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Chapter Four introduces the theological character of the St. John Passion: namely John's concern for the identity of the Messiah and its reflection in several parts of the St. John Passion: in particular, the so‐called “Jesus of Nazareth” choruses; the opening chorus “Herr, unser Herrscher” and the aria “Es ist vollbracht.” It discusses how the structure of the passion mirrors John's account of the passion, comparing Bach's treatment of Part One with that of pietist theologian August Hermann Francke.

Chapter Six presents the manner in which Bach treats Jesus' trial in John's passion narrative. Bach separates out the part of the trial that precedes the scourging as a self‐contained “scene” of highly Christological character, then sets the remainder as a large three‐part segment that is unified theologically and musically by its serving as a kind of “symbolic trial,” extending to the crucifixion itself and the “royal inscription.” Bach's “symbolic trial” is compared with August Hermann Francke's sermons on the passion in John.

Chapter Seven, takes up the part of the passion that follows the “symbolic trial”—namely, the story of Jesus' robe, His last words from the cross, His death and burial. The chorus of the soldiers who divide Jesus' clothes is examined closely for the symbolic qualities associated with its setting as a “permutation fugue.” As in earlier chapters August Hermann Francke's sermons are compared with Bach's design.

This chapter focuses on the efforts of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus and the first director of the Orphanage, August Hermann Francke, to devise a “new way” to teach mathematics and experimental physics in the Orphanage schools—and to turn the school into a space for research by assembling a collection of curious things, including a variety of scientific instruments such as burning mirrors and an air pump. Tschirnhaus is a figure commonly associated with the German Enlightenment, yet he was attracted to Pietism, particularly the early face of movement in Germany: Philipp Jakob Spener. Francke hosted Tschirnhaus at the Orphanage and took his recommendations very seriously. This chapter also considers both Leibniz and Francke’s interest in using the combined resources of the Orphanage and the Berlin Academy of Sciences, which Francke joined in 1701, to attract the attention of Tsar Peter I and to found a Protestant mission capable that would challenge the success of Jesuit missions abroad.

This chapter considers expressions and views of conversion in two major evangelical movements in two locales—Pietism in Germany and Methodism in England. Pietism, whose spirituality informed nearly all aspects of British and American evangelicalism, emerged in the seventeenth century as one of the most important Protestant renewal movements after the Reformation. Pietists stressed that assent to formal doctrine fell far short of true Christianity. Critical of “nominal” religion and dissatisfied with the way that Lutheran pastors preached and carried out their pastoral duties, Pietists located true religion in the heart. Their language of “rebirth,” “regeneration,” and the “new man” stressed the experiential, emotional, even mystical side of the faith. In England, the conversions of John and Charles Wesley were indebted to the influence of Pietist Moravians. John’s itinerating preaching, and organizing skills and Charles’s hymn-writing would profoundly shape England’s Evangelical Revival.

This chapter studies the liturgical occasion for which Cantata 21 was first composed (the third Sunday after Trinity), as well as the second Sunday after Epiphany, which provided some of its imagery, especially the imagery of tears transformed into wine (mvt. 10), which is realized musically in the transformation of the tonality of the cantata from C minor (Part 1) to C major (the final chorus).

A new impulse in life science originated in Germany at the outset of the eighteenth century with the articulation of the idea of organism by G.E. Stahl at the Halle medical school. That development can only be grasped historically in terms of the conflict of Pietism and Enlightenment that gripped the new University of Halle from its founding in 1694 to the middle of the century. Dominated by the Halle Anstalten of August Hermann Francke, the University of Halle entered crisis in the conflict of Francke’s Pietism with the rationalist philosophy of Christian Wolff, leading to the latter’s expulsion in 1723. Francke’s Waisenhaumedizin fused with the medical theory of Stahl to set the frame for the Halle medical faculty. This ended with the restoration of Wolff by Frederick II in 1740, whereupon much of the intellectual energy of the university was siphoned off to the Berlin Academy. This chapter traces the development of the medical faculty at Halle, then concentrates on the thought of Stahl on organism, culminating in his famous debate with Gottfried Leibniz on this question in the second decade of the century.

The chapter makes a case for cosmopolitanism in the development of Pietism, a movement of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries that put the Puritans in touch with what was called the Protestant International. Unlike more conventional readings of the “internationalism” of Pietism, which focus on the networks the Puritans established with coreligionists across the world, this chapter links Pietism to the creation of a cosmopolitan language, which can be seen most explicitly in Cotton Mather’s version of late seventeenth-century Pietism.

While princely residential cities such as Dresden provided key focal points for the Empire’s spiritual and cultural life during the later seventeenth century, Chapter 8 shows that the appeal of the Lutheran baroque extended well beyond courtly circles. Not only princes and nobles but also prosperous burghers commissioned magnificent churches and religious images, as the examples investigated here demonstrate. The chapter uses case studies from two Saxon territories, the Erzgebirge and Upper Lusatia, to suggest that wherever finances permitted churches were rebuilt or redecorated in the new style, employing visual magnificence in the service of Lutheran piety. There were some splendid monuments in Brandenburg as well, for example Andreas Schlüter’s pulpit for Berlin’s Marienkirche (1703). There, however, Lutheran culture was also shaped by the presence of Calvinists and Pietists.

Mark A. Noll provides a detailed comparison of Jonthan Edwards’ biblical interpretation with that of other interpreters in his surrounding context by focusing on Genesis 32:22–32, the account of Jacob wrestling with “a man,” as a case study. He offers a careful comparative analysis of Edwards’ exegesis of this passage across his corpus, and then he compares him with six exegetes: Matthew Poole, Matthew Henry, Cotton Mather, August Hermann Francke, Charles Wesley, and Thomas Scott. These interpreters represent eras prior to, during, and after Edwards’ lifetime; some come from his theological tradition, whereas others do not. By tracing continuities and discontinuities in this exercise, Noll makes incisive observations about Edwards’ exegesis and proposes paths forward in the study of Edwards’ engagement with the Bible.

The concept of religious “awakening” was central to the identity of certain German Protestants in the early nineteenth century. However, those Protestants whose activities constituted the Awakening movement did not create this concept. Quite to the contrary, their notions of religious awakening came from how the words Erweckung, erwecken, and erweckt had been used in a wide range of Protestant texts during the preceding three hundred years. This chapter analyzes how the concept of religious awakening developed within German Protestantism. It establishes the origins of this concept in the early writings of Martin Luther. Next, it tracks how the meaning of awakening developed further through subsequent sixteenth-, seventeenth-, and early eighteenth-century texts. It then considers how the concept of awakening changed through what many contemporary commentators described as a period of momentous religious turmoil and transition in the second half of the eighteenth century.