# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_December 1858_S384
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

384 Church-Contemporary Affairs.

Frankfurt. Our numbers increase yearly in this, a certainly most gratifying
proof of the blessed progress of our church." (Kirchenblatt.)

Rostock. For the regular professorship at the University of Rostock left
vacant by the departure of Prof. Baumgarten, the licentiate and private
lecturer in theology Bachmann, at the University of Berlin, has been
called. He has accepted the call. He is a son of the consistorial
councillor Bachmann of that same city, and is already most honorably known
through several literary works in the field of Old Testament theological
scholarship. His newest work bears the title: "The Festival Laws of the
Pentateuch, newly critically examined by Johannes Bachmann. Berlin,
published by W. Schulze. 1858." (Norddeutsche Correspondenz.)

Giessen. Baumgarten was to go to Giessen in Credner's place. That would
have been, had he not declined, a substantial improvement for Giessen; for
however much B. may read his own particular portion out of the Bible, he
does nonetheless acknowledge a divine revelation that does not spring from
his own reason or strength. But this call is suited, from another angle,
to shed light on our situation. Baumgarten, removed from office in
Mecklenburg, finds employment again in grand-ducal Hesse. This is not the
first case of this kind. Steinacker had to leave Hanover on account of his
unbelief and finds a position as pastor in ducal Saxony, where he sings
the praises of Liszt as though he were the Lord Christ himself. Only this
year Liegel has been called as court preacher to Coburg, although in
Hanover he had, for canonical reasons touching his conduct, been struck
from the list of candidates. Here regiment goes against regiment. This
counter-struggle is carried on still more grandly in the Duchy of Gotha,
where couples are married by the dozen whose union the Prussian supreme
consistorial council declares adulterous. A couple of cases stand for
many. All these church governments, which openly fight one another over
important facts and principles, send their delegates to Eisenach or
Dresden, in order, through common action, to establish and to present an
appearance of unity in the evangelical church of Germany. Is that not
drawing water with a sieve? Our age does not want to believe that all
this unity is mere appearance, and all this building is in vain, so long
as unity in doctrine and in the firm churchly foundations is lacking.
What comes out of all this labor and toil is poor work, rewarded with
ingratitude or even with mockery. (Neues Zeitblatt.)

Brömel against Baumgarten. The Freimund writes: In the Baumgarten
affair, the superintendent of the Duchy of Lauenburg, consistorial
assessor and pastor A. Brömel, has published, through Schlawitz in
Berlin (1858, large octavo, 34 pages, price 27 kreuzer), "a new
statement" under the heading: "Professor Dr. von Hofmann and the
Documents Concerning the Dismissal from Office of Professor of
Theology Dr. Baumgarten at Rostock," with the motto: "One man's word is
but half a word: hear them both out." In it he shows, calmly but forcefully,
that Dr. von Hofmann, being of like mind with Baumgarten, has conducted
the latter's defense in something less than the most candid manner, in
that he has, in citing Baumgarten's writing, in part broken off quotations
precisely where Baumgarten's error came openly to light, in part
deliberately omitted citing such passages as were plainly erroneous, and
in part exploited Baumgarten's expressions, favorably, against their
context. In doing so he also makes evident that Baumgarten harbors
enthusiastic, antinomian, Catholicizing ideas (the latter especially in
the doctrine of justification) and has displayed a bitter contempt for the
confessional writings. But it is also made evident through this work that
all these errors already occur in Dr. Baumgarten's "Zechariah," which he
wrote as early as 1854—55. Nor is the procedure observed against
Baumgarten in individual instances placed in any different light by this
work, since that lay entirely outside its purpose. In any case, though, it
is worth one's while to hear "this other word" as well.

* * *