Above:  The Title Page of the Presbyterian Hymnal (1911) with the Supplement of 1917

Scan by Kenneth Randolph Taylor

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World War I (1914-1918) was a devastating conflict which changed the map of the world.  Many of the problems of today have much to do with that war and the events of the years immediately following it.  Europeans promised the same territory to both Jews and Palestinians, created Iraq (where the British military became bogged down in an insurgency for years), broke up empires, and created new countries, some of which (Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia) which have ceased to exist.  U.S. President Woodrow Wilson (in office 1913-1921) oversold the conflict as a war to make the world safe for democracy.  Meanwhile, back home in the United States, which entered the war in 1917, early in Wilson’s second term, which he won on the slogan “He Kept Us Out of War,” xenophobia, nativism, and irrationality reigned.  The city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, banned performances of the music of Ludwig von Beethoven, an anti-imperialist who died in 1827.  Had the great composer been alive in 1917 and 1918, he would have opposed the policies of Kaiser Wilhelm II.  But why let reason stand between one and an irrational fear?  Mobs burned books in the German language or about Germany, vandalized buildings belonging to congregations where worship was not in English, dachshunds became liberty hounds, the state of Iowa outlawed public gatherings where the spoken language was not English (although many sheriffs in the state permitted Danish Lutheran congregations to worship in Danish), et cetera.  Opposing state-sponsored violence became a crime, one for which many pacifists went to prison and conscientious objectors suffered.  Really, were the Amish, Mennonites, and Quakers threats to national security?  Were the Dutch Reformed (of the Christian Reformed Church in North America in particular) and the Lutherans (especially those in the denominations we call The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod and the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod these days) worshiping in other tongues that threatening?  In November 1918, at the organizing convention of the newly merged United Lutheran Church in America (1918-1962), derived from German immigrant stock in North America since the 1700s, delegates felt the need to demonstrate their patriotism by singing “The Star-Spangled Banner” and “America,” due to lingering suspicions related to Germany, German-Americans, and the war.

The study of the past tells me that the war did not live up to its billing, that wartime hysteria and intolerance turned into widespread disillusionment, and that the psychological scars of the “Great War” or the “World War,” as people called it before World War II, influenced national decision-making (often for the worse) leading up to World War II.  Accounts of the “Lost Generation” and the false sense of security the Maginot Line engendered testify to the aftershocks of World War I.

These and other facts influence how I read certain texts from World War I and the time immediately following it.  How can they not, given my temporal relationship to that conflict?

During that war and immediately afterward some denominations amended their recent official hymnals.  The Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. added the “Supplement of 1917” to its Hymnal of 1911.  This supplement consisted of three patriotic hymns:  “God of Our Fathers, Known of Old,” “The Star-Spangled Banner,” and the “Battle Hymn of the Republic.”  The National Council of Congregational Churches of the United States added three hymns to The Pilgrim Hymnal (1912) after the war.  Hymns #542a-c were, respectively, “O Land of Lands, My Fatherland,” “The Star-Spangled Banner,” and “America, America, The Shouts of War Shall Cease.”  “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” was already present.

Two of those texts intrigue me.  The first is “O Land of Lands, My Fatherland.”  The author was the Reverend Washington Gladden (February 11, 1836-July 2, 1918), whose feast day in The Episcopal Church is July 2.  Gladden, a proponent of the Social Gospel, opposed corruption in government, favored civil rights for African Americans, and supported the labor movement.  He wrote many poems (including hymns), the most famous of which might be “O Master, Let Me Walk with Thee.”  In 1918 he composed the following text:

O Land of lands, my Fatherland, the beautiful, the free,

All lands and shores to freedom dear and ever dear to thee;

All sons of Freedom hail thy name, and wait thy word of might,

While round the world the lists are joined for liberty and light.

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Hail, sons of France, old comrades dear! Hail Britons brave and true!

Hail Belgian martyrs ringed with flame! Slavs fired with visions new!

Italian lovers mailed with light! Dark brothers from Japan!

From East to West all lands are kin who live for God and man.

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Here endeth war!  Our bands are sworn! Now dawns the better hour

When lust of blood shall cease to rule, when Peace shall come with power;

We front the fiend that rends our race and fills our hearts with gloom;

We break his scepter, spurn his crown, and nail him in his tomb.

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Now, hands all round, our troth we plight to rid the world of lies,

To fill all hearts with truth and trust and willing sacrifice;

To free all lands from hate and spite and fear from strand to strand;

To make all nations neighbors and the world one Fatherland!

The second text was, as the hymnal labeled it, “A National Hymn of Victory Inscribed to the Builders of the ‘League of Nations.'”  The author was the Reverend Allen Eastman Cross (December 30, 1864-April 23, 1942), a Congregationalist minister from Manchester, New Hampshire.

America, America!

The shouts of war shall cease;

The Glory dawns! the Day is come

Of Victory and Peace!

And now upon a larger plan

We’ll build the common good,

The temple of the Love of Man,

The House of Brotherhood!

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What though its stones were laid in tears,

Its pillars red with wrong,

Its walls shall rise through patient years

To soaring spires of song!

For on this House shall Faith attend,

With Joy on airy wing,

And flaming loyalty ascend

To God, the only King!

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America, America,

Ring out the glad refrain!

Salute the Flag–salute the dead

That have not died in vain!

O Glory! Glory to thy plan

To build the common good,

The temple of the Rights of Man,

The House of Brotherhood!

To mock the optimism and idealism of the texts is easy to do, but I propose that to do so is in error.  No, these hymns did not predict the future accurately.  Yes, the brutality of history since World War I has belied these texts’ highest sentiments, but the dream those hymns represent has never ceased to be a noble one.  The texts are of their time in two senses:  certain references to nations and the level of optimism regarding the future.  Without a goal to which to aspire, however, how are we humans supposed to improve the world?

I value precision in language, so I mark the difference between the Social Gospel and Neo-Orthodoxy.  The former is more optimistic regarding human potential for effecting goodness than is the latter.  Neo-Orthodoxy, with its sober understanding of human nature, incorporates the best of the Social Gospel and emphasizes the human obligation to reform society and its structures for the better while stating that only God can usher in the Kingdom of God.  I read these quoted hymns through my lens of Neo-Orthodoxy and recognize a combination of naiveté and realism as I mourn the fact of those dashed hopes.  May nobody permit pessimism to prevent one from doing what one can to leave the world (or one’s corner of it) better than one found it.  God can save the world, but we can improve it.  We can love our neighbors as we love ourselves and seek to reform unjust social systems and institutions.  We have a moral imperative to do so.

KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

JULY 26, 2015 COMMON ERA

PROPER 12:  THE NINTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

THE FEAST OF SAINTS ANNE AND JOACHIM, PARENTS OF SAINT MARY OF NAZARETH

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SOURCES IN PRINT

I have provided hyperlinks to some sources.  My other sources were:

Bachmann, E. Theodore, with Mercia Brenne Bachmann.  The United Lutheran Church in America, 1918-1962.  Edited by Paul Rorem.  Minneapolis, MN:  Fortress Press, 1997.

Holy Women, Holy Men:  Celebrating the Saints.  New York:  Church Publishing, 2010.

Mortenen, Enok.  The Danish Lutheran Church in America:  The History and Heritage of the American Evangelical Lutheran Church.  Philadelphia, PA:  Board of Publication, Lutheran Church in America, 1967.

The Hymnal Published in 1895 and Revised in 1911 by Authority of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America; with the Supplement of 1917.  Philadelphia, PA:  The Presbyterian Board of Publication and Sabbath-School Work.

The Pilgrim Hymnal with Responsive Readings and Other Aids to Worship.  Boston, MA:  The Pilgrim Press, 1912.  Amended and reprinted, 1919.

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Above:  My Copies of the Service Book and Hymnal (1958) and The Lutheran Liturgy (1959), July 22, 2013

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U.S. LUTHERAN LITURGY, PART XI

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Holy art thou, almighty and Merciful God, Holy art thou, and great is the majesty of thy glory.

Thou didst so love the world as to give thine only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him might not perish, but have everlasting life; Who, having come into the world to fulfill for us thy holy will and to accomplish all things for our salvation, IN THE NIGHT IN WHICH HE WAS BETRAYED, TOOK BREAD; AND WHEN HE HAD GIVEN THANKS, HE BRAKE IT AND GAVE IT TO HIS DISCIPLES, SAYING TAKE, EAT; THIS IS MY BODY, WHICH IS GIVEN FOR YOU; THIS DO IN REMEMBRANCE OF ME.

AFTER THE SAME MANNER ALSO, HE TOOK THE CUP, WHEN HE HAD SUPPED, AND, WHEN HE HAD GIVEN THANKS, HE GAVE IT TO THEM, SAYING, DRINK YE ALL OF IT; THIS CUP IS THE NEW TESTAMENT IN MY BLOOD, WHICH IS SHED FOR YOU, AND FOR MANY, FOR THE REMISSION OF SINS; THIS DO, AS OFT AS YE DRINK IT, IN REMEMBRANCE OF ME.

Remembering, therefore, his salutary precept, his life-giving Passion and Death, his glorious Resurrection and Ascension and the promise of his coming again, we give thanks to thee, O Lord God Almighty, not as we ought, but as we are able; and we beseech thee mercifully to accept our praise and thanksgiving, and with thy Word and Holy Spirit to bless us, thy servants, and these thine gifts of bread and wine, so that we and all who partake thereof may be filled with heavenly benediction and grace, and, receiving the remission of sins, be sanctified in soul and body, and have our portion with thy saints.

And unto thee, O God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, be all honor and glory in thy holy Church, world without end.  Amen.

–The Prayer of Thanksiving, as printed on page 11 of the Service Book and Hymnal (1958)

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I.  TECHNICAL NOTE

This post, being Part XI of an ongoing series, flows from previous entries, links to which I have provided here:  https://blogatheologica.wordpress.com/2013/07/12/guide-to-posts-about-lutheran-worship/.

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II.  INTRODUCTION

The Service Book and Hymnal (1958), prepared and authorized by eight denominations, superceded five official hymnals-service books:

1. The Common Service Book (1917), of The United Lutheran Church in America (ULCA);
2. The Hymnal and Order of Service (1925), of the Augustana Evangelical Lutheran Church; used also by the Finnish Evangelical Lutheran Church in America since 1930;
3. The Hymnal for Church and Home (1927, 1938, and 1949), of the two Danish-American synods, The United Evangelical Lutheran Church and the American Evangelical Lutheran Church;
4. The American Lutheran Hymnal (1930), of The American Lutheran Church (1930-1960); and
5. The Lutheran Hymnary (1935), of The Evangelical Lutheran Church.

The Service Book and Hymnal also superceded (for the hymnody, at least), The Concordia Hymnal (1932), which The Lutheran Free Church did not authorize but did encourage the use of as its unofficial hymnal.

One of the functions of multi-synodical U.S. Lutheran hymnals and service books has been to foster unity.  Thus new hymnals-service books across denominational lines have preceded mergers.  Examples include:

• The Lutheran Hymnary (1913), four years before the merger;
• the Common Service Book (1917), one year before the merger;
• the Service Book and Hymnal (1958), before mergers in 1960, 1962, and 1963; and
• the Lutheran Book of Worship (1978), nine years before the merger.

The second American Lutheran Church formed by union in 1960; The Lutheran Free Church joined it three years later.  And the Lutheran Church in America came into existence via merger in 1962.  Thus the Service Book and Hymnal (hereafter abbreviated as SBH), became the hymnal of two denominations.

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III.  BACKGROUND

In 1944 the ULCA, pondering the revision of its Common Service Book (1917), resolved to cooperate with as many Lutheran bodies as possible in creating the next hymnal-service book.  The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod, having published its Lutheran Hymnal in 1941 (https://blogatheologica.wordpress.com/2013/07/25/o-come-let-us-sing-unto-the-lord-the-lutheran-hymnal-1941/), declined to participate.  The Joint Commission on the Hymnal, organized in 1945, got down to work with Dr. Luther D. Reed as the chairman.

Aside:  Reed’s account of the preparation process in The Lutheran Liturgy (1959 edition) is thorough without being tedious.  I, seeing no need to paraphrase all of that account here, refer my readers to that fine volume.

Among the issues the representatives of the eight denominations needed to resolve was the plethora of minute differences in their respective variations of the Common Service.  Muhlenberg’s dream of “one church, one book” lived in the minds of many who labored to make the SBH.  When all was accomplished, the Joint Commission had prepared a revolutionary yet traditional resource–a milestone of U.S. Lutheran liturgy.

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IV.  LITURGY

The SBH (1958) contains 314 pages of liturgy and 602 hymns.  This volume, the new book of worship for about two-thirds of U.S. Lutherans, deserves much analysis, a short version of which follows.  The complete, book-length analysis comes courtesy of Luther D. Reed, in the 1959 edition of The Lutheran Liturgy.

The SBH Music Edition contains only part of the ritual.  Other material, such as the occasional services, comes bound separately and in the Text Edition.  I am writing based on the Music Edition, which refers one to the Text Edition for

the whole body of liturgical services.

–page x

The Calendar looks familiar from the Common Service Book (1917), with two additions which attract my attention.  All Saints’ Day (November 1) and the Feast of the Holy Innocents (1958) are new.

The Common Service is present, excluding all other rituals for the Holy Communion.  There are, however, two major differences between this variation on it and the 1888 original version:

1. Although the Church is still “Christian” in the Creeds, there is a footnote which mentions that the use of “catholic” is “the traditional and generally accepted text.”  Reed’s disapproval of the continued substitution of “Christian” for “catholic” notwithstanding, at least he got an asterisk and a footnote to make an accurate point.  It was a partial victory.
2. There is now a Lutheran Canon/Prayer of Thanksgiving.  Reed had proposed one in the 1947 edition of The Lutheran Liturgy (pages 336-337) after arguing for the existence of such a Eucharistic Prayer (on pages 331-336).  His 1947 proposed Prayer of Thanksgiving resembles the 1958 Prayer closely, for he and Paul Zeller Strodach collaborated on the final version, which I reproduced at the beginning of this post.  Variation of the 1958 Prayer of Thanksgiving appears in the Missouri Synod’s Worship Supplement (1969) and Lutheran Service Book (2006), the ecumenical Lutheran Book of Worship (1978), and Evangelical Lutheran Worship (2006), of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA).

There are also the usual prayers and services one expects in such a Lutheran book:  Matins, Vespers, Collects, Introits, Baptism, Confession, Burial of the Dead, and Marriage.  The lectionary, which supports the services Eucharistic and otherwise, is a one-year cycle with three readings per day.

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V.  CONCLUSION

As I ponder the SBH in historical context, I recognize it as an intermediate step.  The Nicene Creed is still in the first-person singular and the Church is still “Christian,” for example, but that began to change by the late 1960s and early 1970s.  Most importantly from a liturgical point of view, the restoration of the Canon was a great step forward, one which the Missouri Synod accepted within eleven years, and which other more conservative synods have continued to reject.  Nevertheless, the ultra-conservative Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod (WELS) added the canon to a service in its Christian Worship:  Supplement (2008).

The SBH was a great advance, one on which that which followed during the next twenty years built and expanded.

Next:  Lord of Heaven and Earth:  The Lutheran Book of Worship (1978).

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KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

JULY 25, 2013 COMMON ERA

THE FEAST OF SAINT JAMES BAR-ZEBEDEE, APOSTLE AND MARTYR

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Ambassador Hymnal for Lutheran Worship.  Minneapolis, MN:  Association of Free Lutheran Congregations, 1994.

Christian Worship:  A Lutheran Hymnal.  Milwaukee, WI:  Northwestern Publishing House, 1993.

Commission on the Liturgy and Hymnal, The.  Service Book and Hymnal.  Music Edition.  Philadelphia, PA:  United Lutheran Publication House, 1958.

Common Service Book of the Lutheran Church.  Philadelphia, PA:  The Board of Publication of The United Lutheran Church in America, 1917, 1918.

Concordia Hymnal, The:  A Hymnal for Church, School and Home.  Minneapolis, MN:  Augsburg Publishing House, 1932.

Evangelical Lutheran Hymnary.  St. Louis, MO:  MorningStar Music Publishers, Inc., 1996.

Evangelical Lutheran Synodical Conference of North America, The.  The Lutheran Hymnal.  St. Louis, MO:  Concordia Publishing House, 1941.

Evangelical Lutheran Worship.  Minneapolis, MN:  Augsburg Fortress, 2006.

Fevold, Eugene L.  The Lutheran Free Church:  A Fellowship of American Lutheran Congregations, 1897-1963.  Minneapolis, MN:  Augsburg Publishing House, 1969.

Hymnal and Order of Service, The.  Lectionary Edition.  Rock Island, IL:  Augustana Book Concern, 1925.

Hymnal for Church and Home.  3d. Ed.  Blair, NE:  Danish Lutheran Publishing House, 1938.

Inter-Lutheran Commission on Worship.  Lutheran Book of Worship.  Ministers Desk Edition.  Philadelphia, PA:  Board of Publication, Lutheran Church in America, 1978.

__________.  Lutheran Book of Worship.  Pew Edition.  Philadelphia, PA:  Board of Publication, Lutheran Church in America, 1978.

Inter-Lutheran Commission on Worship for Provisional Use.  Contemporary Worship 2:  Services–The Holy Communion.  Philadelphia, PA:  Board of Education, Lutheran Church in America, 1970.

Lutheran Hymnary Including the Symbols of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, The.  Minneapolis, MN:  Augsburg Publishing House, 1935.

Lutheran Intersynodical Hymnal Committee.  American Lutheran Hymnal.  Music Edition.  Columbus, OH:  The Lutheran Book Concern, 1930.

Lutheran Service Book.  St. Louis, MO:  Concordia Publishing House, 2006.

Melton, J. Gordon.  Encyclopedia of American Religions.  4h. Ed.  Washington, DC:  Gale Research, Inc., 1993.

Pfatteicher, Phiip H.  Commentary on the Lutheran Book of Worship:  Lutheran Liturgy in Its Ecumenical Context.  Minneapolis, MN:  Augsburg Fortress, 1990.

Pfatteicher, Philip H., and Carlos R. Messerli.  Manual on the Liturgy:  Lutheran Book of Worship.  Minneapolis, MN:  Augsburg Publishing House, 1979.

Reed, Luther D.  The Lutheran Liturgy:  A Study in the Common Service of the Lutheran Church in America.  Philadelphia, PA:  Muhlenberg Press, 1947.

__________.  The Lutheran Liturgy:  A Study in the Common Liturgy of the Lutheran Church in America.  2d. Ed.  Philadelphia, PA:  Fortress Press, 1959.

Stulken, Marilyn Kay.  Hymnal Companion to the Lutheran Book of Worship.  Philadelphia, PA:  Fortress Press, 1981.

Wentz, Abdel Ross.  The Lutheran Church in American History.  2d. Ed.  Philadelphia, PA:  The United Lutheran Publication House, 1933.

With One Voice:  A Lutheran Resource for Worship.  Minneapolis, MN:  Augsburg Fortress, 1995.

Worship Supplement.  St. Louis, MO:  Concordia Publishing House, 1969.

I also found some PDFs helpful:

Christian Worship:  Supplement Introductory Resources.  Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod, 2008.

DeGarmeaux, Bruce.  “O Come, Let Us Worship!  A Study of Lutheran Liturgy and Hymnody.”  1995.

Schalk, Carl.  ”A Brief History of LCMS Hymnals (before LSB).”  Based on a 1997 document; updated to 2006.  Copyrighted by The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod.

Zabell, Jon F.  “The Formation of Function of WELS Hymnals:  Further Conversation.”  For the National Conference of Worship, Music, and the Arts, July 2008.

KRT

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Above:  Trinity Lutheran Church, Altenburg, Missouri

Image Created by the Historic American Buildings Survey

Image Source = Library of Congress

(http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/mo0834.photos.097577p/)

Reproduction Number = HABS MO,79-ALBU,3–2

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U.S. LUTHERAN LITURGY, PART X

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We would gladly behold the day when the One, Holy, Catholic, Christian Church shall use one Order of Service, and unite in one Confession of Faith.

–From the Preface to the Common Service (1888); Quoted in Common Service Book of the Lutheran Church (1917), page 308

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O come, let us sing unto the Lord:

let us make a joyful noise to the Rock of our salvation.

–The Venite from Matins, The Common Service (1888), as contained in The Lutheran Hymnal (1941), page 33

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I.  PREFACE

In the first post in this series (https://blogatheologica.wordpress.com/2013/07/14/muhlenbergs-dream-the-road-to-the-common-service-1748-1888/) I covered the material from 1748 (the founding of the Ministerium of Pennsylvania) to 1788 (the approval of the Common Service).  Then, in Part II (https://blogatheologica.wordpress.com/2013/07/17/the-missing-canon-the-common-service-1888/), I wrote about the Common Service itself.  Parts III-X cover the span of 1888-1941, culminating with The Lutheran Hymnal.  The Common Service had, with the adoption of The Lutheran Hymnal (1941), become nearly universal among U.S. Lutherans.  By 1941 the liturgy was either THE Sunday ritual or a ritual in most current and official U.S. Lutheran service books.  The process of becoming universal was not, however, without some controversy.

One might want to read a previous post about Missouri Synod liturgies (https://blogatheologica.wordpress.com/2013/07/18/my-soul-doth-magnify-the-lord-missouri-synod-liturgies-1847-1940/) before proceeding with the rest of this one.  I refer also to Norwegian-American Lutheran bodies, which I discussed in another previous post (https://blogatheologica.wordpress.com/2013/07/20/that-by-thy-grace-we-may-come-to-everlasting-life-norwegian-american-lutherans-1853-1963/).

I have been studying this material closely, trying to record information accurately as I have reviewed primary and secondary sources.  This has required a commitment of much time, for there are so many synods about which to read.  And, since I grew up United Methodist in southern Georgia, U.S.A., in the Baptist Belt, Lutherans were scarce, if present at all, when I was quite young.  My spiritual journey has taken me into The Episcopal Church.  Anglicanism and Lutheranism have many theological and liturgical similarities and considerable theological overlap, but my adopted vantage point is still one outside of Lutheranism.  If I have misstated anything, I can correct it.

The material is, by its nature, complicated.  I have tried to organize and format it for maximum ease of reading and learning, however.  So, without further ado, I invite you, O reader, to follow the proverbial bouncing balls with me.

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II.  INTRODUCTION

The Lutheran Hymnal (1941), hereafter abbreviated as TLH (1941), stands alongside a few other books of its sort as milestones in twentieth-century U.S. Lutheran history.   Those volumes include:

• The Lutheran Hymnary (1913), by Norwegian-Americans;
• the Common Service Book (1917), by predecessor bodies of The United Lutheran Church in America;
• The Concordia Hymnal (1932), by Norwegian-Americans;
• the Service Book and Hymnal (1958), by predecessor bodies of The American Lutheran Church and the Lutheran Church in America;
• the Lutheran Book of Worship (1978), by predecessor bodies of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America; and
• Lutheran Worship (1982), by The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod (LCMS).

TLH (1941), still in use in some Confessional Lutheran congregations of various denominations, is a classic product of the late Synodical Conference (1872-1966/1967).  At least three current Lutheran successor hymnals of TLH (1941) echo it.  They are, in chronological order:

• Christian Worship:  A Lutheran Hymnal (1993), by the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod (WELS);
• the Evangelical Lutheran Hymnary (1996), by The Evangelical Lutheran Synod (ELS); and
• the Lutheran Service Book (2006), by The LCMS.

TLH (1941) succeeded three hymnals-service books:

• the Evangelical Lutheran Hymn-Book (1912) (http://www.projectwittenberg.org/etext/hymnals/ELHB1912/index.htm), by the Missouri Synod;
• The Lutheran Hymnary (1913) (http://archive.org/details/lutheranhymnary00amergoog), by Norwegian-Americans and used by The Evangelical Lutheran Synod (1918-), a successor of one of the denominations which produced it; and
• the Book of Hymns (1917), by the WELS.

TLH (1941) expanded on parts of all three books and contracted others.  Absent were former services and many Scandinavian hymns, replaced by more German hymns and the Common Service.  These facts caused consternation among many members of the Evangelical Lutheran Synod (ELS) and the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod (WELS).  So there was an adjustment period required.  And many ELS congregations continued to use The Lutheran Hymnary (1913) instead and some WELS Lutherans complained that the services in TLH (1941) were too formal.  Yet TLH (1941) became to many Confessional Lutherans what The Book of Common Prayer (1928) and The Hymnal 1940 became to many traditionalist Episcopalians and Anglicans:  the gold standard.

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III.  LITURGIES IN THE LUTHERAN HYMNAL (1941)

The Calendar, found on page 3, provides the usual well-developed Missouri Synod church year plus two notable additions:  the Feasts of Saint Mary Magdalene (July 22) and the Holy Innocents (December 22).  Alas, there is no Feast of Saint Thomas the Apostle yet.  But at least the next hardcover book in the series, Lutheran Worship (1982), has that.

The services come from the Common Service of 1888.  There are four rituals:

• The Order of Morning Service without Communion;
• The Order of Holy Communion;
• The Order of Matins; and
• The Order of Vespers.

And the Church is still “Christian,” not “Catholic,” in the Apostles’ and Nicene Creeds.  It becomes “catholic” in later LCMS resources, Worship Supplement (1969) and Contemporary Worship 2:  Services–The Holy Communion (1970) yet reverts to being “Christian” in subsequent Missouri Synod books, Lutheran Worship (1982), Hymnal Supplement 98 (1998), and the Lutheran Service Book (2006).  And the Church remains “Christian” in the present worship materials of The ELS and the WELS.

This seems like an excellent time to consult the writings of Luther D. Reed and Philip H. Pfatteicher, two great scholars of Lutheran liturgy.

Reed, in his magisterial studies, The Lutheran Liturgy (1947 and 1959), writes that German Roman Catholics referred to the Church as “Christian,” not “Catholic,” liturgically even before the Protestant Reformation started and that Martin Luther retained the practice.  Yet Lutheran liturgies from Sweden, Denmark, Norway, and France referred to the Church as “Catholic.  Nevertheless, my studies of pre-1958 Scandinavian-American English-language liturgies have revealed the use of “Christian,” not “Catholic” or “catholic.”  So I suggest that anti-Roman Catholicism was a prominent reason for that practice.  Reed considers the use “Christian” in the Creeds something

to be regretted.

(1947, page 285; 1959, page 302)

I agree.

The Nicene Creed, as printed in TLH (1941) and, for that matter, the Service Book and Hymnal (1958), begins:

I believe in one God….

That translation follows the Latin text, as Pfatteicher writes in Commentary on the Lutheran Book of Worship (1990), but the Greek translation uses the first-person plural form instead.  So, if one follows the Greek form of the Nicene Creed,

We believe in one God….

TLH (1941) also offers the following:

• The Athanasian Creed;
• Introits, Collects, and Graduals;
• Invitatories, Antiphons, Responsories, and Versicles;
• Prayer;
• Canticles;
• Psalms;
• a one-year lectionary, which assigns an Epistle and a Gospel reading per Sunday and major feast; and
• a two-year lectionary, which assigns three readings per Sunday and major feast.

A three-reading variant on the one-year lectionary appears in Lutheran Worship (1982), the Lutheran Service Book (2006), Christian Worship:  A Lutheran Hymnal (1993), and the Evangelical Lutheran Hymnary (1996), always with an inter-Lutheran three-year lectionary.  The Evangelical Lutheran Hymnary (1996) adds to that variation on the one-year lectionary two  more series (years, really), each with two readings per Sunday and major feast.  The old one-year lectionary retains its hold on many people, despite the fact that the three-year lectionary covers much more material.  Who, claiming the standard of Sola Scriptura, could object to that?

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IV.  LOOKING AHEAD

The Missouri Synod, having published TLH (1941) just a handful of years before the development of the Service Book and Hymnal (1958) began, declined to participate in that multi-synodical volume, the subject of the next post, U.S. Lutheran Liturgy, Part XI.  Yet the LCMS did begin the process which led to the next multi-synodical service book and hymnal, the Lutheran Book of Worship (1978), a volume which the Missouri Synod helped to create then rejected.  So the denomination cloned and altered the rejected book, calling its version Lutheran Worship (1982), the pew edition of which I plan to review.

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KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

JULY 25, 2013 COMMON ERA

THE FEAST OF SAINT JAMES BAR-ZEBEDEE, APOSTLE AND MARTYR

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Christian Worship:  A Lutheran Hymnal.  Milwaukee, WI:  Northwestern Publishing House, 1993.

Commission on the Liturgy and Hymnal, The.  Service Book and Hymnal.  Music Edition.  Philadelphia, PA:  United Lutheran Publication House, 1958.

Common Service Book of the Lutheran Church.  Philadelphia, PA:  The Board of Publication of The United Lutheran Church in America, 1917, 1918.

Concordia:  A Collection of Hymns and Spiritual Songs.  Minneapolis, MN:  Augsburg Publishing House, 1917.

Concordia Hymnal, The:  A Hymnal for Church, School and Home.  Minneapolis, MN:  Augsburg Publishing House, 1932.

Evangelical Lutheran Hymnary.  St. Louis, MO:  MorningStar Music Publishers, Inc., 1996.

Evangelical Lutheran Synodical Conference of North America, The.  The Lutheran Hymnal.  St. Louis, MO:  Concordia Publishing House, 1941.

Evangelical Lutheran Worship.  Minneapolis, MN:  Augsburg Fortress, 2006.

Hymnal and Order of Service, The.  Lectionary Edition.  Rock Island, IL:  Augustana Book Concern, 1925.

Hymnal Supplement 98.  St. Louis, MO:  Concordia Publishing House, 1998.

Inter-Lutheran Commission on Worship for Provisional Use.  Contemporary Worship 2:  Services–The Holy Communion.  Philadelphia, PA:  Board of Education, Lutheran Church in America, 1970.

Lutheran Hymnary Including the Symbols of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, The.  Minneapolis, MN:  Augsburg Publishing House, 1935.

Lutheran Service Book.  St. Louis, MO:  Concordia Publishing House, 2006.

Lutheran Worship.  St. Louis, MO:  Concordia Publishing House, 1982.

Pfatteicher, Philip H.  Commentary on the Lutheran Book of Worship:  Lutheran Liturgy in Its Ecumenical Context.  Minneapolis, MN:  Augsburg Fortress, 1990.

Pfatteicher, Philip H., and Carlos R. Messerli.  Manual on the Liturgy:  Lutheran Book of Worship.  Minneapolis, MN:  Augsburg Publishing House, 1979.

Reed, Luther D.  The Lutheran Liturgy:  A Study in the Common Service of the Lutheran Church in America.  Philadelphia, PA:  Muhlenberg Press, 1947.

__________.  The Lutheran Liturgy:  A Study in the Common Liturgy of the Lutheran Church in America.  2d. Ed.  Philadelphia, PA:  Fortress Press, 1959.

Stulken, Marilyn Kay.  Hymnal Companion to the Lutheran Book of Worship.  Philadelphia, PA:  Fortress Press, 1981.

Wentz, Abdel Ross.  The Lutheran Church in American History.  2d. Ed.  Philadelphia, PA:  The United Lutheran Publication House, 1933.

Worship Supplement.  St. Louis, MO:  Concordia Publishing House, 1969.

I also found some PDFs helpful:

Christian Worship:  Supplement Introductory Resources.  Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod, 2008.

DeGarmeaux, Bruce.  “O Come, Let Us Worship!  A Study of Lutheran Liturgy and Hymnody.”  1995.

Faugstad, Peter.  “Centennial of The Lutheran Hymnary.”  In Lutheran Sentinel, May-June 2013, page 14.

Marggraf, Bruce.  ”A History of Hymnal Changeovers in the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod.”  May 28, 1982.

Schalk, Carl.  ”A Brief History of LCMS Hymnals (before LSB).”  Based on a 1997 document; updated to 2006.  Copyrighted by The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod.

KRT

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Above:  Detail of the Pulpit and the Altar, St. James German Evangelical Lutheran Church, Altoona, Pennsylvania

Image Created by the Historic American Buildings Survey

Image Source = Library of Congress

(http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/pa2541.photos.142605p/)

Reproduction Number = HABS PA,7-ALTO,78–2

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U.S. LUTHERAN LITURGY, PART III

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We would gladly behold the day when the One, Holy, Catholic, Christian Church shall use one Order of Service, and unite in one Confession of Faith.

–From the Preface to the Common Service (1888); Quoted in Common Service Book of the Lutheran Church (1917), page 308

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It is truly meet, right, and salutary, that we should at all times, and in all places, give thanks unto Thee, O Lord, Holy Father, Almighty Everlasting God.

–The Common Service (1888)

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I.  INTRODUCTION

In U.S. Lutheran Liturgy, Part I (https://blogatheologica.wordpress.com/2013/07/14/muhlenbergs-dream-the-road-to-the-common-service-1748-1888/), I wrote about the process which culminated in the unveiling of the Common Service in 1888.  I chose not to write about that liturgy because I had already entered twenty-four pages of writing from a composition book.  In U.S. Liturgy, Part II (https://blogatheologica.wordpress.com/2013/07/17/the-missing-canon-the-common-service-1888/), I focused on the Common Service.  Now, in Part III, I write about it in The United Lutheran Church in America (1918-1962) and The American Lutheran Church (1930-1060).

I have been studying this material closely, trying to record information accurately as I have reviewed primary and secondary sources.  This has required a commitment of much time, for there are so many synods about which to read.  And, since I grew up United Methodist in southern Georgia, U.S.A., in the Baptist Belt, Lutherans were scarce, if present at all, when I was quite young.  My spiritual journey has taken me into The Episcopal Church.  Anglicanism and Lutheranism have many theological and liturgical similarities and considerable theological overlap, but my adopted vantage point is still one outside of Lutheranism.  If I have misstated anything, I can correct it.

The material is, by its nature, complicated.  I have tried to organize and format it for maximum ease of reading and learning, however.  So, without further ado, I invite you, O reader, to follow the proverbial bouncing balls with me.  Breaking up content into a series of posts should help in the process of digesting the material intelligently; that is my purpose and hope.

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II.  THE UNITED LUTHERAN CHURCH (1918-1962) AND ITS PREDECESSORS

Dr. Martin Luther nailed the Ninety-Five Theses to the church door at Wittenberg in 1517.  1917 being the 400th anniversary of that event, many U.S. Lutherans focused on the occasion to reduce factionalism and to establish a measure of organic unity.  That year three Norwegian synods merged to form the Norwegian Lutheran Church of America, which renamed itself The Evangelical Lutheran Church in 1946.  (I will write about this branch of U.S. Lutheranism in a subsequent post.)  And, in 1917, the General Synod (1820), the United Synod of the South (immediate roots back to 1863), and the General Council (1867) agreed to reunite the following year as The United Lutheran Church in America (ULCA).

The ULCA’s hymnal and service book was the Common Service Book of the Lutheran Church (1917) (CSB), prepared by the denomination’s three predecessor bodies and modeled after the General Synod’s Church Book, itself a towering liturgical achievement.  The CSB followed the Table of Contents of the Church Book closely, down to the CSB‘s Occasional Services, which resemble the Church Book‘s Orders for Ministerial Acts.

Fixed feasts interest me.  So I note that the General Synod’s Liturgy for the Evangelical Lutheran Church (1881) (http://archive.org/details/liturgyofevangel00gene) had only four such feasts:

• Christmas Day (December 25),
• the Circumcision of Jesus (January 1),
• the Epiphany (January 6), and
• Reformation Day (October 31).

The General Council’s Church Book had those also and added the feast days for St. Stephen, St. Michael the Archangel, the Conversion of St. Paul, the Presentation of Jesus, the Annunciation, the Visitation, and the Apostles (including St. Matthias).  The Southern Book of Worship had all of these except the Feast of All Saints.  The CSB followed the lead of the Southern Book of Worship.  And none of these volumes recognized the Holy Innocents or the Confession of St. Peter.  As for the latter omission, I suppose that “…upon this rock…” was too hot a potato for people who did not want to call the Church “Catholic” as late as 1917.

The Icelandic Evangelical Lutheran Synod of America (formed in 1885) merged into the historically German-American ULCA in 1942.  Thus the ULCA became more heterogeneous.

The ULCA merged into the Lutheran Church in America (LCA) in 1962.  The LCA, in turn, helped to form the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) in 1987.

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III.  THE AMERICAN LUTHERAN CHURCH (1930-1960) AND ITS PREDECESSORS

On August 11, 1930, three historically German-American denominations merged to form The American Lutheran Church.  The Buffalo Synod had formed in 1845.  The Iowa Synod had broken away from the Missouri Synod in 1854.  And the Joint Synod of Ohio and Other States had broken away from the Ministerium of Pennsylvania and Other States in 1818 ahead of the creation of the General Synod in 1820.  The American Lutheran Church was an ecumenically active denomination more conservative than The United Lutheran Church in America and more liberal than the Missouri Synod.

The Buffalo Synod used German liturgies initially.  Its first English-language hymnal and service book, produced with the Joint Synod of Ohio and Other States, was The Evangelical Lutheran Hymnal (1880) (http://archive.org/details/evangelicalluthe00evan).  The Sunday morning service in the 1880 edition resembled that of the Southern Book of Worship, but the same sort of material in the 1908 version (http://archive.org/details/evangelicalluthe08van) looked very much like the Pennsylvania Liturgy of 1860 (http://archive.org/details/liturgyforuseofe00np).  The Evangelical Lutheran Hymnal also offered various forms for evening worship and provided an afternoon service.

The Iowa Synod published the Wartburg Hymnal for Church, School, and Home (1918) (http://archive.org/details/wartburghymnalfo00hard).  The Common Service formed the basis for the Communion and the Vespers liturgies there.

The American Lutheran Hymnal (1930), less stately and artsy than the Common Service Book (which came with calligraphy on some pages) offered fewer services than the CSB yet duplicated much material (such as the Common Service) from it.  Other liturgical material came from the 1908 and 1918 hymnals.

The American Lutheran Church (1930-1960) merged into The American Lutheran Church (TALC) in 1960.  TALC, in turn, helped to form the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) in 1987.

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IV.  CONCLUSION

The three main predecessor bodies of The United Lutheran Church in America had prepared the Common Service.  They had been using it for decades when the Common Service Book (1917) debuted.  Adoption of the Common Service in the denominations which formed The American Lutheran Church in 1930 was gradual, however.  Immigrant patterns were giving way to a dominant American liturgy.

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KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

JULY 17, 2013 COMMON ERA

THE FEAST OF BENNETT J. SIMS, EPISCOPAL BISHOP OF ATLANTA

THE FEAST OF THE MARTYRS OF COMPEIGNE

THE FEAST OF THE RIGHTEOUS GENTILES

THE FEAST OF WALTER CRONKITE, JOURNALIST

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

As much as possible I prefer to work with primary sources, although secondary sources frequently prove invaluable in making the best sense of those primary sources.  And I prefer to work with actual bound volumes as much as possible.  For this post, however, some of my sources has been electronic, and I have provided links to them.  So I consider those linked ones cited properly.  I did find certain bound volumes invaluable.  Those credits follow:

Common Service Book of the Lutheran Church.  Philadelphia, PA:  The Board of Publication of The United Lutheran Church in America, 1917, 1918.

Lutheran Intersynodical Hymnal Committee.  American Lutheran Hymnal.  Music Edition.  Columbus, OH:  The Lutheran Book Concern, 1930.

Pfatteicher, Philip H., and Carlos R. Messerli.  Manual on the Liturgy:  Lutheran Book of Worship.  Minneapolis, MN:  Augsburg Publishing House, 1979.

Reed, Luther D.  The Lutheran Liturgy:  A Study in the Common Service of the Lutheran Church in America.  Philadelphia, PA:  Muhlenberg Press, 1947.

__________.  The Lutheran Liturgy:  A Study in the Common Liturgy of the Lutheran Church in America.  2d. Ed.  Philadelphia, PA:  Fortress Press, 1959.

Stulken, Marilyn Kay.  Hymnal Companion to the Lutheran Book of Worship.  Philadelphia, PA:  Fortress Press, 1981.

Wentz, Abdel Ross.  The Lutheran Church in American History.  2d. Ed.  Philadelphia, PA:  The United Lutheran Publication House, 1933.

KRT

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Above:  St. John’s Lutheran Church, Charleston, South Carolina

Image Created by the Historic American Buildings Survey

Image Source = Library of Congress

(http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/sc0169.photos.148685p/)

Reproduction Number = HABS SC,10-CHAR,42–12

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U.S. LUTHERAN LITURGY, PART I

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I.  BACKGROUND

European Lutherans began to settle in the colonies successfully (at New Netherland, to be precise) in the 1620s.  Then there was New Sweden, settled beginning in 1638 at the site of present-day Wilmington, Delaware.  The first Lutheran church in America dated to 1646 on Tinicum Island in the Delaware River, when about five hundred people lived in the colony.  Peter Stuyvesant, Governor of New Netherland, conquered New Sweden in 1655.  Then New Netherland became New York in 1664.  The Lutherans (many of them Finns, for Sweden used to encompass much of Finland), cut off from Sweden, waned, and many of their leaders returned to the old country.  King Charles XI of Sweden revived the flagging Lutheran churches in the 1690s by sending ministers, catechisms, Bibles, and other books.  The founding of new congregations (many of them now Episcopalian) commenced.

There was initially much resistance in the territories which did, in time, become the United States of America to worship in English.  Many colonists with heritages in countries with languages other than English preferred the foreign language, at least for church purposes.  Many of those who preferred to worship in English became Anglicans, and many English-language Lutheran congregations abandoned the Lutheran identity for The Church of England or (after 1788) The Episcopal Church.  The Evangelical Lutheran Synod of New-York (formed in 1786) favored German initially.  And, although there was an English-language hymnal and service book in that synod in 1795, the Synod’s official position just two years later was to encourage those who wished to worship in English to become Episcopalians.  Yet, as Lutherans moved into various colonies, many of them wished to worship in English and remain Lutherans.

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II.  HENRY MELCHIOR MUHLENBERG AND THE 1748 AND 1786 LITURGIES

The chaos which was American Lutheranism in early colonial times called out for the creation of order.  That task fell to Henry Melchior Muhlenberg and his assistants.  The thirty-one-year-old German arrived in America on November 25, 1742, and began his great and daunting work.  Who was a legitimate Lutheran minister?  Many imposters roamed the landscape, wreaking havoc in their wake.  To make a long story short and a complex story simple, he died in 1787, having done his work faithfully and laid a firm foundation for U.S. Lutheranism.

Muhlenberg and others gathered at St. Michael’s Church, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1748 to constitute the Ministerium of Pennsylvania.  At that meeting they also approved the first American Lutheran liturgy, one based on German forms and the service at St. Mary’s Lutheran Church, London, England.  Muhlenberg had worked on the service with the help of two other German pastors, Peter Brunnholtz and John Frederick Handschuh.  This was a compromise liturgy, for there was a variety of Lutheran liturgies in America, and the Swedish rites, with their singing of the Collects, was too “Papist” for many Germans.  The Ministerium vowed to use the 1748 liturgy exclusively, but pastors had to copy out the text, which the Ministerium did not have published.

The 1786 revision did go the printing presses, however.  An English translation of it appeared in the Hymn and Prayer-Book For the Ufe of Fuch Churches as Ufe the Englifh Language (1795) (http://archive.org/details/hymnprayerbo00kunz).  The Reverend John C. Kunze, who had organized the Synod of New-York, wanted to encourage those who preferred to worship in English to remain Lutherans.

The form of the Communion Service is, by 2013 standards, quite sparse.  But the Liturgy of the 1795 book does contain prayers for various settings and for congregations, families, and individuals to use.  And one finds there a catechism (or catechifm), pentitential psalms, and documents explaining Christian history, Lutheran history, and the theology of salvation, aw well as forms for funerals, weddings, and baptisms.  The well-developed lectionary is another nice touch.  Also, the Communion service ends with the Aaronic Blessing (from Numbers 6:23-26) and the Trinitarian formula:

The Lord bless thee, and preferve thee.

The Lord enlighten his countenance upon thee,

and be gracious unto thee!

The Lord lift up his countenance upon thee,

and give thee peace.  Amen.

In the name of God the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

The liturgy specifies that members are to celebrate Communion at least on Christmas Day, Easter Sunday, and Pentecost.

Muhlenberg wanted Lutherans to think beyond their local and provincial interests and to focus on broader goals.  Thus he dreamed of a unified liturgy–one he never saw.  In a letter he wrote on November 5, 1783, the Lutheran Patriarch said:

It would be a most delightful and advantageous thing if all the Evangelical Lutheran congregations in North America were united with one another, if they all used the same order of service.

–Quoted in Luther D. Reed, The Lutheran Liturgy:  A Study of the Common Service of the Lutheran Church in America (Philadelphia, PA:  Muhlenberg Press, 1947), page 181

Yet others kept that dream alive.

Negative liturgical developments occurred as early as 1786.  The revised liturgy of that year omitted the Gloria, the Collect of the Day, and the Nicene Creed, for example.  The 1748 order of worship had specified the following order:

• Hymn
• Congregational confession of sins
• Gloria
• Collect of the Day
• Epistle reading
• Hymn
• Gospel reading
• Nicene Creed
• Sermon
• General Prayer
• Announcements
• Peace
• Hymn
• Closing Collect
• Benediction

But the 1786 revision, in making corporate worship minister-focused, left the congregation with little to do.  This tendency became more prominent as time passed, unfortunately.

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III.  MEMBERS OF THE CONGREGATION AS SINGING KNOTS ON LOGS

In 1814, for example, the Evangelical Lutheran Synod of New-York (yes, they hyphenated the name then) published A Collection of Hymns and a Liturgy for the Use of the Evangelical Lutheran Churches; To Which are Added Prayers for Families and Individuals (http://archive.org/details/collectionofhymn00evan and http://archive.org/details/cluthe00evan).  The driving force behind this book and its 1814 liturgy (not 1817, as Abdel Ross Wentz says in The Lutheran Church in American History) was Dr. Frederick H. Quitman, D.D., President of the Synod.  This new liturgy was minister-focused.  And gone was the Aaronic Blessing, replaced with a rubric:

The service is concluded with a hymn and one of the usual benedictions.

Dr. Wentz, in his book on American Lutheran history, criticized the Rationalistic tendencies with which Quitman infused the 1814 liturgy and with which he also influenced the 1818 German-language liturgy of the Ministerium of Pennsylvania.  Dr. Luther D. Reed, Lutheran liturgical expert extraordinaire, noted the lack of interactvity in the 1818 rite.

Studying the 1814 New York book has revealed some interesting touches.  There is, for example, a prayer for a servant to say on pages 121 and 122.  That prayer reflected its times and the interests of those who had servants, not those of the servants themselves.  And there was a nice portion of the Eucharistic rite:

How can we ever be sufficiently grateful to thee, for preparing such a table for us in the wilderness of this world!  What good thing can we ever want, whilst we have thee for our Shepherd?  What mercy wilt thou refuse to those, whom thou hast redeemed, not with corruptible things, but with the precious blood of Jesus Christ!  What consolation and joy are poured into our hearts, whilst we contemplate him crucified and risen again, triumphing over all his fores and ours, seated at thy right hand, and raising his disciples to his own glory and happiness!

–Page 61 of the Liturgy section, 1814

Various synods–Pennsylvania, New York, North Carolina, and Virginia and Maryland–covering more states than those names indicate–joined forces in 1820 to form the General Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the United States of America.  This national body did not include the Joint Synod of Ohio or the Tennessee Synod, which formed out of the Ministerium of Pennsylvania and the North Carolina Synod respectively.  The General Synod published an enlarged version of the New York 1814 liturgy in an 1837 English-language hymnal.  A 1832 English-language liturgy commissioned by the General Synod and published in a 1834 edition of the New York Collection of Hymns (http://archive.org/details/collectionofhy00evan), was incredible minister-focused, allowing the singing of hymns as the only form of congregational participation.  This restricted role for laypeople continued in the General Synod’s 1842 German-language liturgy (a revision of the 1818 rite) and its 1847 English-language counterpart.  However, the General Synod did publish a revised edition of its 1847 liturgy in 1856, adding the Lord’s Prayer and the Apostles’ Creed to the ritual.  And, in the Creed, the Church was “Catholic.”

In other liturgical news, the Joint Synod of Ohio (1818-1930) published an 1830 English-language liturgy which gave the people little to do.  The Joint Synod worked on the General Synod’s 1847 liturgy.

Frontier conditions made doing proper liturgy difficult.  Thus going to a minister-focused model was practical.  Yet that act constituted bad theology, for “liturgy” means “work of the people.”  The people did not “work” much when all they did was sit, stand, and sing.  To borrow words from  the much-maligned 1814 New York liturgy, Lutherans lived “in the wilderness of this world.”  Breaking away from a frontier mentality was a requirement for doing proper–or at least better–liturgy.

That liturgy was on the way, starting with the Pennsylvania Liturgy of 1860.  A new liturgical age was about to dawn.

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IV.  LITURGICAL RENEWAL

In 1860 the Ministerium of Pennsylvania and Other States published A Liturgy for Use of the Evangelical Lutheran Church (http://archive.org/details/liturgyforuseofe00np).  This liturgy, based on Muhlenberg’s 1748 forms and pre-Reformation rituals, laid the foundation for subsequent services in the next few years while appropriating parts of The Book of Common Prayer generously.  One who reads the 1786 and 1860 liturgies carefully then pays close attention to the Common Service of 1888 should recognize the lineage.

Some particulars of the 1860 Liturgy follow:

• The Nicene Creed is present as an “occasional” substitute for the Apostles’ Creed.  In both Creeds the Church is “Christian,” not “Catholic,” a pattern which repeats for the rest of the century and beyond.
• The Liturgy keeps the long General Prayer before the sermon not because it works best there but because people have become used to it being there.  Later (by a few years) services move the General Prayer to a spot after the sermon, thereby not interrupting the flow of the service.
• There is, as in subsequent liturgies influenced by this one, a section of rites for “Ministerial Acts,” such as funerals, weddings, baptisms, and installations.
• The fixed feasts in the book are Christmas Day (December 25), the Circumcision of Jesus/New Year’s Day (January 1), the Epiphany (January 6), and The Festival of the Reformation (October 31).

The General Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the United States of America (1820-1918) divided twice during the 1860s.  First the General Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the Confederate States of America organized in 1863.  It renamed itself the General Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in North America in 1866 then merged with the Holston Synod and the Tennessee Synod to create the United Synod of the South, known simply as the United Synod of the South, in 1866.  The General Synod split again in 1867, when the more conservative General Council of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in North America constituted itself.  By the way, the antecedents of the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod (WELS) (1918-) helped to form the General Council then left it–one in 1869, another in 1871, and the third in 1888.  Also, the General Synod, the United Synod of the South, and the General Council reunited in 1918 to create The United Lutheran Church in America (ULCA), which merged into the Lutheran Church in America (LCA) in 1962.  The LCA helped to create the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) in 1987.

The Southern Church, called the General Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in North America in 1867, published The Book of Worship (http://archive.org/details/bookofworshi00gene) that year.  This book, which owed much to the  1860 Pennsylvania Liturgy, constituted a great liturgical advance.  The order of Morning Service set the General Prayer after the sermon, unlike the 1860 rite.  Hints of the Common Service of 1888 began to become prominent , as in the Confession of Sin.  And the presence of rituals for other occasions, as in the Order of Ministerial Acts, indicated that the liturgy was not an afterthought tacked onto a hymnal.

The Church Book (1868) (http://archive.org/details/chuse00gene) was another great liturgical advance and foreshadowing of things to come.  The 1868 Book, revised over the decades to include music (http://archive.org/details/evanluth00gene), Ministerial Acts (http://archive.org/details/congruse00gene), and more options for Introits and Collects (http://archive.org/details/chuluth00gene), was in English.  Its German-language counterpart debuted in 1877.  The Church Book, owing much to The Book of Common Prayer and the 1860 Liturgy, set the pattern for the Common Service Book (1917).  There were no Matins of Vespers yet, but the lectionary, two forms for Morning Worship, and the prayers were impressive.  Also, the General Prayer followed the sermon and the Aaronic Blessing ended the service.  The Church Book gained slightly wider acceptance in 1872, when the Tennessee Synod accepted it in place of that body’s 1840 liturgy.

The General Synod revised its liturgy further in the 1860s, 1870s, and 1880s.  The Provisional Liturgy of 1866, never authorized, became the basis of the “Washington Service” of 1869, authorized by the General Synod.  This was the Provisional Liturgy plus the Gloria Patri, the Kyrie, and the Gloria in Excelsis.  It constituted a great advance in recovering a historical Lutheran order of worship.  This Service appeared in the Book of Worship (1871) (http://archive.org/details/bookofworship71gene). an unfortunate volume which consisted mostly of hymns with about twenty pages of services tacked onto the front and prayers, the Augsburg Confession, and Martin Luther’s Small Catechism tucked in at the back.  The Liturgy of the Evangelical Lutheran Church (1881) (http://archive.org/details/liturgyofevangel00gene), however, added more material and kept up will and with the Lutheran Joneses–the General Council’s Church Book and the Southern Church’s Book of Worship.

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V.  THE SHORT TRAIL TO THE COMMON SERVICE, 1870-1888

In 1870, the Reverend Doctor John Bachman, Pastor of St. John’s Church, Charleston, South Carolina (hence the photograph at the top of this post), wrote the leaders of his denomination, the (Southern) General Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in North America, telling them that greater liturgical uniformity among U.S. Lutherans would increase domestic and foreign respect for U.S. Lutheranism and enable the Lutheran churches to accomplish more good in the world.  That proposal failed in 1870 yet passed six years later.  The General Council agreed to cooperate with its Southern counterpart in 1879.  And the (original) General Synod, parent to the other two bodies, joined the party in 1883.

Work got underway in 1884.  All three denominations worked out their disagreements over the committee’s proposed liturgy and the Common Service debuted in 1888 (http://archive.org/details/congruse00gene).

Analysis of the Common Service will wait until the next post in this series.

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VI.  OTHER LITURGIES

I have focused on the mainstream of Lutheran liturgical development so far.  That has been appropriate.  Yet I would be negligent if I were to ignore other liturgical traditions within U.S. Lutheranism through 1888.

It was commonplace for many Lutheran services in the United States to occur in German or some other foreign language into the twentieth century.  In fact, foreign language Lutheran services continue to occur.  Southwest of my location, in Atlanta, Georgia, the Church of the Redeemer (http://www.redeemer.org/) hosts a German-language service, for example.

Back in the nineteenth century….

It was commonplace for English and foreign-language services to coexist within the same denomination.

• The Norwegian Synod produced its first English-language hymnal in 1879.  Some members of the Missouri Synod used this volume.
• The Missouri Synod, which used the Saxon and Loehe Agendas primarily for worship, published the unofficial Lutheran Hymns For the Use of English Lutheran Missions in 1882.
• The Buffalo Synod (1845-1930), of German origin, produced its first English Language hymnal, The Evangelical Lutheran Hymnal, in 1880, with the Joint Synod of Ohio and Other States (http://archive.org/details/evangelicalluthe00evan).  The music edition appeared in 1908 (http://archive.org/details/evangelicalluthe08van).  The service 1880 service was either the 1867 Southern Lutheran service or a variant thereof, where as the 1908 rite was either the 1860 Pennsylvania Liturgy or a variant thereof.
• Finnish Lutheran congregations began to form about 1867.  Prior to that date Finnish Lutherans had joined Norwegian or Swedish congregations.
• The (Swedish) Augustana Evangelical Lutheran Church published its first English-language hymnal after 1888.
• Danish Lutherans in the U.S. published their first English-language hymnal after 1888.

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VII.  CONCLUSION

The Common Service of 1888 did not impose liturgical uniformity upon U.S. Lutheranism.  It has yet to do so, as a review of hymnals and service books in use among U.S. Lutherans confirms.

There is, God willing, more to come.  With these words I conclude this post, the first in a planned series.  Next I will read for and prepare part two.

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KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR

JULY 14, 2013 COMMON ERA

PROPER 10:  THE EIGHTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST, YEAR C

THE FEAST OF SAMUEL OCCUM, PRESBYTERIAN PASTOR

THE FEAST OF SAINT CAMILLUS DE LELLIS, ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIEST

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

As much as possible I prefer to work with primary sources, although secondary sources frequently prove invaluable in making the best sense of those primary sources.  And I prefer to work with actual bound volumes as much as possible.  For this post, however, most of my sources have been electronic, and I have provided links to them.  So I consider those linked ones cited properly.  I did find certain bound volumes invaluable.  Those credits follow:

Pfatteicher, Philip H., and Carlos R. Messerli.  Manual on the Liturgy:  Lutheran Book of Worship.  Minneapolis, MN:  Augsburg Publishing House, 1979.

Reed, Luther D.  The Lutheran Liturgy:  A Study in the Common Service of the Lutheran Church in America.  Philadelphia, PA:  Muhlenberg Press, 1947.

__________.  The Lutheran Liturgy:  A Study in the Common Liturgy of the Lutheran Church in America.  2d. Ed.  Philadelphia, PA:  Fortress Press, 1959.

Stulken, Marilyn Kay.  Hymnal Companion to the Lutheran Book of Worship.  Philadelphia, PA:  Fortress Press, 1981.

Wentz, Abdel Ross.  The Lutheran Church in American History.  2d. Ed.  Philadelphia, PA:  The United Lutheran Publication House, 1933.

I also found some PDFs helpful:

Marggraf, Bruce.  “A History of Hymnal Changeovers in the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod.”  May 28, 1982.

Schalk, Carl.  “A Brief History of LCMS Hymnals (before LSB).”  Based on a 1997 document; updated to 2006.  Copyrighted by The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod.

KRT

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