Church and State in Post-Reformation Germany, 1530-1914

Church and State in Old and NewWorlds

Brill’s Series inChurch History

Edited by

Wim Janse, Amsterdam

In cooperation with

Theo Clemens, Utrecht/AntwerpenPaul van Geest, Tilburg/Amsterdam

Alastair Hamilton, LondonScott Mandelbrote, Cambridge

Andrew Pettegree, St. Andrews

VOLUME 51

Church and Statein Old and NewWorlds

Edited by

Hilary M. Carey and John Gascoigne

LEIDEN • BOSTON2011

Cover illustration: Church and state, no union upon any terms, wood engraving byThomas Nast.Woman symbolizing Justice(?) standing at door of building “State,” as soldiers block steps tomembers of different religions. Repository: Library of Congress Prints and PhotographsDivision Washington, D.C. 20540 USA. Illustration in Harper’s Weekly, v. 15, no. 739 (1871Feb. 25), p. 172.

This book is printed on acid-free paper.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication-Data

Church and state in Old and NewWorlds / edited by Hilary M. Carey and John Gascoigne.p. cm. – (Brill's series in church history ; v. 51)

Proceedings of a workshop held in Dec. 2008 at the University of Newcastle, NSW.Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index.

ISBN 978-90-04-19200-3 (hardback : alk. paper)1. Church and state–History–Congresses. I. Carey, Hilary M. (Hilary Mary), 1957- II.Gascoigne, John, Ph. D. III. Title. IV. Series.

BV630.3.C475 2011261.709–dc22

2010042245

ISSN: 1572-4107ISBN: 978 90 04 19200 3

Copyright 2011 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands.Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Hotei Publishing,IDC Publishers, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers and VSP.

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CONTENTS

Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . viiNotes on contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix

Introduction: The rise and fall of Christendom. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1John Gascoigne and Hilary M. Carey

part iold worlds

The ironies of English Erastianism: Puritanism and the outbreak ofthe English Civil Wars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31Jared van Duinen

The Protestant problem and church–state relations in Old RegimeFrance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55David Garrioch

Church and state in post-Reformation Germany, –. . . . . . . . 77John A. Moses

The broad church movement, national culture, and the establishedChurches of Great Britain, c.–c. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99Stewart J. Brown

part iiimperial states

The crisis of ecclesiastical privilege in Spain and Spanish America:The question of insurgent clergy, – . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131David Cahill

Gladstone, the colonial Church, and imperial state . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155Hilary M. Carey

The Church of England and the British imperial state: Anglicanmetropolitan sermons of the s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183Rowan Strong

vi contents

part iiinew worlds

Debating the US church–state boundary, then and now: Virginiaas a case study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209Frank Lambert

Church and state in New Zealand, –: Religion, politics,and race . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233John Stenhouse

Church and state in the history of Australian welfare . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261John Murphy

From Anglican gaol to religious pluralism: Re-casting Anglicanviews of church and state in Australia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 287Bruce Kaye

Select Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 307

Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 319

CHURCH AND STATE INPOST-REFORMATION GERMANY, 1530–1914

John A. Moses

The course of church–state relations in post-Reformation Germany until WorldWar One was governed by Martin Luther’s understanding of the doctrine of thetwo realms (Zwei-Reiche-Lehre); according to this, the secular realm was theresponsibility of the prince, who was “God’s anointed.” His task was to ensurethe security of the realm, both externally from outside attack and internally topreserve law and order in a fallen world, “the Devil’s Beer House”—des TeufelsWirtshaus. Both these responsibilities were essential to enable Christian peopleto lead godly and productive lives in accordance with their individual callings.The church was there to preach the word of God for the cure of souls. In thisfunction it was supposed to enjoy complete freedom from interference from anysource at all, including the state. The difficulty was that the prince was not onlyhead of the secular state, he was also “summus episcopus” (supreme bishop) ofthe church. Consequently, in reality the church became de facto a departmentof state. After the founding of the Reich by Bismarck in , the Protestantchurches portrayed the Prussian solution to the German question—that is theunification of Germany under Prussian leadership in —as the consequenceof the hand of God in history. The political philosophy of G.W.F. Hegel (–) reinforced the earlier teaching of Luther about the role of the prince bythe grace of God. And in the age of imperialism, the Protestant theologiansdeveloped the doctrine that almightyGodhad called the Prusso-German empireto impose its superior culture by force on the decadent, and virtually godless,empires of the Russians in the east and the French and British in the west.Indeed, war was sanctioned as a divinely inspired act of policy in the realisationof Germany’s imputed mission to the world.

Introduction

This chapter surveys the origins and course of the Prussian Protestantmode of understanding church–state relations in Germany until theoutbreak of World War One, and here it needs to be kept in mindthat the severest political consequences of the Protestant Reformationwere experienced in the Holy Roman Empire, due to the revolt againstthe papacy initiated by Martin Luther. The Wittenberg scholar-monkdesignated the bishop of Rome to be none other than the Antichrist,to whom no further loyalty could be paid on pain of the loss of one’s

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soul.Thereby a revolutionary era in church–state relationswas ushered inthat had worldwide consequences.1 The theological reasons for Luther’sdisaffection from Rome and the church–state doctrine that resultedfrom it, had profound long-term consequences for German—and indeedworld—history, as shall become evident.

The “Protestant Principle”

Luther’s attack on the Roman practice of selling indulgences derivedfrom his insight, taken from St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans, that madeauricular confession to and absolution by a priest as ameans of achievingrighteousness before God, theologically irrelevant. The thrust of Paulinetheology is made clear in chapter , verses –: “When you were slavesof sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. But then what returndid you get from the things of which you are now ashamed? The end ofthose things is death. But now that you have been set free from sin andhave become slaves of God, the return you get is sanctification and its end,eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternallife in Christ Jesus our Lord” [emphasis added].This is the core of the “Protestant principle.” Justification had been

wrought for humankind already on Calvary; it only needed to be recog-nised and the new life in Christ could begin. The point is, for Luther,the individual was unable alone by good works to attain sanctification;it was the free gift of a gracious God. At the time this was theologicallyincendiary, its consequences literally world-shattering.2The steps in the confrontation with the papacy need not be rehearsed

here. The fact is that Rome failed, or rather chose not to comprehendLuther’s teaching on justification. Ironically, Rome finally did so as re-cently as , in a joint statement with the German Lutherans, calledAlle unter einemChristus, announced exactly in the placewhere theAugs-burg Confession had been promulgated in . This document makesclear that there is no conflict with “Catholic” teaching on justification;Luther’s formulation was in all respects rigorously “Catholic.” So, the

1 Gerhard Ritter, Die Weltwirkung der Reformation (München: Oldenbourg Verlag,). See also his Luther, his Life and Work (London: Collins, ).

2 Walter Peter Fuchs, Das Zeitalter der Reformation (München: Deutscher Taschen-buch Verlag, ), pp. – passim. A perceptive survey of the subject is provided byFrank Eyck, Religion and Politics in German History: From the Beginnings to the FrenchRevolution (Houndsmill, Basingstoke: Macmillan, ), pp. –, passim.

church and state in post-reformation germany

“Protestant principle” is essentially “Catholic” after all.3 But in the periodfrom to , that is not how it was grasped; on the contrary, Luther,whose only objective was the renewal of the church, was branded a here-siarch. His refusal in the end to accept papal authority was the real causeof the rift.Being the firebrand he was, Luther proclaimed that the pope was

the Antichrist, and his agents, who came to re-convert his followersby force, were to be regarded as ravening wolves, who, on entering aChristian man’s domain, were to be cut down before they could destroyhis family, his own life, and despoil his worldly goods. Let it be clearlyunderstood, the pope was not just a tyrant, but the devil incarnate. AsLuther formulated it: “If I could kill the devil why would I not do so,even at the risk of my own life?”4As Luther’s thought developed in the conflict with the papacy, he

also discovered Pauline teaching concerning true political authority (dieObrigkeit), the “powers that be,” as expressed in Romans ; and fromthis emerged piecemeal his doctrine of the two kingdoms, or the tworealms, secular and spiritual. And precisely here is where his teaching onthe relationship between church and state becomesmost clear, alongwithits historically portentous political consequences.5Having designated the entire hierarchical structure of the Roman

church to be diabolical, an organisation that preyed on human souls, thequestion to be answered was, who was now responsible for the protec-tion of the faithful and the true church of the Gospel? Luther’s answerwas, the prince, God’s anointed, who becomes a Notbischof (literally, an

3 All under One Christ: Roman Catholic/Lutheran Joint Commission Meeting on theAugsburg Confession Augsburg, February in From Oxford to the Bush: Essays onCatholic Anglicanism in Australia, ed. John A. Moses (Brisbane: Broughton Press /SPCK,), pp. –.

4 ‘Könnte ich den Teufel umbringen, warum wollte ich’s nicht tun, auch mit Gefahrmeines Lebens.’ Quoted after Ernst Weymar, ‘Martin Luther: Obrigkeit, Gehorsam undWiderstand,’Geschichte inWissenschaft undUnterricht, Jg. , Heft (März ), p. .

5 Luther composed no unified systematic treatise on the “two realms.” Rather, there isa series of ad hoc statements in the form of pamphlets.The key ones are: ) “VonweltlicherObrigkeit” () [“On secular authority”], in which obedience to the authorities insecular matters was demanded, and at the same time, the right of resistance in religiousissues. ) “Ermahnung zum Frieden” () [“Admonition to peace”], in which Luthertried to persuade the peasants to keep the peace and obey the authorities. ) “Wider dieräuberischen und mörderischen Rotten von Bauern” () [“Against the murderous andthieving hordes of peasants”], where Luther demanded that the princes ruthlessly cutdown the unruly mobs. ) “Ob Kriegsleute auch im seligen Stande sein können” ()[“On whether soldiers can be saved”].

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emergency bishop), the Roman episcopate being no longer an agency ofalmighty God but of the devil. Indeed, the Protestant prince is under-stood from now on as summus episcopus (supreme bishop). In a word, hehad the duty not only to protect his realm, but to exercise oversight of thegovernance of the church.The long-term consequence of this development was a blurring of the

borders between church and state in Prussia-Germany. The prince wasthe supreme agent on earth in the so-called “economyofGod” (Ephesians, –).6 He had the responsibility for both church and state whichoperate in their allocated spheres, the one commissioned to proclaimGod’s savingWord, the other to establish andmaintain the good orderingand protection of the realm from all enemies both within and without.For Luther, this fallen world was a “stal voller böser Buben,” that is, a

stall full of wicked characters: robbers, cut-throats, prostitutes, usurers,all preying on good Christian people, who sought only to fulfil theirduty in this life, exercising their respective callings in the “economy ofGod,” thus glorifying him. It is here that the prince wielded the swordof justice to protect the law-abiding and punish the law-breakers. Andin order that all in the realm might flourish without fear of invasionfrom external enemies, the prince had the task of maintaining an armyalways to exercise vigilance over the political situation and to use thearmy whenever circumstances required it. So the prince, as well asbeing responsible for the well-being of the church, was also the suprememilitary governor. He had, in short, the highest responsibility in therealm, supervising this “economy of God.” Further, in order to be ableto do all this he was obliged to maintain the aforementioned army, a factthat made the bearing of arms the highest calling, because without theability to protect the realm, the entire “economy of God” was threatenedwith extinction.Indeed, God intended humanity to live in this world in such a way

that each individual could fulfil his or her separate vocation, spirituallynourished by the reading of Holy Scripture. With the Bible now trans-lated into the vernacular, the Word of God was placed in the handsof ordinary people and so it became the platform for a revolutionarynew piety, with the emphasis on society as an organic unity. Luther had

6 The “economy of God” is a concept deriving from St. Paul. For example, in theEpistle to the Ephesians (,–) he speaks of God’s various callings to people, whichwere for the purpose of preparing all the faithful for the work of Christian service for thebuilding-up of the whole community.


no time for Winkelmesse (private masses, said by a chantry priest). Hisstress was placed on the corporate dimension, on the community at large.And here everybody functioned together in an organic whole, doingwhatever people did for a living: housewives, artisans, public officials,judges, hangmen, soldiers, and princes, all contributed to the economyof God, sharing the same Bible-based faith. Indeed everything was ser-vice to God, Gottesdienst. Through Luther, a seismic shift in the waythe faithful related to the Creator had occurred. And here the issue offaith is central. In his Preface to the Letter of Paul to the Romans, Lutherobserved:

Faith is a work of God in us, which changes us, brings us to birth anewfromGod (cf. John ). It kills the old Adam, makes us completely differentpeople in heart, mind and senses, and all our powers, and brings the HolySpirit with it. What a living, creative, active powerful thing is faith! It isimpossible that faith ever stops doing good. Faith doesn’t ask whethergood works are done, but before it is asked, it has done them. It is alwaysactive. Whoever doesn’t do such good works is without faith, he gropesand searches about him for faith and good works but doesn’t know whatfaith and good works are. Even so, he chatters on with a great many wordsabout faith and good works.7

Indeed, for Luther the whole of life was an expression of the divine lovefor creation. As indicated, the role of the church in this new dispensationwas to preach theWord.That included the celebration of the sacraments,the inculcation of inner piety, the sensitising of the individual soul withthe love of God, the arousal of a more profound sense of duty andservice to society, and making the individual aware of his or her rolein the hierarchy of service within the state, the organism within whichGottesdienst took place.The point has been made that the prince is supreme bishop, and

precisely here the church and state are fused together. In his person,the prince combined two offices. And certainly, in Prussia at least, thepastor was clearly understood to act as an agent of the state in hisparish, carrying out duties relating to secular administration in additionto his cultic responsibilities. The pastor became, in short, a Beamter, a

7 Preface of St. Paul to the Romans by Martin Luther, –, translated byBro. Andrew Thornton, OSB, from “Vorrede auff die Epistle S. Paul and die Romer” inD. Martin Luther: Die gantze Heilige Schrifft Deudsch aufs neu Zuericht eds. HansVolz and Heinz Blanke, vols (Munich: Roger & Bernard. ), : pp. –.

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public servant.8 And this had its profound, long-term political-theolo-gical consequences in the thought of G.W.F. Hegel (–), whobecame known as the “royal Prussian philosopher.”9 It is he who system-atised the implications of Luther’s new theology for government. And sothe state became the hand of God moving upon earth, and this was thepre-condition for the rise of a so-called neo-Lutheran doctrine of the twokingdoms or realms. In domestic politics, Hegel endorsed the doctrineof the Rechtsstaat, meaning a state governed within a strict legal frame-work. But in the realm of foreign relations, Hegelianism was moulded bysuch neo-Hegelians as Heinrich von Treitschke (–) into a formofMachiavellianismwhich saw the state operating in the world in pursuitof ever-greater power for the purpose of imposing its unique Volksgeist,or national spirit, on all rivals.10For someneo-Hegelians, the eternal rivalry among stateswas expected

to be concluded by the triumph of that state, representing the will ofGod simply by virtue of the fact that it possessed the most vigorousKultur (culture), combined with Macht (power). This entitled it to sub-due and absorb all less powerful states, allegedly in conformity with thewill of God. Not a few German historians, philosophers, and theologianssince Hegel have claimed to be able to discern the will of almighty Godthroughout history, a phenomenon that led the Swiss theologian, KarlBarth, at the beginning of World War One to chastise his German men-tors and colleagues for allowing their nationalism to distort their theol-ogy. Barth, as a Swiss Social Democrat, was immune to the “dreams anddelusions” ofWeltmacht (world power) that his German contemporarieshad woven as a consequence of their indebtedness first to Luther, andthen, in particular, to Hegel.11

8 Oliver Janz, Bürger besonderer Art: Evangelsiche Pfarrer in Preussen –(Berlin: de Gruyter, ).

9 Heinrich Ritter von Srbik, Geist und Geschichte (München: Verlag Bruckmann,), p. .

10 Friedrich Meinecke, Machiavellianism: The Doctrine of Raison d’État and its Placein Modern History (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, ). The great Prussian system-atiser of the idea of the Rechtsstaat was Samuel Pufendorf (–). However, thefirst scholar to use the term was Robert von Mohl in his work, Die deutsche Polizeiwis-senschaften nach den Grundsätzen des Rechtsstaats (–).

11 Hegel spawned a number of highly influential students, of whom Richard Rothe(–) was probably the most influential. From Hegel’s doctrine of the state,Rothe developed the concept that church and state are but two dimensions of theone divinely-appointed agency. The church is essentially the cultic dimension of the“ethical” state. See, Otto Pfleiderer,The Development of Theology in Germany since Kant:and its Progress in Great Britain since (London: ), pp. –. A peculiar


The notion that imperial expansion, enabled by growing industrialpower and technical expertise, was sanctioned by almighty God wasabsurd to Barth. His publications, beginningwith hisCommentary on theEpistle to the Romans (), offended, in particular, his former mentor,Adolf von Harnack, who never abandoned his faith in the efficacy ofthe Lutheran–Hegelian notion of the power-state, even after the loss ofthe Great War. Such an edifice would scarcely have been recognisable toLuther, who only endorsed what he termed “just wars,” such as defenceagainst the incursions of the forces of the Antichrist, or wars to correctthe anti-Christian behaviour of neighbouring states.Suffice it to observe that, as Prusso-German history in the nineteenth

century evolved, dominated as it was by the rivalry between Prussia andAustria (der deutsche Dualismus), the Lutheran doctrine of church–staterelations (the doctrine of the two kingdoms or realms) mutated underthe hand of a series of Lutheran theologians and historians into the“neo-Lutheran doctrine of the two realms.” Ernst Troeltsch summed upLuther’s original position as follows: “Luther appeals with great emphasisto the belief that the powers that be are ordained by God, and confirmedin their position byHim. It is a duty of obedience towardsGod to exerciseauthority, to obey the Government, and to use authority for the purposeof justice; God himself bears the responsibility for His institutions, anddoes not intend them to be interfered with by human sophistry andargument.”12 It was precisely this sophistry that had disturbedKarl Barth.There had arisen an entire school of so-called liberal German theologiansbetween the time of Friedrich Schleiermacher (–) and Adolf

development of the idea that the church should be absorbed by the state, is HanfriedMüller, Von der Kirche zur Welt: Ein Beitrag zu der Beziehung des Wortes Gottes auf dieSocietas in Dietrich Bonhoeffers theologischer Entwicklung (Hamburg /Bergstedt: HerbertReich Verlag, ). This work is an attempt by the author, formerly a professor at theHumboldt University, East Berlin, to argue that the state of Marxism-Leninism was therealisation of the ethic of the New Testament. In Müller’s, work, Dietrich Bonhoeffer’snotion of “religionless Christianity” is advanced to justify the church policy of the formerEast German regime. On “religionless Christianity,” see Ralf Wüstenberg, A Theologyof Life: Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Religionless Christianity (Grand Rapids, Mich.: WilliamB. Eerdmans, ).

12 Ernst Troeltsch, The Social Teaching of the Christian Churches, vols. (Louisville/Kentucky/Westminster: John Knox Press, ), : p. . See also, Edelbert Richter, ‘DieZweideutigkeit der Lutherischen Tradition,’ Deutschland Archiv, Jg no. (April ),pp. – and Günter Krüsche, ‘The Church between Accommodation and Refusal:the Significance of the Lutheran Doctrine of the Two Kingdoms for the Churches in theGerman Democratic Republic,’ Religion and Society no. (), pp. –, forreflections on the evolution of the neo-Lutheran doctrine of the two realms.

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von Harnack (–), who were called “liberal” (as opposed to“orthodox”) because they claimed to be able to identify the will of Godin the affairs of men, in short in the history of the state. Barth made thepoint that if mere men had claimed to have penetrated the mind of God,it certainly was not the God of Creation but a projection of their ownwish-dreams.13

TheMilitary Consequences

It is crucial to grasp that the Hegelian doctrine of God had been inter-nalised by the Prussian German military leadership as well as by the vastmajority of Protestant theologians. A famous French observer, HonoréMirabeau (–), commenting on the foreign policy of Friedrich II(–), once noted that “La guerre est l’industrie nationale de laPrussie” (“War is the national industry of Prussia”).14 Precisely that viewhad later been elevated by some neo-Hegelians into a world historicalprinciple. On such a view, the state occupied the highest status in theordering of the world, the most important organ of “world reason” andbearer of all historical life. Essentially, the state was a moral idea, sinceobjectivemorality existed only in the collective, never in the isolated indi-vidual. Such a view built onHegel’s dictum thatman “achieves objectivity,truth and morality only in so far as he is a member of a state.”15 And thisstate was essentially a war-making machine that operated autonomouslyin theworld of politics, not subject to the established laws ofmorality.TheMachiavellian model of the essentially amoral state (or prince) had beengiven a Lutheran endorsement by such interpreters of Hegel. Indeed, theedifice of Hegel’s thought conceals a tension between his concept of therights of individuals in the life of a state whenever an emergency occurs,such as eventuates in wartime when such rights became subordinated tonational priorities. Certainly, the individual as a child of God has value,and part of the responsibility of the role of the state is to preserve that

13 Karl Barth,TheEpistle to the Romans (Oxford: OxfordUniversity Press, ), p. ,from the translation of the th edition by Edwyn C. Hoskyns. See also Moses, ‘JustifyingWar as theWill of God: GermanTheology on the Eve of the FirstWorldWar,’Colloquium no. (), pp. –.

14 Cited after George P. Gooch, Frederick the Great (Hamden, Conn.: Archon Books,), p. .

15 Gerhard Ritter, Sword and Scepter, vols, (Coral Gables, Fla.: University of MiamiPress, ), : [translation of Ritter, Staatskunst und Kriegshandwerk: das Problemdes Militarismus in Deutschland, vols. (München: Oldenbourg Verlag, –).


value, but the continued existence of the state has also to be guaranteedand that is where the rights of individuals become subordinated and vir-tually cease to exist.For those espousing a neo-Hegelian view of “reason of state” as being

above all other moral principles, Christianity was stripped of its formeruncontested role in the “realization of the moral idea” and assigned asecondary place behind the state. Indeed, Hegel taught that the state“is the divine will, present as the spirit that develops the world’s trueform and organization.”16 In its constant striving to perpetuate itself,the state was pursuing its legitimate calling from God. Gerhard Ritter,the doyen of post-war German historians, précised Hegel’s thought asfollows: “At any given time, history recognises but a single epoch-makingnation, compared with which all others are absolutely in the wrong; andhistory avails itself of war as the indispensable means for its progress.”17With this ultimate prioritisation of the state, the lives and propertyof individuals were trivial and adventitious. Indeed, the unconditionalduty of the individual was to sacrifice life and fortune without demurin the interests of the state. Consequently, the concept of inalienablehuman rights was clearly untenable for those followers of Hegel who gaveprimacy to the state as the realisation of the Zeitgeist. The priorities ofthe state always took precedence over individual rights. Further, the statehad to be eternally vigilant concerning the aggressive designs of otherstates, and that meant the unqualified endorsement of the right to wagepreventive war whenever the leadership deemed it necessary.This mind-set led also to the conviction that war was a culturally essential factor inthe life of the state, since it served to strengthen the moral health of thenation.Arguably, the most eloquent expression of this conviction came from

Field-Marshal Count Helmuth von Moltke (–): “Eternal peaceis a dream and not a beautiful one at that, and war is a part of God’sordering of the world. In it, the noblest human virtues develop: courage,self-abnegation, loyalty to duty and willingness to sacrifice one’s own life.Without war the world would sink into a quagmire of materialism.”18

16 Ibid.17 Ibid. Ritter here was expounding the ideas of G.W.F. Hegel,The Philosophy of Right.

See the translation by T.M. Knox (Oxford: Clarendon Press, ), pp. –.18 Moltke: Leben und Werk in Selbstzeugnissen: Briefe, Schriften, Reden, selected and

edited by Max Horst (Birsfelden bei Basel: Verlag Schibli-Doppler, no date), p. . Ina letter dated December to the Heidelberg professor of international law, Dr.Johann Kaspar Bluntschli (–), who had sent von Moltke a handbook of the

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What the celebrated field-marshal was expressing here was naught elsethan the established Prusso-German conviction, as enunciated by Hegel,that war was an essential element of God’s plan for the world. And thiswas underpinned by a uniquely German Protestant theology that hadeffectively developed from the time of the Wars of Liberation againstNapoleonic France and remained effectively unchallenged until afterWorld War Two.

TheTheological Consequences

In all this discussion, the “theology of nationalism” occupies a centralplace. The origins of this may be attributed to the aforementioned Berlinpastor, Friedrich Schleiermacher, who had no difficulty, at the time ofthe wars against Napoleon I, in identifying the cause of Prussia with thatof almighty God. This conviction was later fostered by such luminariesas Albrecht Ritschl (–), and then elevated to its highest pointby Adolf von Harnack at the time of World War One. Karl Hammer hasrecalled this phenomenon in his work on German “war theology,” –.19What has emerged very strongly is that there was an unshakable

conviction among German Protestant pastors and theologians that Godhad undoubtedly been guiding the destiny of the nation, in particularprotecting it from the depredations of the degenerate papist Frenchtwice during the nineteenth century (in – and –).These views served not only to heighten the perception of Germany asthe homeland of the Reformation, but also to give rise to the notionof German “chosen-ness” (Ausgewähltheit) by God to uphold genuineChristian values in a world of decadent enemies. This in turn led to

Institut für Völkerrecht, entitled Les Lois de la Guerre sur la Terre, for comment. It is ofsignificance that Bluntschli was Swiss and was a proponent of international peace. Hewasfounder of the Institute of International Law at Ghent.

19 Karl Hammer, Deutsche Kriegstheologie – (München: Deutscher Taschen-buch Verlag, ). See also, Arlie J. Hoover,TheGospel of Nationalism: German PatrioticPreaching from Napoleon to Versailles (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, ); HartmutLehmann, Religion und Religiosität in der Neuzeit (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht,); William R. Hutchison and Hartmut Lehmann eds.,Many are Chosen: Divine Elec-tion and Western Nationalism (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, ); Daniel R. Borg, ‘Ger-man National Protestantism as a Civil Religion’ in International Perspectives on Churchand State, ed. Menachem Mor (Omaha: Creighton University Press, ), pp. –.


the evaluation of the German nation as “God’s nation,” with the task ofboth defending true Christian values and of punishing those nations thatoffended against them.In , the German church historian, Martin Greschat, perceptively

observed that the dramatic defeat of France in the war of –produced something akin to a quantum leap in the German conscious-ness that God had indeed singled out the Prussian-German nation as aninstrument for carrying out his divine purposes for humankind.Whereaspreviously the hand of God could be perceived at various high points inthe course of German history, now the dramatic events that had led tothe founding of the Reich were attributable solely to God’s direct guid-ance (Führung). This then progressed to the belief that God had plannedfor the German nation to be his agent on earth. Prussia-Germany hadbecome the chosen “hammer of God” in history. The Prusso-GermanReich, an avowedly militaristic entity, had always been a key componentof the “history of salvation” (Heilsgeschichte). Consequently, the abilityto wage war came to be prioritised over the precepts of the Sermon onthe Mount (Matt. –) and the dominical injunction about the pursuitof peace among the nations. History was, in short, the tribunal of God,Gottes Gericht, in fact his judgement on the world and for the world. So,the achievement of unity in – that gave the newReich a positionof unprecedented predominance in Europe was, for the Germans, notjust a fortuitous event, but the expression of God’s special favour towardsthem as a nation. It was no wonder that in the national euphoria of thetime theologians and pastors reflected on the question of just what future,far-reaching and glorious tasks Godmight have in mind for his people.20With the neo-Lutheran doctrine of the two kingdoms now widely

acknowledged, obedience to the monarch was seen as a pre-eminentlyChristian obligation. Ever since Germany had successfully resisted theimposition of French political ideas at the time of Napoleon I, when the“Ideas of ”21 were being warmly discussed by German intellectuals,there was a re-evaluation of monarchy as the “true” Christian form

20 Martin Greschat, ‘Krieg und Kriegsbereitschaft im deutschen Protestantismus’ inBereit zum Krieg: Kriegsmentalität im Wilhelminsichen Deutschland –, ed. JostDüllfer and Karl Holl (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, ), pp. –.

21 The “ideas of ” are the summing up of the goals of the French Revolution,“liberty, equality and fraternity”, in short the objectives to be constitutionally anchored.These were intended to replace the system of absolutism based on a monarch by divineright.

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of political order. And although this was challenged briefly in the rev-olutions of , by everywhere in Germany the monarchies hadbeen triumphantly re-affirmed. The doctrine that monarchy existed bythe grace of God was re-confirmed and remained a permanent elementof official German constitutional thought until the revolution at the endof the Great War in –.Given that the first duty of the monarch was the preservation of the

realm from attack from without as well as subversion from within, itwas natural that great emphasis was placed on the efficiency of the armyand the authority of the police. And when Germany became unitedunder Prussian hegemony and attained thereby the status of a Euro-pean great power, pastors, theologians, and historians waxed eloquentabout the providential function of power. It was as though these pro-fessional groups in particular had perceived themselves especially qual-ified to behave as latter-day prophets of Prussia-Germany’s mission tothe world, her Sendung. By the mid-s, under the vainglorious KaiserWilhelm II, the frequent statements by academics such asMaxWeber andthe leaders of the newly founded Pan German League about Germany’sgreat imperial future, were echoed by the pastorate.22 It became fashion-able to celebrate the strength of the army and, in particular, the new Ger-man navy. The increase in German armaments was always justified bythe argument that only through military and naval strength could peacebe ensured for the future. The notion that this unquestioning relianceon massive armaments and the threat of the resort to violence in theregulation of international affairs might actually be a destabilising fac-tor and lead to war, was not seriously entertained in Protestant circles inGermany. As well, this mind-set rejected the idea of maintaining inter-national peace through negotiated compromise and understanding infavour of maintaining peace by deterrence, through the build-up of mas-sive military and naval force. This emphasis, then, on war-preparedness,observes Martin Greschat, corrupted the prevailing understanding ofpeace. The extension of power, the striving for a “place in the sun” for

22 See Wolfgang J. Mommsen,Max Weber and German Politics, – (Chicago:University of Chicago Press, ), pp. –. The reference to the famous InauguralAddress at the University of Freiburg in May concerning the nature of the stateinexorably to expand is on p. . On Pan-Germanism, see Roger Chickering, We Menwho Feel most German: A Cultural History of the Pan-German League (Boston: GeorgeAllen and Unwin, ). In addition, see Woodruff D. Smith,The Ideological Origins ofNazi Imperialism (New York/Oxford: Oxford University Press, ).


Germany, for German prestige in the world, meant that peace would bepreserved only on conditions set by Germany.23Indeed, under Kaiser Wilhelm II from the mid-s at the latest,

Germany became, through her pursuit of these priorities, the most de-stabilising factor in world politics, and that out of ideological convic-tion. It was firmly believed that international peace meant essentially thepostponement of conflict, whichmust inevitably erupt. Responsible states-manship and diplomacy consisted in developing alliances to maintainthe balance of power, and for this one had to be bündnisfähig, mean-ing to be so strongly armed that other powers would always want tobe allied with Germany. This was the inner logic of imperial Germandiplomatic thinking, and it received not only the endorsement of mostleading historians and political commentators, but pre-eminently that ofpastors and theologians as well. Their contribution to the national con-sciousness of war as not only an inevitable but also as a necessary instru-ment of human progress—and, therefore a major factor in the history ofsalvation—cannot be overstated.24This mentality encountered only slight pacifist protest which, when

it occurred, was inevitably repudiated in the leading Protestant churchpress. Indeed, in the period leading up toWorldWarOne, there appearedincreasingly statements by German pastors in which they promoted theidea that peace was only a value that could be realised within the spiritof the individual person. The concept that peace among nations could

23 Greschat, ‘Krieg und Kriegsbereitschaft’ (see above, n. ), p. . See also theremarkable work of Kurt Riezler, who was Bethman Hollweg’s (the German Chancel-lor) personal assistant prior to and during World War One, which he published underthe pseudonym of J.J. Ruedorffer, Grundzüge der Weltpolitik in der Gegenwart (Stuttgart:Deutsche Verlagsanstalt, ), which went through many editions. Riezler argued elo-quently that the Reich was obliged to expand at the expense of declining powers, andtherefore urged the constant upgrading of military and naval power in order to be able tofulfil the nation’s destiny, either by the threat of force or in the last resort by outright war.Riezler’s thought was clearly indebted to Hegel, Leopold von Ranke, and Heinrich vonTreitschke. If nations did not expand they were doomed to extinction. Here was a refinedsocial-Darwinism applied to international relations. See Imanuel Geiss, ‘Zur Beurteilungder deutschen Reichspolitik im ersten Weltkrieg—Kritische Bemerkungen zur Interpre-tation des Riezler Tagebuchs,’ in Die Erforderlichkeit des Unmöglichen: Deutschland amVorabend des ersten Weltkriegs, ed. Hartmut Pogge von Strandmann and Imanuel Geiss.(Hamburg: Europäische Verlagsanstalt, ), pp. –.

24 Wolfgang J. Mommsen, ‘The Topos of Inevitable War in Germany in the Decadebefore ,’ in Germany in the Age of Total War, eds. Volker R. Berghahn and MartinKitchen (London: CroomHelm, ), pp. –.Mommsen examined here theGermanpress of the period, which reinforced the idea that war was the only way out of theperceived dilemma that resulted from the great power rivalry of the day.

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be realised in this world was dismissed as hopelessly Utopian. God hadintended that humanity live on earth in tribes and nations. Hence, it wasnatural that in the struggle for survival there would be clashes of nationalinterest. It was the Christian duty of the individual subject to love hiscountry. In , for example, the Kiel theologian, Otto Baumgarten,published a widely read sermon, entitled Jesu Patriotismus.25 In it heargued that patriotism enkindled in the individual a selfless sense of ser-vice to the national community. Service to the fatherland was essentiallya religious duty. “Germany” became the focal point of Christian belief; itdemanded complete loyalty and preparedness to self-sacrifice from theindividual. Pastors expressed these ideas particularly on national days ofremembrance.26Behind such appeals for patriotic devotion at the time was the desire

for Germany to be a united nation. As stated earlier, the Reich was inter-nally fragmented, not least because of the presence of a vast working-class, political and trade union movement. This perceived itself as alargely loyal opposition, but was regarded in conservative circles, espe-cially the churches, as a most disloyal and subversive source of repub-lican and revolutionary ideas, and hence anti-Christian. The ProtestantChurches, in particular, perceived it as an obligation to emphasise loy-alty to the Kaiser and the German mission to the world. Colonialismand imperialism were given the highest endorsement by the church asGermany’s calling from almighty God. Consequently, the church wasfully behind the naval armaments program, and the friction and pos-sible dangers which this caused with the other powers were largely dis-regarded. There was an abandonment of the central Christian messageabout “peace on earth” in favour of a prioritisation of national destiny,which was presumed to be guided by almighty God. Almost withoutnoticing it, the Protestant Church, by placing its spiritual energy at thedisposal of the nation, became a de facto political party among others.And instead of contributing to the internal unity of the nation, it ratherexacerbated the alienation which other oppositional parties, especiallythe Social Democrats, acutely felt within the nation.27

25 For a wider discussion of this issue, see John A. Moses, ‘Dietrich Bonhoeffer’sRepudiation of Protestant German War Theology,’ Journal of Religious History vol. (), pp. –.

26 Greschat, ‘Krieg und Kriegsbereitschaft’ (see above, n. ), p. .27 Ibid., p. .


Leading Protestant thinkers, such as Friedrich Naumann (–), tried earnestly to rally the working classes around the Kaiser andto win them over to the dominant political culture. He devoted his life’swork to this goal, and his book, Demokratie und Kaisertum, publishedin , had gone through four editions by . His central idea wasthat it ought to be possible to reconcile the aims of socialism with theGod-given realities of the monarchy, on the basis that workers, too, weremembers of the national community by virtue of their blood. Indeed, allclasses were united in a community of fate. Naumann wanted to showthat nationalism and socialism could be amalgamated to a political unityin which each part realised its specific aims while performing its particu-lar indispensable work for the good of the whole.28 His point of departurewas that nations were locked inexorably in an on-going power struggle.That was the basic fact of the human condition. Peace, then, in the trueChristian sense, resided in the hearts of individuals only. It was, there-fore, a demand of prudence that the working class recognise that in sup-porting the monarchy they were guaranteeing their own future; and theindustrialist and commercial classes, for their part, ought to realise thatthe just demands by the masses for social reform ought to be concededin the interests of national solidarity.For Naumann and most of his Protestant colleagues, the nation was

obliged to pursueWeltpolitik in order to survive against the expansionismof the other powers. This is what such luminaries as Max Weber taught.And to do this the entire nation had to be united. What, however,was the function of Christianity in this quasi-social-Darwinist struggle?According to Naumann, it was to emphasise the ethical dimension in theconduct of the power struggle, die Ethisierung der Machtkämpfe.29 This

28 Friedrich Naumann, Demokratie und Kaisertum (Berlin-Schöneberg: Buch Verlagder Hilfe, ), p. .

29 Greschat, ‘Krieg und Kriegsbereitschaft’ (see above, n. ), pp. –. See in thiscontext the remarkable work of Georg Nicolai, Die Biologie des Krieges. Betrachtungeneines Naturforschers den Deutschen zur Besinnung (Zürich: Orell Füssli, , re-issued,Darmstadt, ), in which the renowned doctor examined how the rise of militarism inGermany predisposed especially the intellectual elite, including theologians, to endorseviolence in international relations as not only politically desirable but essential to thelife of humankind. See, Bernhard vom Brocke, ‘ “An die Europaer.” Der Fall Nicolai unddie Biologie des Kriegs: zur Entstehung und Wirkungsgeschichte eines unzeitgemässenBuches,’ in Historische Zeitschrift Bd. , (), –. See also the English trans-lation,The Biology of War (translated by Constance A. Grande and Julian Grande, Lon-don/Toronto: Dent. ).

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was undoubtedly a way of morally endorsing violence in human society,by endowing it with a higher “ethical” purpose. Indeed, it was Christianthought purged of all sentimentalism. The realities of international lifewere extremely harsh. Since war was inevitable, it was essential thatthe nation make every effort to win. Any loss due to weakness wouldbe irresponsible and have the direst implications for the future of thenation. A nation was always struggling for self-preservation. Ethics hereconsisted in sustaining “creative fear” concerning the future in the heartsand minds of the population, which would ensure that there was alwaysa united political will to triumph whenever the next war broke out, as itmost certainly would.Naumann’s thought was designed to expose all pacifist teaching as at

best unrealistic and at worst sentimental foolishness; and it won manyearnest pupils among Protestant pastors. Some of these were to developa theology that equated war with an expression of Christ’s love. Forexample, in the respected liberal theologian, Ferdinand Katten-busch (–), published a pamphlet,Das sittliche Recht des Krieges(‘The Moral Right to War’). In it, the author conceded that, for a Chris-tian, the chief priority was the kingdom of God and the discipleshipof Christ, a proposition which no Anglo-Saxon theologian would con-tradict. However, Kattenbusch inquired, what precisely did these thingsmean in the real world? Certainly, the central issuewas love of neighbour.But then, Kattenbusch pointed out, individuals in this world could notpossibly implement this commission as Christ himself did, because hehad a unique calling. Rather, the Christian had to live by the spirit of theSermon on theMount, which, according to Kattenbusch, taught that onecould change bad behaviour in one’s neighbour by chastisement, even tothe extent of employing military force. In this way one actually servedone’s neighbour.30Kattenbusch was apparently not concerned that this interpretation of

the Sermon on the Mount flew in the face of ICorinthians , especiallyverse , which says: “Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes allthings.” Out of this unconditional commandment to love one’s neigh-bour, for no other reason than that he is one’s neighbour, is made adefinite condition and purpose, namely to change one’s neighbour forthe attainment of a specific goal. And if this is not possible through the

30 Greschat, ‘Krieg und Kriegsbereitschaft’ (see above, n. ), p. .


application of pure, altruistic love, then it is legitimate to “educate”one’s neighbour through the application of the right amount of coer-cion.Kattenbusch’s agenda here is clearly to arrive at an unconditional

justification of war. Obviously, war can only be an expression of loveof one’s enemy when its purpose is to re-educate him out of his prideand bovine stupidity, to call him to reflection (Besinnung). The enemy,of course, is not an individual but a nation, but as Herder had taughthis countrymen in particular, nations have souls. It followed that fora Christian country its land, law, freedom, and honour were sacredthings for which, when they were threatened, it was right and just towage war. Further, some nations could fall prey to the sin of pride andarrogance, and thereby oppress others. In such circumstances, then, itwas appropriate to “educate” them back to reflection.The problem here was who was to decide when a nation was being

arrogant and acting out of overweening pride. One nation must possesssuperior knowledge over another to be in a position to “educate” it.And Kattenbusch conceded that all Christian nations had this “superior”knowledge over all others, and so imperialism and colonialism werelegitimised in principle. He then went on to observe that, even amongthe European nations, all at least superficially Christian, there existedserious differences in the quality of their Christianity, morality, andculture. Here Kattenbusch had no difficulty in arrogating to Germanythe highest rank among the European nations. Its Kultur, as all educatedGermans (Bildungsbürgertum) were convinced, was infinitely superior tothe mere civilisation of those western powers, who erroneously believedthemselves to be the leaders of the world.From this position only a small step was required to apostrophise

Germany as the “educator” of the world. The implications were clear:Germany had evolved as the most superior Kultur in history, led theworld in virtually every branch of the arts and sciences, including history,philosophy, and theology, and was fast becoming the most importantindustrial and commercial power. The idea that Germany was about tochallenge Britain for the leadership of the world hung heavily in the air ofGermany’s university lecture theatres, in the board rooms of the captainsof industry, as well as in the officers’ messes and wardrooms of the armyand navy respectively. It was expressed in the famous poem by EmanuelGeibel, Am deutschen Wesen soll einmal die Welt genesen (“The Germanessence, being, character, or soul, shall bring healing to the world”). TheGerman “sense of mission” (Sendungsbewusstsein) was thus historically

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and theologically underpinned. Indeed, Germany had been chosen byGod to be the arbiter of the world.31Kattenbusch appears to have quite uncritically assumed this to have

been the case when he wrote that every nation was worthy in princi-ple to be preserved. Indeed, nations which had not proved themselvesdisciplined (tüchtig) enough to form or sustain a viable state had tobe subjected to educative coercion like naughty children, so that theymight “pull themselves together” (sich aufraffen) or accept their fate: tobe assimilated by a more powerful, “real,” nation. Naturally, the deci-sion as to whether and when this should occur, Kattenbusch left to thosein power. The state had the right in fact to embark on a war of aggres-sion (Angriffskrieg) if the international situation was so confused that itrequired the sword to create the space for a re-organising of the nations.It was a right such as that which guided the surgeon’s decision to carryout an operation in the hope of healing a patient.As Greschat observes, these apparently learned, but curiously slanted

reflections on Jesus’s commandment to peace, the Sermon on theMount,and Christian morality, served to confirm the validity of the widelyaccepted quasi-social-Darwinist ideas concerning the imperialistic pow-er struggle that had captured the imagination ofmost educatedGermans.War was affirmed not as an aberration in history but as an essential factorfor the advancement of Kultur. This was repeatedly expressed in the pre- writings of the most prestigious Protestant theologians of both the“liberal” and “orthodox” schools. For example, Reinhold Seeberg, whooccupied a chair in theology at Berlin, taught that war promotedmorality(Sittlichkeit) and culture (Kultur).32Seeberg here echoed the widely accepted ideas of the renowned histo-

rian, Leopold vonRanke, in his commentary on the eternal struggleamong states (Die grossen Mächte). The theologians who followed cameto see God as the arbiter of history, who revealed his will to humanity inthe contest of arms between states.The side that won had been the bearer

31 Klaus Vondung, ‘Deutsche Apokalypse ’ in Das wilhelminische Bildungsbür-gertum, ed. Klaus Vondung (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, ), p. : “In thecentre of the ‘German apocalypse’ of was the concept of thewar as the tribunal of theworld (Weltgericht), which God had imposed on Germany’s enemies.” And on page ,“The historical apocalypse of the th century, as well as the apocalyptic comprehension ofthe war in , was a Protestant phenomenon.” [emphasis added].

32 Reinhold Seeberg, Geschichte, Krieg und Seele (Leipzig: Verlag Quelle & Meyer,). See in particular the chapters ‘Der Krieg und die allgemeine Menschenliebe,’pp. –, and ‘Krieg als Kulturfortschritt,’ pp. –.


of God’s will, a view confirmed by Hegel’s teaching. As Seeberg formu-lated it in , “Wars simply serve the purpose of allowing the nationsof the world to test, and possibly correct, their historical validity accord-ing to the measure of their strength. They [wars] force the nations—onecould perhaps say—to swear the oath of disclosure.”33 The German hereis Offenbarungseid, a legal expression translatable in English as “oath ofdisclosure or manifestation,” an oath required of bankrupts, compellingthem to reveal the true state of their affairs. In the transferred sense inwhich Seeberg is using the term here, he meant clearly that war was a testof a nation’s viability. If it could not meet the test then it deserved, quiteliterally, to go out of business.It is now recognised by international scholarship that German Protes-

tant theology, particularly in the years leading up to World War One,contributed significantly to a militarisation of thinking,34 which had theeffect of encouraging the idea of the necessity of war, as well as theincreased preparedness to go to war with both determination and enthu-siasm. As the US historian Roger Chickering has documented, very fewGerman thinkers dared to venture a contrary opinion; minority viewswere contemptuously disregarded.35 It is further stressed that these viewson the role of war in the history of salvation were no mere literaryoutpourings or mental games, but represented beliefs that were deeplyrooted in the German consciousness, especially in church circles, andparticularly in Protestant youth associations.36 Only with this in mind isthat extravagant enthusiasm for war, when it finally became a reality inAugust , explicable.

Conclusion

Finally, what is historically remarkable is the rise of so-called nation-al Protestantism and the identification of the nation with the will ofalmighty God, the conviction that God had chosen the German nation tobe his instrument in the “history of salvation.” This is a phenomenon ofcrucial significance in explaining the course of German history. Betweenthe Wars of Liberation – and the final unification of the Reich

33 Greschat, ‘Krieg und Kriegsbereitschaft’ (see above, n. ), p. .34 Roger Chickering, Imperial Germany and aWorldwithoutWar: the PeaceMovement

in German Society, – (Princeton University Press, ), pp. –.35 Ibid., pp. –.36 Greschat, ‘Krieg und Kriegsbereitschaft’ (see above, n. ), p. .

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under Bismarck after three so-called wars of unification in , thereoccurred a conflation of sacred and secular history, a factor which nohistorian, regardless of ideological persuasion, can afford to disregard.It explains, as we have seen, how religion came to endorse limitlessviolence, how war was prioritised, and how the essential content of thegospel, at the core of which is Christ’s preaching about peace and thecommandment to love one’s enemies, was discarded in favour of Prusso-German national aggrandisement.In domestic politics, too, Bismarck had not shrunk from playing the

“confessional card,” namely in the so-called Kulturkampf (the campaignto suppress Roman Catholic influence in Germany) when, in the wakeof the promulgation of papal infallibility in , he adopted a pol-icy in Prussia of marginalisation of Roman Catholic political influencethat lasted from until . It illustrated just how much Lutheranthinking about the state had dominated the Protestant political elites,especially in northern Germany. As we have seen, the monarch was thesupreme bishop of the state church; indeed, there existed in Lutheranparlance a unity between “throne and altar.” Consequently, the demandsby the Roman Catholic minority (represented politically by the CentreParty) to have complete religious freedom, especially in education,withina Protestant kingdom, was an anomaly that threatened to open the wayfor papal interference in the internal affairs of Prussia. Bismarck, how-ever, in his bans on Roman Catholic schools and religious orders, hadin the end to admit defeat and negotiate a feeble political reconciliationwith Rome. The divisiveness of the Kulturkampf was to bedevil Germandomestic politics for decades to come, because it spawned what becamethe second largest oppositional political movement in imperial Germanyafter social democracy.37When war finally came in , it was assessed as one of national self-

defence against a world of envious enemies. National Protestantism thencame into its own, justifying the war and Germany’s sacred mission; andwhen the German plan of attack, named after its architect, Count vonSchlieffen (–), became bogged down on theWestern Front, ini-tiating four years of unprecedented human slaughter, it was this spiritwhich sustained the German determination to fight on to ultimate vic-tory.The creator, or in any case a deity evolved in the fantasies of German“liberal” theology, had been considered to be the central actor of Prusso-

37 The literature on the Kulturkampf is extensive, but see Lothar Gall, Bismarck, TheWhite Revolutionary, vols (London: Allen & Unwin, ), .


German history from the early nineteenth until the mid-twentieth cen-tury. Never has such a theologically-derived delusion had such dire con-sequences for humanity at large.

Church and State in Post-Reformation Germany, 1530-1914

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