In Pursuit of Religious Freedom should be read by all Syn Conference members and pastors. The books well written, balanced, and analytical.
I will write more about their Pietism later, but Stephan was trained at Halle University and closely associated with Zinzendorf and Pietistic groups. So were Walther and the others.
Stephan was obviously engaged in adultery before he left with the Perry County group. The police were investigating him and he was under house arrest. His wife testified that he kept company with another woman, refusing efforts to repair the marriage. Although Stephan's descendants put together this material, they are fair with the facts, no sparing anyone.
Stephan installed a girl in his house and brought her back when his long-suffering wife kicked her out. Other matters were brought up in court. Stephan left for America with his oldest son and left the rest of his family in Dresden. The court released him just before his departure. The whole community knew about the accusations, so the clergy involved were already his enablers.
CFW Walther and his brother kidnapped their niece and nephew from the parsonage of their ailing father. The attorneys Marbach and Vehse helped in hiding the children and delaying justice. Walther left as a wanted criminal.
One Missouri pastor said the kidnapping was passed off as what the children wanted, but that does not give Walther a license for breaking the law, evading the police, and involving others in deceit and deception. The children did not sail with him but on a later ship.
The Perry Count group began with two disgraceful actions against them before they landed in America.
Soon more developed. When two women confessed to adultery with Stephan, after a particular pointed Rogate sermon in St. Louis, the pastor did not keep this confidence. The seal of the confessional should not be violated, because turning it into a channel for gossip destroys the Sacrament of confession and absolution, one of the Means of Grace.
The pastor told CFW Walther, who began plotting against Stephan. The details are in the book. Walther organized a mob to attack Stephan instead the clergy dealing with him directly. The original pastor should have kept his mouth shut and gone to Stephan, but he launched this debacle anyway.
Using all kinds of subterfuge, Walther led the mob of 300 (supporters only) in attacking Stephan's home. Stephan was stripped of his clothing to rob him of all his money, deposed as bishop, threatened with his life, and deprived of the property given him. OJ Simpson is sitting in prison now because he did far less with force in "trying to get his stuff back."
Detaining and robbing a person by force is a major crime. So is kicking him out of his home and forcing him across the river, perhaps at gunpoint. Later, Walther tricked Stephan's son out of the 80 acres of land that the bishop bought with his own money.
Stephan continued to work as a pastor in Illinois. His son and descendants served in the LCMS, one speaking on The Lutheran Hour.
Like all guilty bullies, Walther worked against the victim, portraying himself as a saint when he really belonged in prison ministry, as a jailbird.
There is no question that Stephan deserved to be deposed - before they even left. And Walther should have faced the justice system, instead of escaping to America.
After waiting for a choice moment, Walther and the others should have proceeded fairly and Scripturally. Walther laid the foundation for tyranny based on double-justification from Halle's Georg Knapp.
