The Encyclopedia Americana (1920)/Walther, Karl Ferdinand Wilhelm

WALTHER, Karl Ferdinand Wilhelm, Lutheran minister and author: b. Langenchursdorf, Saxony, 25 Oct. 1811; d. 7 May 1887. He was for a time pastor at Braunsdorf, Saxony. He emigrated to America with a large colony of his countrymen 1839, and settled in Perry County, Mo. He became pastor in Saint Louis 1841. He founded and edited Der Lutheraner and a German theological journal entitled Lehre und Wehre. He was a leader in the extreme Lutheran confessionalism, or strict adherence to the dogmatical standard, and was colloquially termed “the Lutheran pope.” He organized in 1846 the Missouri Synod, which was the germ of the Synodical Conference, He was professor in the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Saint Louis from 1850 until his death. He was charged with holding Calvinistic principles, which he denied, and with which his doctrine of universal redemption would be quite inconsistent. He published a number of theological works in German; numerous sermons; and ‘American Lutheran Pastoral Theology’ (1872).