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LEHRE UND VVEHRE
MAGAZIN FUER EV.-LuTH. HOMILETIK
THEOLOGICAL QUARTERLy-THEOLOGICAL MONTIiLY
Vol. XIX November, 1948 No. 11
CONTENTS Page
Roma Semper Eadem. L. W. Spitz_. __ . __ ._ .............. _ _ . __ .__ _ ...... __ 801
Union Theses, adopted by Breslau Synod and Saxon Free Church 824
Sermon Studies for the New Church Year ................. _. ____ ......... _._ .. 841
Theological Observer ._ ................ _ ... _ ......... _._ .... _ ... _ ..... _ _ _ ...... _ ... _ .......... _ .. 856
Book Review .. __ . __ ... _._ .. _ ... __ .... _ .... _ ........ _ ..... _ .... __ _____ ._._ ......... _ ... _ 875
Eln Predlger muss nicht alleln wei-
den, also dass er die Schafe unter-
weise. wie sie rechte Christen sollen
seln. sondem auch dane ben den Woel-
fen wehren, dass sle die Schafe nlcht
angreifen und mlt f alscher Lehre ver-
fueh ren und Irrtum elnfuehren.
Luthe1'
Es 1st keln Ding. das die Leute
mehr bel der K1rche behaelt denn
die gute Predlgt. - Apologie. An. Z4
If the trumpet give an uncertain
sound. who Rhall prepare h imself to
the battle1 -1 COf'. 14:8
Published by
The Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod
CONCORDIA PUBLISHING HOUSE, St. Louis 18, Mo.
PR.IN'DD I:l "0'. S. A.
Theological Observer
KFUO and the Lutheran Hour.-The march of the Gospel
continues. While the imprint of secularism can be seen all about
us, there is no generation in which the Good News has been spread
so widely and powerfully as in ours. We are happy to announce
that KFUO has added substantially to its plant and equipment
and that its renovated and enlarged facilities have been dedicated
on October 17 to their exalted, holy use. It is a synodical child
and receives an appropriation for its work, but what is granted is
hardly more than a token. The station has to be supported by
the direct gifts of its friends and well-wishers. Many of those
who send donations are not members of the Lutheran Church or
of any Church.
The Lutheran Hour, embarked now on its sixteenth season, has
quite correctly been called one of the grandest evangelization
agencies which the world has seen. Dr. Walter A. Maier continues
to serve as its regular preacher. It seems incredible, but is borne
out by the lists at the Lutheran Hour office, that the message of
this herald of the Gospel is now heard over 1,100 stations in nearly
all the countries of the world. In humble gratitude we bow our
heads and invoke God's blessings on both the ventures mentioned.
Like KFUO for the by far greater part of its budget, the Lutheran
Hour has to depend mainly on the support of its friends - the
people inside and outside our church body who desire to see the
good news of pardon through the blood of Christ spread throughout
the world. Those who would like to receive full and detailed
information on its globe-encircling activities should write the
Lutheran Hour Office, 3558 S. Jefferson Ave., St. Louis 18, Mo.,
for a copy of the October issue of the Lutheran Hour News. KFUO
regularly issues a bulletin which can be obtained by writing to
the station. A.
Dr. Hamann's Remarks on the Breslau-Free Church "Theses
of Union." - The "Theses of Union" adopted by the Evangelical
Lutheran Free Church (Free Church of Saxony) have rightly
aroused interest far beyond the confines of Germany. In far-
away Australia, Dr. H. Hamann, principal of Concordia College
(Unley, S. A.), has published a translation of the Theses as they
were submitted to him in typewritten copy, together with notes
and comments which, we believe, will greatly interest our readers.
Professor Hamann, for a number of years, has proved himself, in
his capacity as editor of the Australasian Theological Review, a
man of sound judgment, rare insight, and broad vision, whose
opinions are worth noting. His fine translation of the Theses and
his comments appeared in the December, 1947, issue of the period-
ical just mentioned. In an "editorial note" Dr. Hamann writes
by way of preface: "The doctrinal matters that divided Breslau
from our Free Church brethren parallel, to a certain extent, the
[856]
THEOLOGICAL OBSERVER 857
divergent doctrinal views and teachings that have hitherto sep-
arated the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Australia from the
United Evangelical Lutheran Church in Australia. The publication
of the Einigungssaetze, which we offer to our readers in exact
translation, may help to remove whatever doctrinal and practical
differences still keep the two branches of the Australian Lutheran
Church apart. Such at least is the ardent hope and the earnest
desire of the editors."
Summing up his impressions of the "Theses of Union," Dr.
Hamann writes in conclusion: "The translator has no fault to find
with these theses and the explanatory remarks appended. In his
judgment, not a particle of divinely revealed truth has been sac-
rificed or called into qustion. He also believes that our Church
(the E. L. C. A.) as a whole would not hesitate to accept these
Einigungssaetze as a basis of fellowship with the U. E. L. C. A.;
and that if the latter body were to declare its acceptance of them,
the remaining differences and difficulties would be overcome with
comparative ease. Every reader who studies these Theses and
who has followed the discussions and negotiations on Lutheran
unity in the United States of America, cannot fail to observe a
certain similarity between them and the 'Declaration' of the
American Lutheran Church as regards both the matter treated
and the manner of treatment. The Einigungssaetze are perhaps
a little more carefully and conservatively worded, but the kinship
is unmistakable. It is probably due not to accident, nor only to
the fact that there were points of contact between Breslau and
the former Iowa-Ohio Synods, but to a study of the documents
that have so long engaged the attention of the Missouri Synod
and the American Lutheran Church. Of the five 'points of doc-
trine' that were declared to be non-divisive of fellowship in 1938,
three are thus designated by the Einigungssaetze, viz., the chron-
ology of the Thousand Years, the possibility of the conversion of
larger numbers of Jews in the last times, and the possibility that,
before the end, the Antichrist may unite with other antichristian
forces. In short, it is admitted that the Word does not reveal
all that the future may bring. There is no mention of the resur-
rection of some martyrs before the general resurrection - and
a very good thing, too. Besides, Breslau seems to have accepted
the only sound definition of the Church and of its notae. The
concluding remarks on eschatology added to the theses strike us
as quite admirable, considered both theologically and practically.
At about the same time when the Scriptural truths and principles
embodied in the Einigungssaetze prepared the way for unity and
fellowship in Germany, the Missouri Synod withdrew the Basis
of Fellowship of 1938, though this action did not carry with it
any repudiation or condemnation of the doctrinal contents of that
Basis. Perhaps no other measure was open to the Chicago Cen-
tennial Convention if it wished to escape from the impasse
created by subsequent resolutions in 1941 and 1944 as well as by
858 THEOLOGICAL OBSERVER
conditions within the Synodical Conferecne. Yet if the cause of
Lutheran unity is to be advanced in America and Australia, it
will have to be done in somewhat the same manner as that adopted
by the Einigungssaetze; for church-fellowship presupposes, not
absolute unanimity on all matters that may occur to the Chris-
tian when contemplating the entire body of Divine Truth, but
'common acceptance and confession of all doctrines revealed in
Holy Scripture.'" J. T. M.
The New Zealand District Convention of 1948. - The Aus-
tralian Lutheran (June 23, 1948) reports on the annual convention
of the Evangelical Lutheran Concordia Conference of New Zea-
land, held in the capital city of Wellington, from May 15 to 17.
The convention was attended by the Rev. F. Hassold of Eudunda,
Australia, as the official representative of the General President,
and by Mr. Ben Koch of Adelaide, who addressed primarily the
laymen of the District. The New Zealand District is perhaps the
smallest in any Church affiliated with the Missouri Synod. Its
pastoral conference numbers only six persons: Pastors M. Hedrich,
G. Fischer, C. Venz, H. Te Punga, C. Koch, and J. Paech. Essays
were read on the subject "Pastor and People." While the congre-
gations are few and scattered, President Fischer urged thanks-
giving to God for many blessings bestowed by Him upon the
Church in New Zealand during the past year, especially the re-
markable increase in attendance at the Lord's Table. The brethren
were grateful also for the deep interest which the Australian
Church took in their welfare and for the many greetings which
the convention received. Despite the small numbers and the many
difficulties they are facing in their work, our New Zealand brethren
are faithfully continuing in the Lord's work, the report showing
no discouragement on their part at all. May the ever-support-
ing presence of our precious Lord be their comfort and strength
in their arduous and lonely, but glorious task. J. T. M.
Barth vs. Brunner on Communism. - Under this heading the
Christian Century, August 4, sheds light on the lively question,
why Karl Barth has taken no position on the question of Com-
munism, whereas he took such a violent position against Nazism.
This topic is discussed widely in German theology today. Our
readers will therefore be interested in having a resume of the
entire issue as it was brought to light in the correspondence
between Barth and Brunner. We quote from the Christian Cen-
tury. "Since Brunner insists that totalitarianism is the same,
whether Nazi or Communist, Barth's present position is unintelli-
gible to him. Must not the church of necessity, with unambiguity
and passion, say No to Communist totalitarianism, just as it said
No to Hitler? ... Existing Communism leads logically to totali-
tarianism. The question for the Christian church, therefore, is
not whether it will take a negative stand against ideal communism,
but whether it will say No to a total state, which is the only kind
consistent with existing Communism .... Brunner favors certain
THEOLOGICAL OBSERVER 859
state controls and even state ownership. There is a strong move-
ment toward the correction of these capitalistic abuses. . . . Social-
ism, he reminds Barth, is not authoritarian, which is one of the
reasons why Communism seeks to destroy it. 'Shall we allow
socialism to be assassinated by our refusal to say anything as
Christians against its murderers?' Must not Christians rather
join with Socialists in this battle? To remain silent is to deny
a fundamental Christian principle - something Christians must
never do. For the totalitarian state does not recognize the natural
rights of human personality. It is also atheistic by its very nature .
. . . Brunner notes that Hromadka of Prague, formerly of Princeton,
takes practically the same position as Barth, in that he interprets
the present situation as a historical necessity .... As for the argu-
ment that by opposing these Communist governments Protestants
will be aligning themselves with the Roman Catholic Church,
Brunner asks whether, just because the Roman Church takes an
anti-Communist stand, Protestants must stand aside. Did not
Protestants and Catholics stand side-by-side against Hitler? ...
Barth's reply is characteristic. Christians, he declares, do not act
by eternal and guiding principles, but according to the authority
of the Word of God in concrete situations. What obtained in 1933
simply does not obtain now. The situation is different. Therefore,
the Word of God which must be spoken today must be formulated
afresh. The position of the church in political matters, says Barth,
is determined at the point where the church faces the necessity of
speaking responsibly out of the Word of God. The church has
nothing, as church, to do with isms and systems, but only with the
Word of God in historical situations. It does not speak according
to 'principles.' The church makes her judgment according to the
situation. One day she may speak and another day she may be
silent. She declines to systematize her actions. She insists upon
keeping her freedom to speak when the time comes to speak.
The church confronted such a concrete situation in 1933. It was
time to speak then. Why? Because Hitler's regime repre-
sented a temptation to the church. Many an American, Britisher,
and Frenchman admired Hitler. Even Churchill had something
good to say for him! The nations allowed themselves to be seduced
by nazism, which claimed to be Christian. It was not a question
of totalitarianism, nor of nihilism, nor of anti-Semitism. Hitlerism
had a charm about it which overwhelmed men's souls and made
them believe its lies. It was a matter of life and death for the
church, since nazism was a 'masked godlessness.' This, says Barth,
is why he would not compromise at that time, nor pardon any
who had collaborated. But, asks Barth, are we faced by the same
situation today? Can we apply what we said then against nazism
to Communism now? He has seen western Germany and the non-
Russian sectors of Berlin. He knows the fear, the hate, the
repugnance which is felt toward this 'eastern monster.' But among
those who have this feeling, there is not one who regards Com-
munism as a temptation which constitutes a danger! None will
860 THEOLOGICAL OBSERVER
go along with Communism, except a few Communists. Is this not
also true of those who live in America, England, and France'?
'Whoever wants a political negation from me against this system
and method can have it immediately.' But it is rather cheap to
give, and cheap to have! Barth will not admit that it is a Christian,
or a church, responsibility to say about Communism what every
citizen can read in his newspaper and what Mr. Truman and the
pope are saying so well. Has the 'East,' or whatever one may
call it, such a power over us that we must counteract it with an
ultimate word? No, says Barth, for when the church confesses its
faith, it does so by going against the tide with fear and trembling.
Surely the church has no cause to go against the tide today by
giving its witness against Communism, because Communism does
not merit this, whether on account of its Marxist, its imperialistic
or its Asiatic elements .... Where is the spiritual danger, or the
need, which requires that the church should give a witness to
this truth? What is the occasion? Whom would the church
instruct, set right, comfort, or call to repentance and new life
thereby? Certainly not the nations of the 'Christian' West. Cer-
tainly not the Americans! Are they not secure enough against
Russia without our Christian assurance? Certainly not the poor
Russians and the poor Communists! . . . If a concrete situation
should arise as it did in 1933-45, then we shall have to see how
to deal with the situation that may have developed. But in any
case, says Barth, it will not be according to any of the timeless
'principles' to which Brunner wished to win me. It will begin,
rather, with the first sentence of the Barmen Declaration, which
was distasteful to Brunner at the time it was adopted." [ED. NOTE:
The first Barmen thesis stated that "Jesus Christ as He is testified
to us in Holy Scriptures, is the one Word of God to which we must
listen, and which we must obey in life and death. We reject the
error as though the church may seek as the source of its proclama-
tion events, persons, powers, and truths aside of the Word of God
as God's revelation." According to the principles of dialectics,
revelation occurs when the veiled and timeless Word of God be-
comes a re-vealed message for a specific person or group at a
specific time.] F. E. M.
Early Lutheran Influence in England. - Recently a book
appeared which contains interesting material for all students who
are engaged in research pertaining to the influence which Luther
and his co-workers exerted in England when the blessed Reform-
ation of the sixteenth century began. The book has the title
Studies in the Making of the English Protestant Tradition (mainly
in the reign of Henry VIII). The author is E. G. Rupp. The book
is published by Cambridge University Press and can be obtained
in New York from the Macmillan Company. The price is $2.75.
Prof. P. V. Norwood of Seabury-Western Theological Seminary
reviews the book in the July, 1948, issue of the Anglican Theolo-
gical Review l• We quote. a few of his sentences: "Much has been
THEOLOGICAL OBSERVER 861
written with regard to the impact of Calvinism and the Reformed
type of Protestantism on the English Church and religion; little
about the Lutheran influences which preceded. It is now more
than a half-century since the publication of the Lutheran Move-
ment in England by the competent American Lutheran scholar H.
E. Jacobs. In the essays which make up the volume under con-
sideration, Mr. Rupp, an English Wesleyan and 1940 winner of
the Cranmer prize, returns to this neglected theme. It is his pur-
pose to trace the avenues of infiltration of continental reformation
ideas into England and the germination of Lutheran thought in
English minds. Latent Lollardy was quickened by winds from
across the North Sea, and our attention is called to a group of
'Christian Brethren,' an association, 'which embraced men of dif-
ferent callings, different interest, and different theological opinion,
yet all joined by a common concern for reformation in doctrine
and church life, and that linked the workers for that reform in Eng-
land with their brethren overseas.' Their effective promotion of
the study of the Bible and Lutheran books naturally alarmed the
ecclesiastical authorities. Men like Tyndale and John Frith seem
to have had connections with this group. Through the 'Brethren,'
through young Cambridge dons who were adherents of the New
Learning and of Erasmian Biblical scholarship, and through Eng-
lish exiles on the continent, Lutheranism won its way - at great
personal peril to its exponents. Henry's diplomatic dealings with
the Lutheran princes of Germany and their theologians are re-
counted at length - a matter too little regarded by Anglicans,
since it was through the medium of these negotiations that the
language of the Lutheran Confession entered the English form-
ularies at certain points. Rupp's eighth chapter, 'Justification by
Faith and the English Reformers,' amply demonstrates the appro-
priation of this cardinal article of Lutheranism by the English
evangelicals - a fact unpalatable to certain myopic schools of
Anglicanism, who apparently take for native manufacture what is
clearly shown (by verbal parallels) to be an importation." We
hope that by and by Mr. Rupp's book can be reviewed in this
journal. A.
Lambeth and Pan-Protestantism. - America (August 28, 1948)
presents an excellent summary of the Lambeth Conference in an
editorial which reads: "After five weeks of private consultation,
the 326 bishops of the Anglican Communion issued on August 18
the resolutions, lengthy committee reports, and a superbly written
covering letter summarizing the first Lambeth Conference to meet
in eighteen years. Press reports emphasized the condemnation
of Marxian, atheistic Communism, its cruelties, injustice, and ly-
ing propaganda, as a heresy, deriving from Christianity but its
antithesis and contradiction. The resolution, however, concedes
that, provided he believes only in Marxist economic interpretation,
a Communist can be a practical Christian - a designation applied
862 THEOLOGICAL OBSERVER
by the Archbishop of Canterbury to the whole Russian Orthodox
Church. Likewise censured were 'other forms of economic dom-
ination which do not in practise exhibit any clearer recognition
of moral law.' In phrases reminiscent of last November's State-
ment of the Bishops of the Administrative Board of NCWC [The
National Catholic Welfare Conference], the spread of secularism
was deplored. Respects for human rights, irrespective of race or
color, was demanded; collective control of atomic power, limita-
tion of national sovereignties and support of UN were recom-
mended. The growing concern of the State for human welfare
was welcome, but warning was given of the encroachment of the
State, especially in the field of education, which endangers human
personality. Remarriage of divorced persons remains forbid-
den; the Committee of Marriage Discipline, however, approved a
private form of prayer and dedication where marriage in the
church is forbidden. Central in the Conference agenda was the
theme of church unity. Lambeth, 1908, had declared that 'there
could be no fulfillment of the divine purpose in any scheme of
reunion which did not include the great Latin Church of the
West.' Lambeth, 1948, represented the triumph of the Pan-
Protestant policy in the Anglican Communion, the Conference
expressing the hope of an ultimate comprehensive merger with
other Protestant denominations and its present gratification at the
common-denominator unity of the Church of South India. Sig-
nificantly, 1948 is the fourth centenary of Cranmer's proposal to
Melanchthon and Calvin that Protestants should agree on a com-
mon confession of faith lest their differences make them appear
contemptible in the eyes of the Roman Communion, and urging
a general assembly of Protestant divines to be held in England
as the safest place." The last sentence refers to a bit of history
which perhaps is not generally known but shows Cranmer's close
contact with both Geneva and Wittenberg. Nor is it generally
known that in 1548 Cranmer had the Nuremberg Catechism trans-
lated into English, and that scarcely without any change, that
he induced Justus Jonas to translate the Nuremberg Catechism
Sermons into Latin, that, to win the remaining Catholics in Eng-
land to Protestantism, he sent itinerant preachers thoughout the
land, and, finally, that he called into England a number of prom-
inent Reformed theologians. In the following year (1549) he had
the Parliament accept and sanction the first draft of the Book of
Common Prayer, and when his plan to secure a common Con-
fession of Faith, acceptable to all Protestants, failed, he moved the
writing of the Forty-Two Articles of Faith, which were sanctioned
in 1552. Nor must it be forgotten that in December, 1548, Melanch-
thon published the flexible, indulgent Leipzig Interim, so violently
opposed by Flacius and other Gnesio-Lutherans. It was largely
the confessing spirit of Flacius and his fellow opponents of the
Leipzig Interim that put an end to Melanchthon's unionistic med-
dling with Romanists and Calvinists. J. T. M.
THEOLOGICAL OBSERVER 863
International Council of Christian Churches. -Immediately
before the World Council of Churches met in Amsterdam, a meet-
ing was held in that city at which the so-called International
Council of Christian Churches was organized. The Christian Bea-
con of August 26 gives this account of the meeting. "52 churches
and 31 countries were represented at the first congress of the In-
ternational Council of Christian Churches in Amsterdam, the
Netherlands, which has now closed. And it was declared that real
unity in the Spirit and in the things of Christ was enjoyed by the
many delegates, observers, and advisers that attended this first
congress of fundamental Bible-believing churches of the world.
Elected chairman of the sessions and then elected president of
the International Council, the Rev. Carl McIntire has been kept
busy in directing the work of the sessions. Other officers have
been elected and appointed, and the commissions to further the
diversified work and ministry of the Counncil have been estab-
lished. . .. Taking its stand on the Word of God as the only
rule for faith and practice, the Council called upon 'Bible be-
lievers and true Protestants throughout the world to separate
themselves' from the World Council and invited them to join the
testimony of the International Council. . .. The basis of this call
was the inclusion within the World Council of 'leaders and
spokesmen, past and present, some of the most notorious and near-
blasphemous unbelievers of the day.'''
On the World Council of Churches the official pronouncement
of the International Council of Christian Churches reads thus:
"While undoubtedly there are many church units in the denom-
inations officially claimed by the World Council, as well as many
individual members in all the churches belonging to the said de-
nomination who still believe the whole Bible to be the Word of
God and are Protestants in the historic sense, the World Council
in its official proposals, attitude, and doctrinal expressions and
ecclesiastical organizations, is anti-Biblical, anti-evangelical, and
un-Protestant, as is also shown by the fact that some of its
ecclesiastical units have chosen as leaders and official spokesmen,
past and present, some of the most notorious and near-blasphe-
mous unbelievers of the day. An organization which is led by
men who call the doctrine of the deity of Christ 'distilled non-
sense,' who discredit the Old Testament, and ridicule many of the
doctrines of the New Testament, especially the truth of the efficacy
of Christ's blood, cannot, in the Biblical and historical sense, truth-
fully be called Christian."
As to its own character and purposes, the pronouncement says:
"On the other hand, the International Council of Christian Churches
exists to protect against the tenets of Modernism and to proclaim
the doctrines of the faith of the Reformation which it identifies as
the 'faith once for all delivered to the saints,' and for which the
New Testament admonishes us earnestly to contend." A.
864 THEOLOGICAL OBSERVER
The Harvard Lectures on Immortality. - In the Sunday School
Times (April 3,1948) Dr. Ernest Gordon, under the given heading,
writes on the downward course which the "Harvard lectures on
immortality" have taken. About 50 years ago, Miss Caroline
Ingersoll of Keene, New Hampshire, dedicated $5,000 for the estab-
lishment of a lectureship on that subject in honor of her father,
a loyal alumnus of that university. These lectures were to con-
firm the hope of life eternal, but, as Dr. Gordon shows, they mani-
fested, for the greater part, downright apostasy from the Christian
faith. There were exceptions, of course, but most of the lectures
evinced the "creeping paralysis that marks university and theo-
logical life in the America of our time." Sir William Osler, for
example, the "paragon of Anglo-American medicine of the last
generation," presented "an amazing essay, marked by brilliant
writing," but one also "without any positive witness to the resur-
rection or even to immortality as a thing in any way certain."
Dr. Osler was a Canadian minister's son who had drifted far from
the Christian moorings. His colleague Prof. H. A. Kelly, one of
Johns Hopkins' greatest surgeons, who boldly and fearlessly con-
fessed the resurrection of the dead and life eternal through faith
in Christ Jesus, was never asked by President Eliot, one of the
trustees of the Ingersoll Lectureship, to state the ground of his
Christian hope, though the lectureship was established for the
very purpose that this Christian hope might be defended. Again,
Professor Ostwald, the Leipzig chemist, then teaching at Harvard,
was a leader in international free thought. His contribution was
as pagan as it possibly could be, for he wrote as "a materialist with
whom death ends all." Then there was Prof. Wm. James, who
confessed that "his own personal feeling about immortality was
never of the keenest order." He wrote: "Our common animal
essence of patience under suffering and enduring effort must be
what redeems us in the Deity's sight. An immortality from which
these inconceivable billions of fellow strivers should be excluded
becomes an irrational idea for us." To this Dr. Gordon remarks:
"He forgets Romans, as Osler does 1 Cor. 15." Professor Palmer,
another of the lecturers, indeed defended the immortality of the
soul, but he "turned for the defense of immortality to intimations
fOlmd in Shakespeare's Sonnets." His colleague Professor Royce
"spent most of his time defining individuality, as if that were not
a thing we could take for granted. His essay was a Sahara sand-
waste, nor was there a trace of a mirage of Scriptural oasis in it."
Prof. Kirsopp Lake, who also lectured on the subject, was at the
time professor in the Harvard Divinity School. He wrote: "Men
regard the permanent survival of their individuality much as
they look at schemes for their permanent rejuvenation - a pleasant
dream, as Ponce de Leon's fountain of perpetual youth." He pro-
posed as a substitute "for the hope of a better world above for our-
selves to enjoy, the pursuit of a better world for another generation
to inherit." Dr. H. E. Fosdick likewise was asked to lecture, and
he said, among other things, that modern minds are not concerned
THEOLOGICAL OBSERVER 865
with "orthodoxy's theatrical settings of heaven and hell." Shailer
Mathews, onetime president of the Federal Council, delivered
his lecture under the title of "Immortality and the Cosmic Process."
One of his statements, quoted by Dr. Gordon, reads: "We shall
never be more truly immortal than we are at the present hour."
Another statement of his reads: "By making our social relation-
ships more personal and by controlling our physical urges in the
interest of those ends which are superanimal and timeless, we
come into harmony with the eternal personality-producing activities
of the cosmos and so share in the creative urges." Dr. J. S. Bixler,
who at the time he wrote his essay was teacher of the Bible in
Smith College, based his hope of immortality on Walt Whitman
and Emerson. He said: "We must learn with Whitman to cultivate
a mood where knowledge blends with contemplation and in which
we can look up with perfect confidence and peace to the stars."
Again: "It is upon the human soul with its capacity for aesthetic
and mystical detachment ... that man's theories of life must be
built. It is by the light of the soul that man must go forward to
wrest a meaning from the ultimate mystery and to solve the final
riddle of his origin and fate." Dr. Gordon judges rightly: "Bixler
trusts in man for self-redemption," and he concludes his article
with the words: "'Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this
world?' asks the Apostle. He surely has. And how? By leaving
them to their own imaginations and reasonings and philosophizings.
This the Ingersoll Lectures prove to the hilt. They have forsaken
the fountains of living waters and hewn themselves out broken
cisterns that can hold no water, least of all water of life." Since this
type of unbelief is being taught also at other higher schools of
learning, it is well for us to remember in our intercessions and
otherwise the splendid work which our Student Service Com-
mission performs through the many student pastors who are
serving our young people at many colleges and universities. That
their work is not in vain is proved again by the April issue of the
Lutheran Student Pastor, published by the Commission's active
secretary, Rev. R. W. Hahn. Here are some reports: "Colorado
State College: Two students were confirmed last month by
Student Pastor Theo. A. Meyer"; or: "The average church attend-
ance at services conducted by Student Pastor Weber at Purdue
University is 199. The average contribution is 44 cents per wor-
shiper. The total number of Synodical Conference students at
Purdue is 375"; or: "Student Pastor Heintzen's group of 471 at the
University of Illinois includes 89 women, 247 veterans, 91 married
students." And these are only a few of the numerous reports
of signal success reported by Rev. R. W. Hahn. "My Word shall
not return unto Me void" (Is. 55: 11). J. T. M.
The End of "Cuius Regio, Eius Religio." - In the Theological
Quarterly (QuartaIschrift) of the Wisconsin Synod (July, 1948)
Mr. Eugene Wengert, a prominent Lutheran attorney and leading
Lutheran layman, offers an excellent article on the implications
55
866 THEOLOGICAL OBSERVER
of the well-known formula cuius regio, eius religio, adopted as
a recognized doctrine of politics in the Religious Treaty of Augs-
burg, 1555. The doctrine, though practically repudiated at the
close of the Thirty Years' War in 1648, was not fully· abrogated
until the constitutionalism of America brought forth a new political
doctrine of religious freedom in the Bill of Rights. We believe our
readers will appreciate the following paragraph of Mr. Wengert's
article even though they must read it removed from its context:
"The century from 1555 to 1648, having adopted as the raison d'