# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_Mai 1859_S138
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

138 The Distress of the Evangelical Church in the Grand Duchy of Hesse.

as spoken by Christ Himself, declared superstition, while it is nevertheless asserted, in incomprehensible ignorance: "We believe in the God whom Christ teaches us to know." Now a second pamphlet by Jäger appeared: "Christ or Belial! or the So-Called Devil-Dispute in Darmstadt," an examination of the pamphlet by the German-Catholic Hieronymi, "The Revival of the Devil in Darmstadt," as well as of the ecclesiastical conditions in the Grand Duchy of Hesse (Frankfurt am Main, H. L. Brönner). The German-Catholic defender of the evangelical preacher is duly dealt with in it, as likewise the aforementioned address of unbelief which, signed by nearly 1,000 residents of Darmstadt, had been presented to Ewald and accepted by him as an "extraordinary honor before the world"; item, a declaration by Ewald to his addressers, in which he thanks them and, although he had received a reprimand from the authorities, promises to go on preaching as before. At the same time, however, this little pamphlet also sets forth, with commendable openness and precision, how it came about that such a thing could occur among us. The nameless misery, the wretched disorder of our Hessian church for decades, is here laid bare: that in ecclesiastical matters we are in the most shameful dependence on the state authorities; that although formally, for the most part, not united, we are nonetheless continually treated as though we were united; that our Upper Consistory bears "the stamp of a complete lack of confessional principle and character," with a president at its head who at one time co-signed an address to Uhlich, the preacher of the free congregations; that we have no established liturgy, no hymnal purged of rationalism and tastelessness, and — saddest of all — that we must continually use in our Lutheran schools the old Union Baden catechism, abolished even in its own homeland. In short, what for years had filled all faithful servants of the Church and the ever-increasing little flock of believers in our land with deep pain, and had already wrung from them many a cry of distress — of which perhaps even among you, in Saxony, a voice was now and then heard*) — was held up before us anew by a candidate from abroad, and in every quarter capable of judgment it was said: "Now we may no longer keep silent and calmly look on at the disgrace of our church. A public testimony must be raised aloud by those whom the LORD has set as watchmen." Jäger's pamphlet met with the most undivided approval and universal assent among the clergy of the land. Not a single voice has been raised against it by any theologian. Only from the aforementioned German-Catholic preacher did there appear an altogether insignificant piece of hackwork, which turned everything into ridicule and mocked the most important and most sacred truths with the most vulgar jokes. The believing clergy now discussed this matter now and then among themselves, and it was agreed to draw up a

*) Cf. Kirchen- und Schul-Blatt, 1857, No. 27, and 1858, No. 31.