As I mentioned last week, Martin Luther spent some significant time writing about what he referred to as the “three stands” or “estates” in which all people lived.
The first estate established by God was the Church. Now when you look at Scripture that might seem incorrect. After all, there is no church as we know it when we read the first couple of chapters. And we don’t have to go far to see God giving Adam a wife, and thus establishing the household and family. But Luther defines Church a little differently. He says that already in Gen. 2:16-17 when God addresses man and man responds, this is the establishment of the Church. This interaction and relationship between the two is what is truly defining- makes sense.
The next realm established then of course is the household. And we see that operate in a healthy way for a little bit. Man and woman are together. And we even see them given responsibility to work in the Garden. This would be an early establishment of economy and work which Luther mixed in with household. That made pretty good sense in an agrarian economy. After all, the family generally worked together. Today, things are a little different. Work is much more separated from household. How do you think this changes our perception of family and work, that they are almost separate “estates” today? How do you see them still connected?
Finally, Luther said God established the State. of course, the State was established only after the fall. Prefall, humans would have been able to work and cooperate without regulation and laws as we know them. Post-fall it is necessary to establish an order over human and neighbor interactions that deals with sinful nature.
Of course, that doesn’t make the State bad, it’s simply that it’s origin comes out of God’s response to sin. In reality, all three estates are corrupted by sin, and all three are also established and sanctified today by God. Now it’s generally easier for us to see God in the Church, and even in family, but perhaps less so in the State. But what this chapter reminds us is that all three are God’s realm. He is over all. That doesn’t mean that the State needs to be Christian, but that we need to recognize and hope for the State to express God’s will in the world for it’s purposes, to order realtionships and restrain sin.
Ok, so some interesting pieces here. It seems that today we think much more in a four estates sense than in the past, adding work as an estate. Do you see any others?
