Valerius Herberger (1562–1627) is frequently mentioned in scholarship on the Lutheran tradition but seldom studied at length. He served as pastor in Fraustadt, a border town between Poland and Silesia, culturally aligned with the Silesian sphere despite its formal position under the Polish Crown, producing hymns, funeral sermons, and a substantial Passion commentary that circulated well beyond his parish. Benedikt Bauer’s revised Bochum dissertation, supervised by Ute Gause, takes up Herberger’s writings to argue that Passion piety ( Passionsfrömmigkeit ) was a vital element of early modern Lutheranism rather than a residue of medieval devotional habits. The study pursues this claim across three source-genres: the plague hymn Valet will ich dir geben (1613), the seven-volume funeral sermon collection Geistliche Trauerbinden (1611–1621), and the posthumously published Horoscopia Passionis Domini (1636). Across all three, Bauer contends, Passion piety served as a flexible instrument for pastoral care, confessional identity formation, and what he calls the coping with contingency ( Kontingenzbewältigung ) through affective intensification of the Passion narrative. He presents his findings modestly, describing them as a further “fragment” (p. 360) or “pixel” (p. 32) in a still-incomplete picture of early modern Lutheran confessional culture, whose devotional richness has been obscured by the old caricature of a “dead Orthodoxy.”
The first third of the book lays theoretical and contextual groundwork. Chapter 2 surveys competing periodization schemes applied to Lutheran theology between the Reformation and Pietism, finding “Lutheran Orthodoxy,” “Renaissance,” “late Humanism,” and “Baroque,” each too narrow or too burdened by pejorative connotation. Bauer adopts the more open designation “early modern Lutheranism” ( frühneuzeitliches Luthertum ), following proposals by Christian Volkmar Witt and the programmatic 2022 volume edited by Sascha Salatowsky and Joar Haga. Drawing on queer-theoretical impulses to resist the closure and canonization of historical categories (31–33), he argues that monolithic periodizations flatten a complex confessional landscape. Whether or not every reader finds queer theory a natural fit for the subject matter, the point is well taken. The chapter’s second half introduces an affect-theoretical apparatus indebted to Mieke Bal and Monique Scheer. Bauer proposes that Herberger’s texts effected a “de- and reprogramming” ( De- und Reprogrammierung ) of perception through affective amplification of the Passion narrative (37–38). The theoretical pages are dense, but the framework pays dividends in the source analyses that follow.
Chapter 3 reconstructs Fraustadt as a multi-ethnic border town caught between Lutheran conviction and Habsburg Counter-Reformation pressure, establishing why an affective vocabulary of suffering, consolation, and eschatological hope mapped so directly onto the experience of a community under siege. Chapter 4, the analytical core, occupies well over two-thirds of the book and examines the three works in ascending order of scale. The plague hymn (83–96) is read as a theological-poetic response to the epidemic crisis in which the lyrical voice performatively rehearses the act of dying, moving from farewell through compassio with the suffering Christ toward eschatological hope. Bauer notes that the genre-specific poetic language produces a stronger impression of Passion mysticism than the prose works, a qualification worth bearing in mind.
The funeral sermons receive fuller treatment (97–157). One of the more rewarding findings concerns flexibility: Herberger could set aside his characteristic Passion focus when pastoral circumstances required it. In an instructive excursus (pp. 135–156), Bauer examines sermons lacking explicit Passion-piety argumentation, demonstrating that Herberger’s pastoral attentiveness to the bereaved took priority over his own theological program. He leaves open whether the presence or absence of Passion piety reflected the wishes of the deceased’s family, the pastor’s reading of the situation, or some combination, flagging this as a desideratum for future research (p. 365).
The largest section analyzes the Horoscopia Passionis Domini (158–357), a Passion commentary structured as a 24-hour meditation. Bauer devotes careful attention to paratexts: the publisher Gerlach Dybruch’s preface, and Herberger’s own Kurtzer Bericht , read as establishing an “edification contract” ( Erbauungsvertrag , 189) between author, text, and reader. A discussion of image-text intermediality (169–176) describes the commentary’s images as points of affective deceleration, visualization, and meditative immersion. In the hour-by-hour analysis (pp. 205–352), Bauer traces recurring theological motifs, comparisons with Johann Gerhard, and the consistently audience-directed register ( Adressat_innenbezug ) that distinguishes Herberger’s pastoral address from Gerhard’s more academic one. The conclusion identifies as key components the prominence of blood piety, bridal mysticism, and the heart as what Bauer terms the “communication organ of faith” ( Kommunikationsorgan des Glaubens , 367).
The question of proportion deserves a frank word. The roughly two hundred pages devoted to the passio magna contain considerable repetition, and the most important conclusions could have been reached more selectively. A tighter presentation of chapter 4.3 would have sharpened the argumentative force, and future readers may wish to treat sections 4.3.4 through 4.3.7 on the paratexts and the Zwischenfazit (4.3.9) as the most efficient points of entry.
These reservations should not obscure what Bauer has accomplished. The study makes a persuasive case that Passion piety was a theologically substantive and pastorally generative feature of early modern Lutheranism, and that its presence across three distinct genres cannot be dismissed as medieval residue or proto-Pietist anticipation. The comparative work with Gerhard is especially welcome, anchoring Herberger within a broader confessional discourse. Bauer is also right to insist (368–369) that the historiographic habit of locating Passion, blood, and wound piety exclusively in the Middle Ages or in Zinzendorf’s Moravian circles needs correcting, as does the association of heart-centered piety exclusively with Pietism. His book, published with open access, provides a solid foundation for the inter-confessional and comparative studies he calls for.
