirche. St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1921 . This book contains the first edition, the Quarto edition, and translates it from the Latin 1584 Book of Concord, putting in brackets the translation of material found in the Jonas German translation.
  • The Bekenntnisschriften is the critical edition of the Lutheran Confessions, offering the latest academic opinions of the various textual forms of the Lutheran Confessions.


External links

  • - bookofconcord.org
  • - Project Gutenburg


Translations

  • The Concordia Edition of the Lutheran Confessions contains a translation of the first edition, the Quarto edition.
  • The Kolb/Wengert Edition of the Lutheran Confessions contains a translation of the second edition of the Apology, the Octavo edition. The editors of the Book of Concord, rejected the Octavo text for inclusion in both authoritative editions of the Lutheran Confessions, the German edition of the Book of Concord from 1580 and the Latin edition of 1584.