# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1847 11 24_S61
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

had had [them] summoned.

...gathered from the most distant regions of farther Asia — a venerable assembly of men proven in the service of their Lord, some still bearing on their bodies the marks of the Lord Jesus, scars and mutilations which they had received in the persecutions. The heresy of Arius was examined, investigated according to Holy Scripture, found to be heretical and condemned, and a confession of faith was drawn up and adopted. It is founded upon the Apostles' Creed, except that the doctrine of the deity of Jesus Christ, in opposition to the Arian heresy, was brought out and expressed more definitely, as a comparison of the two creeds, particularly in the second article, shows. In the year 381, at the instance of the famous emperor Theodosius the Great, a second general council of the church was held at Constantinople, chiefly on account of the heretic Macedonius, who denied the deity of the Holy Spirit and declared him to be a mere gift and creature of God. At this council the Nicene Creed was repeated and unanimously adopted with some alterations and additions; so that the form in which we know the Nicene Creed is that which it received at Constantinople in 381.

The third is the Athanasian Creed, and it takes its name from the famous bishop of Alexandria, Athanasius, who in his time was a pillar of the church and a courageous defender of the Holy Trinity against the Arian heresy, for which he also endured many persecutions. Scholars are not agreed whether Athanasius himself, or another orthodox man, is the author of this creed. This uncertainty, however, does no harm to this glorious confession, whose authority rests not upon the person of Athanasius but upon its agreement with Holy Scripture; moreover it is undeniable that, even if not composed by Athanasius himself, it is nevertheless a summary of the faith of Athanasius. It treats of the two highest articles of faith: 1) the mystery of the Holy Trinity, 2) the person of Jesus Christ, his divine and human nature, and the states of his humiliation and exaltation. Dr. Luther says of this Athanasian Creed: it is composed in such a way that I do not know whether anything more important or more glorious has been written in the church of the New Testament since the time of the apostles.

So often as we now read these three chief creeds, we ought rightly to praise God, that He has preserved the knowledge of His name in the church against all the raging of Satan through all ages, and has likewise handed down to us these glorious confessions. But what we have already noted concerning the Apostles' Creed also holds true of the Athanasian Creed, namely, that it is not a complete summary of all the articles of faith necessary to salvation, and, taken alone, does not suffice for our time; for which reason the Lutheran church, building upon those three chief creeds, has had to expand its confession and to define it precisely against the errors that arose later, as has been done in the succeeding parts of the Book of Concord.

(To be continued.)

*
——

(Submitted.)
M. Hermann Joachim Hahn, a faithful servant of God and martyr of the Lutheran church.

Although the life, and especially the end, of this servant of Jesus Christ may not be wholly unknown to those readers of this paper who have Saxony as their fatherland, and who perhaps even come from the city within whose walls he proclaimed the Word of God now 121 years ago, yet he deserves, as a faithful witness of Jesus, to become known to other Christians as well, that his memory may remain blessed, and that his bones may continue to flourish among us as well.

M. Hermann Joachim Hahn was born on July 31, 1679, at Grabau in Mecklenburg; his father, Julius Ernst Hahn, who lived to a jubilee old age and outlived the grievous end of his son, was pastor and court preacher there, and his mother a daughter of the town master-builder Jäger of Lübeck. After preliminary instruction in his parents' house, his father sent him to the school of his birthplace, where he early showed considerable ability. In the twelfth year of his age he suffered the misfortune of falling into a stream flowing through the town of Grabau, was carried along in it for a time, but was finally pulled out by an old man and kept alive. It was particularly remarkable that this same man had once also saved Hahn's father from the same water, when he was the age his son now was. How wonderfully does God's providence rule over our lives!

Our Hahn's talents and the knowledge he had gathered enabled him, already in his seventeenth year, in the year 1696, to enter the University of Leipzig, where, however, his father — burdened by the hard times then prevailing — was able to support him for only one year, so that for the rest of his years of study he was obliged to support himself by giving lessons, tutoring, and copying sermons, yet all the while continuing his studies diligently.

During this time, once when he was traveling from Mecklenburg to Leipzig, he came into great danger of his life, when a wagon wheel passed over his head and injured him severely. "Had God permitted it," exclaims an old biographer of the blessed man at this point, "Satan would gladly have crushed and destroyed this good head, which afterward devised and accomplished so much good." It was also in Leipzig that God led the dear man, for six weeks together, through a severe and persistent spiritual trial, in which he doubted the truth of the divine Word and could believe nothing, until he finally overcame through the power of Christ. In this school of trial Hahn had learned that "faith is not the delusion which some take for faith," but the work of God. With humble thanks he therefore recognized, even in this cross, the good hand of God, which through this and other circumstances kept him from the sins of youth, into which his lively temperament and cheerful, joyous spirit might otherwise have easily led him. Through exercises in disputation and preachers' colloquies, he had meanwhile so prepared himself that after four years he became a Master, and later also a Baccalaureus (one who holds the next expectancy to the doctoral degree).

The learning, eloquence, and other fine gifts of the blessed man soon became known, and God so arranged it that two senators of Dresden heard him preach in Leipzig and took such pleasure in him that, at their instance, he was called to Dresden in 1706 to preach a trial sermon, which, with the help of divine grace, he delivered to such general satisfaction that he received from the council the call as deacon at the Church of the Holy Cross. In that same year he became early-morning preacher, and in 1708 Friday preacher. In 1724 Hahn rose to archdeacon and afternoon preacher. Already in 1706 he had married Dorothea Sophia, youngest daughter of Dr. Immanuel Horn, pastor at St. Thomas's Church in Leipzig, with whom he lived nineteen happy years and had five sons*) and five daughters, of whom, however, only six children survived him. A proof of his happy married life is a letter of consolation which, during his fatal illness in Lent 1726, he wrote to his life's companion, but entrusted to a trusted friend, who was to hand it to her after his death; this, however, did not come to pass, since God graciously spared his life at that time.

In his office he showed great faithfulness, untiring diligence and zeal. In particular he took care of the youth entrusted to him; he was very active for the schools of Dresden and most zealously carried out the church examinations. But the growth of the whole flock entrusted to him also lay very much upon his heart, for which reason he also diligently pursued the actual purpose of private confession as it remained in the Lutheran church, and sought to learn whether those who came to confession had knowledge of the necessary saving truths and of the foundation of faith; and when, after such examination, he still found here and there deficiency and ignorance — which were also very great and common in those days — he instructed such persons, if time permitted, at once in the confessional, or summoned them to his house, or even went to them in their dwellings, and so faithfully carried out the office of an evangelical teacher. He rightly divided the Word of God; he indeed inflicted wounds through the word of the Law —

*) One of these, J. E. Hahn, is the author of two well-known sermons: "The Divine Benefits of Grace" and "The Divine Acts of Grace." Descendants of this son were still living in Dresden in the year 1824, who held the memory of their blessed forefather in high honor.