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Pietism and Nationalism: The Relationship between Protestant Revivalism and National Renewal in Nineteenth-Century Germany

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Hartmut Lehmann
Hartmut Lehmann
Affiliation:
professor of modern history in theUniversity of Kiel, Kiel, West Germany.
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Extract

Any discussion of the relationship between Pietism and nationalism must start from a consideration of the two major works in this field: Koppel S. Pinson's Pietism as a Factor in the Rise of German Nationalism, published in 1934, and Gerhard Kaiser's Pietismus und Patriotismus im literarischen Deutschland, published in 1961. Both studies are valuable and lasting contributions to the topic. After presenting the main thesis of both works I will comment on the premises and conclusions of both works and then focus on aspects not mentioned by Pinson and Kaiser, especially the impact of Protestant revivalism on German nationalism in the middle of the nineteenth century.

Type
Research Article
Information
Church History , Volume 51 , Issue 1 , March 1982 , pp. 39 - 53
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Church History 1982

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References

1. This article is an enlarged version of a paper presented at a conference on Romantic nationalism at the Humanities Research Centre of the Australian National University in Canberra in 1980.

2. Pinson, Koppel S., Pietism as a Factor in the Rise of German Nationalism (New York, 1934), p. 25.Google Scholar

3. Ibid., p. 61.

4. Ibid.

5. Ibid., p. 75.

6. Ibid., pp. 94–95.

7. Ibid., pp. 163–164.

8. Kaiser, Gerhard, Pietismus und Patriotismus im literarischen Deutschland (Wiesbaden, 1961), p. 1.Google Scholar All translations from German into English are mine. I am grateful to James Grieve for polishing up my English.

9. Pinson, p. 180; Kaiser, p. 225.

10. For example, Pinson, pp. 13 and 41.

11. See Toon, Peter, “Der englische Puritanismus,” Historische Zeitschrift 214 (1972): 30–41,CrossRefGoogle Scholar citing George, Charles H. and George, Katherine, The Protestant Mind of the English Reformation (Princeton, N.J., 1961).Google Scholar

12. See Lehmann, Hartmut, Pietismus und weltliche Ordnung in Wuerttemberg von 17. bis zum 20. Jahrhundert (Stuttgart, 1969), pp. 14–19;Google Scholar also in Martin, Greschat, ed., Zur neueren Pietismusforschung (Darmstadt, 1977), pp. 82–90;Google ScholarLehmann, Hartmut, “Der Pietismus im Alten Reich,” Historische Zeitschrift 214 (1972): 58–95;CrossRefGoogle Scholar and idem, “Absonderung und Gemeinschaft im fruehen Pietismus,” Pietismus und Neuzeit 4 (1979): 54–82.

13. See Pinson, pp. 25, 48, 58, 95, 118, 206. The subtitle of Kaiser's work is “Ein Beitrag zum Problem der Saekularisation.”

14. According to Pinson the transfer of attitudes dominant in the religious sphere to the political sphere was made possible by two facts: “the secularization of society, and the greater emphasis in religion itself upon the human rather than upon the divine” (p. 118). Leaving aside the question of whether German society was in fact in the process of secularization in the decades around 1800, one can certainly say that among loyal Protestants the emphasis did not shift from the divine to the human.

15. I should note that Pietism in Denmark may be an exception to what I have outlined.

16. There is some question whether Wichern can be counted among nineteenth-century Pietists. On the one hand, Wichern wanted to achieve with the Inner Mission more than the Pietists of his time. On the other hand, one has to take into consideration three things. (1) The Pietists Wichern was referring to were those who had completely withdrawn into their conventicles, caring only in a quietist way for their own salvation but not engaging themselves in any other activities. (2) Wichern considered himself an heir not only of Luther, but more so of Spener, thus placing himself into the mainstream of Pietist tradition. (3) Wichern's central theological perspective was eschatological. Moreover, in a world of progressive secularization he tried to rely on what he called the circles of active, living Christians. If one is ready to accept that Pietism was a movement within Protestantism which continued after the eighteenth century, Wichern was certainly part of it.

17. Wichern, Johann Hinrich, Ausgewaehlte Schriften, 3 vols. (Guetersloh, 1956–1961), 1: 97.Google Scholar

18. Ibid., p.112.

19. Wichern, 3: 293.

20. Ibid., p. 157.

21. Ibid., p. 172.

22. Ibid., pp. 165, 226, 344.

23. Ibid., pp. 263–265.

24. Ibid., p. 216.

25. Ibid., 1: 95.

26. Lehmann, Hartmut, “Friedrich von Bodelschwingh und das Sedanfest,” Historische Zeitschrift 202 (1966): 542–573.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

27. Lehmann, Hartmut, “Bodelschwingh und Bismarck: Christlichkonservative Sozialpolitik im Kaiserreich,” Historische Zeitschrift 208 (1969): 607–626.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

28. Of the standard works on modern nationalism, only Baron, Salo Wittmayer, Modern Nationalism and Religion, 2d ed. (New York, 1960), p. 135,Google Scholar mentions that “the Old Testament significantly influenced also cultural, if not political, nationalism in Germany,” without giving any background, however, or supplying the reader with any further information.

29. Another valuable task would be to study the forms and ways in which these pious views of sacred national history and sacred national mission were secularized in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries, thus showing for later nationalism what Pinson and Kaiser did for the early phases of national thinking.