# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_Mai 1863_S150
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

150 Dr. Tholuck on the Latest Current of Theology.

their children. — He who instructs you in worldly and divine things stands
to you in God's stead; for we praise God as ""the fount from which all
wisdom flows, which pours itself into pious souls."" So the teachers are
comprised within the name of father and mother; for fathers teach their
children. — He who keeps you in discipline and watches over you, so that
you do not ruin yourself through disorderly conduct, so that you give
account through your behavior to the laws, customs, and rights in land and
church, stands to you in God's stead; for we praise God as ""a wonderful
King, Ruler of us all."" So all who exercise a rule over others (be it a
magisterial or a domestic one) are comprised within the name of father and
mother; for fathers restrain their children.

So it was not at all doubtful to our fathers that obedience for God's sake
was also owed to the existing church government. Only the Pope overstepped
the bounds which God had set for his government, refused to have his
speaking, doing, and leaving undone tested against God's Word, and thus
would render no account to the church for his administration of office,
even where it held before him that he ruled contrary to God's Word. This
presumption he glossed over with the name of his divine right — that he
was the vicar of Christ on earth, that therefore whatever he spoke was
spoken down from heaven, and the church had to accept it as God's Word. In
this sense he made the congregation into an assembly of the obedient over
against himself and his clergy as those who command. And for that reason
our fathers rightly separated from his government.

Our church government, however, has hitherto remained within the bounds
assigned to it by the church. Not with the mouth only, but also in deed,
it confesses itself subject to the Word of God and the judgment of the
church. As often as a general synod has convened, it has each time given
that synod a complete account of its administration of office, and has
been condemned by none for false doctrine or unfaithfulness. So will I,
with God's help, honor the same, neither despising nor angering it, but
serving it, holding it dear and worthy, as proof of my faith and as owed
gratitude for the benefits allotted to me by God through it, and also as
an example to the brethren."

Dr. Tholuck on the Latest Current of Theology.

A local exchange paper communicates from the Neue Evangelische
Kirchenzeitung (in Berlin) the following remarkable declaration of Dr.
Tholuck's concerning the present state of theology in Germany:

There are indeed few, says Tholuck, who, in view of the mighty upheaval
that has taken place in recent years in the churchly and political