# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1852 08 17_S207
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

207

words of the "Lutheraner" a sinister, hateful intent is imputed. As to the manner of the strife, the "Lutheraner," as one that also has sin, like all the children of men, will indeed not set itself up as altogether righteous, but where has the "Lutheraner" so offended against the eighth commandment as the "Informatorium"? Rather, in the course of the strife, the "Lutheraner" has always been denied the sparing consideration of love, which seeks to win the erring brother and to be reconciled. Even if someone were not in a position to see on which side the right lies in the differing doctrines, yet the manner in which our opponent has conducted the strife will hardly fill anyone with confidence in his doctrine. For this will escape no one, that the holy apostles, even when they really had to combat false apostles, observed another manner than our opponents. They, the apostles, uncovered the error, showed its harmfulness, warned against it with great earnestness, proclaimed to the seducers God's judgment; but one notices nothing of slanderous attacks upon persons, nothing of carnal embitterment, but even from their reproofs there shines forth a pure zeal for God's honor and truth.

Great is the offense with which our Lutheran Zion has been covered by this strife; great the grief which it has caused many honest souls, great the exultation which it has prepared for the enemies of our Church. Yet it cannot surprise us, for it must needs be that offenses come, but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh. There must also be factions in the true Church, but woe to those who are made manifest as such in God's judgment and sentence. Pastor Grabau has not scrupled to declare our whole Synod a faction; we have until now not yet presumed to pronounce such a judgment upon Pastor Grabau and his people. But the day is perhaps not far off when we shall not need to pronounce it, but when it will be manifest before the eyes of the whole Lutheran Church of Germany as of America who the faction is; unless, by God's exceeding mercy, the last dreadful outcome be averted and Mr. Pastor Grabau let himself be moved to take a way which offers more hope of peace. And this all pious hearts will surely fervently wish and ask of God. How greatly would God's Zion rejoice again after anguish and pain, how joyfully praise and magnify God, if through the mercy of JEsus Christ and through the grace of His Spirit there were gathered again in faith and joined together what Satan has sundered and rent asunder. Ah, that the resistance of the wicked heart and the malice of the devil might not hinder what the gracious will of God and of our Savior Jesus Christ might well grant.

C. F. Gruber.
G. A. Schieferdecker.

Adolph Clarenbach and Peter Fleisteden.

These two men are placed together because on one day, the 28th of September, 1529, they suffered death by fire in Cöln.

Adolph Clarenbach was born at the Buscherhof in the parish of Lüttinghausen*) in the Bergisch country toward the end of the fifteenth century, of poor parents, and showed already as a boy much eagerness to learn, for which reason he was sent to the high schools at Münster and Cöln. Here he soon came so far as to be able to read the Holy Scriptures in the original languages, with which he then busied himself most diligently; he also had the repute of a retired, chaste, God-fearing walk of life. He devoted himself to the teacher's calling and in the year 1523 became first Conrector in Münster, where he awakened love for the pure Gospel not only in the youth entrusted to him but also in many citizens of the city. From 1525 he did the same as Conrector in Wesel, and when he had been banished from there at the instigation of the Cöln Official Trip, amid continued persecution in Osnabrück, in Meldorp in Ditmarsh, in his birthplace, in Lennep, Elberfeld and the surrounding country, with visible success. One of his friends, Pastor Klopreis at Büderich, was at that time summoned to Cöln on account of evangelical heresy; Clarenbach accompanied him voluntarily, in the hope of being useful to him, but upon his arrival in Cöln on the 3rd of April, 1528, was at once arrested and put in the Frankenthurm. Thus began the series of ill-treatments and temptations to recant, the end of which was death by flames.

*) Under the jurisdiction of the city of Lennep.

In the repeated examinations Clarenbach joyfully testified his faith in the living Christ, the only Savior and Redeemer of the human race lost in sins, and in the truthfulness of the Holy Scriptures. He pointed out to the inquisitors, in part his former Cöln teachers, who laid snares for him by captious questions concerning the authority of the Pope, the Church and its ordinances, that the Holy Ghost had inwardly convinced him of the truth of the doctrine laid down in the Apostles' Creed, and that he could recant only if he were convicted of an error from the Holy Scriptures.

Toward the end of his imprisonment Peter Fleisteden, from the village of Fleisteden in the Jülich country, became the companion of his dungeon. Peter had kept his hat on during the Mass in the cathedral choir and outwardly shown his abhorrence of it in the strongest manner, with the intention, explained later, that the people should ask him the reasons of his behavior, and he would then instruct them concerning the nothingness of the Mass observances. But the people were silent, and the clergy also kept quiet. Scarcely had he left the cathedral, however, when he was at once arrested and led to Clarenbach into prison. Fleisteden's provoking manner was quickly broken by Clarenbach's gentle earnestness; both friends strengthened each other to faithfulness and looked joyfully toward the stake.

When the 28th of September, 1529, dawned, the martyrs were conducted, amid a great concourse of the people, through the whole city to the distant place of execution. Even now they were molested by monks zealous for conversion; but this did not hinder them from praising God with a loud voice and teaching the people the whole way. Thus Adolph said among other things: "Praise, honor and thanks be to Thee, Father, that Thou hast let this day appear, which we so greatly longed for." "I am comforted in Christ, I die the death of a Christian, and the will of the Lord is done. It went so with Him, how should it not go so with us? He went before and we must follow after, if we are to be His brethren." "O Cöln, Cöln, he went on after a while, how thou persecutest the Word of God! There is a cloud in the air, which will yet once pour down."*) After he had, among other things, prayed the Creed, Adolph said to the people: "Thus must we follow the new Adam, Christ, in suffering, if He is to come to us at all. The more pressure and persecution, the greater the growth of the new man and the death of the old, of the flesh, of sin, of the devil and of the world. These mock us now and leave us comfortless, but we set against them the one Christ, our Comforter, Advocate and only Mediator, who will surely plead for us before His heavenly Father. Be not offended at our death; for Christ also ought to suffer and through suffering to enter into His kingdom. Through this Christ I exhort you, dear brethren, that ye live without tumult, lovingly, brotherly and Christianly with one another and obey all authority. Our Lord will turn all things to the best and give you His grace and His divine Word."

*) In Cöln a considerable evangelical congregation gathered in the first century after the Reformation, but it was driven out in the seventeenth century.

Then Peter continued, because Adolph complained of weariness: "We were sinners when we came from our mother's womb, and by God's righteousness had deserved death at once. So I exhort you today in the name of God, hold fast to His Word alone, to Christ alone, who is the way, the truth and the life, and turn away from the Pope in Rome and from his church, which leads you away from the grace of God and from Christ's satisfaction, and gives you instead seals, bulls, indulgences, pilgrimages and godless doctrines of men and of devils, that they may fill their purses and kitchens."

Having arrived at the place of execution, Clarenbach prayed: "O Lord, lift up my spirit, that I may forgive my enemies from the bottom of my heart," and then spoke to the citi-