page_title: Philipp Spener
section_title: Theology
hierarchical_section_title: Philipp Spener / Theology
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: Page de titre de l'édition princeps de Pia desideria de Philipp Jacob Spener, texte fondateur du piétisme allemand. Coll. Deutsches Textarchiv, Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften.
context_page_description: Philipp Jakob Spener, was a German Lutheran theologian who essentially founded what would become to be known as Pietism. He was later dubbed the "Father of Pietism". A prolific writer, his two main works, Pia desideria and Allgemeine Gottesgelehrtheit, were published while he was the chief pastor in the Lutheran Church at Frankfurt. In 1691, he was invited to Berlin by the court of Brandenburg. Even in Berlin, Spener was at odds with the predominant Lutheran orthodoxy, as he had been all his life. Spener influenced the foundation of the University of Halle, but the theological faculty of another university, that of Wittenberg, formally accused him of 264 errors.
context_section_description: Highly influenced by Johann Arndt, Lewis Bayly, Jean de Labadie, and Theophil Großgebauer, Spener's own writings display an emphasis on personal transformation through spiritual rebirth and renewal. It is this focus on individual devotion and piety that places him within the realm of Pietism. Spener wanted to strengthen and renew the church through the development of more knowledgeable and devoted members.  In his Pia Desideria, he gave six proposals of how to enact this reform: (1) to more thoroughly acquaint believers with Scripture by means of private readings and study groups in addition to preaching; (2) to increase the involvement of laity in all functions of the church; (3) to emphasize that believers put into practice their faith and knowledge of God; (4) to approach religious discussions with humility and love, avoiding controversy whenever possible; (5) to ensure that pastors are both well-educated and pious; and (6) to focus preaching on developing faith in ordinary believers. As these proposals indicate, Spener saw positive change for the church as dependent primarily upon the pious involvement of individual believers.
  Though Spener has been called the "father of Pietism," Albrecht Ritschl (Geschichte des Pietismus, ii. 163) maintains that "he was himself not a Pietist," as he did not advocate the quietistic, legalistic and semi-separatist practices of Pietism, though they were more or less involved in the positions he assumed or the practices which he encouraged or connived at. The only two points on which he departed from the orthodox Lutheran faith of his day were the requirement of regeneration as the sine qua non of the true theologian, and the expectation of the conversion of the Jews and the fall of the Papacy as the prelude of the triumph of the Church. He did not, like the later Pietists, insist on the necessity of a conscious crisis of conversion, nor did he encourage a complete breach between the Christian and the secular life. Spener was sometimes believed to be one of the godfathers of Count von Zinzendorf, the leader of the Moravian Brethren's Community at Herrnhut in Saxony. Although Zinzendorf met Spener as a child at his grandmother's home in Hennersdorf, Spener was not his godfather.
  Spener was a prolific writer. The list of his published works comprises 7 vols. folio, 63 quarto, 7 octavo, 46 duodecimo; an edition of his chief writings was published by P. Grunberg in 1889. TVG Brunnen Verlag in Gießen, Germany began a new edition of Spener's works in 1996.
caption: Pia Desideria
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