Altlutheraner

The following was translated from Lehre und Wehre, 43 (1897), pp. 285–286.

The cultivation of the German language in German-American families. The well-known German-American statesman [Carl] Schurz in a speech recently urged all German-Americans to preserve their children’s knowledge of the German language. What he says to German-Americans as citizens may be applied mutatis mutandis also to German Lutherans. Schurz said, among other things: “No anxious patriot needs to fear that the maintenance of German in the family stands in the way of learning English. On the contrary, it is to be regretted that in the second generation of German-Americans, among the children of German immigrants, the German language is often entirely lost. It is to be regretted, I say, because a good knowledge of more than one language is an educational tool of inestimable value. Our German-American youth can take an example from their American peers in this direction. While there are — pardon the strong expression — stupid German boys who take great pains to get rid of the German language, there are many thousands of smart American boys who take great pains to learn the German language. And we should carelessly throw away the treasure we possess, while others, recognizing its value, struggle to capture it? And what a ridiculous notion it is, that the maintenance of German alongside English could prevent the German-American from becoming a good German-American patriot. Is the American who learns German for that reason a bad patriot? He is only a more educated American. Therefore, let us learn English, and at the same time diligently cultivate the beautiful, beloved, old mother tongue. To this end, German language classes have been introduced here and there in the public schools, sometimes with little success. This is regrettable, but essentially unsurprising. For, let me tell you, the German-American family is the most effective school in which the German language must be cultivated here in this country through conversation, reading, and correspondence, in order to stay alive among the children. If the language dies out in the family, school instruction treated as a secondary language will be of little benefit. So I appeal to the German-American parents and say to them that it is a neglect of duty if they do not faithfully preserve for their children the wealth they possess in the German mother tongue.”

Thus Schurz from the temporal or civic standpoint. But consider what wealth we have by the knowledge of the German language from the ecclesiastical standpoint! What treasures of spiritual knowledge are stored up, e.g., in the German writings of Luther and in the German church songs! But with the loss of the German language, one is more or less closed off from these treasures. Anglo-American theologians learn German with great difficulty, in order to thereby profit for theology. And now German Lutherans should carelessly abandon the invaluable knowledge of German! Lutheranism truly stands not in the use of a certain language, but in faithful adherence to God’s Word. But whoever knows German is a great fool if he abandons the knowledge of this language. Therefore, Dr. [Charles Porterfield] Krauth also cried out to the Lutherans of this country: “Take care of the German; the English will take care of itself.” Also, English Lutheran pastors who can acquire a newer language alongside English should learn German before all things — in the interest of the Church. F. P.