§ 168.10. In regard to the =Christian life=, the Brotherhood withdrew from politics and society, adopted stereotyped forms of speech and peculiar usages, even in their dress. They sought to live undisturbed by controversy, in personal communion with the Saviour. Their separatism as a covenanted people may be excused in view of the unbelief prevailing in the Protestant church, but it has not been overcome by the reawakening of spiritual life in the Church. As to their =ecclesiastical constitution=, Christ Himself, as the Chief Elder of the church, should have in it the direct government. The leaders, founding upon Proverbs xvi. 33 and Acts i. 26, held that fit expression was given to this principle by the use of the lot; but soon opposition to this practice arose, and with its abandonment the “special covenant” theory lost all its significance. The lot was used in election of office-bearers, sending of missionaries, admission to membership, etc. But in regard to marriage, it was used only by consent of the candidates for marriage, and an adverse result was not enforced. The administration of the affairs of the society lay with the conference of the united elders. From time to time general synods with legislative power were summoned. The membership was divided into groups of married, widowed, bachelors, maidens, and children, with special duties, separate residences, and also special religious services in addition to those common to all. The church officers were bishops, presbyters, deacons, deaconesses, and acolytes.
§ 168.11. =Missions to the Heathen.=--Zinzendorf’s meeting with a West Indian negro in Copenhagen awakened in him at an early period the missionary zeal. He laid the matter before the church, and in A.D. 1732 the first Herrnhut missionaries, Dober and Nitschmann, went out to St. Thomas, and in the following year missions were established in Greenland, North America, almost all the West Indian islands, South America, among the Hottentots at the Cape, the East Indies, among the Eskimos of Labrador, etc. Their missionary enterprise forms the most brilliant and attractive part of the history of the Moravians. Their procedure was admirably suited to uncultured races, and only for such. In the East Indies, therefore, they were unsuccessful. They were never wanting in self-denying missionaries, who resigned all from love to the Saviour. They were mostly pious, capable artisans, who threw themselves with all their hearts into their new work, and devoted themselves with affectionate tenderness to the advancement of the bodily and spiritual interests of those among whom they laboured. One of the noblest of them all was the missionary patriarch Zeisberger, who died in A.D. 1808, after toiling among the North American Indians for sixty-three years. These missions were conducted at a surprisingly small outlay. The Brethren also interested themselves in the conversion of the Jews. In A.D. 1738 Dober wrought among the Jews of Amsterdam; and with greater success in A.D. 1739, Lieberkühn, who also visited the Jews in England and Bohemia, and was honoured by them with the title of “rabbi.”[507]