Wilhelm Sihler

Wilhelm Sihler , also William Sihler (born November 12, 1801 in Bernstadt ad Eigen , † October 27, 1885 in Fort Wayne , Indiana ) was a German Lutheran pastor in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

Life

Sihler studied Protestant theology at the University of Berlin from 1826 to 1829 , where he was influenced by Friedrich Schleiermacher . As a teacher in Breslau and Dresden , under the influence of Johann Gottfried Scheibel and Andreas Gottlob Rudelbach, he changed to neo-Lutheranism and decided against a pastor's office in Germany. From 1838 to 1843 he worked as a tutor in the Baltic States. In February 1843, when Friedrich Conrad Dietrich Wyneken , then pastor in Fort Wayne, published an “emergency call” that was distributed by Wilhelm Löhe in Germany, he made himself aware of the severe shortage of pastors among German Lutherans in the American Midwest. Sihler settled with ten other boys Send theologians there. In 1844 he was in the Evangelical Joint Synod of Ohio and Other States ordained and worked briefly as a pastor and teacher in Pomeroy (Ohio) until 1845 successor Wyneken at St. Paul's Lutheran Church in Fort Wayne was. From 1846 to 1861 he was also president of a seminary for the training of pastors for the German immigrant communities. After he and Carl Ferdinand Wilhelm Walther and others founded the "German Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Missouri, Ohio and other States" (later the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod ) in Chicago on April 26, 1847 , the seminary went to Concordia Theological Seminary .

In addition to his autobiography, Sihler mainly published volumes of sermons. He is referred to by some American Lutherans as "the father of Lutheranism in North America".

Sihler's marriage to Susanna Kern in 1846 resulted in nine children, including the classical philologist Ernest Gottlieb Sihler .

Fonts (selection)

• CV of W. Sihler: Described by himself on multiple request . Volume 1 and 2. St. Louis 1879/80.
• To What Intent Does God Afflict Us With Sickness? In: The Lutheran Witness , July 7, 1883; Volume 2, Number 4, pages 31–32 ( online )
• Conversations between two Lutherans about Methodism . 1863 (English: A Conversation Between Two Lutherans on Methodism ).

literature

• Lewis W. Spitz: Life in Two Worlds: Biography of William Sihler . St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1968.
• Lewis W. Spitz: Professor Wilhelm Sihler: Founding Father of Lutheranism in America and First President of Concordia Theological Seminary . In: Concordia Theological Quarterly 1999, pp. 83-96 ( PDF file) .