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Tabor Church (Berlin-Hohenschönhausen)
Encyclopedia
Tabor Church is the church of the Evangelical
Berlin-Hohenschönhausen Congregation, a member of today's Protestant umbrella organisation Evangelical Church of Berlin-Brandenburg-Silesian Upper Lusatia
(under this name since 2004). The church building is located in Berlin
, borough Lichtenberg
, in the locality of Alt-Hohenschönhausen
. The church was named in memory of the Transfiguration of Jesus
, which allegedly took place on Mount Tabor הר תבור
in today's Israel
.
The congregation's parish comprises the area of the historical village of Hohenschönhausen, which has been incorporated into Berlin by the Prussian Greater Berlin Act
in 1920. Between 1985 and 2001 the area was part of the eponymous former borough of Hohenschönhausen
.
and was built in the late 13th c., but maybe earlier around 1230. That is about 100 years earlier than the first recorded mentioning of the former village (in 1352 and 1356).
The oldest surviving section of the church is its quire built from granite ashlars in late Romanesque
style (13th c.) with a rib vault
. In 1352 - as preserved in a document - Heinrich Billerbeck, the "rector ecclesie in alta schonehusen" (parson of the church in Hohenschönhausen), unmasked a man pretending to be the late Waldemar the Great
of the Margraviate of Brandenburg
, declared dead in 1320.
The present prayer hall of two nave
s is an addition of about 1450 erected from simple boulders and vaulted, supported by a central square pier
. Around 1470 a half-timbered tower was attached to the southern side of the church. In 1480 the family von Röbel was enfeoffed with the manor estate
of Hohenschönhausen, thus also holding the Ius patronatus
to the church.
converted from Catholicism
to Lutheranism
, as earlier had done many of his subjects. The church thus became Lutheran too, like most of the electoral subjects and all the churches in the Electorate of Brandenburg. In 1615 the tower underwent its first total reconstruction, followed by further repairs and new buildings at least once every century.
In 1626 - in the course of the Thirty Years’ War (1618–1648) - the Lutheran Swedish troops under Gustavus II Adolphus
and the Catholic Imperial Army under Wallenstein
ravaged Hohenschönhausen and plundered the church. Out of ten farmer families, three cottager families, and two shepherd families in the parish (as of 1624) only three families holding farms and five merely holding cottages survived (as of 1652).
In 1714 the peaked spire gave way for a domed top with a weathervane. In 1736 Christian Friedrich von Röbel sold the manor estate for 22,800 Thaler
s to Adam Ebersbach, a merchant from Berlin. He had thus become the patron
of the church and financed its renovation in 1738.
Under the reign of King Frederick the Great
also the cemetery around the church - like all cemeteries - had to be planted with mulberry
trees. Their leaves were to be picked by village pupils and to be delivered for the loss-making silk production the king tried to enforce in his dirigist
concept of cameralism. The last mulberry tree fell in the 1980s. After the lost Battle of Kunersdorf
on 12 August 1759 (in the course of the Third Silesian or Seven Years War, 1756–1763, the European chapter of Anglo-French and Indian War
), the inimical Austrian and Russian soldiers robbed what they considered precious from the inventory of the church.
In 1817, under the auspices of King Frederick William III of Prussia
, the Lutheran congregation of Hohenschönhausen, like most Prussian Protestant congregations, joined the common umbrella organisation then called the Evangelical Church in Prussia (under this name since 1821), with each congregation maintaining its former denomination or adopting the new united denomination. In 1905 the church was renovated and renamed into Tabor Church, but also the naming village church continued to be used.
The church weathered the Second World War intact. In 1945 Hohenschönhausen turned out to be part of the Soviet Eastern Sector of Berlin
. Since 1947 the congregation is a member of the Evangelical Church of Berlin-Brandenburg. In 1952 the congregation had to demolish the dilapidated domed top of the tower because in the communist planning system - even seven years after the war - there was a shortage of construction material, at least if needed for a church building. The southerly tower is since a stump.
and is shown today in Märkisches Museum Berlin. In the same year Tabor Church received in return a wooden altar (of the last quarter of the 15th c.) from the village church in Berlin-Wartenberg, showing the carved sculptures of Mary(am) of Nazareth with the infant Jesus in the central field, flanked by two bipartite folding flaps with sculptures of Saints. The pulpit is a creation of the beginning of the 17th c. and is decorated with diamond-styled Herms pilasters
.
The christening bowl
of 1671 shows the coats of arms of the family von Röbel, who then donated it. The parapet of the organ loft (17th c.) shows vivid flat carvings and again the coats of arms of von Röbel family. Two further sculptures of female saints (around 1430) belong to the furnishings. An oval epitaph
commemorates Hans Christoph von Röbel (d. 1671). On the eastern outside wall four plates recall the four major restructurings of the church in 1738, 1801, 1905, and 1924.
Prussian Union (Evangelical Christian Church)
The Prussian Union was the merger of the Lutheran Church and the Reformed Church in Prussia, by a series of decrees – among them the Unionsurkunde – by King Frederick William III...
Berlin-Hohenschönhausen Congregation, a member of today's Protestant umbrella organisation Evangelical Church of Berlin-Brandenburg-Silesian Upper Lusatia
Evangelical Church of Berlin-Brandenburg-Silesian Upper Lusatia
The Evangelical Church Berlin-Brandenburg-Silesian Upper Lusatia is a Protestant church body in the German states of Brandenburg, Berlin and a part of Saxony. The seat of the church is in Berlin. It is the most important Protestant denomination in the area....
(under this name since 2004). The church building is located in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
, borough Lichtenberg
Lichtenberg
Lichtenberg is the eleventh borough of Berlin, Germany. In Berlin's 2001 administrative reform it absorbed the former borough of Hohenschönhausen.-Overview:...
, in the locality of Alt-Hohenschönhausen
Alt-Hohenschönhausen
Alt-Hohenschönhausen is a German locality in the borough of Lichtenberg, Berlin. Known also as Hohenschönhausen it was, until 2001, the main and the eponymous locality of the former Hohenschönhausen borough.-History:The locality, first mentioned in 1230, was an autonomous municipality still...
. The church was named in memory of the Transfiguration of Jesus
Transfiguration of Jesus
The Transfiguration of Jesus is an event reported in the New Testament in which Jesus is transfigured and becomes radiant upon a mountain. The Synoptic Gospels describe it, and 2 Peter 1:16-18 refers to it....
, which allegedly took place on Mount Tabor הר תבור
Mount Tabor
-Places:*Mount Tabor, a hill in Israel near Nazareth believed by many to be the site of the Transfiguration of ChristIn the United States:*Mount Tabor, Indiana, an unincorporated community...
in today's Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
.
The congregation's parish comprises the area of the historical village of Hohenschönhausen, which has been incorporated into Berlin by the Prussian Greater Berlin Act
Greater Berlin Act
The Greater Berlin Act , in full the Law Regarding the Reconstruction of the New Local Authority of Berlin , was a law passed by the Prussian government in 1920 that greatly expanded the size of the German capital of Berlin.-History:...
in 1920. Between 1985 and 2001 the area was part of the eponymous former borough of Hohenschönhausen
Hohenschönhausen
Hohenschönhausen was a borough of Berlin, that existed from 1985 until Berlin's 2001 administrative reform. It was composed by the localities of Alt-Hohenschönhausen , Neu-Hohenschönhausen, Malchow, Wartenberg and Falkenberg.-Overview:...
.
As a Roman Catholic place of worship (until 1539)
Tabor Church is by far the oldest still existing building in the locality. The church is orientedOrientation of Churches
The orientation of churches is the architectural feature of facing churches towards the east .The Jewish custom of fixing the direction of prayer and orienting synagogues influenced Christianity during its formative years. In early Christianity, it was customary to pray facing toward the Holy Land...
and was built in the late 13th c., but maybe earlier around 1230. That is about 100 years earlier than the first recorded mentioning of the former village (in 1352 and 1356).
The oldest surviving section of the church is its quire built from granite ashlars in late Romanesque
Romanesque architecture
Romanesque architecture is an architectural style of Medieval Europe characterised by semi-circular arches. There is no consensus for the beginning date of the Romanesque architecture, with proposals ranging from the 6th to the 10th century. It developed in the 12th century into the Gothic style,...
style (13th c.) with a rib vault
Rib vault
The intersection of two or three barrel vaults produces a rib vault or ribbed vault when they are edged with an armature of piped masonry often carved in decorative patterns; compare groin vault, an older form of vault construction...
. In 1352 - as preserved in a document - Heinrich Billerbeck, the "rector ecclesie in alta schonehusen" (parson of the church in Hohenschönhausen), unmasked a man pretending to be the late Waldemar the Great
Waldemar, Margrave of Brandenburg-Stendal
Waldemar of Brandenburg was Margrave of Brandenburg-Stendal, the last from the Ascanian House.-Life:He was a son of Conrad, Margrave of Brandenburg-Stendal and Constance, daughter of Przemysł I of Greater Poland...
of the Margraviate of Brandenburg
Margraviate of Brandenburg
The Margraviate of Brandenburg was a major principality of the Holy Roman Empire from 1157 to 1806. Also known as the March of Brandenburg , it played a pivotal role in the history of Germany and Central Europe....
, declared dead in 1320.
The present prayer hall of two nave
Nave
In Romanesque and Gothic Christian abbey, cathedral basilica and church architecture, the nave is the central approach to the high altar, the main body of the church. "Nave" was probably suggested by the keel shape of its vaulting...
s is an addition of about 1450 erected from simple boulders and vaulted, supported by a central square pier
Pier (architecture)
In architecture, a pier is an upright support for a superstructure, such as an arch or bridge. Sections of wall between openings function as piers. The simplest cross section of the pier is square, or rectangular, although other shapes are also common, such as the richly articulated piers of Donato...
. Around 1470 a half-timbered tower was attached to the southern side of the church. In 1480 the family von Röbel was enfeoffed with the manor estate
Manorialism
Manorialism, an essential element of feudal society, was the organizing principle of rural economy that originated in the villa system of the Late Roman Empire, was widely practiced in medieval western and parts of central Europe, and was slowly replaced by the advent of a money-based market...
of Hohenschönhausen, thus also holding the Ius patronatus
Ius patronatus
Jus patronatus, also spelt ius patronatus, imitating classical Latin orthography, is the term in Roman Catholic canon law for the "right of patronage"....
to the church.
As a Lutheran place of worship (from 1539 on)
In 1539 Prince Elector Joachim II HectorJoachim II Hector, Elector of Brandenburg
Joachim II Hector was a Prince-elector of the Margraviate of Brandenburg . A member of the House of Hohenzollern, Joachim II was the son of Joachim I Nestor, Elector of Brandenburg, and his wife Elizabeth of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden...
converted from Catholicism
Catholicism
Catholicism is a broad term for the body of the Catholic faith, its theologies and doctrines, its liturgical, ethical, spiritual, and behavioral characteristics, as well as a religious people as a whole....
to Lutheranism
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...
, as earlier had done many of his subjects. The church thus became Lutheran too, like most of the electoral subjects and all the churches in the Electorate of Brandenburg. In 1615 the tower underwent its first total reconstruction, followed by further repairs and new buildings at least once every century.
In 1626 - in the course of the Thirty Years’ War (1618–1648) - the Lutheran Swedish troops under Gustavus II Adolphus
Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden
Gustav II Adolf has been widely known in English by his Latinized name Gustavus Adolphus Magnus and variously in historical writings also as Gustavus, or Gustavus the Great, or Gustav Adolph the Great,...
and the Catholic Imperial Army under Wallenstein
Albrecht von Wallenstein
Albrecht Wenzel Eusebius von Wallenstein , actually von Waldstein, was a Bohemian soldier and politician, who offered his services, and an army of 30,000 to 100,000 men during the Danish period of the Thirty Years' War , to the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II...
ravaged Hohenschönhausen and plundered the church. Out of ten farmer families, three cottager families, and two shepherd families in the parish (as of 1624) only three families holding farms and five merely holding cottages survived (as of 1652).
In 1714 the peaked spire gave way for a domed top with a weathervane. In 1736 Christian Friedrich von Röbel sold the manor estate for 22,800 Thaler
Thaler
The Thaler was a silver coin used throughout Europe for almost four hundred years. Its name lives on in various currencies as the dollar or tolar. Etymologically, "Thaler" is an abbreviation of "Joachimsthaler", a coin type from the city of Joachimsthal in Bohemia, where some of the first such...
s to Adam Ebersbach, a merchant from Berlin. He had thus become the patron
Patronage
Patronage is the support, encouragement, privilege, or financial aid that an organization or individual bestows to another. In the history of art, arts patronage refers to the support that kings or popes have provided to musicians, painters, and sculptors...
of the church and financed its renovation in 1738.
Under the reign of King Frederick the Great
Frederick II of Prussia
Frederick II was a King in Prussia and a King of Prussia from the Hohenzollern dynasty. In his role as a prince-elector of the Holy Roman Empire, he was also Elector of Brandenburg. He was in personal union the sovereign prince of the Principality of Neuchâtel...
also the cemetery around the church - like all cemeteries - had to be planted with mulberry
Mulberry
Morus is a genus of flowering plants in the family Moraceae. The 10–16 species of deciduous trees it contains are commonly known as Mulberries....
trees. Their leaves were to be picked by village pupils and to be delivered for the loss-making silk production the king tried to enforce in his dirigist
Dirigisme
Dirigisme is an economy in which the government exerts strong directive influence. While the term has occasionally been applied to centrally planned economies, where the state effectively controls both production and allocation of resources , it originally had neither of these meanings when...
concept of cameralism. The last mulberry tree fell in the 1980s. After the lost Battle of Kunersdorf
Battle of Kunersdorf
The Battle of Kunersdorf, fought in the Seven Year's War, was Frederick the Great's most devastating defeat. On August 12, 1759, near Kunersdorf , east of Frankfurt , 50,900 Prussians were defeated by a combined allied army 59,500 strong consisting of 41,000 Russians and 18,500 Austrians under...
on 12 August 1759 (in the course of the Third Silesian or Seven Years War, 1756–1763, the European chapter of Anglo-French and Indian War
French and Indian War
The French and Indian War is the common American name for the war between Great Britain and France in North America from 1754 to 1763. In 1756, the war erupted into the world-wide conflict known as the Seven Years' War and thus came to be regarded as the North American theater of that war...
), the inimical Austrian and Russian soldiers robbed what they considered precious from the inventory of the church.
Frederick William III of Prussia
Frederick William III was king of Prussia from 1797 to 1840. He was in personal union the sovereign prince of the Principality of Neuchâtel .-Early life:...
, the Lutheran congregation of Hohenschönhausen, like most Prussian Protestant congregations, joined the common umbrella organisation then called the Evangelical Church in Prussia (under this name since 1821), with each congregation maintaining its former denomination or adopting the new united denomination. In 1905 the church was renovated and renamed into Tabor Church, but also the naming village church continued to be used.
The church weathered the Second World War intact. In 1945 Hohenschönhausen turned out to be part of the Soviet Eastern Sector of Berlin
East Berlin
East Berlin was the name given to the eastern part of Berlin between 1949 and 1990. It consisted of the Soviet sector of Berlin that was established in 1945. The American, British and French sectors became West Berlin, a part strongly associated with West Germany but a free city...
. Since 1947 the congregation is a member of the Evangelical Church of Berlin-Brandenburg. In 1952 the congregation had to demolish the dilapidated domed top of the tower because in the communist planning system - even seven years after the war - there was a shortage of construction material, at least if needed for a church building. The southerly tower is since a stump.
Furnishings
The original altar, depicting Mary(am) of Nazareth, has been translated in 1924 to St. Nicholas' Church in Berlin's central borough of MitteMitte
Mitte is the first and most central borough of Berlin. It was created in Berlin's 2001 administrative reform by the merger of the former districts of Mitte proper, Tiergarten and Wedding; the resulting borough retained the name Mitte. It is one of the two boroughs which comprises former West and...
and is shown today in Märkisches Museum Berlin. In the same year Tabor Church received in return a wooden altar (of the last quarter of the 15th c.) from the village church in Berlin-Wartenberg, showing the carved sculptures of Mary(am) of Nazareth with the infant Jesus in the central field, flanked by two bipartite folding flaps with sculptures of Saints. The pulpit is a creation of the beginning of the 17th c. and is decorated with diamond-styled Herms pilasters
Herma
A Herma, commonly in English herm is a sculpture with a head, and perhaps a torso, above a plain, usually squared lower section, on which male genitals may also be carved at the appropriate height...
.
The christening bowl
Baptismal font
A baptismal font is an article of church furniture or a fixture used for the baptism of children and adults.-Aspersion and affusion fonts:...
of 1671 shows the coats of arms of the family von Röbel, who then donated it. The parapet of the organ loft (17th c.) shows vivid flat carvings and again the coats of arms of von Röbel family. Two further sculptures of female saints (around 1430) belong to the furnishings. An oval epitaph
Epitaph
An epitaph is a short text honoring a deceased person, strictly speaking that is inscribed on their tombstone or plaque, but also used figuratively. Some are specified by the dead person beforehand, others chosen by those responsible for the burial...
commemorates Hans Christoph von Röbel (d. 1671). On the eastern outside wall four plates recall the four major restructurings of the church in 1738, 1801, 1905, and 1924.