Chapter 5

24. Doctrinal Statements from 1829 to 1835.--The Pastoral Letter of the convention of the General Synod in Hagerstown (Haegerstadt), 1829, contains the following statements: The object of the General Synod is not to introduce absolute uniformity also in non-essential doctrines; such a unity did not exist in the early Christian congregations; it is sufficient to adhere to the fundamental tenets of the Reformation; every teacher and layman is entitled to use his Bible without being bound by any human confessions; the General Synod merely demands acceptance of the fundamental doctrines of the Gospel as taught in the Augsburg Confession, and leaves everything else unlimited; but she does not agree with those who absolutely reject all confessions of faith; the Church is in need of a confession in order to protect herself against the Socinians; most of the confessions, however, have lost themselves into minute (_spitzfindige_) and doubtful dogmas, and thus encouraged the spirit of superstition and schism, and naturally must continue to do so, the longer, the more; in every one of the different orthodox [evangelical] denominations, frequently, indeed, in the same congregation, there are persons who differ as much in their opinions as the confession of their Church differs from that of other Churches; accordingly, there is no reason why synods bearing the name of Luther should not unite with the General Synod, though differing in their views as to non-fundamentals; the General Synod has no power to call members of individual synods to account for aberrations in doctrine or life; the most it can do is to admonish such a synod to investigate the matter; however, a synod refusing to demand orthodoxy in fundamentals can be expelled from the General Synod; in brief, the four synods now constituting the General Body are so many independent ecclesiastical jurisdictions, united only in order to promote brotherly love, and to combine their forces in the execution of such things as are of general benefit, and which no individual synod could perform. (16.) "The General Synod therefore," says the letter of 1829, "only demands of those who are connected with her that they hold the fundamental doctrines of the Gospel as they are taught in the Augsburg Confession, and leaves all other things unlimited." "Why, then," the letter continues, "should not all those synods of our country that bear the name of our immortal Luther, and have always yet retained the chief traits of this sublime Reformer, be united by the tender bond of the General Synod, notwithstanding the different opinions which they may entertain in; some points which do not touch the foundation of the Augsburg Confession?" (16.) It was in accordance with the sentiments expressed in this letter when the General Synod at the same convention in Hagerstown adopted for its district synods a constitution with a form of licensure and ordination containing the questions: "Do you believe the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments to be the Word of God and the only infallible rule of faith and practise?" "Do you believe that the fundamental doctrines of the Holy Scriptures are taught in a manner substantially correct (wesentlich richtig) in the doctrinal articles of the Augsburg Confession?" (43. 45.) Prior to 1864 the General Synod as such, however, was not in any shape or manner committed to the Augsburg Confession constitutionally. In 1835, when the Constitution was amended, Synod as such remained non-committal. The doctrinal basis then adopted and embodied in the Constitution does not mention the Augsburg Confession. It reads as follows: "All regularly constituted Lutheran synods holding the fundamental doctrines of the Bible as taught by our Church, not now in connection with the General Synod, may at any time become associated with it by adopting this Constitution and sending delegates to its convention, according to the ratio specified in Art. II." (_Proceedings_ 1839, 49.) Evidently this deliverance, though marking an advance over the Constitution of 1820, intentionally omits a direct reference to the Augustana. Till 1864, then, the exact constitutional basis of the General Synod as such was not the Augsburg Confession, but the indefinite phrase: "the fundamental doctrines of the Bible as taught by our Church." All other confessional deliverances of the General Synod till 1864 may be summarized as follows: The fundamental doctrines of the Bible, _i.e._, the doctrines in which all evangelical (non-Socinian) Christians agree, are taught in a manner substantially correct in the doctrinal articles of the Augsburg Confession.

25. "A Solemn Farce."--The doctrinal basis of the General Synod, prior to 1864, is limited in more than one way. It does not embrace all of the Lutheran symbols. It includes only the twenty-one doctrinal articles of the Augustana. It binds only to the fundamental articles of the Bible. It presupposes that fundamental articles are such only as are agreed to by all evangelical Churches. It leaves the question whether all of those twenty-one articles of the Augsburg Confession are to be regarded as "fundamental doctrines of the Bible" undecided. It adopts the articles of the Augsburg Confession regarded as fundamental, not simply and absolutely, but merely as substantially correct." On the question of the ordination form of 1829 Krauth, Jr., commented in 1857 as follows: "What, then, is that question? We reply, in general: First, that the subject of her general affirmation is not the Book of Concord as a whole, but simply and purely the Augsburg Confession. Secondly, that not the entire Confession, but only the twenty-one articles of it which treat of doctrine, are specified in the affirmation. Thirdly, that only so far as these articles embrace _fundamental_ doctrines does she make an affirmation. Fourthly, that of these she affirms that they teach the doctrines in a correct manner, and defines the correctness as a _substantial_ one." (Spaeth, 1, 386.) J. L. Neve explains: "They [General Synod] considered what the Lutheran Church has in common with the other churches, and looked upon this as the fundamentals of Christianity, while the characteristic peculiarity of the Church of Luther, her special inheritance, was set aside as non-fundamental and unessential." (_Geschichte_, 90.) Accordingly, the General Synod, prior to 1864, did not subscribe to the distinctive doctrines of the Lutheran Church, but only to the doctrines held in common by the evangelical churches of Protestantism. Charles Philip Krauth, who was styled a Symbolist and Old Lutheran by the latitudinarians, declared in 1850, in his address before the General Synod at Charleston: "The terms of the subscription [to the Augustana] are such as to admit of the rejection of any doctrine or doctrines which the subscriber may not receive. It is subscribed or assented to as containing the doctrines of the Word of God substantially; they are set forth in substance; the understanding is that there are some doctrines in it not contained in the Word of God, but there is no specification concerning them. Every one could omit from his assent whatever he did not believe. The subscription did not preclude this. It is at once evident that a creed thus presented is no creed; that it is anything or nothing; that its subscription is a solemn farce." (Spaeth, 1, 370.)

BASIS INTERPRETED.

26. Authentic Explanation of Doctrinal Basis.--In his _Popular Theology_, published for the first time in 1834, S. S. Schmucker wrote: "The General Synod of the Lutheran Church has adopted only the twenty-one doctrinal articles, omitting even the condemnatory clauses of these, and also the entire catalog of Abuses corrected. No minister, however, considers himself bound to believe every sentiment contained in these twenty-one articles, but only the fundamental doctrines. Accordingly, the pledge of adoption required at licensure and ordination is couched in the following terms . . .: 'Do you believe that the _fundamental_ doctrines of the Word of God are taught in a manner _substantially_ correct in the doctrinal articles of the Augsburg Confession?' The Lutheran divines of this country are not willing to bind either themselves or others to anything more than the fundamental doctrines of the Christian revelation, believing that an immense mass of evil has resulted to the Church of God from the rigid requisition of extensive and detailed creeds. . . . We can see no sufficient warrant for any Christian Church to require as a term of admission or communion greater conformity of view than is requisite to harmony of feeling and successful cooperation in extending the kingdom of Christ. . . . Had the early Protestants endeavored to select the principal and fundamental doctrines of Christianity, required a belief of them from all applicants for admission into their ranks, and agreed among themselves that discrepance of views on matters of non-fundamental nature should neither be a bar to ecclesiastical communion nor fraternal affection, they would have saved the Church from the curse of those dissensions by which piety was in a great degree destroyed and on several occasions the very foundations of Protestantism shaken." (Edition of 1848, 50 ff.) In 1850, attacking Reynolds in the _Lutheran Observer_ on account of his defection from American Lutheranism, Schmucker stated: From the very outset the General Synod had abandoned the distinctive Lutheran doctrines, and nevertheless retained the Lutheran name; in spite of his deviations from the Lutheran symbols he, with perfect right, could call himself a faithful Lutheran. (_L._, 6, 139.) Schmucker, "the most authentic interpreter of the Constitution of the General Synod and that of its theological seminary," never identified the "fundamental doctrines of the Bible" with the twenty-one articles of the Augsburg Confession. According to him the fundamentals are obtained by striking from the Augustana everything that is objectionable to any Evangelical Church and retaining the remainder as the substance of Protestantism. All of the fundamental doctrines, Schmucker declared, are contained in the ecumenical creeds; everything else is trans-fundamental, not required by the General Synod for Christian union and communion. In his sermon at the convention in Winchester, 1853, Schmucker maintained that the essential, fundamental doctrines in which the General Synod demands agreement, are "the cardinal doctrines of the Reformation, the points of agreement between the different creeds of the sixteenth century," distinctive doctrines being points of non-essential, non-fundamental difference. According to Schmucker the General Synod's motto, "Uniformity in fundamentals and charity or liberty in non-fundamentals," never meant anything else than uniformity in the doctrines in which the evangelical denominations agree, and liberty with respect to distinctive tenets, also those of Lutheranism. In his _Lutheran Manual_ of 1855 Schmucker wrote: "The founders of the General Synod were men of enlarged, liberal, and Scriptural views of the kingdom of Christ. Convinced of the gradual abandonment of the whole mass of symbolical books in Germany, as well as from the personal examination of them, of their want of adaptedness to the age, they regarded it as the grand vocation of the American Church, released by Providence from civil servitude, to reconstruct her framework, assuming a more friendly attitude toward sister churches, and so organizing as to promote Scriptural union among Protestants, and to bring up our church-institutions to the increased light of Biblical study and Providential development. This enlightened, this millennial attitude of the founders of the General Synod, the writer can confidently affirm, from personal knowledge, having been well acquainted with the greater part of them, and having been present at Baltimore in 1819, when the formation of the Synod was, after ample discussion, resolved on; and at Hagerstown, in 1820, when the Constitution was formed. But the Constitution speaks for itself; for it invested the General Synod with power to form a new Confession of Faith, and new catechisms, suited to the progress of Biblical light and the developed views of the Church. Subsequently it was believed that the necessities of the case would be best met by the retention of the Augsburg Confession, on account of its importance as a link in the chain of historical Christianity, and by prescribing its _qualified_ adoption, _viz_., as to the fundamental aspects of Scripture doctrine. . . . It is an incontestable fact, which can easily be established, that the original standpoint of the General Synod, whilst controlled by the Pennsylvania Synod, was rejection of the binding authority of the old confessions. This is undeniably proved by their not even naming the Augsburg Confession in their Constitution, by their declining even a qualified recognition of it, and by their inserting a clause expressly giving authority to the General Synod to form a confession of faith; yea, even going further, and giving the same authority to each District Synod also. (See the original Constitution, Article III, Section 2.) It seems to me no intelligent and unprejudiced mind can resist this conclusion as to their doctrinal standpoint, whilst I and others who were present know it to have been as above stated." In his manuscript notes Schmucker says: "It is worthy of constant remembrance that during the first four centuries, under the immediate pupils of the inspired apostles and their successors, the voice of the universal Church under the whole heaven was that nothing more than fundamental agreement should be required for communion in the Christian Church and Christian ministry. Not a single orthodox church practised differently. All required assent only to the several ecumenical confessions, the so-called Apostles' and the Nicene Creeds. . . . No, the practise of binding the conscience of ministers and members to extended creeds, containing minor points, on which men in all churches and all ages have differed and ever will differ, and thus splitting up the Body of Christ without His authority, is, and must be, highly criminal. The fathers who founded the General Synod all considered the recognition of fundamentals as sufficient, and here, in this free country, determined to return to the practise of the earlier and purer centuries of the Church. These fathers were Drs. J. G. Schmucker, George Lochmann, C. Endress, F. W. Geissenhainer, Daniel Kurtz, H. A. Muhlenberg, P. F. Mayer, H. Schaeffer, and D. F. Schaeffer, Rev. Gottl. Shober, and Rev. Peter Schmucker, with their younger colaborers, Drs. Benjamin Kurtz, S. S. Schmucker [Charles Philip Krauth?]. [tr. note: sic] Holding this opinion, they did not introduce any recognition, even of the Augsburg Confession, into their original Constitution in 1820. But at the third meeting, in 1825, they adopted certain resolutions for the foundation of the theological seminary and statutes for its government, and bound its professors to the fundamental doctrines of Scripture as taught in the Augsburg Confession. They thus returned to the principles and practise of the earlier and purer centuries of the Church, when the influence of the Savior and His inspired apostles was more sensibly felt in the Church." (Spaeth, 1, 342. 337. 354.)

27. "Lutheran Observer" Interpreting Basis.--Apart from its coarseness and fanaticism, especially during the thirty years' editorship of Dr. B. Kurtz, the _Lutheran Observer_ has throughout its existence, from 1831 to 1916, always been an essentially correct exponent of the original doctrinal and confessional attitude of the General Synod. Consistently a General Synodist cannot disown the _Observer_ without renouncing the General Synod itself. Now, according to the _Observer_, the General Synod has always stood for unity in essentials, or fundamentals, and liberty in non-fundamentals, understanding by fundamentals those doctrines only in which Evangelical Christendom is agreed, and by non-fundamentals distinctive tenets, also those of Lutheranism. Quoting from Dr. S. Sprecher's inaugural address at Wittenberg College, Springfield, O., the _Lutheran Observer_, October 26, 1849, declared that Lutherans [of the General Synod], in adopting the confessions, "do not bind their conscience to more than what all evangelical Christians [denominations] regard as fundamental doctrines of the Bible. We are bound to believe only that the sublime plan of the Gospel is taught in the Augsburg Confession. This is the position held by the General Synod and by the American Lutheran Church in general, and this seems to have been the position also of the Church in the earlier and purer days of the Reformation." (_L._, 6, 57.) In 1860 the _Observer_ declared that the General Synod was organized on the basis of a compromise with respect to doctrines of minor import, such as the doctrine of the Lord's Supper, of the power of Baptism and of absolution. _Observer_, April 8, 1864: "We ought to be one in the doctrine of faith which embraces the fundamental doctrines of Christianity, while we should practise love with respect to other things. By fundamental doctrines we understand such and such only as are necessary to make a man a true child of God. . . . Who can be a Christian and deny the essence and existence of God, Christ, and the Holy Spirit, the atonement, the doctrines of repentance and faith in Christ, the necessity of justification before God and of sanctification of the heart, or the moral law as the rule of life, the doctrine of immortality and our future destination? These doctrines, which are essential to faith and Christian life, are fundamental and ought to be received by the heart and practised, while all other doctrines may be necessary more or less in order to perfect the Christian character and render it more symmetrical, but do not strike the heart of true religion." (_L. u. W._, 1864, 154.) _Observer,_ March 12 and 19, 1869: "The doctrinal basis of the General Synod demands adoption of the fundamental doctrines of the Word of God as taught in the Augsburg Confession, but she has never determined which doctrines she regards as fundamental and which not. Formerly she was satisfied with the general judgment of the Protestant world with respect to the fundamental articles of Christianity . . ., but during the last decade the question was extensively discussed: What is fundamental? We see no reason why the General Synod could not and should not supplement her basis by a definition and enumeration of the fundamental doctrines. . . . According to the universal judgment of the Church the doctrinal opinions in which the orthodox Protestant Churches differ are not fundamental, but non-fundamental doctrines. Whether God's decree of election is absolute or conditional; whether the corruption of the fallen nature of Adam was propagated or only the guilt of his sin was imputed to his descendants; whether the atonement is universal or limited to the elect; whether justification occurs by the imputation of the righteousness of Christ to believers or by the imputation of faith; whether the presence of Christ in the Lord's Supper is bodily or spiritual; whether the receiving of body and blood is by faith or by the mouth, is limited to believers or extends also to unbelievers; whether the church government is participated in by laymen or limited to the ministers; whether the Scriptural principles on this matter establish an hierarchy or democracy--these and many other questions are differently answered by different Protestant denominations, but without objectively destroying the ground of faith or subjectively the essence of faith. . . . In short, the doctrinal views which still separate the Protestant churches are not fundamental." (_L. u. W._, 1869, 121.)