Early history of the Lutheran church in America

Front matter

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Chapter I. The Swedes

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Early Settlements in the New World — Enterprise of Gustavus Adolphus — Swedes on the Delaware — Gov. John Printz — Rev. John Campanius — Luther's Small Catechism — John Thelin — Benevolent zeal of the King of Sweden — Rev. Messrs. Biork and Rudman — The City of Philadelphia — William Penn — Church Erection — Wicaco— Rev. Charles Magnus Wrangel — Unity of Swedes and Germans — Conferences — Bryzelius 9

Chapter II. Spiritual Condition Of The Swedes

The Enterprise in erecting Churches — Zeal of Campanius — Of Messrs. Biork and Rudman — Wrangel — Revivals among the Swedes — Separation of Swedes from the Fellowship of Lutherans — Increase of Demand for English Preaching 42

Chapter III The Dutch

Commercial Objects — Lutherans worship in Private Dwellings — Persecution — Rev. John E. Goetwater — Rev. Justus Falk-

Language 61

S CONTENTS.

chapter iv. THE GERMANS

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Record of German Immigration — Benevolence of Queen Anne — New York — Schoharie — The Susquehanna — Arrival of Pastors — Lutherans in Philadelphia — Providence — New Hanover — Rev. Henry M. Muhlenberg — Arrives in Charleston — Salzburgers — Arrives in Philadelphia 70

Chapter V. Congregations Organized

Churches in Philadelphia and its Vicinity — Muhlenberg's Activity — Increased Demand for Pastors — Handschuh — Kurtz — Schaum — Lancaster 95

Chapter VI State Of German Churches

German Reformed — Lutheran Population — Church Discipline — Purity of Doctrine — Youthful Piety — Catechetical Instruction — Synod of Pennsylvania organized — Learning of the Clergy — Straitened Circumstances of many Germans — Redemptioners — Neulaender — Impostors — Germans Reserved — Too tenacious of the Mother-Tongue — Consequent Losses of the Church, &c. &c 115

EARLY HISTORY

Chapter I. The Swedes

It is proposed to furnish a short history of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. The field of observation thus opened is, in itself, so extensive and so full of materials, that the chief difficulty will be in making the history a short one.

After the agitations of Europe consequent upon the Reformation had begun to subside, various causes combined to arrest and fix upon the newlydiscovered Continent of the West the practical attention of the nations of the Old World. To some, it appeared as an admirable field for the exercise of a bold and adventurous spirit. Others appreciated it because it promised to reward the enterprise of commerce with the richest gains.

And yet another class longed for it, and sought it under the noble conviction that it would be an asylum for the oppressed, a refuge from civil and religious persecution, affording to their devout and believing hearts what their native land had denied them, — "freedom to worship God."

So a company of English adventurers effected the first permanent settlement upon this continent, in Virginia, in the year 1607. The Dutch, impelled by the spirit of mercantile enterprise, established a second colony along the Hudson in 1614; and the Puritans, supported through many trials by their faith in God, and enthusiastic for the advancement of his kingdom upon earth, planted the third in New England in 1620.

Influenced by the progress of these events, many families from the several countries of Europe which had adopted the Augsburg Confession, set out to seek a home and a place to worship God, in the attractive regions of the West. First, and, until the end of his days, most prominent in encouraging this movement, stood that illustrious hero of our faith, Gustavus Adolphus, King of Sweden. The statements of the climate and the soil and the population of America that had reached him were such, that, in his sagacity and the comprehensiveness of his spirit, he rapidly developed a plan for the establishment of colonies in foreign parts, to which emigrants from all Europe were to be invited. The motives that mainly influenced him were these : — the planting of the

Christian religion amongst the heathen, the honor of his own kingdom, and the commercial interests of his subjects.

His own subjects were especially interested. Cheered by the encouraging accounts they had received from the New World, many of the inhabitants of Sweden and Finland turned their longing eyes towards what seemed to them to be an earthly paradise. Their piety, their enterprise, were alike engaged and ready to forsake their kindred and their homes to brave the dangers of the deep, and so, with the Divine blessing, to carry the intelligent plans of their sovereign into successful operation. Startling events, however, soon attracted their attention to another quarter, and for a time their peaceful purposes were utterly confused by the stern and relentless demands of war. The Protestant princes of Germany, having been compelled to take up arms in defense of their religious rights, placed Gustavus Adolphus at the he-ad of their allied forces. His attention was, of course, at once diverted from the immediate execution of his plan for colonization. Yet he had not forgotten it. Only a few days before that glorious victory upon the field of Liitzen, in the blaze of which he lost his life, he recommended to the people of Germany the colonial project, which he still regarded as " the jewel of his kingdom." The enterprise thus so fondly contemplated by the king, was designed to open a safe retreat for the good and defenseless of every land, to be a blessing to the common man, and at the same time, without national distinction, to offer its advantages to the whole Protestant world.

After the death of Gustavus, the chief control of the undertaking was assumed by Oxenstiern, Prime Minister of Sweden. This distinguished statesman, eminently fitted for the post by his qualities both of mind and heart, urged on the work at once with the intelligence of a patriot and the zeal of a Christian.

Accordingly, in 1637, two ship-loads of emigrants from Sweden sail up Delaware Bay. They are richly furnished with provisions for themselves, with merchandize for traffic with the Indians, and with the means of instruction and edification in the holy faith they professed. In all this we can readily discover the industry of their habits, the integrity of their purposes, and the purity of their character.

The Dutch having already settled upon the east, the Swedes on their arrival purchased and occupied the lands on the west of the Delaware, from its mouth far up to the vicinity of Trenton. Tidings of their safety and their pleasant prospects reached their brethren at home. Bands of emigrants from the Fatherland soon followed, and ere long "the eye of the stranger could begin to gaze with interest upon the signs of public improvement, ever regularly advancing from the region of Wilmington to that of Philadelphia."

The power of Sweden over this territory ceased after the lapse of seventeen years. The Swedish colonists, whose numbers perhaps never far exceeded one thousand, were forced to submit to their more powerful neighbors, the Dutch of the New Netherlands. So, the results which otherwise would naturally have followed from this early establishment of the Lutheran Church in America, were of course greatly interfered with by the civil and political disturbances that so soon effected the overthrow of Swedish power.

These events, however, cannot be overlooked in any history of the Lutheran Church in America. The class of Lutherans of the present day that traces its descent from these ancient Swedes, though retaining the name of Lutheran, harmonizes in doctrine and in polity with a church that knows not the Augsburg Confession. Their rectors and teachers can make it plain enough that they inherit the names and the blood of the early colonists ; but their total separation from the fellowship of Lutherans, and the sportiveness with which they can regard some of the solemn usages of their fathers,* may indicate that, content with

* The author of the "Annals of the Swedes," for example, in giving an account of an ordination of a pastor by three Swedish ministers, not one of whom was a bishop, sees how utterly at variance this was with all the views and usages of his own Episcopal Church. As the pastor ordained was to be sent to the Lutheran Church in New York, Mr. Clay gets over the difficulty by facetiously observing, that "perhaps they thought such orders would do for the Dutch."

the name of the Swedish Church, they have entirely relinquished the inheritance of its Lutheran spirit.

To the Lutheran Church in America that inheritance belongs ; and she has never been backward in the assertion of her claim. Those Swedish colonists were Lutherans. They were of the same blood and faith as the noble heroes who a few years before had followed their great prince in the defense of Christian liberty through the battlefields of Europe, and who, like him, at last lay down in victorious peace upon the plains of Liitzen. They were Lutherans, bringing the Bible with its Sacraments, the Church with its- ministry, the Augsburg Confession and the Small Catechism, along with them. Not only was it intended by the originators of the colony that its religious element should be a prominent one; but, as we learn from its records for upwards of a whole century, a commendable zeal was displayed, both along the Delaware and in the fatherland, to keep that religious element true to its Lutheran type.

To plant the Christian religion amongst the heathen, was the first object contemplated by the great Gustavus; and so the first establishment of Lutheranism in America deserves to be regarded as that of a missionary Church. The specific form of doctrine, however, to which the colonists were bound both by their own convictions and by the instructions of the government at home, was the form expressed in the familiar words, — "upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, according to the unaltered Augsburg Confession."

In the royal instructions sent from Sweden in 1642, by John Printz, governor of the colony, whilst the relations he should maintain to all his neighbors, and the efforts he should make for the civil and economical improvement of the people, are minutely specified, the religious, the Lutheran element of the colony is commended to his attention, by a prominence that he could scarcely -have overlooked. "Before all," says this letter of instructions, "the governor must labor and watch that he renders in all things to Almighty God the true worship which is his due, the glory, the praise, and the homage that belongs to him, and take good measures that the Divine Service is performed according to the true Confession of Augsburg, the Council of Upsal, and the ceremonies of the Swedish Church, having care that all men, and especially the youth, be instructed in all the parts of Christianity, and that a good ecclesiastical discipline be observed and maintained."*

We have much reason to believe that these instructions were faithfully executed In company with Governor Printz, upon his arrival in 1642, came also the Rev. John Campanius, as chaplain of the colony. We may readily infer, from his enlightened zeal on behalf of the Indians, that he was diligent and devoted as the spiritual guide of

* Hazard's Annals of Pennsylvania.

■r his own countrymen. His intimacy with the

neighboring tribes and their several chiefs was promoted by the successive governors of the colony; and with the simplicity and tenderrn one who is dealing with babes, he unfolded before them the great mystery of the gospel, God manifest in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself.*

Encouraged by the interest they manifested in his instructions, he addressed himself diligently to the study of their language, that he might the more readily proclaim to them in their own tongue the wonderful works of God. The early appearance of Luther's Small Catechism, which, like the Augsburg Confession, is one of the symbols of the Church, translated into the language of the Indians, afforded an evidence of his zeal and his success. It could hardly be supposed that we should be indifferent to the circumstances so plainly indicated by these facts, that "Lutherans were the first missionaries of the Cross, at least in Pennsylvania, and that perhaps the very first work ever translated into the language of the Indians in America was Luther's Small Catechism. "f

It was not unusual for the Swedish pastors to oe recalled after a few years' residence in the colony, and to be appointed to some valuable and honorable post at home. The result of this was many changes in the pastoral relations,

and the churches at times were wholly forsaken, like sheep without a shepherd. After the conquest of the colony by the Dutch in 1655, many of the principal men and families were violently removed, intercourse with Sweden was almost entirely abandoned, and the congregations, unable to supply their pulpits as they became vacant, were compelled to rely for the conduct of public worship upon the zeal and devotion of laymen themselves.

Under these circumstances, so unfavorable to the growth and even to the continuance of the Church, we might suppose that their religious zeal would have become deeply chilled, or at least that their affections would have been somewhat removed from the fair form of their Lutheran faith. But their Christian zeal and their Lutheran affec* tions nobly survived forty years of trial. After the lapse of that time subsequent to 1655, during which they sometimes had two pastors, sometimes but one, sometimes none at all, they express their hungerings for the word of the Lord, the preaching of the gospel, with a touching importunity ; and their declarations of attachment to the true Lutheran faith rise to the high level of Christian heroism.

After a long and painful interruption of their intercourse with Sweden, a friend and an advocate was furnished for them in the person of John Thelin, a pious man of Gottenburg. Interested himself in their spiritual welfare by the inform ation he had providentially received, he was able to interest the court of Sweden also on their behalf. In 1692 he addressed them in a letter assuring them of his Christian sympathy, of the willingness of the King of Sweden to befriend them, and asking to be more particularly informed of their spiritual necessities. Their answer was dated May 31, 1693. Among other things, they state in reply, "We heartily desire, since it hath pleased his majesty graciously to regard our wants, that there may be sent unto us two Swedish ministers, who are well learned in the Holy Scriptures, and who may be able to defend them and us against all false opposers, so that we may preserve our true Lutheran faith, which, if called to suffer for our faith, we are ready to seal with our blood. We also request that those ministers may be men of good moral lives and character, so that they may instruct our youth b}' their example, and lead them into a pious and virtuous way of life." In the same letter they request that books of devotion, Bibles, hymn-books, catechisms, might be purchased in Sweden and forwarded to them, promising at the same a proper maintenance to the ministers after they should arrive.

Of this letter many copies were taken : it was circulated from hand to hand in Sweden : it drew tears from many eyes.* The king himself took prompt and active measures to answer and even

* Clay's Annals, pp. 46-47.

to exceed their prayer. The pious zeal of the Swedes on the Delaware to preserve among themselves and their children the pure evangelical religion was highly jpleasing to the monarch. Instead of two ministers, as they had modestly asked, he sent them three, — the Rev. Messrs. Rudnian, Biork, and Auren. Instead of the few books they had requested as a purchase, he sent them hundreds, as a gift. He provided a vessel for the passage of the ministers ; he furnished them with large funds to meet their expenses ; he dismissed them in the * name of the Lord ; he invoked the divine blessing upon them ; he promised never to forget them.*

The final departure of these ministers from Sweden was delayed, for a short time, by a circumstance that recalls an interesting fact mentioned in the foregoing narrative. They had already taken leave of their friends. They were about to set sail ; but the failure of the printer to furnish them with the Indian catechisms forbade the movement, and they went not, until five hundred copies of Luther's Small Catechism were placed on board. f This book had been translated by Campanius, one of their first ministers, about fifty years before ; and the liberal supply granted to them on this occasion shows at once how anxious the Church in Sweden was, that they should be diligent as missionaries of the Cross amongst

the heathen, and, in all their instructions, faithful to the Symbols of the Lutheran Church.*

During all this time, and subsequently, the enterprise and the benevolence of the Swedes was exercised, to a commendable degree", in the erection of churches at suitable points. Fort Christina, on Christina Creek, where their first settlement was made in 1638,f Tinicum,J selected as the residence of Governor Printz in 1646, and Philadelphia, which Mr. Biork considered, in 1697, as a " clever little town," were the chief places of their solemn assemblies. It will accord best with the brevity to which we are bound, and be quite sufficient for our purpose, if we confine ourselves more particularly to a notice of the place last specified.

The city of Philadelphia was founded by William Penn in 1683. The movements of "William Penn in locating his city were opposed by the Swedes, who were the owners of the soil. But

* A copy of this book is to be seen in the Philadelphia Library. It is in Indian and Swedish, — the languages alternating. It contains every thing usually found in the old German editions, — the five principal parts, the doctrine of confession, tables of duties, and the very prayers. Appended to it is a vocabulary of Indian words and phrases, which, with the catechism, makes a volume of one hundred and sixty pages, duodecimo. The Swedish portion is printed in German and the Indian in Roman characters. It is dated 1696, and both for paper and for type seems to have been put forth in liberal style. The pages of the Catechism itself number one hundred and thirty-five.

•j- Now the city of Wilmington, Delaware.

X Now the Lazaretto, twelve miles below Philadelphia.

his conciliatory manner, his kind promises, perhaps enforced by a reference to the weight of royal authority which he might call to his aid, and, above all, the liberal exchanges of land which he proposed, disarmed their opposition, and they acquiesced in the plans of the great founder of Philadelphia.

The stream of intercourse between the Swedes and William Penn ran smoothly. If we refer to the fact that an occasional obstruction disturbed the peaceful current, it may serve to show more clearly what strong claims each party had to the respect and consideration of the other. Their character and bearing were such as to draw from him, on several occasions, a manly testimony in their favor. They received him kindly, as they always had, the few English who preceded him. Their respect to authority, and their kind behavior to his own countrymen, he had to commend. He had seen few young men more sober and industrious than they could show. He had met with few families more interesting than those of Swedish name.

Perm's dealings with the Indians have obtained such a record in history as to command the praise of Christians in every land. Under the shade of the large elm-tree in Shakamaxon, the chiefs of the Algonquin race were captivated by the simplicity and sincerity of his manners, and by the language of pure affection in which he addressed them. "We will live," said they, "in love with

William Perm and his children, and with his children's children, as long as the moon and sun endure."* It should be remembered, however, that Penn's intercourse with the Indians had been preceded by the Christian labors of pious Lutherans, and that, for forty years, these sons of the forest had been accustomed to hear the truths and to discern the principles of the gospel, proceeding from the lips and exemplified in the lives of Europeans. Along with all the civil intercourse between the Indians and the Swedes, there ran a line of spiritual sympathy, which, having begun in the time of Campanius, was afterwards greatly strengthened in the days of Biork and Euclman. It was by such- influences, long and steadily operating to subdue the passions and to conciliate the feelings of savage men, that the way was made straight for the successful application of the plans of the great philanthropist.

Half a mile below the southern limits of the city of Penn, stood the Swedish Church of Wicaco. Having been built in 1669, it had been the scene of gospel ceremonies and of Christian devotion for several years before the arrival of the English colonists. It was, indeed, originally erected by the command of the Government, as a block-house, or place of defense against the Indians ; but the Lutherans, as though they relied more upon the weapons of a spiritual than upon those of a carnal

* Baird's Religion in America, p. 70.

warfare, converted the fort into a church, and in 1677 called the Kev. Jacob Fabritius as its pastor.*

Thus, for five years before the arrival of William Penn, the gospel had been preached, its solemn ordinances had been administered, and the voice of rejoicing and salvation had been heard proceeding from the tabernacles of Zion, frequented by zealous Lutherans, in the immediate vicinity of what was afterwards the scene of his celebrated treaty. With the Indians, the Swedes were wont to live in much greater friendship than with the English themselves. f There is every reason to believe, that they never forgot their obligations to endeavor to bring them into the marvellous light of the truth; and the effect of all these circumstances, in calming and controlling the feelings of the Indians in their intercourse with white men, it were vain to question. Though we would not detract, in the least, from the merited praise of William Penn, yet we may honestly claim that to the Lutheran Church belonged the part of pioneer in the management of a treaty which, for its purity and integrity, has, above all others, a world-wide, an everlasting fame.

It was at an early period of their ministry that Biork and Eudman began to agitate the subject of church-erection. With little money and with strong faith, a substantial building was commenced

* Clay's Annals, p. 37.

f Mr. Biork's Letter in 1697 ; Clay's Annals, p. 67.

at Christina in 1698; and on Trinity Sunday, 1699, the church was consecrated to the service of Almighty God. "When the work began at Christina, there was a similar effort at Wicaco ; but, in consequence of a difference of sentiment as to the proper location of the church, no progress was made for upwards of a year. The difficulty, however, having been removed, the erection of the new church was commenced, on the site of the old church or block-house of 1669. On the first Sunday after Trinity, in the year 1700, in the presence of a large, promiscuous assembly, and by solemn acts of devotion, this church was consecrated to the service of God and the preaching of his word. By their zeal and enterprise, as displayed in the erection of these two churches, the Lutherans had distinguished themselves and commanded the admiration of their wealthier English neighbors. Their dimensions, the convenience of their internal arrangements, the tasteful simplicity of their adornments, elicited, in that early day, the meed of praise which is now lavished only upon the sacred temple where the costly perfections of art and skill combine to excite all the feelings of awe and veneration. The English inhabitants, having been interested in the progress of the churches at Wicaco and Christina, continued, long after their consecration, to gaze upon them with wonder. The fame of them was noised abroad to neighboring provinces. Strangers, visiting the region of the Delaware, walked round about these walls of

Ziou, and, with respectful mien, were pleased to enter her sacred courts. Even the Governors of Maryland and Virginia, — Nicholson and Blackstone, — attended by their respective suites, were gratified on the occasion of seeing with their own eyes these noble monuments of Christian zeal and of Lutheran enterprise.*

It was through this church at Wicaco, that the principal stream of communication ran between the Swedes and the other adherents of the Lutheran faith in America.

The close of the seventeenth and the beginning of the eighteenth century brought large additions to the number of Lutherans. The emigration was especially strong between the years 1708 and 1720. Persecuted inhabitants of the Palatinate, rejoicing in the favor and sympathy of Queen Anne, flocked * together by thousands upon the shores of England. They were fed there and clothed by the royal bounty. They were edified by the spiritual attentions of preachers of the court; and when the day of their departure arrived, four thousand Germans at once found accommodations upon ten ships prepared for a voyage to the Western World. f The immediate history of these emigrants, who landed in New York, June 13, 1710, belongs to another branch of our subject. Though the main body attempted to settle in the interior of New York, the proportion that came at once to the

province of Pennsylvania was not a small one. These emigrants, 'tis true, contributed nothing of any direct value in the establishment of the Church. Without religious teachers to instruct and build them up in the faith of the gospel, surrounded by sects which, though small, were contentious, and too much engrossed by the cares of this life, they served, at best, only as pioneers to prepare the way for their brethren who were soon to follow.*

This service they effectually rendered. The Bible, the hymn-book, and Arndt's True Christianity, with which they had been generously furnished by the munificence of friends in England, enlivening the hours of their rest and their devotion, still bound them to the faith of their fathers; and when the tide of emigration began again to flow, it was towards the province chosen by these earlier emigrants that its current was directed.

The Lutheran families that arrived during this next period of emigration between 1720 and 1740 were both numerous and hearty in their attachment to the Church. From the Palatinate, from Wurtemberg, from Darmstadt, from other portions of Germany, they came, having one Lord, one faith, one baptism. Many of them sought and found a home in Philadelphia and its vicinity, and, although unable in their poverty either to build church or school-house, or even to secure the ground for such an object, they nevertheless maintained the unity of the faith, and hopefully awaited a more prosperous day.

Upon the arrival of Henry Melchior Muhlenberg in 1742, he found the Lutheran Church of the Germans in Philadelphia in the habit of holding public worship in a small house that had been rented for the purpose. The interest awakened by his appearance amongst them was such, that in a short time this house was altogether too small to accommodate the growing crowds. The Lutheran Church of the Swedes was generously offered for the use of the Germans ; and so it happened, that the consecrated walls within which the father of the Lutheran Church in America first proclaimed the unsearchable riches of Christ were those of the Swedes at "Wicaco.* Upon a set day in this church there was a novel and attractive ceremony, refreshing doubtless to many a weary heart, and sanctioned by the holy offices of religion. The Swedes and the Germans were gathered together. Muhlenberg presented his testimonials and letters of recommendation. The senior pastor of the Swedes opened and read them in the hearing of all the people ; and there, in the midst of songs of praise and fervent prayer, Muhlenberg was solemnly installed as regular pastor of the German Lutherans in and around Philadelphia, f

A union of hands between the poorer Germans and the more prosperous Swedes, apparently so

earnest and sincere lis this, might well suggest the thought that there i > have been a unity

of heart, all the goodly, pleasant fellowship of brethren. Such in truth there was; and it is this and the long continuance of it that justifies us :n the belief, that the early progress of the Swedish, congregations, now separated though they be, belongs to the history of the Lutheran Church in America.

With such a beginning, we might expect to find Muhlenberg, though the pastor of the Germans, moving freely and figuring largely among the Swedes. And when we find them, in their prosperous settlements along the Schuylkill, clustering around him and begging him, with tears in their eyes, to visit them and preach to them upon the Lord's day, — when we see him administer the holy Sacraments in their devout assemblies, — when we hear them testify, with joyful hearts, that these impressive scenes reminded them of apostolic times,* — we have' no difficulty in concluding, that the Swedes and the Germans of this earlier period were one united family in all the completeness of Christian fellowship.

The fruits of Muhlenberg's pastoral fidelity, and of the adherence of the Swedes to the doctrine and order of the Lutheran Church, began in due time to ripen. In the year 1759, there arrived from Sweden a young man duly accredited as provost or chief pastor of the Swedish churches.