Evangelical Lutheran Church of Lithuania
Encyclopedia
The Evangelical Lutheran Church of Lithuania is a Lutheran
church body comprising congregations in Lithuania
. The ELCL is a member of the Porvoo Communion
and the Lutheran World Federation
.
Reflecting its conservative confessional Lutheran stance, in 2000, the ELCL declared itself in full fellowship with the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (U.S.). In 2006 the ELCL reported having 21,000 active members, 52 congregations, and 15 pastors. The current Bishop of the church is the Rt Revd Mindaugas Sabutis.
, when Kaunas
, a large town in Lithuania
, accepted the Augsburg Confession
in 1550. However, after 1945 the church body also integrated Lutheran congregations in the formerly German Klaipėda Region
, the northern part of Lithuania Minor
, where Lutheranism dates back to 1525.
Since 1525 Lutheranism started spreading among Lithuanians in Lithuania Minor, which comprised about a quarter of Ducal Prussia
, the first state to officially adopt Lutheranism as state religion. Ducal Prussia emerged from the Roman Catholic Teutonic Prussia
, which, however, only had superficially missioned the rural, mostly Lithuanian population and thus only erected few churches.
The Prussian Lithuanians were only thoroughly Christianised starting with the Reformation in Prussia, the Prussian estates
established the Lutheran Church in Prussia by the Church Order
decided on 10 December 1525. Already on 18 January 1524 Bishop George I
of Pomesania
(and Samland
), who had converted to Lutheranism in 1523, ordered to only use native languages at baptisms. The widespread pagan worship of Perkūnas
, symbolised by the goat buck
, was forbidden in the same year, and repeated in 1540. The Church Order provided for visitations of the parishioners and pastors, first carried out by Bishop George I in 1538. The principal usage of the native language secured the survival of the Lithuanian language in Prussia
.
In 1544 Albert, Duke of Prussia founded the Albertina University
, Königsberg in Prussia/Karaliaučius, which became the principal educational establishment for Lutheran pastors and theologians of Lithuanian language. At the same time the Counter-Reformation
reduced the number of Protestants
in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania
(Lithuania proper). Right in 1544 Duke Albert appointed Lutheran pastors, who had fled anti-Protestant oppression in the Grand Duchy, as professors at the Albertina, namely Stanislovas Rapolionis (who finished his doctorate at Wittenberg
University with a ducal scholarship) and Abraomas Kulvietis
(exiled 1542).
More refugees from Lithuania proper followed and became pastors in various parishes, such as Martynas Mažvydas
, who published the Lutheran Catechism
usa Prasty Szadei in 1547. Among the first native Prussian Lithuanian pastors were Johannes Bretke/Jonas Bretkūnas
(pastoring in Labiau/Labguva (Polessk)
and later in Königsberg), who published a Lithuanian hymnal
in 1589, and wrote the first Lithuanian translation of the Bible
between 1590 and 1591. Thus the Reformation brought to Lithuania Minor and Lithuania proper the first printed book in the Lithuanian language
, the Lutheran Catechism (1547), and later (1591) the first Lithuanian Bible, which was not printed before the 18th century, however.
With the dwindling of Protestantism in Lithuania proper since the 17th century the Prussian Lithuanian Lutheran clergy consisted mostly of natives, many of German language, who had learned Lithuanian only as second language.
In 1525 the Lutheran church found only nine places in Lithuania Minor with churches, to wit Gerdau/Girdava (Zheleznodorozhny)
, Insterburg/Įsrutis (Chernyakhovsk)
, Memel/Klaipėda
(3 churches, one of Lithuanian language), Puschdorf-Stablack/Stablaukis (Stabławki), Ragnit/Ragainė (Neman), Saalau/Želva (Kamenskoye), Tapiau/Tepliava (Gvardeysk)
, Tilsit/Tilžė (Sovetsk)
, and Wehlau/Vėluva (Znamensk)
. Until 1531 more parishes were founded, several of them were supervised by an archpriest (later called superintendent
) on behalf of the bishop or the Pomesanian Consistory (est. In 1602 in Saalfeld in Prussia/Zaalfeld (Zalewo)
, after giving up the episcopate in 1587).
Between 1529 and 1600 31, mostly simple structured, Lutheran churches have been erected in Lithuania Minor. By the end of the 17th c. the number of Lutheran parishes in Lithuania Minor reached 112, with 68 offering Lithuanian services before the great plague (1709–1711), which killed about half the population and reduced the parishes with Lithuanian services to 59. In the parishes with services in Lithuanian and German each pastor served both language groups, only in the cities of Königsberg (Steindamm Church of St. Nicholas, Lithuanian Church of St. Elisabeth, Sackheim), Memel and Tilsit separate churches were exclusively used for parishes of Lithuanian language. Between 1700 and 1918 another 51, usually more massive churches were erected.
In order to restaff orphaned pastorates after the plague King Frederick William I of Prussia
established two departments, in 1718 the Lithuanian Seminary at Albertina, and in 1727 another one (Halės lietuvių kalbos seminaras) at University of Halle upon Saale, closed in 1740. Johann Jakob Quandt
, who also published a Lithuanian bible, a milestone of Lithuanian standard language translated by him and a team of nine further theologians, was the first head of the seminary at Albertina.
The king established a fund granting scholarships for eight students at Albertina and free food for twelve students in Halle. Kristijonas Donelaitis
, alumnus of Albertina Lithuanian Seminary and Lutheran pastor, became a famous poet who wrote a masterpiece of early Lithuanian literature
. Daniel Klein
, another Albertina alumni and pastor of Tilsit, wrote the first grammar book of the Lithuanian language and hymn
s, 36 of which are still in use in the Lithuanian Lutheran church until today. Consistorial Councillor Ludwig Rhesa/Liudvikas Rėza
, an Albertina alumni and professor, leading the Lithuanian Seminary since 1810, distinguished himself as collector and publisher of Lithuanian poems and reeditions of the Lithuanian bible in 1824.
The archpriests of Lithuania Minor were based in Tilsit (as of 1547), Ragnit (as of 1554), Insterburg (as of 1575), Schaaken in Prussia/Šakiai (Niekrasovo) (as of 1590), Memel (as of 1592), Wehlau (as of 1608), and Labiau (as of 1707). In 1751 Pomesanian Consistory and Sambia
n Consistory were merged in the Prussian Consistory in Königsberg, led by general superintendents since 1812. By the mid-1720s the rising number of Lutheran parishes were organised in inspections (renamed Kirchenkreis in the 19th c.; i.e. deaneries
), such as in Stallupönen/Stalupėnai (Nesterov)
, Fischhausen/Žuvininkai (Primorsk)
, Schaaken in Prussia, Labiau, Insterburg, Tilsist, Ragnit and Memel.
The overall number of Prussian parishes with Lithuanian service rose to 92 in the course of the 18th and 19th centuries due to the ongoing establishment of new churches, while services in Lithuanian were given up in many parishes, rather in the south than in the north of Lithuania Minor, due to the assimilation of Lithuanian speakers to German.
After the plague the depopulated areas were also resettled with Lutheran refugees of German language from Salzburg. So by the second half of the 19th century the number of parishes offering Lithuanian services had shrunk to 67 (116,998 parishioners), with an additional seven Roman Catholic parishes (3,395 faithful), mostly of immigrants from Lithuania proper, and five Baptist congregations of Lithuanian language (with 400 congregants).
By 1913 only 45 parishes offered Lutheran services in Lithuanian, also a consequency of the ban on Lithuanian as school language in Germany in 1873. So the Pietist laymen group called sakytojai ' onMouseout='HidePop("34828")' href="/topics/Shtundists">Shtundists
) bewared Lithuanian language from vanishing.
there were 80 Evangelical Lutheran Church in Lithuania congregations in Lithuania proper, and 72 pastor
s were serving about 25,000 members. Whereas in the Klaipėda Region (a Lithuanian autonomous region between 1924 and 1939) 40 pastors, many maintaining services in Lithuanian, served about 137,750 mostly Lutheran parishioners (among them 35,650 Prussian Lithuanians) in 1930.
However, the parishes in the Klaipėda Region remained members of the Ecclesiastical Province of East Prussia until 1925, a subsection of the Evangelical Church of the old-Prussian Union, a church of united administration
of Lutheran and Reformed congregations founded in 1817 by combining the Lutheran and Reformed churches in then Prussia. The parishes formed the Memel deanery, the Heydekrug/Šilutė
deanery and the new Pogegen/Pagėgiai
deanery, comprising since 1919 those parishes of the deanery of Tilsit, itself remaining with Germany, which were located north of the Memel/Nemunas
river and thus disentangled.
After the nationalist demagoguery following the cession of the Klaipėda Region
(northern Lithuania Minor), first a League of Nations mandate, after Word War I, only nine Lutheran parishes continued Lithuanian services in the southern and central part of Lithuania Minor, which remained with Germany, but were mostly forbidden after the Nazi takeover in 1933.
On 30 July 1919 a majority of 82 synodals from Klaipėda Region decided to keep the jurisdiction with the Ecclesiastical Province of East Prussia against two votes for a separation and 15 abstentions. However, after the Lithuanian annexation of the region, not hindered by the protecting powers combined in the Council of Ambassadors
, the Lithuanian government demanded the separation of the Protestant church, announcing it would otherwise withhold the salaries of the clergy.
The majority of the regional clergy and the Evangelical Supreme Ecclesiastical Council (Evangelischer Oberkirchenrat, EOK), the old-Prussian executive body, resisted this plan.
Therefore Viktoras Gailius, Land Director of the Klaipėda Region
addressed the EOK in Berlin, which sent envoys to Memel, in order to conclude a contract on the future of the old-Prussian Lutheran parishes and the one single Reformed congregation in Memel city, on 27 and 29 September 1923. But an agreement turned out impossible.
Superintendent F. Gregor of Memel deanery preferred the regional synodal federation to be a subsection of the East Prussian ecclesiastical province, whereas the faction of sakytojai laymen within the regional Lutheran parishes, forming since 1919 the mostly Lithuanian-language inofficial Klaipėda Regional Synod , demanded – also incited by the Lithuanian central government – under the government-appointed leader Pastor Valentinas Gailius (Ruß/Rusnė
) an independent church body.
However, Gailius, whom the Lithuanian government had granted the title general superintendent, failed to win the pastors and parishioners to also elect him general superintendent. His many decrees were simply ignored in the parishes, who considered his officiating an illegitimate intrusion of government interferment into affairs of ecclesiastical autonomy. The consistory in Königsberg, still the competent directing body, deposed him as pastor.
So in April and June 1924 Gailius twice convened the Lithuanianian-language inofficial Klaipėda Regional Synod and formed a preliminary executive body for an independent church. However, the majority of the pastors and of the elected representatives of the parishioners rejected his approach. Embittered Gailius finally resigned.
In 1925 then the Klaipėda Directorate sent for their part a delegation, including independists and proponents wishing to upkeep the connection with the old-Prussian church, in order to negotiate with the EOK in Berlin. After negotiations between April 18 to 23, and again July 16 to 18, 1925 the Agreement concerning the Evangelical Church of the Memel Territory was concluded and signed on July 23.
Both parties had stipulated that the Lutheran parishes and the single Reformed congregation in Memel should form the Regional Synodal Federation of the Memel Territory with its own consistory led by an elected general superintendent. This regional synodal federation then formed an old-Prussian ecclesiastical province of its own, disentangled from that of East Prussia. The federation was independent from any government interference by the Lithuanian central government or the Klaipėda Directorate. In 1926 first elections were held for the regional synod, and the synodals elected Gregor the first general superintendent and church councillors for the executive body, the consistory in Memel, which constituted in 1927. When in 1933 Gregor retired O. Obereigner, the former Superintendent of Pogegen deanery, succeeded him.
German and Lithuanian were equally to be used in preaching and every pastor was to master both languages. Until 1 January 1932 also foreign pastors were allowed be employed. However, in 1923 the native language of 37 out of 40 pastors in the Klaipėda Region was German, and only three were native speakers of Lithuanian. In 1936 their number had shrunk to two, with the pastors being German native speakers mostly only able to passively understand and read Lithuanian.
With the formation of the German Evangelical Church on 14 July 1933, uniting all German Protestant regional churches
under Nazi government and German Christian pressure, members of the Memel consistory agreed to further collaborate with the Berlin-based EOK within the new federation, whereas the Lithuanian central government refused to allow the regional Protestant representatives to join conventions of the German Evangelical Church.
The central government doubted the further validity of the concordat of 1925 since it considered the old-Prussian church to have changed its legal identity. However, on 26 August 1933 the EOK assured that the old-Prussian church persisted so that the central government refrained from cancelling the concordat.
In 1934 the central government-appointed governor in the Klaipėda Region expelled nine pastors bearing German citizenship in 1934, causing Nazi Germany to protest. After 1935 Lithuania accounted for Hitler’s rising power and rather maintained a low profile in the controversy on affairs in the Klaipėda Region.
With Lithuania ceding Klaipėda Region with effect of 22 March 1939, after the German ultimatum to Lithuania
, again not hindered by the protecting powers of the Council of Ambassadors, the majority of the parishioners welcomed the return to Germany. The EOK sent telegrammes to the parishes thanking them for maintaining the union with the old-Prussian church in the prior years, suggesting this union evidenced their German attitude. On 1 May 1939 the regional synodal federation was abolished and its parishes reintegrated into the Ecclesiastical Province of East Prussia.
dangerously approached the Klaipėda region, the Nazi authorities ordered civilians to evacuate the endangered areas. However, the evacuation started too late since the Red Army approached much faster than expected and could cut off the territorial connection with German-held territories by January 26, 1945. Many refugees perished due to Soviet low-flying strafing attacks, coldness, or were finally – after the Soviet conquest – directly killed by Soviet soldiers.
Rescued were mostly those who managed to flee before the Soviets via land or by sea vessels into the areas conquered by the Britons and Americans. Among them the pastors A. Keleris, J. Pauperas, M. Preikšaitis, O. Stanaitis, A. Trakis, and J. Urdse, who recollected Lithuanian parishes and reorganised Lithuanian pastoring in the western zones of Allied-occupied Germany. Together with 65,000 refugees from Lithuania proper, mostly Roman Catholic, who made their way to the western zones, 158 schools of Lithuanian language were founded there until 1948.
With the emigration of many Lithuanians to overseas or the assimilation of the remaining Lithuanians and Prussian Lithuanians, who hold German citizenship, in West Germany the number shrunk to a mere one, Litauisches Gymnasium/Vasario 16-osios gimnazija (Lithuanian High School) in Lampertheim in Hesse
. Until 1990 this high and boarding school remained the only Lithuanian school in the free world, attended by several known exiled Lithuanians.
The remaining inhabitants of Lithuania Minor underwent terrible years under the Soviet annexation, especially those in the Russian Kaliningrad oblast
. They were generally robbed and plundered, many imprisoned in labour camps, some deported to Sibiria, and generally refused any access to ordinary food supplies causing most of them to perish.
An exception were those Prussian Lithuanians surviving in or returning to the Klaipėda Region, which became part of Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic on 7 April 1948. They could return to their homes, which, however, had often been taken by immigrants from Lithuania proper. There were generally considered second class citizens.
The Lutheran parishes in the Klaipėda Region were revitalised by the laymen sakytojai, since all pastors had perished or remained exiled in the west. The first Lutheran service is recorded for 9 January 1945 in Priekulė (Prökuls). With time 27 Lutheran parishes were registered in all of Lithuania, with 12 located in the Klaipėda Region, to wit in Katyčiai (Koadjuthen)
, Kintai (Kinten)
, Klaipėda (Memel), Lauksargiai (Launen), Pašyšiai (Passon-Reisgen), Plikiai (Plicken), Priekulė, Ramučiai (Ramutten), Saugai (Sausgallen), Šilutė (Heydekrug), Vanagai (Wannaggen), Vyžiai (Wiekschnen). They form a part of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Lithuania since.
When in 1958 the Soviet Union allowed Prussian Lithuanians to revert for their prior annulled German citizenship many emigrated to West Germany
until 1967. So after war-related death toll and flight, perishing under Soviet post-war occupation, and the emigration in the 1950s and 1960s a mere 7,000 to 8,000 of the 137,750 mostly Lutheran Protestants (among them 35,650 Prussian Lithuanians; as of 1930) continued to live in the Klaipėda Region.
During the changes of World War II, also many congregation members from Lithuania proper emigrated, were exiled, or were killed. The churches that remained without pastors were closed and used for other purposes or were destroyed. During Soviet occupation of Lithuania proper from 1940 to 1941 and again 1944 to 1990, religious instruction was forbidden and church membership entailed public penalties.
With Lithuanian independence in 1990, the ELCL began to receive back church buildings and properties that in Soviet times were nationalised and used for various profane purposes
. Churches and property were returned throughout the 1990s.
Lutheranism
Lutheranism is a major branch of Western Christianity that identifies with the theology of Martin Luther, a German reformer. Luther's efforts to reform the theology and practice of the church launched the Protestant Reformation...
church body comprising congregations in Lithuania
Lithuania
Lithuania , officially the Republic of Lithuania is a country in Northern Europe, the biggest of the three Baltic states. It is situated along the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea, whereby to the west lie Sweden and Denmark...
. The ELCL is a member of the Porvoo Communion
Porvoo Communion
The Porvoo Communion is a communion of 12 mainly northern European Anglican and Lutheran churches. It was established in 1992 by an agreement entitled the Porvoo Common Statement which establishes full communion between and among the churches...
and the Lutheran World Federation
Lutheran World Federation
The Lutheran World Federation is a global communion of national and regional Lutheran churches headquartered in the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva, Switzerland. The federation was founded in the Swedish city of Lund in the aftermath of the Second World War in 1947 to coordinate the activities of the...
.
Reflecting its conservative confessional Lutheran stance, in 2000, the ELCL declared itself in full fellowship with the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (U.S.). In 2006 the ELCL reported having 21,000 active members, 52 congregations, and 15 pastors. The current Bishop of the church is the Rt Revd Mindaugas Sabutis.
History
The Evangelical Lutheran Church of Lithuania dates back to the ReformationProtestant Reformation
The Protestant Reformation was a 16th-century split within Western Christianity initiated by Martin Luther, John Calvin and other early Protestants. The efforts of the self-described "reformers", who objected to the doctrines, rituals and ecclesiastical structure of the Roman Catholic Church, led...
, when Kaunas
Kaunas
Kaunas is the second-largest city in Lithuania and has historically been a leading centre of Lithuanian economic, academic, and cultural life. Kaunas was the biggest city and the center of a powiat in Trakai Voivodeship of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania since 1413. During Russian Empire occupation...
, a large town in Lithuania
Lithuania
Lithuania , officially the Republic of Lithuania is a country in Northern Europe, the biggest of the three Baltic states. It is situated along the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea, whereby to the west lie Sweden and Denmark...
, accepted the Augsburg Confession
Augsburg Confession
The Augsburg Confession, also known as the "Augustana" from its Latin name, Confessio Augustana, is the primary confession of faith of the Lutheran Church and one of the most important documents of the Lutheran reformation...
in 1550. However, after 1945 the church body also integrated Lutheran congregations in the formerly German Klaipėda Region
Klaipėda Region
The Klaipėda Region or Memel Territory was defined by the Treaty of Versailles in 1920 when it was put under the administration of the Council of Ambassadors...
, the northern part of Lithuania Minor
Lithuania Minor
Lithuania Minor or Prussian Lithuania is a historical ethnographic region of Prussia, later East Prussia in Germany, where Prussian Lithuanians or Lietuvininkai lived. Lithuania Minor enclosed the northern part of this province and got its name due to the territory's substantial...
, where Lutheranism dates back to 1525.
Since 1525 Lutheranism started spreading among Lithuanians in Lithuania Minor, which comprised about a quarter of Ducal Prussia
Ducal Prussia
The Duchy of Prussia or Ducal Prussia was a duchy in the eastern part of Prussia from 1525–1701. It was the first Protestant duchy with a dominant German-speaking population, as well as Polish and Lithuanian minorities...
, the first state to officially adopt Lutheranism as state religion. Ducal Prussia emerged from the Roman Catholic Teutonic Prussia
Monastic State of the Teutonic Knights
The State of the Teutonic Order, , also Monastic State of the Teutonic Knights or Ordensstaat , was formed in 1224 during the Northern Crusades, the Teutonic Knights' conquest of the pagan West-Baltic Old Prussians in the 13th century....
, which, however, only had superficially missioned the rural, mostly Lithuanian population and thus only erected few churches.
The Prussian Lithuanians were only thoroughly Christianised starting with the Reformation in Prussia, the Prussian estates
Prussian estates
The Prussian estates were representative bodies of Prussia, first created by the Monastic state of Teutonic Prussia in the 14th century but later becoming a devolved legislature for Royal Prussia within the Kingdom of Poland...
established the Lutheran Church in Prussia by the Church Order
Church Order (Lutheran)
The Church Order or Church Ordinance means the general ecclesiastical constitution of a State.The early Evangelical Church attached less importance to ecclesiastical ritual than the pre-Reformation Church had done...
decided on 10 December 1525. Already on 18 January 1524 Bishop George I
George of Polentz
George of Polentz was bishop of Samland and Pomesania and a lawyer. He was the first Lutheran bishop.Polentz was a member of an old Saxon noble family. He studied law in Bologna and was private secretary to the papal Curia, then stood as a soldier in the service of Emperor Maximilian I...
of Pomesania
Bishopric of Pomesania
The Bishopric of Pomesania was a diocese in the Prussian regions of Pomesania and Pogesania. It was founded as a Roman Catholic diocese in 1243 by the papal legate William of Modena. The bishops, whose seat was Riesenburg , possessed one-third of the bishopric's territory...
(and Samland
Bishopric of Samland
The Bishopric of Samland was a bishopric in Samland in medieval Prussia. It was founded as a Roman Catholic diocese in 1243 by papal legate William of Modena. Its seat was Königsberg, until 1523 the episcopal residence was in Fischhausen. The bishopric became Lutheran in the 16th century during...
), who had converted to Lutheranism in 1523, ordered to only use native languages at baptisms. The widespread pagan worship of Perkūnas
Perkunas
Perkūnas was the common Baltic god of thunder, one of the most important deities in the Baltic pantheon. In both Lithuanian and Latvian mythology, he is documented as the god of thunder, rain, mountains, oak trees and the sky.-Etymology:...
, symbolised by the goat buck
Goat
The domestic goat is a subspecies of goat domesticated from the wild goat of southwest Asia and Eastern Europe. The goat is a member of the Bovidae family and is closely related to the sheep as both are in the goat-antelope subfamily Caprinae. There are over three hundred distinct breeds of...
, was forbidden in the same year, and repeated in 1540. The Church Order provided for visitations of the parishioners and pastors, first carried out by Bishop George I in 1538. The principal usage of the native language secured the survival of the Lithuanian language in Prussia
Prussia (region)
Prussia is a historical region in Central Europe extending from the south-eastern coast of the Baltic Sea to the Masurian Lake District. It is now divided between Poland, Russia, and Lithuania...
.
In 1544 Albert, Duke of Prussia founded the Albertina University
University of Königsberg
The University of Königsberg was the university of Königsberg in East Prussia. It was founded in 1544 as second Protestant academy by Duke Albert of Prussia, and was commonly known as the Albertina....
, Königsberg in Prussia/Karaliaučius, which became the principal educational establishment for Lutheran pastors and theologians of Lithuanian language. At the same time the Counter-Reformation
Counter-Reformation
The Counter-Reformation was the period of Catholic revival beginning with the Council of Trent and ending at the close of the Thirty Years' War, 1648 as a response to the Protestant Reformation.The Counter-Reformation was a comprehensive effort, composed of four major elements:#Ecclesiastical or...
reduced the number of Protestants
Protestantism
Protestantism is one of the three major groupings within Christianity. It is a movement that began in Germany in the early 16th century as a reaction against medieval Roman Catholic doctrines and practices, especially in regards to salvation, justification, and ecclesiology.The doctrines of the...
in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania
Grand Duchy of Lithuania
The Grand Duchy of Lithuania was a European state from the 12th /13th century until 1569 and then as a constituent part of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth until 1791 when Constitution of May 3, 1791 abolished it in favor of unitary state. It was founded by the Lithuanians, one of the polytheistic...
(Lithuania proper). Right in 1544 Duke Albert appointed Lutheran pastors, who had fled anti-Protestant oppression in the Grand Duchy, as professors at the Albertina, namely Stanislovas Rapolionis (who finished his doctorate at Wittenberg
Wittenberg
Wittenberg, officially Lutherstadt Wittenberg, is a city in Germany in the Bundesland Saxony-Anhalt, on the river Elbe. It has a population of about 50,000....
University with a ducal scholarship) and Abraomas Kulvietis
Abraomas Kulvietis
Abraomas Kulvietis was a jurist and a professor at Königsberg Albertina University, as well as a reformer of the church....
(exiled 1542).
Martynas Mažvydas
Martynas Mažvydas Martynas Mažvydas Martynas Mažvydas (1510 near Žemaičių Naumiestis (now in Šilutė district municipality) - May 21, 1563 in Königsberg (now Kaliningrad) was the author and the editor of the first printed book in the Lithuanian language....
, who published the Lutheran Catechism
Catechism
A catechism , i.e. to indoctrinate) is a summary or exposition of doctrine, traditionally used in Christian religious teaching from New Testament times to the present...
usa Prasty Szadei in 1547. Among the first native Prussian Lithuanian pastors were Johannes Bretke/Jonas Bretkūnas
Jonas Bretkunas
Jonas Bretkūnas, Johann Bretke, also known as Bretkus was a Lutheran pastor and was one of the best known developers of the written Lithuanian language...
(pastoring in Labiau/Labguva (Polessk)
Polessk
Polessk , prior to 1945 known by its German name Labiau is a town and the administrative center of Polessky District of Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia. Population: 4,744 ....
and later in Königsberg), who published a Lithuanian hymnal
Hymnal
Hymnal or hymnary or hymnbook is a collection of hymns, i.e. religious songs, usually in the form of a book. The earliest hand-written hymnals are known since Middle Ages in the context of European Christianity...
in 1589, and wrote the first Lithuanian translation of the Bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
between 1590 and 1591. Thus the Reformation brought to Lithuania Minor and Lithuania proper the first printed book in the Lithuanian language
Lithuanian language
Lithuanian is the official state language of Lithuania and is recognized as one of the official languages of the European Union. There are about 2.96 million native Lithuanian speakers in Lithuania and about 170,000 abroad. Lithuanian is a Baltic language, closely related to Latvian, although they...
, the Lutheran Catechism (1547), and later (1591) the first Lithuanian Bible, which was not printed before the 18th century, however.
With the dwindling of Protestantism in Lithuania proper since the 17th century the Prussian Lithuanian Lutheran clergy consisted mostly of natives, many of German language, who had learned Lithuanian only as second language.
In 1525 the Lutheran church found only nine places in Lithuania Minor with churches, to wit Gerdau/Girdava (Zheleznodorozhny)
Zheleznodorozhny, Kaliningrad Oblast
Zheleznodorozhny , prior to 1946 known by its German name Gerdauen, is an urban locality in Pravdinsky District of Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia, located southeast of Kaliningrad, near the border with Poland...
, Insterburg/Įsrutis (Chernyakhovsk)
Chernyakhovsk
Chernyakhovsk is a town and the administrative center of Chernyakhovsky District of Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia, located at the confluence of the Instruch and the Angrapa Rivers, forming the Pregolya...
, Memel/Klaipėda
Klaipeda
Klaipėda is a city in Lithuania situated at the mouth of the Nemunas River where it flows into the Baltic Sea. It is the third largest city in Lithuania and the capital of Klaipėda County....
(3 churches, one of Lithuanian language), Puschdorf-Stablack/Stablaukis (Stabławki), Ragnit/Ragainė (Neman), Saalau/Želva (Kamenskoye), Tapiau/Tepliava (Gvardeysk)
Gvardeysk
Gvardeysk is a town and the administrative center of Gvardeysky District of Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia, located on the right bank of the Pregolya River east of Kaliningrad. Population: -History:...
, Tilsit/Tilžė (Sovetsk)
Sovetsk, Kaliningrad Oblast
Sovetsk , known by its historical German name of Tilsit in East Prussia before 1946, is a town in Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia, located on the south bank of the Neman River. Population: -History of Tilsit:...
, and Wehlau/Vėluva (Znamensk)
Znamensk, Kaliningrad Oblast
Znamensk is a settlement in Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia. It is located on the right bank of the Pregolya River at its confluence with the Lava River some 50 km east of Kaliningrad...
. Until 1531 more parishes were founded, several of them were supervised by an archpriest (later called superintendent
Superintendent (ecclesiastical)
Superintendent is the head of an administrative division of a Protestant church, largely historical but still in use in Germany.- Superintendents in Sweden :...
) on behalf of the bishop or the Pomesanian Consistory (est. In 1602 in Saalfeld in Prussia/Zaalfeld (Zalewo)
Zalewo
Zalewo is a town in Iława County, Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship, Poland, with 2,977 inhabitants .Until 1945 Saalfeld was in Kreis Mohrungen, East Prussia.-Famous people :*Robert Roberthin , one of the first regional poets...
, after giving up the episcopate in 1587).
Between 1529 and 1600 31, mostly simple structured, Lutheran churches have been erected in Lithuania Minor. By the end of the 17th c. the number of Lutheran parishes in Lithuania Minor reached 112, with 68 offering Lithuanian services before the great plague (1709–1711), which killed about half the population and reduced the parishes with Lithuanian services to 59. In the parishes with services in Lithuanian and German each pastor served both language groups, only in the cities of Königsberg (Steindamm Church of St. Nicholas, Lithuanian Church of St. Elisabeth, Sackheim), Memel and Tilsit separate churches were exclusively used for parishes of Lithuanian language. Between 1700 and 1918 another 51, usually more massive churches were erected.
In order to restaff orphaned pastorates after the plague King Frederick William I of Prussia
Frederick William I of Prussia
Frederick William I of the House of Hohenzollern, was the King in Prussia and Elector of Brandenburg from 1713 until his death...
established two departments, in 1718 the Lithuanian Seminary at Albertina, and in 1727 another one (Halės lietuvių kalbos seminaras) at University of Halle upon Saale, closed in 1740. Johann Jakob Quandt
Johann Jakob Quandt
Johann Jakob Quandt was a Lutheran theologian, best known for the first major complete Bible in Lithuanian, the Quandt Bible of 1735.-References:...
, who also published a Lithuanian bible, a milestone of Lithuanian standard language translated by him and a team of nine further theologians, was the first head of the seminary at Albertina.
The king established a fund granting scholarships for eight students at Albertina and free food for twelve students in Halle. Kristijonas Donelaitis
Kristijonas Donelaitis
Kristijonas Donelaitis was a Prussian Lithuanian Lutheran pastor and poet. He lived and worked in Lithuania Minor, a territory in the Kingdom of Prussia, that had a sizable minority of ethnic Lithuanians...
, alumnus of Albertina Lithuanian Seminary and Lutheran pastor, became a famous poet who wrote a masterpiece of early Lithuanian literature
Lithuanian literature
Lithuanian literature concerns the art of written works compiled by Lithuanians throughout their history.-Latin language:A wealth of Lithuanian literature was written in Latin, the main scholarly language in the Middle Ages.-Lithuanian language:...
. Daniel Klein
Daniel Klein (grammarian)
Daniel Klein was a Lutheran pastor and scholar from Tilsit, Duchy of Prussia, who is best known for writing the first grammar book of the Lithuanian language.Klein studied philosophy, theology, Greek and Hebrew in the University of Königsberg...
, another Albertina alumni and pastor of Tilsit, wrote the first grammar book of the Lithuanian language and hymn
Hymn
A hymn is a type of song, usually religious, specifically written for the purpose of praise, adoration or prayer, and typically addressed to a deity or deities, or to a prominent figure or personification...
s, 36 of which are still in use in the Lithuanian Lutheran church until today. Consistorial Councillor Ludwig Rhesa/Liudvikas Rėza
Ludwig Rhesa
thumb|Bust of Rheza at [[Vilnius University]]Ludwig Rhesa, also known as Martin Ludwig Rhesa, Ludwig Jedemin Rhesa, Liudvikas Rėza , was a consistorial councilor and a professor at the University of Königsberg in East Prussia.He was born as Ludwig Rheese in the village of Karwaiten on the Curonian...
, an Albertina alumni and professor, leading the Lithuanian Seminary since 1810, distinguished himself as collector and publisher of Lithuanian poems and reeditions of the Lithuanian bible in 1824.
The archpriests of Lithuania Minor were based in Tilsit (as of 1547), Ragnit (as of 1554), Insterburg (as of 1575), Schaaken in Prussia/Šakiai (Niekrasovo) (as of 1590), Memel (as of 1592), Wehlau (as of 1608), and Labiau (as of 1707). In 1751 Pomesanian Consistory and Sambia
Sambia
Sambia or Samland is a peninsula in the Kaliningrad Oblast of Russia, on the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea. The Curonian Lagoon and the Vistula Lagoon demarcate the peninsula. Prior to 1945 it formed an important part of East Prussia.-Names:Sambia is named after the Sambians, an extinct...
n Consistory were merged in the Prussian Consistory in Königsberg, led by general superintendents since 1812. By the mid-1720s the rising number of Lutheran parishes were organised in inspections (renamed Kirchenkreis in the 19th c.; i.e. deaneries
Deanery
A Deanery is an ecclesiastical entity in both the Roman Catholic Church and the Church of England. A deanery is either the jurisdiction or residence of a Dean.- Catholic usage :...
), such as in Stallupönen/Stalupėnai (Nesterov)
Nesterov
Nesterov is a town and the administrative center of Nesterovsky District of Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia. Population: -History:In the Middle Ages, the area in Old Prussia had been settled by the Nadruvian tribe of the Baltic Prussians. It was conquered by the Teutonic Knights about 1276 and...
, Fischhausen/Žuvininkai (Primorsk)
Primorsk, Kaliningrad Oblast
Primorsk , prior to 1945 known by its German name Fischhausen, is an urban locality in Baltiysky District of Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia, located on the Vistula Lagoon. Population:...
, Schaaken in Prussia, Labiau, Insterburg, Tilsist, Ragnit and Memel.
The overall number of Prussian parishes with Lithuanian service rose to 92 in the course of the 18th and 19th centuries due to the ongoing establishment of new churches, while services in Lithuanian were given up in many parishes, rather in the south than in the north of Lithuania Minor, due to the assimilation of Lithuanian speakers to German.
After the plague the depopulated areas were also resettled with Lutheran refugees of German language from Salzburg. So by the second half of the 19th century the number of parishes offering Lithuanian services had shrunk to 67 (116,998 parishioners), with an additional seven Roman Catholic parishes (3,395 faithful), mostly of immigrants from Lithuania proper, and five Baptist congregations of Lithuanian language (with 400 congregants).
By 1913 only 45 parishes offered Lutheran services in Lithuanian, also a consequency of the ban on Lithuanian as school language in Germany in 1873. So the Pietist laymen group called sakytojai ' onMouseout='HidePop("34828")' href="/topics/Shtundists">Shtundists
Shtundists
The Shtundists are any of several Evangelical Protestant groups in the former Soviet Union and its successor states. More specifically, the term refers to sectarian Christian groups that emerged among Ukrainian and Russian peasants in southern regions of the Russian Empire in the second half of...
) bewared Lithuanian language from vanishing.
Lithuanian Lutheranism between the wars
Before World War IIWorld War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
there were 80 Evangelical Lutheran Church in Lithuania congregations in Lithuania proper, and 72 pastor
Pastor
The word pastor usually refers to an ordained leader of a Christian congregation. When used as an ecclesiastical styling or title, this role may be abbreviated to "Pr." or often "Ps"....
s were serving about 25,000 members. Whereas in the Klaipėda Region (a Lithuanian autonomous region between 1924 and 1939) 40 pastors, many maintaining services in Lithuanian, served about 137,750 mostly Lutheran parishioners (among them 35,650 Prussian Lithuanians) in 1930.
However, the parishes in the Klaipėda Region remained members of the Ecclesiastical Province of East Prussia until 1925, a subsection of the Evangelical Church of the old-Prussian Union, a church of united administration
United and uniting churches
United and uniting churches are churches formed from the merger or other form of union of two or more different Protestant denominations.Perhaps the oldest example of a united church is found in Germany, where the Evangelical Church in Germany is a federation of Lutheran, United and Reformed...
of Lutheran and Reformed congregations founded in 1817 by combining the Lutheran and Reformed churches in then Prussia. The parishes formed the Memel deanery, the Heydekrug/Šilutė
Šilute
Šilutė is a city in the south of the Klaipėda County, Lithuania. The city was part of the Klaipėda Region and ethnographic Lithuania Minor. Šilutė was the interwar capital of Šilutė County and is currently the capital of Šilutė district municipality.-Name:...
deanery and the new Pogegen/Pagėgiai
Pagegiai
Pagėgiai is a city in the south western Lithuania. It is located in the region of the former prussian tribe of Skalvians. It is the capital of Pagėgiai municipality, and as such it is part of Tauragė County.-Name:...
deanery, comprising since 1919 those parishes of the deanery of Tilsit, itself remaining with Germany, which were located north of the Memel/Nemunas
Neman River
Neman or Niemen or Nemunas, is a major Eastern European river rising in Belarus and flowing through Lithuania before draining into the Curonian Lagoon and then into the Baltic Sea at Klaipėda. It is the northern border between Lithuania and Russia's Kaliningrad Oblast in its lower reaches...
river and thus disentangled.
After the nationalist demagoguery following the cession of the Klaipėda Region
Klaipėda Region
The Klaipėda Region or Memel Territory was defined by the Treaty of Versailles in 1920 when it was put under the administration of the Council of Ambassadors...
(northern Lithuania Minor), first a League of Nations mandate, after Word War I, only nine Lutheran parishes continued Lithuanian services in the southern and central part of Lithuania Minor, which remained with Germany, but were mostly forbidden after the Nazi takeover in 1933.
On 30 July 1919 a majority of 82 synodals from Klaipėda Region decided to keep the jurisdiction with the Ecclesiastical Province of East Prussia against two votes for a separation and 15 abstentions. However, after the Lithuanian annexation of the region, not hindered by the protecting powers combined in the Council of Ambassadors
Council of Ambassadors
Council of Ambassadors was an intergovernmental agency, founded in 1919 by decision of the states of the Entente. The Council was to implement the provision of the Treaty of Versailles. It comprised the ambassadors of the United Kingdom, Italy, and Japan in Paris and was chaired by foreign minister...
, the Lithuanian government demanded the separation of the Protestant church, announcing it would otherwise withhold the salaries of the clergy.
The majority of the regional clergy and the Evangelical Supreme Ecclesiastical Council (Evangelischer Oberkirchenrat, EOK), the old-Prussian executive body, resisted this plan.
Therefore Viktoras Gailius, Land Director of the Klaipėda Region
Directorate of the Klaipėda Region
The Directorate of the Klaipėda Region was the main governing institution in the Klaipėda Region from February 1920 to March 1939. It was established by local German political parties to govern the region between the signing of the Treaty of Versailles and establishment of French provision...
addressed the EOK in Berlin, which sent envoys to Memel, in order to conclude a contract on the future of the old-Prussian Lutheran parishes and the one single Reformed congregation in Memel city, on 27 and 29 September 1923. But an agreement turned out impossible.
Superintendent F. Gregor of Memel deanery preferred the regional synodal federation to be a subsection of the East Prussian ecclesiastical province, whereas the faction of sakytojai laymen within the regional Lutheran parishes, forming since 1919 the mostly Lithuanian-language inofficial Klaipėda Regional Synod , demanded – also incited by the Lithuanian central government – under the government-appointed leader Pastor Valentinas Gailius (Ruß/Rusnė
Rusne
Rusnė is a town in Šilutė district, Lithuania, located on the Rusnė Island in the Nemunas Delta, 9 km south-west from Šilutė.Rusnė was first mentioned in historical sources in 14th century. In 1419 the first church was built in Rusnė, and in 1553 a Lithuanian parish school was established...
) an independent church body.
However, Gailius, whom the Lithuanian government had granted the title general superintendent, failed to win the pastors and parishioners to also elect him general superintendent. His many decrees were simply ignored in the parishes, who considered his officiating an illegitimate intrusion of government interferment into affairs of ecclesiastical autonomy. The consistory in Königsberg, still the competent directing body, deposed him as pastor.
So in April and June 1924 Gailius twice convened the Lithuanianian-language inofficial Klaipėda Regional Synod and formed a preliminary executive body for an independent church. However, the majority of the pastors and of the elected representatives of the parishioners rejected his approach. Embittered Gailius finally resigned.
In 1925 then the Klaipėda Directorate sent for their part a delegation, including independists and proponents wishing to upkeep the connection with the old-Prussian church, in order to negotiate with the EOK in Berlin. After negotiations between April 18 to 23, and again July 16 to 18, 1925 the Agreement concerning the Evangelical Church of the Memel Territory was concluded and signed on July 23.
Both parties had stipulated that the Lutheran parishes and the single Reformed congregation in Memel should form the Regional Synodal Federation of the Memel Territory with its own consistory led by an elected general superintendent. This regional synodal federation then formed an old-Prussian ecclesiastical province of its own, disentangled from that of East Prussia. The federation was independent from any government interference by the Lithuanian central government or the Klaipėda Directorate. In 1926 first elections were held for the regional synod, and the synodals elected Gregor the first general superintendent and church councillors for the executive body, the consistory in Memel, which constituted in 1927. When in 1933 Gregor retired O. Obereigner, the former Superintendent of Pogegen deanery, succeeded him.
German and Lithuanian were equally to be used in preaching and every pastor was to master both languages. Until 1 January 1932 also foreign pastors were allowed be employed. However, in 1923 the native language of 37 out of 40 pastors in the Klaipėda Region was German, and only three were native speakers of Lithuanian. In 1936 their number had shrunk to two, with the pastors being German native speakers mostly only able to passively understand and read Lithuanian.
With the formation of the German Evangelical Church on 14 July 1933, uniting all German Protestant regional churches
Landeskirche
In Germany and Switzerland, a Landeskirche is the church of a region. They originated as the national churches of the independent states, States of Germany or Cantons of Switzerland , that later unified to form modern Germany or modern Switzerland , respectively.-Origins in the Holy Roman...
under Nazi government and German Christian pressure, members of the Memel consistory agreed to further collaborate with the Berlin-based EOK within the new federation, whereas the Lithuanian central government refused to allow the regional Protestant representatives to join conventions of the German Evangelical Church.
The central government doubted the further validity of the concordat of 1925 since it considered the old-Prussian church to have changed its legal identity. However, on 26 August 1933 the EOK assured that the old-Prussian church persisted so that the central government refrained from cancelling the concordat.
In 1934 the central government-appointed governor in the Klaipėda Region expelled nine pastors bearing German citizenship in 1934, causing Nazi Germany to protest. After 1935 Lithuania accounted for Hitler’s rising power and rather maintained a low profile in the controversy on affairs in the Klaipėda Region.
With Lithuania ceding Klaipėda Region with effect of 22 March 1939, after the German ultimatum to Lithuania
1939 German ultimatum to Lithuania
1939 German ultimatum to Lithuania was an oral ultimatum presented to Juozas Urbšys, Foreign Minister of Lithuania, by Joachim von Ribbentrop, Foreign Minister of Nazi Germany, on March 20, 1939...
, again not hindered by the protecting powers of the Council of Ambassadors, the majority of the parishioners welcomed the return to Germany. The EOK sent telegrammes to the parishes thanking them for maintaining the union with the old-Prussian church in the prior years, suggesting this union evidenced their German attitude. On 1 May 1939 the regional synodal federation was abolished and its parishes reintegrated into the Ecclesiastical Province of East Prussia.
Post war development
By the end of 1944, when the Soviet Red ArmyRed Army
The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army started out as the Soviet Union's revolutionary communist combat groups during the Russian Civil War of 1918-1922. It grew into the national army of the Soviet Union. By the 1930s the Red Army was among the largest armies in history.The "Red Army" name refers to...
dangerously approached the Klaipėda region, the Nazi authorities ordered civilians to evacuate the endangered areas. However, the evacuation started too late since the Red Army approached much faster than expected and could cut off the territorial connection with German-held territories by January 26, 1945. Many refugees perished due to Soviet low-flying strafing attacks, coldness, or were finally – after the Soviet conquest – directly killed by Soviet soldiers.
Rescued were mostly those who managed to flee before the Soviets via land or by sea vessels into the areas conquered by the Britons and Americans. Among them the pastors A. Keleris, J. Pauperas, M. Preikšaitis, O. Stanaitis, A. Trakis, and J. Urdse, who recollected Lithuanian parishes and reorganised Lithuanian pastoring in the western zones of Allied-occupied Germany. Together with 65,000 refugees from Lithuania proper, mostly Roman Catholic, who made their way to the western zones, 158 schools of Lithuanian language were founded there until 1948.
With the emigration of many Lithuanians to overseas or the assimilation of the remaining Lithuanians and Prussian Lithuanians, who hold German citizenship, in West Germany the number shrunk to a mere one, Litauisches Gymnasium/Vasario 16-osios gimnazija (Lithuanian High School) in Lampertheim in Hesse
Lampertheim
Lampertheim is a town in the Bergstraße district in Hesse, Germany.-Location:Lampertheim lies in the southwest corner of Hesse in the Rhine rift at the Biedensand Conservation Area and borders on Baden-Württemberg and Rhineland-Palatinate...
. Until 1990 this high and boarding school remained the only Lithuanian school in the free world, attended by several known exiled Lithuanians.
The remaining inhabitants of Lithuania Minor underwent terrible years under the Soviet annexation, especially those in the Russian Kaliningrad oblast
Kaliningrad Oblast
Kaliningrad Oblast is a federal subject of Russia situated on the Baltic coast. It has a population of The oblast forms the westernmost part of the Russian Federation, but it has no land connection to the rest of Russia. Since its creation it has been an exclave of the Russian SFSR and then the...
. They were generally robbed and plundered, many imprisoned in labour camps, some deported to Sibiria, and generally refused any access to ordinary food supplies causing most of them to perish.
An exception were those Prussian Lithuanians surviving in or returning to the Klaipėda Region, which became part of Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic on 7 April 1948. They could return to their homes, which, however, had often been taken by immigrants from Lithuania proper. There were generally considered second class citizens.
The Lutheran parishes in the Klaipėda Region were revitalised by the laymen sakytojai, since all pastors had perished or remained exiled in the west. The first Lutheran service is recorded for 9 January 1945 in Priekulė (Prökuls). With time 27 Lutheran parishes were registered in all of Lithuania, with 12 located in the Klaipėda Region, to wit in Katyčiai (Koadjuthen)
Katyčiai
Katyčiai is a small town in Klaipėda County, in northwestern Lithuania. According to the 2001 census, the town has a population of 737 people....
, Kintai (Kinten)
Kintai
Kintai is a small town in Klaipėda County, in western Lithuania. According to the 2001 census, the town has a population of 833 people....
, Klaipėda (Memel), Lauksargiai (Launen), Pašyšiai (Passon-Reisgen), Plikiai (Plicken), Priekulė, Ramučiai (Ramutten), Saugai (Sausgallen), Šilutė (Heydekrug), Vanagai (Wannaggen), Vyžiai (Wiekschnen). They form a part of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Lithuania since.
When in 1958 the Soviet Union allowed Prussian Lithuanians to revert for their prior annulled German citizenship many emigrated to West Germany
West Germany
West Germany is the common English, but not official, name for the Federal Republic of Germany or FRG in the period between its creation in May 1949 to German reunification on 3 October 1990....
until 1967. So after war-related death toll and flight, perishing under Soviet post-war occupation, and the emigration in the 1950s and 1960s a mere 7,000 to 8,000 of the 137,750 mostly Lutheran Protestants (among them 35,650 Prussian Lithuanians; as of 1930) continued to live in the Klaipėda Region.
During the changes of World War II, also many congregation members from Lithuania proper emigrated, were exiled, or were killed. The churches that remained without pastors were closed and used for other purposes or were destroyed. During Soviet occupation of Lithuania proper from 1940 to 1941 and again 1944 to 1990, religious instruction was forbidden and church membership entailed public penalties.
With Lithuanian independence in 1990, the ELCL began to receive back church buildings and properties that in Soviet times were nationalised and used for various profane purposes
Profane use
Profane use is a term used in the Roman Catholic Church to refer to closed parish churches that will no longer be used as churches. This is often done in preparation to sell the former church building to another party...
. Churches and property were returned throughout the 1990s.