THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
and obedience, and was empowered to make whatever changes and ordinances it deemed best without awaiting a decision of the synod. According to tradition, it never abused its privileges, and held a general council yearly whenever this was possible, while other synods also existed in individual districts. The presiding officer of the " Close Council " was called a " judge " (sudi), and this office was originally united with that of bishop in the person of Matthias, although he proved himself unequal to the position in the strife with the " small " party, so that Procopius was appointed sudi, Matthias retaining only the episcopal power of ordination. Authorized by the "Close Council,"
he associated Thomas and Elias,
3. Later whom he had already ordained priests,
Org-aniza- and after the death of Matthias and
tion. the resignation of Procopius in 1500,
the power of direction and ordination was again united, and given to four newly chosen Brethren, Thomas, Elias, Lukas, and Ambrose, the first two already possessing the episcopal ordination and the last two now receiving it. Each of them was placed over a diocese which he controlled and in which he ordained the priests. The priest next in age to these four was called the judge, and had special functions. Jafet, writing in 1605, sought to show that this organization existed from the first and that four bishops had ruled simultaneously since 1467, and this erroneous view was so widely disseminated by Wengierski (Regcnvolscius) that it is still found sporadically. At the head of each community stood the priest or director (sprdvee), who lived in the " house of the Brethren " and supported himself as an artisan or farmer. He might possess property, although he was bound by certain restrictions, so that when, for example, he received a legacy, he was required to deposit it with the " Close Council," which deprived him of it in case of need or inability to discharge his office. While there was no insistence on the celibacy of the clergy, it was regarded as desirable, in view of the unsettled position of the community, and was the rule until the second half of the sixteenth century. With the priest lived his assistant or deacon, who aided him both in his daily toil and in teaching school, and especially in the instruction of the acolytes (young men in training for the priesthood), who resided in the "house of the Brethren." The deacon accompanied the priest in ail his pastoral journeys, and was permitted to preach, to baptize in case of need, and to aid in the Lord's Supper, although he could neither consecrate the elements nor pronounce the benediction at the close of the service of the community. A council of the community aided, and in part supervised, the priest in controlling the property of the congregation and in distributing alms. The income consisted, in addition to gifts and foundations, of two collections, taken at Christmas and St. John's Day. Three persons were deputed to oversee the giving of alms, while the council of the community was required to reconcile antagonistic members of the congregation with each other or with the priest, to control morals, and to maintain the discipline of the church. The bodies next in rank
were the " Close Council " and the synods. The council of the community found its counterpart in a committee of aged widows and spinsters appointed to supervise the morals and the conduct of the sisters. This organization, the genesis of which is known chiefly from the Dekrety, remained unchanged after Lukas. It was first described in full detail by Lasicius in the eighth book of his history of the Brethren, and was officially formulated by them at the General Synod of 2eravic in Moravia, held in 1616.
III. Development from 1528 to 1621 : The independent development of the Unitas Fratrum closed with the death of Lukas. The Lutheran party among the Brethren, headed by such men as Johann Horn (Roh), Michael Weisse, Johann Augusta, and Mach Sionsky, now became more prominent and assumed the leadership. After the brief administration of the insignificant Martin Skoda, Horn became judge in 1532, but was surpassed in importance by his colleague Johann Augusta, a man characterized by meager educa-
, T , tion, yet of great firmness, enerarv,
1. Johann , ' ,' ° , , , .' 8J,'
Augusta. a el°quence> and deeply impressed with a sense of the peculiar advantages of the community. He sought to associate the Brethren with the foreign Evangelicals, and found a favorable opportunity shortly after 1530, when the margrave George of Brandenburg requested Conrad of Krajek to instruct him in the doctrines of his sect. A confession was prepared, and Luther was induced to have it printed at Wittenberg with a eulogistic preface. At the same time, however, Augusta made overtures to the Strasburg theologians, and Matthias Cervenka, his envoy to Butzer, unexpectedly met Calvin. On the other hand, his relations with the Utraquistic Church of Bohemia were strained, especially during the administration of Mistopol. Another trait which characterizes the history of the Brethren after Lukas (1528-47) is the prominence of their nobility. The country estates were required to take part in the country diets just as the estates of the kingdom shared in the royal diets, and it thus became necessary for the estates of the Brethren to enter the former to defend the existence of their ecclesiastical union. In 1535, therefore, they gave King Ferdinand the creed of the Brethren, signed by all members of the nobility among them, twelve lords and thirty-five knights. Since ten of the twenty-six nobles tried by Ferdinand after the suppression of the so-called Bohemian revolt in 1547 were members of the Unity, he found a long-desired pretext to crush the community so far as possible. The decree of Vladislav was reenforced, certain estates which had been the centers of the brotherhood were confiscated by the king, and the former protectors of the Brethren were no longer able to evade the execution of the decree under the existing circumstances. The community was practically destroyed in Bohemia. Its seat of government was transferred to Moravia, but the majority of the Brethren were banished from the entire kingdom. Augusta himself was betrayed to Ferdinand, and regained his freedom only after repeated tortures and an imprisonment of sixteen years.