# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_Mai 1864_S157
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Church-Contemporary Affairs. 157

to be brought forward, which in essence amounted to blessing us with a
presbyterial and synodal constitution. The second chamber of the estates,
composed of the most varied elements, agreed to this motion by an
overwhelming majority of votes, and we have witnessed the unheard-of
spectacle that Catholics and Mennonites, in league with a number of members
of the evangelical state church more or less estranged from it, have made
the innermost affairs of our church the subject of their deliberations. Such
a highly uncalled-for and in every respect improper interference of a
political body in the affairs of the church could naturally not be accepted
without a decided testimony on the part of the clergy. Such a testimony has
been given in a "Legal Protest," first by 114 clergymen, to whom 25 more
later attached themselves.*) The Legal Protest has caused no small stir,
particularly also on account of the relatively very large number of its
signatories. This was not what people in Hesse had expected. The democratic
newspapers, and unfortunately along with them the so-called "Evangelische
Blätter," the organ of our Union party, raised their voice and did
everything to discredit the signers of the Legal Protest; and when, on top
of that, the first chamber of the estates, in deliberating on the second
chamber's resolution, in a correct appraisal of the matter declared itself,
by all votes against 3, incompetent with respect to such church questions,
the storm only grew stronger. In the face of the hated party of the
Lutherans, all other differences were forgotten; on that day Herod and
Pilate became friends, and, with a unanimity hardly to be expected, all
opponents of the Lutheran Church joined together for common action. The
common assault was organized from wholly unionistic Rhine-Hesse. A petition
to His Royal Highness the Grand Duke, signed by almost all the Rhine-Hessian
pastors, opened the campaign. This petition was then eagerly circulated by
men of confidence in the two other provinces and presented for signature to
all pastors who had not signed the Legal Protest. It did indeed meet with
great response, so that up to the present a total of 300 pastors and
candidates for the pastoral office have committed themselves by signature
to this document. It makes a truly comical impression when the signers of
this petition are pleased to say of themselves that they do not (as we
Lutherans, namely, do) place themselves above and beside, but within their
congregations, and go and stand with them. It would be superfluous labor to
discuss the remaining content of the petition here. It is interesting to
see how, on this question of church polity, the parties divide among us in
Hesse. One may say that the great majority of the signers of the petition
still live, more or less, within the old Hessian rationalism. The recent
movements have brought this party, too soon pronounced dead, back into the
light. Never before have the two camps stood opposed to one another so
definitely and sharply delimited among us. We count, in all, about 500
evangelical clerical positions in the country. The petition for a
presbyterial and synodal constitution bears 300 signatures, the Legal
Protest 139, or, respectively, 127. There thus remains a small residue of
about 60–70 pastors who have taken neither side. To these belongs the
majority of those who hold the reins of church government. The struggle is
thus shaping up extremely favorably for the church party; we stand at 2 to
3, or, to reckon quite humbly, one to three — a most striking ratio when
one considers how few pastors holding to the church's faith could be found
in Hesse barely 20 years ago. The reviewer well remembers what a stir it
caused when, in the year 1816, at the Sandhof conference near Frankfurt,
eight — I say eight — participants from Hesse were present, six clergymen
and two laymen. And now a testimony such as the foregoing finds 139
signatures! Truly, the Lord has done great things for us. This stands out
all the more clearly when one considers with what kind of teachers our
university and our preachers' seminary were and are staffed, and how much
trouble has been taken again and again to suppress every churchly movement.
— The proportion between the parties, however, appears even more favorable
still when one looks at the 300 signatures of the

*) Of these 139, incidentally, 12 have declared themselves in agreement
only with the formal part, so that the number of actual signatories comes
to 127.