Text extracted by BackToLuther from original book by Roy Suelflow by OCR. Much verification work has been done so that this is a relatively correct rendition of original. Surely a few errors remain. See the original blog post here for downloadable PDF scan of original book to for verification purposes. At some point I may add hyperlinks to the Contents and footnotes, possibly also an Index. But for now, the simple text with original page numbering will suffice.
Last edit on November 3, 2014.
Correspondence
of
C. F. W. Walther
Translated, edited, and annotated by
Roy A. Suelflow
Concordia Seminary St. Louis, Missouri
Copyright 1980
Roy A. Suelflow
CONTENTS
Preface
27 February 1843 p. 1
14 May 1843 p. 6
Walther Letter of Introduction to Kluegel
9 November 1843 p. 10
17 August 1843 p. 11
19 January 1846 p. 20
29 October 1850 p. 24
A GUTACHTEN of C. F. W. Walther
1850 p. 28
2 January 1845 p. 30
19 March 1849 p. 40
25 January 1858 p. 45
7 May 1861 p. 57
Walther, Lange, Saxer, Schick to Gustav Seyffarth
15 October 1859 p. 59
17 June 1862 p. 60
16 May 1866 p. 63
4 December 1869 p. 66
30 May 1872 p. 69
6 January 1873 p. 71
3 December 1873 p. 73
21 July 1876 p. 75
22 January 1878 p. 77
23 May 1878 p. 79
19 June 1881 p. 81
7 August 1878 p. 83
Walther to the Board of Elders of the Evangelical Lutheran Trinity Congregation in Detroit
13 January 1878 p. 85
F. A. Ahner to C. F. W. Walther
19 February 1878 p. 89
19 February 1878 p. 89
Notes p. 94
PREFACE
Recently I worked through the letters of C. F. W. Walther (1811-87) as a participant in a major production of Walther essays and papers to be published by Concordia Publishing House. It disturbed me that many valuable and interesting letters had to be excluded from the projected volume of letters because of space limitations. It is hoped that this small volume here offered to the public will rescue a few of these letters from continuing obscurity.
The first block of letters deal with the Lutheran Church on the Wisconsin frontier, an area that has always had a special interest for me. It is helpful to include also several letters of L. F. E. Krause, first Lutheran pastor in Wisconsin, written to Walther in St. Louis. This contributes to our understanding of the problems of the churches at that time. It is fortunate that a few such crucial letters to Walther somehow escaped destruction. Walther received a large amount of correspondence - possibly as many as 2, 000 letters a year - which moved him to adopt a policy of destroying letters after he answered them.
The involvement of Walther, Krause, and Kluegel in the planting of Lutheranism in Wisconsin is an especially significant triangle of tension, on which some of the documents included here shed some light. It is not the case that I can boast that this is the first time that any of these documents are offered to the reading public in English translation. As early as 1946, I had included some of this correspondence in both German typescript and in English translation in the appendix of my Master of Sacred Theology dissertation. But the appendix was omitted when the dissertation was published serially in the Concordia Historical Institute Quarterly. Further, the letter of Walther to Krause of January 1846 was translated by Carl S. Meyer and published in Letters of C. F. W. Walther: A Selection (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1969), p. 70-75. But Meyer unfortunately
was unable to identify the recipient. This omission greatly reduces the value of the letter in helping the modern reader understand the "Sitz im Leben."
This Wisconsin correspondence helps us greatly in understanding Walther as a truly evangelical churchman, Krause as a troubled minimally prepared pastor who was all too ready to take refuge in formalism and in rigid rules when he encountered a problem, Kluegel as a disturbed churchman, a victim of the times, who caused difficulty for people he bumped into in his erratic course of a churchman.
Walther's letter to Sihler of January 1845 is very helpful in giving us an insight into the early conditions of the Saxon congregations in the Midwest.
Walther's letter to Alexander Lange is not only interesting because the recipient was a well educated man who nonetheless never found a satisfying Synodical context in which to work out his ministry. This letter also reveals the more pedantic side of Walther.
It is a privilege to offer this small collection of Walther correspondence to interested readers.
1
To Rev. L. F. E. Krause, first Lutheran pastor in Wisconsin. ^
27 February 1843
14 March 1843
Grace Mercy and Peace from God the Father,
and from the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father in truth and in love. Amen.
Honored Sir,
Dear Fellow Pastor: 1
Your welcome letter of the 16th of last month is at hand, and I see therefrom that also in your case the sad split in the congregation is continuing, and that it appears more and more that this split cannot be healed. This is not so strange, for God's Word cannot lie, when it testifies that there must indeed be sects so that the righteous may become manifest. It cannot be otherwise, for what we first read, learned, studied, and believed from God's Word, and from the treasured testimony of our fathers, that we now see and experience by ourselves now that we are on the battlefield. It is no different here in St. Louis nor among the brethren in Perry County. Also here there are a number of people who emigrated with us, who now oppose us and are as embittered against us as the unbelieving world is. But here the opposition which I experienced with my congregation, takes a slightly different form. For our opponents declare that we are still a Stephanite sect, which did not fully purify itself, and which has not made adequate confession of its fall, nor returned to the Lutheran church. Also, they throw it up to us that we have a Spener 2 -like pietistic tendency. Therefore, they say that my call is simply a human one, and our congregation is a sect or a false church, and our whole church affiliation is mispleasing to God; and they say that participation in our sacraments and the office of the keys is sinful. Thus they make it seem
2
that they have to break off all church fellowship with us, and they hold their own separate services with the reading of sermons, singing, administration of baptism and of the Lord's Supper by virtue of their spiritual priesthood, to the great offense of the world and all of the children of God who see this perversion of the divine order. Most of them permit themselves to be perverted by an arrogant, enthusiastic, misdirected merchant and lawyer by the name of Marbach 3, who has returned to German believing he had been personally injured by me. We have both orally and in writing decisively declared our separation from the errors which had crept in under Stephan 4 and from the sinful ungodly praxis and the secret goings on which had become a public scandal, but nothing satisfied these people. They do not want to hear anything of a reform in the church if it does not involve the abolition of the whole congregation affiliation. They are exceedingly weak in knowledge and hardly know the first rudiments of pure doctrine, and yet they consider themselves called to dispute points of doctrine and to reject everything indiscriminately what in their ignorance they consider pietism. They desire to play the role of the sharpest defender of orthodoxy, and yet are themselves so far removed from orthodoxy as night is from day. Their chief technique is to cast suspicion on us saying we insist on clinging to the old offences rather than admit them. In short, one finds them not orthodox, but rather one finds orthodoxism 5 and Carlstadtism 6 mixed in one glorious confusion.
I sincerely regret to see that most of these separatists, whom you consider obstinate, will likely settle in your area. There are 15 of them, including their wives, and I believe that most of them are unsettled in their conscience but pride would not let them admit their false separation. Therefore they would rather move, for they think in a different location their conscience will no longer sound the alarm, but they will again deceive themselves. To these separatists
3
belongs also a candidate Kluegel. 7 This man was from way back a very restless individual, first as an unbelieving Herrnhuter, 8 next as a Stephanite, and now as a Separatist. He has neither a thorough scientific nor a theological education, but his main talent is an eloquence and the ability to take in and deceive unlettered and simple people. Kluegel was therefore the closest confidant and the favorite of Stephan. After the discovery of the Stephanite offence, none of us pastors and candidates wanted to have anything to do with this man, since we had to do everything possible at that time not to lose our good name in the civil sense. This alienation from Kluegel at that time was the beginning of his later inexorable opposition. To summarize his basic tenets is hardly possible, since his thought is confused and since he constantly speaks in aphorisms. He is not able to verbalize Lutheran systematic theology, nor is there any cohesiveness in his own ideas. Whenever there is opportunity he seeks to create friction with us. He wants to be a puritanical Lutheran; nothing, nothing at all is to have any significance but Luther, and besides him Kluegel does not even want to hear of any other theologians. Whatever does not have the form of Luther, is false and unlutheran. For it is all denounced as either antinomianism or as pietistic, or what have you. The more he tries in his delusions to ape Luther, the more unlutheran he becomes. I am afraid that if he will again gain influence as a preacher in his congregation, he will attract many people and cause great harm. But he will not endure long, but will soon be revealed in all his foolishness and enthusiasm. With the other enthusiasts he has been repeatedly challenge to point out our false doctrine, but they could never even make one point. Thus they have been altogether put to shame. They see that they are no longer able to delude even the most simple people here, and thus they seek a different locale, where they might be able to boast about their profound understanding of quite a number of points which have been discussed
4
here a thousand times and on which we have given them the proper insights. For among these confused people the old proverb is again proven true, that arrogance is the mother of all heresy.
These Separatists are divided into several factions, as the lie not only contradicts truth but is at odds with itself. But they are all agreed in the rejection of our church. The leader of the one party is a certain Sproede, 9 a baker, who insists on being especially strictly orthodox and thus rejects the other party which is headed by a certain Billing, a goldsmith, and which conducts lay baptisms and communion. Kluegel in contrast is a different leader in Perry County although at the present time he is without followers. To a certain degree, both parties count him as one of them. Besides that, there is a tailor by the name of Philipp here, who wants to stand between the two parties or above them. He is thinking of leaving for Wisconsin one of these days.
This is, then, what I want to communicate to you in all haste. Forgive me for delaying this reply so long. I had intended to give you additional answer and this is the reason why with the lack of time I had not written at all. But now I see myself compelled to ask you to make do with these few lines.
I would gladly have written about the Pietists 10 yet. I do not condone their errors, but rather reject them decisively, and I have nothing to do with their indifferentism which is becoming evident here and there. But I do not identify Spener, Francke, 11 Rambach. 12 and Bogatzky13 as enthusiasts or as heretics, but see them as competent men and as my brethren in the faith. I do not believe that either our Separatists or those over there can base their sacramental practice on any kind of basis, or that they even try. I commend you and your congregation to
5
the God of all grace.
Your humble coworker in the Word
Carl. Ferd. Wilh. Walther
6
To Rev. L. F. E. Krause in Wisconsin ^
St. Louis 15 May 1843
Grace, Mercy, and Peace from God the Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ, the son of the Father in truth and in love, abide with you.
Honorable Sir Dearly Beloved Pastor: 1
The love of truth compels me to follow my recent letter with another.
A few days after I mailed the last letter, candidate Kluegel arrived whom I had mentioned to you. After my past experiences, I expected that Kluegel would either completely avoid meeting with me or if that would not be possible, would cause friction and spread the seeds of disharmony in my field of labor entrusted to me by the Lord. But how surprised was I when I discovered Kluegel was a different man than I had known in Perry County two years ago. He shows in word and deed that he now is concerned only with the main thing, namely that certainty on which we now stand on the basis of pure doctrine, and on this basis to be able to form a proper fellowship, which he desires to establish with my congregation. As huge as the suspicion was with which I first encountered him, I had to overcome this when I saw that he had only been estranged from us because of his firm resolve never again to form any kind of church affiliation only on the basis of the name Lutheran, but to do it only on the basis of the pure and unadulterated truth. We began to discuss those doctrines which were in question among us, namely the doctrine of the call, of faith, of justification, of good works, of free-will, the election of grace, etc., on the basis of God's Word and according to the confessions and Luther's writings, and I had to admit that Kluegel had through his diligent study of Luther come to greater clarity on many points, as I also had done myself, and when Kluegel saw I stood on the same basis as he and
7
had the same objectives, through the grace of God we arrived at a sincere consensus. Only one point there is on which we reopened our discussions, among all those which we had discussed and that was the doctrine of election. On this point Luther in his model book, De Servo Arbitrio,2 seems to be saying something different than the Formula of Concord in the articles on the freedom of the will and on eternal predestination and election. It is understood that I hold to the letter of the Formula of Concord. As far as I can see now, Kluegel had a positive influence on the local Separatists and has led them to the one point of the basis on which their separatism was made.
Of course under these circumstances Kluegel's relationship to you and to your Separatists came up for discussion. To my great joy I did not find Kluegel difficult on this point. He admitted it had not been right that he had gotten in touch with the Wisconsin Separatists and not first correspond with them. But he explained in an attempt to excuse himself, that he was not informed on the church conditions of those people. Then we discussed what we should do next. Kluegel is of the conviction that everything possible should be done to lead the Wisconsin Separatists back into their first church fellowship, and it depended on this, whether you, most respected pastor, teach pure and simple the doctrine of Law and Gospel and probably administer the Holy Sacraments. Kluegel declared that even now he would not follow the invitation which had again been extended to him to go to Wisconsin, and would rather first write the Separatists there again, to tell them that he would not have any dealings with them if they would not commit themselves to seek fellowship on the basis of the truth and to free themselves of other things in life and discipline, namely, some incorrect actions which they had undertaken. He wrote that if they were inclined to return to the proper fellowship on this basis, then he would go to
8
Wisconsin and gladly help out whenever he could to bring them to clarity and certainty.
At this point I see no reason why I should entertain suspicion against Kluegel's motives, and as far as I understand your circumstances, it might be very good if you would undertake a friendly dialogue with Kluegel about these matters. We are dealing here with souls, on whose account one should make concessions to weakness in as far as the truth will not suffer in that case. For church regulations are not to dominate faith, but rather faith should be dominant over the church regulations. Also for other reasons it would be extremely desirable if you would not withdraw from a dialogue with Kluegel, since we highly respect you for your decisive confession and for your strict adherence to the Lutheran church, but there is something else, concerning which I am filled with real concern, namely whether your viewpoint on the question of obedience to the office of the ministry, your view of church ceremonies, of the canon and of adiaphora is not somewhat foggy here and there. You will forebear my frankness on this matter. We would gladly let all our concerns drop and see a firmly grounded confession take form which would be based and founded on our precious Lutheran church.
I hope not only but I believe that you can come to the same conclusions with Kluegel as I have, if you can overcome your inclination and approach Kluegel without any kind of suspicion. Kluegel, as he testifies, believes the same.
Kluegel holds the greatest trepidation for Wisconsin on account of the goldsmith Billing, who has moved to Wisconsin with his party which he assembled here with the assumption that a spiritual priest is of just about the same significance as a pastor. Billing will certainly continue to seek his own aggrandizement. Kluegel has no sympathy with this kind of enthusiastic Anabaptist tendency which overthrows divine order
9
as well as the office of the ministry.
Now, most honored pastor, he has received the spirit of love even as I write it to you in the same spirit, and do write me again as soon as you can possibly spare the time. Please be real frank in expressing yourself to me and call my attention to everything which has given you any kind of concern and which you believe necessary to communicate to me in respect to Kluegel.
God bless you, your home and your congregation through Jesus Christ. Amen.
Your fellow servant in the house of God,
C. F. W. Walther, pastor
10
Letter of introduction for Kluegel. ^
St. Louis November 9, 1843
The candidate of the holy ministry Mr. Gottlieb Kluegel of Paitzdorf in the Dukedom of Saxony Altenburg has been living with me, the undersigned, during the period of three months immediately preceding his move to Milwaukee. During this time I have come to know him as a man who has no other concern but to learn to know pure Lutheran doctrine, to practice that doctrine in all circumstances, and to confess and defend it, to preserve peace and unanimity with those who have fellowship with him on this basis, and to pursue a pious and God pleasing life. Previous to this Kluegel had stood in constant opposition against the Lutheran congregation here in St. Louis as also against the congregation in Perry County, Missouri. But as I have learnt to know now, he was first driven to that view point by the conviction, which was at first well grounded, that those congregations were not based on pure Lutheran doctrine. Even if on the part of candidate Kluegel at that time there was at times activity that seemed too stormy, at the time when we pastors of the congregation named above were beginning to purify ourselves of the old Stephanite leaven, we cannot now hold this against him as a suspicion of Separatism since even among us there was at that time not complete freedom from human elements.
This I testify to under the confidence of the ministry as being in accord with the truth. St. Louis, Missouri. November 15. 1843
Carl Ferd. Wilh. Walther, pastor.
11
Letter of Rev. L. F. E. Krause to The Rev. Mr. Carl Ferdinand Wilhelm Walther, German Ev. Luth. pastor, St. Louis, MO. ^
Town Nine, Washington County, Territory of Wisconsin,1 August 17, 1843.
Grace and peace in Christ.
Venerable, dear pastor and fellow pastor:
Your last respected letter of May 16 I have answered twice, and from week to week I have been expecting your fraternal reply; yet since almost three months have elapsed and since my anticipation was unnoticed by you, my hope remained in vain. But the desire to have some definite expression from you on why you have for so long ceased from our official correspondence, moves me to write you another letter.
Eight days ago today, namely August 10, Candidate Kluegel came to me. Since your letter of May 16 had portrayed this man as one who wants to stand only on the basis of the pure truth, I also received him as such. But to verify that he was sincerely disinclined toward all separatism, - for he had given proof of his schismatic tendencies when he caused schisms between the pastor and the members of the church, either he himself helping to cause the schism or at least giving his moral support, as your report about him (dated March 14 of this year) also expressed it - but to become certain that he was disinclined to separatism I asked him whether he was again in accord with the Lutheran Church in Missouri, and whether he had obtained testimony [to this effect] and whether he had received a commission to deal with me officially. His answer was first directed along the lines of enthusiastic confusion in respect to the church, which was with him not only a Platonic concept, but he considered the church a group of people of which the pastor under no circumstances was a member but is a man with whom the congrega-
12
tion makes a contract, as in other cases where help has to be hired, whom (the pastor) they (the congregation) could again dismiss if it suited them. He did not accept the proof to the contrary which I gave him out of Dr. Luther's writings concerning the call into the ministry. He then continued in his confusion and rejected the Scriptural principle concerning the right of judgment in cases concerning matters of doctrine, which right also pastors have. When I advanced Acts 15 as proof, he answered sarcastically: "Where is it written that we are to be guided by this?" Since this man proved himself to be so unchristian, I wanted to cease completely, but I thought that probably I could bring him to his senses by means of Luther's advice, since he (Kluegel) was all the time making deductions according to reason, and therefore I read him a passage concerning this out of Luther's writings. He was acquainted with all this, and said he had understood Luther so and so, and rejected the proof. He finally burst forth with: "what those people were saying is true, and what we here are saying is not true, " that he did not for a second make an attempt to unite himself with these people, with whom he was in complete harmony. He also said that our church records, which we would have consulted in this affair, did not concern him. Thereupon I told him that since he was accusing the local church of a lie without being able to prove it, therefore I would no longer oppose him with a single word and would say no more in this matter. Then he remained with me for another half hour, but did not accept my invitation to stay overnight with us, but left, saying that he had promised to stay with Hegner and Arndt, two of the most extreme separatists, the latter of whom is one of their leaders.
Here I have to add a few things so as to oppose the lies of which Kluegel, since he talked to me, has made himself guilty in his attempt to establish himself among the separatists. I expressed myself that it was very difficult
13
for him, which was his own fault, - that he wanted to deal with me officially, yet did not have any proof for the status which he claimed to have in the church at present, but that his dealings themselves actually argued against such a claimed status, and that he had failed to obtain a commission for such ecclesiastical dealings. But he countered this with: "Pastor Walther did not have time to write these things," and, speaking about the [other] pastors in Missouri, he replied that he felt he should tell me that they themselves did not know how they stood toward Rev. Grabau and myself. He replied that they composed a very extensive letter, which they would send me. I countered: "If the fellow pastors from Missouri really do stand in doubt as to how to consider me and Rev. Grabau, yet the well-being of the church would require them officially to send someone to Buffalo and here [Freistadt] to investigate this affair so that they will not be deceived in their correspondence with us, since the church here and in Buffalo reports so and so, but the sectarians report the contrary. Then he (Kluegel) said: "Since Pastor Walther has passed a different judgment about me in his letter of May 16 than in his first letter, this should be sufficient." I countered with: "You have discussed the matter with Pastor Walther, but not with the whole Lutheran Church in Missouri, from which you had separated your self. As much as I respect the judgment of my brother in office, Walther, yet I cannot accept his private judgment as a guide in this public ecclesiastical affair. What reason do you have for not having reached some kind of an agreement with the collective church from which, and not merely from Pastor Walther, you had separated yourself?" He did not know what to say to this, but tried to cover up with his loquaciousness. I then asked him whether he, without feeling too bored, would listen to a few lines from Pastor Grabau's letter, dated June 29. He answered yes. I read him the passage, which reads word for word as follows: "Pastor Brohm,2 on his journey thru Buffalo to New York, stopped over
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night here, and assured me that the brethren in office in Missouri acknowledge Mr. Kluegel as an erring spirit, who, in spite of all the admonitions which he had received, the gravity of which he had to acknowledge, nevertheless sinned against his conscience. " That is not true, was his answer. I countered that I would have to accept as true this testimony of the brethren in office as long as he could not prove the contrary. That he could not. Several days later, on August 11, Kluegel came to me with the question whether I would be satisfied if he would write to Pastor Walther to obtain a commission from him. My answer was: "For this it is necessary that the whole church in Missouri pass a resolution, because up till now you have not been able to produce any evidence that you are in unity with the Lutheran Church there [in Missouri]. We ourselves do not feel a very great urge to start an investigation of this affair between the church and the sectarians - who have been invited repeatedly by the church to come and reach an understanding, but who have despised the invitation, - because we live peaceably, both pastor and congregation. Besides that we are now awaiting the arrival of Rev. Kindermann 3 and his congregation from Germany. They will then be right here, so that the separatists can ask this congregation to make an investigation. We do not feel urged [to cause an investigation to be made]. Kluegel answered: But will these people - he meant the separatists - feel an urge to do this [namely to get Kindermann's congregation to make an investigation]? I answered: "I doubt whether they will, since for more than 3 years they have not had such a desire, but have despised the office of the ministry. When Pastor Grabau wrote to them from Buffalo more than 3 years ago, that he would come to them for a while to exercise the office of the ministry among them, if they would send him the money to cover traveling expenses, since he was too poor and could not make the trip on his own means, then they answered that that would be too expensive. Faithful members in Town Nine
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and in Milwaukee gave encouragement and proved that the necessary sum could be raised, and offered their own contributions, but the sectarians railroaded their "No" thru. But in spite of this that they claimed they could not raise the amount yet they built themselves 80 houses, one of them valued at $1000, [it is difficult to decipher this part of the manuscript. The only reading we can make out is "Haeuser gebaut, eines $1000 an Werth, sich 80." Krause uses some other odd constructions in this Tetter.] and they bought 140 acres of land, bought lots in the city and built houses on them, and yet these people say that they were desirous of establishing the office of the ministry [among themselves]? Kluegel replied: "If that were the case, then these people no doubt dealt unjustly." I replied: "But you don't have to take my word for it, there close by lives Helm, go and ask him." Kluegel: "That I will do. But could we not meanwhile discuss this affair privately, until we get the answer from Missouri to my letter which I sent there and until Pastor Kindermann comes?" I said: "By no means. We two have no private matters to discuss, for it is an affair of the church. You don't believe me, nor the church records, nor the members of the congregation, but believe the separatists, with whom, as you yourself told me yesterday, you are in agreement, and you also give other evidence of this. For that reason all discussion between you and me is useless, and furthermore (discussion with you) is not permitted me, since I do not have the right to give orders to the congregation. Pastor Kindermann and his congregation will arrive. There these people may make their propositions, because that is God's regulation. If you are not satisfied with the decision of these people, you can go further, to the church in Missouri, and ask them to make an investigation. That would be dealing in an apostolic manner, according to Cor. 14, 40 and Acts 15. Kluegel replied: "Alright, I will go to Helm, but he did not come back to me, for Helm explained the situation to him like wise in accord with the truth. But in spite of
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the fact that he had learned the truth, he still acts contrary to it. In Milwaukee he had already preached to the sectarians before he had come to me, telling them that the pastors in Missouri had declared Pastor Grabau's Hirtenbrief 4 as heretical; that the sectarians were in the right; and that he (Kluegel) wanted to come to see me and really tell me off. Furthermore, he had made some threatening remarks to one member of our congregation: "whoever will proclaim that I, Kluegel, am holding an incorrect position, him I will immediately sue before the government." The crabby enthusiast! If I had only known that he had already then set himself up as a sectarian preacher, I would not have had any discussion with him. For in this letter of May 16 he writes: "he does not want to establish any party." But hardly has he set out for Milwaukee, when he already preached to the sect. Such actual lies don't bother him at all. On the previous Sunday he preached to the mob in Town Nine, and then quickly came to my service, but when the confessional service began, he ran out of church. In the afternoon he preached to the sect between Town Nine 5 and Milwaukee, and a few days later he baptized a child among the sectarians in Milwaukee. Here and in the city they are overjoyed with the one who is arousing them, but yet an old deceived woman stated: "Kluegel seems too frivolous to me." The mason Bichle is a very ambitious agent for him. To Helm and Schmidt - members of the church - he, Kluegel, said that it was not necessary for him to be ordained by a pastor, for that was an empty ceremony which anybody could perform who had learned it. [He said] that there was no such thing as office of the ministry, but that anybody could practice as soon as he had learned how. But Helm brought up Article 14 of the Augsburg Confession and also the Smalcald Articles about the power of bishops and their jurisdiction, as also Article 28 of the Augsburg Confession, and Helm said to him that he should adhere to God's Word, and that he should be ordained in Missouri, if
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he had more confidence in those pastors, but Kluegel replied that ordination at the hands of a pastor was not necessary. Schmidt, who did not have the Symbolical books at hand, reminded Kluegel of Titus 1, of the apostolic regulation, but that was a laughing matter for Kluegel. Therefore he consequently walks with the enthusiasts now. Our members say very properly: "He cannot carry on that way very long." Buenger 6 at least adhered to some order, but Kluegel throws overboard all divine regulation, by which he is digging his own grave. Now of course the people are praising him sky-high, because he is confirming them in their sins. I have never seen such a fat theological enthusiastic spirit as Kluegel.
Now, beloved brother, I must also express my two-fold regrets concerning yourself. 1) That Kluegel has out talked you, with his impudent mouth. 2) That he takes refuge in your opinion and says that you are in unity with him, which has made the sect so overconfident that it is useless to think that they would now return. As correct to the finest shade as your letter of March 14 was in describing his false spirit, – for thus he has proven himself to be and still proves it now, as you had described him then, so completely incorrect is your report of him of May 16. Now, if Dr. Luther finally saw that he had been deceived by Agricola, whom he was able to observe in his everyday affairs for ten years, then it is not to be wondered that the same thing should happen to us, true prophets and Luther's students. And you may comfort yourself. Naturally, it would have been better if you had given my last two letters, which I wrote in answer to your last letter of May 16, due consideration, and if you had sent the theological opinion of your brethren in office concerning Kluegel, instead of permitting yourself to be silenced by him [Kluegel], [and instead of] advising that fox to accept that sectarian call which he seeks to justify thru your agree ment. And (I hope) that you will not consider
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my fraternal answer to you in a bad light, if I am to tell you that thereby you are becoming guilty of making those deceived souls completely blind thru Kluegel and making them stumble so badly that, whereas the church had been one body with one captain, now it has to suffer attacks. Now, since thru your opinion, which was well meant, but which did not have such good results, you have caused the church to suffer (at the hands of Kluegel) will you not make good by not doing anything more unless you have advice, and by a trustworthy testimony of the pastors, stating that it is not true what the sectarian preacher is bragging about like a green horn, [when he says] "Pastor Walther has admitted that he had been lying about Kluegel in his letters to Krause, and that he, Walther, will now no longer correspond with Krause. " I can assure you that I sincerely pardon your hasty step, altho it has deeply grieved me and the faithful congregation here and in Milwaukee. The devil wanted to divide the church by means of your haste, but I think that this will lead to a better understanding between you and us, since God's Word encourages us to this, Genesis 50, 20.
The enclosed letter to the rest of the brethren in office in Missouri is addressed to Loeber in your care, and I beg you to forward it immediately. It contains only the report about Kluegel. And I have said nothing about you in this respect, so as not to cause a rift between you and the other brethren on account of your hasty but well meant judgment about Kluegel, which he has literally sneaked (out of your hands). For that belongs into a discussion of yourself with the other brethren in office there. But I have only included the reports of Kluegel's enthusiastic practice in Wisconsin and your explanation of this matter, how Kluegel had sought an appointment from you.
We are looking forward to receiving a fraternal answer in the Lord soon. Your brother
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in office, who holds you very dear,
(signed) L. F. E. Krause
Marginal note: Whoever sees and hears Kluegel, knows now what a misguided Schwenkfeldian mind is.
20
To Rev. L. F. E. Krause in Wisconsin. ^
St. Louis January 19, 1846
Grace, Mercy, and Peace from God the Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father in truth and in love, be with you all. Amen.
Dear friend and brother: 1
It certainly will have alienated you that I have so long been silent in view of your letter of October 30 last year. The reason for this was that I wanted to write a real detailed response to you, but because of the great amount of official duties which constantly weigh upon me, I could not find time for such a long letter. But since I now see that I will look for a lightening of my official duties in vain, as you also mention would be desirable as you explain the things in your letter, I now will no longer delay my answer, but will serve you with as much as I can at this point.
First of all, you were struck by the fact that in my written explanation I was not able to declare the so-called pietists as being pure teachers, and had to take exception to the teaching especially in the matter of justification. At the same time you could not harmonize how I would then accept Arndt,2 Mueller,3 and and Scriver 4 as Lutherans.
I would first say the following in response. Pietists admit the thesis, that faith alone justifies without works, and they do not deny this expressly anyplace. But to admit this is not the same as saying that they teach justification in a pure way. For to this belongs such a distinction between Law and Gospel that would include the concept of a human being turned completely away from his own works to Christ alone. This is the point that is missing in our dear Pietists. Among them are to be understood Spener and
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Franke and those who have come out of their schools such as Bogatzki,5 Freilinghausen,6 Porst,7 C. Schade,8 Joach. Lange,9 Gerber,10 Fresenius,11 and others. These all indeed adhere to the basic emphasis that man is justified alone through faith, but with that they emphasize repentance and crushing of the heart to such a degree and the particular circumstances in which a person first has to find himself before he would dare to believe, and they identify so many signs of a truly penitent heart, which then first can dare to approach Christ, to such a point that Christ and His grace and mercy must be pushed into the background. The result is that Christianity appears more as a serious burden, that Christ is made out to be a hard demanding Savior rather than a gracious one. The whole character of Pietistic writings is namely this, that they do not seek to lead poor impotent sinners to Christ, but rather to prevent anyone from coming to Christ who does not truly belong to Christ, that they build a fence around Golgotha as there was around Sinai. They are incessantly working on their readers that if they feel any kind of inadequacy or if they doubt their state of grace, to consider everything as useless that they have experienced heretofore and to subject themselves to another great process of repentance to enable them properly to appear before Christ while they are meditating on this that they are not able to bring any doubting sinner, precisely because of his doubts in his own power of sanctification and for this reason sinners are constantly again defiling themselves, to make them certain in the faith and firmly attached to the Word of the Gospel from which alone light, life and power can come into the heart dead with sin.
I would be able to cite large numbers of passages from the writings of the Pietists, where they express themselves completely contrary to the pattern of pure doctrine, but I do not want to stop at individual passages and possibly incautious expressions on their part, in which they speak of the presupposition of good works
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for the bestowal of grace in the Word, which we could take and even interpret according to the best possible construction. But I beseech you to pay attention to the whole matter of dealing with souls, which is expressed in the Pietistic writings. And if you do so, then you will readily see that they have a thousand times more emphasis on what man must do in contrast to the reception of what God has done for man. The result is that anyone who entrusts himself to the cure of souls embodied in these writings will not easily remain certain of his state of grace, but will constantly be assailed by doubt and be tempted to engage in running hither and yon and will no doubt soon be plunged into despair. I speak from experience. To this must be added that the Pietists have a miserably tough resistance against the rejection of false enthusiastic teachers if these have the appearance of a pious holy spiritual emphasis, and that all of them dream of a thousand year reign or at least of much better times for the church which can be expected in the future.
As far as my commending Arndt, Mueller and Scriver in spite of this, you have to consider that these were not Pietists, for these did not come out of either Spener's nor Franke's school, but that these lived either before or contemporaneously with Spener. In a letter to Watertown 12 I made reference to these men but not because I held them to be Pietists, but because Kluegel had simply included them under the Pietists without making any necessary distinctions. Between these people and the real Pietists I make another major distinction, although I find Luther's doctrine of the Holy Scriptures more Biblical, evangelical and purer than that of these men. If you for example would make a careful comparison of the seventh sermon of Scriver in the second part of his Seelenschatz, which deals with justification, then you would observe that as gloriously as Scriver speaks of justification and of his own experience of it, that nevertheless he constantly inclines to the view that faith justifies because
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through it Christ is united with us and because in that way we become partakers of the divine nature. The citations he has from Luther are not given in their real sense. I am sorry that I am not in a position to prove all this in more detail, which of course could be done verbally very quickly. Furthermore, you should not forget that a judgment of a book will turn out differently when it is made to those who do not know anything about pure doctrine, or who do not want anything of it, compared to making such an evaluation to those who are capable of distinguishing the better from that which is only good, or finally when such an evaluation is made to those who probably are greatly intrigued by such writings, who may have some motes in their eyes but nevertheless are rich in their Christian experience. It is in this last category in which I classified the Watertown people, and I wrote to them as such. I consider them to be people who have been mislead, to whom one should yield as much as one could with a good conscience. I have reference here to my criticism of such men as Arndt, Mueller, and Scriver. And finally, consider that most competent theologians have spent lifetimes researching the real standpoint on which the Pietists stood, yet without really understanding this totally. Therefore, do not be surprised, if you yourself make only slow progress in this before you see these circumstances real clearly. First of all Law and Gospel has to be distinguished in our own hearts through longer experience, and then we will attain to greater powers of discrimination which will enable us to detect the aberrations of those who still try to build on solid ground. If you should desire further elucidation, certainly Pastor Keyl, who has been preoccupied with research into the Pietists and their relationships to Luther for a long time, will gladly serve you more than I could in the very limited time I have now.
I commend you to the grace of God,
Your
Carl Ferd. Walther, pastor
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Letter of L. F. E. Krause to Walther and Wyneken ^
Buffalo, New York October 29, 1850
Grace and peace in Christ Jesus our Lord! In Him, dearly beloved brethren Walther and Wyneken! 1
On October 5 I sent you my request for forgiveness for the honorable synod. I also re quested the fraternal counsel of the synod since I presented in a brief summary how through the help of God I have come to understand the hierarchy and the corruption of souls which takes place in the Buffalo Synod through this hierarchy and therefore through the compulsion of my con science according to the Word of God Galatians 5, 1, I have felt compelled to separate myself from that synod.
With a longing heart I yearn to see the requested response which would be a balm for my soul in this pressing situation in which I find myself because of my enemies and my utter lonesomeness. Next to God's grace those words of response would have been the most precious words for me which could have lifted me towards the hope so that through the mediation of my dear brother Schaller 2 and reconciliation with him which I requested from him last week Wednesday, when I saw him on his return to Buffalo, and had a short half-hour to speak with him here.3 And thus I hoped that my petition will be read in your conference and will not be denied me. Schaller also informed me that he really intended to travel over Pittsburg, but that it was not possible for him to travel that route and that he much preferred to go over Detroit and Buffalo to Baltimore and in fact was urged to do so. If this route of travel had already been established in St. Louis, he might have been able to bring a report from you.
In the meantime I hope that I shall be given some information from Pastor Ernst. But
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since, as I think, Pastor Ernst already returned home the previous Saturday, it seems that I had to get along without the desired response, and thus in the name of God I made my petition known to you by telegraph to seek an answer to my petition of the 5th of this month, and I remarked at that time that it was impossible for brother Schaller to travel over Pittsburgh. I made this inquiry to indicate to you, my dear brother, that I had the joy to learn to know our dear brother Schaller and that I had hopes for an answer to my petition of the 5th of this month, which now I hope to see confirmed in the response that I am requesting from you. There fore I hope that you will not take this petition from me and my telegram in any other way but as a fraternal message. You know how frightened the burdened heart can be when it has to wait unduly. Oh, if I could only verbally share my sufferings with you, and would that I could even now, since brother Schaller has traveled through our parts here, could travel to you this long journey in order to hear from your own mouth the advice and suggestions for myself. Please pray for me together with the other brethren and please fulfill my petition soon for an answer and for a decision.
I may be open and free with you and I want to tell you that it is very difficult for me that had to wait till today, and longer for any news about the response from you which requested by telegraph but in spite of this, in spite of the many tribulations and attacks of Satan, I have the childlike confidence in the Almighty Triune God and Lord, that He will not abandon me here so that my enemies can rejoice and that they would cry out, Behold, no one will receive him because he is a schismatic priest, as Pastor Grabau announces from his pulpit every Sunday.
If you advise me personally to come to St. Louis, please do so soon. Or wherever you want to summon me, I will without further ado
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under God's assistance travel there. My dear wife, the sharer of my cross, is also prepared as also our children to journey with me wherever it may be. You can easily surmise how difficult our position is since I here have no job and besides am exposed to all the scheming of the hierarchy. Yet this latter factor would not be a tribulation for me if I only had some work in the vineyard of the Lord.
My petition then to you, honored brother, and to the dear brother Wyneken, as president of the synod, is that you would fraternally, upon the receipt of this letter, grant me an answer to my telegram, whether should immediately travel to St. Louis, or whether should wait for an answer to this letter so that I can make arrangements for my family as is necessary. Please understand, beloved brother, and consider this confidential expression of mine which comes out of a care-worn, oppressed heart, with cordial and fraternal concern, and please share with me, I beseech you cordially, a response to let me know by telegraph that you have received my letter and that you accepted it favorably and then through a fraternal reply, please write me further information on my disposition. May our faithful God protect and guard you and all His servants and children against the kind of dejection in which am now caught. Please pray for me that in the power of God may find strength in this evil hour and that may do all things properly and obtain the victory.
Please forgive me for writing to both of you in one letter, dear brethren, since you both lead the affairs of synod as brother Schaller assured me and thus both of you will discuss my case. In the love of our exalted Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, your loving but weak and persecuted and most humble brother, in love,
L. F. E. Krause
Buffalo [New York] 29 October 1850
27
[At the end of the letter Krause inquired whether Walther got the polemical pamphlet which Krause had written against the Buffalo Synod and its authoritarian church polity. ]
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A GUTACHTEN 1. OF C. F. W. WALTHER ^
Requested by the congregation in Milwaukee, Granville,2 Freistadt, and Kirchain, Wisconsin, and by teacher Wallschlaeger,3 the official representative of an interested party, made the following declaration about the dispute concerning prayer, which has erupted among Lutheran Christians in Wisconsin, having consulted with Pastor Geyer 4 on the one hand, and with Wallschlaeger on the other, besides Pastor Lochner.5
Since both parties agree, as I see it, that offering ex corde prayer in public worship assemblies on behalf of and in the name of the Christian congregation belongs to the official duties of the called pastor and is not the prerogative of the collective members without distinction nor of a teacher or an elder as a condition of their office; since also both parties agree that only such people besides the pastor of the congregation should lead public prayer who are recognized as qualified for this both by the pastor as well as by the congregation, and who have been called for this either for life or for emergencies and for temporary cases of need; since also both parties agreed that such an office established for prayer is not a separate office, but is a part of the public ministry, and that such a prayer leader is therefore only a helper of the pastor; since both parties also agree that when need does not demand it, it would be in harmony with divine order that the pastor alone lead public prayer in and in the place of the congregation; therefore we hold that both parties agree with each other at least at the present, that the argument has by God's grace been resolved, and that only misunderstandings or some other sinful aspect hinders mutual fraternal agreement. We hold that since Pastor Geyer's opposition party is of the same opinion with him in the above points, and since he [Geyer] had approved the arrange ment under which public ex corde prayers were offered by a different person, according to the
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conditions named above, the opposition party should return to the fellowship of the congregation from which they had separated. But since we were not able to speak with the opposition, we cannot say with certainty whether their former separation was an unjust action, even if it had just this one reason that Pastor Geyer had not rejected as incorrect the opinion of our synod on prayer; thus we hold that this separation cannot be justified.
Finally we beseech and implore both parties in the name of our dear Lord Jesus Christ that they earnestly and fervently beseech God that He would pour out over them the spirit of unity and peace, and the spirit of truth, and that He would thus incline the hearts of all that the bleeding wounds of the anguished church in Wisconsin might be healed so that the church might live in peace and be adorned with the fruits of the spirit so that every man may see that God is also present here in His Zion. Amen. Amen.
[An editorial note on the manuscript by an unidentified person dates this document in 1850.]
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To Dr. Wilhelm Sihler January 2, 1845 ^
Most regarded brother, pastor and fellow Christian:
I cannot express what great joy it was when received your precious letter of December 11 on Holy Christmas Eve, and a few days before that a similar letter from Pastor Ernst.1 God be praised for His grace that He moved you, dearest brethren, to reach out to others in this way. May He grant that the relationship established between us may become a rich blessing for us and for the whole church especially in this our new homeland. For a long time already I have groaned in the inner man that I have to stand here so alone, and this as the times become almost unbearable. Oh, how great is the danger here that only new sects will develop from isolated Congregations. According to my convictions there is no congregation tied to any other so that the two together have a common church government in order to possess all the rights and gifts of the church. How can we hope that we may be preserved in the fellowship of one mind and one speech if we despise outward ties with those who now make the same confession before the world, when such a union is possible? We, who permitted ourselves to be unbelievably blinded by Stephan formerly, have special reason to seek out those of orthodox faith in order to be assimilated into even if only their outward fellowship. If not, we would give the enemies of light cause to consider us as another sect and to treat us as such. And God knows that we ourselves under Stephan had nothing else in mind but to prove ourselves completely faithful to the true Lutheran church. But there was nothing which caused us to fail in this very thing than our stubborn exclusiveness. The more dangerous and corrupting this became for us the more we now yearn for the careful preservation of catholicity and the avoidance of every type of
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separatism. Therefore you are most welcome, dear brethren. With great joy do I offer you the hand of friendship. And do this in conjunction with my colleagues here, with Pastor Buenger,2 who works with me in the same congregation. I am sorry that I cannot also at the same time give you the thinking of the other pastors working with us in the same faith in the west, but I will send your letter as also those of Pastor Ernst to them and to ask them to express them selves on this. 1 do not doubt that they will all express themselves as we did in the increasing hope of a union with you.
You present several questions for my response and also Pastor Ernst did so. I believe I may assume that the questions the latter presented were sent no less by your desire. I therefore take the liberty to enclose Pastor Ernst's answers with this letter to you and ask you to share this with Pastor Ernst as soon as possible, since I am short of time right now. You certainly will forgive this presumption.
The first question: "What is the situation in the city of Wittenberg 3 on the Mississippi, and with the congregations in Altenburg,4 Dresden, Frohna, etc. in the Saxon colony?" Answer: Wittenberg is located very unfavorably, though it was first supposed to be the midpoint in Perry County of our colonies for the immigrants. It has remained the weakest of all the places. It contains several stores and shops and some professional establishments. The little congregation there is a filial congregation of Frohna. Four miles from the Mississippi there is Altenburg, where Pastor Loeber 5 works. This is the most spread out and has the largest population and is continuing to grow into the kind of place that Wittenberg was supposed to become. Here they are building a fine stone church to be completed in the course of next summer. there is also posted a teacher, our dear Winter 6 from Plamena [or Plenena] near Halle. Next to Altenburg there is also a pastor established
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at Dresden and Seelitz. Formerly Seelitz was the parish of Pastor Buenger who emigrated from Lunzenau in Saxony, but who resigned out of conscience scruples three years ago and wanted to return to Germany, but then permitted himself to be named as the pastor of a separated part of the congregation of Pastor Grabau with which part he became familiar on his journey.8 He is still there. From Altenburg three miles west towards the county seat Perryville, there is the little village of Frohna where Pastor Keyl 9 is serving the small congregation in their church and school. Five miles southwest from Frohna is the Paitzdorf congregation, served by our beloved Pastor Gruber 10 from Reuss in Altenburg, to which two other congregations which have existed here for some time have joined themselves (the one in Perryville and the one on the Whitewater, Jackson County). The first named congregation had, to work through many difficulties but God helped them thus far that now there is no longer any lack of the basic needs of life. For a while also the confusion of minds was great, in which the members found themselves when the Stephanite deception was discovered. There were splits, tension between congregations and pastors and the like, but since God gave us grace, the light of the pure doctrine has broken forth even more brightly, no matter how deep the darkness in which those people had suddenly found themselves, so now the finest relations prevail between pastors and congregations.
Second question: "What is the situation in the congregation in St. Louis,11 with its church building and its school?" Among all the congregations this one has advanced the most in outward aspects. At the time of my brother's ministry there, the people were extremely poverty stricken, but God has graciously looked after it, so that the congregation now has its own fine brick church in this growing city so important to the west with a present population of about a thousand people. In the church there is also a large
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space in the basement, like they build here, in which the first parish school and the voters assemblies are conducted. Since my official duties have increased very much, F. Buenger, former candidate and school teacher, was called as second pastor. He also looks after the first class in our first school and also serves a small country congregation as also a filial, twelve miles from here. Teacher for the second class is Buenger's younger brother,12 and he also serves as the teacher at a second, smaller, congregational school in the northern part of the city. The number of our school children comes to 130 to 140, of which about one third are such whose parents have not yet joined our congregation but only attend our public services. The number of our voting members (male adults) is presently 120. In 1844 baptized 70 children in the city. We have about 1600 communicants.
Third question: "Is there hope that a seminary for pastors and teachers could be established in St. Louis or in some other place in the settlement? " The basis for such an institution was laid in our first year in Altenburg.13 At first the former candidates Brohm, Fuerbringer and Buenger and taught in it. As the three last named were called away, Brohm with Pastor Loeber took care of the school and almost totally without any kind of support from the poor congregations. After also Brohm left, called as pastor to New York, the congregations here in Perry County finally adopted this important undertaking, even if with modest resources. Candidate Goenner 14 was named by the joint congregations as college teacher two years ago. He really only taught the philological disciplines, since the students get instruction in other fields from Rev. Loeber and Keyl. The school up to now had more the form of an academy but there are two students who now are being inducted into the real academic studies. There are 8 students in all. I will ask Rector Goenner to give you a detailed report about our school. It might be possible that you could arouse interest
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in Germany for it, for we need some charitable help, if we don't want this school to remain sickly and weak. Especially desirable would it be to move the school to St. Louis.
Fourth question: "What are the conditions of the congregations, of the pastors Fuerbringer, and Schieferdecker?15 Would those two not be willing to enter into closer relationships with the brethren in Ohio? " About these two brethren I can tell you that they labor under great difficulties but not without fruit. Fuerbringer's congregation is 37 3/4 miles from here,16 and Schieferdecker's is 20 miles, and the congregations present an increasingly optimistic prognosis of becoming a good Lutheran growth stock, especially that of Schieferdecker, in spite of its small size. The same holds true of the congregation which our dear M. Wege 17 serves as German Lutheran preacher in Benton County, Missouri, 250 miles from here.
Fifth question: "With whom do the Saxon pastors comprise a synod, or are they alone by themselves?" Among us pastors, Loeber, Keyl, Gruber in Perry County, Schieferdecker and Fuerbringer in Illinois, Wege in Benton County, Missouri, Brohm in New York, and myself and my colleague Buenger, and Pastor Geyer,18 just now taking a position in Watertown, Wisconsin, there is a unity of faith and confession, an agreement in our views of conducting the ministry, and such a conformity in liturgy and the like, and we carry on correspondence in which we share our experience and mutually advise each other, admonish, comfort, discipline, and en courage each other. There is among us a relationship of the innermost friendship. Also the congregations organized from fellow emigrants, are also in fraternal contact. But with all this no real ecclesiastical organization has come into being. Our main objective thus far was only being mutually founded on pure Lutheran doctrine. We have above all sought to strive after a con stant oral and written exchange of ideas and
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thus help each other stay in step as we progressed out of the Stephanite delusion and move forward to the clear truth. Through the discovery of the Stephanite deception we were driven into the writings of Luther. We have next to the Word of God, studied almost exclusively all the writings of Luther and we believe that there the guiding of the Holy Spirit through this incomparable treasure of Luther's writings to have now first come to proper clarity. We had become suspicious of all our understanding, thus everything was subjected to the strictest re-examination. Up to now our goal was a thorough reformation in doctrine and practice, and that was what we believed we had to pursue. But we do not want to follow a false spiritual tendency. We see vividly that without an outward uniting of the pure Lutheran pastors and their congregations, the unity of the spirit and thereby the unity of doctrine cannot be preserved, and much less will the gift of anyone of them be used for the common good. I can therefore answer your question by saying that we are working towards a common church government.
Sixth question: "Would it be possible together with our brethren to form a church organization? " do not only hold this to be possible but for being very desirable, and also to be promising for our common good, in fact I hold it for being unavoidable conscience-wise if a union could be in some way attained. But I must remark that the whole west is filled with German demagogues who do anything to make every form of a Synodical organization hated, and even well intentioned people do not remain untouched by them. There is here thus a certain revolution against this kind of institution, for people are afraid of priest rule. On top of this is the problem that our congregations of emigrants are running scared of anything which might give suspicion of being a hierarchy, since they had suffered so terribly under Stephan. Therefore we would have to discuss the question first how the desirable church affiliation could be intro-
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duced without arousing the suspicion that the shepherds have in mind a way to dominate the flocks, or that the tendency could easily lead to this. I for my person am prepared to make every possible sacrifice in order to bring about church union. Just for this purpose I dared in God's name to launch a little leaflet called the Lutheraner,19 in spite of the great lack of necessary gifts for this, and dared to send it out into the world and to present it to the church in America to do at least my little part to call together those who are correct in the faith. Here your third question also has bearing as to whether we have any ties with the present Lutherans in the Buffalo area in Wisconsin. With real sadness had to report that a tie-in had in fact been initiated, but this was shattered since Pastor Grabau's position was at the time based on errors which he expressed in a Hirtenbrief (pastoral letter) which he sent for our evaluation.20 His main errors consist in this that he holds ordination to be a divine ordinance, ascribes an authority to the church orders to bind consciences, restricts contrary to God's Word the right of congregations to call pastors and decide matters. And in contrast he elevates the ministry in several respects to a higher position than the Word of God, our confessions, and Luther's writings do. The pastors that hold with Grabau against us are Rohr in Canada and Krause and Kindermann in Wisconsin.21 But through Pastor Ehrenstroehm 22 a conference was recently arranged in Wisconsin in which possibly the last attempt will be made to establish face to face discussion to establish unity and on that basis to establish common church government.
The Seventh Question: "Would it not be possible that new arrivals could receive ordination either in St. Louis or at some place designated by delegates belonging to that synod?" This question is related to the solution of the sixth question. Up to now each one of the pastors among us, though standing independently, have
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availed themselves of the prerogative which they have by virtue of their call into office to ordain publicly in his congregation any orthodox and properly called candidate upon his request.
The Eighth Question: "Are there in and around St. Louis people who would like to study for the ministry and are teachers being prepared there? " This is answered under three.
The Ninth Question: "What provision would the brethren in St. Louis advise to preserve German? " In our situation here we know of no other means except our little college. Besides, there seems to be much less danger here that the German language will be crowded out in our congregations than there is in the East and the Middle States. The Lutheran congregations here are exclusively German and have no need of English services. The greatest danger here is the lack of knowledge and indifference connected with the poverty of the scattered congregations. Since it is possible for the Methodist preachers provided richly with means of support to carry on gratis in the little congregations for quite a while, they are the ones who reap the harvest. Also the Evangelicals 23 here find it more possible to gather congregations since they gather all people together who call themselves Protestant. When I was asked to send a congregation a German pastor, the matter misfired on the condition which I had to make, that I could not recommend any of the so-called united preachers. Ohio, Illinois, Missouri, Wisconsin are sad fields of labor. A Lutheran is heartbroken when he sees how Satan has barred almost all doors. Here there would be enough to deliberate for a Lutheran synod under the most fervent mutual prayers to the Archbishop of the flock. Oh that this synod soon would come into existence through Jesus' help. I am not acquainted with the congregations between here and Columbus.
The Tenth Question: "Would friends in St. Louis be willing to take over the historic
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German school of Grimm for their own strengthening? Would they be willing to encourage others to do this?" I must confess that I am not familiar with the indicated work, and I ask you for further information. I need not elaborate that all of us here are all thinking most earnestly of doing everything possible to preserve the German language and to counter the evil leaven, which creeps into the pure doctrine and the polity of our church with the English language.
The Eleventh Question: "Would it be agreeable to you if we would regularly see to it that you would get the most important church literature? " This question has happily over whelmed me. You would move us to profound thanks for we do not yet have ways to acquire such literature directly.
In respect to the unfortunate Stephan, I had no opportunity to apprise myself of his present situation or of his feelings. As far as I know, he now lives in Kaskaskia, Illinois, where it is said he still functions as a pastor among the Germans there. Up to two years ago we still made attempts to bring this deeply fallen man to a knowledge of his sin, but till then it was all futile. In a hardened and arrogant manner he denies everything of which he was convicted very clearly. He continued to declare himself a martyr.
I hope it might be possible for you to visit us in St. Louis sometime. I would see to it that the pastors associated with me in Missouri and Illinois would assemble here at the same time. Might it not be possible that you and the respected pastors and brethren of the faith might take part in the conference scheduled for Wisconsin for the next spring?24 If you could not personally take part, you might be in touch by correspondence. For this purpose I stand ready, if you so desire, to send you the Hirtenbrief of Pastor Grabau mentioned above.
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I am writing the above to you in the utmost hurry, which I hope you will forgive me, since I am at the present laboring under such an enormous work load and could not let you go without an answer.
I send my greetings to you and all of yours cordially and fraternally and I pray God, who has begun the work of concord, that He would also further it in His name and for His honor for blessings for many souls.
Your humble brother in the Lord Jesus Christ,
Karl Ferd. Wilh. Walther, pastor
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To a German Churchman ^
March 19, 1849
Honored Sir Dearly Beloved Brother in the Lord: 1
The day before yesterday was an unusual day of joy for me. It was the day on which your worthy letter of January 11 of this year reached me with its enclosure. Already when I read your letter I thanked God in my heart for the precious gift which I received from you, and now I make haste to express to you also my thanks.
When five years ago I decided to publish the Lutheraner, I did this in no way because I considered myself equipped for this kind of an enterprise, but I did it because I could no longer bear to see the enemies of the church carry on as they did without let or hindrance, that every error should be permitted to be voiced without any kind of challenge and to be spread all over; and I did it so that the truth once more should have a public defense and a confessor, so that the German Lutheran immigrants would not in whole groups be enticed into the sects when there was no one who took care of the innocent and neglected people who for the most part were already so helpless in the father land. was pained by the insults to the honor of God and by the seduction of so many unsuspecting souls into all kinds of false beliefs, and this finally overcame the feeling of inadequacy for editing a church paper. Without confidence in myself, but with total trust in Him for whose truth I wanted to witness, I began sending out this little leaflet into the world. And behold, the Lord blessed this modest effort beyond all prayer and understanding. This paper is not only the chief means of a blessed union of the friends of the church, but has also won for itself a large number of friends among pastors and laity, has strengthened many a person who was uncertain and has led many a person back
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to the truth who had been misled before. I have a whole box full of letters which are documentation for this. This experience has mightily strengthened me in the faith, yet I have by no means become blinded to the shortcomings under which the Lutheraner 2 is suffering under my editorship. I not only agree in my heart with the complaint of our honored Loehe about the inept, old Frankish and yet ungerman language in which the Lutheraner is written for the most part, no less do see all too well, on what a low rung this paper stands in respect to the selection and treatment of the material in it, and God alone is aware how I pray to Him inwardly without ceasing that He would help us so that the editorship of this paper would be transferred to other more capable hands. I have been especially sorry that thus far I have not been in a position to gain a correspondent in the old fatherland who could make regular reports for the Lutheraner about the ecclesiastical and political affairs of our homeland. Reverend Brohm in New York was appointed in the Synodical convention during its last session to give short reviews on world affairs for the Lutheraner, and although Brohm has done everything possible to fulfill this assignment, yet the comprehensiveness as well as the precision of his reports suffered naturally from the fact that almost always the news to which he had access was made available to him only in the biased and radical political press. Therefore I cannot say what joy it has brought me to hear that you, honored sir, have kindly agreed to take over the business of a German correspondent for our poor meager Lutheraner, and that your first attempt is now in my hand. What have received is completely as would wish it. May the Lord grant you time and health so that you may continue in the way you have begun. You will thereby not only win the gratitude of all true Lutherans, but you will also receive much blessing. hope not only that the Lutheraner will through publication of such interesting correspondence become more appreciated and more valuable to all its readers
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but that through them this paper may gain entree with many people who feel repulsed by the dryness of most of the articles in the papers and by the exclusive character that they reflect. I am very much looking forward to some substantial help, viewing the content of your correspondence, to aid me in revealing the truth and in fighting for the same. Of special interest to me right now is the witness of a German correspondent against the revolution. The teaching of the Scriptures on government, as you may well imagine, has now everywhere become a sign that is spoken against and on which the thoughts of many hearts are revealed. [A footnote adds:] how things are done in this connection here defies all expression. In Philadelphia there is an association organized among the Germans there which has set aside large sums of money as bounty for the murder of every sovereign of the German states and which has now through its secretary, the newspaperman Wollenweber, challenged people openly to take part in assassinations.
Here it is not only the open rationalists who speak in favor of the revolution, but all the German religious periodicals blow the same horn as the radical papers do. One can hardly believe how far the blinding of even the so-called "believers" has gone on this point. I have read these days that the so-called North German Lutheran preacher Suhr 3 in Cincinnati had written that the revolutionaries only want to establish through deeds what the Christian preachers are pledged to achieve through the preaching of the Word of Christ. "If anyone among you would be lord over you, let him be your servant" etc. Christ was the first one, it is said, who wanted to put into effect the principle of republicanism in its total implication. As far as the Romanists are concerned they speak a different language since the Pope has gotten into a bind because of the revolution. The Lutheraner is the only periodical which publicly confesses the Scriptural doctrine of the divine institution of government. Praise to God that the Lutheraner in its witness
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is not without visible and wholesome influence both on the people and on the editors of other religious papers. I hope for much good to come from the clarifying and reporting of the first point of current history which you share in your correspondence.
Assuming your kind permission, I have deleted the words, in your correspondence which deal with Hecker,4 "in the procession of a Rinaldo Rinaldini." Hecker is staying in our neighborhood and is fully deified here. Thus I thought it was a matter of Christian prudence not to arouse the rage of the mob with such an epithet. The liberals of our city are already much aroused against me. On New Year's Eve somebody fired a shot through the glass window just over my bed, which stands very close to the large window and in which I was fast asleep with wife and child. It appears that the shot was only intended as a scare, but it might also be a prelude to real intentions. You can well imagine that I though not afraid of a martyr's death do not consider myself worthy of the death of a martyr, yet would not really care very much to seek martyrdom.
It has been a great joy for me that you promise to include something of church affairs when you send in your next material for the Lutheraner. May the Lord grant that you will be able to forward more encouraging news than you had hoped when you did your first report. For our Lutheran church in America it will be of incalculable effect how you describe our mother church in Germany.
For a long time already I was supposed to write to our most revered fatherly friend Pastor Loehe in behalf of synod, but was at the same time supposed to present to him a justification of our Synodical constitution, but with all the mass of official duties, editorial duties, and presidential affairs which sometimes almost crush me, I have not had the leisure to do so, and
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thus to date the response and expression of gratitude to the dear pastor [Loehe] and to you have not been forthcoming. Immediately after Easter I will carry this out, however. In case you would be speaking with Loehe soon, kindly convey to him my most respectful greetings and as much as possible excuse my negligence. With heart felt respect, your fellow believer,
C. F. W. Walther, pastor
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To Pastor A. Lange, Cook's Store (now Concordia) Lafayette County, MO ^
St. Louis 25 January 1858
Dearly beloved brother: 1
Only today do I get to answer your valued letter, since I was sick when it arrived. As little as 1 have time to correspond, was nonetheless cheered by your letter so full of questions. When you were here the last time, was so
burdened with all kinds of work that I could not suppress a certain measure of preoccupation, which you obviously must have noticed and which I fear you may have taken for something other than what it was. Praise God, that your presence via letter in my study has laid to rest my misgivings on this. Satan is so busy to destroy the unity of the Christians, especially of the pastors of the Gospel, since he knows how harmful this would be, he knows all too well how to loosen if not to destroy the strongest bonds of brotherly love through the most miserable little concerns. Let us therefore be diligent to preserve the unity and the spirit through the bonds of peace, so that this unity may be realized among us, whereas in the union it is only an empty shell.
But to the point. Before get to the actual response to your special questions, permit me to preface this with several points so as to avoid any misunderstanding. According to the convictions on which our synod was organized on the basis of God's Word, 1) everything in the church is to be done in an orderly manner; 2) if a church is therefore to be divided geographically, that is it is not attachment to a particular person but proximity of an orthodox pastorate for a certain part of the inhabitants of an area which should determine the borders of the territory of these Christians. Titus (1, 5) was supposed to appoint elders city by city. Paul did not want to know anything of any Pauline party, nor of an Apollo party, nor of a Petrine party which
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would not at the same time be concerned with the question of proper preaching but whether only of Paul, Apollo or Peter. If, however, it were an open matter for everybody to select a pastor according to their own tastes, and thus to change from congregation to congregation according to their own tastes, this would thereby open the doors to every kind of humanistic elements. It is even more evident that without a demarcation according to some kind of geographical determination, order and peace in the church will hardly be possible and those who are evil inclined will be misled to withdraw from church discipline under a show of right and this will give pastors an opportunity according to the motivation of their flesh to engage in enticing other members and to try to attach them to their person. God wills it evidently that every pastor have his own flock (1 Peter 5: 2) and that not only no lay person but also no pastor intervene in his office.
(Cfr. What Peter says Chap. 4, 15). If a flock has been entrusted to a pastor, by God Himself, then it is not up to the pastor's whim to give up the flock or any part of it, nor is it up to the whim of the hearer to cease to consider that person as his pastor whom God has appointed for him. For this kind of whim would dissolve the divinity of the call of the pastor indirectly as would be done if the call is relevant to a certain number of people rather than a certain specific place. In that case, no hearer could be permitted to move away and become a member of a different parish. Presupposing all this above, it still remains certain that we here do not deal with the means of grace, but rather with a salutary order without which the church as a whole could not continue to exist. God would not change people into something else than what they are both before and after conversion. But this order can and must yield where the edification of the church or the salvation of the individual demands it. If therefore a pastor holds this principle of the order and the divinity of
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the call, then he can easily according to God's Word make a judgment whether the circumstances require setting aside this particular order. "The welfare of the people is the supreme law." This is an old pastoral and church polity principle which also here finds its applicability. But so that you will not only have my poor evaluation, will share some information from the councils, namely, the Wittenberger faculty opinion. We read there among other things "whether and in what respect a pastor may not receive other church members, for a church member may not leave his pastor's care and turn to another pastor?" Before one can establish any principles there must be certain cases narrated which must be considered the exception, in which a pastor not only should but may accept some other members and minister to such members with Word and Sacrament, and on the other hand a member may turn from his own pastor to another. 1) If in a city there are more parishes of different religions [obviously denominations are meant] in such a case an orthodox Christian may turn to the people of his own faith. 2) If a person is overtaken by some illness in a foreign country, he may be received by another pastor for ministration. 3) If a pastor for invalid reasons refuses absolution to anybody. 4) In the case where someone leaves his regular pastor out of ill will. In the case of a city or a territory in which there is just one doctrine taught and one sacrament, yet by different pastors and where there are different parishes, there each pastor has been put in charge of a part of the people to care for them with sermons and administrations of the Sacrament and other privileges of the church. There also each individual citizen of such a city and such a land knows to which church he belongs, to which pastor he is attached, and from whom he can and should receive proper teaching and sacraments. It may happen that one or more of such people without any real need and without any previous reason except that they develop some ill will against their proper pastor, go to receive absolution
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and the sacraments from another pastor who suits them better. In such a case the question arises whether these church members are correct in this and whether also such a pastor sought out by that person can really with a good conscience minister to them and whether he may encourage them to follow him instead of their regular pastor. Here those reasons must be considered from which it is concluded that each pastor is conscientiously to look after his parishioners and be satisfied not to shepherd any other. Also, that a parishioner should be satisfied with his own pastor and remain with him and receive absolution and the sacrament from him and not seek out others who are not his pastors. The first reason for this is taken from the writings of the Apostles Peter and Paul, who testify with explicit words, that each pastor is to look after his own parishioners and according to the best of ability to provide for them, and that he will have so much work to do that he will not be coveting other members. (1 Peter 5: 1-4). Here the apostle among others uses the word cleros, which in translation is a people, a laos, that is such a part of a people, which through lot or through some other divine arrangement as through a lot is assigned to one for special shepherding, and Peter wants this to be understood to mean that each pastor is supposed to have his parish people or parish area assigned to him, to which he is to confine himself and permit others to look after their own people and parish. (Cfr. Acts 20: 28; 2 Tim. 4) So then the meaning of the Apostle is, that henceforth the pastors whom they appoint and who will follow them, are not to take over any and all congregations, as the Apostles themselves had done by command of Christ, inasmuch as the Apostles were general and universal pastors throughout the whole world, but would want each one to remain with his own congregation and serve it to which he has been called and appointed. So we have here doctrine enough and a certain command to the effect that no pastor is to accept other parishioners without some unusual need, as announced previously. The
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other reason also is based on the first Apostles, since they command the parishioners and congregations of Christians, that each one is to follow his pastor and to be obedient to him and render honor and provide for his needs. (See Hebrews 13, 17) Here one should remark first of all, that the Apostle writes "your teachers," namely not those whom you for your own person and by your own preference have sought out and elect ed as teachers, but rather those who through proper call and through appointment of God have been set over you as teachers. Furthermore, he sets forth the reasons therefore, why this is to happen, why one should be obedient to one's teachers, since he says that it is because they watch over your souls, and also because they must give an account for your souls and give an answer therefore. Finally, he also enumerates a warning of the harm which will follow if one is disobedient to this and if one will not accept reproof and indoctrination, namely that the poor preachers will have to carry out their office with sadness. In this case things will not go well and these disobedient parishioners will have no blessing from their stubborn wills, and all manner of hurt and blame will fall upon them for they will therefore have an ungracious God and an ensnared conscience. (Cfr. Phil. 2: 25; 29; 30). In Titus I the Apostle says that he has left Titus in Crete so that he should completely carry out the work that Paul has begun, namely, that he provide for elders, that is pastors, and servants of the church for all the cities so that each city be provided with a pious and a specific pastor under whom the people are to learn God's Word and to whom they should render due obedience. And to this instruction of the Apostle Paul belong also the teaching of our Lord Christ, in which he confirms and requires the proper obedience of parishioners to their teachers and thus indicates, that the disobedience and despising of those sent by him and of the faithful servants of the church constitutes a great sin which not only offends against the person of the servant of the church but also affects
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and villifies the Lord Jesus Christ and His heavenly Father. (Cfr. Matt. 10, 40; John 13, 20; Luke 10, 16), As therefore the first reason we had cited above gives us instructions and clarity on the point that a pastor with good con science cannot reach out further than to where his call applies, so we learn and are instructed from the second reason cited above, that in like manner parishioners consider it highly impossible to withdraw themselves from their proper preacher without need from whom they have adequate spiritual care and turn to some other pastor. The third reason that must be adduced is the firm and earnest mandate of God to the prophet Ezekiel, given to all servants of the church in Chap. 3, 33. There we hear what a serious matter it is for our dear Lord for the proper instruction of the office in the church that He indicates that where His servants are unfaithful and flagging in zeal, that He will require the blood of the godless from the hands of the servants of the church and thus demand a very harsh accounting and if their office does not extend to the whole people, as some would gladly indicate with respect to this passage, in a special way their responsibility does extend to each person of the parishioners entrusted to them. And even if our faithful archbishop Jesus Christ had not just commanded a faithful shepherd to watch over his flock of 100 in general but has indicated by His own example to seek the individual one that is lost, and to bring it back. This passage also makes it mighty clear that a pastor cannot be held responsible for all people in general, so not all people but only his one congregation can be assigned to him for care and he should assume the care over this one, and this one is to be his to hold with him and follow his teaching and instruction in good obedience and this obedience is forthcoming from the whole congregation put in his charge and from each individual member. The fourth reason is taken from the definition and description of an upright bishop and Christian pastor [Deletion in the typescript.] The fifth reason
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one has to find in the command of the apostle when he says, "let everything be done decently and in order," affairs cannot be conducted well and orderly when pastors and parishioners over step their office, if the pastor wants to take over the care of people who have not been entrusted to him, and if a parishioner likely leaves his regular pastor and follows another. It would take too long to narrate what compound damage and dirt results from this, for already it is no small loss that both pastor and parishioner act in sin against the Bible passages and the commands given under the first and second points above, and that the pastor in such a case is overreaching the bounds of propriety because he becomes an allotrioepiskopos, that is one who accepts foreign responsibilities and who interferes in another's office which is not proper and which is otherwise strenuously prohibited by the Apostle. Thus, also in this way disobedience and contempt for their pastors is engendered in the parishioners. For as soon as the parishioner knows that another pastor will arrogate to himself care over such a parishioner, it will soon come about that when a pastor has to act in a way displeasing to a member, the member will become dissatisfied and come to despise his pastor and seek out another. Above all the example of such a case of turning away and forsaking a properly called pastor creates great harm for thereby either suspicion is cast over the pastor as if he dealt in a way that people had to forsake him or hereby others find an excuse to follow the example and thus forsake their own pastor and violate that obligation to obedience, for what one person considers as right, others will assume as right and thus the damage is so much greater and conspicuous and will get many followers. And the rubbish is piled up even higher when parishioners migrate from one pastor to another, with the result that nobody is able to pay much real attention to their life and their conduct. For in such a case one puts the blame on the other, and these same people want to remain communally undisciplined, for
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if anyone speaks to them somewhat firmly, they will turn to another. So they get stuck in their sins and do not acknowledge that they commit a great and serious wrong, since they keep the sin on their conscience and only out of hypo critical show do they go to another pastor to hear sermons and receive the sacraments. Through this they then certainly will more broadly and more sharply draw down God's wrath to their own condemnation. And finally, their harm becomes more real through the established order of doing things, when these parishioners who leave the care of their pastors and receive communion from another even while they carry in their heart their ill will against their own pastor out of which ill will they have first left him, and there fore these same people receive the sacraments unworthily to their most frightful detriment. Since another pastor helps them consciously do this, both parties become guilty of this sin. For as great as his sin is who patently receives the sacrament unworthily, so is also the sin of the pastor who in a lighthearted way gives the person the Sacrament without sufficient warning against God's wrath and punishment. Since also such people can be influenced and persuaded to get along with their pastors and to be reconciled with them, it would be proper if after such reconciliation, they would stay in their care and receive absolution and the sacraments from them. This would be a witness that such a reconciliation is not a feigned hypocrisy, but is a matter of the heart. But if such people would hesitate to do this, it is still a dangerous impasse with them, for their inward feeling is revealed thereby, showing that they are still afflicted with an old inner resentment. On this point it is to be considered for all that such people seek and receive absolution and the sacrament from others. " (Thesauri Consiliorum by G. Dedekennus, Part II, p. 445-452). But that there are exceptions, that the fathers teach decisively, thus find in the Wittenbergian Consilien an opinion on this question whether a church member can switch pastors if he has
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a falling out with one but is again reconciled with him. There it says, "the return to the former confessional could take place because of hypocrisy and covering up of the inner resentment, whereas changing the confessional or the non-return to the first could stem from such causes which might not contain any resentment but only weakness and fear that the confessing parishioner could not preserve his devotion and thus could not so sincerely grasp the comfort and reproof, and that he could not pour out his heart so confidently to the offending (or offended) confessor. Such weakness could without any inimical affectation be so irrepressible in the heart of the confessor against his former father confessor that he could not be dissuaded therefrom even though there may not be any stubbornness in him. To that may be added the fact that it may harm the parish, that there may be the fact of a bad neighborhood, possibility of deceptive teaching, marriage, or moving into another parish. Which things are to be avoided and since the choosing of a father confessor in one parish is an adiaphoron according to the substance of it and would become impermissible only because of the offense associated with it, there could be cases in which it should be permitted a reconciled parishioner to utilize the services of a different father confessor. With these two conditions, first, if the whole local presbyterium (ministerium) or if one would not want to inform them of the case, then some other impartial body should after sufficient care be taken and inquiries be made, establish a judgment that the non-return to the former father confessor is, first, due only to a weak confidence in the father confessor, and second, that the respective parishioner in deed and conduct gives evidence of a loving relation ship to the father confessor, the same as the other Christians, and certainly that as far as human eyes can judge, certain greater mischief would result if the parishioner were not given access to a different father confessor. For even if one would not want to think or do anything evil in order that good may result, so the changing
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of a father confessor is not intrinsically or knowingly evil but is so only because of the accidentia, namely that an offense against the ministry through public feeling be distinguished therefrom and let it be made clear to everyone that the ministerium found such overwhelming cause to grant this or that person a different father confessor. Secondly, that such a change
is made not in a unilateral manner, but with the previous knowledge of the former father confessor and that it occurs knowingly and that one and all who might be offended can under stand the reason for the permitted change. "
(Consillia Ph. Wittenbergensia, Wittenberggeistliche Rathschlaege, pt. 2, 141-142). But this case deals only with the switching of a father confessor in the same parish. But this moderation is applicable in the case of new pastors though not working in the same parish, provided that the welfare of the souls of the parishioners demand it.
Now to your questions.
To question number one, no.
To question number two, no.
3. Yes.
4. It is not permitted.
5. Answered in the quotation above.
6. He who distinguished clearly, teaches well. Of course, separation from a congregation can be associated with separation from God and to involve this latter too. Need has no commandment and it has its applicability too.
7. Thereby you would open the door to every manner of disorder.
8. If there are no problems of conscience involved, it is certainly not your duty but on
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the contrary that you do not lay the basis for a horrible confusion in your congregation and harbor and nourish the great sinful delusion that you see your calling and the Word as emphasizing persons rather than your office.
To question 9, joining a synod is completely a matter of Christian freedom. Sinful motives could well be damning in this but remember that the church does not judge hidden motives.
To question 10, God forbid. If you are not yet convinced that you are a proper servant of God, or if you still do not have the knowledge that you associate yourself with this orthodox ministerial office which through God's grace and guidance is proffered you. If the cause for separation or of independence is spiritual pride or contempt for the divinely ordained ministry, then you will not be able to get together to edify yourselves in the proper faith, but as far as the willful sinners among them are concerned, they no doubt are in the power of Satan. It seems to me, and I believe that you are caught in a misunderstood humility and a confusion of your person with your office, and that on the point of obedience to the office of the ministry, you were too lax, whereas somebody else probably has tuned the strings too tautly on the other side. It is blessed to hold the mean! To recommend excommunicated members to other pastors that they accept them, is contrary to all divine
order, for such are to be considered as publicans and sinners and to be shunned as such.
Please consider my forthrightness kindly. Write me soon again so that I may know if you are satisfied. Time does not permit me to analyze many further points where somewhere some misunderstanding might be possible. Time is even lacking for me to reread this letter. Therefore please excuse any errors committed in haste, which you will find in this letter.
May God grant that I may soon see you
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here again, and then have an opportunity to say more to you in one hour than could write in one day. The Lord be with you. Cordial greetings to your wife. Your friend and brother, united through the bonds of one faith,
C. F. W. Walther
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To teacher Theo. E. Buenger 1 ^
St. Louis May 7, 1861
My dear brother-in-law:
Thanks, sincere thanks for your friendly and loving invitation. But we are not able to accept. I as pastor, cannot leave this precious congregation in such times as the present. We may soon be compelled to admit in our conscience that it is necessary to utilize all our powers which we have to counter the plans of Satan. My family, which 1 had to get out of the danger zone, had sent out to the Kirckhoff 2 settlement in Missouri, since our state can be easily isolated from the free states and it might be possible that I could be separated from my family for a longer period of time. am a Missourian and therefore will never be moved to separate my fortune from that of my state unless am forced. This state has so far protected me in life and property, so in the time of need will not become unfaithful to it.
There is great excitement here but it has not come to actual physical violence, but since the state militia has concentrated here yesterday, it is possible that any moment a frightful catastrophe could erupt. The worst is that our congregation itself because of various viewpoints of the political situation in the state is split in two. Very slowly our congregation members began themselves to read the constitution of the United States and of the state of Missouri and thus to compare this state of affairs and to form their own convictions. Up to now most of them have only been influenced by the Boernstein 3 politics. How they therefore judge, you can well imagine. Boernstein lives as a captain of the Union troops in the Marine hospital with his regiment, opposite the college. These gentlemen really are not inclined to visit the college and to take care of this once and for all, for they know that as Christians we stand on the side of the
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state government, in which we live, and stand, since we are "at all hazards" subject to that authority, which has power over us.
Therefore we are not in a position to accept any kind of token of your love for us and we only ask in these dangerous times that you pray for us, which we no doubt need very much, since God knows what kind of frightful uprisings may occur in these next days which has been engendered through 30 years of abolitionist agitation.
Greet your family, the brothers Mueller 1 and Wunder, Conrector Schick and your colleagues and remind them that they would all remember our precarious position before God's throne. God be with you and with yours,
C. F. W. Walther
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Concordia College, St. Louis, MO
October 15, 1859
Your Excellency Highly Revered Doctor and Professor:
After the Lord yesterday from His inexpressible mercy helped us to come to an understanding again, we the undersigned, are compelled to express our most sincere wish to you, our dear colleague:
May you once again before God reconsider your resolve to resign your position at our institution, and we hope it might be possible to make our joy in a reconciliation complete by remaining in our midst.
But it is our most sincere desire that you spend your last years with us and that we may therefore have opportunity to manifest even more love to you, which you so highly deserve. May the Lord, the Archbishop of this Church, watch over you,
The faculty: C. F. W. Walther
R. Lange
G. Alex. Saxer
G. Schick
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To Professor Gustavus Seyffarth ^ ↓
St. Louis June 17, 1862
Honored and dear professor:
Your worthy letter of June 11 has reached me. You can well imagine how deeply am touched by its content. This was a streak of lightning from a clear sky. It was not only that you are not agreed with Professor Hengstenberg 1 on the question of slavery, that struck me so hard, although I never even suspected this, but it was much more that you have already decided to break fellowship with us because of a difference between us on this point which has already been finalized and which can in no way be eliminated; and you have done this without following the procedures in God's Word for a repeated reproof to people that are caught in error (Titus 3, 10). In fact, you have issued a threat to us that if we do not repent immediately you will publicly testify against us. I do not find it very likely that the article now in question is really what moved you to adopt your present stance toward us. am unable to eliminate the thought that you had already felt estranged from us before and that this article has only served to bring you to the resolve to separate from us. This gives me inner pain since I have always thought highly of you, have always spoken for you against those who would disparage you. But I am too far removed from you physically to try to dictate to your conscience in this matter provided you were moved in your conscience to act the way you did in respect to our mutual relationship. Only this one thing I want to say, and I dare not fail to say this, that you would consider whether in the Hengstenberg article, you do not see other things in the preface to the article in Lehre und Wehre 2 than are actually contained therein. That article as we understand it has absolutely nothing to do with our civil war here as far as the conditions of government are concerned, but it deals
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with the private abolitionist agitations which would give this war a different purpose, as our administration has declared. This article does not concern itself with the matter of making an apology for slavery as sometimes occurs here, but it rather declares “we do not deny that in the southern slave states abuses occur which really sadden the heart of the Christian who is a friend of man.” The antithesis is expressed this way that the relationship between slaves and masters is not as it is usually alleged to be per se wrong. And in this antithesis I agree with the contributor. Not the political but rather the moral and religious aspect of the relationship of slavery is what is the issue here. Whatever our administration does in this war, we subject ourselves to that, according to Romans 13:1. And we are of the opinion that in this respect we do not need any substantiation as little as Hengstenberg did when in the year 1848 he was one of the few who condemned the revolutionary activities at the time, in the face of no insignificant danger to himself. But the unbiblical assumptions which private individuals would like to use to undergird the war effort, for example the unbiblical assumption that slavery in itself is sinful, this belongs to the forum of a religious journal for discussion. And against this and this alone we stand up to speak according to Hengstenberg's precedent. Whatever you may think of this, I must first of all guard against the conjecture which you make to the effect that do not hold those to be Christians who disagree with us on the points of the article lying before me now. Secondly, I must ask you to consider, not on our account but on your account and on account of the peace of the church, whether it would be God-pleasing and whether it would further the welfare of the church now to open a public dispute on this point. It is no doubt right to act according to one's conscience, but we dare not forget either that we are responsible to God for the function of our consciences.
I ask you then, respected professor, to
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receive this clarification which has been extracted from me under deep sadness, to receive it in a friendly way and soon to let me know that even if in any event you should decide to leave the fellowship of our church, you would not on that account enter the ranks of our personal enemies. If you will not do the latter, possibly under different circumstances you may once again be reconciled to our position in doctrine. May our gracious God grant this for Jesus' sake. Amen.
Your deeply disturbed
C. F. W. W.
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To Director J. C. W. Lindemann, Addison, Illinois ^
St. Louis May 16, 1866
My dear brother:
Your dear letter of the 12th, which I just received, hit me like a veritable thunder clap out of the clear blue sky. If I had no knowledge of the wonderful circumstances in which the poor children and servants of God can stumble, your information which you wrote me would have perplexed me completely, in fact would have made me completely dubious about you or your colleague. But God has lead me not always in bright sunlight but often in the dark vale of heavy affliction, so that I believe can transport myself into your position and into your feelings. To put it briefly, I have no doubt but that you are stuck in a very heavy affliction, and if you are seeking comfort in the hope that you can escape from your difficulty by being released from your present office, you are simply in error. No, no, dear brother, the dear Lord has called you there and there you have to stay. Although it may seem in your own mind, as if the evil foe had lead you there because you are buffeted on all sides and everything seems to go wrong, yet this is only an appearance. Where Satan is carrying on, there his own servants stay with joy and it looks as if here the dear angels are residing. But in the house of Job, where God resides and where the dear angels are watching there the devil is loose. I must of course assume that you also have your weaknesses, and possibly these consist of precisely those attributes which give the others a small victory but without doubt those with whom you are dealing have the same attributes and bearing the burden of their brother becomes very wearisome for them. Where you are convex, those others are not exactly concave, so that you always have a confrontation. In brief, you are a human being and they are human beings and so it is not to be wondered at that people like Paul had a sharp disagree-
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ment with Mark and Barnabas and Silas at times. But God carries on His work through men with whom it sometimes seems as if one would go to the right and the other to the left and the third one would hold back, and yet the work progresses. Why? So that we may see that we are only God's masks, we can really only spoil His work. But still God does not carry it on without us but through us and at times only with us and in spite of us.
Please do not misunderstand me. I have no intention of presumptuously making a judgment and ascribing any kind of fault to you and certainly not the larger fault in this present misunderstanding. I only want to say even if you were partly at fault this would be no reason whatsoever that you would dare to give up your present office.
As far as I can see, you are especially gifted for our teacher's seminary. As far as know, the whole synod is unanimous in this. But that you are constituted in such a way, that other people easily feel hurt by you, this is no proof that you are in the wrong office.
So for the time being you should abandon all thoughts of being relieved of your present yoke, except through a blessed death. am far removed from using my "personal and official influence" (as you wrote) to help you in this way escape from your present difficulty, and I will much more use both personal and official influence to keep you nicely in your present post. am of the firm conviction that the clouds of despair which now weigh on your spirit will again be dispersed and that you will again work in your present calling with joy and contentment. But also be patient with the weaknesses of your colleagues and do not permit a permanent disharmony to develop between you so that you cannot freely look them in the eye. Do not let up till the misunderstandings are removed and the several sins are sincerely forgiven.
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Temporarily only so much on this point. May God give me grace when can go to see you that then may mediate as an impartial person in case any little splinters are still sticking in any one at that time.
Mr. Diez 1 has by my suggestion given up the idea of going to Addison, as you already know. I have not yet dared to inquire about Mr. Brauer 2 in Baltimore. I am afraid that the Baltimore people will cry murder if we would call him away from there. When will go to Addison, we can discuss this thing together and then initiate something.
Please content yourself with this miserable scribbling as I have just taken a few minutes robbed from other duties. commend you to the enlightening, comforting, and guiding mercy of our faithful God. May He guide us into the
best ways.
Yours, in the Lord,
C. F. W. Walther
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To Mr. A. F. Brackmann, Lutheran parochial teacher. ^
Concordia Seminary December 4, 1869
Honored Professor [Brackmann]: 1
The time is inadequate to give you a detailed answer to your letter of November 27. Please excuse me, therefore, if only touch on the most essential points. After receipt of your letter I assembled the school board here and shared the necessary points with them. The result of our discussion was the following concensus (only Mr. Meyer was absent). We have declared in the document of appointment which we sent ahead that it was our earnest will, as soon as circumstances permit, as soon as the receipts from the increasing number of pupils will increase, to raise the teacher's salary. Of course our intention naturally could be nothing else but this, that the number of pupils will have to increase to the point that the school would become self- supporting and thus produce the increased salary. We could naturally not think of it that the Association 2 would continue to subsidize it as it did in the beginning. Of course we did not extend a temporary appointment to you as Mr. Witte received, but gave you a permanent appointment. Therefore when we gave the reason for this as being that we wish to see our school become part of the church organization, you will see therefrom, that we did this with the assumption that our high school would eventually become a part of our church school structure here. This unfortunately we have not been able to achieve up to this time. But when set this forth this way, this is not intended to establish any kind of legal relationship between us, but only to give you an insight into our view of the matter. We understand that in that meeting which was held after Pastor Schaller's return from synod, we should have declared to you with certainty, that first of all we would only receive one class of boys, and that secondly with the
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reduced number of pupils the increase in salary, as you call it, and as you no doubt could take it, could not be carried out. We therefore consider ourselves obligated, to grant you this increase in salary for the time between the second last board meeting, in which that declaration was made, if the income from tuition monies and subscriptions in any way permit this. That we have declared to you that it is possible that the school will close already at Easter time and that in this case you would have the opportunity to seek a different position or to accept a different post or at your own jeopardy to remain with our school, this has its basis herein that it has been put into effect to change the school-year so that it does not begin on September first as formerly, but now at Easter. We of course understand that we bear the fault for having enticed you out of a very lucrative situation and that we will maintain you without loss to you during the time that you will not have income.
Permit me to make two other observations. We do not doubt at all that the school can be maintained as a one class school, and that, when it has deeper roots in the congregation, it will become multi-class. In the latter case we have no intention to think of any other person except you as a teacher, who have dedicated yourself to this school with such great sacrifice. We hope therefore, that you will have no reason to be concerned about your position or your income after Easter. We have told you that we are making arrangements only for the time till Easter, but we did this because we know how easily well founded hopes can even erode, and because we do not want to leave you in uncertainty about this eventuality and do not want to deceive you. It is also practically certain that in due time our high school will become amalgamated with our congregational school, but our certainty is only a human one, and we wish that you also, as we do, view the future of our high school as completely in God's hands.
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If you were to take a legal view, then the matter must have an unfortunate ending. But if love and equity will prevail and above all, if we keep the kingdom of God in view, then we will together strive for this beautiful objective without tiring, and God will aid us that we fail not. We knew that we dealt with you as with a Christian and indeed a Lutheran. So we dealt with you now in that Way in the firm hope that our mutual efforts for such a beautiful undertaking will not remain without fruit.
Hopefully we soon may have an opportunity to speak personally about this. A written ex change in such delicate matters is precarious. It is too easy to be misunderstood and to cause negative attitudes which one did not anticipate. Please do not lose your confidence in us though we are now filled with some trepidation. Stand with us in the bad time and God will also permit us to see good days again.
Humbly yours in the Lord in brotherly love,
C. F. W. Walther
[A note on the original manuscript indicates that a copy of this letter was made by J. G. Walther, December 4, 1869.]
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To Rev. Hugo Hanser,1 Baltimore, Md. ^
St. Louis May 30, 1872
My dear brother:
In all haste, only inform you that have conferred with the other members of the faculty and shared your letter with them and that every one of them has had the experience that the students coming from Fort Wayne 2 have for the last years with few exceptions only a Christian attitude and motivation for the theological calling. The impressions which receive regularly are such that I almost completely despair. Yet God up till now has given His grace that most of them, after the Word of God has been brought to bear on them constantly, finally are overcome by the power of the Word. As hear, Lindemann 3 himself challenged the students to share with him the experiences they had in Fort Wayne, and an unchristian spirit had been prevalent, one that was dominated by human laws and human fears. I have spoken to the teachers there repeatedly but they have never been willing to admit that this was so.
I am unable to comply with your request to give you special hints for the forthcoming investigation there, since 1 have not been put on the committee by synod, and furthermore, I have noticed for a long time that the exercise of my supervisory duties have been poorly received. want to say just confidentially to you that besides this, men like Wyneken 4 and and Schwan 5 have done what they could to make me ineffectual.
May God support the committee to carry out its high and responsible assignment so that a comfort as well as a blessing my redound to the church. While you are there, we here will be kneeling in prayer. In the Lord Jesus, your saddened but hopeful,
C. F. W. Walther
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P. S. With the above complaint about Wyneken and Schwan I by no means intend to imply that these brethren have opposed me with conscious deliberation. However, certain inexplicable antipathy against me was always expressed in every possible circumstance. Without doubt the devil is behind this, for he well knows that harmony among the servants of Christ will be harmful for himself. May God help us poor sinners through all this. Without doubt, myself, without wanting to do so also bear great fault.
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To Pastor F. Sievers,1 Frankenmuth, MI ^
St. Louis January 6, 1873
Dear and honored friend and brother:
Only today do I get to answer your letter of the 29th of December, since did not want to answer only on the basis of my bare awareness that there are no people that I know suitable for your district school. Therefore I made further inquiries. But even now I cannot recommend anybody to be appointed to your school. Mr. Brackmann,2 former teacher at our high school,3 was not only completely competent for such an office, but was also willing to assume it. Although he was not deep in knowledge, yet he was throughout an upright Christian and Lutheran. But he has a wife and three children and would not be able to make do with the salary of $250 which he would receive as a district school teacher. Moreover, I feel heartily sorry for this man. He is in a painful situation. He is now recovering from a nervous disease connected with dizziness and is without employment and thus without support. His abilities are exceptional. He is good in philosophy and in history and he is competent in the English language, both speaking and writing. Only his methodology leaves something to be desired. And yet his pupils, both boys and girls, always learn some thing from him. But an institution such as our high school is, in which everybody wants to become a polyhistor within one year, according to the wishes and expectance of the parents, surpassed the demands which were first made of him and which he was able to meet. Thus in a polite manner he was pushed aside and now actually suffers financial embarrassment. He is a man of a simple heart, easily led. Would you possibly know a position for him? God grant that could help him find a position and thus also a means of livelihood. As far as the mission enterprises of our dear Baierlein 4 are concerned, I am of the opinion that we do not dare to hold
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out great promises for them. Baierlein seems to me to be a man who starts many things but is unsteady, although his competency is certainly significant.
Your dear sons 5 make me heartfelt joy. They are diligent, conduct themselves in a way seeming for a Christian youth, and are much beyond most others in the finer customs, and seem to be making progress.
Be content with these few lines. The letters from Neustadt 6 you will permit me to publish in Der Lutheraner without the names. When this has been done, I shall send them back to you with thanks.
The Lord be with you and yours.
C. F. W. Walther
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To Pastor H. Fick, Boston, Mass. ^
St. Louis December 3, 1873
Your dear letter has greatly embarrassed me. I wish the dear Springfield brethren hearty success for their beautiful undertaking,1 and when people ask me whom I could mention as being most suitable as director of the projected institution it was you whom I first named as especially qualified. Yet I am pulling back from this to advise you not to accept the call which you have received. Your present call is without doubt a firm and certain one, and the institution to which you have been called stands so uncertainly that there is some reason for concern that the whole plan will prove to be completely unworkable and will fail. The young pastor Bensen no doubt spoke very sanguinely when we dealt with the matter of initiating this business. He was hoping for money contributions from various sources, for the recruitment of girl pupils and in any case for cordial and lively sympathy for the project. But this does not seem to be confirmed. The panic which now has spread through this land paralyzes everywhere the spirit of enterprise, even where there is prospect of rich return. But even more so where this is not the case and where only the noble purpose of enthusiasm can be given. What shall I do now? Should encourage you to take a risk and to give up a certain blessed activity and a certain calling for that purpose? am not able to do that. My conscience as well as my inner love for you do not permit me to do that. It would be an intolerable thought to me to entice you into a situation in which you already in advanced years, would have to slug it out like a youth. No, that I cannot do, although my heart bleeds when 1 think of the misled Springfielders. I am now facing a tragic dilemma. Either a man like you has to assume the direction or nobody, or at least very few will have confidence in this institution and will send their children. Either we risk your whole
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future or if we do not, we jeopardize significant offerings in money which the dear Springfielder people have brought and will have to bring. Benson enticed me into giving my consent in this by means of his declaration that there was enough money in hand or at least promised to make possible a firm material basis for this enterprise. But can assure you that I have decisively resisted urging anyone to bring any offerings, since by all means wanted to avoid any kind of responsibility in this matter. only promised them to make the Lutheraner the means available to them for announcements. I have experienced with our high school what cares come with that when people are involved in enterprises which demand sacrifice, who then threaten any moment to collapse like houses of cards.
In sum, my advice is that you decline at least for the time being this call until this matter has a firmer foundation, till at least it has been proven that this kind of an institution can exist. But you dare not betray me. Otherwise the dear Springfielder people will think that I am secretly working against them after have given my public consent.
May God grant His providence to this matter which began in Christian simplicity, and take it into His gracious hand so that this may have a good conclusion.
With inner love for you, I am your concerned brother and companion in battle and suffering in the Lord.
C. F. W. Walther
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To Wm. Sihler, Ft. Wayne, IN ^
July 21, 1876 St. Paul, MINN
As much as I dislike again to burden you with a visitation assignment, I have no other way out. From the enclosed documents you will see that charges against Pastor Meyer 1 in Kirchhayn have come to me which are made in criticism of the decision of the district president as an appeal for a new investigation. I myself am incapable of undertaking this since after the close of the convention of the Northwestern District and the Synodical Conference, I had to hurry home to prepare after a very short rest to go to Indianapolis and Baltimore for the conventions of the Central and Eastern Districts. After that I must necessarily begin my teaching duties in St. Louis. At the beginning of November I must again leave to take part in the meetings of the School Book Committee, which may take from 8 to 14 days. Thus I have indicated to the Kirchhayn people that if they are absolutely unable to be content with the present settlement, to apply to you with the request that you represent me in the investigation and that you have the final voice in making a decision. If such a request should now reach you, then I would petition you if at all possible to meet that request. It is said that among those making the appeal there are some good souls who have been deluded, for whose sake it is highly desirable that we meet the complainants positively. It may even be possible that also such among them will be regained, who have up to now proven themselves to be rather malicious. May God give you the grace that no one will be lost and that you may succeed to save what still is salvageable, and protect the congregation against complete destruction and dissolution. It seems to be a rather bad situation there.2
In the hope that I may soon be privileged to see you in joy again, and rejoicing with you in God, I am yours with greetings in the old
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love.
C. F. W. Walther
P. S. Up till now the Synodical Conference Convention has been moving along quite well, it was richly blessed.
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To J. C. W. Lindemann, Addison, IL ^
St. Louis January 22, 1878
My heartily beloved Lindemann:
Those are indeed startling developments of which you have written me under the date of January 13. But we should not be surprised. The devil well knows that your institution is a poison and a pestilence for him, and why should he not then rage there against you? But it will happen to him as always, when hellish deception and darkness strive against the Lord of Lords. He does himself harm and only advances the Lord's work. Because if he arouses these useless characters who have wandered into our Teachers' Seminary, to yield to the lusts of the flesh and the desires that are within themselves, and thus to push them out of the seminary, then the devil only reveals to us where the dark spots were and we can then according to our report, begin the proper cure or even undertake an amputation. Praise God that you do not shrink back when Satan bares his teeth, but that you bravely counter him. May God sustain you in this attitude. If a comparison were permitted, I would like to say that Teachers' Seminary students should be even more grounded in piety than students in a theological seminary, since the former in their office will not find as many things which, so to speak, they can with force, cast away before God in comparison with the pastors. And the teachers are susceptible to much greater temptations to seek the good will of the people and to misuse this since they do not have as much responsibility to speak the full truth to people as the pastors have.
That one member of the Board of Control has expressed the thought that you are conducting a tyrannical regimen since when you are present everything goes well but when you are absent the devil is turned loose, that is such a mixed up wisdom as if someone said it is a bad reflec-
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tion on the police that thieves are out mostly at night.
I have now somewhat examined Pastor Lange's presentation on the doctrine of creation, and must admit to you that he has now pretty well convinced me of the truth of his assumptions. But want to first undertake more studies on this point before make a public confession.
In inner love your much preoccupied but under achieving
C. F. W. Walther
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To Th. Ruhland, 1 Saxony, Germany ^
St. Louis, Missouri May 23, 1878
My dear friend and brother:
The day before yesterday received your dear letter of the 2nd of last month just when I came home from the meeting of the delegate synod toward evening. In this meeting the nomination of candidates for the new professorship at our Concordia had taken place. This session was for me a very painful one, since it was resolved that our dear Stoeckhardt 2 would not be nominated, and this because of the fact that they not only pointed to various errors which occur in his catechetical work, but especially because there had not been any kind of public retraction of these errors. Stoeckhardt himself has cited this his work in the Freikirche,3 even though not for the reason of substantiating anything therein that was in error, but yet without any warning of the errors found therein, without retraction. These reasons were so powerful that they silenced me and did not permit me further to insist on the inclusion of our precious Stoeckhardt in the list of candidates. So then yesterday the election was conducted and a younger man elected who had studied at our Concordia, and although he came from the Wisconsin Synod, had become a darling of the Missourians. His name is Franz Pieper.4 In our synod a practically insurmountable aversion is dominant against all things German, which was triggered through Dr. Seyffarth,5 Licentiate Preuss,6 and Baumstark,7 with all of whom we had such misfortune.
The above I have been wanting to write to you in great haste in the midst of very many duties.
Dr. Sihler wrote to Hoerger 8 two weeks ago and reproved him for his false doctrine concerning the kenosis and of adiaphora. Whether we will send a delegation depends on whether Hoerger
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shows himself amenable to this reproof.
The Lord be with you. With greetings to dear Stoeckhardt, most humbly,
C. F. W. Walther
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To H. G. Sauer, 1 pastor in Ft. Wayne, IN ^
Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, MO June 19, 1881 My dear pastor:
Several hours ago Professor Crull 2 and his family left here again for Ft. Wayne. Unfortunately his one surviving son was unable to find a cure for his illness here. The symptoms on the contrary became even more serious. His heavy speech, a result of nerve inflammation, became even heavier. Inability to focus the eyes, which is a frequent result of diphtheria, has also begun to afflict the boy. Professor Crull, for his part, instead of being able to recover and to recuperate here, rather became more run down than he even was when he arrived.
These facts comprised the reason why I turn to you as a member and, if am not mistaken, as the chairman of the [Ft. Wayne Concordia College] Board of Control. must urgently beseech you as a matter of conscience that you and the other members of the Board of Control must object that Professor Crull should function till the close of the semester. Our local doctor Wislizency, an experienced and skilled physician, said that Professor Crull's son could only recover in a cooler climate, which is also the case in no less a way with the father. Now Pastor Adolph Biewend in Boston has a lovely little place on the seashore where Professor Crull would find everything necessary for himself and his family. believe that the honorable Board of Control ought therefore to urge Professor Crull without delay to journey to Boston with his family to take advantage of this opportunity for recovery. It would be irresponsible if the synod would not do everything which it could to save this lone surviving son for this faithful servant and that this faithful servant himself need not be offered up as a sacrifice. Of what benefit would
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it be for synod if the Professor would continue his classes till the middle of July if by doing this he would possibly go to ruin himself? What a burden rests on the heart of this poor man and how it gnaws on his vitality can well be imagined.
You will forgive my unsolicited imposition. But I know that you will forgive me since you believe with me that love is the supreme commandment.
This matter now rests in your hands and in the hands of the whole Board of Control. And there it rests well. Do not permit the excessive zeal of our precious Crull cause you to delay giving him a written prescription for this rest period.
Again, with a thousand thanks to you and your honored wife for the love you have shown me, and also for sending me the garment which carelessly left behind at your place.
With heartfelt greetings to you and your wife, yours thankfully,
C. F. W. Walther
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To J. C. W. Lindemann, 1 Addison, IL ^
August 7, 1878
My cordial, most intimately beloved, sincerely highly honored brother Lindemann:
You have given me a bad scare with your letters of the 6th and the 5th of this month. What in all the world happened? It is not true that you are not up to the demands of your post, for by the Grace of God you alone are up to it. You are above all the one through whose faithfulness and skill God has given us and still preserves for us such a blessed teacher's seminary. It is highly desirable that we have on the faculty of our teacher's seminary a classically trained man, who can read the journals containing divine wisdom in the Latin language and test them according to the original text of the Word of God. In fact, this is in many aspects of relative necessity. That the director have precisely this kind of training is absolutely not necessary. Therefore for God's sake do not assume the responsibility for having your call nullified. God does not tolerate our fooling around with these things. If others are ready to assume this kind of responsibility, then let them and if they succeed then you have to suffer this in humility and patience. But till that happens, stay put, where God has posted you since you desire to have a peaceful con science. You had better abandon that nice little dream of the quiet life of a literary man in a small town far removed from all those people who make life miserable for us. As much as you would be suited for this and as much as you would create a great benefit for the people in this kind of role, you are not called to this, whereas if without your doing and with God's permission people were to cashier you out of your office, which do not at all fear, then you would again be available for the ministry in which God has sealed your work. Your gift to write books for the people would therefore not go lost.
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To help you according to your proposition to shake off the heavy yoke which weighs on you is asking too much of me, as you yourself seem to feel. May God in His grace preserve me from that. According to my conviction you are at the right post. And may God sustain and strengthen and bless you in that post till your death, if the world is worth it, and maybe then crown you with the incorruptible crown. "Wait on the Lord. Rejoice and do not despair and wait on the Lord." "The Light shall again and again rise for the righteous, and joy in the heart of the pious."2 That applies to you. Hold fast to that. Do not deny the word of God when it speaks to you. This much today in all haste. It is already late at night, and therefore I must now attempt to get some sleep.
Greet your daughter the bride, and assure her of my innermost wishes that the Lord would make her blessed and grant her salvation.
Your brother and fellow participant in the tribulation and in the kingdom and in the patience of Jesus Christ,
C. F. W. Walther
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January 13, 1878 ^
To the Highly Respected Members of the Board of Elders of the Evangelical Lutheran Trinity Congregation in Detroit, Michigan ^
Beloved Brethren in the Lord:
With great sadness noticed from your honored letter of the 8th of this month that there still are several members of your congregation who insist on attending services at other churches and take practically no part in the congregation services in your church, whereas they appear in meetings of the congregation and take part in discussions, in consultation, in resolutions and in voting.
Now, you seek my advice. Here it is:
You cannot continue in that way. A congregation cannot continue to be composed for a longer time of two classes of members, of which one group will attend the services but the other group attends services in other churches. Such exceptions can probably be tolerated for limited time when there is concern for the souls of the people involved and for the peace of the congregation, since love, which is the highest law, in times of need takes precedence over order. But love does not dissolve all order. This it cannot do, since God's word says, "Let everything be done decently and in order. " (1 Corinthians 41, 40) The protesting party had received permission to commune in other churches and to absent them selves for a time from the public worship services of their congregation since they have declared that because of the mistakes that had occurred to have lost all confidence in their pastor. This was the utmost that could have been conceded to them in spite of the fact that they had to admit that their pastor taught pure doctrine. The concession was made because the protesters were to be spared from the shame which they considered to consist herein if after the conclusion
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of peace they would again regularly attend the divine services which they had avoided till then. If they now will say that they still do not have any confidence in their pastor and for that reason cannot come and make confession and commune, then their viewpoint is highly problematic since their pastor has admitted where he has not dealt properly and has indeed humbled himself so far as to concede that right to those protesting people to decline his further pastoral care. As question able as this may be, this was ascribed to their conscience, into which no one can peer, and the judgment was relegated to the one who sees into the heart, and thus it was permitted to the protesters further to take communion in other churches till they would want to return to their own church. But the regular attendance at other divine services and nonetheless the active participation in the congregational voters assembly in their own church, this dare not continue any longer. This must cease.
The time in which it may have appeared to be embarrassing for the protesters again to return to their church is long over. If they cannot prove that Pastor Huegli is a false teacher then they have the holy duty, since they live in his parish, to hear him as their appointed teacher. If they do not want this, then they must either adhere in the hearts to a different doctrine from that which is preached in their church and thus because of their own false doctrine refuse to hear their pastor, or they are enthusiasts, who because they view their pastor as unworthy, consider his sermons as being anemic, or they are irreconcilable and refuse to forgive, or they are arrogant and want to dominate the congregation.
Therefore these protesters should be confronted with the following questions:
1. Whether they sincerely subscribe to the eighth article of the Augsburg Confession?
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2. Whether they can prove that the pastor of their congregation is a false teacher?
3. Whether they can prove that their pastor has been living an offensive life?
4. Whether they can prove that their pastor tyrannizes their conscience?
5. Whether they can prove that their pastor, although he wants to preach and officiate properly, is incapable thereof?
6. Whether they believe that one can separate oneself from an orthodox pastor who is not ungodly or whether one must do so even if he has weaknesses or if he does not possess all the traits which one would gladly see in him?
If they answer number one with yes, and if they cannot come up with any evidence in respect to questions two to five, and if they do not want to be caught in the horrible error refer red to under six, then they should be asked whether they will again regularly attend their church. If they do not want that, they should be told that their responses come either out of false doctrine or out of personal hate or out of arrogance, and their problems should be addressed in a friendly yet earnest manner. But if this will not work with them, then they should be told that the very least which the congregation must do is that it will not be permit ted in the future to avoid the services of the congregation but to take part in discussions and in voting in the voters assembly. This is my advice.
But consider this well, dear brethren, this is only my advice, which I considered myself obligated to give you upon your request. I must
therefore request you not to make any direct public use thereof, since you have obtained this advice and declined to publicize it, and you
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should deal according to this only when you are clearly convinced that this advice harmonizes with God's Word, of which I myself of course have no doubt. I make this request not because I fear to come out into the open with my advice, nor to take responsibility for the results that may flow from this, but rather I do this so that every person of those whom I do not know will not feel that they are being strong-armed by official authority.
In a completely private way you may of course share my letter with the persons concerned, if you believe that this would convince them; but do not do this publicly in order to shame them and not at the beginning of a meeting with them, but only if the confrontation should appear that they would finally be willing to yield if they were convinced.
Since I have no time to make a copy of this letter but since have a concern to keep in mind what I have written, therefore ask you to take the responsibility of making a copy and sending it to me.
In this matter the elders above all ought to deal with the pastor and to implore wisdom and patience from above.
I greet you in inner love and with the prayer to God that He may turn this sad matter to a good conclusion,
Your brother in the Lord,
C. F. W. Walther
P. S. After I have once more read through the above, I am of the opinion that it would be better if this letter were not shared with those people who absent themselves from the services but that they rather be told that if they want to learn the meaning of the written attempt at conciliation they should get in touch with me.
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Trostville, Saginaw County, Michigan ^
February 19, 1878
Honorable Doctor: 1
Necessity drives me to communicate to you the following. Two weeks ago on Saturday I received a letter from the elders of Trinity con gregation in Detroit which contained the petition to make a visitation of the church on the 5th Sunday after Epiphany and the following evening to attend a voters assembly. The letter began thus: "We, the undersigned" etc., and it ended thus: "With greetings and with high respect signed by the elders of Evangelical Lutheran Trinity Congregation in Detroit, Michigan, J. A. Huegli. " etc. Unfortunately the letter was on the way for almost 8 days so that I was unable to answer. Since it said in the letter: "We wish that you might come the following Sunday or Monday because there will be matters that must come up in our congregation, which are of such a nature that your presence at these discussion will be of particular blessing and help. " So I journeyed to Detroit on Monday. I was of the opinion that the elders had called me by request of the congregation. But this was not so. Dr. Huegli explained to me that the congregation knew nothing about this. If I had answered he would have informed his congregation. You can see herefrom, my dear doctor, that Pastor Huegli and his Board of Elders have dealt unilaterally. So as not to cause any com motion and to spare Pastor Huegli, 1 did not attend the voter's assembly. In this meeting first of all candidates were to be nominated for elders, and secondly they wanted to implement a resolution dealing with the protesting party (Toepel and the others), that is, to deprive them of the right to speech and vote. I besought Pastor Huegli to work for a delay of this matter. After the assembly he told me that he had success fully but with difficulty achieved a two week postponement. He said he had also talked with
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Toepel and the others and had shared with them that I was in Detroit and had asked them to attend the voters assembly in order peacefully to discuss the problem. On Tuesday evening, February 12, 1 attended a meeting of the elders but with the declaration that would not serve as chairman. The elders as well as Pastor Huegli alluded to a letter which they had gotten from you in which the procedure is precisely stated which they had agreed upon with the pro testing people. They had understood the ultimatum to mean that the protesting people would have to come to church. You, my dear doctor, were reported also to have said the same thing in the voters assembly in July of last year. This, they said, was even in the protocol. Then I had to read the whole protocol, but the protocol of the last meeting of July 4 was missing. Nobody could give an explanation what had happened to it. I asked Pastor Huegli and the elders why they had made that agreement with the pro testing party. They answered that the pastor and the congregation had made provisions for the election of elders. Pastor Huegli had besought the protesting members to attend the meeting of the elders. But the protesting members had replied, that they were going to meet at Mr. Rohahn's and that the elders would please come there. This actually took place on Wednesday evening, February 13. But three elders declined to attend. In this meeting now an attempt was supposed to be made to establish peace between the congregation and the protesters. Pastor Huegli declared that he was tired of the tensions and that he was no longer able to bear this because of physical condition and therefore made the following proposition:
1. The protesters were to promise that they would freely come back to church;
2. He, Pastor Huegli, would promise to defend the protesters in the voters assembly. But the protesters replied that number 2 had first to be carried out. They demanded that
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the congregation first recognize it as unjust and to ask for forgiveness from them that the congregation had broken the concord made July 4th, because the protesters had not promised that they would return to church. The ultimatum had indicated this, and to say this in the congregation had been promised them by Professor Walther. they said they had promised to come back to church as soon as they had again confidence in Pastor Huegli and in the congregation. They said they had all come back except one, namely Toepel. There were things, they said, that had again shattered there inchoate confidence, for example there was dancing at the children's festival and the elders had permitted this to go on. (The protesters told me privately that their own church pews had been rented out to other people, without having informed them, although they had paid for them. One of them told me his family had come to church, and that in their pew others had been found who had kept them out of the pew by extending their legs. They said one elder had told them they had no right to that pew any longer. Pastor Huegli promised them to investigate this matter. Only Mr. Toepel's pew had not been rented out yet.) In that meeting there was a lot of talk back and forth but they were not able to obtain consensus. The elders declared they could not see that the congregation had broken the concord. Shortly before midnight the meeting adjourned. On Thursday, February 14, 1 again journeyed home. As far as I can see the situation in Pastor Huegli's congregation is very tragic. The advice which the conference offered to him he has declined to follow. He believes that he has done enough. The congregation has resolved that nothing further may be copied out of the protocols. Members of the congregations are saying to the protesters: "Now you will be excommunicated. " When the protesters inquired in that meeting how that resolution read which the congregation had passed and which was to be implemented in 14 days, neither Pastor Huegli nor any of the elders were able to give them a response. Finally elder
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Flach said something about this but they could not make sense out of it. In that meeting I learned from one of the protesters that the protocol of the meeting held in the forenoon of July 4th was recorded in the main protocol book of the congregation which is in the safe keeping of teacher Plumhoff. I also reproved them in that meeting that Pastor Huegli and the elders had invited me to Detroit without the knowledge or without the request of the congregation. Elder Flach was of the opinion that he could not agree that this had been done behind the back of the congregation. The protesters kept on saying that the congregation is Pastor Huegli and his elders. It seems to me that they are right. I had not found that Pastor Huegli ever reproves his elders. What the congregation will now do in the next meeting I cannot say. But I harbor the fear that the congregation will withhold the right of speech and vote from the protesters. Now I share all this with you, my dear doctor
not so that you can make use thereof but only to inform you how I found the situation there. Pastor K. Moll told me that the letter which Pastor Huegli and his elders had written to you was a false presentation of the actual situation from A to Z. He gave me the permission to share this with you. I am sincerely glad that you have been made a doctor of theology now. May God grant you much grace and instruct and protect you for many many years to come.
With the wish of divine blessing and with my cordial greetings, your humble
F. A. Ahner
[written on the same sheet with Ahner's letter is the following by Walther]
To Pastor J. A. Huegli, Detroit ^
Beloved brother:
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I consider it my duty to share with you the above letter. I hope that Pastor Ahner has made an incorrect judgment. For if this were not so then could not condone the position that you and your congregation and your elders occupy and would have to fear that the matter will come to an evil conclusion. I am sending this letter in confidence and request you only to make indirect use thereof and after a time to return it to me.
Your deeply concerned
C. F. W. Walther
St., 13/3/78
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NOTES ^
To Rev. L. F. E. Krause, 27 February 1843
1. This letter is evidently addressed to Leberecht Friedrich Ehregott Krause (1804-1885), the first Lutheran pastor to serve in Wisconsin. He was a Silesian, was ordained into the Lutheran ministry by Johann Gottfried Scheibel, the staunch opponent of the state church in Prussian lands. Krause was the leader of a group of Silesian Lutherans who determined to emigrate to America in the late 1830's. He established contact with J. A. A. Grabau, the acknowledged leader of the Prussian emigration who settled in Buffalo, N. Y. and organized the Buffalo Synod in Freistadt and Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in 1845. Krause had a vast challenge in Wisconsin, serving as the sole Lutheran pastor in and around Milwaukee. Historic Lutheran congregations such as Trinity, Freistadt (Mequon), Trinity, Milwaukee (both in the LCMS) and St. Paul's Milwaukee (in the ALC) date their origins to his work. In the widening rift between the Missouri Synod and the Buffalo Synod after 1847, Krause became a chief defender of authoritarianism in the Lutheran ministry. In fact, his own congregations in Wisconsin resented his arbitrary absolute authority to the point that incredible tensions erupted. Due to this most of his members joined the Missouri Synod. His ineptness, stubbornness and his misfeasance destroyed his ministry, and almost destroyed him. He left Wisconsin, served other congregations in Michigan, New York, Minnesota, joined the Missouri Synod after an abject apology, rejoined the Buffalo Synod after an even more abject apology, organized his own synod, then joined the Ohio Synod, finally leaving for Australia where his ministry encountered similar turmoil.
2. Philip Jacob Spener (1635-1705), German Pietist.
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3. Francis Adolph Marbach (1798-1860), a Saxon attorney who was a member of the Saxon emigration 1838-39. He had signed the episcopal investiture of Martin Stephan early in 1839, and was C. F. W. Walther's chief opponent in the Altenburg Debate.
4. Martin Stephan (1777-1846), pastor of the Bohemian Lutheran church in Dresden, Saxony, a significant leader in the return to confessional Lutheranism, and leader of the Saxon emigration which brought some 600 Lutherans to Missouri in early 1839. He was removed from his office as bishop of this group of people, who had settled in Perry County, Missouri, and in St. Louis, because of moral laxity, and was expelled from the colony. He spent the last years of his life in Illinois, and was buried at Horse Prairie. Because of the authoritarian approach in his function as pastor and bishop, a deep reaction set in among his followers. Some were convinced that without a bishop they could not have a church, and thus were convinced they had to return to Germany. Among these was Marbach. Others, like C. F. W. Walther, reorientated their new insights in respect to the church and ministry on the basis of the New Testament, and on Luther, which then informed the subsequent Missouri Synod church polity. This issue of the authority of the ministry versus that of the congregation was at the heart of the problem with the Buffalo Synod and its leaders like J. A. A. Grabau and L. F. E. Krause.
5. Orthodoxism is a prejorative term and implies the overemphasis of orthodoxy.
6. Carlstadt (c. 1480-1541) (Andreas Bodenstein), German Reformer in the radical tradition. In 1505 he began to teach at University of Wittenberg. Luther countered "the new Judas" in one of his significant tracts.
7. Gottlieb Kluegel was one of the candidates of theology among the Saxon immigrants, listed
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as 32 years of age at the time (thus must have been born about 1806). Very little is actually known about him except that he was very dis turbed by the church conditions among the immigrants and thus did not blend in with the Saxon congregations in Missouri. It seems that at first he held with the Marbach tradition on the ministry, but he soon switched to the opposite pole and associated with the laymen who were strongly anticlerical. A certain Bierosch, a Silesian lay man, had had a tiff with Grabau in Hamburg
and was turned off by the strong insistence on the authority of the ministry. Bierosch and others in Wisconsin invited Kluegel, and in 1843 he appeared on the scene, organizing a congregation of anticlerical laymen. Government records show he functioned as a registered pastor for several years. Krause assumed that he was functioning with approval of the Saxons in Missouri. It
must be conceded that Walther had given him a fairly clean bill of health theologically. See the next letter dated 15 May 1843. Kluegel's activities developed tensions between the Buffalo Synod and the Missouri Synod, even before those organizations themselves came into being.
Carl S. Meyer, Letters of C. F. W. Walther: A Selection, (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1969), p. 70-75 translated this letter, but reads 'Paul Kluegel' for 'P. Kluegel.' The 'P' stood for 'Pastor,' not for Paul.
8. Herrnhuter refers to the Hussite emigrants from Moravia and Bohemia who settled on the lands of Count Ludwig von Zinzendorf in the early 18th century, and who founded the settlement of Hurrnhut there. They became very fervent
missionaries all over the world. Later they are generally known as Moravians.
9. Ferdinand Sproede was a layman among the Saxon immigrants. In the post-Stephan unrest he was critical of the Perry County pastors, and challenged the validity of their calls into the ministry. Kluegel (see note 7) was attracted
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to him, and stayed with him for some time before going to Wisconsin.
10. Pietism refers to a complex movement growing out of German theology which stressed subjective feeling in contrast to mere head knowledge of Christian doctrine, emphasized continuing repentance and the absolute need for good works as a continuing development of justification. It had a distinct anti-ecclesiastical bias, since it feared the formalism of the organized church.
11. August Herman Francke (1663-1727), German Pietist leader and educator at the University of Halle, who also conducted his own educational and charitable enterprises in that city. He is well remembered for his contribution to world missions.
12. Johann Jakob Rambach (1693-1735), pastor, theologian and hymnodist of the pietist movement.
13. Karl Henry von Bogatzky (1690-1774), writer of pietistic devotional literature.
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To Rev. L. F. E. Krause 15 May 1843
1. Internal evidence indicate that this is addressed to Rev. L. F. E. Krause in Wisconsin.
2. De Servo Arbitrio is the well-known essay by Luther, vol. 33 of American Edition, ed. Philip. S. Watson, Philadelphia: Fortress, 1972.
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Letter of Introduction for Kluegel.
November 9, 1843
1. See note 7 above.
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To Rev. C. F. W. Walther August 17, 1843
1. "Town Nine" is the designation Krause used for the settlement of Freistadt, about 20 miles north of Milwaukee.
2. Theodor Julius Brohm (1808-1881), one of the Saxon candidates of theology who came with the immigrants in 1838-39. Early in 1843 he was called to a small congregation in New York City thru the mediation of J. A. A. Grabau. Obviously Brohm traveled the Great Lakes route from St. Louis to New York. Since he assumed his office in New York 31 March 1843, he must have come thru Buffalo some days or weeks before that.
3. Gustav Adolph Kindermann (1805-1856), Lutheran pastor from Pomerania who emigrated with a group of lay members in summer of 1843. He traveled the usual route, up the Hudson, from Albany to Buffalo, then thru the Great Lakes to Milwaukee, proceeding a few miles beyond where Krause's village of Freistadt was located. Kindermann and his parishioners founded the settlement of Kirchhayn and established historic David's Star church there. Some of his parishioners split in Milwaukee and proceeded to Lebanon and Water town, Dodge County, Wis.
4. The Hirtenbrief or Pastoral Letter was an admonition which Grabau in Buffalo, N. Y. had written to the Lutheran pioneers in Wisconsin in 1840 before they had a pastor, instructing them on proper procedures to follow in respect to church functions when no pastor was available. Grabau was opposed to having laymen perform any church functions except emergency baptisms.
5. Town Nine refers to the settlement in Freistadt. The sect between Town Nine and Milwaukee refers to a group of people in the extreme northern part of Milwaukee County, in and around the old settlement of Granville, now part of the City of Milwaukee.
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6. Ernst Moritz Buerger (1806-1890), one of the original Saxon immigrants, but after the deposition of Bishop Stephan he was plagued by the notion that the church no longer existed among them and that he had to return to Germany. On his way to New York, he traveled over Buffalo,and was called to the pastorate there among some recent immigrants who were separating from Grabau's congregation.
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To Rev. L. F. E. Krause January 19, 1846
1. The internal evidence indicates that this letter was written to L. F. E. Krause in Wisconsin.
2. Johann Arndt (1555-1621) known as the forerunner of German pietism, famous for his devotional writings in a mystical vein. Walther left off the final "t" in the name.
3. Heinrich Mueller (1631-75), German devotional writer and hymnodist.
4. Christian Scriver (1629-93) German Lutheran pastor, preacher and hymn writer.
5. Bogatzki, see note under letter of 27 February 1843.
6. Johann Anastasius Freylinghausen (1670-1739), German theologian who succeeded Francke as superintendent of the academy in Halle in 1727. He was one of the best-known hymnodists of pietism.
7. Johann Porst (1668-1728), pietist hymn writer.
8. Johann Caspar Schade (1666-98), pietist who worked with Spener in Berlin.
9. Joachim Lange (1670-1744) professor at Halle, prolific pietist author, one of the active polemicist against the theologians of Lutheran Orthodoxy.
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10. It is not clear whether Walther referred to Heinrich Nikolaus Gerber (1702-1775), German Lutheran composer, or to his son Ernst Ludwig Gerber (1746-1819), musicologist.
11. Johann Philipp Fresenius (1705-1761) Lutheran clergyman, well-known churchman in the moderate pietistic tradition.
12. Watertown, Wis. A colony of Lutheran immigrants had settled there who had come to America in 1843 under Rev. Gustav Adolf Kindermann. He was not able to serve them, for it was about 40 miles from Kirchhayn, where his main congregation was located some 25 miles northwest of Milwaukee. Therefore the people in Watertown asked the Saxons in Missouri to send one of their unemployment candidates of theology. Thus Karl Ludwig Geyer (1812-1892) became the pastor there, the first Saxon to work in Wisconsin.
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To Walther and Wyneken October 29, 1850
1. Krause wrote this letter after his complete falling-out with Grabau and the Buffalo Synod. At the time he was applying for membership in the Missouri Synod. In view of the sharp denunciations he had uttered and written about the Missouri Synod in the past, it is no wonder that he was filled with trepidation about his status. F. C. D. Wyneken was president of the Missouri Synod.
2. Gottlieb Schaller (1819-1887), one of the pastors sent to America by Wilhelm Loehe, was pastor in Philadelphia at the time.
3. This letter is the work of a man under enormous emotional stress, and it is not strange that some imperfect syntax slipped in.
4. Johann Adam Ernst (d. 1895), one of the first two Loehe missionaries sent to America, was
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pastor in Eden, N. Y. at the time.
5. J. A. A. Grabau was pastor of the Buffalo
Synod congregation in Buffalo, N. Y., and was
president of the Buffalo Synod.
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A Gutachten of C. F. W. Walther
1. A Gutachten is a theological opinion or judgment. Prominent churchmen were at times asked to provide such opinions when churches did not know how to deal with a problem.
2. Granville was about 12 miles north of Milwaukee in the northern part of Milwaukee County. It is now incorporated into the city of Milwaukee. There were some early German Lutheran settlers there. Freistadt was the settlement about 7 miles north of Granville where Pastor Krause had first lived and worked. Kirchhain was another four miles northwest of Freistadt, where Gustav Adolf Kindermann was pastor.
3. Little is known about this teacher Wallschlaeger. He was evidently a parochial school teacher who had moderate anticlerical tendencies.
4. Karl Ludwig Geyer (1812-1892) Saxon immigrant and pastor at Immanuel, Town Lebanon, near Watertown, Wis.
5. Friedrich Lochner (1822-1902), Loehe missionary sent to America in 1845, was in early contact with the Saxons in Missouri, participated in the founding of the Missouri Synod 1847. He served for many years as pastor of historic Trinity church, Milwaukee. He was a gifted artist and writer, and was the outstanding specialist in liturgics in Synod.
* * * * *
To Dr. Wilhelm Sihler January 2, 1845
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1. Adam Ernst, one of the two first missionaries sent by Wilhelm Loehe to work in America, arriving in 1842. He first taught school in Columbus, OH, but in summer of 1843 took a pastorate in Marysville, Union Co., OH, 30 miles northwest of Columbus. Ernst called the town Neuendettelsau after Loehe's home town in Bavaria.
2. Friedrich Buenger, one of the Saxon candidates of theology who was helping Walther in St. Louis both by teaching school and in the parish ministry.
3. Wittenburg, Perry Co., MO, is the town on the river where the Saxons first landed.
4. Altenburg and Frohna were Saxon settlements in Perry County which flourished and developed vigorous churches. Dresden did not flourish, and before long was remembered only as a name.
5. Gotthold Heinrich Loeber was the oldest of the Saxon pastors.
6. J. F. Winter was a teacher.
7. Ernst Moritz Buerger was one of the Saxon candidates of theology. When he wanted to return to Germany because he was convinced the church did not exist among the Saxons after Bishop Stephan's dismissal, he traveled over Buffalo, N. Y. to see some relatives. Just at that time some of Rev. J. A. A. Grabau's people were forming a new congregation there in protest against Grabau's authoritarian ministry, and Buerger was persuaded to remain in America and take over that congregation. In the tensions with Grabau and the Buffalo Synod, Buerger's name comes up often, therefore.
8. The congregation which Buenger pastored in Buffalo was Trinity.
9. E. G. W. Keyl was one of the Saxon pastors.
10. Theodor Carl Friedrich Gruber was one of
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the Saxon pastors.
11. Those Saxons who settled in St. Louis founded Old Trinity, of which O. H. Walther, older brother of C. F. W. Walther, was pastor till his death in 1841. Thereupon the congregation called the younger of the brothers, who then served them till his death in 1878.
12. Theodore Buenger, accomplished musician and teacher.
13. The school which is now Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, was founded in 1839 in Perry County.
14. Johan Jakob Goenner was one of the Saxon candidates.
15. Georg Albert Schieferdecker, one of the Saxon candidates, at that time pastor of the congregation in Columbia, St. Clair Co., Ill., and of the one in Waterloo, Monroe Co.
16. Ottomar Fuerbringer, one of the Saxon candidates, was pastor at the congregation at Elkhorn Prairie, (now Venedy) Washington Co., Ill.
17. Emil Julius Moritz Wege, Saxon candidate who took over a mission field on the frontier in Benton Co., Mo.
18. Ludwig Geyer, one of the Saxon candidates, was the first of their number to serve in Wiscon sin. When Pastor Gustav Adolf Kindermann arrived in Wisconsin from Germany in 1843 a substantial portion of his members settled in Watertown, some 40 miles from where the rest of them settled in Kirchhayn. Kindermann suggested that possibly one of the Saxons could serve the Watertown group, and thus Geyer became pastor there.
19. Der Lutheraner was a German church magazine which Walther and Trinity church in St. Louis launched in 1844. It soon became the most influential confessional Lutheran church paper
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In the midwest.
20. Der Hirtenbrief, title affixed to a pastoral letter which Rev. J. A. A. Grabau had written in 1840 to hold those people especially in Wisconsin in check who, because they had no ordained pastor in their settlements, were going to have laymen administer church rites and sacraments. The critiques of this and counter critiques with the original document were all published by the Saxons in Missouri as Der Hirtenbrief des Herrn Pastors Grabau zu Buffalo vom Jahre 1840, Nebst den zwischen ihm and mehreren lutherischen Pastoren von Missouri gewechselten Schriften, New York: H. Ludwig & Co., 1849.
21. Heinrich von Rohr, military officer who had come with the Prussian immigration, was at first the lay leader of the group which went to Wisconsin in 1839. Before long, he took up theological studies at Martin Luther Seminary, Buffalo, N. Y., which J. A. A. Grabau had founded, and became a pastor in the Buffalo Synod, founded 1845. Leberecht Friedrich Ehregott Krause was a Silesian, and the first Lutheran pastor to work in Wisconsin. He was affiliated with Grabau in the Buffalo Synod. The Buffalo Synod in fact was founded in his parish in Freistadt and Milwaukee, Wis. Before long, however, Krause was to have a falling out with Grabau. For Kindermann, see note 18 above.
22. Karl Wilhelm Ehrenstroem, a pastor from Altmark, Prussia, had emigrated in 1844, since the Prussian police had detained him. Some of his adherents settled in Bergholz, Wallmow and Martinsville, between Buffalo and Niagra Falls. Before Ehrenstroem served a short stint as pastor there, he had gone to the Wisconsin settlements, but the Lutherans there did not take to his radi cal theology. Then he served in the New York settlements possibly only a few months. In early 1845 he abandoned his congregations. Like a comet making one pass around the sun, he made one pass around the nuclei of organized church
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life, but then returned to the unknown reaches of outer space.
23. By Evangelicals are meant those German Protestants who did not have the high level of confessional consciousness that others like the Saxons had who had come thru the anti-rationalistic Awakening in Germany. Without a confessional consciousness, many German Protestants were willing to gloss over the doctrinal distinctions between Lutheran and Reformed churches, and therefore they preferred the term 'evangelisch' or evangelical, which in this context has a totally different meaning than it does in American church circles in the 20th century. Since the Evangelicals advocated union with the Reformed, they are also called "Unirte, " a word difficult to translate but which must be rendered as "United" at times.
24. This refers to the projected conference which Grabau and his men were planning for 1845, which became the organizing convention of the Buffalo Synod.
* * * * * *
To a German Churchman March 19, 1849
1. ^ This letter must have been written to a German churchman, probably somebody associated with Loehe.
2. Der Lutheraner was the church paper which Walther began publishing in 1844.
3. This man has not been identified.
4. ^ Friedrich Hecker (1811-1881) a German politician and statesman who had been the leader of the 1848 revolution in Baden. With many other so-called '48ers he came to America when the revolution failed. In Belleville, St. Clair Co., Ill., there was a veritable settlement of these German political activists, including such well-known
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men as Gustav Koerner; in 1849 Hecker joined them. He was also very much the political activist, running on the same Republican ticket in 1856 with Abraham Lincoln. There was no love lost between the German confessional Lutherans such as Walther and the '48ers.
5. Walther was at the time President of Synod, President of Concordia Seminary, and pastor of Trinity church in St. Louis.
* * * * * *
To Pastor A. Lange 25 January 1858
1. This letter is addressed to Rev. Alexander Lange, who had been a member of the Kirchen verein des Westens, an "Evangelical" synod which had its headquarters in St. Louis, and had found ed Eden Seminary. Lange worked in Lafayette County, Mo. only very briefly. He disappeared from the scene, only to show up in Wisconsin. Later he worked in Michigan also.
2. 1 Cor. 14, 40.
3. Georg Dedekennus (1564-1628) compiled and edited a collection of theological judgments and opinions from theologians, lawyers, and con sistories entitled Thesaurus consiliorum et Decisionum, 4 vols., 1623, which furnished prece- dents and guidelines for pastors who had difficult cases of casuistry to decide.
* * * * * *
To Theo. E. Buenger May 7, 1861
1. Theodore Ernst Buenger (1821-1876), Walther's brother-in-law, was teacher at Immanuel, Chicago.
2. Walther gives the address of Kerckhoff or Kerkkof as:
Kerkkofs Farm
Sandy Creek
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Hillsboro
Jefferson Co., Mo.
3. Heinrich Boernstein was a prominent German in St. Louis, and was editor of Westliche Post,a German newspaper. He was named as commander of the Second Regiment of German volunteers in the hectic days of spring and early summer, 1861, when the Germans rallied in St. Louis to the cause of the Union, to prevent the Federal arsenal from falling into the hands of Governor Jackson.
4. It has not been ascertained who the Muellers were. Heinrich Wunder (1830-1913) became pastor of St. Paul's, Chicago, in 1851. Georg Schick
(1831—1915) had been pastor of Immanuel, Chicago, but was at the time on the faculty of the preparatory department of the St. Louis seminary.
* * * * * *
^ To Gustav Seyffarth October 15, 1859
1. ^ Gustav Seyffarth (1769-1885) was a renowned Egyptologist and archaeologist at the University of Leipzig. When he retired there with a full pension, Walther prevailed on him to teach at Concordia Seminary, St. Louis. He served in this capacity gratuitously for three years, but felt uncomfortable with the view on slavery which Walther espoused. Walther had no sympathy with the abolitionist view, and held that slavery per se was not contrary to the Scriptures. This and the following letter reflect a bit of the tension which resulted when Seyffarth left the Seminary.
* * * * *
^ To Prof. Gustavus Seyffarth June 17, 1862
1. Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg (1802-1869), professor at the University of Berlin.
2. In Lehre und Wehre VIII (April 1862)
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p. 105-110 a short article had appeared by C[raemer] entitled "Dr. Hengstenberg ueber die Sclavenfrage." This synopsized what Hengstenberg had written earlier in Evangelische Kirchenzeitung, the conservative German church paper.
* * * * * *
To J. C. W. Lindemann May 16, 1866
1. Christian Diez was a music teacher in Milwaukee, but also taught in St. John's parochial school in Milwaukee, where Dulitz was pastor at the time. He was received as an advisory member of Synod in 1853, but seems to have prospered more as a private music teacher.
2. Karl Brauer (1831-1907) had come to America in 1850 and taught in various parochial schools in Synod. He served as professor of music at the Teacher's Seminary in Addison, I11., from 1866 to 1897. In 1888 he published his famous Choralbuch, and contributed many articles on music and on organs in the teachers' journal of the Missouri Synod, the Evangelisch-Lutherisches Schulblatt.
* * * * * *
To Mr. A. F. Brackmann December 4, 1869
1. A. F. Brackmann was a teacher from Baltimore who was engaged by an association of Lutherans in St. Louis to conduct what Walther calls a "Buergerschule." This word, precisely translated, is "citizens' school. " August C. Stellhorn, Schools of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (St. Louis: CPH, 1963), p. 165 f. considers this the first attempt at a Lutheran high school in St. Louis. From this letter of Walther, it is obvious that the enterprise was not going well.
2. The Association was the group formed voluntarily by individual Lutherans in the St. Louis area for the purpose of operating this school.
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To Rev. Hugo Hanser May 30, 1872
1. Hugo Hanser (1831-1885) was just elected to a special committee to investigate the unsatis factory conditions at the Ft. Wayne college.
2. The preparatory department of the St. Louis seminary had been moved to Ft. Wayne, Ind., in 1861. When students graduated there, they entered the seminary in St. Louis.
3. Johann Christoph Wilhelm Lindemann (1827-1879) had been named to head the normal school in 1864 which Synod operated in Addison, I11. at that time.
4. Friedrich Wyneken was a past president of the Missouri Synod and at that time was pastor in Cleveland, OH.
5. H. C. Schwan was president of the Central District at this time.
* * * * * *
To Rev. F. Sievers January 6, 1873
1. Ferdinand Sievers (1816-1893) the man who really espoused the cause of missions in the Missouri Synod.
2. A. F. Brackmann, see note in letter of December 2, 1869.
3. This was a high school launched by a voluntary association of Lutherans in St. Louis. See letter of December 2, 1869.
4. Edmund R. Baierlein had been one of the missionaries working among the Indians in Michigan before the Missouri Synod was organized. He had been trained by the Leipzig Mission Society but sent by Loehe. In 1853 the Leipzig society
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wanted their man back in order to send him to India. Since Baierlein had been a member of Synod and knew the pastors, he served as a natural bridge between the Missouri Synod and the Leipzig Mission Society's work in India.
5. The two sons must have been Frederick, born 1852, and Bernhard born 1853, students at the seminary.
6. Letters from Neustadt, see "Nachrichten aus und ueber die bairische Landeskirche, aus zwei Privatbriefen," in Der Lutheraner, XXIX, p. 66- 68.
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To Rev. H. Fick December 3, 1873
1. In Springfield, I11., a group of Lutherans, apparently led by Rev. C. W. Aug. Theodore Bensen (1849-1881) wanted to get a high school under way, but the project does not seem to have gotten off the ground.
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To Wm. Sihler July 21, 1876
1. Kirchhayn, Wisconsin was the settlement where the second large group of German Lutheran immigrants to go to Wisconsin had settled in 1843. It is about 4 miles northwest of Freistadt, where the first settlement was made almost 4 years earlier. At first the people in Kirchhayn were unified in one congregation belonging to the Buffalo Synod, but when the tensions with Krause developed a few years after Kirchhayn had been founded, it spilled over to those people also. The congregation split into three parts. The Buffalo Synod congregation was St. John's. The smallest part in the split was comprised of the people who joined the Missouri Synod. This con gregation is Immanuel. The largest part of the immigration formed David Star Church, which
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eventually joined the Wisconsin Synod. The Missouri Synod congregation was beset by many problems, and Synodical officials were quite frustrated with the intransigent members there. The pastor at the time was Johann Heinrich Meyer. He held the pastorate there from 1872 to 1876.
2. Sihler found out for himself how bad the situation was. After the visitation he remarked that he had never seen such belligerent Lutherans. One member of the church had called a non-member a Hurenbok, a fornicator. The whole congregation was up in arms whether this was not unchristian. The issue was not whether the labeling of the non-member was accurate or not, but whether it was proper. The issue was litigated up to the district president who ruled that it was not improper for a church member to call a non-member who was a fornicator such a name.
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To J. C. W. Lindemann January 22, 1878
1. It has not been ascertained who this pastor Lange is to whom Walther makes reference, nor what the particular view of creation is to which reference is made here.
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To Th. Ruhland May 23, 1878
1. Pastor C. F. Theodore Ruhland was president of the Saxon Free Church.
2. Georg Stoeckhardt (1842-1913) had met Ruhland when Stoeckhardt had served as pastor of the church at Planitz, Saxony, 1873-76. When he protested vigorously against abuses in the state church he was suspended from office. With part of his congregation he joined the Saxon Free Church. With Ruhland he founded the Freikirche, official journal of the Free Church. For his incisive articles exposing the corruption in the
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State Church he was sentenced to four months imprisonment. Walther wanted Stoeckhardt on the St. Louis seminary faculty, but could not convince synod to call him, so it was arranged that he was called as pastor of Holy Cross, St. Louis. He was immediately put to work teaching at the seminary part-time. In 1887 he was named to a full-time professorship.
3. Die Ev.-luth. Freikirche was the organ of the Saxon Free Church.
4. Franz August Otto Pieper (1852-1931) became Walther's understudy as professor of systematics at the St. Louis seminary, later succeeded Walther as president of the seminary, and served as president of the Missouri Synod from 1899-1911.
5. Gustavus Seyffarth, see note in letter of October 15, 1859.
6. Friedrich Reinhold Eduard Preuss (1834-1904), German scholar called to the St. Louis seminary 1869, who soon defected to the Roman Catholic Church.
7. Hermann Michael Baumstark (1839-76), professor in the preparatory department of the practical seminary, then in St. Louis, was deposed in 1869 because he was negotiating with the Jesuits for Roman Catholic membership.
8. A. Hoerger, separatist pastor in Bavaria, Germany.
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To H. G. Sauer June 19, 1881
1. Hermann Gottlieb Sauer (1845-1896), pastor at St. Paul's in Ft. Wayne, and chairman of the Board of Control of Concordia College there.
2. August Crull (1845-1923) was a professor at the Ft. Wayne college. His family had an inor-
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dinate amount of illness.
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To J. C. W. Lindemann August 7, 1878
1. This letter to J. C. W. Lindemann, Director of the Teachers' Seminary in Addison, I11., re flects some of the problems this man had. He was a gifted individual, but had received little formal education. It is obvious that he felt inferior. He died less than half a year after Walther wrote him this letter.
2. This is probably a combination of Ps. 62, 5; 37, 9; 49, 3; 112, 4.
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To Board of Elders of Trinity Congregation, Detroit
January 13, 1878
1. Trinity congregation, Detroit, Mich., evidently had some intense problems at that time.
2. Johann Adam Huegli (1831-1904), pastor at Trinity, Detroit, since 1860, and a past president of the Northern district of the Missouri Synod (1873-75).
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To Walther, Trostville, Mich. February 19, 1878
1. This letter is addressed to Walther, it is included in this collection because of the way Walther handled the problem which prevailed in Trinity congregation, Detroit, Mich., and the use he made of this letter of F. A. Ahner, who had made an official visitation at Trinity in order to help pastor and people resolve their problems.
2. Johann Konrad Ludwig Moll (1839-1897) was pastor of Immanuel congregation, Detroit at the time.