Stimuli et clavi

Stimuli et clavi ( Latin for “skewers and nails”) is the title of a collection of 95 theses that the Lutheran pastor Heinrich Hansen published in 1917. They are a counterfactor to Martin Luther's 95 theses , which he had published 400 years earlier, as well as the 95 theses by Claus Harms on the Reformation anniversary in 1817. Hansen's theses were one of the origins of the high church movement in German Protestantism .

content

The title of the stimuli refers to Koh 12.11  LUT . They formulate "the concern of a reformatory renewal of the Lutheran church".

The following of the 95 theses were particularly provocative:

2. Protestantism has no reason to celebrate anniversaries, but it does have reason to repent in sackcloth and ashes.
3. The Reformation movement, which began in 1517, gave impetus to many good things, but it has even become the cause of many a deterioration, or in other words: it cast out one devil, but let in seven worse ones.
4. The Reformation can justifiably be called a deformation because its well-intentioned endeavors have largely failed.
5. A reformation of the old church was necessary at the time, but the one that took place failed.
13. The signature of today's Protestantism is: mass apostasy and isolated religious groups and individuals; general unbelief and a remnant of believers; general death and individual sparks of life.
16. Individualism and subjectivism, which gave rise to the formation of innumerable sects, are to be seen as the fundamental flaw and main damage of Protestantism.

In the doctrine of the sacraments , Hansen defends the "Catholic" ex opere operato :

81. The sentence: the sacraments work by being carried out can be defended.
82. It is wrong to say that the faith of the recipient gives power to the sacraments; it is no different than saying that the hand that takes a gift that is offered creates that gift.

A special concern for Hansen was the Low German language in the service:

56. It is a departure from the basic principles of the Reformation when the Gospel is preached in a foreign language in many countries in Germany, namely in High German instead of Low German.

literature

• Heinrich Kröger : On the prehistory of Heinrich Hansen's 95 theses . In: Hochkirchliche Vereinigung Augsburgischen Confessing (ed.): Seventy Years of High Church Movement (1918–1988) , Bochum 1989, pp. 22–32; there p. 33–52 also the full text of the theses (Latin and German)
• Friedrich Wilhelm Bautz : Hansen, Heinrich. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 2, Bautz, Hamm 1990, ISBN 3-88309-032-8 , Sp. 518-519.

Web links

• Stimuli et clavi ; Text of Hansen's 95 theses
• Hansen, Heinrich (Christian Cyclopedia)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Kröger, p. 28
2. ↑ cf. Karl Buchheim : A Saxon Life Story: Memories 1889-1972 . Munich 1996, p. 114
3. ↑ according to Lk 11,24-26  LUT