The sort of person they call a Christian
First picture.
It is a young man — let us think of it so, reality furnishes examples in abundance — it is a young man, we can imagine him with more than ordinary ability, knowledge, interested in public events, a politician, even taking an active part as such.
As for religion, his religion is...that he has none at all. To think of God never occurs to him, any more than it does to go to church, and it is certainly not on religious grounds he eschews that; he almost fears that to read God's Word at home would make him ridiculous.
When it turns out that the situation requires him to express himself about religion and there is some danger in doing it, he gets out of the difficulty by saying, as is the truth, "I have no opinion at all, such things have never concerned me."
This same young man who feels no need of religion feels the need of being...paterfamilias. He marries, then he has a child, he is...presumptive father. And then what happens?
Well, our young man is, as they say, in hot water about this child; in the capacity of ...presumptive father he is compelled to have a religion. And it turns out that he has the Evangelical Lutheran religion.
How pitiful it is to have a religion in this way. As a man he has no religion; when there might be danger connected with having even an opinion about religion, he has no religion — but in the capacity of...presumptive father he has (risum teneatis!) that religion precisely which extols the single state.
So they notify the priest, the midwife arrives with the baby, a young lady holds the infant's bonnet coquettishly, several young men who also have no religion render the presumptive father the service of having, as godfathers, the Evangelical Christian religion, and assume obligation for the Christian upbringing of the child, while a silken priest with a graceful gesture sprinkles water three times on the dear little baby and dries his hands gracefully with the towel——
And this they dare to present to God under the name of Christian baptism. Baptism — it was with this sacred ceremony the Saviour of the world was consecrated for His life's work, and after Him the disciples,44 men who had well reached the age of discretion and who then, dead to this life (therefore were immersed three times, signifying that they were baptized into communion with Christ's death), promised to be willing to live as sacrificed men in this world of falsehood and evil.
The priests, however, these holy men, understand their business, and understand too that if (as Christianity must unconditionally require of every sensible man) it were so that only when a person has reached the age of discretion he is permitted to decide upon the religion he will have — the priests understand very well that in this way their trade would not amount to much. And therefore these holy witnesses to the truth insinuate themselves into the lying-in room, where the mother is weak after the suffering she has gone through, and the paterfamilias is...in hot water. And then under the name of baptism they have the courage to present to God a ceremony such as that which has been described, into which a little bit of truth might be brought nevertheless, if the young lady, instead of holding the little bonnet sentimentally over the baby, were satirically to hold a night cap over the presumptive father. For to have religion in that way is, spiritually considered, a pitiful comedy. A person has no religion; but by reason of family circumstances, first because the mother got into the family way, the paterfamilias in turn got into embarrassment owing to that, and then with the ceremonies connected with the sweet little baby — by reason of all this a person has...the Evangelical Lutheran religion.
Second Picture.
It is a tradesman. His motto is: Every man's a thief in his business. "It is impossible," says he, "to be able to get through this world if one is not just like the other tradesmen, who all pay homage to the maxim that every man is a thief in his business."
As for religion — well, really his religion is this: Every man's a thief in his business. He also has a religion in addition to this, and his opinion is that especially every tradesman ought to have one. "A tradesman," says he, "even if he has no religion, ought never to let that be noticed, for that may readily be harmful to him by casting possibly suspicion upon his honesty; and preferably a tradesman ought to have the religion which prevails in the land." As to the last point, he explains that the Jews always have the reputation of cheating more than the Christians, which, as he maintains, is by no means the case; he maintains that the Christians cheat just as well as the Jews, but what injures the Jews is the fact that they do not have the religion which prevails in the land. As to the first point, namely, the profit it affords to have a religion, with a view to the countenance it gives to cheating — with regard to this he appeals to what one learns from the priests; he maintains that what helps the priests to cheat more than any other class in society is precisely the fact that they are so closely associated with religion. If such a thing could be done, he would gladly give a good shilling to obtain ordination, for that would pay brilliantly.
So two or four times a year this man puts on his best clothes...and goes to communion. Up comes a priest, a priest (like those that jump up out of a snuffbox when one touches a spring) who jumps up whenever he sees "a blue banknote."45 And thereupon the priest celebrates the Holy Communion, from which the tradesman, or rather both tradesmen (both the priest and the honest citizen), return home to their customary way of life, only that one of them (the priest) cannot be said to return home to his customary way of life, for in fact he had never left it, but rather had been functioning as a tradesman.
And this is what one dares to offer to God under the name of the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, the Communion in Christ's body and blood!
The Sacrament of the Lord's Supper! It was at the Last Supper that Christ, Who from eternity had been consecrated to be the Sacrifice, met for the last time before His death with His disciples, who also were consecrated to death or to the possibility of death if they truly followed Him. Hence for all the festal solemnity it is so shudderingly true, what is said about His body and blood, about this blood-covenant which has united the Sacrifice with His few faithful...blood-witnesses, as they surely were willing to be.
And now the solemnity is this: to live before and after in complete worldliness — and then a ceremony. However, for good reasons the priests take care not to enlighten people about what the New Testament understands by the Lord's Supper and the obligation it imposes. Their whole business is based upon living off of the fact that others are sacrificed, their Christianity is, to receive sacrifices. If it were proposed to them that they themselves should be sacrificed, they would regard it as a strange and unchristian demand, conflicting violently with the wholesome doctrine of the New Testament, which they would prove with such colossal learning that the span of life of no individual man would suffice for studying all this through.
Translator's Footnotes
44As there is no evidence that the Apostles were baptized, S. K. uses the general term "disciples."
45The five-dollar bills were blue.