Nicolaus von Zinzendorf

Life

Zinzendorf was born into a noble family in Dresden, Saxony. At the age of ten he entered the boarding school of August Hermann Francke in Halle. There he came under the influence of Lutheran Pietism, a movement that placed greater emphasis on personal conversion and a godly life than on adherence to doctrine. From 1716 to 1721 he studied law at the University of Wittenberg and traveled to various countries. In 1721 he became a legal counselor at the Dresden court, and after his marriage in 1722 he settled on his estate at Berthelsdorf.

In 1722 he permitted Protestant refugees fleeing persecution in Moravia and Bohemia to build a village on part of his estate. This village was Herrnhut, meaning "the Lord's protection." In 1727 he withdrew from public office to devote himself entirely to leading the community. As the community grew, so did tensions with the Lutheran Church and the Saxon government. He was ordained a Lutheran minister in the mid-1730s, but he was banished from Saxony in the late 1730s, and the banishment was not lifted until 1747. Meanwhile, in 1737, he became a bishop of the Moravian Brethren. During his exile he traveled through the Netherlands, England, and North America establishing communities, and in 1741 he founded the settlement of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. From 1747 to 1755 he made London the center of his activities. After his first wife died in 1756, he married Anna Nitschmann the following year. He died at Herrnhut in 1760.

Ministry and Achievements

• Renewal of the community: In May 1727 he established order in the community through the "Brotherly Agreement." On August 13 of the same year, a spiritual experience during a Communion service at the Berthelsdorf church came to be commemorated as the "birthday" of the renewed Moravian Church. That same year also marked the beginning of a round-the-clock prayer watch that continued without interruption.
• Missions: In 1732 Herrnhut sent its first missionaries to the West Indies. Missiologists regard his greatest contribution as awakening within Protestantism the conviction that cross-cultural mission is the essential calling of the church.
• Church unity: He sought to regard the Brethren not as a separate denomination but as a "church within the church" working within the existing churches. He made living peaceably alongside believers of other confessions, rather than contending with them, a principle of the community.
• Hymns and writings: He wrote many hymns and prayers; among his best-known works is "Jesus, Thy Blood and Righteousness." In 1733 he began, together with scholars, a translation of the Bible from the original languages. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) honors him as a hymnwriter and renewer of the church, commemorating him on May 9.

Influence on the Korean Church

His influence on the Korean church is largely indirect. The Brethren community in London organized by Zinzendorf is known to have influenced the conversion of John Wesley in 1738 (see Aldersgate experience), and Wesley's Methodist movement became the root of the Korean Methodist and Holiness church traditions. In addition, the mission movement he led is regarded as an early example of modern Protestant foreign missions, and this current is connected to the Protestant tradition of sending missionaries that later extended to Korea.

Assessment

Supporters regard him as a pioneer of modern Protestant missions and a renewal leader who pursued unity across denominational lines. In his own time, however, he engaged in repeated controversies with Lutheran orthodoxy and with the Halle Pietists. Because he led a sect without legal standing, he was also banished on more than one occasion. Some scholars criticize his style of leadership as excessively authoritarian, pointing to his wish to be called "Papa."