# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1853 08 30_S3
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

3

the Ministry, that the judging of doctrine, etc., belongs to the preacher together with all, because he too is a member of the Church, and before all, because he represents the congregation; further, that in certain cases he has also alone to decide, e.g. whether someone is admissible to the Holy Supper or not. This is well expressed if one uses the words of the Thesis, not so by the proposed expression. For when one speaks of an executive power, one understands by it commonly the power to put into practice something which has been resolved by others, but not by him who has this power, with the others, or even alone.

"Still less," the author of the article continues, "are we satisfied by the eighth Thesis." He says he would hesitate to call the Ministry the highest in the Church, and gives as his reason that this would be spoken neither fittingly nor humbly. One hardly comprehends how so great a misunderstanding of this Thesis was possible. What the Thesis says of the Ministry, in order to set it in the right light according to its relation to other church offices, the author of the article refers to a reprehensible disposition of the bearer of the office, and while it is said that the Ministry is the highest because it comprehends in itself all other church offices, so that he who bears it is, by divine right, also authorized for all other church offices, and may validly perform them in cases where human order fails of its purpose: he misunderstands that he who holds the Ministry is greater than those who administer other church offices, and therefore may demand the precedence and honor from these, which they owe him. We agree therefore entirely with the author when he says: "How absurd it is for the servant to exalt himself over those whom he serves," without seeing in this any conflict with the Thesis.

The other part of the Thesis, however, namely, that all other church offices flow from the Ministry, the author denies outright. For, he says, this is arguing in a circle. Arguing in a circle would occur here if one said: the Ministry has the church power from the Church and the Church has it again from the Ministry. In the Thesis nothing of the kind is said; therefore a misunderstanding must again prevail here. Probably the expression "flow" has given occasion for it. The same can and shall mean nothing more than that Christ instituted only one office, and that therefore all church power is comprehended in this office in the wider sense of the word, so that, where there are various church offices, only human order has divided that power, and has assigned these parts to various persons. If one would therefore deny this Thesis, one would have to show that Christ instituted more offices than one. That no one can do, for God's Word does not suffer it, and the Herr Author naturally does not mean it either. The expression which he proposes in place of that used in the Thesis, "all preachers are of equal rank and the difference in this respect is only human order," leaves out the reason of it, namely, that the Ministry is the highest, and is only a single consequence from it.

Although the sender of this had to reject, according to his conviction, the said exceptions of the article reviewed, he can nevertheless not conceal his heartfelt joy that the work of Prof. Walther on Church and Ministry, and the doctrine of the Lutheran Church set forth in it, has found such recognition from so eminent a member of the English Lutheran Church of this country as the author of this article is, a joy which many a reader will surely share.

The July number of the Evangelical Review of this year contains the following articles. 1. The Influence of the Bible upon Literature. By the Rev. J. A. Seiss. 2. The Church as it is presented in the Confessions of Christendom. By the Rev. C. T. Krauth. 3. Contribution to Christology. Translated from the German work of Thomasius. 4. Remarks on Prophecy. By the Rev. J. Oswald. 5. Doctrine of the Scripture on the Resurrection of the Dead. By the Rev. T. Rizer. 6. The Jewels of Our People. By the Rev. J. F. Smith. 7. Letter to a Doubter. 8. Our Foreign Missionary Activity. 9. Tischendorf's Edition of the Septuagint. 10. Notices of Newly Published Works. 11. German Religious Periodicals. 12. Church News.

(Submitted.)

Herr Pastor Winkler in Detroit*) declares that he can at last give the readers of the "Informatorium" the "key" to Professor Crämer's doings in his congregation. And what is this key? It consists in this: Pastor Winkler claims to have made the discovery that the threads to the whole rabble-mischief in Detroit reach back to the year 1845, and were spun, not from St. Louis, but from Neuendettelsau in Franken, not through Prof. Walther, but really through Pfarrer Löhe. And indeed Herr Winkler gives the following explanation of the dreadful mystery of iniquity in No. 2 of the 3rd volume of the "Informatorium":

*) We take up this communication only because in it a member of our Ministerium defends himself against a slander which, if it contained truth, would make the enemies of the LORD blaspheme. Otherwise we beg earnestly that the poor "Lutheraner" be spared replies to personal revilings. A paper that keeps on railing and railing can revile no one any more, unless it be by praise. Ed.

"My preacher's post (!) in Detroit was already given to another in Germany; — therefore I was in the gentlemen's way. For several months the Lutheran people in Detroit had been negotiating with me about the acceptance of a call to them, and at last I followed the urgent call and entered upon my office in Detroit in the spring of 1845. — Later I read a writing from Germany: 'The talented young man F. Lochner' was destined for Detroit. — Map and Christian call to the ministry came here into hostile conflict."

Pastor Winkler has probably read the "Church Communications" still appearing in Franken, in which Pfarrer Löhe each time announced to the friends of the Lutheran Church of North America the sending forth of new pupils, and spoke of their suitable employment. With me the matter stood thus. A few months before my sending forth, Pf. Löhe was requested by one of his older pupils, Pastor Hattstädt in Monroe, to designate one of his pupils for Detroit, since the Lutheran congregation there was without a preacher and had turned to him with the request to help it to the obtaining of an upright preacher. Without any guile, therefore, Pf. Löhe, at my sending forth in March 1845, gave me the direction to go to Detroit and to accept the congregation there; without any guile he announced the appointment made to the readers of his paper; without any guile I submitted to his direction. It is possible that in the meantime the Detroit congregation had entered into negotiation with Pastor Winkler; but of that no one in Germany knew anything. On my arrival in America I visited the then President of the Michigan Synod, Pastor Schmidt at Ann Arbor, since I had with two other brethren the direction from Germany to join this Synod. From him I learned that the Detroit congregation had meanwhile called the then Prof. Winkler at Columbus, known to us already from his letters written to Pf. Löhe, and that he would enter upon his office there in 3 — 4 days. Since Pf. Schmidt now offered me the congregation in Toledo, Ohio, but I, upon closer acquaintance with its unionistic standpoint, had scruples about accepting a call thither, I seized an opportunity offering itself to make a journey to Detroit and in this matter to hear the counsel of Pastor Winkler, since he at that time had all my esteem and my full confidence. From then on I stood for a whole year as neighboring pastor in friendly correspondence with Pastor Winkler, and never was a syllable uttered by me as if I regretted not having come to Detroit, or as if I had any special designs upon Pastor Winkler's "preacher's post," and just as little did Pastor Winkler let it be heard that he suspected me on that account. But how I thought at that time concerning the filling of the Detroit congregation, be-