st the Missouri Synod. Her attitude of certainty and
conviction in the doctrines which she championed was branded and
denounced as "intolerance," "bigotry," "narrow-mindedness,"
"exclusiveness," "aloofness," "pride," "Pharisaism," etc. In his
_Problems and Possibilities_ Dr. Gerberding wrote: "We have often said
that this body of Lutherans, more than all others, has saved the Germans
of the Middle West from being swamped in materialism and rationalism.
Honor to whom honor is due. But the very prosperity of these Lutherans
has made them haughty, self-sufficient, self-righteous. A tone of
Pharisaism and of infallibility seems to run through their utterances.
They seem not only to believe in an infallible revelation from God, but
in themselves as infallible interpreters of that revelation. Every one
who does not accept their interpretation is branded as a heretic of the
same kind and quality as those against whom the apostles warn, and whom
believers are not to receive into their houses nor bid Godspeed. All who
do not accept their interpretation in every jot and tittle are anathema
in the apostolic sense. Their interpretations, glosses, and theses, and
resolutions as to what the Confessions mean also seem to be infallible.
Woe be to the Lutheran who dares even to question their conclusions!"
(162.) Revealing the same animus, Dr. G.W. Sandt published in the
_Lutheran_ of December 12, 1918: "The new and powerful stream of
immigration, which was headed by Dr. Walther, and out of which has grown
the Synodical Conference, with its more than 800,000 communicants and
the largest theological seminary in the land, represents the reaction
against the unionism of the State Church in Saxony. A man of deep piety,
strong convictions, and sound theological learning, he became the
apostle of a sturdy confessionalism, as orthodox as that of
Hengstenberg, as vital and spiritual as that of Spener, and as fruitful
in good works as that of Francke. He and his followers nursed that
orthodoxy so faithfully and fenced it in so securely as to make
Missourianism the synonym for the straitest sect of Lutheranism in the
world. A doctrine of rigid aloofness and separatism was developed as a
wall of defense, as binding upon a Missourian's conscience as almost any
article in the Augsburg Confession could possibly be. It was inevitable
that he and his followers should come into conflict with such leaders as
Loehe and the Fritschels (founders of the Iowa S