Volume I Part 4 (1/2)

64. C. F. L. Endress Denounces Form of Concord.--Among the better cla.s.s of Lutherans prominent in the Pennsylvania Synod during the decades immediately preceding and following the year 1800 were such men as J. B. Schmucker, H. A. Muhlenberg, Lochman, Probst, and Endress. In the Proceedings of the General Synod, 1827, Lochman and Endress are spoken of as belonging to ”the Fathers of our General Synod, and able ministers of the Lord Jesus,” as the ”oldest and most respected members”

of the Synod of East Pennsylvania, as ”men who were among the brightest ornaments of the Lutheran Church, and whose departure is lamented no less by the synods in general than by that to which they more immediately belonged.” (12. 21.) Yet they, too, were absolutely indifferent as to the Lutheran Symbols. Dr. C. F. Endress, a pupil of Helmuth, a leading spirit in the Pennsylvania Ministerium and most prominent in the unionistic transactions with the German Reformed Church, declared his theological position as follows: ”We have the Formula Concordiae, in which expulsion, condemnation, anathema, were, in the most liberal manner, p.r.o.nounced and poured forth against all those who were of a different opinion, which, however, thank G.o.d, was never received universally by the Lutheran Church. I would suffer both my hands to be burned off before I would subscribe that instrument.” ”As we have hitherto received the Augsburg Confession and Luther's Catechism and Melanchthon's Apology, so I have no objection that they should be kept in reverence and respect as our peculiar doc.u.ments, but not to overrule the Bible. For by this shall the Lutheran Church forever distinguish itself from all other religious connections, that the Bible, the Bible alone, shall remain the only sun in Christ Jesus, and that we rest upon human declarations of faith only in so far as they receive their light more or less from that great light.” ”What shall I answer on the question, What is the confession of faith of the Lutheran Church?

Answer: I will not dictate to you what you should say; but if I should be asked, I would say, first, and princ.i.p.ally, and solely, and alone: The Holy Word of G.o.d contained in the writings of the prophets and apostles. The confessions of faith by the Church of the first four centuries we hold in conformity with the Bible, and receive them, as far as I know, universally in the Lutheran Church. The confession of the princes of the German Empire presented at the Diet of Augsburg is held by all in honor and respect, and when we compare it with other human confessions, we give it a decided preference. Luther's Catechism is used in all Lutheran churches, and no catechism of other religious denominations has that honor. The so-called Apology is in possession of very few Lutheran ministers; but whether they have read it or not, they consider it a good book. The Smalcald Articles I have often read. In Germany they are taken up among the Symbols. I know not whether any other divine in the Lutheran Church in America ever read it except Muhlenberg and Lochman. In short, we hold firmly and steadfastly to our beloved Bible, when the one holds to Calvin, the other to Zwingli, a third to the Heidelberg Catechism, a fourth to the Confession of the Synod of Dort, a fifth to the Westminster Catechism, a sixth to the Common-prayer Book, a seventh to the Solemn League and Covenant, and the eighth to the darkened and depraved reason per se, the ninth to reason under the name of Holy Spirit, and the tenth to the devil himself in the form of an angel of light. But I will cleave to my beloved Bible, and hereby it shall remain. Amen.” (_Luth. Observer_, Sept., 1881.)

65. Rev. Probst Defending Union.--The _Lutheran Observer_, September, 1881, from whose columns we quoted the statements above concerning Dr.

Endress, continues: Rev. Probst, who was a member of the Pennsylvania Synod from 1813 until his death, and well acquainted with the sentiments of his brethren, in a work published in 1826 for the express purpose of promoting a formal and complete union of the German Reformed and Lutheran churches in America, ent.i.tled, _Reunion of the Lutherans and Reformed_, says that there was no material difference of doctrinal views between them, the Lutherans having relinquished the bodily presence, and the Reformed unconditional election. Speaking of the supposed obstacles to such union, he remarks: ”The doctrine of unconditional election cannot be in the way. This doctrine has long since been abandoned; for there can scarcely be a single German Reformed preacher found who regards it as his duty to defend this doctrine. Zwingli's more liberal, rational, and Scriptural view of this doctrine, as well as of the Lord's Supper, has become the prevailing one among Lutherans and Reformed, and it has been deemed proper to abandon the view of both Luther and Calvin on the subject of both these doctrines.” (74.) ”The whole ma.s.s of the old Confessions, occasioned by the peculiar circ.u.mstances of those troublous times, has become obsolete by the lapse of ages, and is yet valuable only as matter of history. Those times and circ.u.mstances have pa.s.sed away, and our situation, both in regard to political and ecclesiastical relations, is entirely changed. We are therefore not bound to these books, but only to the Bible. For what do the unlearned know of the Augsburg Confession, or the Form of Concord, or the Synod of Dort?” (76.) ”Both churches [the Lutheran and the Reformed] advocate the evangelical liberty of judging for themselves, and have one and the same ground of their faith--the Bible. Accordingly, both regard the Gospel as their exclusive rule of faith and practise, and are forever opposed to all violations of the liberty of conscience.” (76.) ”All enlightened and intelligent preachers of both churches agree that there is much in the former Symbolical Books that must be stricken out as antiquated and contrary to common sense, and be made conformable with the Bible, and that we have no right to pledge ourselves to the mere human opinions of Luther, or Calvin, or Zwingli, and that we have but one Master, Christ.

Nor is any evangelical Christian bound to the interpretations which Luther, or Calvin, or any other person may place on the words of Christ; but each one has the right to interpret them according to the dictates of his own conscience.” (80.) ”Inasmuch as all educated ministers of the Lutheran and Reformed churches now entertain more reasonable and more Scriptural views on those doctrines which were formerly the subjects of controversy, what necessity is there of a continued separation?” (81.)

SYNOD'S UN-LUTHERAN ATt.i.tUDE CONTINUED.

66. Decades of Indifferentism.--After the abortive efforts at establis.h.i.+ng a union seminary and uniting with the Reformed organically, and after her withdrawal from the General Synod in 1823, the Pennsylvania Synod pa.s.sed through a long period of indifferentism before the spirit of Lutheran confessionalism once more began to manifest itself, chiefly in consequence of influences from German Lutheran immigrants and by the activity of such men as Drs. Krauth and Mann.

However, even till the middle of the nineteenth century the symptoms of reviving Lutheranism in the Pennsylvania Synod were but relatively weak, few, and far between. The Agenda of 1842 still contained the union formula of distribution in the Lord's Supper and revealed a unionistic and Reformed spirit everywhere. A form of Baptism savors of Pelagianism and Rationalism. The Agenda does not contain a single clear and unequivocal confession of the Lutheran doctrine of the real presence.

The second form for celebrating the Lord's Supper states: ”As we are sensual creatures, He [Christ] has appointed two external, visible elements, bread and wine, as tokens (Pfaender), as it were, in order by them to a.s.sure us that with, in, and under them (mit, bei und unter denselben) we should become partakers of His body and blood, that is, of His entire grace of atonement. As surely, therefore, as a penitent communicant receives the blessed bread and the blessed cup, so surely he, in a manner invisible, will also receive from his Savior a share in His body and blood.” (_Lutheraner_ 1844,47; 1846,61.81.) In 1848 Rev.

Weyl, of Baltimore, the arch-enemy of confessional Lutheranism and unscrupulous slanderer of Wyneken, Reynolds, etc., declared in his church-paper that within the whole Synod of Pennsylvania there were hardly ten preachers who, in their faith and teaching regarding the doctrine of the Lord's Supper, deviated from the views of the General Synod. Dr. Walther remarked with respect to this statement, which he was inclined to regard as mendacious: ”Since the [Pennsylvania] Synod was not ashamed to conclude its Centennial Jubilee by declaring this miserable paper [of Weyl] its organ and thereby publis.h.i.+ng to the world its spiritual death [as a Lutheran Church], it serves her right to have this man write her epitaph.” (_L_. 1848, 31.) Concerning the new hymn-book of the Pennsylvania Synod, Rev. Hoyer wrote in _Kirchliche Mitteilungen:_ ”After a closer inspection I found that this hymn-book was compiled for three cla.s.ses of people, Orthodox, Unionists, and Supranaturalists. Here we find, besides 'Es ist das Heil uns kommen her,' also 'Religion, von Gott gegeben,' as well as a hymn for the national holiday, the 4th of July, imploring the Lord to give us the spirit of Was.h.i.+ngton.” (1850, 91; _L_. 7, 65.) _Der Lutherische Herold_, which, edited by H. Ludwig, appeared since April, 1851, in New York, represented the cla.s.s of German Lutherans within the Ministeriums of Pennsylvania and New York then most advanced in their protestations of Lutheranism. But what kind of Lutheranism it was that Ludwig and his paper advocated appears from the following quotation: ”We expect little sympathy from the Old Lutherans; yet, our endeavor shall always be to banish from our columns everything that might increase the breach, _for in doctrine we are one, we only differ in the form, of the dress_, that is to say, in practise, and in the mode and manner of spreading the doctrine.” (_L._ 1, 151; 8, 143.) In January, 1855, the same paper was complimented by the _Reformierte Kirchenzeitung_ as follows: ”The _Lutherische Herold_, published by H. Ludwig, endeavors to mediate between the two extremes in the Lutheran Church of this country, and represents the milder Melanchthonian conception of the Sacraments. We read the _Herold_ with joy, and wish it a recognition and encouragement commensurate with its services.” (_L_. 11, 102.) As late as 1851 the Pennsylvania Synod, according to the report of the convention in that year, 51 ministers being present, maintained fraternal intercourse with the Reformed, United, Methodists, and Moravians. She admitted Reformed and Presbyterian preachers as advisory members. Synod had also received a Reformed minister as such into her ministerium. She a.s.sembled in Reformed and Presbyterian churches for union services, and attended the service in a Methodist church. She also adopted the resolution to enter into more intimate relations with the Moravians. (_L_. 1852, 138.) In the following year Synod returned to its original confessional position in the days of Muhlenberg, though in a somewhat equivocal manner.

(Spaeth, _W. J. Mann_, 171.) In 1853, however, at the same time appealing to all Lutheran synods to follow her example, the Pennsylvania Synod resolved, by a vote of 54 to 28, to reunite with the General Synod, then rapidly approaching its lowest water-mark, doctrinally and confessionally, its leading men openly and uninterruptedly denouncing the doctrines distinctive of Lutheranism and zealously preparing the way for the Definite Platform as a subst.i.tute for the Augsburg Confession.

Indeed, the Pennsylvania Synod added to its resolution on the reunion that, ”should the General Synod violate its const.i.tution, and require of our Synod a.s.sent to anything conflicting with the old and long-established faith of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, then our delegates are hereby required to protest against such action, to withdraw from its sessions, and to report to this body.” (Penn. Minutes 1853, 18.) However, the action as such was tantamount to a violation and denial of the Lutheran Confession. Dr. Walther remarked with respect to the union: ”This event will be hailed by many with great joy, a joy, however, that we are unable to share in in any measure. . . . For who does not see that the Synod [of Pennsylvania], by entering into ecclesiastical union with a body notoriously heterodox, has already departed from, and actually denied, the good Confession of our Church?”

(_L_. 9, 122.) Confirming the correctness of this statement, the Pennsylvania Synod, thirteen years later, when the ranks of her conservatives had materially increased, severed her connection with the General Synod.

67. Dr. Sihler's Estimate.--In 1858 Dr. Sihler wrote concerning the Pennsylvania Synod: ”When the writer of this article, more than fourteen years ago, came to this country and gradually informed himself on the American conditions of the Lutheran Church, he had to observe with heartfelt sorrow that the Pennsylvania Synod, then still undivided and very numerous, in whose territory or vicinity the leaders of the so-called Lutheran General Synod have their field of labor was so completely indifferent toward the shameful apostasy of the latter from the faith and the Confession of the Lutheran Church. For in vain one looked for a strong and decided testimony in any of the synodical reports of this church-body against the pseudo-Lutherans of the General Synod. Nor was there to be found within the Pennsylvania Synod, or in other synods not belonging to the General Synod, so much earnest zeal and love for the truth of G.o.d's Word and of the Confessions of the Church, nor did it have any men among its theologians who were able to expose thoroughly in the English language the error, the hollowness and shallowness of the miserable productions of a Schmucker and Kurtz, who were made Doctors of Theology by G.o.d in His wrath and by Satan as a joke and for the purpose of ridicule. On the contrary, they seemed to be not a little impressed with the theological learning and dogmatical science of these two so-called Doctors, who, in rare self-satisfaction, found life and complete happiness in Reinhard's supernaturalism. In short, these open counterfeiters, Calvinists, Methodists, and Unionists, these base traitors and destroyers of the Lutheran Church, were and always remained the dear brethren, who contributed not a little to the prosperity and welfare of the dear 'Lutheran Zion.' Accordingly, it did not require a gift of prophecy when the writer of this article, as early as 1844, foretold in the _Lutherische Kirchenzeitung_ [edited by Schmidt in Pittsburgh] that, in differently observing, as they did, the anticonfessional, church-destroying activities of the so-called General Synod, yea, fraternizing with their leaders, they would become their prey, as was actually the case several years ago.” (_Lehre u. Wehre_ 1858, 137.)

LUTHERANS IN SOUTH CAROLINA.

68. Pioneer Pastors in South Carolina.--In 1735 colonists from Germany and Switzerland had settled in Orangeburg Co., S.C. Their first resident pastor was J. U. Giessendanner, who arrived in 1737 with new emigrants, but died the following year. He was succeeded by his son, who was ordained first by the Presbyterians and then by the Bishop of London, in 1849. [tr. note: sic!] Orangeburg was thus lost to the Lutheran Church.

At Charleston, S.C., Bolzius conducted the first Lutheran services and administered the Lord's Supper in 1734. Muhlenberg preached there in 1742. The first pastor who, in 1755, organized the Lutherans at Charleston into a congregation (St. John's) was J. G. Friedrichs (Friederichs). In 1759 he was succeeded by H. B. G. Wordman (Wartmann), who had labored in Pennsylvania. In 1763 Wordman was succeeded by J. N.

Martin. He dedicated the church begun in 1759. J. S. Hahnbaum, who came from Germany with his family in 1767, was, according to the church records, forbidden to ”be addicted to the English Articles” and to attack the Church of England. The gown, wafers, festivals, gospels and epistles, and the use of the litany on Sunday afternoons, are required.

(Jacobs, 297.) Hahnbaum died in 1770. His successor, who also married his daughter, was Magister F. Daser. He had arrived in Charleston, sold as a redemptioner, and had been redeemed by one of the elders of the Lutheran congregation. (G., 574.) In 1774 H. M. Muhlenberg advised the congregation and adjusted some of her difficulties. In the same year Martin returned and served till 1778, when he was succeeded by Christian Streit, who labored until he was driven away in the vicissitudes of the Revolutionary War, there being a tradition of his arrest by the British in 1780. (Jacobs, 297.) Pastor Martin served a third term in Charleston from 1786 to 1787, when he was succeeded by J. C. Faber, who wrote to Germany, from where he had arrived in 1787: His congregation was growing; it was a model of Christian unity; it consisted of Lutherans, German Reformed, and Catholics; they all lived together most peacefully, attending the same services and sharing in the support of their pastor, who had brought about such a union. No wonder that the congregation was satisfied with the service of the Episcopalian Pogson when Faber had resigned on account of ill health. (G., 582 f.)

69. ”Unio Ecclesiastica” in South Carolina.--In 1788 fifteen German congregations were incorporated in the State of South Carolina, nine of them being Lutheran and six Reformed or United. The Lutheran congregations were served by F. Daser, J. G. Bamberg, F. A. Wallberg, F. J. Wallern, and C. Binnicher; the rest, by the Reformed Pastors Theus and Froelich. In 1787 these ministers and congregations had united as a ”corpus evangelic.u.m” under the following t.i.tle: ”Unio Ecclesiastica of the German Protestant Churches in the State of South Carolina.” Pastor Daser was chosen _Senior Ministerii_. At the following convention, January 8, 1788, all Lutheran ministers present pledged themselves on the Symbolical Books. A third meeting was held August 12, 1788; President Daser presented a const.i.tution, which was adopted. Among other things it provided: 1. The intention of this union was not that any member should deny his own confession. 2. A Directorium, composed of the ministers and two laymen, should remain in power as long as a majority of the 15 congregations would be in favor of it. 3. The Directorium should be entrusted with all church affairs: the admission, dismissal, election, examination, ordination, and induction of ministers; the establishment of new churches and schools; the order of divine service, collections, etc. 4. Any member of any of the congregations was bound to appear before the Directorium when cited by this body. 5. Where the majority of a congregation was Reformed, a Reformed Agenda and Catechism were to be used. 6. The ministers should be faithful in the discharge of their pastoral duties, . . . visiting the schools frequently, admonis.h.i.+ng the parents to give their children a Christian training, etc. 7. A copy of this const.i.tution should be deposited in every congregation and subscribed by its members. 8. Complaints against the pastor which the vestry failed to settle should be reported to the President immediately. 9. The brethren in Europe should be pet.i.tioned to provide the congregations with preachers and schoolteachers.--It is self-evident that this anomalous union with a Directorium invested with governing and judicial powers, to whose decisions Lutheran as well as Reformed pastors and congregations had to submit, lacked vitality, and, apart from flagrant denials of the truth, was bound to lead to destructive frictions. After an existence of several years the ”Unio Ecclesiastica” died a natural death, the Directorium, as far as has been traced, holding its last meeting in 1794. By 1804, the ministers who had organized this union body, all save one, were dead. The congregations eked out a miserable existence, becoming, in part, a prey to the Methodists and Baptists. Thus also the promising Lutheran field of South Carolina was finally turned into a desert, chiefly in consequence of the dearth of Lutheran preachers, who really could have been produced from this very field. (G., 601 ff.)

THE NORTH CAROLINA SYNOD.

70. Unionistic from the Beginning.--Most of the Germans in North Carolina came from Pennsylvania. In 1771 the congregation at Salisbury (which was in existence as early as 1768, and soon thereafter erected a church), together with the congregations in Rowan Co. and in Mecklenburg Co., sent a delegation to England, Holland, and Germany, asking for a.s.sistance. The result was that Pastor A. Ruessmann, who died in 1794, and Teacher J. G. Arends (Ahrends), who soon officiated as pastor, were sent in 1773. In 1787 Pastor Chr. E. Bernhardt arrived, followed by C.

A. G. Stork (Storch) in 1788, and A. Roschen, who returned to Germany in 1800. But it was not genuine Lutheranism which was cultivated by these German emissaries. Many of the books coming from Helmstedt were of a rationalistic character. Also the North Carolina Catechism (”Nordkarolingischer Katechismus . . ., entworfen von Johann Kaspar Velthusen, Doktor und ordentlichem Lehrer der Theologie, erstem Prediger in Helmstedt und Generalsuperintendent”) savored of rationalism. The confessional and doctrinal degeneration of the pastors in North Carolina appears from, and is attested by, the fact that in his ordination, in 1794, R. J. Miller was pledged to the Thirty-nine Articles of the Episcopalians. The Synod of North Carolina experienced a rapid growth, receiving 19 congregations into members.h.i.+p in 1813. According to the Report of 1815, twenty lay delegates were present at the meeting of that year. In 1823, after the separation of the Tennessee Synod, the North Carolina Synod reported 19 ministers with about 1,360 communicants. Its first convention had been held in Salisbury, May 2, 1803. Besides the lay delegates, this meeting was attended by Pastor Arends, Miller, Stork, and Paul Henkel. From the very beginning the Articles of Synod made no mention of the Lutheran Confessions. At the meeting of 1804 a Reformed minister delivered the sermon. In 1810 a resolution was pa.s.sed permitting every pastor to administer communion to those of another faith. It was furthermore resolved: ”Whereas it is evident that awakenings occur in our day by means of preaching for three consecutive days, and whereas this is to be desired among our brethren in the faith, it was resolved, on motion of Mr. Philip Henkel, to make a trial in all our churches next spring.” In the same year the North Carolina Synod ordered the ordination of the Moravian G. Shober (Schober). The minutes of 1815 record the following: ”Since the church council of a newly built Reformed church in Guilford County expressly desires that our next synod be held in their church, it was resolved that synod shall be held in said church on the third Sunday in October, 1816.” As in the other Lutheran bodies of that time, pulpit- and altar-fellows.h.i.+p, Reformed teaching, and Methodistic enthusiasm became increasingly rampant in Synod. In 1817 Synod declared that it would continue to bear the Lutheran name, and became demonstrative over the Reformation tercentenary. The same convention, however, pa.s.sed a resolution with regard to the joint hymn-book published by Schaeffer and Maund in Baltimore, as follows: ”We hereby tender the aforementioned gentlemen our heartiest thanks, and rejoice that we are able to accede fully to the aforementioned recommendations for its use both at church and in private among all our congregations. At the same time we humbly pet.i.tion the G.o.d of love and unity to crown it with blessings in His kingdom and temple. It was also resolved that the English Agenda which Quitman had introduced in New York ”be adopted as one of our symbolical books, and as such be recommended for use.” (G., 647.)

71. Shober's Jubilee Book.--In 1817 Synod also approved of, and resolved to publish, Shober's jubilee book, ”A Comprehensive Account of the Rise and Progress of the Blessed Reformation of the Christian Church by Doctor Martin Luther, begun on the thirty-first of October, A.

D. 1517; interspersed with views of his character and doctrine, extracted from his book; and how the Church established by him arrived and progressed in North America, as also the Const.i.tution and Rules of that Church, in North Carolina and adjoining States, as existing in October, 1817.” In the Preface, Shober gives utterance to the hope that all Protestant churches and their individual members would, by reading his book, be moved ”to pray to G.o.d that He would awaken the spirit of love and union in all who believe in the deity of Jesus Christ, the only Mediator between G.o.d and men, in order to attain the happy time prophesied, when we shall blissfully live as one flock under one Shepherd.” On page 208 ff. he says: ”Why are we not all united in love and union? Why these distances, controversies, disputes, mutual condemnations, why these splittings of formulas? Why cannot the Church of Christ be one flock under one Shepherd? My friends, at the proper time the Lord will unite us all. Thank G.o.d, we see the morning star rising; the Union approaches, in Europe through Bible-societies, in America, too, through mission-societies, through the efforts of the rich and poor in sending out religious tracts, through the hundred thousand children who now learn to know their G.o.d and Savior in the Sunday-schools. Through frequent revivals and many other signs it becomes apparent that the earth will soon be filled with the knowledge of the Lord. Among all cla.s.ses of those who adore Jesus as G.o.d I see nothing of importance which could prevent a cordial union; and what a fortunate event would it be if all churches would unite and send delegates to a general convention of all denominations and there could settle down on Christ, the Rock, while at the same time each denomination would be permitted to retain its peculiar ways and forms.

This would have the influence on all Christians that, wherever and whenever they met each other, they would love one another and keep fellows.h.i.+p with each other.” Synod declared: This book ”will give to our fellow-Christians in other denominations a clear view of what the Lutheran Church really is.” Yet, in this jubilee-gift Shober practically denied the Lutheran doctrines of the Lord's Supper and of Absolution, and, as shown, enthusiastically advocated a universal union of all Christian denominations. Previously Shober had written: ”I have carefully examined the doctrine of the Episcopal Church, have read many excellent writers of the Presbyterians, know the doctrine of the Methodists from their book _Portraiture of Methodism_, and am acquainted with the doctrine of the Baptists, as far as they receive and adore Jesus the Savior. Among all cla.s.ses of those who adore Jesus as G.o.d, I find nothing of importance which could prevent a cordial union.” (647 f.

682.)

CRITICAL CONVENTIONS.

72. ”Untimely Synod” of 1819.--The leaders of the North Carolina Synod, Stork, Shober, Jacob Scherer, Daniel Scherer, Miller, and others, cherished a sanguine hope of uniting all churches into a national American Church, despite doctrinal differences. What could be more delightful, and what in all the world could be more desired, they declared in 1820, than ”to bring about a general union of all religious parties throughout the entire land, that the glorious prophecy might be fulfilled: that they might all be one flock who are all under one Shepherd.” (_Tennessee Report_ 1820, 25.) The scheme also of organizing a Lutheran General Synod (for which purpose the Pennsylvania Synod had invited all other Lutheran bodies to attend its meetings at Baltimore in 1819 in order to discuss plans for this projected Pan-Lutheran union) was exultantly hailed as a step in this direction by leaders of the North Carolina Synod, notably by Shober. Accordingly, in order to enable the North Carolina Synod to take part in the meeting at Baltimore, the officers of Synod autocratically convened that body five weeks before the time fixed by the const.i.tution. Shober was sent to Baltimore as delegate, and took a prominent part in drawing up the ”Planentwurf,” the tentative const.i.tution for the organization of a General Synod. This irregular meeting of the North Carolina Synod was later on known as the ”Untimely Synod.” It provoked much ill feeling and led to the organization of the Tennessee Synod in 1820. (_Tenn. Rep_.

1820, 49.) At this ”Untimely Synod” David Henkel was charged with teaching transubstantiation, because he had preached the Lutheran doctrine of the Lord's Supper to his congregations. Synod found him guilty, and degraded him to the rank of catechist for a period of six months. Says the Report of the Tennessee Synod, 1820: ”David Henkel was to be ent.i.tled to his former rank in office only when, after a period of six months, sufficient written evidence should have been submitted to the President that peace obtained in his congregations, and that no important accusation was lodged against him by others, especially by the Reformed [Presbyterians], whereupon the President would be empowered to confer on him the privileges of a candidate until the next synod.” (18.) The following statement of the same Report characterizes the doctrinal att.i.tude of President Stork and other leaders of Synod: ”We [the Henkels] have written evidence that, when a paper was read at said 'Untimely Synod' containing the statement that the human nature of Jesus Christ had been received into the divine nature (da.s.s die Menschheit Jesu Christi in die Gottheit sei aufgenommen worden), and that therefore He possessed all the divine attributes, the President [Stork] declared that he could not believe this. And when it was said that such was the teaching of the Bible, he answered: 'Even if five hundred Bibles should say so, he would not believe it!' And to our knowledge he was never called to account for this statement.” (20.) The autocratic actions of the leaders of the North Carolina Synod and their adherents virtually resulted in a rupture of Synod in the same year. For the dissatisfied party held a synod of their own at Buffalo Creek, at the time specified by the const.i.tution, and ordained Bell and David Henkel.

73. ”Synod of Strife” (Streitsynode).--The meeting at Lincolnton, N.

C., 1820, which followed the ”Untimely Synod,” was marked by painful scenes and altercations and the final breach between the majority, who were resolved to unite with the General Synod, and the minority, who opposed the union and accused the leader not only of high-handed, autocratic procedure and usurpation of power in contravention of the const.i.tution, but also of false doctrine, and publicly refused to recognize them as Lutherans. On Sunday, May 28, Synod was opened with a service in which Stork preached German and Bell English. Monday morning the preachers, delegates, and a great mult.i.tude of people from the neighborhood returned to the church. They found it occupied by Pastors Paul Henkel, Philip Henkel, David Henkel, and Bell, who refused admission to the rest. After some parliamenteering, written and verbal, both parties entered the church. The Henkels report as follows: ”They [the opponents] took their stand on the fact that the majority was on their side and according to it everything should be decided.

Accordingly, before they came to us in the church, they first delegated one of their preachers with two questions directed to one of our preachers. The first was: 'Whether he intended to separate from the North Carolina Synod?' The second: 'Whether he was willing to be governed by a majority of preachers and delegates in the matters disputed?' He, giving him no decisive answer, came to the rest of us and told us. We answered in writing: 'That we neither intend to separate ourselves from Synod, nor would suffer ourselves to be governed by a majority; but that we wanted everything investigated and decided according to the doctrine of the Augsburg Confession and according to the const.i.tution or order of our church, nothing else.' In the mean time the minister delegated came to us where we were gathered and demanded a verbal answer to the same questions. We then gave this answer also verbally, whereupon he said with an arrogant gesture and autocratic tone: 'That is not the point; I only ask, Do you want to, or do you not want to?' We answered: 'We did not want to.' He declared, 'That is all I desire to know'; and saying which he rapidly turned about and hastily ran away from us. In the mean time the mult.i.tude of our opponents moved toward us, proposing the same questions. We answered as before. The leaders among them endeavored to maintain that, in order to decide the dispute, we were not bound to the const.i.tution, but only to the majority of the votes of the preachers and delegates, which majority they had; and that it was reasonable and fair for us to act according to it in this dispute. But we thought that the doctrine of the Augsburg Confession (being a.s.sured, as we were, that it can be proved by the doctrine of the Bible) should be of a greater weight to us than the voice of a majority of men who are opposed to the doctrine and order of our Church. After a brief altercation of this kind they went into the church, and we followed. Here the President [Stork], in a long speech in German, endeavored to prove what he had a.s.serted before. The Secretary [Shober] made a still longer speech in English, in which he endeavored to prove that we were not at all bound to act according to the const.i.tution or order of our Church; although he himself, with the approval of Synod, had written the const.i.tution and had it printed, this was not done with the intention of making it a rule or norm by which we, as members of Synod, were to be guided in our transactions; it was merely a sort of draft or model according to which, in course of time, one might formulate a good const.i.tution, if in the future such should become necessary. However, it was proved [by the Henkels] from the const.i.tution itself that it had been received as just such an [official]

doc.u.ment, sanctioned, after previous examination and approval by several ministers, by Synod and ordered to be printed. To this he [Shober]