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CONCORDIA THEOLOGICAL MONTHLY Editorial Helsinki - After One Yea.· Jesus Christ: Conservative and Liberal ERWIN L. LUEKER The Process of Americanization HOlnilctics Theological Observer Book Review VOL. XXXV July -August 1964 Nos. 7 and 8 BOOK REVIEW All books reviewed in this periodical may be procured from or through Concordia Pub lishing House, 3558 South Jefferson Avenue, St. Louis, Missouri 63118. MOVING FRONTIERS. Edited by Carl S. Editor Meyer has assembled a distin Meyer. St. Louis: Concordia Publishing guished panel of highly knowledgeable col House, 1964. 500 (T) pages. 9 maps. laborators - Thomas Coates, William J. Cloth. $8.50. Danker, Erwin 1. Lueker, Herbert T. Mayer, This is a most welcome book. At the Everette Meier, Robert C. Schultz, Lewis human level, institutions - including church William Spitz, Sr., and August R. Suelflow. bodies - are what they are very largely be The nine chapters cover "The Lutheran cause of what they have been and because of Church in America, 1619-1857," "The Eu the environment in which they have devel ropean Background," "The Beginnings of oped and to which they have reacted. 'Missouri, Ohio, and Other States' in Amer Changes ar~ ~~_.:_.,_11y taking place, but ica. "The Missouri Synod Organized," developments of the past frequently con "Early Growth of the Missouri Synod," "The tinue to determine the decisions of the pres Missouri Synod and Other Lutherans Before ent. Men's memories are notoriously short, 1918," "Into All the World," "The Process however, and the influence of history is fre of Americanization," and "Four Decades of quently - all too frequently - discounted Expansion, 1920 -1960." The translated chiefly because it has been forgotten. sections in part reproduce existing publica Moving Frontiers is an effective aid to the tions; in part they are new. A very high fickle memory of the older generation and an degree of readability has been achieved. instructive resource for those whose life span (Only very occasionally an overly literal is too short to have lived through a great rendering, like "deacon" for the German deal of the past. Diakon in the sense of "curate" or "assistant Whether the reader is a member of The pastor," may mislead the unwary, or a recon Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod who dite term like "shrove money," the volun seeks a better understanding of the church tary gift made by a penitent after receiving body to which he belongs or whether he holy absolution, may demand recourse to stands outside the Synod's fellowship and more than a collegiate dictionary.) wishes to learn what has led the Synod to This volume provides documentation for its present complex of attitudes and posi a history of The Lutheran Church - Mis tions, he will find Moving Frontiers vastly souri Synod, not of the Lutheran community illuminating. This issue of CoNCORDIA in America as a whole. The attitude of the THEOLOGICAL MONTHLY contains on pages authors toward the Synod of which they all 407 to 419 a sufficiently representative ex are members is not wholly uncritical, but at cerpt to make a description of the book's certain points some readers might have been method unnecessary. This sample adequately grateful for more in the way of outside illustrates the authoritative and admirably appraisals of and reactions to Missouri Synod succinct introductions, the original documen positions. The galley proofs on the basis of tation that in nearly every case manages to which this review is written do not contain be neither too short nor too long and the the introductory material to the work. On wide range of the subject matter. principle, apparently, the authors have re- 441 442 BOOK REVIEW produced official documents where these were place, and it is hard to see what could have to be had. Official documents are certainly been omitted. A measure of the comprehen more authoritative than private expressions. siveness of the work is its inclusion of both But official documents arc also likely to be "A Statement of the Forty-four" and the a little stuffier, a little stiffer, a little less per Confessional Lutheran's reaction to it. The sonal, a little less revealing, and a little less major difficulty clearly is that space limita lively than private expressions of opinion. tions prevented the treatment of certain areas The reader will therefore be grateful for the which probably even the editor and the au leavening provided by the private expressions thors skirted with regret. of opinion. One such area is the role played by the At the same time the authors are sober nonofficial religious press of our Synod. The historians, and they have wisely refrained contribution which the Waltber League Mes from the incorporation of too much "human senger from Walter A. Maier to Alfred interest" material solely to provide "human Klausler made to the development of atti interest." There is enough of this, however, tudes within The Lutheran Church - Mis to make the nonhistorian (as well as the his souri Synod is barely hinted at. The forma torian) happy. This reviewer thinks of such tive role of the organ of the American items as the instructive excerpts from the Lutheran Publicity tlureau, the American diaries of Muhlenberg and Paul Henkel. Or Luthera1l - which from Paul Lindemann Claus Harms describing his reaction to through Adolph Meyer to John Tietjen has Schleiermacher's Reden uber die Religion. pioneered in sponsoring so many new ideas Or Duden's glowing descriptions of mid- and so many new types of church activity 19th-century mid-America. Or the evidence is not, as far as this reviewer could discover, of the poverty of Lohe's North American even hinted at. Similarly, for an earlier gen apostles. Or Craemer's report of his Indian eration the Abendschule played a formative school. Or the dedication of Trinity Church, role of great significance. Freistadt, Wisconsin (along with the North A second important area that deserves ern District's urgent plea to the same con more than the casual attention which it re gregation not to discontinue private confes ceives is that of "stewardship." The present sion and absolution). Or the ordination (in relative liberality of the members of The Lu connection with a celebration of the Holy theran Church - Missouri Synod is not an Communion) of C. J. Hermann Fick in accident. It has a history of trial and error 1847. Or the schedule of increases in profes that ought to have been more fully docu sors' salaries in 1860 (Walther's was doubled mented. from $500 to $1,000 a year). Or Chaplain A third significant area is the history of Richman's experiences as a Civil \Var padre. worship within The Lutheran Church - Mis Or W/alther's 9-word cablegram to Carl souri Synod. The worship of God in Christ Manthey Zorn. Or the moving account of is at the very least a major activity of the Naether's death in India. church militant. It too has a history, not No anthology is ever completely satisfac least in The Lutheran Church - Missouri tory to everyone, but in this case the editor Synod. The frontiers of worship among us and his collaborators deserve extremely high have moved, thanks be to God. But Moving marks for effort and achievement. The selec Frontiers, alas, all but wholly ignores the tion of materials is splendid. A great deal of subject. screening and pruning has obviously taken Omissions like these can be corrected in BOOK REVIEW 443 a second edition. They do not reduce the BIBLICAL AND OTHER STUDIES. Edited value of the actual contents of the first edi by Alexander Altmann. Cambridge, Mass.: tion. Even as it stands, Moving Frontiers is Harvard University Press, 1963. viii and an admirable book in conception, in design, 248 pages. Cloth. $6.00. and in execution. It ought to be in the per This first volume of Studies and Texts to sonal library of every professional servant of be published by the Philip W. Lown Insti The Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod, tute of Advanced Judaic Studies contains pastor, professor, executive, teacher. The a number of articles which should appeal nonprofessional church member who buys it also to students not primarily interested in for himself or as a gift will not regret the Talmudic studies. Cyrus H. Gordon leads off purchase. In a parish library - and no par with an article demonstrating how archae ish library will from now on be complete ology confirms the nature of the milieu without it - it will enhance the useful in sketched in the patriarchal narratives of formation of church members and inspire Genesis. E. A. Speiser underscores this with them to devout praise of God for what He a comparative study of the Nuzi tablets and has done for them and for the whole church the stories related concerning the attempts through their synod. And in any community of Abraham and Isaac to pass off their wives that has a church of The Lutheran Church as sisters. Missouri Synod there should be no public A determined challenge to Paul Kahle's library or college library that does not re thesis on Old Testament textual history is ceive Moving Frontiers within a month. (If made by Moshe Goshen-Gottstein in "The the library's budget will not permit imme Rise of the Tiberian Bible Text." The diate acquisition, the gift of a copy by the Aleppo Codex now being edited in Jerusalem church would be an elementary public rela- was, according to Gottstein, the first codex tions action!) of the complete Old Testament and marks ARTHUR CARL PIEPKORN a climactic stage in the Tiberian text tradi A HISTORY OF MISSION HOUSE-LAKE tion because it is, he claims, the acme of the LAND.