Showing papers in "Church History in 1970"
TL;DR: Las Casas' fight to preserve the freedom of the Indians has gained for him not only devoted admirers, but also angry detractors as mentioned in this paper, and he labored for fifty years before death finally halted the steady flow of polemics from his pen.
Abstract: As a defender of the Indians and an opponent of the methods used by the Spanish conquistadors, Bartolome de Las Casas was as controversial a figure in the sixteenth century as he has been in the last four hundred years of historiography. Las Casas' fight to preserve the freedom of the Indians has gained for him not only devoted admirers, but also angry detractors.1 Las Casas was not the only Spaniard who defended the Indians, but his efforts are the best known. He labored for fifty years before death finally halted the steady flow of polemics from his pen. However, he was not just a sheltered academician like Vitoria, but he actively championed the rights of the Indians by working and living among them in the New World.
37 citations
TL;DR: With the endowment of a lectureship for the defense of the Christion faith, the distinguished English natural philosopher, Robert Boyle, gave the Anglican church a unique opportunity to counter the atheistic currents of thought which were posing a challenge to the faithful in the late seventeenth century as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: With the endowment of a lectureship for the defense of the Christion faith, the distinguished English natural philosopher, Robert Boyle, gave the Anglican church a unique opportunity to counter the atheistic currents of thought which were posing a challenge to the faithful in the late seventeenth century. Of the Boyle lectures preached between 1692 and 1713, the most important and popular ones incorporated the new natural philosophy of the age—including some of the recently published ideas of Newton—in an apologetic which was remarkable for its flexibility and its concern with contemporary theological issues. Within the institutional framework which Boyle's generosity had provided, certain of the Anglican clergy devoted themselves anew to the age-old exercise of utilizing the discoveries of science in the service of their faith. It was particularly appropriate that they do so since many of the challenges were based implicitly or explicitly on a materialistic and mechanistic science.
16 citations
TL;DR: In the era between the Civil War and the Depression, the mythical character called the American Mind was troubled as discussed by the authors, which was the product of latent guilt feelings and suggested for therapy that he read himself to sleep with recent studies of the oppressive effects of Puritanism on young national minds.
Abstract: In the era between the Civil War and the Depression the mythical character called the “American Mind” was troubled. All was well during the day when prosperity and success faced him at every turn, but at night he would sometimes dream of his childhood and awake feeling strangely uneasy. His analyst explained that this tension was the product of latent guilt feelings and suggested for therapy that he read himself to sleep with recent studies of the oppressive effects of Puritanism on young national minds. Turning to these works, the “American Mind” found that the analyst had been quite right. The source of the guilt feelings, he discovered, was an irrational phase of his development called the Reformation. This phase had been dominant when he lived in New England (he since had moved to the Midwest), but he was assured that the latest scholarship had discovered its influence to be harsh, grotesque, superstitious, narrowminded, illiberal, and worst of all intolerant.1 The problem was, one expert informed him, that this era “was unleavened by the spirit of the Renaissance.” Another observed that the Reformation attitudes were a “subtle poison” flowing thorugh the veins of the entire social organism. Still another implied that the “splendor of the Renaissance” had been delayed three hundred years by Reformation intolerance. Convinced that the open-mindedness of the Renaissance was healthier than the irrational bigotry of the Reformation, the “American Mind” of this era began to feel easier about his past. He resolved to tolerate everyone, except of course his more conservative enemies whom he damned as “Puritan.”
14 citations
TL;DR: The image of the shell of a gourd with loose seeds rattling within is a good one to convey the dissociation between the purposes of the society and the real beliefs of individuals as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: “Only the shell of orthodoxy was left.” Such was the considered judgment of Henry Adams on the condition of the inherited socioreligious order of New England by the year 1800.1 The image of the shell of a gourd with loose seeds rattling within is a good one to convey the dissociation between the purposes of the society and the real beliefs of individuals that had come to pass by the end of the eighteenth century. And it presents a notable contrast to the close congruence of individual belief and the social aims of the first generation of New England Puritans.
12 citations
TL;DR: The relationship between the Renaissance and the Reformation is a major theme of sixteenth-century historical studies as mentioned in this paper and the discussion of the influence of these two movements upon one another has centered on two facets of their relationship: first, the influence the Renaissance in creating an intellectual atmosphere which fostered certain Reformation movements such as a revival of biblical studies, the rejection of scholasticism, and the undermining of the ecclesiastical authority of the Roman church; and secondly, the reformation's rejection of Renaissance humanism because of its optimistic view of human nature.
Abstract: The relationship between the Renaissance and the Reformation is a major theme of sixteenth-century historical studies. Generally, the discussion of the influence of these two movements upon one another has centered on two facets of their relationship: first, the influence of the Renaissance in creating an intellectual atmosphere which fostered certain Reformation movements such as a revival of biblical studies, the rejection of scholasticism, and the undermining of the ecclesiastical authority of the Roman church; and secondly, the Reformation's rejection of Renaissance humanism because of its optimistic view of human nature. This latter relationship was exemplified in the debate between Martin Luther and Erasmus of Rotterdam, the undisputed leaders of the respective movements during the early decades of the sixteenth century. While the question of the Reformation's dependence upon Renaissance intellectual movements is usually conceded (after all Luther did use Erasmus' edition of the Greek New Testament as the basis for his German translation), there has been little evaluation of the corresponding influence of the Reformation on Renaissance humanism.
10 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors take the suggestion made by James Gustafson in his Treasure in Earthern Vessels, that no one subjected the Christian movement to a social analysis or took a Gallup poll of popular opinions, but there is some evidence from which to gain an impression of how Christianity appeared to outsiders.
Abstract: How did Christianity appear to men and women of the GrecoRoman world when it first began to emerge into public view? What ideas and conceptions were present within Roman “social thought” to identify and define a new phenomenon such as Christianity? What did men “see” when they looked at the Christians? In antiquity no one subjected the Christian movement to a social analysis or took a Gallup poll of popular opinions, but there is some evidence from which to gain an impression of how Christianity appeared to outsiders. As a methodological guideline I take the suggestion made by James Gustafson in his Treasure in Earthern Vessels.
10 citations
9 citations
TL;DR: In this article, Tertullian's attitude to military service is examined for a more accurate understanding of his own changing views on the empire and the duties of citizenship, and they are also important evidence for marking a crucial stage in the pre-Constantinian evolution of the relations of church and state.
Abstract: The aim of this paper is to throw some light on Tertullian's attitude to military service. His statements on this subject are highly useful for a more accurate understanding of his own changing views on the empire and the duties of citizenship. They are also important evidence for marking a crucial stage in the pre-Constantinian evolution of the relations of church and state. It will be seen that the whole question of Christians serving in the Roman army became relevant only in the late second century; Tertullian is one of the earliest literary witnesses for this momentous development. Therefore, on both counts, the texts deserve close scrutiny.
8 citations
TL;DR: In 1549, at the beginning of the third session of King Edward VI's first parliament, legislation was introduced intending to facilitate the reformation of the ecclesiastical laws of England as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: In November, 1549, at the beginning of the third session of King Edward VI's first parliament, legislation was introduced intending to facilitate the reformation of the ecclesiastical laws of England. In the House of Lords, Archbishop Thomas Cranmer and others submitted a bill “touching Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction” which would have given the bishops and their ordinaries the power to excommunicate and to imprison those who were in need of discipline in order to help tidy up what was regarded then to be an immoral and disorderly nation. This bill passed the House of Lords and was sent down to the House of Commons for consideration.
8 citations
TL;DR: The most important interpretations of the Pietism of the last century have been studied in this paper, where the authors consider only the most important interpretation of Pietism from the point of view of history.
Abstract: Time and again theologians of various schools have tried to place Pietism into a framework of theological and intellectual history. It is here impossible to pay tribute to every interpretation; this study will consider only the most important interpretations of the last century. 1
7 citations
TL;DR: The flowering of foreign missions in nineteenth-century America owed so much to evangelical Protestantism in Europe, that historians looking for uniquely American features in missionary enterprises have had very little to go on Historians who have attempted to identify the uniqueness of American missions have generally seized upon the links between the missionary spirit and ideas of manifest destiny as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: The flowering of foreign missions in nineteenth-century America owed so much to evangelical Protestantism in Europe, that historians looking for uniquely American features in missionary enterprises have had very little to go on Historians who have attempted to identify the uniqueness of American missions have generally seized upon the links between the missionary spirit and ideas of manifest destiny Ralph Gabriel taught a generation of historians to see American missions as one aspect of a “mission of America” with ramifications that went far beyond preaching to the heathen Perry Miller traced the roots of the mission of America to the Plymouth Colony itself and rewrote the history of American development in terms of an “perrand into the wilderness” Nineteenth-century foreign missions were for Miller the most typical expression of national self-consciousness
TL;DR: The National Council of Churches did not "represent" its member churches as discussed by the authors, but instead reported an existing concensus within its total constituency, but to provide guidance in examining the issues in the context of Christian faith and ethics.
Abstract: This is an amazing book because the author is an amazing man. For forty and more years, main-line American Protestantism kept Samuel McCrae Cavert at the center of its cooperative enterprise at the national level. It is out of this experience that the author writes, with a style as fresh as morning and springtime, and yet with objectivity and scholarly discipline. His chapters encompass enormous detail which can be at hand, not by virtue of memory, but by virtue of well kept records. The author keeps himself out of the account, wastes no time arguing any case, nor indulging in any sentimental reminiscense. Nonetheless, his evaluations are clear, and forcefully put. It is obvious why Cavert was kept where he was, at the center, for it is obvious that the churches always knew where he stood, and he was no mere mirror of their least common denominator. On pages 263 and following he deals with the argument that in many of its pronouncements the National Council of Churches did not \"represent\" its member churches. While asserting that statements of the council have represented the collective judgments of responsible denominational leaders, Cavert asserts that the council does not presume to speak for the churches in the sense of reporting an existing concensus within its total constituency, but to speak to the churches for the sake of affording guidance in examining the issues in the context of Christian faith and ethics. Despite its objectivity this is a book that only Cavert could have written, and therefore tells as much about the author as it does about the movement to which he gave leadership. There is accurate accounting of the forces, both constructive and negative that were operative during the period covered—and that makes it all the more clear how sharp a dividing line in the experience of the churches have been the twelve months since the publication of this book, and the King and Kennedy assassinations. There is here no hint of the rise of the revolutionary mood which was in existence by the end of 1968, nor of the rise of Black Power and the sharpening of the issues of racism that characterized the winter of 1969. Yet it must be said that this account is evidence that the churches were, prior to the Spring of 1968, thoroughly involved in the social issues of the time. There is a sudden new challenge to the direction the ecumenical movement took in America from 1900 to 1968, but this book does establish the standard account of that movement in those years.
TL;DR: In the early nineteenth century, there was no longer "any such thing as a foreign country" for the affluent nineteenth century Englishman, Europe remained for all practical purposes the limit of the horizon.
Abstract: The Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars took the English into Europe in unprecedented numbers, and, once there, they stayed. Commerce and industry followed inevitably in the wake of the armies; colonies of Englishmen sprang up in places not previously centres of international trade; English industrialists promoted factories and railways, operated and maintained by English workmen. The new industrial aristocracy chose to spend its vacations in Europe, usually at the fashionable watering places, and some were sent by their physicians into more or less permanent European exile. Not without reason did the Christian Remembrancer ask rhetorically, in 1845, if there was yet a square yard of ground in all the five continents which the restless curiosity of the English traveller had not raked over. Yet, if psychologically, there was no longer “any such thing as a foreign country” for the affluent nineteenth century Englishman, Europe remained for all practical purposes the limit of the horizon: and it was within this ambit that the transformation was most substantial. Sporting members of parliament had their château in Provence or their schloss in Hungary where their forebears had been content with a shooting-box on the Yorkshire moors, and undergraduates went off fly-fishing during the long vacation to Norway rather than to Wales. Altogether, the knowledgeable Anglo-German, George Biber put the English population on the continent in 1845 at between 200,000 and 300,000. 1 There was no doubt about it; whatever government policy was to be, England's psychological isolation from Europe was at an end.
TL;DR: Langford as discussed by the authors argued that the years 1900-1920 in English theology are better understood as a time of exploration than fulfillment, an exploration of the relation between secular and sacred which had become ever more urgent since the Enlightenment.
Abstract: An indication of Langford's competence and confidence in handling his materials is seen in his challenge of several reigning dogmas of historical and theological interpretation of this period. For example, he argues persuasively that as early as 1910, rather than 1914 or 1918, most of the significant ruptures with the Victorian past had occurred, and World War I was really an interruption or perhaps an acceleration of this process rather than its cause or culmination. His section on idealistic psychology gives helpful insight into the treatment of the person of Christ by pre-War idealism and the new theology. But perhaps his most controversial judgment is his assertion that the Lux Mundi group sought to do justice to the element of transcendence as well as immanence in the godhead, though few would quarrel with his opinion that the emphasis upon immanence was due less to the negative reaction against deism than the positive appropriation of Spencer, Darwin, and Hegel. Langford concludes that the years 1900-1920 in English theology are better understood as a time of exploration than fulfillment, an exploration of the relation between secular and sacred which had become ever more urgent since the Enlightenment.
TL;DR: In the two decades from 1590 to 1610, there were three major events in the life of the Seven Provinces of the United Netherlands as mentioned in this paper : the outbreak of the so-called Arminian controversy over predestination and related issues, culminating in the polarizing of the Dutch Reformed Church into Remonstrant and Contra-remonstrant parties.
Abstract: In the two decades from 1590 to 1610, there were three major events in the life of the Seven Provinces of the United Netherlands. In theology there was the outbreak of the so-called Arminian controversy over predestination and related issues, culminating in the polarizing of the Dutch Reformed Church into Remonstrant and Contra-remonstrant parties. In economics there was the transition from late-medieval and intra-European trade patterns to the new global and colonial patterns of the Dutch East India Company. In politics there was the signing of a truce with Spain, with the unprecedented granting of independence to a new nation by a great power.
TL;DR: The prophet in the book of Ezekiel was asked, "0 mortal man, can these bones live?" And his reply was not an optimistic "they will live" but rather "0 Lord God, thou knowest".
Abstract: J WILLIAM FROST After having surveyed the barrenness of the valley in which were scattered skeletal remains, the prophet in the book of Ezekiel was asked, "0 mortal man, can these bones live?" And his reply was not an optimistic "they will live" but rather "0 Lord God, thou knowest" When the historian begins to discuss the common theological assumptions and issues which perplexed the seventeenth century, he does not know whether they can be put into a meaningful context and is uncertain that these "bones" can be made to live The recent historian
TL;DR: This paper reported that large numbers of Irish-Americans were dissatisfied with Catholic attitudes toward American conditions and might consequently sever their ties with the church, and that the American Catholic press showed particular concern that Patrick Ford, the influential and controversial editor of the New York Irish World, encouraged immigrants to question their traditional place in the church.
Abstract: During the late nineteenth century, Irish immigrants were not always sympathetic toward the Catholic Church. Observers indicated that large numbers of Irish-Americans were dissatisfied with Catholic attitudes toward American conditions and might consequently sever their ties with the church. At times, priests, members of the hierarchy, and the American Catholic press showed particular concern that Patrick Ford, the influential and controversial editor of the New York Irish World, encouraged immigrants to question their traditional place in the church. In the late 1870s, Ford's opinions of American socio-economic and political affairs directly challenged those of Catholic spokesmen.
TL;DR: In this article, the development of political organization, social structures, and economic relationships seem to be outside the author's concerns, even in the political-religious-cultural constellation which she has taken for her own, there are limitations.
Abstract: areas in the tenth century. At least in some of these cases, civilization was at a much higher level than it was in the Loire-Elbe-Rome triangle where the author concentrates her attention. In addition, the development of political organization, social structures, and economic relationships seem to be outside her concerns. Even in the political-religious-cultural constellation which she has taken for her own, there are limitations. The missionary activities of the Christian church {e.g., Olaf Trygvasson and St. Vladimir) are often passed over in silence, as are the wonderful learning and literature of Islam, even in Spain; the life of European Jewry; the Baltic trade; and the England of Alfred the Great (d. 901), Edward the Elder, Edgar, Ethelred the Unready (d. 1016)—a most notable series of kings—and St. Dunstan. Even many developments in France do not tempt her.
TL;DR: In this article, the Holy See's posture of neutrality in the Croatian War of Independence is discussed. But the authors focus on the relations with Ante Pavelic and his Croat government and their reactions to the efforts of both of the warring camps to enlist the Vatican on their side.
Abstract: officials in the Holy See's Secretariat of State like Domenico Tardini, Luigi Maglione, and Giovanni Battista Montini (the present Pope Paul VI) , correspondence with papal nuncios, ambassadors, and various heads of state. They provide interesting details on such matters as the policies of the Vatican radio, relations with Ante Pavelic and his Croat government and the Holy See's reactions to the efforts of both of the warring camps to enlist the Vatican on their side. We see again how painstakingly the pope labored at maintaining the Holy See's posture of neutrality, probably the only expedient course of action in a conflict that pitted millions of Catholics against each other in a total war characterized by great ideological fervor.
TL;DR: Cusanus' early career as a canon lawyer in the service of the archdiocese of Trier is described in this paper, where it is argued that disappointment and failure in the field of law led Cusanus to take up theology as his career.
Abstract: Gregor Heimburg, the bitter critic of the papacy and of Nicholas of Cusa, is said to have taunted Cusanus, saying that because Cusanus was defeated in a lawsuit in Mainz, he turned from the practice of law to theology.1 Heimburg, a utriusque iuris doctor who rendered his legal services to both secular and ecclesiastical princes, was certainly versed in the legal literature of his time. But, as we shall see below, history does not seem to bear out his insinuation that disappointment and failure in the field of law led Cusanus to take up theology as his career. It is probably of little importance to ask whether Cusanus would have continued to work as a lawyer had he won the case in Mainz. We must note, however, that Cusanus is so well known as a theologian, cardinal, philosopher, and even as a scientist that we are apt to forget his early career as a canon lawyer in the service of the archdiocese of Trier. It is only recently that due attention began to be paid to the legal activities of Cusanus.2 The purpose of this paper is to throw light not only on his education and activities as a canon lawyer, but also on the role which he played in the disputed episcopal election of 1430 in the archdiocese of Trier.
TL;DR: Gibbon's footnotes in the Decline and Fall are a candid and reliable index of the materials used in its composition, and the reader of Gibbon is most forcefully struck by those mordant remarks which annihilate the work and occasionally the character of some obscure pedant as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: DAVID P. JORDAN Gibbon was scrupulous and generous in discharging his intellecttual and scholarly debts. The footnotes in the Decline and Fall (which comprise about a fourth of the work) are a candid and reliable index of the materials used in its composition. The reader of Gibbon is most forcefully struck by those mordant remarks which annihilate the work-and occasionally the character-of some obscure pedant. But the majority of Gibbon's notes are elegant apostrophes to the scholarship that supports the Decline and Fall. Of all the secondary authorities cited by Gibbon-there are nearly 3,000 such references1none is so frequently cited (about 250 times) and praised as Sebastien LeNain de Tillemont. He is "that learned Jansenist," "the indefatigable Tillemont," "the accurate M. de Tillemont"; and in one of those felicitous metaphors of which Gibbon was a master, Tillemont is "the patient and sure-footed mule of the Alps" who "may be trusted in the most slippery paths.2 Gibbon's debt to Tillemont is well known. The nature of that
TL;DR: Inflation and Witchcraft: The Case of Jean Bodin this article, a book about the history of the French Revolution, is described as a "short version of a volume soon to appear on eighteenth century British logic and rhetoric".
Abstract: (4) some radical reformers. Professor Monter, \"Inflation and Witchcraft: The Case of Jean Bodin,\" makes a possible case for Bodin's work outside of writing on history, the first of its kind I have seen recently. It is written in the vein of an historian as attorney for defense. The final essay is by W. S. Howell, who writes on John Locke and the new logic. He describes it a shortened version of a volume soon to appear on eighteenth century British logic and rhetoric. What was the \"old\" logic? It had said that man obtained valid knowledge about himself and his world by examining propositions previously established in connection with all of the subjects of human concern.\" After Locke some ancient as well as more recent certainties were no longer sure, such as innate ideas and selfevident propositions. An examination of the contents of this book showed that it is not a run of the mill in honorem volume. It is apparent that Harbison touched his students and colleagues so as to evoke their best in a project planned to honor him. A life and works of Harbison serves as preface, and the book ends with a very helpful index. The editors are to be congratulated.
TL;DR: Weiss as discussed by the authors investigated the interest of these Englishmen in the new learning during that interval and brought the narrative to 1485, a time which for him marks the beginning of genuine English humanism.
Abstract: Since H. L. Gray questioned the view that “Italian learning languished” between the death of Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, in 1447 and 1488 when John Colet, William Grocyn, and Thomas Linacre visited Italy, several scholars have attempted to show the nature of the new learning fostered in England by such intermediaries as Robert Flemmyng, William Selling, and John Free, among others. Roberto Weiss has investigated more thoroughly than anyone else the interest of these Englishmen in the new learning during that interval. His book brings the narrative to 1485, a time which for him marks the beginning of genuine English humanism.While there is no doubt that Colet, Grocyn, and Linacre were leaders of the avant garde of humanism or that Selling, Flemmying, and Free helped bridge the gap between 1447 and 1488, some less well-known men played an important part in the advance of the new learning.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors present the political and economic history of the era in an interesting and often masterly manner, which is useful to those who teach and study the Reformation, either as a part of church history or independently.
Abstract: tions of the age and tends to underemphasize the religious content of the period. For example, the authors seem to understand Luther but fail to convey the impression that he was the key figure involved in the key crisis of the century. Furthermore, Calvin appears to be misunderstood, or at least misinterpreted. Many Galvin authorities will disagree with the statement that: "The basic theme of all the editions of the Institutes is that man belongs to God, that it is man's duty to sacrifice himself to God and through such sacrifice to seek union with Him." (p. 145) Moreover, it is difficult to reconcile statements like: "Thus a clear conscience was the only sign of election, an 'inner certitude' that God's battles were being fought . . ." with "A clear conscience did not mean certainty. . . ." (both on p. 146) The Anabaptists are given short shrift and Minister is grossly oversimplified. And it is interesting that the names of Schwenkfeld, Franck, and Weigel are mentioned in connection with the early Anabaptist movement but nothing is said of Balthasar Hubmaier and Menno Simons, (p. 127) The authors present the political and economic history of the era in an interesting and often masterly manner. Also, anyone beginning a serious study of sixteenth-century history will find an early chapter on the sources extremely helpful. Moreover, the volume will be useful to those who teach and study the Reformation, either as a part of church history or independently, in that it provides the necessary perspective for an understanding of the political and economic climate in which the religious storms of the sixteenth century raged. And most important, this work captures the spirit of an age which in so many ways resembles our own: full of excitement, questioning of authority, turmoil, unrest and change.
TL;DR: In this paper, the editor has increased the usefulness of the journal by identifying the men and movements referred to and by providing, whenever possible, a summary of Robson's sermons from Quaker records.
Abstract: so sparing in his remarks on significant developments in Quaker life and thought. Writing primarily for his wife, Robson devoted more space to his itinerary and to flora and fauna than to the substance of the Quaker developments he witnessed and to the content of his own sermons and discussions. The editor has increased the usefulness of the journal by identifying the men and movements referred to and by providing, whenever possible, a summary of Robson's sermons from Quaker records.
TL;DR: The American Colonization Society was organized in 1816 for the purpose of colonizing the free Negroes of the United States as discussed by the authors, and after a series of difficulties, the society sent to Liberia Lott Cary who provided leadership and direction in this colony until his premature death in 1828.
Abstract: The American Colonization Society was organized in 1816 for the purpose of colonizing the free Negroes of the United States. After a series of difficulties, the society, in 1821, sent to Liberia Lott Cary who provided leadership and direction in this colony until his premature death in 1828. Advocates of African colonization were motivated by various and sometimes divergent ideals. One was the belief that colonization of the American free Negro in Africa would be a means of spreading Christianity and civilization to that continent. Although Cary was not always enthusiastic about the American Colonization Society and its policies, it never sent anyone to Liberia who more nearly fulfilled this ideal. By the time of his death the Liberian colony was firmly planted.
TL;DR: In the second volume of Wort und Stunde as discussed by the authors, a collection of essays on early medieval history is published, focusing on the first encounter of the Christian message with the Germanic world.
Abstract: Hermann Dorries, the emeritus professor of church history at the University of Gottingen, is better known in the English-speaking world for his studies of Constantine and of Basil the Great than for his essays on early medieval history. These essays, however, now collected in the second volume of Wort und Stunde, demonstrate how extensive over the years has been Domes' contribution to our knowledge of the Carolingian period. The essays touch on many subjects—the missionary activity of Boniface and Ansgar, the history of the German Arians, the theological stance of Gottschalk of Orbais, the impact of the division of the Carolingian kingdom on the later investiture controversy, the reform of the abbey of Bursfelde in the later middle ages—though in this diversity certain themes recur. Dorries is interested in the first encounter of the Christian message with the Germanic world. The Germans, like the Romans before them, came to the Christian message with their own religious presuppositions and forms of communal life. The adoption of the Christian faith by the Germanic peoples resulted in a Germanisation of that faith, a process which Dorries views in both its positive and its negative aspects. Neither the Christian message nor the Germanic world remained untouched by their encounter with each other. In two essays, dating from the 1930s, Dorries attacks the Nazi glorification of the Germanic national churches and of the Germanisation of Christianity. At the same time he resists the tendency to regard this process as the progressive corruption of the pure essence of Christianity. Gottschalk, whom some historians regard as a theologian caught in the grip of the old Germanic belief in fate, is convincingly demonstrated by Dorries to be an Augustinian who uses the categories of St. Augustine to break the hold of fatalism on his people. History is not in the hands of a blind fate, as the Germans had believed, but is guided by the wisdom of the sovereign God, who wills the redemption of man in Jesus Christ. Dorries has illuminated an extremely difficult period of church history, for which there are all too few reliable studies. These wise and learned essays deserve to be widely read by all historians of the medieval church.
TL;DR: The Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral as mentioned in this paper is a statement of Episcopalian, ecumenical principles that was conceived by William R. Huntington (1838-1909), acknowledged leader of the denomination's House of Deputies, liturgical scholar, and first presbyter of his generation.
Abstract: Over one hundred years have passed since the conception in 1865 of what became known as the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral. This statement of Episcopalian, ecumenical principles was conceived by William R. Huntington (1838–1909), acknowledged leader of the denomination's House of Deputies, liturgical scholar, and “first presbyter” of his generation. 1 Huntington was inspired by the national disunity of the Civil War years and by the reunion of the states in 1865 to seek some means of uniting the country's churches. At the same time he recognized that the Episcopal church stood in need reform if it were to serve in any way whatever as an agent of reconciliation. The result was the famous Quadrilateral. Its author designed his proposal both as a statement of “the true Anglican position” and as a basis for church unity, soon to be expressed, it was hoped, in a comprehensive, national church for America.
TL;DR: In the first chapter, "Luther als Sprachereignis" as discussed by the authors, Ebeling makes the puzzling assertion that the relatively late appearance of Luther's law-gosoel terminology does not signify a change in the substance of his teaching.
Abstract: ideas ? Confusing and a little disappointing is the first chapter, \"Luther als Sprachereignis\" (translated \"Luther's Linguistic Innovation\"), since that key designation is not explained early enough. It is partly the fault of the translator, who, rather than retaining the German Spr acker eignis or rendering it literally, chose to interpret it in a way neither warranted by what Ebeling mainly means by the word, nor very helpful as a guide to Ebeling's particular insight along these lines. Among other things, he uses the word to indicate that Luther's linguistic production itself constitutes a St>racher eignis—a speech event—of supreme import in western cultural and religious history; that the essence of \"the Reformation\" (from a normative theological if not an historical point of view) is the word, not a reforming program; that the relationship between God and man is definitively a Sprachereignis; that speech is what gives events—even the Christ event—not onlv their proper interpretation but their life-giving power. Despite this concentration on language, Ebeling on p. 110 makes the puzzling assertion that the relatively late appearance of Luther's law-gosoel terminology \"does not signify a change in the substance of his teaching.\" But if the word —the words—carry the substance, how can such a striking and central linguistic innovation as Luther's \"law and gospel\" (instead of \"letter and snirit\") be brushed aside so easily? Does that not obscure the speech-character of the Reformation as portrayed here?