Itt-Ott, 1990 (23. évfolyam, 114-117. szám)

1990 / 117. szám

an order of worship in the stricter sense in the book, prescribing how the divine service was to be conducted.

But Honter’s most eloquent passages in the work are the ones in which he writes about the need for schools. “As one plants young trees in the garden in order that when the old decay one will have others in their stead, so have our grandfathers judged it of foremost importance that... youth be educated”. The main purpose of such education was to be the “maintenance of religion and of the church, but not merely in order to provide for good singing during services: rather, to rear and to teach young people in the liberal arts and in Christian dogma, so that this Fatherland of ours, surrounded by enemies, so richly blessed by God, will never become pagan because of the neglect of the leaders who are sworn to uphold it.” (Just that had happened to part of Hungary after Mohács, under Turkish occupation, arguably because of the neglect of her leaders.) He adds that the schools had decayed for lack of care, and that they must now be put in good shape, with new buildings, and with good salaries paid by the communities to attract good teachers, who will act as the assistants to the above-described worthy parsons. He recommends a system whereby talented boys, who have nothing more to learn in village schools, are to be sent to gymnasia in the cities; and that if the facilities in the cities prove too small, the expropriated cloisters be rebuilt to house them. The curriculum in the elementary schools is to be reading, writing and grammar, in both Latin and German; dialectics, Greek, and other liberal arts (Teutsch 1923, 49-50).

Because of Honter’s influence, the Saxon primary schools were indeed rejuvenated, and there was not a village left without such a school, even though initially most left much to be desired: instead of the learned men Honter envisioned as teachers, most in fact had little more training than an apprenticeship spent with a more experienced man. Nor were they remunerated as Honter had proposed: instead, they were for the most part paid miserably and only in kind, so that there were complaints that the farmers sent only their weakest sons to become teachers. “Good teachers and preachers do not just grow like toadstools on a dungheap” — thundered Pastor Dürr in one of his sermons (Teutsch 1923, 50). Yet overall, the foundations had been laid, and the system worked, mutatis mutandis with much improvement, well into our present century.

But it was the new Saxon middle schools, the gymnasia, that became the pride and joy of the cities. The one in Kronstadt opened its doors in 1544, with Honter’s learned friend, Valentin Wagner as rector. The boys were instructed in Greek grammar, the Latin and Greek New Testaments, in Seneca and in other classic writers, as well as in religion, music, geography, and arithmetic. Honter republished his Grundriß der Weltbeschreibung for them, with colored maps. The school was patterned on the humanistic gymnasium of Nürnberg (Teutsch 1923, 51-52).

Others soon followed. Hermannstadt bought up several houses and built a large school next to its main church. The school in Bistritz was run down and in disarray; Franciscus Davidis, or Ferenc Dávid as he is

26 ITT-OTT 23. évi. (1990), téli (117.) szám

known to the Hungarians, became rector there in 1551, rebuilt the building and expanded the staff. Stadtpfarrer Fleischer set up a fund with a donation of 172 gold gulden to support Saxon students at German universities. Other funds were established to assist pupils of meager means (Teutsch 1923, 52).

In 1539, Honterus had also turned his attention to the question of civil law. He published a small compendium of Roman law in that year, which even King János recognized. But since the Saxon University now demanded that Saxons be judged by their own code, and not merely on the basis of the former common law, he added, in 1544, a Handbuch des bürgerlichen Rechts zum Gebrauch für die sächsischen Städte und Stühle in Siebenbürgen, again based largely on Roman law, which the Saxons adopted. “As one Church ties together the seven forts” — Transylvania’s German name is Siebenbürgen — so should “a common code of law protect and delight the faithful” - wrote Valentin Wagner in his introductory poem to the work (Teutsch 1923, 55).

Honter died in 1549. What he left behind, in addition to some thirty books, was not a new religion, but an autonomous national minority church that preached the Lutheran Gospel in Saxon, but read Luther’s German Bible, sang German hymns, and conducted its affairs in German; a strengthened political union of the Saxons, who would go on to prosper economically, culturally and politically until the destruction of their society in the last fifty years; and a minority school system that provided the support for Saxon society, religious and civil, until that, too, was nationalized and eliminated by the Romanian state after the Second World War.

By 1552, all Saxon communes had adopted Honter’s Kirchenordnung: the Saxon Reformation was essentially over. What remained was to defend it against competing reformers, now chiefly in the Hungarian camp, against various attempts at a Catholic restoration by Hungarians and by the Habsburgs, and against all other vicissitudes of history. All that the Saxons accomplished successfully during nearly four centuries.

Transylvanians of all nationalities and faiths are justly proud that in their land the Reformation, elsewhere so bloody, was carried out in an exemplary, civilized fashion. Indeed the modus vivendi that was worked out not long after Honter’s death among the several received denominations — the Lutherans, the Calvinists, the Unitarians and the Roman Catholics, and to a lesser extent even with the not quite recognized Romanian orthodox — has no parallel in the history of Europe. It is not my task to speak about the era of toleration edicts of Transylvania, nor about the beneficent role of the Transylvanian court. But I should like to close with an observation. It has been said that there was tolerance in Transylvania only because none of the various religious and ethnic groups on the scene was strong enough to make war upon, or to suppress the others. That may be true, of course, but there seems to have been rather more to it than that. There is a wisdom, a calmness to the Transylvanian reformation that I for one find surprising. We