DIE PFARRWAHLEN IM UNTERWÄLDER KAPITEL IM 17. JAHRHUNDERT
The Election of Pastors in the Antesilvanum Chapter in the 17th Century

Summary/Abstract: Research on Lutheran confessional culture in Transylvania has focused mainly on pinpointing the official theology and the antagonism towards Calvinism. The paper attempts to show, on the basis of the archival documents of the Antesilvanum Chapter based in Sebeș, how the election of pastors in the 17th century, especially towards the end of the 17th century, is a characteristic feature of Lutheran confessional culture, which corresponds to the results of research in this field. Analyzing the microhistory of a multi-ethnic chapter, composed of towns and villages located on the Fundus regius or on the Noblemen’s domains, we found out how the chapter representatives tried to maintain their customs regarding what they considered one of the pillars of freedom of the privileged Saxon churches: the election of pastors by the local communities through the chapter’s supervision and the patronage of the superintendent. The oppressive climate imposed by the preference of the princes of Transylvania towards Calvinism and the political regime with its obvious absolutistic tendencies led to the “embedding” of the Lutheran confessional identity. In the case of the election of pastors, this is manifested in the rigorism and obstinacy with which the chapter tries to maintain its own procedures and customs, which is difficult to achieve, for example, in the context of a serf village with a very influential landowner who is ignorant of Saxon ecclesiastical particularities, or in the context of free villages whose electors are subject to pressure from the Saxon political elite, both at the level of the Nation's University and at the level of the Seats, with no lesser interference than from the nobility. It was even more interesting to observe how the representatives of the church united with the political leadership of the Seats and the University in depriving the Romanian inhabitants of the free villages of participating in the election of the Saxon pastor, to whom they paid tithes.

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