Martin Beschich

Paul Jobst Martin Anbich (born September 18, 1897 in Heuckewalde / Thuringia ; † January 5, 1971 in Bamberg ) was a German Protestant theologian , pastor abroad in São Paulo (Brazil) and President of the Central Brazilian Synod .

biography

family

Begich was the youngest son of Pastor Paul Begich and his wife Hedwig Begich, geb. Müller, pastor's daughter and great-niece of the founder of St. John Lutheran Church in Chester ( Illinois ) CH Siegmund Buttermann (1819–1849).

During the First World War, his sister Gertrud Anbich (1894–1976) wrote a diary that was only published a hundred years later as a DRK helper in Zeitz . The older brother, Johannes Anbich (1894–1915), also studied theology, but died in the First World War.

Begich grew up in close proximity to his cousins ​​Jobst, Heinrich and Siegfried Begich from Profen and Joachim Gegich from Ostrau, who also became theologians.

education and profession

Like his brother Johannes, he attended the Königliche Stiftsgymnasium Zeitz , where he passed his Abitur in 1916. From the end of October 1916 he served in the Guard Grenadier Regiment of Emperor Alexander . From 1919 he studied theology at the University of Jena , later at the University of Halle . After the vicariate in Hohenmölsen and Neudaberstedt near Erfurt , he found his first pastor's position in Gleina near Zeitz from 1924 to 1929 .

For more than 30 years from 1929 onwards he worked as a pastor abroad in the rapidly expanding metropolis of São Paulo , after a second pastorate was established there for the German community. In 1962 he and his wife Herta geb. Hauenstein back to Germany.

Act

In Brazil, he worked from 1929 to 1962, initially as the second city pastor, and during this time he developed the Wartburg House into a versatile support and training center for adults and young people. A second focus of church work was created with a new parish and parish house, which was built on the property of the Heydenreich Foundation in Vila Mariana in São Paulo. In 1956 he was elected President of the Central Brazilian Synod , which he chaired until he retired in 1962.
He devoted himself to researching the larger context of the Protestant Church in Brazil. With his knowledge - especially in the field of the Old Testament - he contributed to the revision of the Portuguese Bible translation, which was carried out in the 1950s by the Brazilian Bible Society ( Sociedade Biblica do Brasil ).

Gegich was an avid diary writer. At the age of 14 he made his first notes. During the First World War he wrote a field diary, parts of which were incorporated into the official regimental history in a different style. The war diary, which he read several times in the course of his life and provided with marginal notes, shows the "mentally injured 'warrior' of the First World War". The diary from the vicariate in Gleina and over the first twenty years as a parish priest in Brazil have remained unpublished.

His multiple historical reviews and his journalism in many German-language papers in Brazil and in the Staden yearbook are still valued today. For many years he also founded and directed the parish journal Kreuz im Süd . His attitude as a pastor abroad in the time of National Socialism is viewed critically: Despite his anti-militarist approaches in his private field diary, the national Protestant-raised son of the pastor was not able to question the mentality of the Protestant parsonage of the imperial era lastingly enough:

"His spiritual foundation, the experience of the progressive de-churchization of society in the 1920s and the challenge of preserving Germanness in the colony (in a positive sense: preserving the roots, the language, the literature) drove him - contrary to his cousin Joachim, Jobst, Heinrich and Siegfried into the arms of the National Socialists. (...) The renewed national Protestant hopes for the religious renewal of society subsided relatively quickly. At the same time, he was likely to have been under the pressure of the regulations from the Reich, which was eagerly wooing the Germans abroad. The majority of Protestants expected especially from the Germans abroad the strengthening of the entire German national body, which appeared to be amputated of some limbs as a result of the Versailles Treaty . "

In addition to theological work, he left behind numerous historical works, in particular on the history of German immigration and the development of the German-speaking Protestant community in Brazil. In the Institute Martius-Staden , São Paulo is preserved his legacy.

Honors

• In 1954, he was awarded the Federal Cross of Merit for his work in the relief organization for the victims of the Second World War .

Works (selection)

• Festschrift for the 25th anniversary of the inauguration day of the German Evangelical Church in São Paulo , São Paulo 1933.
• Contributions to the Protestant church history in Brazil. The Huguenots in Guanabara Bay , In: Deutsch-Evangelische Blätter für Brasilien, São Leopoldo, 1938, issue 1/3.
• Villegaignon and the Huguenots in Guanabara Bay (special print in the Staden-Jahrbuch, vol. 5), São Paulo 1957, pp. 185–201.
• Anniversary publication on the return of the 50th founding day of the Central Brazilian Synod on 28/30. June 1912 , São Paulo 1962.
• Church history of Brazil in demolition . In: Peter Kawerau , Martin Anbich, Manfred Jacobs: Church history of North America / Brazil / South America's Spanish tongue (= KiG Vol. 4, Delivery S, pp. 23–34), Göttingen 1963.

literature

• Stefan Wolter: Pastor children in the world war. A hospital diary and a field diary by Tutti and Martin Greich 1914–1918 (= series Denk-MAL- Prora , vol. 6), Projekt -Verlag Halle 2014, ISBN 978-3-95486-455-3 .

Web links

Martius Staden Institute /

Individual evidence

1. Jump up ↑ The younger brothers were Otto and the pastor Karl Anbich . See the curriculum vitae of Paulestrich in his personal reports.
2. ↑ Stefan Wolter: Pastor children in the world war. Halle 2014, p. 52 ff.
3. ^ New Church Website / History
4. ↑ During the First World War, a young girl writes a diary in the General Anzeiger Erfurt.
5. ↑ Petrik Wittwika: "It is a treasure that provides a lot of information and approaches to research for the further processing of Zeitz regional history". On everyday life in a murderous war , Mitteldeutsche Zeitung, 30./31. August 2014
6. ↑ Johannes Gegich in the online project Fallen Memorials
7. ↑ Congregational Letter to the Erlöserkirche April / May 2012, No. 2, p. 9.
8. ↑ Stefan Wolter: Pastor Children in World War I , 2014, p. 60 ff .: Profen cousin Elisabeth married the pastor Rudolf Hintzsche. They were the parents-in-law of the pastor at the Berlin Zionskirche, Hans Simon, who with his wife gave space to the opposition environmental library in the basement of the rectory in the 1980s . The fourth cousin from Profen, Paul Gerhard Anbich, chose the military career and fell in 1942 as a captain in the Wehrmacht . The cousin Irmgard Anbich, who grew up in East Prussia and daughter of the lawyer Otto Anbich, married the later lieutenant general of the Wehrmacht Paul Gurran .
9. ↑ Stefan Wolter: Pastor Children in World War II Halle 2014, p. 32 ff.
10. ↑ The Kaiser Alexander Guard Grenadier Regiment No. 1 in the World War 1914–1918. On behalf of d. Alexander-Bund edited by Thilo von Bose (From Germany's Great Times; Vol. 45); Zeulenroda 1932.
11. ↑ Stefan Wolter: Pastor children in the world war. Hall 2014, p. 37.
12. ↑ Stefan Wolter: Pastor children in the world war. Halle 2014, p. 39 f. Hans-Jürgen Prien is also critical : Evangelical church development in Brazil. From the German Protestant immigrant communities to the Evangelical Church of the Lutheran Confession in Brazil (= The Lutheran Church, History and Design, Volume 10). Gütersloh 1989, p. 46 f.
13. ↑ Typical inscription of historical documents by Martin Anbich
14. ↑ OS 25 ANOS DA COMUNIDADE EVANGÉLICA DE SÃO PAULO PUBLICAÇÃO COMEMORATIVA DE M. BEGRICH (1933).