12 Facts About Paul Gerhardt

Paulus or Paul Gerhardt was a German theologian, Lutheran minister and hymnodist.

Paul Gerhardt's father died in 1619, his mother in 1621.

The school almost closed in 1626 when the plague came to Grimma, but Paul Gerhardt remained and graduated from there in 1627.

Paul Gerhardt seems to have had some hesitancy about leaving Mittenwalde since it was only after long deliberation that he accepted the appointment.

When Paul Gerhardt came to Berlin he found a city full of strife between the Lutheran and Reformed clergy.

Paul Gerhardt wanted to make peace between the clerical factions, but being Reformed himself, he concentrated most of his efforts on making his lands more Calvinist.

Paul Gerhardt placed only Reformed pastors into parishes, removed the Lutheran professors from the University of Frankfurt and forbade students from his lands to study at the University of Wittenberg.

Paul Gerhardt sponsored a series of conferences between the Lutheran and Reformed clergy in the hopes of having them arrive at some consensus, but the result was the opposite: the more the two sides argued, the further apart they found themselves.

Paul Gerhardt was a leading voice among the Lutheran clergy, and drew up many of the statements in defense of the Lutheran faith.

Paul Gerhardt's sermons and devotional writings were so free from controversy that many among the Reformed attended his services, and the wife of the Elector, Louisa Henrietta, was a great admirer of him and his hymns.

Paul Gerhardt put an end to them in 1664 and published his "syncretistic" edict.

The life of Paul Gerhardt has been written by Roth, by Langbecker, by Schultz, by Wildenhahn and by Bachmann ; by Kraft in Ersch's und Gruber's Allg.