RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Lutherans
English denominations of another faith. The national and linguistic feeling was stronger with the Germans than their ecclesiastical and Lutheran consciousness. They felt themselves nearer to the Reformed Germans than to the English-speaking Lutherans, and the venerable Charles Frederick Schaeffer (q.v.) of New York voiced the general sentiment when he said, in a letter addressed to the Pennsylvania Synod in 1819, that " as the Lutherans and Reformed in Germany had been brought together in one united church, so the true Germans in America should, in this respect, follow the example of the Germans in Germany."
4. The General Synod: At this critical period in the history of the Lutheran Church in America the first steps were taken toward the formation of a Lutheran General Synod, in order to stop the threatening disintegration, to unite more firmly
the scattered members of the Lutheran
1. Organ- Church on this continent, and to secure
ization and for her a recognized position. The
Purpose- mother synod of Penasylvania took
the initiative at itsconvention in Harrisburg, 1818. An organization was effected in Hagerstown, Pa., in 1820, and in the following year the first regular convention was held in Frederick, Md., the Synods of Pennsylvania, North Carolina, / and Maryland-Virginia being represented. New York sent no delegates until 1837. Ohio and Tennessee stood aloof. Pennsylvania withdrew again in 1823, yielding to the unreasonable anxiety of some of its country congregations who feared the danger of hierarchical oppression on the part of the general body. Thus, for eight years the General Synod consisted of the small synods of North Carolina, Maryland-Virginia, and West Pennsylvania. The Hartwick Synod, in the State of New York, entered in 1831, the synod of South Carolina in 1835; New York in 1837 At all times the General Synod represented only a minority of Lutherans in America. For a considerable period the mother synod of Pennsylvania alone outnumbered the general body. The General Synod undoubtedly was a courageous and determined attempt to perpetuate the Lutheran Church and to give her a standing and recognition in America, such as she had not enjoyed before. It succeeded"^, in organizing the educational and missionary work of the church. The establishment of the theological seminary in Gettysburg, the sending of a delegation to Germany to rouse the sympathies of the fatherland and to collect contributions for the Lutheran Church in America, the formation of the Parental Educational Society, the Central Missionary Society, and the Foreign Missionary Society were measures of the highest importance, looking to the vital interests of the Lutheran Church in her new western home. There was, from the beginning, an element that sought to remain in contact with the faith of the fathers and the historical Lutheran Church and manifested a certain consciousness and appreciation of the peculiar gifts and responsibilities of the Lutheran Church and an endeavor to assert and preserve her individual character. But then there was, on the other side, a broad and powerful current of unionism and in-
differentism which declared, in an official communication to the Evangelical Church in Germany (1845): " In most of our church principles we stand on common ground with the Union Church of Germany. The distinctive doctrines which separate the Lutheran and the Reformed Churches we do not consider essential. The tendency of the socalled old Lutheran party seems to us to be behind the time. Luther's peculiar views concerning the presence of the Lord's body in the communion have long been abandoned by the majority of our ministers." While in the Pennsylvania Synod, during the thirty years of its separation from the General Synod, a more conservative and churchly spirit had gradually gained the ascendency, it nevertheless maintained friendly relations with the General Synod. On several occasions approaches were made by prominent men of the General Synod toward the restoration of the union. The Pennsylvania Liturgy and Hymn-Book were adopted by the General Synod. And the Pennsylvania Synod endowed a professorship in Pennsylvania College, Gettysburg, belonging to the General Synod. Thus the way was prepared for the formal return of the mother synod to the General Synod, which took place in Tg53rr- The step was taken in the hope of strengthening the conservative element in the General Synod and with the reservation, that " should at any time the General Synod violate its constitution and require of our synod, or of any synod, as a condition of admission to or continuation of membership, assent to anything conflicting with the old and long-established faith of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, then our delegates are hereby required to protest against such action, to withdraw from its sessions, and to report to this body." In order to define more clearly the position of American Lutheranism, which was claimed to be the position of the General Synod in its majority, Samuel Simon Schmucker published in 1855 the Lutheran Manual, an American recension of the
Augsburg Confession, the " Definite
2. Dissen- Platform," in which the seven articles
tient Move- on abuses are entirely omitted, and of
ments. the twenty-one doctrinal articles twelve
are more or less altered, particularly those treating of the sacraments. The effect of this publication was a disappointment to the author and his party. It opened the eyes even of the indifferent and undecided ones and caused them to reflect. On all sides strong protests arose against this attack on the venerable Augustana. Only a few Western synods adopted the " Definite Platform." While, even then, an 'open rupture was for the time avoided, the " Definite Platform " certainly hastened the crisis in the General Synod. During the Civil War the Southern churches had withdrawn and established the General Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the Confederate States of America (1863). The second, far more important rupture dates from the convention of the General Synod in York, Pa., 1864. The Franckean Synod, New York State, applied for admission into the General Synod. It had never formally adopted the Augsburg Confession, and had been declared Sabellian and Pelagian by the
Lutherans