Luther's exposition of the Magnificat, Mary's song in Luke 1:46–55, was written in 1521, a year that saw him summoned to the Diet of Worms, placed under the imperial ban, and hidden at the Wartburg. He began the work before Worms and finished it in his confinement, and he dedicated it to the young Duke John Frederick of Saxony, nephew of the Elector who was protecting him. The dedication frames the commentary as counsel for a future ruler: a prince needs to know how God deals with the mighty, and nowhere, Luther says, is this set out more plainly than in the song of a poor girl from Nazareth. Luther translated the canticle into German himself and then worked through it phrase by phrase.
The heart of the exposition is Luther's reading of the line that God "regarded the lowliness of his handmaiden." He insists that lowliness here does not mean humility as a virtue Mary possessed and was aware of; it means her nothingness, her social and spiritual insignificance, which God simply looked upon. Mary magnifies God, not herself, and her song is pure praise for a grace that found no merit in her. From this Luther draws his characteristic theme: God works in the depths, among the despised, and his works run contrary to appearances. He gathers the song's claims into six works of God — mercy toward those who fear him, the scattering of the proud, the casting down of the mighty, the exalting of the lowly, the filling of the hungry, and the sending away of the rich with nothing — and treats each as a description of how God actually governs the world, with pointed application to princes. He distinguishes between those who love God for his gifts and those who love him for his goodness alone, and he holds up Mary as the model of the latter. Throughout, Luther keeps calling her the Mother of God and urges that she be honored, while warning sharply against any devotion that makes her the ground of hope or lets her obscure the one who did great things for her.
The work has endured because it holds together things later Protestant and Catholic readers often pulled apart: warm reverence for Mary and uncompromising insistence that all glory belongs to God. It is also one of the clearest short statements of Luther's theology of the cross applied to Scripture, politics, and the inner life at once, written while his own fate was unsettled. It remains among the most accessible and pastoral of his writings.
Who should read this: anyone wanting to pray the Magnificat with more understanding, preachers preparing for Advent, and readers curious how an early Reformer spoke about Mary. It is not for those seeking polemic against Catholic devotion or a systematic treatise; it is a devotional commentary, and it rewards slow reading more than argument.
The Magnificat
by Martin Luther
For Luther's exposition of Mary's song (Luke 1:46–55), written in 1520–21 for the young prince John Frederick of Saxony on how God regards the lowly.
Length About 28,400 words, about 2 hours.
Should I read this?
Luther's exposition of Mary's song (1521), written for Prince John Frederick, on how God regards the lowly and humbles the proud.
How it proceeds
Independent intensities, 0–5 — what the work is made of, not how good it is.
Luther's exposition of the Magnificat, Mary's song in Luke 1:46–55, was written in 1521, a year that saw him summoned to the Diet of Worms, placed under the imperial ban, and hidden at the Wartburg. He began the work before Worms and finished it in his confinement, and he dedicated it to the young Duke John Frederick of Saxony, nephew of the Elector who was protecting him. The dedication frames the commentary as counsel for a future ruler: a prince needs to know how God deals with the mighty, and nowhere, Luther says, is this set out more plainly than in the song of a poor girl from Nazareth. Luther translated the canticle into German himself and then worked through it phrase by phrase.
The heart of the exposition is Luther's reading of the line that God "regarded the lowliness of his handmaiden." He insists that lowliness here does not mean humility as a virtue Mary possessed and was aware of; it means her nothingness, her social and spiritual insignificance, which God simply looked upon. Mary magnifies God, not herself, and her song is pure praise for a grace that found no merit in her. From this Luther draws his characteristic theme: God works in the depths, among the despised, and his works run contrary to appearances. He gathers the song's claims into six works of God — mercy toward those who fear him, the scattering of the proud, the casting down of the mighty, the exalting of the lowly, the filling of the hungry, and the sending away of the rich with nothing — and treats each as a description of how God actually governs the world, with pointed application to princes. He distinguishes between those who love God for his gifts and those who love him for his goodness alone, and he holds up Mary as the model of the latter. Throughout, Luther keeps calling her the Mother of God and urges that she be honored, while warning sharply against any devotion that makes her the ground of hope or lets her obscure the one who did great things for her.
The work has endured because it holds together things later Protestant and Catholic readers often pulled apart: warm reverence for Mary and uncompromising insistence that all glory belongs to God. It is also one of the clearest short statements of Luther's theology of the cross applied to Scripture, politics, and the inner life at once, written while his own fate was unsettled. It remains among the most accessible and pastoral of his writings.
Who should read this: anyone wanting to pray the Magnificat with more understanding, preachers preparing for Advent, and readers curious how an early Reformer spoke about Mary. It is not for those seeking polemic against Catholic devotion or a systematic treatise; it is a devotional commentary, and it rewards slow reading more than argument.
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