David Meder

David Meder (* 1548 in Osterfeld ; † March 7, 1616 in Nebra ) was a canon preacher from 1577 to 1595 and at times general superintendent in Öhringen and later pastor in Naumburg , Neukirchen bei Borna and Nebra. He wrote the Hohenlohe Church Ordinance from 1578.

Life

He was the son of the Osterfeld pastor Gallus Meder and attended schools in Osterfeld as well as in Zeitz and Naumburg, where the father had official seats over time. From 1561 he studied in Leipzig, where he heard Philipp Melanchthon and Victorinus Strigel . In 1566 he was ordained a priest. In the following years he was on a long journey through Franconia and probably also became Protestant at that time. In 1573 he was city chaplain in Ansbach . In 1574 he was a Protestant pastor in Leutershausen in Brandenburg-Ansbach , where, however, he encountered difficulties because of a penitential sermon. In 1577 he became a preacher in Öhringen and, as such, after the founding of the consistory in 1579, he was also general superintendent. He encountered great disorder and inequality in the pending parishes. In 1578 he wrote the Hohenlohe Church Ordinance and initiated a general visit to carry out this second reform , which regulated and adjusted church conditions in Hohenlohe. He had based his church regulations on the Brandenburg chapter and consortium regulations from his previous place of work in Leutershausen. His adversary was the Neuenstein councilor Zacharias Hyso , who obtained changes to the church order from the Counts of Hohenlohe. At first, Jacob Andreae became Meder's advocate , at whose suggestion Meder accompanied the special superintendents on the visitation. Andreae visited Meder himself in 1581, but soon reprimanded his training and points of view, so that Andreae urged a reorganization of the Hohenlohe church leadership and Meder's disempowerment. From 1582 there was temporarily no more consistory, although Meder and the Öhringen church servants mostly still had higher-level tasks until around 1586. In 1595 Meder gave up his office in Öhringen and turned to Naumburg, where he was a preacher at the cathedral. In 1596 he was pastor in Neukirchen bei Borna and as one of the three adjuncts assigned to superintendent David Teuber as a companion during his visitations. In 1599 Meder handed over the pastorate in Neukirchen to his son David Bernhard Meder (1577-1625) and initially returned briefly to Naumburg before accepting a pastorate in Nebra, where he was buried. His tombstone was still there in the 18th century, and a Latin grave poem has survived.

family

From around 1573 he was married to Catharina Möringer, the daughter of a forester from Würzburg. The marriage had eight children by 1581, six of whom were still alive at the time. The children are all likely born in Öhringen.

Fonts

In addition to the Hohenlohe church ordinance of 1578, he wrote a supplement to the catechism that was added to the catechisms in 1752. In 1578 he also wrote a defense of the Hohenloh Catechism. In 1589 his description of the Oehringische Wasserflut appeared in Nuremberg . He was also the author of various printed funeral and witch sermons.

literature

• Wolfgang Billig: David Meder (1548–1616) from 1577 to 1595 general superintendent in Öhringen and later pastor in Naumburg, Neukirchen and Nebra. In: Genealogy , Heft 5–6 / 1996, pp. 160–169.
• Walther Ludwig: The Latin grave poem on David Meder († 1616) . In: Genealogy , Issue 9-10 / 1996, p. 273.