/Herrnhuters/.[13]--This sect was only a development of the Moravian Brothers founded in 1457 by one of the Hussite leaders. It owes its development in the eighteenth century to Count Zinzendorf (1700-1760), a wealthy nobleman and a Pietist of the school of Spener. A number of the Moravian or Bohemian Brethren having appealed to him for a suitable place to establish a settlement, he offered them portion of his estate at Hutberg (1722). As they were inclined to quarrel amongst themselves he undertook in person the work of organisation. He appointed a college of elders to control the spiritual and temporal affairs of the community, together with a college of deacons to superintend specially the temporal wants of the brethren. Like the Pietists generally he paid little attention to dogmatic differences, allowing the Lutherans, Calvinists, and Moravians to have their own separate elders. As he was anxious to undertake missionary work he received Holy Orders, and wished to preach in Bohemia, but the Austrian government refused to allow him to continue his work in that province, and even secured his banishment from Saxony. He went through Europe visiting Holland and England and established some of his communities in both these countries, after which he returned to Herrnhut in 1755. During his lifetime Zinzendorf was looked upon as the head of the whole community, but after his death it was much more difficult to preserve unity. The Herrnhuters made some progress in Germany, but their greatest strength at the present day is to be found in England and the United States.
/Swedenborgians/.[14]--The founder of this sect was Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772), who was born at Stockholm, and educated at the University of Upsala. He was a very distinguished student especially in the department of mathematics and physical science, and after an extended tour through Germany, France, Holland, and England he returned and settled down in Sweden, where he was offered and refused a chair at Upsala. From 1734 he began to turn to the study of philosophy and religion. After 1743, when he declared that Our Lord had appeared to him in a vision, had taught him the real spiritual sense of Scripture, and had commanded him to instruct others, he abandoned his mathematical pursuits and turned entirely to religion. As Judaism had been supplanted by Christianity, so too, he maintained, the revelation given by Christ was to be perfected by that granted to himself. He rejected the Justification theory of Luther, the Predestination teaching of Calvin, the doctrines of the Trinity, of Original Sin, and of the Resurrection of the body. The one God, according to him, took to Himself human flesh, and the name, Son of God, was applied properly to the humanity assumed by God the Father, while the Holy Ghost was but the energy and operation of the God Man. The new Jerusalem, that was to take the place of the Christian Church, was to be initiated on the day he completed his great work /Vera Christiana Religio/ (1770).
He claimed that the last Judgment took place in his presence in 1757.
During his own life he did little to organise his followers except by establishing small societies for the study of the Bible, but after his death the organisation of the new Jerusalem was pushed on rapidly.
From Sweden the sect spread into England, where the first community was established in Lancashire in 1787, and into America and Germany.
For a long time the Swedenborgians were persecuted as heretics in Sweden.
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[1] Kawerau, /J. Agricola/, 1881. Elwert, /De antinomia Agricolae/, 1837.
[2] Moller, /Dr. Andreas Osiander/, 1870.
[3] Preger, /M. Flacius Illyrikus und seine Zeit/, 2 Bde., 1859-61.
[4] Dowling, /The Life and Correspondence of Christ/, 1863.
[5] Maronier, /Jacobus Arminius/, 1905. De Bray, /Histoire de l'eglise Arminienne/, 1835.
[6] Keller, /Geschichte der Wiedertaufer und ihres Reichs/, 1880.
[7] Schyn, /Historia Christianorum qui Mennonitae appellantur/, 1723.
[8] Hofmann, /Caspar Schwenkfelds Leben und Lehren/, 1897.
[9] Bock, /Historia Antitrinitariorum maxime Socinianismi/, 1774-84.
Lecler, /F. Socin/, 1884.
[10] Denzinger, op. cit., no. 993.
[11] Ritchl, /Geschichte des Pietismus/, 1880-6.
[12] Hossbach, /Ph. J. Spener und seine Zeit/, 1853.
[13] Camerarius, /Historica narratio de Fratrum Orthodoxorum ecclesiis/, etc., 1625. Hamilton, /A History of the Moravian Church or the Unitas Fratrum/, 1900.
[14] Tafel, /Documents concerning the Life and Character of E.
Swedenborg/, 1875-77. Gorres, /Emanuel Swedenborg, seine visionen und sein verhaltniss zur Kirche/, 1827.