Altona Confession

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Altona Confession at the main church in Altona

The Altona Confession is the common name for the word and confession of Altona pastors in the need and confusion of public life , a pulpit notice that was read out by 21 Altona pastors on January 11, 1933 in the main church Altona and the Petrikirche in Altona and in the Hamburgische Church newspaper of January 20, 1933. It represents a late reaction of the clergy to the Altona Bloody Sunday of July 17, 1932, on which Communists and National Socialists fought a bloody street battle with 18 dead.

Emergence

Already on July 18, 1932 , one day after the Altona Bloody Sunday, all the Evangelical Lutheran pastors present in Altona met at Provost Georg Heinrich Sieveking's. They planned an “emergency service” for the following Sunday, during which a “message from the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Altona” was read out. On August 1, 1932, the Altona Pastors' Conference set up a commission and instructed it to clarify the church's position on political parties and movements. Experience has shown that funeral ceremonies, which the pastors had to hold, were repeatedly converted into political demonstrations; therefore the tasks of church and state should be clearly delimited.

The theses developed were discussed in several general conferences from September 1932. There were strong debates about the relationship between creation and original sin and the consequences of this relationship for the understanding of politics and culture. For Hans Asmussen , who played a key role, the “rejection of church liberalism and positivism ” was decisive. The strived for distancing the church from politics and culture as a whole was criticized only by a minority of liberal pastors. On December 14th, 21 pastors (Abraham, Andersen, Hans Asmussen, Christansen, Karl Hasselmann , Hildebrand, Hoffmann, Ketels, Knuth, W. Petersen, A. Reuter, R. Reuter, Roos, Schröder, Siegmann, Sieveking, Stalmann, Thedens, Thomsen, Thun and Johannes Tonnesen ) completed the Altona Confession and set an evening service on January 11, 1933, a Wednesday, as the date for the reading . On this day the main church in Altona was so overcrowded that a parallel service was held in St. Petri , where Asmussen read the confession. The text was distributed in an edition of 230,000 copies and printed in the Hamburg church newspaper .

content

Under the heading The Word and Confession of Altona Pastors in the Need and Confusion of Public Life , the Church’s first task is to “sharpen conscience and preach the Gospel.” At the same time, claims based on an alliance in the political struggle, Aiming at the consecration and justification of political action or merely material help and thereby failing to recognize this fundamentally different mission of the church. Each of the articles is introduced with words that are reminiscent of the Reformation confessional writings of the 16th century: "We believe, teach and confess".

Article 1 “Of the Church” says: “She must speak the word freely. It is not subject to anyone… […] If someone at military, state or party festivals only wants the church to enhance the solemnity of the festivities, he is abusing the church. [...] Anyone who expects the pastor's preaching to justify or confirm a certain form of economy, war or peace, armed service or the refusal to war - who demands of the pastor [... that he] necessarily bless the heroic death for the fatherland Should address death, which leads him to deny the Lord Christ and his work of redemption. "

Article 2 “From the Limits of Man” rejects the utopia of a coming earthly world empire of justice, peace and general welfare. This denies the limits set by God. Any party that promises such goals becomes a religion.

In Article 3 “From the State” God is referred to as the Creator of the State. However, a right of resistance is granted: "But if the case occurs that the authorities themselves act against 'the city's best', then everyone must decide when the moment has come when one has to obey God more than man".

In Article 4 “On the tasks of the state”, the parties are criticized as political denominations that endanger the existence of the state. In the choice of words, a diction that was caught up in the zeitgeist of the time is striking; There is an unmistakable allusion to the hated Versailles Peace Treaty : “Because life is constantly threatened as a result of sin, God commands the state to be ready to defend it by force of arms in an emergency. If need be, treaties that endanger the very existence of the state must be fought and eliminated. Because life is bigger than anything people set. God created us as Germans. That's why we should also want to be Germans. As certainly as every nation has the right to live and its duty to live, so certainly we Germans also have it. Wherever we are threatened in our being German, the German authorities have the task of God, the people and the state to preserve their Germanness. "

Article 5, “Of the Commandments of God,” contains thoughts on Sunday holiday rest, marriage, jurisdiction, and unemployment. It is called a sin, "when members of the people are judged to be subhuman, when respect for the German nation is undermined, but it is exposed in defenselessness to attacks and the diplomatic game of all."

The confession ends with a clear reference to “the word of the cross” as the basis and goal of the church's message. This “is most likely to be heard where people submit to God's order and remain within the limits set by God.” The Gospel puts everyone in their right place and is “the only help and complete salvation for our earthly fatherland”.

reviews

The confessional document, largely written by Hans Asmussen , was critical of ideology against political extremism of any kind and is considered the first important document of the church's resistance to the Nazi dictatorship, which was organized a little later in the Confessing Church . The total political neutrality of the church is abandoned and instead political doctrines of salvation are sharply attacked. However, it is controversial in scholarship to what extent it had a direct impact on the Barmen Theological Declaration .

Even if the creed is "committed to the authoritarian-organic thinking of young conservatism" in some of its statements, its lasting significance lies in the demarcation from the total claims of political movements that see themselves as saviors. The church historian Klaus Scholder assesses it as a "step into a new country, the importance of which should only be fully demonstrated in the coming years".

consequences

The confession met with a lively response. Several church groups joined him; and it was seen as a paradigm of an ecclesiastical position on public life. However, the unity of the pastors involved did not last long. Some joined the German Christians , others were subjected to reprisals after the seizure of power. Provost Sieveking lost his office in December 1933, Hans Asmussen was temporarily suspended in May 1933 and then permanently in May 1934 and could no longer work as a pastor until the end of the war. However, he was involved in the Barmen Theological Declaration , which is still valid today in many Protestant regional churches.

Footnotes

  1. ↑ Enno Konukiewitz: Hans Asmussen. A Lutheran theologian in the church struggle. Gütersloh 1984, ISBN 3-579-00115-9 , pp. 49/50
  2. ↑ Enno Konukiewitz: Hans Asmussen ... page 51
  3. ↑ Claus Jürgensen: The pastors of Altona - 50 years ago. In: Reinhold Günther u. a. (Ed.): The Altona Confession. Text and Theology - Contemporary History and Witnesses. (Nordelbischer Konvent booklet 21) Neumünster 1983, p. 28
  4. ↑ Hamburgische Kirchenzeitung, Volume 8.1933 of January 20, 1933, pages 2 to 5
  5. ↑ Reinhold Günther u. a. (Ed.): The Altona Confession. Text and Theology - Contemporary History and Witnesses. North Elbian Convent Volume 21, Neumünster 1983; P. 6
  6. ↑ Reinhold Günther u. a. (Ed.): The Altona Confession ... p. 8
  7. ↑ Hartmut Ludwig: Altonaer Confession , RGG 4th edition, Volume 1, Col. 381
  8. ↑ Klaus Scholder: The churches and the Third Reich. Volume 1, Frankfurt / M .: Ullstein 1977, p. 227

literature

The Altona Confession

  • in the Hamburg church newspaper of January 20, 1933 as a facsimile for online display on the screen and as a download (pdf, 8 MB) [1]
  • printed in full and a. in
    • Joachim Beckmann (Hrsg.): Church yearbook for the Evangelical Church in Germany 1933-1945 . 2nd edition Gütersloh: Mohn 1976, pp. 17-22
    • Reinhold Günther u. a. (Ed.): The Altona Confession. Text and Theology - Contemporary History and Witnesses. (Nordelbischer Konvent booklet 21) Neumünster 1983
    • Simon Gerber: Again: The Altona Confession. Writings of the Association for Schleswig-Holstein Church History 52, Neumünster 2006, pp. 251–261