"Every article of faith is a principle in itself and does not need to be proved by another article."

     Martin Luther at the Marburg Colloquy of 1529, according to Hermann Sasse, This is my body:  Luther's contention for the real presence in the sacrament of the altar (Minneapolis:  Augsburg, 1959), 261 (Hed[io], Coll[in], An[onymous]).  =WA 30.3, 141 (An[onymous], Coll[in]):

An.] Lutherus respondit:  Quemque articulum fidei sui ipsius principium esse, nec opus esse exemplo simili probari.

Coll.] Lutherus.  Non petimus principium, nam articulus fidei non probatur per articulum.

Anonymous]  Luther responded [that] every article of faith is its own [first] principle [(lit. a principle of itself)], and [that] it is not required [(nec opus esse) that it] be demonstrated by a comparable such [(exemplo simili)].  |  LW 38, 51:  Every article of faith is a principle in itself and does not need to be proved by a similar example.

Collin]  Luther:  We are not begging the question [(Non petimus principium, We are not in search—i.e. need—of a principle)], for [one] article of faith is not demonstrated by [another] article.  |  LW 38, 61:  We are not begging the question, for one article of faith is not proved by another.

=Walter Koehler, Das Marburger Religionsgeschpräch 1529:  Versuch einer Rekonstruktion (1929), __.  I was put onto this by Tom [G. A.] Hardt, "Keine Kirchengemeinschaft mit Häretikern!  (Nulla communicatio in sacris cum haereticis)," Lutherische Blätter 12, no. 65 (Juli 1960):  66 (62-83):  "Jeder Glaubensartikel ist sich selbst Prinzip und bedarf nicht des Beweises durch einen anderen."

     With this Luther was able to affirm the spiritual eating (manducatio spiritualis) so stressed by Zwingli and Oecolampadius without being compelled thereby—as if by an Oecolampadian "norm for the whole of [Christian] doctrine" rooted in the principle of justification by faith alone—to dispense with the doctrine of the Real Presence:  "Your argument implies this:  [that] because we affirm [(haben)] a spiritual eating, there is no need of a bodily.  I answer:  The spiritual eating we in no way deny.  Indeed, we everywhere teach and believe that it is necessary.  But by this can it not be established that the bodily is useless or unnecessary" (cf. the translation on p. 236 in Sasse).

     What he is arguing for here would seem to be an interpretation of the "This is my body" controlled by the mandatum (revelation) rather than a kind of rationalistic consistency.  And to that extent he may be right.  The consistency is surely to be sought in convenientia post factum alone (?).

'"The [ancient] catholic church was a confessional church whose harshness had nothing in common with the contemporary church of tolerance."

"The 'Great Church' invented by [Bishop Bo] Giertz and A history of the ecumenical movement 1517-1948 [(London:  S.P.C.K., 1954)] never existed.  The [ancient] catholic church was a confessional church [(Konfessionskirche)] whose harshness [(Schroffheit)] had nothing in common with a modern church of tolerance [(Toleranzkirche)].  The anathema [pronounced] against heretics and apostates was for it [(die alte Kirche)] a matter of real consequence [(eine Realität)].  Though small and inconsequential, it raised [high] the claim to be the sancta ecclesia catholica."

     Tom [G. A.] Hardt, "Keine Kirchengemeinschaft mit Häretikern!  (Nulla communicatio in sacris cum haereticis)," Lutherische Blätter 12, no. 65 (Juli 1960):  64 (62-83).  I know nothing about Prof. Hardt, who undoubtedly followed Luther in anathematizing the Roman Catholic Church.  But if so, then the anathema that he would reserve to confessional Lutheranism was, of course, also pronounced against it in the manner of that same "ancient church."