A History of the Moravian Church

by J. E. Hutton

And now the stream from Moravia increased in force and volume. Again and again, ten times in all, did the roving David journey to the Moravian dales; and again and again did the loud blast of the trombones in the square announce that yet another band of refugees had arrived. Full many a stirring and thrilling tale had the refugees to tell; how another David Nitschmann, imprisoned in a castle, found a rope at his window and escaped; how David Schneider and another David Nitschmann found their prison doors open; how David Hickel, who had been nearly starved in a dungeon, walked out between his guards in broad daylight, when their backs were turned; how Andrew Beier and David Fritsch had stumbled against their prison door and found that the bolt was loose; how Hans Nitschmann, concealed in a ditch, heard his pursuers, a foot off, say, "This is the place, here he must be," and yet was not discovered after all. No wonder these wanderers felt that angels had screened them on their way. For the sake of their faith they had been imprisoned, beaten, thrust into filthy dungeons. For the sake of their faith they had left behind their goods, their friends, their worldly prospects, had tramped the unknown mountain paths, had slept under hedges, had been attacked by robbers. And now, for the sake of this same faith, these men, though sons of well-to-do people, settled down to lives of manual toil in Herrnhut. And the numbers swelled; the houses rose; and Herrnhut assumed the shape of a hollow square.

At this point, however, a difficulty arose. As the rumour spread in the surrounding country that the Count had offered his estate as an asylum for persecuted Protestants all sorts of religious malcontents came to make Herrnhut their home. Some had a touch of Calvinism, and were fond of discussing free will and predestination; some were disciples of the sixteenth century Anabaptist mystic, Casper Schwenkfeld; some were vague evangelicals from Swabia; some were Lutheran Pietists from near at hand; and some, such as the "Five Churchmen," were descendants of the Brethren's Church, and wished to see her revived on German soil. The result was dissension in the camp. As the settlement grew larger things grew worse. As the settlers learned to know each other better they learned to love each other less. As poverty crept in at the door love flew out of the window. Instead of trying to help each other, men actually tried to cut each other out in business, just like the rest of the world. As the first flush of joy died away, men pointed out each other's motes, and sarcasm pushed charity from her throne; and, worse than all, there now appeared that demon of discord, theological dispute. The chief leader was a religious crank, named Krüger. He was, of course, no descendant of the Brethren's Church. He had quarrelled with a Lutheran minister at Ebersdorf, had been promptly excluded from the Holy Communion, and now came whimpering to Herrnhut, and lifted up his voice against the Lutheran Church. He did not possess the garment of righteousness, he decked himself out with sham excitement and rhetoric; and, as these are cheap ribbons and make a fine show, he soon gained a reputation as a saint. He announced that he had been commissioned by God with the special task of reforming Count Zinzendorf; described Rothe as the "False Prophet" and Zinzendorf as "The Beast"; denounced the whole Lutheran Church as a Babylon, and summoned all in Herrnhut to leave it; and altogether made such a show of piety and holy devotion to God that his freaks and crotchets and fancies and vagaries were welcomed by the best of men, and poisoned the purest blood. His success was marvellous. As the simple settlers listened to his rapt orations they became convinced that the Lutheran Church was no better than a den of thieves; and the greater number now refused to attend the Parish Church, and prepared to form a new sect. Christian David himself was led away. He walked about like a shadow; he was sure that Krüger had a special Divine revelation; he dug a private well for himself, and built himself a new house a few yards from the settlement, so that he might not be smirched by the pitch of Lutheran Christianity. Worse and ever worse waxed the confusion. More "horrible"[75] became the new notions. The eloquent Krüger went out of his mind; and was removed to the lunatic asylum at Berlin. But the evil that he had done lived after him. The whole city on the hill was now a nest of fanatics. It was time for the Count himself to interfere.

For the last five years, while Herrnhut was growing, the Count had almost ignored the refugees; and had quietly devoted his leisure time to his darling scheme of establishing a village "Church within the Church" at Berthelsdorf. He had still his official State duties to perform. He was still a King's Councillor at Dresden. He spent the winter months in the city and the summer at his country-seat; and as long as the settlers behaved themselves as loyal sons of the Lutheran Church he saw no reason to meddle in their affairs. He had, moreover, taken two wise precautions. He had first issued a public notice that no refugee should settle at Herrnhut unless compelled by persecution; and secondly, he had called a meeting of the refugees themselves, and persuaded them to promise that in all their gatherings they would remain loyal to the Augsburg Confession.

Meanwhile, in the village itself, he had pushed his scheme with vigour. He named his house Bethel; his estate was his parish; and his tenants were his congregation. He had never forgotten his boyish vow to do all in his power to extend the Kingdom of Christ; and now he formed another society like the old Order of the Mustard Seed. It was called the "League of the Four Brethren"; it consisted of Zinzendorf, Friedrich de Watteville, and Pastors Rothe and Schäfer; and its object was to proclaim to the world, by means of a league of men devoted to Christ, "that mystery and charm of the Incarnation which was not yet sufficiently recognized in the Church." He had several methods of work. As he wished to reach the young folk of noble rank, he had a school for noblemen's sons built on the Hutberg, and a school for noblemen's daughters down in the village; and the members of the League all signed an agreement to subscribe the needful funds for the undertaking. As he wished, further, to appeal to men in various parts of the country, he established a printing-office at Ebersdorf, and from that office sent books, pamphlets, letters, and cheap editions of the Bible in all directions. As he longed, thirdly, for personal contact with leading men in the Church, he instituted a system of journeys to Halle and other centres of learning and piety. But his best work was done in Berthelsdorf. His steward, Heitz, gave the rustics Bible lessons; Pastor Rothe preached awakening sermons in the parish church, and his preaching was, as the Count declared, "as though it rained flames from heaven"; and he himself, in the summer season, held daily singing meetings and prayer meetings in his own house. Hand in hand did he and Rothe work hard for the flock at Berthelsdorf. On a Sunday morning the pastor would preach a telling sermon in a crowded church; in the afternoon the squire would gather his tenants in his house and expound to them the morning's discourse. The whole village was stirred; the Church was enlarged; and the Count himself was so in earnest that if the slightest hitch occurred in a service he would burst into tears. While things in Herrnhut were growing worse things in Berthelsdorf were growing better; while stormy winds blew on the hill there was peace and fellowship down in the valley. How closely the Count and the pastor were linked may be seen from the following fact. The Count's family pew in the Church was a small gallery or raised box over the vestry; the box had a trap-door in the floor; the pastor, according to Lutheran custom, retired to the vestry at certain points in the service; and the Count, by opening the aforesaid door, could communicate his wishes to the pastor.

He had now to apply his principles to Herrnhut. As long as the settlers had behaved themselves well, and kept their promise to be loyal to the National Church, he had left them alone to follow their own devices; and even if they sang old Brethren's hymns at their meetings, he had no insuperable objection. But now the time had come to take stern measures. He had taken them in out of charity; he had invited them to the meetings in his house; and now they had turned the place into a nest of scheming dissenters. There was war in the camp. On the one hand, Christian David called Rothe a narrow-minded churchman. On the other hand, Rothe thundered from his pulpit against the "mad fanatics" on the hill. As Jew and Samaritan in days of old, so now were Berthelsdorf and Herrnhut.

At this critical point the Count intervened, and changed the duel into a duet {1727.}. He would have no makers of sects on his estate. With all their faults, he believed that the settlers were at bottom broad-minded people. Only clear away the rubbish and the gold would be found underneath.

"Although our dear Christian David," he said, "was calling me the Beast and Mr. Rothe the False Prophet, we could see his honest heart nevertheless, and knew we could lead him right. It is not a bad maxim," he added, "when honest men are going wrong to put them into office, and they will learn from experience what they will never learn from speculation."

He acted on that maxim now. He would teach the exiles to obey the law of the land, to bow to his authority as lord of the manor, and to live in Christian fellowship with each other. For this purpose, he summoned them all to a mass meeting in the Great House on the Hutberg {May 12th.}, lectured them for over three hours on the sin of schism, read out the "Manorial Injunctions and Prohibitions,"[76] which all inhabitants of Herrnhut must promise to obey, and then submitted a number of "Statutes" as the basis of a voluntary religious society. The effect was sudden and swift. At one bound the settlers changed from a group of quarrelling schismatics to an organized body of orderly Christian tenants; and forthwith the assembled settlers shook hands, and promised to obey the Injunctions and Prohibitions.

As soon as the Count had secured good law and order he obtained leave of absence from Dresden, took up his residence at Herrnhut, and proceeded to organize all who wished into a systematic Church within the Church. For this purpose he prepared another agreement {July 4th.}, entitled the "Brotherly Union and Compact," signed the agreement first himself, persuaded Christian David, Pastor Schäfer and another neighbouring clergyman to do the same, and then invited all the rest to follow suit. Again, the goodwill was practically universal. As the settlers had promised on May 12th to obey the Manorial Injunctions and Prohibitions, so now, of their own free will, they signed a promise to end their sectarian quarrels, to obey the "Statutes," and to live in fellowship with Christians of all beliefs and denominations. Thus had the Count accomplished a double purpose. As lord of the manor he had crushed the design to form a separate sect; and as Spener's disciple he had persuaded the descendants of the Bohemian Brethren to form another "Church within the Church."

Nor was this all. As the Brethren looked back in later years to those memorable days in Herrnhut, they came to regard the summer months of 1727 as a holy, calm, sabbatic season, when one and all were quickened and stirred by the power of the Spirit Divine. "The whole place," said Zinzendorf himself, "represented a visible tabernacle of God among men." For the next four months the city on the hill was the home of ineffable joy; and the very men who had lately quarrelled with each other now formed little groups for prayer and praise. As the evening shadows lengthened across the square the whole settlement met to pray and praise, and talk with each other, like brothers and sisters of one home. The fancies and vagaries fled. The Count held meetings every day. The Church at Berthelsdorf was crowded out. The good David, now appointed Chief Elder, persuaded all to study the art of love Divine by going through the First Epistle of St. John. The very children were stirred and awakened. The whole movement was calm, strong, deep and abiding. Of vulgar excitement there was none; no noisy meetings, no extravagant babble, no religious tricks to work on the emotions. For mawkish, sentimental religion the Count had an honest contempt. "It is," he said, "as easy to create religious excitement as it is to stir up the sensual passions; and the former often leads to the latter." As the Brethren met in each other's homes, or on the Hutberg when the stars were shining, they listened, with reverence and holy awe, to the still voice of that Good Shepherd who was leading them gently, step by step, to the green pastures of peace.