We Have Got to Talk About Usury (Part XIV): After Luther—Spangenberg, Melanchthon, Brenz, Aepinus, Chemnitz, and Selnecker
Ludger tom Ring the Younger, Portrait of Martin Chemnitz, 1569.
The following post is the fourteenth in a series on usury by the Rev. Vincent Shemwell. Rev. Shemwell serves as pastor of Bethlehem Lutheran Church in Johnson City, Tennessee. He graduated from Concordia Theological Seminary in Fort Wayne with the M.Div. in 2022, and received his STM from CTSFW in 2024, writing his thesis on Johann Georg Hamann. The previous installments can be found below:
Part I: Introduction
Part II: The Old Testament
Part III: The New Testament
Part IV: The Church Fathers—Clement of Alexandria through Hilary of Poitiers
Part V: The Church Fathers — The Cappadocians
Part VI: The Church Fathers — Church Councils and Ambrose
Part VII: The Church Fathers—Chrysostom through Leo the Great
Part VIII: Medieval Theologians
Part IX: The Medieval Church Continued—Councils, Canon Law, Dante, and Other Matters
Part X: Luther—His First Foray, in Translation
Part XI: The Strauss Affair and Luther’s Long Sermon
Part XII: Luther on Why Pastors Must Preach against Usury
Part XIII: Miscellaneous Mentions by Luther and a Few Misconceptions
Shortly before Luther’s death, Johann Spangenberg, an early supporter of the Reformation and pastor at Nordhausen, wrote the following in his 1545 commentary Der Apostel Geschichte: Kurtze auszlegung—Für die jungen Christen, in Frage verfasset (pg. 190): “Dear friends, do you imagine that it causes no anguish to a preacher when he learns that within his own congregation, among the very sheep entrusted to his care, there are found open blasphemers, usurers, idle swindlers, misers, adulterers, profligate drunkards, and similar scoundrels? Have you not heard what God declared to the prophet: that He will require their blood at the hands of those who failed to preach and punish their sin?” Here Spangenberg alludes to Ezekiel 3:18, 20 and 33:6, 8, where the Lord warns His shepherds that they will be severely judged if they neglect to lead their flock according to His law and truth. Notably, in this brief catalog of scandalous sins demanding pastoral attention in 1545, Spangenberg includes usury. Perhaps he was inspired by Luther’s words half a decade prior in his public admonition to brother pastors.
Following Luther’s death, a growing number of exceptions were introduced to the long-standing prohibition against usury. These exceptions were, at least initially, well-intentioned and concerned only Zinskauf and similar contracts. In time, however, they came to be applied even to ordinary loans. Yet despite this widening permissiveness, several of Luther’s immediate disciples endeavored—albeit at times imperfectly—to remain faithful to his original teaching on usury.
Let us begin with the reformer’s chief disciple, Philip Melanchthon (1497–1560). Luther’s trusted colleague and theological systematizer, Melanchthon, first treated the prohibition against lending at interest in his most celebrated work, the Loci communes. This text underwent numerous revisions throughout his life; but in the very first edition, published in 1521, shortly after Luther’s two impassioned sermons on usury were published, the following passage appears under the section “Quid evangelium”: “To this pertains what has been decreed concerning usury: that money may be lent at interest to foreigners, not toward relatives. But now, since there are no longer any foreigners, as all are kinsmen, the charging of interest on a loan is universally forbidden.” For whatever reason, Melanchthon—later known to waver on crucial theological issues—removed this clear condemnation from subsequent editions.
This is not to suggest, however, that Melanchthon abandoned Luther’s position on interest-bearing loans. With respect to ordinary lending, he continued to uphold the traditional prohibition. In the passage cited above, by “the charging of interest on a loan,” he means any profit expected from a loan, that is, any sum demanded beyond the principal solely on account of the lending itself and not in compensation for an actual loss incurred due to the loan (i.e., interesse). This practice, together with Luther, Melanchthon consistently condemned as invariably sinful.
Where Luther and Melanchthon differed was in their respective treatments of Zinskauf and interesse. Luther tolerated Zinskauf contracts because he regarded them as genuine real estate transactions or rental arrangements rather than loans. For him, a just Zinskauf contract belonged to the realm of trade rather than finance, an arrangement grounded in tangible land and actual produce. Its success depended, in part, upon what God had rendered fruitful: the earth itself. In this sense, the returns were understood as being paid to the purchaser through God’s providential blessing of the land.
Over time, however, these contracts became increasingly divorced from agricultural property. Instead of “purchasing” rental income derived from the harvest of a specific parcel of land, lenders began to “purchase” income generated from the monetary resources of individual borrowers or entire borrowing communities. The transaction thus ceased to be anchored to real estate and became, in essence, an exchange of money for the promise of more money—that is, a legal artifice devised to exact payment for the use of money itself, the classic definition of usury. In such cases, Zinskauf contracts became virtually indistinguishable from interest-bearing loans. No longer grounded in the fruitfulness of the earth, they rested instead upon what is by nature sterile and intended merely for exchange. A long-accepted form of sale thereby became a disguise for finance.
This development deeply troubled Luther, whose limited toleration of Zinskauf did not extend to such problematic forms. He therefore insisted that a just Zinskauf contract must (1) be tied to real property; (2) involve both purchaser and seller in mutual need and shared risk; and (3) not exceed a rate of six percent. Even among Roman Catholics these property-less contracts remained controversial. In 1569, for example, Pope Pius V, in the papal bull Cum onus, declared that Zinskauf contracts had to be attached to “fruitful immobile goods specifically designated to pay returns,” otherwise they were inherently usurious (see Paolo Astorri’s “Early Modern Lutheran Theologians and the Redeemable Census,” in Studia Historica: Historia Moderna 44, no. 1 (2022): 53–76, at 56).
But on this issue, Melanchthon adopted a somewhat more permissive stance than either Luther or the later pope. In 1555, Augustus, Elector of Saxony, issued a territorial law forbidding lenders to profit from particular Zinskauf contracts at a rate exceeding five percent (Astorri, “Early Modern Lutheran Theologians,” 54). Throughout his life, Luther had fervently advocated for such civil intervention, though it came only after his death. Yet ironically, this same ordinance also gave formal sanction to Zinskauf contracts wholly detached from agricultural property. From that point onward, a number of Lutheran thinkers, including Melanchthon, exhibited an increasing tolerance toward these theologically suspect arrangements.
In defending this broader latitude, Melanchthon formulated a distinctive argument grounded in the doctrine of the two kingdoms. He maintained that God appoints the civil magistrate to regulate such contracts and that Christians are bound to obey civil authority insofar as obedience does not contradict Scripture. With respect to these questionable Zinskauf transactions, Melanchthon reasoned that although they bore a close resemblance to interest-bearing loans, if civil law permitted them, both purchasers and sellers might make use of them without burdening their consciences, provided the rates were not extortionately high. Even before the issuance of the 1555 law, he had written in his 1538 Philosophiae moralis epitome (133): “The following principle must be carefully observed: Christians may lawfully make use of contracts sanctioned by civil law and by the authority of the magistrate, that is, by a prudent and just judge or jurist. Christians may indeed avail themselves of political ordinances, which possess validity not only by reason but also by virtue of the magistrate’s authority, which God Himself has ordained.” Considering the manifestly usurious nature of these property-less Zinskauf contracts—finance cloaked in the form of trade—Melanchthon’s argument is not entirely compelling; yet it would be taken up and perpetuated by several later thinkers.
When it comes to interesse, Melanchthon was, for the most part, in agreement with Luther. To justify interesse, an actual and demonstrable loss had to be shown, and it could be charged only toward those capable of repaying it. Yet in his justification for certain cases of interesse, Melanchthon introduced a distinction that would ultimately prove crucial to defenses of interest-bearing loans. In his Prolegomena in Officia Ciceronis, published posthumously in 1562, he asserts that charitable lending is a matter of Christian duty and must never be undertaken for the sake of profit. He writes (Corpus Reformatorum XVI, 579): “Those who are members of the church ought to be free from grasping for profit and from usury; so that, if a pious man who is truly in need asks another for a loan, and the one not in need willingly lends it and receives back the same amount at the appointed time, he should demand nothing more, for God so commands concerning lending, which is a duty, that it be gratuitous and without deceit.”
Elsewhere, however, Melanchthon delineates another form of lending, one not necessarily governed by charitable obligation. In his 1545 Dissertatio de contractibus, he explains that certain loans, in which neither borrower nor lender is acting out of necessity or duty, may legitimately be undertaken for purposes of economic enterprise (CR XVI, 506). In such cases, he argues, interesse may be imposed when there are clear and reasonable grounds for doing so. This distinction, of course, stands in marked contrast to Luther’s conviction that lending ought always to arise from necessity and charity.
While Melanchthon’s distinction here pertains specifically to interesse, the logic underlying it appears to imply that Luke 6:35 applies exclusively to those in genuine need (i.e., specified cases of dutiful lending). In effect, he seems to open the possibility for lending to be conducted for profit, so long as it takes place within the sphere of commerce and among men of means. Even so, in the same text he cautions the reader, remarking that “he is no way defending those who practice lending as a profession for the sake of profit” (506). Nevertheless, later thinkers would develop his line of reasoning further, setting it in opposition to Luther’s firm rejection of commercial lending for gain and its inherent tendency to foster and embolden avarice.
Between Luther’s toleration of certain forms of Zinskauf—a toleration that, in retrospect, warrants scrutiny, especially given how readily such arrangements were severed from real property and thus rendered nearly indistinguishable from interest-bearing loans—and Melanchthon’s differentiation among classes of persons in lending, the groundwork was laid for some within the subsequent generations of Lutherans to construct theological defenses of lending at interest.
Still within the first generation, Johannes Brenz (1499–1570), in a sermon on Luke 6 published in 1541, makes a similar differentiation concerning classes of persons in lending. He writes (In evangelii quod inscribitur secundum Lucam, duodecim priora capita homiliae centum et decem, 183): “To begin, with respect to the meaning of these words, ‘Lend, hoping for nothing in return,’ it must be noted that, just as in loving, so also in lending two classes of people are set before us. For in the matter of loving one another, on the one hand the order of friends is set before us, and on the other, the order of enemies. If I turn myself to the order of enemies, then I am commanded to love my enemies. Will it then be the case that because I am commanded to love my enemies, I may not also love my friend? Certainly not! Indeed, I must also love my friend, not, of course, within the order of enemies (in which I find no friend), but within the order of friends. And each kind of love—love toward enemies as well as toward friends—must have its own proper conditions…. So likewise in lending with the two classes of people set before us: one is the class of the poor, possessing nothing; the other is that of the rich, or of those who possess lands and other earthly goods. If I turn myself to the class of the poor and destitute, and see their necessity, then it is certainly commanded that I lend, hoping for nothing in return. For this is what the law of Moses, the prophets, Christ, and the apostles continually instill; in fact, this is the very thing to which the nature of human reason itself leads and urges us: namely, that we should assist the necessity and want of our neighbor however we can, and that, from our abundance, we should supply the needs of others. But will it then follow that because it is commanded that I help the poor and lend freely, I may not use civil contracts with the rich and those who possess fields? Contracts in which equal values are exchanged? And must I also lend freely to the rich and to landowners without any expectation of repayment? By no means.”
“Just as in loving, where I am required to love my enemies if I turn to the order of enemies, but must nevertheless also love my friends, who stand on the other side, so also in lending, I am required to help the poor according to my ability, yet at the same time it is permitted me to make use of civil contracts with the wealthy and those who possess lands and other goods. And when I am dealing within that order, it is not required that I lend hoping for nothing, just as it is not required that I love enemies when I am within the order of friends, since among friends I have no enemies. Rather, what is required is what Paul writes: that no one oppress or defraud his brother in business (1 Thess. 4:6). For if it were not permitted a pious man to conduct civil business—to buy, to sell, and to receive equal value for equal value—then Paul would not only have forbidden fraud in business, but would have condemned the business itself. And in another place, he says (1 Cor. 7:30–31): ‘Those who buy as though they did not possess, and those who use this world as not misusing it.’ If the mutual contract of buying and selling, by which those who possess fields and goods deal with one another, were in itself impious, Paul would not merely correct the attitude of the buyer but would reject the buying itself…. So this is what we have said: when we come to the poor, their necessity must be relieved freely, without hope of return; but when we come to those who possess money, lands, or other goods, then it is not necessary to expose one’s goods for free, but it is permitted to use civil contracts in which equal value is rendered for equal value. Therefore, when it is said, ‘Lend, hoping for nothing in return,’ civil contracts are not being prohibited; only this is being commanded: that we assist the necessity of our neighbor.”
In this sermon, Brenz addresses the issue of Zinskauf contracts, including those no longer tied to real property. Although he, like Luther and Melanchthon, did not classify such contracts as loans in the strict sense (which is why he frames them in terms of trade), his defense departs from Luther’s universal application of Luke 6:35. Brenz maintains that the command to love one’s neighbor varies in application depending on whether one is dealing with an enemy or a friend, and he extends this logic to Christ’s command, “Lend, hoping for nothing in return.” Consequently, he contends, lending need not always serve exclusively charitable ends; it may also be undertaken for other economic purposes. In transactions involving the wealthy, Brenz insists that the governing text is not Luke 6:35 but 1 Thessalonians 4:6. In such cases, justice and reciprocity, rather than charity, are the guiding principles. Where Melanchthon had only parenthetically implied that Luke 6:35 applies uniquely to the poor, Brenz articulates the argument more explicitly. And it is not difficult to see how this line of thinking could be extended beyond Zinskauf contracts to ordinary lending, which in due course it was.
In the same sermon, Brenz essentially adopts the Melanchthonian argument concerning contracts and the doctrine of the two kingdoms. He claims that Scripture does not clearly define which contracts are sinful and which are not, and therefore it falls to the magistrates, as God’s appointed authority, to regulate these matters (184). Accordingly, like Melanchthon, Brenz allows Christians to engage in contracts so long as they are sanctioned by civil law. Yet such a view is tenable only if one assumes a valid distinction within Luke 6 and the biblical prohibition against usury. Otherwise, as Luther insists in his Long Sermon, civil permission cannot render righteous what God’s Word plainly condemns (LW 45:277).
Brenz’s contemporary, Johannes Aepinus (1499–1553), likewise upheld this distinction in lending and the related argument that Christians may make use of contracts authorized by magistrates. Yet in his In psalmum XV commentarius (1543), he introduces a third class of persons relevant to lending. He writes (27–28): “There are three classes of men in this life, and both the Lord and nature itself command that men of one class should help those of another, but with some difference and in a distinct manner. Some men are poor, who by the unavoidable necessity of poverty are driven to begging, and who are unable to repay what they receive. Others are temporarily indigent, who require the help of others for a time, although not perpetually; these at some point are able to return what they have received. Of the third class are those who possess property sufficient for themselves, who do not need the goods or resources of others for the preservation of their necessary comforts.”
Aepinus then contends that, with respect to the second class, one may expect the eventual return of the principal, though never anything in excess of it. But with the third class, i.e., those of substantial means, lending may be undertaken for profit, provided the contract accords with natural and civil law. In other words, Brenz developed the distinction to account for the return of the principal in certain cases, and Aepinus further developed it to make room for profit. Aepinus even deems it “a pernicious error to apply each of the Gospel’s commands indiscriminately to all orders and conditions of men,” as Luther had done (29). Rather, this third class must be treated distinctly, and from them profit may be sought, which, Aepinus argues, should not be labeled usury (31). Against Luther and the historic Christian position, he maintains that lending is not always governed solely by need and charity; it may also serve the purpose of generating profit.
Moreover, following Melanchthon and Brenz, Aepinus regards Scripture as silent on the question of which contracts are sinful and which are not. Since “Christ has neither established political governments nor enacted laws concerning human affairs and disputes—as His kingdom is not of this world—He obviously leaves the judgment of such matters to the magistrates” (28). Thus, in his view, the moral status of a contract depends both on the class of persons involved (32–33) and on whether the arrangement conforms to natural and civil law.
Turning now to the next generation of Lutherans, the so-called “second Martin”—who, as we shall see, proved far more faithful to the first—recognized no distinction between classes of persons in Luke 6. Martin Chemnitz (1522–1586) argued that in the principal biblical passages addressing usury—Psalm 15, Ezekiel 18, and Luke 6—Scripture establishes no distinction upon which the conscience may securely rely. In the Loci theologici, first published in 1591, he notes that “avarice is ingenious in finding pretexts,” a danger against which one must remain vigilant, particularly since “errors in this matter are exceedingly dangerous,” given the dreadful fate assigned to the usurer in Psalm 15 and Ezekiel 18 (1653 ed., II, 162).
Addressing the “imagined” distinction introduced by Melanchthon and further advanced by Brenz and Aepinus, Chemnitz writes (165–66): “But against these and all other similar reasonings there stands this simple, firm, and solid foundation: If Scripture, in its description of usury, had established such a distinction—that when something beyond the principal is demanded from a poor man it is a sin, but when from a rich man it is a lawful and pious thing—then the answer would be plain enough. But as it is, Scripture condemns usury in general and without qualification, meaning every excess demanded on a loan beyond the principal, without distinction, from whomever it is taken, as in Psalm 15:5, Ezekiel 18:8, and Luke 6:35. Therefore, since God judges according to the revealed Word, the conscience can by no means be certain if, without the clear Word of God, it invents such a distinction for itself. For whatever arguments may be devised, these general sentences will always stand against them: ‘He who does not put out his money for usury,’ etc. And as to the fact that in certain testimonies explicit mention is made of the poor, it is for the same reason that in the fifth and seventh commandments widows, orphans, and the poor are often mentioned, namely, that injury should not be done to them in particular. However, it does not then follow that injury should be inflicted on married people, adults, the powerful, or the wealthy…. So whatever is demanded beyond the principal on a loan is usury…. And this Scripture forbids in general … simply and universally.”
Chemnitz takes considerable care to demonstrate through his exegesis that the Hebrew text offers no basis for any supposed differentiation (162). More intriguingly, he argues that in Matthew 5 and Luke 6 Christ explicitly repudiates such legalistic distinctions. Just as Jesus rebuked the Pharisees for their exploitation of the civil toleration of divorce, so too He reproved the Jews for continuing to posit a distinction between Israelites and foreigners in lending. The certificate of divorce had been permitted because of the hardness of the Israelites’ hearts (Matt. 19:8), in order to prevent even greater sin; and Chemnitz proposes that Christ’s teaching in Matthew 5 and Luke 6 follows the same pattern. Israelites had once been allowed to charge interest to foreigners due to their hardness of heart, yet this practice nonetheless went against God’s will. He writes (160): “It is argued that because Moses, in the laws concerning lending and usury, makes a distinction between one’s neighbors or brothers and the foreigners, therefore the will of God is satisfied if only friends are supported through the charitable service of lending; but it is no sin, they say, if others are drained through usury. But Christ, Who was sent not that He should be a political lawgiver, but that He should instruct the conscience before God by the revelation of His eternal and immutable will, says that, in the court of conscience, the distinction between the neighbor and the foreigner, which once had its place in civil society, no longer holds; rather: ‘Give to him who asks of you,’ whether he be friend or foe. And concerning ordinary lending, whether to the poor or to the rich, to friends or to enemies, He says: ‘Lend, hoping for nothing in return.’ Thus, just as the law concerning the certificate of divorce has been politically abolished, so the same should be the case with the distinction concerning usury.”
Chemnitz maintains not only that the conscience cannot be certain of any distinction in Luke 6, but also that the broader context suggests that Jesus is, if anything, rejecting such differentiation altogether. In his judgment, the distinction proposed by Melanchthon and elaborated upon by Brenz and Aepinus amounts to little more than avarice seeking a pretext to justify itself. And so, following Luther, Chemnitz affirms that Luke 6:35 applies universally. He further agrees with Luther that usury is chiefly a first commandment issue—something Melanchthon, Brenz, and Aepinus either overlooked or minimized. He writes (161): “In Psalm 15 we are clearly shown how usury is at variance with the first commandment: ‘Lord, who may abide in Your tabernacle? Who may dwell in Your holy hill? … He who does not put out his money at usury.’”
Since usury is, at its core, a first commandment issue, Chemnitz underscores that the true sin in lending lies in idolatry and mammonism, that is, in the intention to profit (162): “The definition of Christ is this: ‘He who gives a loan with the intention of profit is a usurer.’ For when He says, ‘Lend, hoping for nothing in return,’ He reveals that kind of profit-seeking motivation by which a person would not otherwise have been willing to lend.” In other words, Luke 6:35 requires that lending proceed from charity, for lending is an opportunity for good works not self-enrichment. God provides, and one ought not attempt to provide for himself in ways that run contrary to God’s law or that threaten to substitute the love of money for the love of God.
Still, the fact that lending must arise from charity does not render considerations of justice irrelevant. Brenz and Aepinus stressed justice and reciprocity; Chemnitz also attends to these concerns. For instance, in cases of interesse, where a lender suffers a demonstrable loss, any borrower capable of making compensation is obliged to do so, for he, too, “must never seek to enrich himself by the loss of the one from whom he has received the free favor of a loan” (168). Similarly, when addressing an antidoron—or a gift offered after the loan has been repaid—Chemnitz writes (168): “If the borrower, by the use of another’s money, has gained for himself or has escaped some great loss, then surely, by the duty of gratitude and by the mutual regard of charity, he is bound to make a gift in return.” Such a gift cannot constitute the basis of the loan, nor may it be anticipated at the outset by the lender; yet justice obliges a borrower who has benefited and is able to demonstrate gratitude to do precisely that.
In view of these considerations, Chemnitz allows that justice has its place and he is even willing to acknowledge Aepinus’ three classes of men, though he finds no biblical warrant for the distinction itself. But even here, regarding the third class of men making use of Zinskauf contracts, he insists that charity must remain primary, while justice and reciprocity are secondary considerations (164–65). The law of justice, he contends, never grants anyone the right to profit from lending itself, which God intends to be wholly gratuitous (169). This is why Chemnitz asserts that lending for economic gain should never be a profession. He writes (165): “Whoever has money and is able to engage in lawful forms of trade by which he could sustain himself, yet prefers to profit from lending because he regards that method as easier and involving less labor and risk, sins against the doctrine of the sharing of goods, in which God wills that charity be exercised, not so that one alone should enjoy the benefit while others bear the labor and the dangers.” By “lawful forms of trade,” Chemnitz appears to exclude Zinskauf contracts severed from property and produce, as Luther had done before him. Instead, he is referring to investments in tangible, productive goods, things made fruitful by God’s own providence, in which both profit and risk are mutually borne.
In concluding his treatment of usury in the Loci, Chemnitz addresses two common objections, which merit quotation (170): “It is argued that political society, given the present character of men’s morals, cannot exist without usury. For the use of another’s money is both in general necessary and especially so for maintaining commerce. And no one is willing to lend gratuitously. Therefore, lending at interest must be tolerated. I answer: By this argument the whole of Scripture could be overthrown. For the world does not wish to walk in the way of God’s commandments. Shall we therefore say that all those things which are plainly condemned in Scripture are not sins? … Furthermore, it is often said that a great benefit is conferred upon those to whom money is given at interest; for many in this way become rich. Therefore, it should be considered a work of charity. I answer: One must not call that a benefit or a work of charity which so clearly stands against the commandments of God.”
In short, Chemnitz regarded lending at interest as fundamentally a first-commandment issue and held that Scripture offers no distinction among persons when prohibiting usury. For him, it follows that God wills lending to be wholly gratuitous and that both lender and borrower should act out of necessity and charity, bearing the law of justice in mind when it comes to interesse and antidora. Concerning gain, Chemnitz observes that God has provided other lawful avenues for profit, avenues not dependent upon money itself, which is by nature sterile and unproductive. The pursuit of profit, moreover, is not to be the aim of the Christian life; rather, this life is to be marked by faith and the practice of good works, for which lending freely affords abundant opportunity.
Before concluding this part of our series, I would like to cite one final thinker from Chemnitz’s generation. Nikolaus Selnecker (1530–1592), a student of Melanchthon who, along with Chemnitz, was a principal author of the Formula of Concord, issued the following warning in his 1565 Paedagogiae christianae (204): “Today Germany is being suffocated by the crime of usury, as are other nations. And there is grave reason to fear that this evil may, in the end, bring Germany to ruin, although presently the whole world laughs heartily when such things are suggested. For example, there was that affluent merchant who once quipped when Luther wrote against usury: ‘What is that fine fellow and theologian doing? He ought to be commending this business to me, for I practice usury and know perfectly well what it is and what it accomplishes for me.’ Thus, there is no shortage of cunning men who seek out subterfuges and, for the most part, put forward objections as though they were somehow legitimate defenses.”
Luther was right; so too was Chemnitz and Selnecker. Avarice is ingenious in finding pretexts. May we always keep that in mind.
God willing, in the next part of our series, we will take up Aegidius Hunnius and Gerhard, the latter of whom, contra Chemnitz, extended the distinction introduced by Melanchthon and developed by Brenz and Aepinus, applying it beyond Zinskauf contracts to lending in general. Whether this distinction constitutes a mere crafty pretext, or whether, as Aepinus argued, failing to make this distinction constitutes “a pernicious error,” I leave to your judgment, dear reader.
Stay tuned.