Evangelical Lutheran (Old Lutheran) Church

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Evangelical Lutheran Church Berlin

The Evangelical Lutheran (Old Lutheran) Church was a Lutheran church of old denomination . It was formed from 1830 under the name "Evangelical Lutheran Church in Prussia" (later "in Old Prussia"). Today it belongs to the Independent Evangelical Lutheran Church .

Emergence

Evangelical Lutheran Church of the Holy Cross (Berlin-Wilmersdorf)

In the old Lutheran church, those Lutheran congregations in Prussia united to form a church independent of the sovereign, which neither accepted the union between Lutheran and Reformed congregations that took place in 1817, nor the king's agendas, nor the union reverse. The leading clergyman of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Prussia was the Breslau professor of theology Johann Gottfried Scheibel .

For the 300th anniversary of the Augsburg Confession , the dispute intensified in 1830 between King Friedrich Wilhelm III . as well as the newly founded United Evangelical Church in Prussia . It was not possible for the Lutheran parishes to remain within the Protestant Union Church due to the emphasis and the unique selling point of the Evangelical Lutheran Confessions , so that, with the approval of the Uniate Regional Church, the Prussian state proceeded with tough persecution measures against the Old Lutherans. This led, among other things, to an escape of Old Lutherans to North America and Australia .

It was only tolerated by the state in 1841 and finally recognized by the state under strict conditions in 1845, so that it could give itself its own church order. This makes it the oldest Lutheran old denominational church in Germany. Their members were soon referred to as "Old Lutherans" by outsiders. Later it also belonged to communities in other German states, for example in Nassau (from 1852), Baden , Kurhessen , Waldeck and Frankfurt . In these countries, some independent Lutheran churches later formed, such as the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Baden from 1865.

The administration of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Prussia was the responsibility of the Oberkirchenkollegium (older spelling Ober-Kirchen-Collegium, OKC) in Breslau. One of their leading clergymen was Oberkirchenrat Walther Günther from Wuppertal-Elberfeld. From 1883 to 1945 the church maintained a theological seminary in Breslau. In 1930 the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Old Prussia was recognized as a corporation under public law (KdöR). In 1954 the Oberkirchenkollegium took its seat in Wuppertal . In 1955 it was called the Evangelical Lutheran (Old Lutheran) Church .

The Old Lutheran congregations in the Pomeranian and Poznan Voivodeships with around 7,000 members formed the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Poland (Kościół Ewangelicko-Luterański w Polsce; from 1926 Evangelical Lutheran Church in Western Poland / Kościół Ewangelicko) at a synod in Bromberg on October 13, 1920 -Luterański w Polsce Zachodniej in contrast to the Evangelical-Augsburg Church in Poland ) under the spiritual direction of Superintendent Reinhold Büttner, pastor in Rogasen .

After Breslau was placed under the administration of Poland after the Second World War , the Evangelical Lutheran (Old Lutheran) Church and the Evangelical Lutheran Free Church in Oberursel in Hesse established their own church university, the Lutheran Theological University of Oberursel .

Merger to form the Independent Evangelical Lutheran Church

On the territory of the (old) Federal Republic of Germany, the Evangelical Lutheran (Old Lutheran) Church merged with other Lutheran churches to form the Independent Evangelical Lutheran Church (SELK).

Because of the division of Germany , the communities in the GDR could not participate in this merger. That is why they initially continued to exist as an independent free church of the same name. From 1972 onwards, this formed the informal "Association of Independent Evangelical Lutheran Churches in the GDR" with the Evangelical Lutheran Free Church, which in the west was also involved in the merger to form the SELK. In 1984 the Evangelical Lutheran Free Church in the GDR terminated this cooperation due to theological differences. After there were no more political obstacles due to German reunification , the Evangelical Lutheran (Old Lutheran) Church also joined the SELK in the area of ​​the former GDR in 1991.

See also

literature

  • Jürgen Kampmann, Werner Klän (Ed.): Prussian Union, Lutheran Confession and Church Characteristics. Theological determination of places in the struggle for the claim and scope of denominational determination of the church (=  Oberurseler Hefte supplementary volumes , volume 14). Edition Ruprecht, Göttingen 2014, ISBN 978-3-8469-0157-1 .
  • Werner Klän, Gilberto da Silva (ed.): Sources on the history of independent Evangelical Lutheran churches in Germany. Documents from the area of ​​Concord Lutheran Churches (= Oberurseler Hefte supplementary volumes, Volume 7). 2nd Edition. Edition Ruprecht, Göttingen 2010, ISBN 978-3-7675-7138-9 .
  • Werner Klän: The old Lutheran church formation in Prussia. In: The Lutheran Church. History and creation. Volume 13, German Lutheranism and the Union Problem. Pp. 153-170.
  • Gottfried Nagel: The struggle for the Lutheran Church in Prussia. Wroclaw 1930.
  • Gottfried Nagel: Our home church. A greeting on the anniversary of the Reformation for Lutherans in Prussia. Elberfeld 1917.
  • Gottfried Nagel: Our home church. Brief history of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Prussia. Wroclaw 1924.
  • Otto Schmeckenbecher, Ulrich Kabitz: Understanding life paths. My dear children, questions for my father , old and new from the Lutheran Church (New Series). Church history reading books, Volume 2nd Edition Ruprecht, Göttingen 2014, ISBN 978-3-7675-7147-1 .
  • Jobst Schöne : The beginnings of building a state-free Lutheran church in Prussia. In: ders .: Church and Church Regiment in the Work and Thinking of Georg Philipp Eduard Huschke (works on the history and theology of Lutheranism). Berlin 1969.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Clifford Neal Smith: Nineteenth-century Emigration of "Old Lutherans" from Eastern Germany, mainly Pomerania and Lower Silesia to Australia, Canada, and the United States. McNeal, Westland 1980
  2. ↑ Parish of Sankt Petri Wuppertal, Independent Evangelical Lutheran Church - History, accessed on July 22, 2019.
  3. ↑ Olgierd Kiec: The Protestant Churches in the Poznań Voivodeship 1918–1939 [= Kościoły ewangelickie w Wielkopolsce wobec kwestii narodowościowej w latach 1918–1939, Upowszechnianie Nauki Oświata, Warszawa 1995, ISBN 83-85618-21 ; ISBN 83-85618-21 ; German], Siegfried Schmidt (ex.), Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 1998, (Sources and Studies, German Historical Institute Warsaw / Niemiecki Instytut Historyczny w Warszawie ; Vol. 8), ISBN 3-447-04030-0 , p. 33f.