120. Altar- and Pulpit-Fellowship, Lodges and Chiliasm.--Immediately at

its first convention at Fort Wayne, 1867, it became apparent that the

General Council was unwilling to take an unequivocal and decided stand

with respect to Lutheran doctrine and practise. At Fort Wayne the Joint

Synod of Ohio, through its delegates (G. Cronenwett, F.A. Herzberger,

G. Baughman), after stating that, despite the reception of the Doctrinal

Basis, "un-Lutheran doctrine and practise" were still found in some of

the synods connected with the Council, requested an answer to the

following questions: "1. What relation will this venerable body in

future sustain to Chiliasm? 2. Mixed communions? 3. The exchanging of

pulpits with sectarians? 4. Secret or unchurchly societies?"

"Especially," they declared, "would we earnestly desire a decided answer

with regard to the last item, inasmuch as the Joint Synod, for years

already, in view of certain relations in one of its district synods, has

had difficulties in consequence of four pastors belonging to secret

societies, and would not, therefore, again burden its conscience." The

answer was: "That this Council is aware of nothing in its 'Fundamental

Principles of Faith and Church Polity' and Constitution, nor in the

relation it sustains in the four questions raised, which justifies a

doubt whether its decision on them all, when they are brought up in the

manner prescribed in the Constitution, will be in harmony with Holy

Scripture and the Confession of the Church. That so soon as official

evidence shall be presented to this body, in the manner prescribed by

the constitution, that un-Lutheran doctrines or practises are authorized

by the action of any of its synods, or by their refusal to act, it will

weigh that evidence, and, if it finds they exist, use all its

constitutional power to convince the minds of men in regard to them, and

as speedily as possible to remove them." (_Doc. Hist_., 156.) In other

words: Unite with us, and then we shall see what can be done, according

to the "educational methods," with reference to the Four Points. A

similar evasive answer was given to the following petition of the Iowa

Synod: "In order to effect a union of the Church, and that we may all

truly agree in the principles of practise as well as of faith, without

conditions, the delegates [G. Grossman, S. and G. Fritschel] of the

Synod of Iowa propose, in accordance with the instructions of their

Synod, that the General Council shall expressly acknowledge what,

according to the understanding of the delegates of said Synod, is

virtually acknowledged in the 'Fundamental Principles of Faith and

Church Polity' adopted by this body, _viz._: 1. that according to the

Confession of the Evangelical Lutheran Church there must be, and is,

condemned all church-fellowship with such as are not Lutherans; for

example, ministers serving congregations such as are mixed and not

purely Lutheran, receiving such congregations and their pastors into

synodical connection, the admittance of those of a different faith to

the privilege of Communion, the permission of those not Lutheran to

occupy our pulpits, etc.; 2. according to the Word of God,

church-discipline be exercised, especially at the celebration of the

Holy Communion, and be likewise exercised towards those who are members

of secret societies." The answer was: "That the General Council is not

prepared to endorse the declaration of the Synod of Iowa as a correct

logical deduction and application of the negative part of our

Confessional Books, and that we refer the matter to the District Synods,

until such time as, by the blessings of God's Holy Spirit and the

leadings of His Providence, we shall be enabled throughout the whole

General Council and all its churches to see eye to eye in all the

details of practise and usage, towards the consummation of which we will

direct our unceasing prayers." (161.) In other words: Unite with us, and

we shall see what can be done in the future, and whether your position

really is in harmony with the Lutheran Confessions. Hereupon the Iowa

men declared that their Synod could not unite with the Council, because

"in accordance with our deep and sincere conviction, which is at the

same time that of the Synod we represent, we must declare it to be a

necessary precedent condition of an official ecclesiastical connection

between synodical bodies that there should be a complete and hearty

agreement not only in the principles of faith and confession, but also

in an ecclesiastical practise accordant with such faith and confession,

as set forth especially in the first of the propositions presented by

us." (162.) Among the pastors who, at Fort Wayne, also declared their

dissent with respect to the dubious attitude of the Council regarding

the Four Points were the Revs. J. Bading, A. Hoenecke, A. Martin, C.F.

Welden, and C. F. Heyer. (155 ff.)

121. Side-lights on "Four Points" Difficulties.--Dr. S.E. Ochsenford

explains in _Documentary History of the General Council_: "The

difficulty lay in the fact that some synods demanded that that should be

done at once[?], regardless of consequences, which others felt could be

done with much better results by following an educational method,

leading in the process of time all the synods and congregations, among

many of which in certain portions of the Church there existed peculiar

difficulties, to the same lofty eminence of purity in doctrine and in

practise, and so true unity in both. The older synods had difficulties

in this respect, of which the more recently formed synods had no true

conception. These difficulties could not be eradicated at once and by

the fiat of any organization; but as they had grown up gradually, so

they must be removed by a process of education." (164.) Dr. Spaeth gives

the following explanation of the situation, and apology for the attitude

of the General Council at Fort Wayne: "There appeared at this point a

wide difference, especially between the Eastern and Western synods,

which was in the first place the natural result of the historical

development, through which those various sections of the Church had

passed which now endeavored to form an organic union. The Lutheran

Church in the Eastern part of our country, having been founded about one

hundred and fifty years ago, had passed through all the different stages

of church-life, suffering, and death, by which the history of the Church

and theology of the German Fatherland was characterized in that period.

We need not be surprised to find that during this time many things crept

in which were in conflict with the spirit and Confession of our Church.

Over against those things the renewed appreciation of the Lutheran

Confession and the honest return to the same was of comparatively recent

date. It was therefore not to be expected that there should have been on

all sides at the very outset a thorough insight into all the

consequences and obligations of a decided and consistent adoption of the

Lutheran Confession. On the other hand, most of the Lutheran synods of

the West had been founded at a much more favorable season. Out of the

very fulness and freshness of the revived Confession, partly even in the

martyr-spirit of a persecuted Church, have their foundations been laid

and their structures raised. Accordingly, their whole congregational

life could much more easily and more consistently be organized on the

principles established in the Confession, and many evils could be

excluded which in other places had taken root and had been growing for

nearly a century." (164.) However, both Spaeth and Ochsenford fail to

see the real issue; for the grievance at Fort Wayne was not the

inability to abolish immediately all abuses referred to in the Four

Points, but rather the persistent refusal on the part of the General

Council to take, as such, a definite and unequivocal Lutheran attitude

with respect to these questions. Nor was the charge, at least on the

part of Missouri, with respect to the "educational method," as advocated

and applied from 1867 to 1918 by the Council, directed against this

method as such, but against the mutilation of this method by practically

eliminating its eventual natural termination, expulsion according to

Matt. 18, and against the apparent insincerity in the advocacy, and the

lack of seriousness in the application of this method. Indeed, the real

grievance was not that weak members of the General Council were lagging

behind in Lutheran doctrine and practise, but that many of her prominent

leaders and her periodicals occupied an un-Lutheran position and

championed un-Lutheran doctrine and practise.

AKRON-GALESBURG RULE.

122. Non-Lutherans Admitted Exceptionally.--Regarding the Four Points,

especially the question of altar- and pulpit-fellowship, the General

Council during its subsequent history never really rose above the Fort

Wayne level. In 1868, at Pittsburgh, the Council declared "that no man

shall be admitted to our pulpits, whether of the Lutheran name or any

other, of whom there is just reason to doubt whether he will preach the

pure truth of God's Word as taught in the Confessions of our Church."

(208.) As though a sectarian minister could preach in accordance with

the Lutheran symbols; or offense and unionism were fully eliminated when

the sectarian minister, preaching in a Lutheran pulpit, proclaims none

of his errors! The same convention held: "Lutheran ministers may

properly preach wherever there is an opening in the pulpit of other

churches, unless the circumstances imply, or seem to imply, a fellowship

with error or schism, or a restriction on the unreserved expression of

the whole counsel of God." (209.) But, apart from other considerations,

the fact is that, as a rule, these conditions were not and could not be

complied with. Furthermore, the same convention declared: "Heretics and

fundamentally false teachers are to be excluded from the Lord's Table."

(209.) But the convention at Chicago, in 1870, explained: "Although the

General Council holds the distinctive doctrines of our Evangelical

Lutheran Church as in such sense fundamental that those who err in them

err in fundamental doctrines, nevertheless, in employing the terms

'_fundamental errorists_,' in the declaration made at Pittsburgh, it

understands not those who are the victims of involuntary mistake, but

those who wilfully, wickedly, and persistently desert, in whole or in

part, the Christian faith, especially as embodied in the Confessions of

the Church Catholic, in the purest form in which it now exists on earth,

to wit, the Evangelical Lutheran Church, and thus overturn or destroy

the _foundation_ in them confessed; and who hold, defend, and extend

these errors in the face of the admonitions of the Church, and to the

leading away of men from the path of life." (215 f.) Accordingly, the

fact that a Christian held the Reformed view on the Lord's Supper did

not _per se_ exclude him from the altars of the General Council.

123. "The Rule Is."--At Akron, O., 1872, in answer to a question of the

Iowa Synod referring to the declaration of 1870, Dr. Krauth, then

President of the General Council, submitted the following: "1. The rule

is: Lutheran pulpits are for Lutheran ministers only. Lutheran altars

are for Lutheran communicants only. 2. The exceptions to the rule belong

to the sphere of privilege, not of right. 3. The determination of the

exceptions is to be made in consonance with these principles, by the

conscientious judgment of pastors, as the cases arise." (216.) At

Galesburg, 1875, the General Council declared: "The rule which accords

with the Word of God and with the Confessions of our Church is:

'Lutheran pulpits for Lutheran ministers only--Lutheran altars for

Lutheran communicants only.'" (217.) However, this declaration, which,

for the time being, satisfied the Iowa Synod, admits of the

interpretation: The exceptions are: Lutheran pulpits for non-Lutheran

ministers, and Lutheran altars for non-Lutheran communicants, as was

virtually admitted also by the General Council in her answer of 1877 to

an appeal from the Ministerium of New York against violation of the

Galesburg Rule. (217.) Returning--if indeed a return was required--to

the Akron Declaration, the General Council, in 1889, stated "that at the

time of the passage of the Galesburg Rule, by the General Council, the

distinct statement was made that all preceding action of the General

Council on pulpit- and altar-fellowship was unchanged.... Inasmuch as

the General Council has never annulled, rescinded, or reconsidered the

declarations made at Akron, 0., in the year 1872, they still remain, in

all their parts and provisions, the action and rule of the General

Council. All subsequent action of the General Council is to be

understood and interpreted according to the principles there determined

and settled.... The present position of the General Council is to be

understood and interpreted in such manner that neither the amendment and

further explanation at Galesburg nor the original action at Akron be

overlooked or ignored, both of which remain in full force and mutually

interpret and supplement one another." (219.) Exceptionally,

non-Lutherans may be admitted to Lutheran pulpits and altars--such,

then, was the final official decision of the General Council as to the

question of pulpit- and altar-fellowship. In the _Lutheran_ of May 3,

1917, Rev. J.E. Whitteker, president of the General Council Home

Mission Board, said that it was his custom not to refuse the Lord's

Supper to non-Lutherans. (_L. u. W._ 1917, 463.) Dr. J. Fry, _The

Pastor's Guide_, says: "It is not considered proper to give a general

invitation to persons belonging to other congregations to participate in

the Communion at the time when it is administered. If any public

invitation is given, it should be at the time when the Communion and

preparatory services are announced, and such persons be requested to

make personal application to the pastor, so he may know who they are,

and judge of their fitness to join in the Communion. The door should not

be opened wider to strangers than to children of the household." (54.)

In 1904 Dr. Deindoerfer of the Iowa Synod declared: "We do not see that

in the circles of the General Council, as a whole, the churchly practise

has improved and become less offensive, and that earnest proceedings are

instituted against members who are guilty of offensive practise--a state

of affairs which our Synod never can and will sanction." (_L. u. W._

1904, 516.)

INTERDENOMINATIONAL FELLOWSHIP.

124. Sound Principles.--The doctrinal basis of the General Council as

well as a number also of its later declarations and resolutions as to

church-fellowship and cooperation with non-Lutherans are sound. They

breathe the Lutheran spirit revealed in the manly words of C.P. Krauth:

"The Lutheran Church can never have real moral dignity, real

self-respect, a real claim on the reverence and loyalty of her children

while she allows the fear of denominations around her, or the desire of

their approval, in any respect to shape her principles or control her

actions. It is a fatal thing to ask, not, What is right? What is

consistent? but, What will be thought of us? How will our neighbors of

the different communions regard this or that course? Better to die than

to prolong a miserable life by such a compromise of all that gives life

its value." (_L. u. W._ 1917, 468.) In 1909 Dr. T.E. Schmauk, then

president of the General Council, declared in regard to the World's

Missionary Conference: "We regret our inability, on account of our sound

fundamental principle of unity as a prerequisite to cooperation, to

enter in as one of the active elements in such a meeting." The committee

reported: "We approve of the President's position as to the World

Conference and the Federal Council." In 1913 the General Council

resolved with respect to participation in "The World Conference on Faith

and Order": "While regretting that it is unable to unite with the

Communion of the Episcopal Church in arranging for, and conducting, a

Conference on Faith and Order, yet, nevertheless, it hereby resolves to

appoint a Committee on the Unity of Faith, which shall be authorized,

without participating in organization or arrangement of any conference,

to present and set forth the Lutheran faith touching particular

doctrines, either independently, or when they are under discussion in

any conference or gathering, without, however, granting the committee

any power of association, arrangement, fellowship, or practical

direction, but confining it to the one specific function of witness and

testimony to the faith that is in us, and which we rejoice to confess,

and to have tested, before all the world." In 1915 the General Council

made the statement: "Regarding general movements in the Christian world

which have arisen in the last few years looking to the drawing together

of the whole Christian Church on earth, such as the movement of a free

Protestantism toward a united foreign mission objective, the Federation

of Churches, and other movements of a similar character, we recommend

that, while we cannot at this time [sic!] organically participate, it is

well, nevertheless, to keep fully informed as to their trend, direction,

and development." (467.) In 1917 Schmauk said in the _Lutheran_: "The

Lutheran faith has suffered terribly in the past by attempts of union

and cooperation with various Christian denominations and tendencies.

Usually they have penetrated insidiously into our spirit, and poisoned

our own life-roots, and taken possession of our palaces. But these

damages have been wrought through an attempted unity with men who are

not at one with us in the profession of a _common faith_. As Luther

said: 'They have a different spirit.'" (468.)

125. Facts Discounting Declarations.--Although the General Council as

such has always confined its fraternal intercourse and cooperation to

Lutheran synods (General Synod, United Synod South, etc.), its members

and official boards have not. In 1916 several representatives of the

General Council attended the Latin-America Missionary Conference, its

Mission Board was connected with the "Foreign Mission Conference," a

body composed of Adventists, Baptists, Quakers, Universalists, Reformed,

etc. (461.) In his pamphlet, _Dangerous Alliances_, 1917, Rev. W.

Brenner, a member of the General Council, wrote: "The _Woman's Mission

Worker_, the _Foreign Missionary_, and the _Home Missionary_

[periodicals of the General Council] have published letters and articles

defending Lutheran participation in 'union movements.' In the _Lutheran_

of September 14, 1916, Rev. C.F. Fry lauds federation in 'mission-work'

and 'Reformation celebrations.' 'On Tuesday evening pastors of

non-Lutheran churches presented their greetings,' so the _Lutheran_ of

November 18, 1915, describes in part the 175th anniversary celebration

of St. John's Ev. Lutheran Church at Easton, Pa. Rev. E.S. Bromer, D.D.,

of the Reformed Church, addressed the congregation of the First Lutheran

Church of Greensburg, Pa., on the occasion of its hundredth anniversary.

(_Lutheran_, Nov. 18, 1915.) Emmanuel Lutheran Church of the Augustana

Synod laid the corner-stone of a new church edifice, November 12, 1916,

at Butte, Mont. 'Brief congratulatory speeches were made by Hon. C.H.

Lane, mayor of Butte, and the Rev. J.H. Mitchell, chairman of Butte's

Ministerial Association.' (_Lutheran_, Nov. 30, 1916.) We have also read

of Anti-Saloon League representatives, and Women's Christian Temperance

lecturers, male and female, who delivered speeches in the Lutheran

churches." (463.) In 1915, when the General Council met in Rock Island,

Dr. Gerberding occupied the pulpit of the Presbyterian church. At Port

Colborne, Can., on November 11, 1918, Rev. Knauff of the General Council

fellowshiped with Methodists, Baptists, Presbyterians, and Anglicans in

a united Thanksgiving service. (_Luth. Witness_ 1919, 14.) Dr. J. Fry in

his _Pastor's Guide_: "A Lutheran pastor may officiate on any occasion,

or perform a ministerial act in which ministers of other creeds take

part, provided the occasion and circumstances are such as will not

violate synodical order, nor compromise his confessional position."

(84.) Again: "Y.M.C.A.'s, W.C.T.U.'s, Christian Endeavor, etc., are

rarely [sic!] to be recommended to our people, as they are generally

conducted on 'new-measure' lines, and their influence is to make our

members dissatisfied with Lutheran or churchly ideas and usages." (97.)

It may be safely said that without the sanction of this species of

unionism openly practised within the General Council, the Lutheran

Merger of 1918 would have been an impossibility. And yet, this practise

admits of but one construction: mutual acknowledgment. "When teachers

and preachers exchange pulpits and chairs, it is an emphatic way of

declaring, not their personal friendship, but their endorsement of each

other's teachings; it is all the same as to infer that they are in

accord in their essential teachings." (Editor of the _Presbyterian_.)

ATTITUDE TOWARD LODGES.

126. Sound Lutheran Principles.--At its convention at Pittsburgh, 1868,

the General Council made the following declarations with respect to

secret societies: "1. Though mere secrecy in association be not in

itself immoral, yet as it is so easily susceptible of abuse, and in its

abuse may work, as it has often worked, great mischief in family, Church

and State, we earnestly beseech all good men to ponder the question

whether the benefits they believe to be connected with secret societies

might not be equally reached in modes not liable to the same abuse. 2.

Any and all societies for moral and religious ends which do not rest on

the supreme authority of God's holy Word as contained in the Old and New

Testaments; which do not recognize our Lord Jesus Christ as the true God

and the only Mediator between God and man; which teach doctrines or have

usages or forms of worship condemned in God's Word and in the

Confessions of His Church; which assume to themselves what God has given

to His Church and its ministers; which require undefined obligations to

be assumed by oath, are unchristian, and we solemnly warn our members

and ministers against all fellowship with, or connivance at,

associations which have this character. 3. All connection with infidel

and immoral associations we consider as requiring the exercise of prompt

and decisive discipline, and after faithful and patient monition and

teaching from God's Word, the cutting off the persistent and obstinate

offender from communion of the Church until he abandons them and shows a

true repentance." (_Doc. Hist._,208.)

127. Practise out of Tune with Principles.--From the very beginning the

official declarations of 1868 were and remained a dead letter. With the

exception of the Augustana Synod, lodges were generally tolerated and,

in part, practically encouraged within the General Council throughout

its history--resolutions to the contrary notwithstanding. Lodge-men were

received with open arms, and no questions were asked. In 1873 the

English District Synod of Ohio, affiliated with the Council, deposed

Rev. Bartholomew because, for one reason, he, in a sermon, had testified

against the lodgism prevailing in Synod. (Report 1874, 45. 47 ff.) The

_Pilger_, a German paper published within the General Council, wrote in

1875: "Testimony against secret societies will bring little result so

long as the Church [General Council] looks on in silence while pastors

of the Christian Church are members of antichristian lodges. Indeed,

many resolutions have been passed against pastors being members of

secret orders; but paper is patient, and those who are rebuked laugh at

Synod's resolutions." _Herold und Zeitschrift_, August 2, 1884, related

of a pastor connected with the Council: "He is a Freemason. He does not

refrain from showing his attitude toward the lodge. Recently, after

delivering the funeral address for a Freemason, he put on his Masonic

uniform before the congregation, and marched out to the grave. Some time

ago he announced a lecture on Masonry in his church. Appearing before a

large audience which had gathered, in the white leathern apron and other

paraphernalia of his order, he, in eloquent fashion, set forth the

advantages of Masonry, etc., making special mention of its great

antiquity and marvelous liberality." In 1886, the _Lutheran_ declared

that excommunication because of membership in a secret society had never

been an official demand of the General Council. The _Lutherisches

Kirchenblatt_, edited by pastors connected with the Council, reported a

meeting of the Pennsylvania Ministerium, held in January, 1887, as

follows: "Pastor Hinterleiter made a motion that pastors ought not

belong to secret societies. Pastor Struntz vehemently opposed this

motion, declaring that it had no place in a constitution, but was part

of a pastor's private life. Dr. Fry expressed it as his opinion that

such a resolution would give offense." In the _Lutheran Church Review_,

April, 1903, Carl Swensson wrote: "I believe the entire stand taken by,

for instance, our Augustana Synod on the secret society question has

been a mistake and a misfortune. Society members, inside or outside of

the Church, should be treated just as any other people." (_L. u. W._

1903, 184.) In the same year a number of General Council ministers

publicly joined the Mystic Shriners. On May 6, 1917, the pastor of the

First English Lutheran Church in Kitchener (Berlin), Ont., held a

lodge-service for the Freemasons and Odd-Fellows. At the convention of

the Ministerium of Pennsylvania in 1917 a petition signed by thirteen

members was presented to amend the constitution _by striking out_

section 51 in Art. 10, according to which "any minister belonging to the

Ministerium who shall, after due admonition, persist in fellowship and

cooperation with any such antichristian society or order [lodges],

whether secret or not, shall be subject to discipline." (_Proceedings_

1917, 182.) No action was taken by Synod.

128. Educational Method a Pretense.--In dealing with offenders also

against the Lutheran principles pertaining to lodge-membership, the

General Council advocated the "educational method." But the fact is that

during the whole course of its history no serious and persevering

efforts whatever were made to enlighten the congregations as to the

utter incompatibility of Lodgism and Lutheranism. Geo. Fritschel: "It

cannot be denied that the General Council as such has done nothing to

bring about a progress in this question" (concerning lodge-membership).

The same, he says, was true of its chief synods. Partly they did not

want any discussions on this question. The officers of the Pennsylvania

Synod remained unconcerned even when ministers joined the lodges.

(_Geschichte_, 2, 322.) The Iowa _Kirchenblatt_, November 24, 1917,

declared that the policy of education as advocated by the Council had

utterly and finally failed. (_Luth. Witness_ 1918, 387.) In the same

year Rev. W. Brenner wrote: "There is an official General Council

declaration which solemnly warns its pastors and people against all

fellowship with, or connivance at, secret societies (_Doc. Hist._, 208);

but from the attitude of some General Council ministers and their

practise no one would ever suspect that they had ever read, or were

aware of the fact, that such a document existed. During their seminary

days little was heard on the subject, and so they are surprised when

they see how other pastors who studied in other seminaries take a firm

stand and refuse absolutely to officiate at any funeral where

lodge-chaplains are permitted to take any part in the service." (_L. u.

W._ 1917, 462.) Dr. J. Fry, professor in the Seminary of the General

Council at Mount Airy, advises in his _Pastor's Guide_: "Ministers

should not refuse to officiate at the funerals of persons who were not

members of the Church, or who died impenitent.... Neither should a

minister refuse to officiate because some lodge or other society may be

present and have its service at the grave.... He should finish his

service, and quietly step back." (64.) Again: "Pastors are sometimes

asked to preach special sermons before lodges.... If there should be any

good reason for their coming as a body, the service should be at an hour

which interferes with no other service." (75.)

CHILIASM.

129. Official Attitude.--At the convention in Pittsburgh, in 1868, the

following declaration regarding Chiliasm was adopted by the General

Council: "2. The General Council has neither had, nor would consent to

have, fellowship with any synod which tolerates the 'Jewish opinions' or

'chiliastic opinions' condemned in the Seventeenth Article of the

Augsburg Confession. 3. The points on which our Confession has not been

explicit, or on which its testimony is not at present interpreted in

precisely the same way by persons equally intelligent and honest, and

equally unreserved and worthy of belief in the profession of adherence

to the Confessions, should continue to be the subject of calm, thorough,

Scriptural, and prayerful investigation, until we shall see perfectly

eye to eye both as regards the teaching of God's Word and the testimony

of our Church." (_Doc. Hist._, 207.) According to the General Council,

then, while the gross and carnal millennialism of the Jews must be

rejected, there is a chiliasm which should be tolerated and continue to

be the subject of further prayerful research. Pastors Bading, Adelbert,

and Klingmann of the Wisconsin Synod, however, immediately, protested

that they "rejected every form of chiliasm as against the Scriptures and

the Confessions."

130. Kind of Chiliasm Tolerated.--The chiliasm which had always been

advocated by members of the General Synod, and which the General Council

refused to reject, was of a kind with the one entertained by Dr. John

Geo. Schmucker (1771--1854), the father of S.S. Schmucker, and by the

Drs. Helmuth, Lochman, Daniel Kurtz (died 1856), by Loehe and leaders of

the Iowa Synod, and especially by Dr. J.A. Seiss of the Pennsylvania

Synod. According to J.G. Schmucker, the Second Petition of the Lord's

Prayer and, among others, also the following passages of the New

Testament: Matt. 5, 35; 8, 11. 26. 29; Acts 3, 20. 21; Rom. 8, 20. 21;

11, 25. 26, treat of a coming millennium, in which Christ will reveal

Himself in a visible pavilion, take possession also of the civil power,

govern the world according to the principles of the New Testament, bring

about a great temporal happiness, prolong the life of the saints, etc.

These and similar views were endorsed and advocated also by the

_Lutheran_, the organ of the conservatives within the General Synod.

(_L. u. W._ 1861, 282.) In his _Last Times_ and _Lectures on the

Apocalypse_, Dr. Seiss taught: "There is a first resurrection at the

beginning of the Millennium, and a second resurrection at the end of the

Millennium. The one embraces the martyrs and saints,--who are 'blessed

and holy,' 'who have fallen asleep through Jesus,'--the other is the

resurrection of the remaining dead." Seiss also denied that the Papacy

is the true Antichrist. In the _Lutheran Cyclopedia_, published by

Jacobs and Haas, Dr. Seiss states: "That there have been teachings and

beliefs put forth, and usually called chiliasm, which are heretical and

subversive of the true Gospel, there can be no question. That Jesus and

His apostles, as well as the great body of primitive Christians, held

and taught what some call chiliasm, or millenarianism, can as readily be

substantiated. And that there are various open questions touching these

eschatological particulars on which the final word has not yet been

spoken, and which may be considered chiliasm, must likewise be

admitted." (87.) A chiliasm, then, which expects a time of universal

prosperity and glory for the Church on this side of the resurrection, a

time when the whole world will be converted to Christ, a time when peace

and righteousness will be established from the rivers to the ends of the

earth; a chiliasm which believes in a future twofold coming of Christ, a

double resurrection, a conversion and restoration of Israel, a future

personal Antichrist, embodying all antichristian elements,--such a

chiliasm, according to Seiss, the _Lutheran Cyclopedia_, and the General

Council, conflicts neither with the Bible, nor the Confessions, nor

Lutheran orthodoxy. (87 f.)

OTHER ABBERRATIONS.

131. Reformed Tendencies.--In the _Lutheran and Missionary_, April 13,

1876, Dr. Seiss declared that it was an arrogance to make the doctrine

that unbelievers as well as believers receive the true body and blood of

Christ at the Lord's Table an article of faith. Nor was the Puritanic

doctrine concerning the divine obligation of the Sunday, universally

held in the General Synod, discarded by the synods and congregations

constituting the General Council. The Reading _Kirchenblatt_, December

19, 1903, wrote: "On the second Sunday in Advent the Philadelphia

Sabbath-Association celebrated its anniversary in the Evangelical

Lutheran Church (Rev. C.L. Fry) in Philadelphia. Addresses were made by

prominent Sabbath-workers. The leading speakers were the well-known John

Wanamaker (Presbyterian) and the Methodist Rev. Dr. Mutchler.... Pastors

of our own Synod foster un-Lutheran doctrine, and our superiors remain

silent. Do they know of it? Certainly! All the dailies brought the news:

first the invitations, then long reports. And what do our professors say

to it? They keep silence.... But why do so many of our pastors hold a

false, Puritan doctrine of the Sabbath? Because they have learned no

better. If the students in our institutions would learn Luther's true

doctrine concerning Sunday and sanctifying the holy-day, they could not,

after becoming pastors of Lutheran congregations, take part in the

fanatical doings of the sects. But, as it is, they go hand in hand with

the sects, invite them to their churches, and permit them to present a

false doctrine of the Sabbath to their Lutheran church-members." (_L. u.

W._ 1904, 38; 1901, 85.) In his _Catechist_ Dr. Gerberding teaches: "The

law of one holy day of rest: its purpose is rest for the body and

refreshment for the soul. All works of mercy and real necessity are

allowed." In 1816 the District Synod of Ohio refused to discipline a

pastor who did not believe that a child becomes a Christian, and is

endowed with faith, in Baptism. (_Luth. Witness_ 1918, 341. 356.) Rev.

Brenner: "How long ago has it been considered a good policy in the

General Council for its Mission Boards to agitate 'working together with

the denominations about us for the best interest of our fellow-men,' and

to 'agree on a program to lift the world to a higher level' by

'petitioning, demanding, and insisting upon special legislation for

abolishing the saloon,' and doing a thousand other things which is the

business, not of the Church, but of the State.... Individual synods have

passed prohibition resolutions. Individual pastors have gone entirely

too far in this matter. They are fanatical on the subject. Some have

almost gone daft over the liquor problem." (_L. u. W._ 1917, 465.) The

_Home Missionary_, December, 1916, declared that what the Lutheran

Church teaches in reference to the separation of Church and State is

"rot" and "fool" theology. (464.)

132. Qualified Confessional Subscription.--It was an ultrasymbolism, not

countenanced by the Lutheran Church, when the _Lutheran and Missionary_

maintained in its issue of September 27, 1867, that it was false,

dangerous, and inconsistent to declare it the duty of Lutherans to

compare for themselves the confessions received from the fathers with

the Scriptures, and if found erring, to correct them; that this

unbridled and radical theory, resting on the false assumption that

private investigation of the Scriptures is the foundation of our faith,

could not be proved by the Scriptures, and, reduced to practise, would

endanger all purity of doctrine, and finally destroy all ecclesiastical

communion. (_L. u. W._ 1867, 371.) In the _Lutheran_, March 5, 1908,

however, Dr. H.E. Jacobs, defending the other extreme, wrote: "Some of

the difficulties that men whom we esteem have urged against the

acceptance of all our Confessions are due to a misunderstanding of what

is involved in a confessional subscription. They conceive of the

Confessions as an external law that binds the conscience to a mechanical

acceptance of all [doctrinal matter] that may be found in these

documents. What is properly confessional in these documents is their

answers to the questions that rendered the framing of a confessional

statement necessary.... We must study our Confessions as an organism,

and appreciate the relation of each part to the other parts and to the

whole Confession. Where the heart of each confession and of each

doctrine confessed lies, must be the object of our search. To tear

passages from their connection, or to represent isolated passages and

merely incidental statements as having confessional authority is as

unfair to the Confessions as it is to the Holy Scriptures." (Jacobs

denies that all of the astronomical, geological, historical, and similar

statements of the Bible are true.) The _Lutheran World_, commenting on

Dr. Jacobs's statements, remarked: "But do not Dr. Jacobs's declarations

sound very much like a _quatenus_ rather than a _quia_ mode of

confessional subscription? For a long time we have not seen a

theological statement that reminds us so much of the 'substantially

correct' mode of subscription formerly in vogue in the General Synod. It

certainly does not sound as stalwart as the General Synod's resolution

in 1895, when she declared 'the Unaltered Augsburg Confession as

throughout in perfect consistence with that Word'--namely, the Word of

God." (_L. u. W._ 1908, 233.) In his _Book of Concord_, 1893, Dr. Jacobs

declared that only the primary, not the secondary, arguments of the

Confessions are involved in the subscription. "'The primary,' says

Jacobs, 'are the dogmas set forth with the purpose of showing they are

believed and taught by the Lutheran Church, the confutations of errors

whereby it wished to declare that it contradicted them, and formulas of

speech either expressly prescribed or proscribed.' The secondary are

'all those particulars introduced to confirm or illustrate the former,'"

etc. (2, 13.)

ROMANISM.

133. Jacobs and Haas on Ordination, etc.--With respect to the doctrine

that the public office of the ministry originates in, and is transferred

by, the local congregation, Dr. Jacobs declared: "Nothing can be clearer

than the antagonism of our great Lutheran divines to this position, nor

anything be more convincing than their arguments against it."

(Gerberding, _The Lutheran Pastor_, 73.) Luther's language on this

question, Jacobs maintains, is "not guarded with the same care as that

of the later dogmaticians." (74.) According to Jacobs the right to call

a minister "belongs neither to the minister alone nor to the laity

alone, but to both in due order." (_Summary of Christian Faith_, 427.

424.) Dr. J.A.W. Haas: "The transference theory has been developed in

antithesis to Rome, and in it Lutherans have agreed with the Reformed."

It "makes the ministry an organ growing out of the congregation, which

ill befits the divine origin of the ministry." "In it the main accent is

placed on the vocation, of which ordination is the attestation."

(Gerberding, _l.c._, 77.) Ordination, Dr. Haas declares, is "the

prerogative of the whole Church." It includes "the separation for the

ministry with invocation of blessing and consecration under divine

approval." For this reason "ordination is not repeated." (112.) "This

realism of a divine gift [in ordination] was apparently not held by

Luther.... He declares the right of all believers to the office, because

of the spiritual priesthood, and sees the consecration (_Weihe_) in the

call. 'Ordo est ministerium et vocatio ministrorum ecclesiae.'" (116.)

134. Gerberding and Fry on the Ministry.--In his _Lutheran Pastor_ Dr.

G.H. Gerberding, professor at the seminary of the General Council at

Maywood (Chicago), declares: It is clear "that this transference theory

is not held by our older theologians. Neither have we been able to find

any ground for it in Holy Scripture. Where is there a single proof that

the congregation, made up of believing priests, does on that account

possess the right to exercise the ordinary functions of the ministry?

Where is the proof that the ministry is created by the congregation?

Where is it written that the minister is amenable to the congregation?

If the congregation of laymen alone makes the minister, then it can also

unmake, or depose, him from his office. The whole theory is unscriptural

and unhistoric. Only the fanatical sects, which have a low view of the

means of grace, can, with any consistency, hold such a view." (82.)

Again: "This [the outward call] does not come from the ministry alone.

Neither does it come from the laity alone. It must come from the Church.

But the Church is neither the ministry without the people nor the

people without the ministry.... Christ, then, exercises His power to

call men into the ministry through the Church [ministers and laymen].

The Church may exist either in the congregation or in the representative

Church [synod], made up of ministers and lay representatives of

congregations. Either the congregation, as defined above, not without a

pastor, or the representative body, made up also of pastors and people,

has a right to extend the outward call." (86.) "The transference theory

is unscriptural and not consistent with the Lutheran doctrine of the

means of grace." (110.) "It is unscriptural and un-Lutheran to hold that

the meaning and use of ordination consists essentially in this that it

publicly attests and satisfies the validity of the call." (110.)

Ordination "conveys the special grace needed for the special work of the

ministry." (120.) In his _Pastor's Guide_, 1915, Dr. J. Fry, professor

at the seminary of the General Council in Mount Airy, Philadelphia,

teaches: The call to the ministry "must come from God, from the Church

[synod] and from a particular place or congregation." (5.) "Of all these

qualifications [required for the ministry] the Church [synod] must be

the judge, and in her synodical organization and authority must extend

the call to the ministry." (6.) "A pastor serving a parish of more than

one congregation has no right to resign one congregation and retain the

others without the consent of the president of the synod to which the

parish belongs." (14.) "The call should also specify that either party

desiring to withdraw from the agreement [between the pastor and

congregation] must give three months' notice to that effect to the other

party. This provision will do away with the very objectionable custom in

some congregations of holding annual elections for a pastor." (9.) "The

power to decide and impose penalties belongs to the pastor and church

council." (92.) Dr. Fry regards "the pastor and church council as the

highest authority in all congregational matters." (98.) All of these

tenets are corruptions of the Scriptural and evangelical doctrines as

proclaimed again by Luther. Consistently developed, their terminus is

Rome. However, in the atmosphere of American liberty, where State and

Church are separated and the will of the former is not foisted on the

latter, Romanistic tendencies cannot thrive, nor did they ever to any

extent succeed in practise in the Lutheran Church, a Church whose

fundamental articles are the doctrines of justification by faith alone

and absolute spiritual freedom from every human authority.

SYNERGISM.

135. Synergistic Teaching on Conversion.--In his _Confessional

Principle_, 1911, Dr. T.B. Schmauk rejects Melanchthon's _aliqua causa

discriminis in homine_, some kind of discriminating cause in man.

Schmauk writes: "Several qualities and motives in Melanchthon's nature,

including his humanist outlook on free will, and his tendency to

emphasize the necessity of good works, contributed to inspire him with

erroneous views, when the evangelical doctrine began to be wrought out

more expansively, and led him to find the cause for the actual variation

in the working of God's grace in man, its object. This subtle

synergistic spirit attacks the very foundation of Lutheranism, flows out

into almost every doctrine, and weakens the Church at every point. And

it was practically this weakness which the great multitude of

Melanchthon's scholars, who become the leaders of the generation of

which we are speaking, absorbed, and which rendered it difficult to

return, finally, and after years of struggle, to the solid ground once

more recovered in the Formula of Concord." (611; _L. u. W._ 1912, 33.)

Evidently, this is sound Lutheranism; and similar testimonies were

occasionally heard within the General Council throughout its history.

(_L. u. W._ 1904, 273: Rev. Rembe; 1917, 473: Rev. G.H. Schnur.) But it

was the song of rare birds. The synergistic note was struck much more

frequently and emphatically. For making his anti-synergistic utterances

Schmauk was called to order by Dr. Gerberding. And in 1916 Schmauk

himself opened the _Lutheran Church Review_ to L.S. Keyser, the zealous

exponent of synergism within the General Synod, who wrote: "Faith's

experience always includes the fact that, while the ability of faith is

divinely conferred, the exercise of that ability is never coerced, but

belongs to the domain of liberty.... The same is true of all volitions:

the ability to will is divinely implanted; the act itself belongs to the

sphere of freedom. The ability to repent is from God; the use of that

ability belongs to man's liberty." "The Scriptures never command men to

regenerate; they always put that category in the passive voice, 'Except

any one be born again'; but the Bible again and again commands men to

repent and believe, putting the verbs in the active voice, imperative

mood. What inconsistent commands these would be if man possessed no

freedom in the exercise of repentance and faith!" "God's fiat of the

individual's election unto salvation must have been decided upon in

foresight and foreknowledge of the whole content of faith, including

both its divine enablement and its human element of freedom." (65.)

Similar views on man's freedom and responsibility were expressed by Dr.

Haas in _Trends of Thought_, 1915. In his book, _The Way of Life_, 1917,

Dr. Gerberding explains: "After prevenient grace, however, begins to

make itself felt, then the will begins to take part. It must now assume

an attitude, and meet the question: Shall I yield to these holy

influences or not? One or the other of the two courses must be pursued.

There must be a yielding to the heavenly strivings or a resistance. To

resist at this point requires a positive act of the will. This act man

can put forth by his own strength. On the other hand, with the help of

that grace already at work in his heart, he can refuse to put forth that

act of his will, and thus remain non-resistant." According to Gerberding

man "may be said, negatively, to help towards his conversion." (167 ff.;

_L. u. W._ 1917, 214.) Prior to 1901 Rev. C. Blecher, by order of the

pastoral conference of Connecticut, belonging to the Council, published

a pamphlet which was recommended for the widest possible distribution by

the _Lutherische Herold_. In it Blecher, in direct opposition to the

Formula of Concord, Art. 11, section 60 ff., maintains: Two persons are

never in equal guilt when the one resists the grace of God from

inherited blindness and weakness, like Peter, while the other resists

contumaciously and purposely, like Judas." (_L. u. W._ 1901, 65; 1902,

144.) In 1900 Dr. Seiss had maintained in the _Lutheran_: "Conversion is

largely one's own act. God first makes it possible; but then the

responsibility rests upon ourselves to determine whether or not we will

comply with the truth brought to our understanding." (_L. u. W._ 1900,

243. 246.) Misstating historical facts and revealing his own synergistic

attitude, Dr. G.W. Sandt wrote editorially in the _Lutheran_ of March

27, 1919, concerning Dr. Stellhorn's polemics against the Missouri

Synod: "When the controversy with Missouri was at its height, he

[Stellhorn] could do no other but cast his soul into it and stand for

the defense of the universal call to grace and salvation as over against

the special call as Calvin and others teach it. He resented the charge

of synergism which came from his opponents, and renounced it as strongly

as any Missourian could."

136. Synergistic Predestination.--Synergism in the doctrine of

conversion naturally leads to synergistic teaching on predestination.

Moreover, the doctrine of predestination is, as it were, the

bacteriological test whether one's Lutheran blood is really and

absolutely free from synergistic infection also in the doctrines of

conversion and justification. However, also in these tests as to the

doctrinal purity of the General Council the results, as a rule, were

negative. In his _Summary of Christian Faith_, 1905, Dr. H.E. Jacobs

gives the following presentation of the doctrine of predestination:

"Since God has not predestinated all that He has foreknown ('for all

that the perverse, wicked will of the devil and of men purposes and

desires to do and will do, God sees and knows before,' _ib._), but, in

His inexplicable will, has allowed a certain measure of freedom and

contingency in His creatures, and afforded them a degree of moral

responsibility, knowing from all eternity what will be the result of

their use of this trust, He also has determined how in every case their

decision and activity will be treated." "When, therefore, God has willed

that He will be determined in a certain decision by the free decision of

a creature, that freedom of the creature will certainly be guaranteed in

the result; but what in the exercise of this freedom the decision of the

creature will be, as well as the determination of His will concerning

it, He knows from all eternity, and makes His plans accordingly." "The

fulfilment or non-fulfilment of the proviso or condition is contained in

the foreknowledge which determined the free destination." (556 f.)

According to Jacobs, then, Predestination depends on the divine

foreknowledge of the use that man will make of the freedom with which

God has entrusted him. Plainly synergistic doctrine!

LIBERALISTIC TRENDS.

137. Rejecting Verbal Inspiration.--Even the doctrines of the verbal

inspiration and the complete inerrancy of the Holy Scriptures have been

assailed by prominent representatives of the General Council and the

_Lutheran Church Review_. Dr. H.E. Jacobs, in his introduction to

_Biblical Criticism_ (1903) by Dr. J.A.W. Haas, states: "It is,

therefore, the Word and not the words; the divine substance and not the

particular human form in which that substance is clothed; the divine

truth and not the human language, with all its limitations, which, in

accommodation to human finiteness, the Holy Spirit employs, that is

'the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth.'" (18.)

"Nevertheless, the subordination of the words of Holy Scripture to the

Word in no way diminishes the need of the most reverent handling and the

most careful judgment of the words themselves when considered in the

place which they are intended to serve." (19.) "A text from Genesis and

one from John, one from the Psalms, and another from Romans, cannot

stand upon the same footing.... Many a precious passage in the Old

Testament can no longer be used as the sincere expression of Christian

faith in the light of the clearer revelation of the Gospel." (21.)

"There are few theorists who would assign the same degree of inspiration

to the statistics and rolls in Ezra or Chronicles as to those parts of

the New Testament for whose reading the dying ask when all other earthly

words have lost their interest. Even the distinction between the Petrine

and the Pauline theology, which the Tuebingen school so greatly

exaggerated, contains within it an element of truth, when the difference

is found to be one of degree, but not one of kind." (21.) "The time has

come when, in antagonism to such [radical] criticism, the Church must

offer a restatement of its doctrine of the Holy Scriptures. The theories

of our dogmaticians are not the confessional declarations of our Church.

The Augsburg Confession contains no statement on this topic." (26.) "It

is only the Formula of Concord that gives an official utterance.... But

it formulates no definition either of revelation or inspiration. It

simply presents to us in the Scriptures an inerrant and infallible judge

concerning all religious truth.... Religious truth, it declares, 'is to

be received only as revealed in God's Word," and for this Word we turn

to the Scriptures." (27.) "For the truths made known by such revelation

we are referred to a record. But that such a certain and indubitable

record should be made, another supernatural act is necessary, and this

is inspiration. This includes everything that is necessary to render the

record an infallible standard of all religious truth." (27.) "If the

verbal theory of inspiration mean that every word and letter are

inspired, so that the writer was purely passive and performed a merely

mechanical office, as 'the pen of the Holy Ghost,' this, we hold, is an

assumption for which we have no warrant.... All we need to know is that

in the Holy Scriptures we have a complete, clear, and unerring record of

revealed truth, that is made the standard, for all time, of religious

teaching." (28.) Evidently, then, Drs. Jacobs and Haas do not believe

that the Holy Scriptures everywhere are inspired and free from error.

138. Bible Fallible in Scientific Matters.--Dr. J. Stump, professor in

the seminary of the General Council in Chicago, supporting Dr. Jacobs,

maintained in the _Lutheran Church Review_ of January, 1904: One cannot

speak of a confessional Lutheran doctrine of inspiration. Quenstedt's

doctrine of verbal inspiration is mechanical and in conflict with all

that we know of the Holy Ghost's activity; it cannot be proven from the

Scriptures, nor indeed is it necessary. Stump considers the Bible free

from error in its religious teachings, but not in its astronomical,

geological, physical, and similar statements. To quote literally: "The

holy writers were not inspired, however, to be 'teachers of astronomy,

or geology, or physics,' and no number of contradictions in this sphere

would shake our confidence in the absolute authority of Holy Scripture

as the infallible test of theological truth, and inerrant guide in all

matters of faith and practise." "The dogmaticians were led to maintain

it [the verbal inspiration] by the exigency of the times and the stress

of their severe dialectics. [The interest of the dogmaticians was to

present the clear doctrine of the Scriptures on inspiration.] And as a

result of their doctrines, they were logically obliged to claim the

absolute impossibility of any kind of error or inaccuracy whatsoever in

the Scriptures, even in unimportant externals; and further more to claim

that the Scriptures are not only the sole and infallible guide in

matters of religion, but also an infallible guide in matters of human

science so far as they touched upon any part of science's domain,

--claims which a careful examination of the Scriptures and the purpose

for which they were written do not bear out." (_L. u. W._ 1904, 85.) It

was in agreement with these views when the _Lutheran_, prior to 1904,

maintained that the Bible must be explained according to the modern

sciences.

139. Other Symptoms of Liberalism.--As a rule, the inerrancy of the Holy

Scriptures is denied in the interest of the theory of evolution, a

doctrine absolutely incompatible with, and, consistently developed,

destructive of, the very fundamentals of Lutheranism. The evolutionary

doctrine, however, this antipode of Christian thought, which, wherever

digested, has proved to be the beginning of the end of Christianity, was

adopted also and publicly defended within the General Council. Rev.

Brenner says: "I have heard General Council ministers say that they did

not believe everything that is written in the Bible, and as they

continued to explain their views, it became very evident that they were

evolutionists." (_L. u. W._ 1917, 465.) Dr. T.E. Schmauk, the president

of the General Council, declared in the _Lutheran_, April, 1912:

"Evolution is the most wide-embracing, suggestive, and fascinating

theory of things and life that ever has been offered. In innumerable

cases it has been found to be in accord with nature and with history. In

itself it is not a cause, but a process. Evolution as a partial process

may be within Christianity." In 1915, in his book, _Trends of Thought_,

Dr. J.A.W. Haas wrote: "If evolution as a biological theory remains

within its limits and knows its sphere, it will not contradict the

claims of Christianity. If we avoid a materialistic philosophy in

biology, and if we do not make nature all-controlling, we can accept

evolution as not in disagreement with Christianity." "But, on the other

hand, Christianity must be careful not to demand as Biblical facts old

hypotheses of species. It must differentiate between statement in

popular religious language and the interpretation which tradition has

put upon Biblical statement. In this tradition there are elements of

past science which have unconsciously colored the Biblical account.

Christianity must also treat its document historically, and not be

disturbed if the temporal vessels of its religious truths are not shaped

scientifically. Were they thus shaped, they would fail in their very

purpose. It is general, popular, descriptive, childlike language, which

is universal and lasting. But Christianity must make certain great

reservations over against any theory of evolution. It must demand that

the doctrines of a personal God, of the final spiritual character of

life and its origin, and of the divine nature of man's spirit be not

violated." "Christianity can allow an evolution as the continuation of

creation." (_L. u. W._ 1915, 514.) The _Lutheran_, June 21, 1917,

published an article of L.S. Keyser in which he maintains: "Evolution is

God's method of developing that which He has previously created. The

evolutionary process may have continued for millenniums upon millenniums

until the introduction of life. Whether man's body was evolved or not,

surely his soul must have been created. We should use two terms:

creation and evolution. Together they afford an adequate explanation of

the universe as it is to-day." (_Lutheran Witness_ 1918, 372.) According

to _Lutherischer Herald_, October 15, 1904, Dr. Pick, of the General

Council, declared: "Harnack is all right." (_L. u. W._ 1904, 517. 564.)

"Keeping company with liberals, we are not surprised that some of our

ministers are liberals in both doctrine and practise," says Brenner in

_Dangerous Alliances_, 1917. "What is to be thought of the orthodoxy of

a General Council minister who says: 'God spoke to the Christians of

that day through their experience no less clearly than through the words

of St. Paul'? _Lutheran_, March 29, 1917, p. 7. What about the soundness

of the faith of a D.D. who can recommend _Hastings's Bible Dictionary_

as a reliable work of reference? Rev. M.S. Waters recommends a book that

is full of the worst heresies; but the president of the New York and New

England Synod, Rev. W.M. Horn, when his attention is called to the

matter, bluntly declares: 'I will do nothing in the case referred to.'

On request of the District Synod of Ohio, the president of the General

Council appoints a committee, with Dr. Joseph Stump of the Chicago

Seminary as chairman. The committee investigates. It reports that 'The

General Council at this stage has no jurisdiction in the case.' The

charges were not denied. This question has not been settled, and so far

as we know, no effort has been made since the General Council met in

Rock Island, two years ago, to settle it. On the evidence submitted to

him, Dr. T.E. Schmauk, president of the General Council, stated in his

report: 'I am convinced that the man's views are unevangelical and

thoroughly subversive of the principles on which the General Council is

founded.' Gen. Council Minutes, 1915, p. 23." (_L. u. W._ 1917, 465.)

EQUIVOCAL ATTITUDE.

140. Maintaining a "Wise" Neutrality.--In the controversies of the

Lutheran Church in America the General Council has persistently and on

principle refused to take a definite stand. "The General Synod," says

Dr. Singmaster, "has wisely refrained from making minute [!] theological

distinctions, and has thus obviated much useless discussion. Apart from

the special activities already alluded to, it has made few [quite a

number of false] special doctrinal deliverances." (_Dist. Doctr._, 60

f.) Doctrinal neutrality was the policy also of the United Synod in the

South and of the General Council. The _Lutheran_, April 24, 1902, stated

that, over against the General Synod, the fathers of the Council

insisted on an unequivocal doctrinal and confessional basis, while, over

against Missouri and other synods, they left room for divergence in the

application of certain principles. "Kiss and make up," was the advice

Carl Swensson, writing in the _Lutheran Church Review_, gave to the

disrupted synods of the Lutheran Church in America. (_L. u. W._ 1903,

146.) With respect to the doctrinal differences between Ohio and

Missouri the _Lutheran Church Review_ wrote in 1917: "There are less

clear doctrines which despite the honest, sincere, and persistent

efforts of men to state them in harmony with the divine Word admit of an

honest difference of opinion." (450.) "There has been," says Dr. Jacobs,

"no controversy within the General Council on the subject of election,

and, therefore, no official declaration by the Council on the subject

that has so largely occupied the attention of a number of synods."

(_Dist. Doctr._, 1914, 116.) That applies to practically all of the

doctrines controverted within the Lutheran Church of our country. In

reference to them it has always been the policy of the General Council

to maintain a wise neutrality. In _Lutherisches Kirchenblatt_, December

29, 1900, Rev. Wischan of the General Council hit the nail on the head

when he said: "As to our doctrinal position, we find ourselves in a

peculiar situation. When questioned concerning our attitude toward those

doctrines which have been discussed in the most spirited manner, and

partly have become the occasion for ecclesiastical separations, we are

embarrassed for want of an answer. We know exactly what the position of

Missouri is in the doctrines of conversion and predestination. We know

also what Ohio teaches in opposition to Missouri. But who can tell us

what the General Council teaches on these points? Possibly, many among

us agree entirely neither with Missouri nor with Ohio. Possibly some

incline to the views of Ohio, while others prefer the Missourian

doctrine. But at present there is no clarity in these matters in our

midst, everybody apparently having the privilege of choosing his own

position without fearing that the Church might call him to account. Very

convenient indeed; but surely it is not the ideal. Or do those questions

lie on the periphery to such an extent that an answer is a matter of

absolute irrelevancy to a Lutheran Christian?" (_L. u. W._ 1901, 53.)

141. Not in Sympathy with Missouri.--The unionistic and indifferentistic

position of the General Council with respect to the differences in

doctrine and practise prevailing within the Lutheran synods of the

United States naturally led to a high degree of animosity and unfriendly

charges against the Missouri Synod. Her attitude of certainty and

conviction in the doctrines which she championed was branded and

denounced as "intolerance," "bigotry," "narrow-mindedness,"

"exclusiveness," "aloofness," "pride," "Pharisaism," etc. In his

_Problems and Possibilities_ Dr. Gerberding wrote: "We have often said

that this body of Lutherans, more than all others, has saved the Germans

of the Middle West from being swamped in materialism and rationalism.

Honor to whom honor is due. But the very prosperity of these Lutherans

has made them haughty, self-sufficient, self-righteous. A tone of

Pharisaism and of infallibility seems to run through their utterances.

They seem not only to believe in an infallible revelation from God, but

in themselves as infallible interpreters of that revelation. Every one

who does not accept their interpretation is branded as a heretic of the

same kind and quality as those against whom the apostles warn, and whom

believers are not to receive into their houses nor bid Godspeed. All who

do not accept their interpretation in every jot and tittle are anathema

in the apostolic sense. Their interpretations, glosses, and theses, and

resolutions as to what the Confessions mean also seem to be infallible.

Woe be to the Lutheran who dares even to question their conclusions!"

(162.) Revealing the same animus, Dr. G.W. Sandt published in the

_Lutheran_ of December 12, 1918: "The new and powerful stream of

immigration, which was headed by Dr. Walther, and out of which has grown

the Synodical Conference, with its more than 800,000 communicants and

the largest theological seminary in the land, represents the reaction

against the unionism of the State Church in Saxony. A man of deep piety,

strong convictions, and sound theological learning, he became the

apostle of a sturdy confessionalism, as orthodox as that of

Hengstenberg, as vital and spiritual as that of Spener, and as fruitful

in good works as that of Francke. He and his followers nursed that

orthodoxy so faithfully and fenced it in so securely as to make

Missourianism the synonym for the straitest sect of Lutheranism in the

world. A doctrine of rigid aloofness and separatism was developed as a

wall of defense, as binding upon a Missourian's conscience as almost any

article in the Augsburg Confession could possibly be. It was inevitable

that he and his followers should come into conflict with such leaders as

Loehe and the Fritschels (founders of the Iowa Synod), with Loy and

Stellhorn and Allwardt in the Joint Synod of Ohio, and with Schmidt in

the United Norwegian Church as it then existed. The controversies on the

ministry, on predestination, on conversion and synergism, while

expressive of deep conviction and loyalty to the Truth, do not form a

chapter in our history of which Lutherans can feel proud. When orthodoxy

becomes so strict and strait-laced and legalistic, when it stands up so

erect as to lean backward, both the interests of the Truth and of the

Church are bound to suffer. The cause of unity is harmed, and union or

cooperation is rendered impossible." However, if the paramount object of

the Lutheran Church always was, is now, and ever must be, to maintain

the truth and the unity in the Spirit, then, whatever in other respects

may justly be said in praise of the General Council, her neutral

attitude toward the doctrinal differences of the Lutheran synods in

America, though temporarily it may have proved expedient in the interest

of external union, was in reality neither Christian, nor Lutheran, nor

conducive to the unity or any other real and abiding blessing of our

beloved Church. For while indeed forbearance also with the weak in

knowledge and faith is a mark peculiar to the Christian spirit,

indifferentistic silence as to what is true or false, right or wrong, is

neither a virtue, nor, in the long run, will ever prove to be of true

advantage anywhere, least of all in the Lutheran Church.

THE UNITED SYNOD IN THE SOUTH.

ORGANIZATION.

142. Synods Participating in the Union.--The United Synod of the

Evangelical Lutheran Church in the South was organized June 23, 1886, in

Roanoke, Va., after a doctrinal basis had been agreed upon at a

preliminary meeting in Salisbury, N.C., 1884. The following synods

participated in the union: 1. The North Carolina Synod, organized in

1803, and since 1820 prominent in the General Synod. 2. The South

Carolina Synod, organized in 1824, of which Dr. J. Bachman, who opposed

the confessionalism of the Tennessee Synod, was a member. Bachman

(1790-1874) served the same congregation in Charleston for sixty years,

and became renowned also as a scientist. E.J. Wolf: "Bachman was in the

first rank of ornithologists in his day. With Audubon, whose two sons

married his two daughters, he prepared _The Birds of America_ and _The

Quadrupeds of America_. He was a member of numerous scientific societies

and numbered among his correspondents such men as Humboldt and Agassiz."

(_Lutherans in America_, 475.) 3. The Virginia Synod, organized 1829, in

which S.S. Schmucker, J.G. Morris, C.P. Krauth, J.A. Seiss, and B.M.

Schmucker were active for a time. 4. The Southwest Virginia Synod,

organized in 1841 and adhering to its loose doctrinal basis till 1881.

5. The Georgia Synod, organized in 1860, of which the _Lutheran

Cyclopedia_ remarked: "Half of the pastors are compelled to engage in

secular pursuits for a support." At present the Georgia Synod is one of

the most prosperous in the Southern group. There is no pastor of a

regular parish of the Synod who is not supported by his parishioners.

The members of the Georgia Synod are for the greater part descendants of

the Salzburgers, who, in 1734, founded Ebenezer, twenty-five miles from

Savannah. 6. The Mississippi Synod, organized in 1860. 7. The Tennessee

Synod, founded 1820. 8. The Holston Synod, which branched off from the

Tennessee Synod in 1860.--These synods are almost entirely English. Very

few of its congregations have regular German services beside the

English. The synodical Publishing House and Theological Seminary are

located in Columbia, S.C. Other schools are: Newberry College in

Newberry, S.C.; Roanoke College in Salem, Va.; Lenoir College in

Hickory, N.C. The official paper of the United Synod, the _Lutheran

Church Visitor_, has appeared for fourteen years with the motto, "God's

Word, Our Rule; Christ, Our Pattern; A Pure Faith, Our Watchword." Dr.

W.H. Greever, editor of the _Visitor_ from 1904 to 1914, now edits the

_American Lutheran Survey_. In addition to several benevolent

institutions, the Southern Synods support a heathen mission in Japan

since 1892. In 1886 the United Synod numbered 32,000 communicants,

14,000 belonging to the Tennessee and Holston Synods. The figures prior

to the Merger in 1918 show 257 pastors, 484 congregations, 53,226

communicant, and 73,510 baptized members.

143. Origin of General Body South.--In 1863 the North Carolina, South

Carolina, Virginia, and Southwest Virginia Synods withdrew from the

General Synod because of the Civil War and offensive resolutions adopted

by the General Synod with respect to Southern Lutherans and their

attitude toward the war. In the same year the four synods, uniting with

the Georgia Synod, organized the "General Synod of the Evangelical

Lutheran Church in the Confederate States of America." After the war

(1866) this name was changed to "Evangelical Lutheran General Synod in

North America," and subsequently to "General Synod of the Evangelical

Lutheran Church in the South." In the interest of union, the Tennessee

Synod, which occupied a truly Lutheran position and stood for an

unqualified adoption of the Lutheran symbols, sent a delegate to the

General Synod South in 1867. Seventeen years later, 1884, at Salisbury,

N.C., a doctrinal basis was adopted, which in 1886 resulted in the

organization of the United Synod in the South, now merged into the

United Lutheran Church in America.

DOCTRINAL BASIS.

144. From Laxism to Confessionalism.--The secession of the four Southern

synods in 1863 was not caused by any doctrinal differences or

dissatisfaction with, and opposition to, the un-Lutheran confessional

basis and unionistic practise of the General Synod. Nor was it of any

immediate consequence as to the doctrinal and confessional attitude of

the General Synod South, organized in the same year. Moreover, at its

first convention in 1863, the General Synod in the Confederate States,

the liberal-minded Bachman presiding, after animated discussions,

declared in favor of a qualified subscription to the Augsburg

Confession. Unanimously and solemnly the following doctrinal basis was

adopted: 1. That the Holy Scriptures are the sole infallible rule of

faith and practise; 2. that the Apostles' Creed, the Nicene Creed, and

the Augustana "contain the fundamental doctrines of the Holy

Scriptures"; 3. that, whereas different views concerning some doctrines

of the Augustana have ever obtained and still obtain among the members,

Synod permits "the full and free exercise of personal judgment with

reference to these articles." (_Dist. Doctr._, 1893, 171.) Doctrines in

question were those of the Lord's Supper, absolution, baptismal

regeneration, Sunday, etc., as set forth by Schmucker and Kurtz.

However, already in the revised constitution, printed in the _Book of

Worship_, 1864, the third, the most offensive point of this basis, was

omitted. And soon after contact with the Tennessee Synod and the desire

to draw her into the union of the general body, led to a movement in the

confessional direction. In 1867 the General Synod South resolved to deny

approval to publications supporting principles in conflict with the

Augustana, and to refuse appointment of theological professors holding

doctrines in conflict with this Confession. According to the _Book of

Worship_ of 1868 the candidates for ordination were required to take an

oath of fidelity to the Word of God and the Lutheran Confessions based

thereon. The Form of Confirmation contained a pledge of lifelong

fidelity to the Confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church. In 1872

Synod adopted an essay of Dr. Dorsch, in which he declares that the

General Synod South unequivocally confesses the Augsburg Confession in

its true, real, and original sense. According to the Constitution of the

Theological Seminary (1873) the professors acknowledged, and subscribed

to, "the Augsburg Confession, as in all its parts in harmony with the

Rule of Faith and a correct exhibition of the doctrines of the Word of

God." In 1880 the General Synod South informed the Tennessee and Holston

Synods that she adopts the secondary Lutheran symbols "as in accord

with, and an unfolding of, the teaching of the Unaltered Augsburg

Confession." In 1882 the General Synod declared itself ready to enter

into organic union with other Lutheran bodies "on an unequivocal

Lutheran basis." Several years later, as stated, the union was effected.

145. Sound Lutheran Basis.--The confessional basis agreed upon 1884 and

adopted at the organization in 1886 embraces the following articles: "1.

The Holy Scriptures, the inspired writings of the Old and New

Testaments, the only standard of doctrine and church discipline. 2. As

a true and faithful exhibition of the doctrines of the Holy Scriptures

in regard to matters of faith and practise, the three ancient symbols,

the Apostolic, the Nicene, and the Athanasian Creeds, and the Unaltered

Augsburg Confession of Faith. Also the other Symbolical Books of the Ev.

Lutheran Church, _viz.:_ the Apology, the Smalcald Articles, the Smaller

and Larger Catechisms of Luther, and the Formula of Concord, as true and

Scriptural developments of the doctrines taught in the Augsburg

Confession, and in the perfect harmony of one and the same faith."

Substantially this was the basis of the Tennessee Synod; its adoption at

Salisbury must be regarded as a triumph of the confessional fidelity of

this body. "The strength of the Tennessee Synod," says Dr. E.T. Horn,

"was given to the maintenance of orthodoxy; nor are we able to deny that

their championship was needed and has been effectual." Among the other

factors contributing to this result the testimony of Walther and the

Missouri Synod must not be overlooked and underrated. Dr. A.G. Voigt,

professor in the Seminary at Columbia, S.C., admits: "Lutherans in the

South could not remain untouched by the influences that were at work in

other parts of the country. The increasing appreciation of confessional

Lutheranism which in the middle half of the nineteenth century passed

over from Germany into and through this country also gradually permeated

the South. It served to deepen the devotion of the Tennessee Synod to

the historic Lutheran Confessions, and to awaken in the other synods a

growing esteem and affection for the same Confessions." (_Dist. Doctr._,

1914, 181.)

INDIFFERENTISM

146. Actual Conditions.--All sectarian churches formally acknowledge the

Bible, yet they reject many of its doctrines. So a Lutheran synod may,

in a formal and official way, accept the Lutheran symbols, and at the

same time ignore or reject its material content. Witness the Lutheran

state churches in Europe and the General Synod in America. In a measure,

the actual conditions also within the congregations and district synods

of the United Synod in the South have always been in conflict with their

truly Lutheran basis. False doctrines, especially pertaining to the

Puritanic observance of the Sabbath, were held and taught within the

Synod. Without a word of criticism, for example, the _Lutheran Church

Visitor_, July 13, 1911, published the following from the _Sunday-school

Times_: "Don't use a public vehicle on Sunday unless you are prayerfully

convinced that it would be sinning against God and man not to do so. Is

not that a reasonable and safe principle? Is any other principle a safe

one? A very limited amount of Sunday travel seems to be necessary.

Probably more than ninety-nine one-hundredths of it is unnecessary and

therefore wrong. To use a trolley car or train to go to church on Sunday

may or may not be right; it is simply a question of God's expressed will

for the individual at that particular time. To walk, or to attend

another church would sometimes be the solution. To make a mere

convenience of Sunday travel, under any circumstances, would seem to be

a violation of the spirit of the day. But God will make each case clear

to each surrendered seeker after the light of God's will, if the doing

of God's will and the avoiding of sin by the widest possible margin are

the only impelling motives."

147. Ignoring Intersynodical Differences.--With respect to the doctrines

controverted within the Lutheran Church of America the United Synod has

always maintained a neutral and indifferentistic attitude. Dr. Horn

writes: "It can be said of the doctrinal basis of the Southern Synods

that it is the sincere and intelligent confession of the churches. By

this I do not mean that the Lutheran churches in the South have pondered

all the controversies in which the symbols originated, and to which they

gave the answer; nor that they have accepted all the inferences which

sincere Lutherans now draw from the Confessions, and even may be

justified in urging." (_Dist. Doctr._, 1893, 183.) Dr. Voigt: "The

United Synod has no distinctive doctrines apart from the distinctive

doctrines of common confessional Lutheranism." (_Dist. Doctr._, 1914,

179.) In other words, the United Synod accepts only those doctrines in

which all agree who claim to be confessional Lutherans. The _Lutheran

Church Visitor_, March 15, 1917, wrote: "The United Synod has the

fundamental doctrines, rests on them, and is satisfied with them. Not,

perhaps, the doctrines fundamental to Missouri, but fundamental to

Christian faith and life." Ridiculing the doctrines of conversion and

election as taught by the Missouri Synod, the _Visitor_ continues:

"These doctrines are the simon-pure, unadulterated, unalloyed Lutheran

doctrines! Missourianism and Lutheranism are convertible terms!"--

Regarding the fact that the United Synod has refused to take a definite

stand with respect to the doctrinal differences within the Lutheran

Church, the _Visitor_, March 15, 1917, remarked: "Still, husband and

wife may live together in peace and happiness although they do not agree

on every point. It may even be understood that some subjects are

altogether taboo." This, evidently, is the spirit of indifferentism,

inherited from the General Synod, with whom, in accordance with the law

of spiritual affinity, the United Synod exchanged fraternal delegates,

and is now organically united in the United Lutheran Church in America.

148. Old Spirit of Indifferentism.--To what extent the leaven of

indifferentism was active also within the United Synod in the South

appears from the following utterances of a layman in the _Lutheran

Church Visitor_: "The spirit that developed this country, and that which

has animated the clergy of the Lutheran Church, are antipodal. This

unprogressive spirit, together with their aversion to innovations of all

kinds, their refusal to deal with present-day problems, their mania for

ramming doctrine wholesale down the throats of their communicants, their

spirit of aloofness from ministers of other denominations, and their

refusal to cooperate with them, has been the chief cause of this lack of

progress in our Church. They have, in their strict and even painful

adherence to dogma and form, taken the spirit and life out of the Church

and its worship. The enthusiasm and warmth of natural religion have

given way to a religion of form and ceremony. They have taken the life

and beauty out of the Bible, and made it a code of dry and inspired

theology. Instead of preaching, they have almost invariably talked

theology, and theology alone. Our Church has never been in need of

would-be theologians, but we have been and are now sorely in need of

pastors and preachers. They have discouraged honest investigation, if

that investigation has the least taint of rationalism. In their supreme

disgust for innovations they have made our Church as inflexible and

unfit for the various conditions of modern life as the customs and

practises of the Middle Ages would be out of place now. They have been

completely oblivious of the fact that there are necessarily change and

progress in theology and religion as well as in everything else. True,

there are certain fundamentals that never grow old; equally true is it

that there are some non-essentials that change with the varying hours.

The non-essential has been made essential, and so strongly insisted upon

that it is almost a sacrilege even to insinuate against its authority."

The _Visitor_, March 15, 1917, referring to this publication, remarks:

"Well, we admit the excerpt from the article is pretty raw. But the

_Visitor_ believes in allowing some freedom even to the religious

press.... Unanimity ere long becomes monotony. _Varietas sine unitate

diversitas. Unitas sine varietate mors_."

UNLUTHERAN PRACTISE.

149. Lodge-, Pulpit-, and Altar-Fellowship.--Forbearance with all manner

of weakness in doctrine and practise does not _per se_ conflict with

confessional Lutheranism. But a refusal on principle to take the correct

position, also as to Lutheran practise, is indeed incompatible with true

Lutheranism. The attitude of the United Synod, however, toward lodge-,

pulpit-, altar-, and church-fellowship has always been of a kind which

practically amounted to a denial of its confessional basis. Dr. Voigt

confesses: "As a matter of fact and actual practise, Lutheran ministers

in the United Synod do not invite others to occupy their pulpits

indiscriminately; and although in some churches the custom of extending

a general invitation at Communion still continues from earlier times,

the practise is diminishing, and in most churches has passed away with

the introduction of the Common Service. As to secret societies, there is

not much agitation against them except in the Tennessee Synod, and a

number of United Synod ministers are known to be members of such orders;

but the sentiment of most ministers is unfavorable to them." (_Dist.

Doctr._, 1914, 188.) "Discussions in regard to stricter or more lax

practises have never led to divisions nor issued in official

pronouncements of distinctive developments of confessional position."

"Firm as they are in their convictions, Southern Lutherans are

generally adverse to controversy. This is probably the true explanation

of the conservative attitude of the United Synod towards the questions

connected with pulpit- and altar-fellowship and secret societies. There

are differences of view on these questions existing in the United Synod.

But the disposition has always been not to fight the differences out,

but to wait for time to bring about unanimity in regard to them. In the

formation of the United Synod peculiar circumstances thrust these

questions upon the notice of the body; but it declined to legislate in

regard to them because it was unwilling to go through the throes of

controversy which a decision upon them involved. Combined with this

aversion to controversy, there exists an evangelical [?] impatience of

legal constraint, which impels men to act upon principle rather than by

rule." "It has already been stated that the Tennessee Synod is unique

among the synods constituting the United Synod in having rules against

pulpit- and altar-fellowship and secret societies; and the United Synod

has pledged itself not to employ in its general work, in its theological

seminary, in its mission operations, in the editing of its official

organ, any person who would foster secretism or unionistic fellowship."

(_Dist. Doctr._, 1914, 147 f.; 1893, 182.)

150. Attitude toward Non-Lutheran Denominations.--The United Synod as

such did not establish an exchange of delegates with any of the

non-Lutheran churches. However, invitations to preach in their pulpits

on the occasion of synodical conventions were not refused. The _Lutheran

Church Visitor_, March 15, 1917: "Our United Synod ministers are not

ashamed to speak of our Evangelical Lutheran testimony before

Methodists, Baptists, Presbyterians, _et al., et id genus omne._" But

the fact is that at such occasions the distinctive features of

Lutheranism are, as a rule, passed over in silence; that full fellowship

of prayer and service is indulged in; and that the spirit of

indifferentism as well as the desire, on the part of the Lutheran synods

and congregations, for returning the comity and kindness received at the

hands of Methodists, etc., is encouraged and strengthened. As such,

furthermore, the United Synod did not take an active part in

interdenominational organizations, but, on the other hand, did not

consider it a denial of the truth when its pastors openly and heartily

participated in local ministerial unions, or when its congregations

occasionally joined in union religious meetings. Thus Drs. Horn and

Drach took part in the Interdenominational Conference at Edinburgh in

1910. The _Lutheran Church Visitor_ encouraged participation in

interdenominational meetings; _e.g._, in its issue of April 6, 1916, the

Men's National Missionary Congress in Washington, D.C. "So it has done,

does, and shall continue to do, and not be ashamed," declared the

_Visitor_, March 15, 1917, and explained in defense of this attitude

toward non-Lutheran bodies: "The United Synod believes that the lump

[non-Lutheran churches] cannot receive 'absent treatment,' and that the

Lutheran leaven cannot be placed in the lump from a prohibitive

distance." However, according to the history of the Lutheran Church in

America, in practically all of the interdenominational movements and

meetings participated in by Lutherans, the rule has been not to confess,

but, directly or indirectly, to deny the distinctive truths of

Lutheranism. Speaking of the United Synod, Dr. Voigt remarked: "Rigid

exclusiveness is quite foreign to its spirit."

TENNESSEE AND HOLSTON SYNODS.

151. Tennessee Lowering Her Standard.--The Tennessee Synod, whose early

history is dealt with extensively in _American Lutheranism, Part I_, was

the main factor in bringing about the change in the confessional

attitude of the Southern synods. The _Lutheran Church Visitor_, March 8,

1917: "The Tennessee Synod helped the other synods to rise and regain

their Lutheran feet. Since then she has helped them to keep their feet

and to win stronger foothold." "The ministers of the Tennessee Synod,"

says Dr. Horn, "trained as they have been for the most part in the homes

and companionship of older ministers, have not a wide and varied

culture, but possess a profound acquaintance with the writings of Luther

and a ready and genial knowledge of the Holy Scriptures." (_Dist.

Doctr._, 1893, 178.) In the revised constitution of 1866 the original

confessional statement of the Tennessee Synod, adopting the Augsburg

Confession without limitation or qualification, was enlarged to include

also the Apology, the Smalcald Articles, the Smaller and Larger

Catechisms of Luther, and the Formula of Concord "as true Scriptural

developments of the doctrines taught in the Augsburg Confession." In

the same year the Tennessee Synod, following the example of her

daughter, the Holston Synod, eliminated from her constitution the

objectionable features respecting incorporation, theological seminaries,

synodical treasuries, etc. Among the Southern synods the Tennessee Synod

alone adopted rules against pulpit- and altar-fellowship and against

holding membership in secret societies. Her endeavors to induce the

United Synod to take a similar position failed. Indeed, the original

constitution, submitted in 1884 at Salisbury, contained a paragraph

against pulpit- and altar-fellowship, membership in lodges, and

chiliasm. And when this paragraph was rejected, Polycarp Henkel,

representing the Tennessee Synod, refused to vote for the constitution.

In 1886 the Tennessee Synod adopted the Salisbury basis, but added a

declaration which condemned chiliasm, lodge-services, pulpit- and

altar-fellowship, and all church union and cooperation conflicting with

pure Lutheran doctrine, and recommended that the United Synod embody in

its by-laws a paragraph pledging theological professors to teach nothing

contrary to these principles or the doctrines of the Lutheran Church. At

the meeting of the United Synod in Savannah, 1887, Socrates Henkel

proposed a corresponding by-law, which, however, was tabled till the

next meeting. The Tennessee Synod reaffirmed its resolution with the

threat that they would not cooperate with the United Synod until a

by-law embodying the four points had been adopted. However, when the

North Carolina Synod, with equal determination, took the opposite stand,

Tennessee yielded, compromising on, and contending herself with, the

resolution adopted in 1900 in which the United Synod assured the

Tennessee Synod that, in their common work, they would earnestly

endeavor to avoid everything that might tend to burden the consciences

of brethren in any synod, and that all synods were equally bound to

direct their practise and fulfil their duties according to their honest

and conscientious conviction of the true and real sense of God's Word

and the Confessions. Thus the Tennessee Synod, untrue to her noble

traditions, finally did waive her demand for a correct Lutheran position

on the part of the United Synod with reference to the four points.

Tennessee closed her eyes to the fact that she remained responsible not

only for what was done conjointly with the other synods in the United

Synod, but also for the practise of these synods as such. Unionism, once

again, had gained the victory. And now, after decades of fraternal

intercourse with the General Synod, the Tennessee Synod is organically

united with the synods in opposition to which she organized in 1820.

152. Holston Synod.--The Ev. Luth. Holston Synod was organized January

2, 1861, by 11 ministers and 16 congregations (with a communicant

membership of 1,000) residing in East Tennessee and neighboring counties

of Virginia, after having received their honorable dismission for this

purpose from the Tennessee Synod, which by this action was left without

a single congregation or minister in the State whose name she bears. The

step was taken not because of any dissatisfaction with the doctrinal

position of the Tennessee Synod, but on account of the inconvenience and

expensiveness of attending her conventions. However, the peculiar

attitude of the Tennessee Synod toward theological seminaries,

incorporation, synodical treasuries, etc., contributed to the

separation. (_Holston Minutes_, 1861 ff.) In his Quartocentennial

Address, 1886, Dr. A.J. Brown, for more than twenty-five years president

of the Holston Synod, stated: "There was at the time of her formation,

and had been for some time prior to this, considerable dissatisfaction

with the constitution of the Tennessee Synod, and strong efforts were

being made to have it amended. It was contended by the advocates of

reform that that instrument contained features and prohibitions which

cramped and crippled the energies of the Church in the prosecution of

her sublime mission, and that it no longer reflected the views of the

whole Synod." The Holston Synod, then, did not model her polity after

that of the mother synod. (_Minutes_, 1886.) But, while this was

undoubtedly a progress in the right direction, the strict Lutheranism of

the Holston Synod did not prove to be as pronounced and consistent as

that of the Tennessee Synod had been. In 1886 the Holston Synod numbered

15 pastors and 27 congregations, with a communicant membership of 2,000,

compared with 1,800 communicant members at present. The minutes of the

Holston Synod record numerous reports and resolutions with respect to

Mosheim Institute, which, however, proved to be a failure.

153. Sound Doctrinal Position.--As a preliminary basis the Holston

Synod, in 1861, adopted the Augsburg Confession and Luther's Smaller

Catechism, at the same time declaring that "we do not intend to

repudiate the rest of the Symbolical Books so called, and unlutheranize

those who adopt them in connection with the Symbols which we have

adopted, because we are satisfied that they, rightly understood and

explained, contain nothing contrary to our doctrinal basis, and that we

will, therefore, not refuse to fellowship those who adopt the collective

body of the Symbolical Books as their Confessional Basis." (_Minutes_,

1861, 6.) Owing to the unsettled state of affairs in consequence of the

Civil War, the constitution was not ratified till 1865. Its second

article, "Of the Confessional Basis," reads as follows: "1. We

acknowledge the canonical books of the Old and New Testaments as the

only infallible rule of faith and practise. 2. We acknowledge the

Augsburg Confession of Faith and Luther's Smaller Catechism as a correct

statement of the doctrines of the Christian system of which they treat,

and no minister connected with this Synod shall hold or preach, nor

shall any church connected with this Synod, or any private member of any

Church so connected, hold or propagate, any doctrine which may be

repugnant to these universally acknowledged symbols of the Evangelical

Lutheran Church." (_Minutes_, 1865, 11.) In its revised constitution of

1895 the Holston Synod adopted all the Lutheran symbols.

154. Entering Various Unions.--In 1867 the Holston Synod resolved to

unite with the General Synod South. In the following year A.J. Brown

reported that he had been present at the last session of the General

Synod, and that he was highly pleased with the action of that Synod, and

felt assured that "it would be instrumental in bringing about much good

in our Lutheran Zion." (_Minutes_, 1868, 4.) In 1872, however, a

resolution was adopted to withdraw from the General Synod because "there

is much that is un-Lutheran in doctrine and practise in individual

members" of that Synod. (7.) Two years later a union was effected with

the General Council. (_Minutes_, 1874, 13.) In 1880 the delegate to the

General Council "presented in glowing words the intellect, the breadth

of view, the depth and elegance of culture, the sincere love and burning

zeal for the soul and God's holy truth, of those composing that body."

(19.) In 1885 the Holston Synod endorsed the action of the Diet held at

Salisbury (1884), and declared its readiness to join the remainder of

the Southern Lutheran synods, on that basis, to form a General Union.

(11.) In his Presidential Report, 1886, A.J. Brown stated with respect

to the Salisbury agreement: "I will barely add that the union was

effected without any compromise of principle or proper feeling of

self-respect on either side, and on a basis strictly Lutheran, and with

a unanimity unprecedented in the history of similar movements." (7.) In

1890 the delegate to the United Synod reported: "While united in

doctrine, it is to be regretted that we are not so fully united in

practise, as was made apparent by the action of the United Synod on the

'By-laws, Rules of Order, and Regulations,' and particularly in regard

to work. This section, which is the bone of contention, embraces

substantially the celebrated 'Four Points.' And even here the difference

is not so much in principle as in the practical application of

principles. There are extremes on both sides. An attempt to embody the

Four Points' in our basis of union would have defeated the organic union

of our Southern Church in one general body; the adoption of the

regulation in question would now disrupt it. We advise moderation. The

union of our Church in the South is of too much importance to be broken

up, or even hazarded by the adoption of any measures not clearly

required by our doctrinal standards, or of doubtful expediency." (15.)

Thus also with the Holston Synod union had become the primary, unity a

secondary consideration.

COMMON SERVICE.

155. A Chief Bond of Union.--The relations of the United Synod with the

General Council and the General Synod were of a most cordial nature,

manifesting themselves in the exchange of fraternal delegates

(established by Southern General Synod in 1878) and in various

cooperations, especially in the preparation and use of the Common

Service. Concerning the exchange of delegates the sentiment was voiced

again and again: "It was the joy of the members of the United Synod to

have present the brethren of those bodies, to dwell together in goodly

fellowship for a little season. Every heart was glad to feel that we

were one in the faith and usage of the Evangelical Lutheran Church."

Also with respect to the United Synod the Merger in 1918 came as a ripe

fruit of the cordial relations which had been cultivated for decades.

One of the chief bonds of union during this period was the Common

Service, for which the United Synod justly claimed to be entitled to

special credit. The first impulse for such a unity in service came from

H.M. Muhlenberg. In a letter of November 5, 1783, four years before his

death, he expressed the desire "that it would be a most delightful and

advantageous thing if all the Evangelical Lutheran congregations in

North America were united with one another by using the same order of

service." Among others who later entertained the same wish was Charles

Philip Krauth. In a letter to his son, April 2, 1857, he said: "Whilst

I am anxious for such an agreement in regard to a doctrinal basis as

will embrace all the wings of Lutheranism in our country, I very much

wish we could agree on forms of worship in accordance with the

liturgical character of our Church, and erect a barrier against the

Fanaticism and Methodism which so powerfully control some of our

ministers and people." (Spaeth, _C.P. Krauth_, 1, 380.) _The English

Liturgy_ (1860), the _Church Book_ (1868), and the _Kirchenbuch_ (1877)

of the Pennsylvania Synod and the _Book of Worship_ of the General

Synod, South, may be regarded as preliminary steps toward the

realization of this wish.

156. Cooperation of General Bodies.--In a letter to the convention of

the General Synod South, at Winchester, Va., 1870, Dr. Bachman of

Charleston, four years before his death, expressed it as the strongest

desire of his heart that all English-speaking Lutherans should have a

common service. Pursuant to, and in accordance with, this request the

General Synod South in 1874 elected a committee to prepare "The Common

Service for the Use of Evangelical Lutheran Congregations." In 1876

Synod proposed negotiations on this matter with the General Synod and

the General Council. The General Council, in 1879, resolved to

cooperate, "provided the rule which shall decide all questions in its

[Common Service] preparation shall be: The common consent of the pure

Lutheran liturgies of the sixteenth century, and, when there is not an

entire agreement among them, the consent of the largest number of those

of greatest weight." In 1883 the General Synod declared her readiness to

cooperate in accordance with the rule proposed by the General Council.

The work was completed by a Joint Committee appointed by the three

general bodies, B.M. Schmucker serving as chairman. In 1888 the _Common

Service_ appeared in two editions, one published at Columbia, S.C., by

the United Synod South, the other at Philadelphia by the General Synod.

In his preface to the Southern edition B.M. Schmucker said: "The Common

Service here presented is intended to reproduce in English the consensus

of these pure Lutheran Liturgies. It is therefore no new Service, such

as the personal tastes of those who have prepared it would have selected

and arranged; but it is the old Lutheran Service, prepared by men whom

God raised up to reform the Service, as well as the life and doctrine of

the Church, and whom He plenteously endowed with the gifts of the Holy

Ghost.... This Common Service is in its newest parts as old as the time

of the Reformation," etc. The work of the committee was approved by the

three cooperating general bodies. The General Synod ratified it in 1885

and adopted the Manuscript in 1887. The efforts made at the conventions

in 1880, 1891, and 1893 to rescind this action failed. The Common

Service was adopted also by the Iowa Synod, the Joint Synod of Ohio, and

the English District of the Missouri Synod. But, while every Lutheran

will rejoice at this success, it must not be overlooked that liturgical

similarity dare never take the place of doctrinal unity. In 1873, in a

public letter, the secretary of the East Pennsylvania Synod declared

that similarity of ceremonies in the whole synod was of greater import

than unity in confession (_L. u. W._ 1873, 153.) Perhaps, this was

exceptional. However, it does not appear that the bodies cooperating in

preparing the Common Service developed a corresponding energy and

determination in bringing about a true Lutheran unity in doctrine and

practise. Yet, unity in doctrine is of divine obligation and of the very

essence of the Lutheran Church, while similarity in ceremonies,

desirable and advantageous as it may be, is, and always must remain, a

matter of expediency and Christian liberty.

THE END OF VOLUME II.