No CrossRef data available.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 December 2008
One of the most important analyses of the rise of German nationalism was Koppel Pinson's Pietism as a Factor in the Rise of German Nationalism (1934). This study was one of the first to apply the methodology of Tawney, Dilthey, Troeltsch, and Weber to the analysis of early nationalism. Pinson held that the intellectual and social content of seventeenth–century Lutheran pietism “unknowingly” created many preconditions of the peculiar type of German nationalism that appeared in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Pinson argued that the qualities of pietism which were transferred to later German nationalism were strong emotional fervor, moral purity, the experience of conversion, and the cultivation of the German language. All social classes would be able to cultivate these spiritual aims, producing what Pinson called a general priesthood of believers, or salvation within and through the group. The identification of the qualities of the good German with those of the good Christian was for Pinson the crux of the process.
1. Pinson, Koppel S., Pietism as a Factor in the Rise of German Nationalism (New York, 1934), p. 14.Google Scholar
2. Ibid., p. 181.
3. Ibid., p. 161.
4. Kaiser, Gerhard, Pietismus und Patriotismus im literarischen Deutschland: Ein Beitrag zum Problem der Säkularisation (Wiesbaden, 1961), pp. 11–12.Google Scholar
5. Ibid., p. 23.
6. Luther, Martin, Luther's Works, LIV: Table Talk, ed. and trans. Tappert, Theodore G. (Philadelphia, 1963), No. 4018, 09 19, 1538.Google Scholar
7. See Holborn, Hajo, Ulrich von Hutten (New York, 1958),Google Scholar and Spitz, Lewis, The Religious Renaissance (Cambridge, 1963).Google Scholar
8. Broad surveys of the German patriotism of the period include: Kohn, Hans, The Idea of Nationalism (New York, 1960);Google ScholarHertz, Friedrich, A History of the German Public Mind (2 vols., New York, 1959–1964);Google Scholar and Zeydel, Edwin Hermann, The Holy Roman Empire in German Literature (New York, 1918).Google Scholar Useful works in German are Fleming, Willi, Deutsche Kultur des Barocks (Constance, 1960);Google Scholar and Wels, Kurt, Die Patriotische Strömungen in der Deutschen Literatur des Dreissigjährigen Krieges (Greifswald, 1912).Google Scholar
9. See: Schultz, Heinrich, Die Bestrebungen der Sprachgesellschaften (Berlin, 1897);Google Scholar and Vietor, Karl, Probleme der deutschen Barockliteratur (Leipzig, 1928).Google Scholar
10. For the character of seventeenth-century German literature see: Francke, Kuno, A History of German Literature as Determined by Social Forces (New York, 1907);Google ScholarHankamer, Paul, Deutsche Gegenreformation und Deutsches Barock (Stuttgart, 1964);CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Rose, Ernst, A History of German Literature (New York, 1960).Google Scholar
11. Schottel, Justus Georg, Friedens Sieg (1642), in Neudrucke Deutscher Literaturwerke, CLXXIV (Berlin, 1915), 15.Google Scholar
12. Rist, Johann, Katechismusandachten (1655), p. 24. See also his Kriegs und Friedens Spiegel (1650).Google Scholar
13. The extravagant bombast and contrived erudition of this early German linguistic patriotism may be best examined in Schottel's, Ausfürliche Arbeit auf der Teutschen Hauptsprache (Brunswick, 1663).Google Scholar
14. See also his Horrendum Bellum Grammaticale Teutonum Antiquissimorum (Brunswick, 1673).Google Scholar
15. For a comprehensive, exacting catalogue of the authors and the literature of seventeenth-century Germany, see Goedecke, Karl, Grundriss der Deutschen Dichtung, II (Berlin, 1897).Google Scholar
16. For the evolution of the German drama in the seventeenth century, see: Gaedertz, Theodor, Das Niederdeutsche Drama von den Anfängen bis zur Franzosen Zeit (Berlin, 1884);Google Scholar and Maitland, W. F., “Some Notes on German Drama as National Commentary in the Seventeenth Century,” Modern Language Review (07 1937).Google Scholar
17. See Helmreich, Elsie Winifried, The Chorus in the German Drama (New York, 1912).Google Scholar
18. For the rediscovery of the old German heroes see Frenzen, Wilhelm, “Germanienbild und Patriotismus im Zeitalter des deutschen Barocks.” Deutsche Vierteljahrschrift, II (1937).Google Scholar See also Gotthelf, Friedrich, Das Deutsche Altertum in den Anschauungen des sechzehnten und siebzehnten Jahrhunderts (Berlin, 1900).Google Scholar An excellent survey is that of Kuhnemund, Richard, Arminius, or the Rise of a National Symbol in Literature (Chapel Hill, N. C., 1963)Google Scholar. Arminius was the leader of a group of German tribes in the first century A. D. A fomenter of rebellion, he destroyed three Roman legions in the battle of the Teutoberg Forest in A.D. 9. This disaster caused the Romans to withdraw their frontier from the Elbe to the Rhine. A very useful work is the doctoral dissertation of Vogt, Erika, Die gegenhöfische Strömung in der deutschen Barockliteratur (Leipzig, 1931)Google Scholar. Vogt argued that the hero represented middle-class simplicity and honesty as opposed to the French vices of the courtly baroque.
19. Schottel, , Friedens Sieg, p. 30.Google Scholar
20. See Schottel, Justus Georg, Sonderbare Vorstellung von der Ewigen Seeligkeit (Brunswick, 1673).Google Scholar
21. Letter of Christian of Anhalt to Ludwig of Anhalt-Cöthen, June 8, 1648, in Krause, Gustav, ed., Ertzschrein der Fruchtbringenden Gesellschaft: Briefe, Devisen, und anderweitige Aktenstücke (Leipzig, 1855)Google Scholar. This collection of correspondence between the intellectuals themselves and their patrons is one of the most valuable source materials on the moralistic aims of linguistic patriotism.
22. Rist, Johann, Philiosophische Phoenix, Das ist: Kurze, jedoch Grundliche und Sonnen-klare Entdeckung der wahren und Eigentlichen Matterei des Allerbesten Stein der Weisen (Nuremberg, 1675), p. 10.Google Scholar
23. Rist, Johann, Das Friedewünschende Teutschland (1647), in Goedecke, K. and Tittmann, J., eds., Deutsche Dichter des siebzehnten Jahrhunderts, XV (Leipzig, 1884), 31.Google Scholar
24. For the vocabulary of pietism, see the valuable work of August Langen, , Der Wortschatz des Deutschen Pietismus (Tübingen, 1954)Google Scholar. Langen recognizes both Rist and Schottel for their contributions to the vocabulary of early pietism.
25. Schottel, , Friedens Sieg, p. 67.Google Scholar
26. Gläser, Enoch, Fried Erlangendes Teutschland (Wittenberg, 1649).Google ScholarHadewig, Johann Heinrich, Fried Erlangtes Teutschland (Hanover, 1650).Google Scholarvon Birken, Sigmund, Teutsher Kriegs- Ab und Friedens Einzug (Nuremberg, 1650).Google Scholar
27. Schottel, , Friedens Sieg, p. 54.Google Scholar
28. Ibid., p. 69.
29. Ibid., p. 71.
30. “Ein Pfarherrn im Holstein,” Das Friedewünschende Teutschland (1806), p. 1.Google Scholar
31. It might be useful to keep in mind the similarities and differences between the Thirty Years' War in Germany and the English Civil War that raged in the same period. The idea of the chosen people, of a national purity, of the comparison drawn with the Hebrews renders the English Puritan patriotism of the period similar to that of the pietistic patriotism of the Germans. But the similarities end here: English religious patriotism was wedded to political and constitutional issues, rather than to the purity of a semi-paganized, heroic past. It did not arise in the destruction of the nation, but in the struggle against royal authority. Above all, English Puritan patriotism was optimistic; it was backed by a victorious army and parliament. German pietistic patriotism was far more nonpolitical and much less optimistic.