December 5
211/216
(traditional date)
Clement of Alexandria, the first early church theologian
to show an extensive knowledge of pagan and Christian
writings in his refutations of pagan criticisms, died (b.
ca. 150).
531/532
Sabas, a monk since childhood, died five days after
returning from a diplomatic mission to Constantinople (b.
439, Cappadocia).
1484
Pope Innocent VIII (1432–1492)
issued the bull
Summis desiderantes, ordering the Inquisition of
Germany.
1532
Nikolaus Selnecker, hymnist and co-author of the Formula
of Concord, was born at Hersbruck, near Nürnberg, Germany
(d. 24 May 1592).
1590
Johann Habermann, renowned Hebraist, devotional writer
and educator, died (b. 10 August 1516, Eger, Bohemia).
1590 Niccolò Sfondrati (1535–1591)
became
Pope Gregory XIV, succeeding
Pope Urban VII (1521–1590),
who died two months earlier.
1689
Salomo
Liscow, hymnist, died (b. 1640, Niemitsch, Lower
Lusatia).
1780
John Hands, missionary to India, was born in Roade,
Northamptonshire, England (d. 30 June 1864).
1791
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Austrian musician and composer,
died (b. 27 January 1756).
1804 Missionary
Wilhelm Tobias Ringeltaube
(1770–1816)
landed at Tranquebar, India. [German
article in Bautz Kirchenlexikon]
1824
Walter C. Smith, Scottish clergyman and hymnist, was
born in Aberdeen, Scotland (d. 19 September 1908, Kinbuck,
Dunblane, Perthshire, Scotland).
1829
Alexander Williamson, missionary to China, was born in
Falkirk, Scotland (d. 28 August 1890).
1834
Mary Ann Thomson, American hymn writer, was born in
London, England (d. 11 March 1923, Philadelphia).
1837
Joshua Marshman, missionary to India, died in Serampore,
India (b. 1768).
1855
Judson W. Van DeVenter, American Methodist evangelist
and hymnist, was born near Dundee, Michigan (d. 17 July
1939).
1859 John A. Schwoy, professor at Concordia
College (Bronxville, New York), was born at Paterson, New
Jersey (d. 6 December 1927). He was educated at Concordia
College (Fort Wayne, Indiana) and Concordia Seminary (Saint
Louis), where he graduated in 1883. He served as a
missionary in Texas for a year, then took a call to
Alexandria, Virginia, in 1884. Health problems led to him to
resign his pastorate in 1893. While recuperating, he studied
Latin and English literature at New York University, earning
an A.M. degree. In 1896 he served a Hackensack, New Jersey,
mission for a time and then was installed as pastor at
Richfield, New Jersey. In 1906 he accepted a call to
Concordia College (then in Hawthorne, New York) as an
instructor in English, serving until 1921, when failing
health again led to his resignation.
1875
Charles Michael Jacobs, professor at the Lutheran
Theological Seminary (Mount Airy, Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania), was born in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, the son
of Henry Eyster Jacobs (d. 30 March 1938).
1902
Henry Stephen Cutler, American Episcopal chorister and
composer, died (b. 13 October 1825, Boston, Massachusetts).
1907
Priscilla Jane Owens (b. 21 July 1829, Baltimore,
Maryland), American Methodist schoolteacher and poet, died
in Baltimore.
1921
Charles L. Brown, Lutheran missionary to Japan, died (b.
3 December 1873, Iredell County, North Carolina).
1931 Ludwig Herman Ilse, composer, died in
Bedford, Ohio (b. 23 December 1845, Hanover, Germany). He
was educated at the Missouri Synod teachers college at
Addison, Illinois, and served as teacher and organist at
churches in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; Chicago, Illinois;
Brooklyn, New York; and Bedford, Ohio. His publications
include several choral and organ books, and he was music
editor of the Evangelical Lutheran Hymn-Book (1912).
[The Handbook to the Lutheran Hymnal, comp. W. G.
Polack (Saint Louis: CPH, 1942): 525]
1933
The
21st Amendment
to the U.S. Constitution was ratified, repealing the 18th
Amendment and legalizing the manufacture and sale of liquor
in the U.S. once again.
1941
Levi Franklin Gruber, Lutheran pastor, professor and
lecturer, died (b. 13 May 1870 near Reading, Pennsylvania).
1949 A joint committee of the Synodical Conference
and the American Lutheran Church adopted
Common Confession, Part I, which was accepted in 1950 by
each denomination.
1953 John (Jaan) Sillak died. He was born in
Estonia in 1864 and completed his studies in languages (of
which he spoke seventeen) in Europe in the 1880s. He
continued his studies at Concordia Theological Seminary
(Springfield, Illinois) in 1901 and was ordained and
installed in 1901 at Saint Peter Lutheran Church (Josephsburg,
Canada). He served for fifty-two years throughout Western
Canada.
1983
John A. T. Robinson (b. 1919), Anglican clergyman,
bishop of Woolwich, and author of Honest to God
(1963), died.
2001 F. Samuel Janzow, professor at Concordia
University (River Forest, Illinois) and noted hymn writer,
author and translator, died. He was a professor of religion
and English at River Forest from 1954 until his 1981
retirement. Janzow wrote or translated thirty-three hymns
that appear in Lutheran Worship, and he also
translated Luther’s
Large Catechism, published by Concordia Publishing House in
1978. A 1936 graduate of Concordia Seminary (Saint Louis),
Janzow served pastorates in London, England, from 1936 to
1946. He earned a master’s
degree in 1948 from the University of Minnesota, then was
pastor of Trinity Lutheran Church (Trimont, Minnesota) from
1948 to 1954. His Ph.D. (1968) was from the University of
Chicago.
