1. General
1.1. Definition
Until well into the 20th century, the term church order always referred only to the legal systems of the churches in the territories of the Holy Roman Empire in which the Reformation had been established, negating any continuation of canon law (Ecclesiastical law). Quite recently the term has also been applied to texts composed between the 2nd and 5th centuries that deal with questions of how life should be ordered in the Christian communities […