Here is a glorious passage from Luther’s Genesis commentary explaining Jacob’s Ladder.
Here’s a video of me teaching this passage in the Worldwide Bible Study.
But this is Jacob’s dream: A ladder has been placed on the earth—a ladder which touches heaven with its top. On it the angels are ascending and descending. And the Lord Himself is reclining on the top of the ladder and is speaking that promise to this third patriarch. He is not speaking through a man. No, He Himself is speaking, a fact which, as we have stated, should be carefully observed in the histories of the fathers.
Moreover, the ladder is a picture or an image, as it were, that has to have a meaning. For the angels are spirits and fire, as we read in Ps. 104:4: “Who makest Thy angels spirits and Thy ministers a flaming fire.” Therefore they have no need of a ladder on which to ascend or descend. Much less does God Himself have need of a ladder to recline on when He has to speak to Jacob, the heir of the promise. But the images and pictures suggested by this ladder have been explained in various ways, and it is not worthwhile to gather and recount them all.
Lyra says that the rungs refer to the patriarchs who are enumerated at the beginning of Matthew’s Gospel in the genealogy of Christ. For both sides indicate that Christ descends from sinners as well as from righteous men. The angels, he says, refer to the revelation of the incarnation of Christ—the revelation which took place through the fathers, the prophets, and the apostles. He interprets the ascent as the devotion of the saints when they pray. This thought is not irreverent. But it does not seem to be the principal explanation of allegory.
The Glossa ordinaria interprets the ascending angels as the blessed angels who minister to God in heaven. Then it interprets the descending angels as those who do so to minister to men, as is written in Hebrews (1:14): “Are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to serve, for the sake of those who are to obtain salvation?” And in Dan. 7:10 we read: “A thousand thousands served Him; and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before Him.”
Gregory calls the angels preachers who give thought to Christ when they ascend and later, when they descend to the church, serve the members of the church. But who could enumerate all the speculations? Although they are godly, yet, like many things in the fathers, they have not been expressed at the right time or at the right place. It is true that a preacher must first ascend through prayer in order to receive the Word and doctrine from God. He should also study, learn, read, and meditate. Later he should descend and teach others. These are the twin duties of priests: to turn to God with prayer but to turn to the people with doctrine. But these matters should be left where they belong.
But because mention is made of this ladder in the first chapter of the Gospel of John, we should look rather at that text. For there the Lord Himself seems to interpret this picture. When Philip brings Nathanael to Christ, he says: “Behold, an Israelite indeed!” (John 1:47.) Here, as Augustine says, he reminds us of that ladder of Jacob, who is also called Israel. This is what Christ says (John 1:50): “Because I said to you: ‘I saw you under the fig tree,’ do you believe? You shall see greater things than these.” And He adds (v. 51): “Truly, truly, I say to you: ‘You will see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.’ ” We should believe and be content with this explanation of our Savior; for He has a better understanding than all other interpreters, even though they agree properly in this point, that this dream signified that infinite, inexpressible, and wondrous mystery of the incarnation of Christ, who was to descend from the patriarch Jacob, as God says: “In your seed, etc.” Therefore He revealed to Jacob himself that he would be the father of Christ and that the Son of Man would be born from his seed. God did not speak this in vain. Indeed, He painted that picture of the ladder to comfort and console Jacob in faith in the future blessing, just as above (Gen. 22:18) He gave the same promise to Abraham and Isaac in order that they might teach and transmit it to their descendants as certain and infallible, and expect a Savior from their own flesh. In this way God strengthens Jacob, who, like the useless trunk of a tree, is wretched and afflicted in a foreign land; and by means of this new picture He transfers to him all the blessings, to assure him that he is this patriarch from whom the Seed promised to Adam will come.
Therefore we must understand the angels in their proper meaning, as Christ calls them in John 1:51, where He speaks of them as “the angels of God,” that is, the blessed ones. They ascend and descend on Christ or upon Christ. The LADDER signifies the ascent and the descent that are made by means of the ladder and by means of the rungs. If you remove the ladder, it signifies nothing else than the ascent and the descent. The angels, however, do not use a physical ladder or an imaginary one. Nevertheless, there is an ascent and a descent, that is, an angelic ladder, so to speak. This is the principal meaning, just as Christ Himself explains the descent and the ascent of the angels upon the Son of Man without a ladder.
But what is this ascent and descent? I reply that it is this very mystery that in one and the same Person there is true GOD and man. Accordingly the unity of the Person fulfills this mystery. And we, who believe, fulfill the Word of Christ (John 1:51): “You will see … the angels … ascending and descending.” For we believe in the one Lord, His only-begotten Son, born of the Virgin Mary, true God and man. This mystery is so great, so grand, so inexpressible, that the angels themselves cannot marvel at it enough, much less comprehend it. But, as is stated in 1 Peter 1:12, these are “things into which angels long to look.” For angels cannot rejoice and marvel enough at that inexpressible union and unity of the most diverse natures which they do not reach either by ascending or by descending. If they lift up their eyes, they see the incomprehensible majesty of God above them. If they look down, they see God and the Divine Majesty subjected to demons and to every creature.
These are marvelous things: to see a man and the lowliest creature humbled below all, to see the same creature sitting at the right hand of the Father and raised above all the angels, and to see Him in the bosom of the Father and soon subjected to the devil, as is stated in Ps. 8:5: “Thou hast made Him a little lower than the angels.” Likewise in Eph. 4:9: “He had descended into the lower parts of the earth.” This is a wonderful ascent and descent of the angels, to see the highest and the lowest completely united in one and the same Person, the highest God lying in the manger. Therefore the angels adore Him there, rejoice, and sing: “Glory to God in the highest” (Luke 2:14). On the other hand, when they consider the lowliness of the human nature, they descend and sing: “And on earth peace.”
When we see the same thing in the life to come, we, too, shall feel and speak far differently from the way we feel and speak now. For now these are things such as the angels do not comprehend. Nor can they be satisfied. Indeed, they always desire to look into this inexpressible goodness, wisdom, kindness, and mercy poured out upon us when that Person, who is the highest and is terrible in His majesty above all creatures, becomes the lowest and most despised. We shall see this wondrous spectacle in that life, and it will be the constant joy of the blessed, just as it is the one desire and joy of the angels to see the Lord of all, who is the same as nothing, that is, the lowest.
We carnal and ignorant human beings do not understand or value the magnitude of these things. We have barely tasted a drink of milk—not solid food—from that inexpressible union and association of the divine and the human nature, which is of such a kind that not only the humanity has been assumed, but that such humanity has been made liable and subject to death and hell yet in that humiliation has devoured the devil, hell, and all things in itself. This is the communion of properties. GOD, who created all things and is above all things, is the highest and the lowest, so that we must say: “That man, who was scourged, who is the lowest under death, under the wrath of God, under sin and every kind of evil, and finally under hell, is the highest God.” Why? Because it is the same Person. Although the nature is twofold, the Person is not divided. Therefore both things are true: the highest divinity is the lowest creature, made the servant of all men, yes, subject to the devil himself. On the other hand, the lowest creature, the humanity or the man, sits at the right hand of the Father and has been made the highest; and He subjects the angels to Himself, not because of His human nature, but because of the wonderful conjunction and union established out of the two contrary and unjoinable natures in one Person.
This, therefore, is the article by which the whole world, reason, and Satan are offended. For in the same Person there are things that are to the highest degree contrary. He who is the highest, so that the angels do not grasp Him, is not only comprehended but has been comprehended in such a way, is so finite, that nothing is more finite and confined, and vice versa. But He is not comprehended except in that Word as in breasts in which milk has been set forth and poured. Faith takes hold of this Word, namely, “I believe in the Son of God, our Lord Jesus Christ, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary (these are the breasts), suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried; He descended into hell; the third day He rose from the dead; He ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty, after subjecting all the angels to Himself.” Here there is God and man, the highest and the lowest, infinite and finite in one Person, emptying and filling all things.
This, then, is the ascent and descent of the angels of God and of the blessed, who look on this, pay attention to it, and proclaim it, as can be seen on the day of the nativity. They descend as though there were no God up in heaven. They come to Bethlehem and say: “Behold, I announce great joy to you, The Lord has been born for you” (cf. Luke 2:10–11). And in Heb. 1:6 we read: “When He brings the First-born into the world, He says: ‘Let all God’s angels worship Him.’ ” They adore Him as He now lies in the manger at His mother’s breasts. Indeed, they adore Him on the cross, when He descends into hell, when He has been subjected to sin and hell, when He bears all the sins of the whole world. And they submit themselves forever to this lowest One. Thus, therefore, the angels ascend and see the Son of God, who is begotten from eternity. On the other hand, they descend when they see Him born in time of Mary. And whether ascending or descending, they adore Him.
This is how Christ explains this ladder. I regard this as the chief and proper explanation of this passage. And this is that great and indescribable dignity of mankind which no one can express, namely, that by this wonderful union God has joined the human nature to Himself. Ambrose and especially Bernard take great pleasure in this passage, which is exceedingly delightful, and in this work of the incarnation.27 And it is right and godly for them to do so. For this pleasure will be a joy above all joy and will be eternal blessedness when we truly behold there our flesh, which is like us in all respects in the highest as well as the lowest place. For He did all this for us. He descended into hell and ascended into heaven. This sight the angels enjoy forever in heaven, and this is what Christ means when He says (Matt. 18:10): “Their angels always behold the face of My Father who is in heaven.” They look constantly at the divinity. And now they descend from heaven after He has been made man. Now they look upon Christ and wonder at the work of the incarnation. They see that He has been made man, humiliated, and placed on His mother’s lap. They adore the man who was crucified and rejected, and they acknowledge Him as the Son of God.
Bernard loved the incarnation of Christ very much. So did Bonaventure. I praise these men very highly for the sake of that article on which they reflect so gladly and brilliantly, and which they practice in themselves with great joy and godliness. Bernard thinks and imagines piously enough that the devil fell because of that envy on account of which he begrudged men such great dignity, namely, that God would become man. For he thinks that when Satan was a good angel in the sight of God, he saw that one day the divinity would descend and take upon itself this wretched and mortal flesh and would not take upon itself the nature of angels. Moved by that indignity and envy, thinks Bernard, the devil raged against God, with the result that he was thrown out of heaven. These thoughts of Bernard are not unprofitable, for they flow from admiration for the boundless love and mercy of God. The devil was a very handsome angel and a decidedly outstanding creature. But when he saw that it had been predetermined that God would assume human nature and not the nature of the angels, he was inflamed with envy, anger, and indignation against God for not being willing to take him, who was a most handsome spirit, and for not being able to become a participant in the divinity and in such great majesty. It pained him that that wretched mass of human flesh had to be preferred to himself; for he thought that all this became him better than it did this sinful flesh, which is liable to death and all evils.
And, what is most surprising, this opinion crept into the Alcoran, no matter who the author or what the occasion, was. It certainly seems that the devil himself suggested to the author of the Alcoran that good angels became demons because they refused to adore Adam.29 Satan could not conceal this sin of his. Therefore he imposed it on this instrument of his to stir up hatred against God. He distorted the true cause of the Fall, as though the angels were compelled to adore Adam, that is, a creature, and that when they refused, they were hurled headlong from heaven and became angels.
This is almost in agreement with what Bernard imagined, and by what he himself points out the devil betrays in what respect he sinned. He wanted to be like God. When he saw that it would come to pass that GOD would lower Himself in such a way that He would assume man, he thought that this honor most properly suited him. This is how the ancients understand the well-known passage in Is. 14:13. They refer it to this fall and sin of the devil. The passage reads as follows: “You said in your heart: ‘I will ascend to heaven; above the stars of God I will set my throne on high.’ ” For then he would truly have become like God if God had assumed him into the unity of His Person as He assumed man. The fact that the humanity has now been assumed makes this man the Son of God, because He is one Person. This man born of the Virgin Mary is God Himself, who created heaven and earth. The angel would have been adorned with the same glory if the Son of God had become inangelate, so to speak, and had taken up that most beautiful spirit. For then it would have been said: “That Lucifer is true God, the Creator of heaven and earth.”
This, says Bernard, is what the devil seems to have sought to achieve. But when he had been repulsed, he was inflamed with great hatred, wrath, and envy against God for honoring the human nature in this way with the divine nature and because he himself was compelled to adore the human nature in the divinity. This is the origin of that hatred and rage of the devil and the world by which he plots and sets in motion the destruction of our nature with whatever darts and devices he can, for it is the height of his monstrous hatred against the Seed of the woman, the Son of God. It is He who is involved. It is an ancient and inveterate hatred, conceived and rooted in heaven, so that it can never be eradicated. Accordingly, the ladder is the wonderful union of the divinity with our flesh. On it the angels ascend and descend, and they can never wonder at this enough. This is the historical, simple, and literal sense.
Luther, Martin. 1999. Luther’s Works, Vol. 5:215-223 (Lectures on Genesis: Chapters 26-30. Edited by Jaroslav Jan Pelikan, Hilton C. Oswald, and Helmut T. Lehmann. Vol. 5. Saint Louis: Concordia Publishing House.)
