# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1849 06 26_S173
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

173

is not needed. As to the celebration of the Lord's Supper, Zwingli, more than was otherwise his custom, adhered to the forms of the Roman Mass. The Zurich church order of 1529, which originates from him, retains for the celebration of the Lord's Supper even the old pieces, the Gloria, the Kyrie, the Lectionenfest, although it alters the wording, the use and the sequence of them in many respects. But already the Basel church order of 1529 takes a decidedly different way. It divides the celebration of the Lord's Supper into two parts: the "Preparation for the Lord's Supper," which as to time may be separated from the celebration itself, and the celebration of the Lord's Supper itself, which may be attached to the preaching service. That preparation consists of a general confession and absolution, the singing of psalms, a common prayer for all the needs of the Church, and a lesson from the Holy Scripture concerning the Passion of Christ; but the celebration of the Lord's Supper itself consists of a short exhortation to the communicants, the Lord's Prayer, the words of institution, the distribution, and a prayer of thanksgiving. This, then, has also remained in the main the Reformed order. Other matters, as for example the difference in the formula of distribution, the varying procedure in the shaping and distribution of the bread, and so forth, need only be mentioned here. Into the middle between the Lutheran and the Reformed manner stand the uniting church orders, which one may divide into two classes. To the first belong those which attach themselves to the Reformed manner and endeavor to complete it somewhat, for example the Ulm church order of 1531, which agrees on the whole with the Basel order mentioned above and Lutheranizes only in the enlargement of certain individual pieces, for example in this, that they transform the exhortation to the communicants into a formal sermon on the use and benefit of the Lord's Supper, that they appoint the lesson of fitting passages of Scripture, and so forth. To the other class belong those church orders, for example the Württemberg, Baden, Hessian and others, which on the whole retain the Lutheran manner, but abridge it. Thus it is with them throughout the rule that they omit the Introit, Kyrie and Gloria, and in their place set only one or two German hymns; they further gladly replace the Kyrie, after the Reformed manner, by a confession of sins, to which, however, they then add, after the Lutheran manner, a form of absolution. Another point of offense to them is the double lesson of the Epistle and the Gospel. They therefore omit the one or the other, and then necessarily also the gradual, sometimes even the Collect. So it comes about that the most determined among them omit everything which the Lutheran order of service prescribes before the sermon, and that in its place they set only one or several hymns, namely "Come, Holy Ghost." With regard to the administration of the Sacrament, the Preface and Sanctus do not often occur in the uniting church orders, and if they have such things, they let the preacher speak them, whom they do not let sing at all. Frequently they appoint, after the exhortation to the communicants, after the Reformed custom, the reading of the general confession and absolution. Not seldom, finally, it happens that at the consecration the preacher does not speak the Lord's Prayer, but instead of it the congregation sings the hymn "Our Father, who art in heaven."

We have now still to set forth the Lutheran order of the secondary services, and indeed first of those which precede the chief service, the Saturday Vespers and the Sunday Matins, both of which date from the Middle Ages.

By Saturday Vespers is understood every Vespers preceding a Sunday or festival day, later called the afternoon service. Early on it was introduced in the Greek Church, and for this reason, that, guided by the Jewish custom of beginning the Sabbath with the evening before, it was regarded as an introduction to the chief service of Sunday, and in it men sought to present the whole time from the Fall until the birth of Christ as the time of waiting for the future salvation, in order thereby to prepare the congregation for the salvation to be preached in the service of the next day. This service soon passed from the Greek into the Roman Church, and was here later transformed into the Hora vespertina, or into the sixth of the seven hours of prayer (Horae canonicae, or Siebengezeit), which were prescribed for every day. The Lutheran Church retained the Saturday Vespers and its significance, but, guided by right principles, regarded the confessional service as the proper preparation for the chief service of the next day. Accordingly the Saturday Vespers in the Lutheran Church consists of two parts, of the Vespers proper and the confessional service. Concerning the latter, which after the Lutheran manner consists of catechetical examination, private confession and absolution, nothing further is to be said here. The arrangement of the former, however, is so manifold that almost every church order differs somewhat from the others in it; yet certain pieces occur in almost every order of Vespers, namely these: the singing of psalms, a Bible lesson, preferably from the Old Testament, and the Magnificat, then the Salutation, Versicle and Collect de tempore, and the Benedicamus (not the Benediction); at the close, perhaps, still "Lord, keep us in Thy Word," and then the confessional act begins.

With regard to the execution, however, a distinction is to be made between the church orders, in that most of them retain for the cities the frequent use of the Latin language, while in the country congregations they exchange it for the German; the fullest form of such a Vespers is the following: German psalm, German hymn de tempore, lesson, Magnificat, Salutation, Versicle and Collect, Benedicamus, Grant us peace, and so forth, and thereafter the confessional act.

The uniting church orders, like a few other church orders otherwise pure, have only a hymn sung at the beginning, then the address concerning repentance and the Lord's Supper (Beichtrede), directed from the pulpit to the confitents, and then the confessional act to follow; some among them, to be sure, let a hymn be sung also after this Beichtrede; others, however, omit even the hymn before the Beichtrede; yet always the result of this is that the Vespers service proper is wholly omitted and only the confessional act remains.

The Sunday Matins had in the Greek and then in the Roman Church the significance of an hour of praise and thanksgiving to God for the sending of His Son; the Lutheran Church has in general held fast to this significance. The sequence of the individual pieces is regularly this, that the singing of psalms goes first, the lessons, usually from the New Testament, come in the middle, and the Te Deum follows. When two lessons take place, then upon the first, the Old Testament one, follows the Te Deum, and upon the second, the New Testament one, the Benedictus; then the Matins, like the Vespers, comes to an end with the Salutation, Versicle, Collect and Benedicamus, perhaps also with "Grant us peace graciously."

To these pieces is added in larger cities the early sermon, so that the Sunday Matins, like the Saturday Vespers, receives two divisions, the praise by the singing of the pieces mentioned and the early sermon, which either precedes or follows the first division; if the early sermon precedes that praise, then the latter forms the introduction to the chief service.

As to the order for the country congregations, not only was the use of the Latin language exchanged for that of the German, but certain abridgments also came in. The fullest form of a rural Sunday Matins is: "German psalm, biblical lesson with summaries, read by the sexton, Te Deum, sung between sexton and congregation, or between preacher and sexton, Collect and Benedicamus. At the least, however, the Te Deum shall be sung by the preacher and sexton and be concluded with the versicle and collect belonging to it. — The uniting church orders have only the early sermon in the midst of hymns, and so omit the Matins proper altogether.

The Sunday Vespers, as the church orders appoint it for the larger cities, comprises a threefold content: the lesson together with the hymns and the like, as in the Saturday Vespers, then the sermon, mostly on the Epistle, for very seldom does catechization take place there, which then appears merely as an appendix to the first part of the Vespers. Finally, the use of the Te Deum. Accordingly the form of the Sunday Vespers is as a rule the following: singing of a psalm with intonation, antiphon, responsory, hymn or hymn de tempore, Epistle sermon, Magnificat, Nunc dimittis, Collect, Benedicamus, and thus there results as the purpose and sense of the Sun-