Strangers to Sisters - Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary Library: Essays

important given the tiny size of the re-organized synod. How would the pastors and
teachers answer the question, “Are we alone wise among all the Norwegian Lutherans of
this country?”
In this era of visible devastation caused by the Madison Settlement, the leaders of
ELS were led to study the Scriptures even more deeply. This hermeneutic not only
caused them to fully appreciate their doctrinal heritage, but poised the ELS to see
deceptions of the union movements that began to threaten and eventually destroy the
Synodical Conference. They, like their fathers before them, realized that ecclesiastical
chicaneries of false teachers can be unmasked only with sound Scriptural theology.
I. Foundations of the Norwegian Hermeneutic: Johnson and Caspari
At the beginning of the 19 th century, Norway was a country deeply divided
religiously. On the one hand, the clergy of the state had become infected with the
rationalism of continental Europe. Professors like Svend Borchmann Hersleb (1784-
1836) and Stener Johannes Stenersen (1789-1835) had brought a moderate Lutheran
orthodoxy tinged with scientific rationalism to the Norwegian State Church. 12 This only
added to the popular perception of the state church and clergy as being aloof from the
people they served, living in a privileged world with an untroubled conscience. 13
With such popular discontent over the spiritual shepherding of the Norwegian
State Church, Hans Nielsen Hauge (1771-1824), a revivalistic lay-preacher, found a
ready audience throughout Norway. Although a layman, he preached a message of
repentance and regeneration throughout Norway, reviving the backsliders and
12 Michael Langlais, “Gisle Johnson and the Johnsonian Awakening: 19 th Century Norwegian Lutheranism
and its importance for America,” Lutheran Synod Quarterly 36, no.2 (June 1996), 19.
13 Langlais, 18.
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