# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_November 1855_S351
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

New Literature. 351

Where Do We Stand toward Pastor Löhe?

A Voice from the Missouri Synod in North America.

It affords us no small pleasure to announce a brochure of two full sheets, written under the above title by Pastor Röbbelen in Frankenmuth, in the State of Michigan, and published these very days, which we consider well worth reading in a high degree.

To be sure, this little work may at first seem to be of interest only to those to whom the relationship of Pastor Löhe to our synod is not entirely clear in every point, who in particular would like to know how it came about that this dear man, whom we always name only with the highest esteem, so suddenly withdrew his hand from the Franconian colonies in the State of Michigan and turned with his activity to a field of his own, to Iowa. This occurrence was the immediate occasion for this little work, and one finds the course of the matter briefly related in it, but then also the actual ground of this separation stated, as resting precisely in the divergent doctrine of Pastor Löhe. There shines forth from this writing a truly touching fusion of personal, heartfelt love for Pastor Löhe and a decided rejection of his views, which diverge from the Lutheran confession. One reads between the lines that the words were traced with the pen of a hot sorrow, with many a deep sigh, and we believe that Pastor Löhe's own heart could scarcely have received a more keenly felt, and at the same time more beneficial, blow of love from a faithful friend's hand. Certainly, to many of his former grateful students and friends, Pastor Röbbelen's words are as if written from their very souls, or rather, as it were, torn from the heart with the utmost pain.

Let no one suppose, however, that these are the only persons for whom the said little work has significance. It is, rather, of far more general interest. In our judgment it is a truly powerful and mighty word, a word in which the author displays a depth, a richness of feeling, a strength and elevation of spirit, a fullness of thought together with certainty and clarity in pure doctrine, such that we are indeed astonished to perceive such a gift in our midst, one that can be described by no other name than originality and native power. And it is our heartfelt wish only that this rare gift be drawn forth and set to work in an activity fully corresponding to it.

We do not deny that the said little work, particularly its first pages, is somewhat difficult to understand and requires some reflection. Yet it is not, as with many recent learned works, the ambiguous,