Editing Pietism (section)

==History==
===Forerunners===
As the forerunners of the Pietists in the strict sense, certain voices had been heard bewailing the shortcomings of the church and advocating a revival of practical and devout Christianity. Amongst them were the [[Christian mysticism|Christian mystic]] [[Jakob Böhme]] (Behmen); [[Johann Arndt]], whose work, ''True Christianity'', became widely known and appreciated; [[Heinrich Müller (theologian)|Heinrich Müller]], who described the [[baptismal font|font]], the [[pulpit]], the [[Confession (religion)|confessional]], and the [[altar]] as "the four dumb idols of the Lutheran Church"; the theologian [[Johann Valentin Andrea]], court chaplain of the Landgrave of Hesse; Schuppius, who sought to restore the Bible to its place in the pulpit; and [[Theophil Großgebauer|Theophilus Grossgebauer]] (d. 1661) of [[Rostock]], who from his pulpit and by his writings raised what he called "the alarm cry of a watchman in [[Zion|Sion]]".

===Founding===
[[File:Philipp Jakob Spener.jpg|thumb|upright|left|[[Philipp Spener]] (1635–1705), the "Father of Pietism", is considered the founder of the movement.]]
The direct originator of the movement was [[Philipp Spener]]. Born at [[Rappoltsweiler]] in Alsace, now in France, on 13 January 1635, trained by a devout godmother who used books of devotion like Arndt's ''True Christianity'', Spener was convinced of the necessity of a moral and religious reformation within German Lutheranism. He studied theology at [[Strasbourg]], where the professors at the time (and especially Sebastian Schmidt) were more inclined to "practical" Christianity than to theological disputation. He afterwards spent a year in [[Geneva]], and was powerfully influenced by the strict moral life and rigid ecclesiastical discipline prevalent there, and also by the preaching and the piety of the [[Waldensian]] professor Antoine Leger and the converted [[Society of Jesus|Jesuit]] preacher [[Jean de Labadie]].

During a stay in [[Tübingen]], Spener read Grossgebauer's ''Alarm Cry'', and in 1666 he entered upon his first pastoral charge at [[Frankfurt]] with a profound opinion that the Christian life within Evangelical Lutheranism was being sacrificed to zeal for rigid [[Lutheran orthodoxy]]. Pietism, as a distinct movement in the German Church, began with religious meetings at Spener's house (''collegia pietatis'') where he repeated his sermons, expounded passages of the [[New Testament]], and induced those present to join in conversation on religious questions. In 1675, Spener published his ''Pia desideria'' or ''Earnest Desire for a Reform of the True Evangelical Church'', the title giving rise to the term "Pietists". This was originally a pejorative term given to the adherents of the movement by its enemies as a form of ridicule, like that of "Methodists" somewhat later in England.

In ''Pia desideria'', Spener made six proposals as the best means of restoring the life of the church:

# The earnest and thorough study of the Bible in private meetings, ''ecclesiolae in ecclesia'' ("little churches within the church")
# The Christian priesthood being universal, the laity should share in the spiritual government of the church
# A knowledge of Christianity must be attended by the practice of it as its indispensable sign and supplement
# Instead of merely didactic, and often bitter, attacks on the heterodox and unbelievers, a sympathetic and kindly treatment of them
# A reorganization of the theological training of the universities, giving more prominence to the devotional life
# A different style of preaching, namely, in the place of pleasing rhetoric, the implanting of Christianity in the inner or new man, the soul of which is faith, and its effects the fruits of life

This work produced a great impression throughout Germany. While large numbers of [[Lutheran Orthodoxy|orthodox Lutheran]] theologians and pastors were deeply offended by Spener's book, many other pastors immediately adopted Spener's proposals.

===Early leaders===
[[File:A Tidemand-Haugianerne.jpg|thumb|[[Haugean]] Pietist [[Conventicle]]]]
In 1686 Spener accepted an appointment to the court-chaplaincy at [[Dresden]], which opened to him a wider though more difficult sphere of labor. In [[Leipzig]], a society of young theologians was formed under his influence for the learned study and devout application of the Bible. Three magistrates belonging to that society, one of whom was [[August Hermann Francke]], subsequently the founder of the famous orphanage at [[Halle, Saxony-Anhalt|Halle]] (1695), commenced courses of expository lectures on the Scriptures of a practical and devotional character, and in the [[German language]], which were zealously frequented by both students and townsmen. The lectures aroused the ill-will of the other theologians and pastors of Leipzig, and Francke and his friends left the city, and with the aid of [[Christian Thomasius]] and Spener founded the new [[University of Halle]]. The theological chairs in the new university were filled in complete conformity with Spener's proposals. The main difference between the new Pietistic Lutheran school and the orthodox Lutherans arose from the Pietists' conception of Christianity as chiefly consisting in a change of heart and consequent holiness of life. Orthodox Lutherans rejected this viewpoint as a gross simplification, stressing the need for the church and for sound theological underpinnings.

Spener died in 1705, but the movement, guided by Francke and fertilized from Halle, spread through the whole of Middle and North Germany. Among its greatest achievements, apart from the philanthropic institutions founded at Halle, were the revival of the [[Moravian Church]] in 1727 by [[Nicolaus Ludwig Zinzendorf|Count von Zinzendorf]], formerly a pupil in Francke's School for Young Noblemen in Halle, and the establishment of Protestant missions. In particular, [[Bartholomäus Ziegenbalg]] (10 July 1682 – 23 February 1719) became the first Pietist missionary to India.

Spener stressed the necessity of a new birth and separation of Christians from the world (see [[Asceticism]]). Many Pietists maintained that the new birth always had to be preceded by agonies of repentance, and that only a regenerated theologian could teach theology. The whole school shunned all common worldly amusements, such as dancing, the theatre, and public games. Some believe this led to a new form of justification by works. Its ''ecclesiolae in ecclesia'' also weakened the power and meaning of church organization. These Pietistic attitudes caused a counter-movement at the beginning of the 18th century; one leader was [[Valentin Ernst Löscher]], [[superintendent (ecclesiastical)|superintendent]] at Dresden.

[[File:Mose Lambsen fparm.jpg|thumb|Title page of the 1743 ''Mose och Lambsens wisor''. This edition had 136 hymns, which were not numbered, although most had instructions as to which melody the text should be sung. For a complete list of hymns, see the Swedish article on ''[[:sv:Mose och Lambsens wisor|Mose och Lambsens wisor]].'' The title is a reference to [[:s:Bible (King James)/Revelation#Chapter 15|Revelation 15]]:3, where those who triumph over the beast sing the songs of Moses and the Lamb.]]

===Establishment reaction===
Authorities within state-endorsed Churches were suspicious of pietist doctrine which they often viewed as a social danger, as it "seemed either to generate an excess of evangelical fervor and so disturb the public tranquility or to promote a mysticism so nebulous as to obscure the imperatives of morality. A movement which cultivated religious feeling almost as an end itself". While some pietists (such as Francis Magny) held that "mysticism and the moral law went together", for others (like his pupil Françoise-Louise de la Tour) "pietist mysticism did less to reinforce the moral law than to take its place… the principle of 'guidance by inner light' was often a signal to follow the most intense of her inner sentiments… the supremacy of feeling over reason".<ref name= "Cranston">{{cite book|title=[[Jean-Jacques: The Early Life and Work of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, 1712–1754]]|author=Maurice Cranston|publisher=University of Chicago Press|year=1982}}</ref> Religious authorities could bring pressure on pietists, such as when they brought some of Magny's followers before the local [[Consistory (Protestantism)|consistory]] to answer questions about their unorthodox views<ref>{{cite book|title=Jean-Jacques Rousseau: Restless Genius|author=Leo Damrosch|publisher=Mariner Books|year=2005}}</ref> or when they banished Magny from [[Vevey]] for heterodoxy in 1713.<ref name="Cranston"/> Likewise, pietism challenged the orthodoxy via new media and formats: Periodical journals gained importance versus the former pasquills and single thesis, traditional [[disputation]] was replaced by competitive debating, which tried to gain new knowledge instead of defending orthodox scholarship.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Pietismus und Aufklärung: theologische Polemik und die Kommunikationsreform der Wissenschaft am Ende des 17. Jahrhunderts|last=Gierl|first=Martin|publisher=Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht|year=1997|language=de|trans-title=Pietism and enlightenment, theological polemic and the reform of science communication end of the 17. century}}</ref>

===Hymnody===
{{Main|Hymnody of continental Europe#Pietism}}

===Later history===
[[File:Der breite und der schmale Weg 2008.jpg|thumb|left|upright|''The Broad and the Narrow Way'', a popular German Pietist painting, 1866]]
As a distinct movement, Pietism had its greatest strength by the middle of the 18th century; its very individualism in fact helped to prepare the way for the [[Age of Enlightenment|Enlightenment]] (''Aufklärung''), which took the church in an altogether different direction. Yet some claim that Pietism contributed largely to the revival of Biblical studies in Germany and to making religion once more an affair of the heart and of life and not merely of the intellect.{{Citation needed|date=November 2012}}

It likewise gave a new emphasis to the role of the laity in the church. Rudolf Sohm claimed that "It was the last great surge of the waves of the ecclesiastical movement begun by the [[Protestant Reformation|Reformation]]; it was the completion and the final form of the Protestantism created by the Reformation. Then came a time when another intellectual power took possession of the minds of men." [[Dietrich Bonhoeffer]] of the German [[Confessing Church]] framed the same characterization in less positive terms when he called Pietism the last attempt to save Christianity as a religion: Given that for him religion was a negative term, more or less an opposite to [[revelation]], this constitutes a rather scathing judgment. Bonhoeffer denounced the basic aim of Pietism, to produce a "desired piety" in a person, as unbiblical.

Pietism is considered the major influence that led to the creation of the "[[Prussian Union (Evangelical Christian Church)|Evangelical Church of the Union]]" in [[Prussia]] in 1817. The King of Prussia ordered the Lutheran and Reformed churches in Prussia to unite; they took the name "Evangelical" as a name both groups had previously identified with. This union movement spread through many German lands in the 1800s. Pietism, with its looser attitude toward confessional theology, had opened the churches to the possibility of uniting. The unification of the two branches of German Protestantism sparked the [[Prussian Union (Evangelical Christian Church)#Quarrels over the union|Schism of the Old Lutherans]]. Many Lutherans, called [[Old Lutherans]] formed [[free church]]es or emigrated to the United States and [[Australia]], where they formed bodies that would later become the [[Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod]] and the [[Lutheran Church of Australia]], respectively. (Many immigrants to America, who agreed with the union movement, formed German Evangelical Lutheran and Reformed congregations, later combined into the [[Evangelical Synod of North America]], which is now a part of the [[United Church of Christ]].)

[[File:SUVISEURATELLTA 2.jpg|thumb|[[Summer services]] are a feature of [[Laestadian Lutheran]] piety.]]
In the middle of the 19th century, [[Lars Levi Laestadius]] spearheaded a Pietist revival in Scandinavia that upheld what came to be known as [[Laestadian Lutheranism|Laestadian Lutheran theology]], which is heralded today by the [[Laestadian Lutheran Church]] as well as by several congregations within mainstream Lutheran Churches, such as the [[Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland]] and the [[Church of Sweden]].<ref name="Holmquist1981"/><ref name="ElgánScobbie2015">{{cite book|title=Historical Dictionary of Sweden|last1=Elgán|first1=Elisabeth|last2=Scobbie|first2=Irene|date=17 September 2015|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield Publishers|isbn=9781442250710|page=159|language=en}}</ref> After encountering a [[Sami people|Sami]] woman who experienced a conversion, Laestadius had a similar experience that "transformed his life and defined his calling".<ref name="Kivisto2014">{{cite book|title=Religion and Immigration: Migrant Faiths in North America and Western Europe|last=Kivisto|first=Peter|date=16 October 2014|publisher=Wiley|isbn=9780745686660|page=109|language=en}}</ref> As such, Laestadius "spend the rest of his life advancing his idea of Lutheran pietism, focusing his energies on marginalized groups in the northernmost regions of the Nordic countries".<ref name="Kivisto2014"/> Laestadius called on his followers to embrace their Lutheran identity and as a result, Laestadian Lutherans have remained a part of the [[Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland]], the [[national Church]] in that country, with some Laestadian Lutherans being consecrated as [[bishop]]s.<ref name="Kivisto2014"/> In the United States, [[Laestadianism in the United States|Laestadian Lutheran Churches]] were formed for Laestadian Pietists.<ref name="Kivisto2014"/> Laestadian Lutherans observe the [[Lutheran sacraments]], holding classical Lutheran theology on [[infant baptism]] and the [[real presence of Christ in the Eucharist]], and also heavily emphasize [[Confession (Lutheran Church)|Confession]].<ref name="Lamport2017">{{cite book|title=Encyclopedia of Martin Luther and the Reformation|last=Lamport|first=Mark A.|date=31 August 2017|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield Publishers|isbn=9781442271593|page=406|language=en}}</ref> Uniquely, Laestadian Lutherans "discourage watching television, attending movies, dancing, playing card games or games of chance, and drinking alcoholic beverages", as well as avoiding birth control – Laestadian Lutheran families usually have four to ten children.<ref name="Lamport2017"/> Laestadian Lutherans gather in a central location for weeks at a time for [[Summer services|summer revival services]] in which many young adults find their future spouses.<ref name="Lamport2017"/>

[[R. J. Hollingdale]], who translated [[Friedrich Nietzsche]]'s ''[[Thus Spake Zarathustra]]'' into English, argued that a number of the themes of the work (especially ''[[amor fati]]'') originated in the Lutheran Pietism of Nietzsche's childhood – Nietzsche's father, [[Carl Ludwig Nietzsche]], was a Lutheran pastor who supported the Pietist movement.<ref name="Nietzsche1974">{{cite book|author=Nietzsche|first=Friedrich|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=a9VxKgui0mEC&pg=PT30|title=Thus Spoke Zarathustra|date=28 February 1974|publisher=Penguin Books Limited|isbn=978-0-14-190432-0|pages=30|translator-last=Hollingdale|translator-first=R. J.|author-link=Friedrich Nietzsche|translator-link=R. J. Hollingdale}}</ref>

In 1900, the [[Church of the Lutheran Brethren]] was founded and it adheres to Pietist Lutheran theology, emphasizing a [[Born again|personal conversion experience]].<ref name="Tweton1988"/><ref name="Cimino2003">{{cite book |last1=Cimino |first1=Richard |title=Lutherans Today: American Lutheran Identity in the Twenty-First Century |date=2003 |publisher=Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing |isbn=9780802813657 |page=3 |language=en}}</ref>