Jerald C. Brauer

Types of Puritan Piety

The Practice of Piety by Lewis Bayly was one of the most famous treatises ever penned by a Puritan. This devotional manual went through numerous editions and was translated into six languages, including into German by Philip Jacob Spener. Piety is the term that best expresses Puritan religiousness. Spirituality was a term seldom employed by Puritans, and when used it never referred to their essential religiousness. Today spirituality is used as a description of all forms of piety, though originally it referred to a particular kind of piety, namely that which developed out of monasticism. Roman Catholic spirituality, whether lay or clerical, has been shaped by the massive presence of monasticism. But Protestant piety has been shaped by the massive absence of that monastic ideal. Hence, the term piety will be used in an effort to delineate Puritan religiousness.

Regionalism and Religion in America

The purpose of this paper is to continue and perhaps to further discussion of the basic assumptions that long have undergirded the various general interpretative survey histories of Christianity and religion in America. 1 Attention to particular problems, issues, and regions and the struggle with new methods have made available fresh insights into the nature of religious history in the American context. These insights raise the question of whether another general survey history of Christianity or of religion in America can or ought to be written until the profession develops a more adequate interpretive framework built solidly on recent research.

In Appreciation of Joseph Sittler

It is difficult, if not impossible, to summarize the long and distinguished career of Joseph Sittler. The various articles contributed to this special issue by friends and colleagues represent an analysis and an interpretation of different facets of his theology and intellectual efforts over the years. So rich and complex has been his life and career that it is necessary and proper to devote a few lines to the totality of that career. There have been three distinct phases in the evolution of Sittlers life and work, and each has been articulated in close conjunction with the others. He has never left behind the previous stage but always carried it on into the next phase, so that his career represents an integrity, a wholeness, as it has moved from stage to stage. At the beginning of his work, Sittler wished only to be a parish pastor, but a pastor with a difference. He was not interested in statistics, gimmicks, or the traditional criteria of success in the ministry. Formed and shaped at Hamma Divinity School under the influence of John O. Evjen, a Leipzig Ph.D. under Rudolph Sohm and master of twelve languages, Sittler cut his theological teeth on Luther, not orthodox Lutheran theologians, and on Kierkegaard. During his first years in a parish in Ohio, Joseph Sittler became a founder of a Lutheran theological discussion group devoted to the study of the nature of the church and the proper understanding of the Gospel, particularly as interpreted by Paul, Luther, and Sohm. With Evjen as their mentor, this group met regularly for discussion and published a mimeographed series of papers. Quickly the group was recognized as embracing the radical young theologians within American Lutheranism, and Sittler emerged as their primary spokesman and leader. Meanwhile, within his parish, he quickly established a reputation as a profound and eloquent preacher, a reputation which soon led to invitations to speak throughout the country. Yet it would be misleading to think of his ministry as having centered wholly in preaching, for he