Hey, remember my Lutheran saints series? It’s been awhile, for which my apologies. But the long absence of this series is not due to neglect of the saints—far from it. In fact, I have taken a detour from writing up hagiographies for an eventual book of Lutheran saints to do the theological background work that I always knew I’d have to do as well.
This scholarly sidestep is not chiefly due to anticipated hostility from fellow Lutherans toward the very notion of a Lutheran sanctorale. If anything, I’d say my church community is positively longing for better acquaintance with its own saints. But there is certainly an ongoing sense that it is vaguely illegitimate. Good Lutherans that we are, we want solid theological arguments before plowing ahead. I can’t blame us for that! It’s the right instinct.
Writing up hagiographies has been extremely instructive, and I’m glad I started there. It alerted me to the possibilities and pitfalls of the genre, but also told me what to start looking for in the theological literature. And the truth is, I’ve found tons. Hagiography has never been the primary melody of Lutheranism, but it has always existed as a harmony line, adding depth and complexity to what could easily become pure abstraction (I’m looking at you, justification by faith—at least versions of you as deployed by certain Lutheran theologians who shall remain unnamed. This is hagiography, after all, not hamartiography).
Hardly surprising, Lutheran hagiography had its first flower in the sixteenth century, under Luther’s own reform of the genre (a lot more of it than you might think), and then after his death with commemorations of him. But additionally 16th century Lutheranism made a point of reconstruing previous hagiographical sources for its own purposes, especially the church fathers and virgin martyrs of the early church.
Lutheran hagiography continued through the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. The record is a bit thinner here, though I suspect that has more to do with general scholarly neglect of Lutheranism in those centuries (as compared to the 16th) than a real absence. What is very clear is that the mission movement gave new impetus to Lutheran hagiography, which starts to flower again by the late 19th century for this reason.
However, a big thing happened in the 20th century… namely, the Bolshevik revolution in Russia, followed by subsequent communist revolutions, followed by fascist revolutions. As it was in the beginning, so it is now: there’s nothing like a jealous, totalizing state to generate new Christian martyrs. This can present its own kinds of complications—nationalist and political sentiments do get entangled with Christian commitments—but we must not forget that Jesus was crucified on a Roman cross, not a Jewish one.
So, in other words, the incredible political upheaval of the early 20th century, including almost unimaginable levels of violence, persecution, and mass murder, meant a tremendous uptick in the number of martyrs and confessors of the church. Even steadfast Lutherans could not ignore it.
Which leads us to Oskar Schabert, a germanophone pastor of the Baltic region. Quick history lesson: present-day Estonia and Latvia had a very long-standing German presence. “Germany” as a nation is a 19th-century invention; “German” as a language and culture long pre-dates the nation by close to a millennium. The strong German presence in the Baltic region meant that Lutheranism arrived there in the 16th century and has remained there ever since. However, the Baltic region has long been a matter of intense interest to Russia, too, and thus the Baltic lands have been a place of contest and episodic occupation.
Anyway, by the early 20th century, the Lutherans of the Baltic region had already had a lot of ups and downs with the Russians, including efforts to entice them into Orthodoxy, not by honest means but through political pressure. (I don’t mean to pick on the Orthodox alone here; all Christians have a dirty track record on this score.) But even that was nothing compared to what happened with the Bolshevik revolution in 1917, which yanked Russia out of World War I and sent that nation and its satellites careening into a horrific history of persecution, not only of Lutherans but of all Christians and lots of other categories of “undesirables” as well.
Schabert was a survivor of these persecutions. He suffered unjust imprisonment and knew either directly or through their letters numerous pastors who were executed, as well as some laypeople. His book Martyrs: The Suffering Path of Baltic Christians, reports what the Baltic Lutheran church went through during this period, based on his own firsthand knowledge as well as reliable secondhand reports. Published in 1920, it’s very close to the events it records.
Theologically, two things stand out about it.
As far as I’ve been able to find, Schabert is the first Lutheran in centuries to make the strong claim that true martyrs and confessors have been raised up by God in his own time and place. He quotes Luther doing the same regarding 16th century martyrs, but subsequent Lutherans were fairly modest in claiming saints; their hagiographical works referred to people farther in the past. (Also, generally speaking, Germany and the Scandinavian countries just suffered less persecution overall than places like England, France, and the Netherlands.) Schabert makes the bold assertion of there being true Christian martyrs in his own time, as true as in the early church. It appears that both his claim, and the sheer force of the experience of persecution and counter-witness, re-empowered Lutherans to entertain the possibility of martyrs and saints in their own day and age.
The other notable thing is that Schabert calls seriously into question church reliance on the state. For all we’re taught about Luther’s efforts to disassociate church and state, the fact is that lived historical Lutheranism ended up falling back on state protection. Under the circumstances, it was hardly surprising—either cozy up to princes, or get exterminated by the emperor. Not a happy choice! And whatever our judgment now, I don’t think it’s fair to condemn past Christians for believing that the state’s embrace of the Christian faith was a positive and providential act of God. Let’s not forget the brutality of ancient pagan regimes. The chance to soften up public life with the gospel was a fair risk to take.
But Schabert stands in the 20th century, and he has a lot of church history to look back on. He is willing at last to challenge the internal rot and compromise that happens when the church accepts a government patron—even before the oppression begins. He and his fellow faithful made a discovery common to the persecuted: God generously gives of his Spirit to the oppressed and causes extraordinary growth despite the terrible circumstances. In fact, Schabert is clearly astounded by the new strength, commitment, and passion of the church arose in the face of persecution. And none of it needed state support.
So, as both a recovery of 16th-century Lutheran hagiographical impulses, and a long overdue step toward church disentanglement from state patronage, Schabert’s little book is hugely important.
And for that reason, instead of summarizing its contents here in the usual format of a hagiography, I’m just making the whole book available to you. As far as I know, it’s the first and only translation into English of this book. At the end of the text I explain the resources and tools I used to produce this English version. Rather than publish it in a journal or as a book, I’ve decided it’s better to make it as widely available as possible. So, please download and read, and be refreshed and strengthened in your faith, since that, after all, is the purpose of hagiography.