THE MENNONITE BROTHERHOOD IN RUSSIA (1789 - 1910), P. M. Friesen, 1911

have arisen in the Lutheran Church, have produced a different evaluation of ordination. [Luther, the presbyter, ordained a bishop for the Naumburg diocese (Nikolas von Amsdorf) ‘without salt, fat, tar or grease,’ that is, without anointing oil or the ceremonies of the Catholic Church; cf. the Calwer Church Lexicon and Plitt and Petersen, Martin Luther. . . .] The pietistic system of collegiality viewed it as an indifferent [as an ‘introduction’ to every appointment to a parish], repeatable ceremony without any intrinsic significance or corresponding effect. Indeed, well into our own century (as the Wuerttemberg Church to 1855, for example), entire [Lutheran] territorial churches have not practiced ordination except as an introduction [an ‘induction’: a blessing with the laying on of hands whenever a pastor takes over a new parish . . .]. Ordination is not necessary for salvation, nor is it necessary in order to make the official acts of the minis ter and his administration of the means of grace efficacious, as though the latter could not otherwise be effective [as the Catholic Church teaches]; it is necessary, however, to maintain good order within the church and its service, to maintain the awareness amongst the members of the church that the ministerial office is instituted by God and invested with godly authority, and to maintain the awareness among the ministers that they are servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God and therefore accountable to God. From the very inception of the Lutheran Church, the power to ordain has been in the hands of the superintendent [the ‘main overseer,’ in Russia— the provost: the ‘Superior’], who can draw other church officers as witnesses and assistants into his service, but who can also have an ordinary minister substitute for him and entrust to him the power to ordain. [In the Mennonite churches the highest or final authority quite naturally lies only and alone with the ‘brotherhood.’]” II. From the Calwer Church Lexicon of 1905, vol. 2, page 310: . . According to the original Reformation point of view, as well as that of the symbolical books (the Augustana articles XIV), only a person duly appointed [by the Mennonites— elected by the brotherhood] to a pastorate [the position of Documentary Supplement 173 elder or minister] is entitled to administer the means of grace, nor is a special ordination necessary for this. It is true, of course, that in order to have been duly appointed to a ministerial position one must be confirmed by the church authorities [the decisive authority among the Mennonites is the brotherhood. . . .] The following Protestant churches of episcopal polity claim apostolic succession: 1) The Anglican (state church) of England; 2) The Lutheran Churches of Scandinavia (Denmark, Norway, Sweden) and Russian- Finland (but not as necessary to salvation); 3) The Moravian Brethren (although many consider their succession to be very d