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1. Historical Survey The term “Thirty Years’ War,” first used shortly after 1648, denotes the series of political and military engagements that had its focus in central Europe from 1618 to 1648 but that affected the whole of Europe in its complexity, course, and consequences. At the beginning of the 17th century France was still resisting Hapsburg encirclement, the Estates-General were battling for freedom against Spain (though there was a 12-year truce starting in 1609), and the Nordic kingdoms of…

[German Version] (Oct 22, 1639, Borgholzhausen, near Bielefeld – Jul 14, 1697, Kiel). After studying at Rostock and Straßburg (Strasbourg), he was appointed assistant pastor in Bielefeld in 1665 and in 1667 headmaster of a school there; for a while he was closely associated with the Labadists (J. de Labadie) in nearby Herford. In 1672 he was appointed superintendent in Lüneburg, and in 1689 was made general superintendent for Schleswig-Holstein and senior court chaplain in Gottorf. As a painstakin…

[German Version] (Nov 24, 1627, Ilmenau – Jul 8, 1661, Rostock). After studying in Rostock (M.A. in 1650) Großgebauer was deacon of St. Jacobi in Rostock from 1653 onward. Imbued with the reform zeal of the Rostock orthodoxy (II, 2) and influenced by the edifying literature of England, he fought against unbelief ( Praeservativ wider die Pest der heutigen Atheisten, 1661), lamented the futility of many sermons, and devised a radical church reform agenda in his Wächterstimme aus dem verwüsteten Zion (1661). His proposals: precedence of the pastoral ministry over the preaching…

[German Version] ( Jan 13, 1635, Rappoltsweiler, Elsass [Ribeauvillé, Alsace] – Feb 5, 1705, Berlin), father of Lutheran Pietism (I, 1). Son of a devout middle-class family with connections at court, he was brought up on edifying Puritan literature and J. Arndt’s Wahres Christentum. At the age of 16, he entered the University of Strasbourg (II); after foundation courses in philosophy (1653 master’s disserta-¶ tion against T. Hobbes), he studied the system of Lutheran orthodoxy (II, 2.a) under J.K. Dannhauer, a theology he remained faithful to throughout his…

[German Version] (Dec 6, 1650, Leipzig – Mar 30, 1712, Stettin). After his studies in Leipzig and Strasbourg, he became Saturday preacher in Leipzig in 1672, superintendent in Leisnig in 1673, superintendent in Grimma in 1678, and fourth professor of theology in Wittenberg in 1684. From 1686, he was ¶ principal pastor at St. Jakobi in Hamburg, and at the same time professor in Kiel; in 1701, he was appointed professor in Greifswald and Swedish general superintendent of Western Pomerania. Even if posterity remembers him only as the “hammerer of heretics and pietists” ( malleus haereticoru…

[German Version] (1614, Münzenberg – Feb 20, 1683, Giessen). After studying in Marburg, he taught at the Pädagogium and was Archidiakonus there. In 1652, he became professor of Hebrew and theology in Giessen; in 1654, director of the institute for stipend recipients; in 1654, doctor of theology; in 1656, superintendent; in 1676, professor primarius. Misler wrote, in addition to numerous disputations, dogmatic ( Orthodoxia iuxta seriem articulorum Formulae Concordiae, 1669) and controversial writings ( Speculum Anti-Jesuiticum, 1660), as well as sermons. Twice (1653 and…

[German Version] (Jun 15, 1635, Duisburg – Jan 1, 1693, Bremen). After studying from 1654 to 1658 in Utrecht (with G. Voetius), Duisburg (with Johannes Clauberg [1622–1665]), and Leiden (with ¶ J. Coccejus), Undereyck set out on an extensive study tour, visiting Switzerland, France, and England. His piety was shaped by Dutch precisianism (J. van Lodenstein). As a pastor in Mühlheim an der Ruhr from 1660 to 1668, Undereyck pressed for conversion and rebirth (Regeneration), called on people at home, and engaged in catechesis. F…

[German Version] (Nov 25, 1642, Vaihingen an der Enz – summer 1693, Rotterdam) began his studies at Tübingen in 1661, receiving his M.A. in 1664. In 1666 he was appointed lecturer at the Tübingen Stift, and in 1671 he became a deacon in Bietigheim, where he became an adherent of J. Böhme under the influence of L. Brunnquell, a neighboring pastor. He was valued at the Stuttgart court as a mathematician and astronomer; in his Cometo-Scopia (1681) he prophesied the rapidly approaching end of the world and the coming of the millennial kingdom. Suspended from office in 1686…

[German Version] (Feb 25, 1651, Wrocław [Breslau], Poland – Oct 4, 1689, Moscow), a chiliastic mystic. While still a student of jurisprudence in Jena, Kuhlmann came under the influence of the Lutheran mysticism of H. Müller and published a collection of poems entitled Himmlische Liebesküsse ([Heavenly love-kisses] 1671, repr. 1971). In the Netherlands, he underwent a process of transformation between 1674 and 1678, influenced by the writings of J. Böhme and the eschatological expectations of Johannes Rothe, which caused him to become a church-critical millennialist ( Neubegeister…

[German Version] (Jan 13, 1666, Kühndorf, near Meiningen – Jul 25, 1698, Berlin). While studying in Leipzig, Schade became a follower of A.H. Francke; he joined the Leipzig Collegium Philobiblicum and soon became a spokesman for the Pietist movement in Leipzig. Forced to leave Leipzig, in 1691 he became a deacon at Sankt Nikolai in Berlin, alongside P.J. Spener. There he preached revivalist sermons and led collegia pietatis. His polemic against perfunctory absolution as part of traditional penitential practice (“Beichtstuhl, Satansstuhl, Feuerpfuhl,” linking th…

[German Version] (Nov 5, 1607, Cologne – May 14, 1678, Wieuvert, Friesland), daughter of Dutch Reformed parents, she lived in Utrecht after 1623 and was allowed to study at the university there (e.g. with G. Voetius). Her outstanding erudition and linguistic facility, coupled with artistic talent, gained her renown as the “prodigy of her time.” She corresponded with many scholars, including R. Descartes and Christian Huyghens, and defended the right of women to engage in scientific studies ( Dissertatio de ingenii muliebris ad doctrinam et meliores litteras aptitudine, 1643). Late…

[German Version] is the name given to the drawn-out controversies in the second half of the 17th century between high Lutheran orthodoxy (II, 2.a.β) and the union efforts of G. Calixtus and the University of Helmstedt, suspected of religious “syncretism.” Repelled by the horrors of the Thirty Years War, Calixtus shifted from polemics to irenics, calling for toleration and ecclesiastical peace between the confessions on the basis of a shared doctrinal foundation from the Early Church ( consensus antiquitatis). When the Jesuits rejected his plans for a reunion of the univer…

[German Version] (Sep 7, 1642, Leipsdorf, Saxony – Oct 22, 1721, Leipzig). After studying philosophy, history, and theology, Rechenberg began teaching in 1665 at the University of Leipzig; in 1677 he was appointed professor of philology and history. Through his fourth marriage (1686), to P.J. Spener’s eldest daughter Susann Catharina, he had close ties with Pietism. His appointment to succeed J.B. Carpzov (2) as professor of theology in 1699 effected a reversal in the attitude of the Leipzig theological faculty, which had been hostile to Pietism. His 1700 disputation De gratiae revo…

[German Version] (Dec 15, 1608, Demmin, Hither Pomerania – Oct 18, 1655, Wolfenbüttel). During his time as a student in Straßburg (Strasbourg), Lütkemann was influenced decisively by Johann Schmidt. After travels in Italy and France, he received his master's degree from the philosophical faculty at Rostock, where he was appointed professor of metaphysics and physics in 1643. Appointed deacon in the church of Sankt Jacobi in 1648, he gained a reputation as an outstanding preacher. Forced to leave M…

[German Version] I. Church History 1. Germany and Europe. Protestantism is a synoptic term for all the Christian churches and groups with roots in the 16th-century Reformation. The term embraces the Lutheran and Reformed confessional churches (Lutheranism, Reformed churches) that emerged directly from the Reformation as well as the Anabaptist movements, the Anglican Church (with some qualifications), and the churches and Free churches associated indirectly with the Reformation that came into being later …

[German Version] (Feb 18, 1683, Detmold – Dec 8, 1729, Bremen) was the most influential German Reformed theologian of the 18th century. Educated at the academic Gymnasium in Bremen under C. de Hase in the spirit of Reformed Precisism (G. Voetius), Lampe completed his theological studies in Franeker under C. Vitringa, who acquainted him with the chiliastically transformed covenant theology of J. Cocceius. In 1703, he became preacher in Weeze ¶ near Kleve, in 1706 parish priest in Duisburg, and from 1709 parish priest at St. Stephani in Bremen. In 1720, he became pro…

[German Version] (May 1, 1661, Mörz, near Belzig – Sep 5, 1709, Wittenberg). Neumann grew up in Zittau, where he studied in the Gymnasium with the influential polyhistor Christian Weise, to whom he remained attached throughout his life. After studies at Wittenberg, he was appointed adjunct on the philosophical faculty in 1681 and professor of poetics and university librarian in 1690. In 1692 he was appointed professor of theology, synodal assessor, and provost of the castle church in Wittenberg. N…

[German Version] (Sep 22, 1662, Leipzig – Aug 24, 1732, Frankfurt am Main). After studying in Leipzig, Pritius became Saturday preacher at the Nikolaikirche in Leipzig (1690), minister and professor at the Gymnasium in Zerbst (1698), and superintendent in Schleiz (1701). In 1705 he traveled to Holland and England; in 1708 he became pastor at the Marienkirche, Greifswald, and professor of theology there; in 1711, senior of the Lutheran Ministry of Preachers in Frankfurt am Main. At an early age he …

[German Version] (Dec 29, 1673, Sondershausen – Feb 12, 1749, Dresden). As the son of the Wittenberg professor of theology Caspar Löscher (1636–1718), Valentin Löscher also studied in Wittenberg. After a study tour (extending as far as Holland and Denmark), he received a master's degree and became an adjunct to the faculty of philosophy in 1692. He was appointed pastor and superintendent in Jüterbog (1699), superintendent in Delitzsch (1702), professor of theology in Wittenberg (1707), pastor of t…

[German Version] (Apr 10, 1579, Dannenberg – Sep 17, 1666, Wolfenbüttel). After studying in Rostock, Tübingen, and Strasbourg, and journeying to Italy, France, and England, August led a withdrawn, scholar's life from 1604 to 1634 in Hitzacker, where he collected books and art treasures, and corresponded with, for example, J.V. Andreae. His court preacher Heinrich Varenius lent his …