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389 RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA Theological seminaries
3. Plymouth: This seminary, or, rather, " mission house," is located near Plymouth, Sheboygan Co., Wis., and was founded by the Sheboygan Classic of the Reformed Church in the United States in 1860, to provide ministers for the settlers who emigrated to Wisconsin and the Northwest from Switzerland and Germany, for whom it was impossible to procure ministers either from Europe or from the eastern part of the United States through the board of missions of this church. The first instructors were Rev. H. A. Muehlmeier and Rev. J. Bossard. The seminary has, from the beginning, been an integral part of the mission house, but its formal organization -as a school separate from the preparatory departments, college and academy, did not occur till 1875, when the Synod of the Northwest, to which the school had been transferred by Sheboygan Classic in 1867, passed resolutions to that effect, and founded the various chairs of theology. In 1881 the Central Synod was organized in Ohio, and this new German synod, as also, in 1886, the German Synod of the East, received a proportional interest in the institution, so that the mission house is now the property of the three German synods of the Reformed Church in the United States. The seminary has adhered faithfully to the confession of the church, the Heidelberg Catechism; and in the liturgical conflict of the sixties and early seventies it, together with the great majority of the German ministers of the church, occupied a middle ground, inclining neither to ritualism nor to the so-called new measures. Among the instructors Dr. Bossard (b. 1885) was known and acknowledged in Germany as an authority in philology, especially in Greek and Hebrew grammar; Rev. H. Kurtz (d. 1889) was an authority in classic church music, and many of his anthems and other compositions, published by the Central Publishing House, Cleveland, O., are sung throughout the church; and Dr. H. J. Ruetenik, still living, ranks high as editor and author.
The seminary is under the control of a board of trustees elected by the synods. In 1910 there were three professors and twenty-six students, all of this church and from various states. The endowment, which is slowly increasing, amounts to $40,000, and annual collections from the congregations affiliated with the school cover the running expenses. The library of the mission house contains 16,000 volumes, of which about half are theological.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: D. W. Vrle9en, GeSChlChte des MtBSlOnHauses, Cleveland, O., 1885; L. Praikschatis and H. A.
Meier, Das Mission-Maus, ib., 1897.%V b. Reformed (Dutch).-1. New Brunswick: This institution, officially designated " The Theological Seminary of the Reformed (Dutch) Church in America at New Brunswick, New Jersey," is located, as its name indicates, in New Brunswick, Middlesex Co., N. J. Its origin was due to the need of the Dutch churches in New York and New Jersey for educated ministers when conditions made it no longer possible to obtain them in Holland. In 1784, the " General Body," afterward the General Synod, appointed as its professor of theology the Rev. John H. Livingston (q.v.), minister of the Protestant Reformed Dutch Church of New York City. This
professorship he held until his death in 1825, and his students attended his lectures in New York for twelve years, when, on account of the expense to students of city life, he removed them to Flatbush, L. L, though the next synod directed their return to New York: After having graduated about ninety students there, the seminary was removed to New Brunswick, N. J., in 1810, where its work was carried on in the buildings of Queens College (since 1825 Rutgers College), an institution founded by the Dutch churches, and at that time under the control of their General Synod. In 1856 a separate and spacious campus was acquired by the synod, which is the present home of the institution, and now contains three large halls and six residences. The first professor of languages, Rev. H. Meyer, was appointed by the synod also in 1784, and in 1812 Rev. John M. Van Harlingen became the first professor of ecclesiastical history, while in 1815 pastoral theology was formally provided for, in connection with the historical chair. In 1865 practical theology became a distinct department under Rev. D. D. Demarest, and in 1884 the department of languages was divided. In 1905 a lectorship in Biblical history and theology was established, and instructors in oratory and music are also regularly employed.
The seminary has had a large influence in. the life of the church to which it belongs, and has sent many strong men into the pulpits, the seminaries, and the missions of other churches. It is the birth-place of the Arabian Mission. Its average number of stu dents is thirty-five, of whom one-third are from the Middle West. It has five professors, a lector, and two instructors, an endowment, aside from scholarships, of $525,000, and a library of 49,000 volumes. There is no corporate body apart from that of the General Synod, which owns the property, chooses the professors, supervises their work through a board of superintendents, and dictates the curricu lum. The institution thus stands, in fact and in principle, for the complete control by the Church of the training of the Church's ministry. In its actual work, it stands for a theology resting on Holy Scrip ture as a positive and authoritative revelation, which centers around the doctrine of the gracious sover eignty of God, and it aims to produce a scholarly and evangelical ministry of catholic and aggressively missionary spirit. J. P. SEARLE.BIBLIOGRAPHY: Centennial Discourses, New York, 1877; E. T. Corwin, Manual of the Reformed Protestant Dutch
Church in North America, 4th ed., New York, 1902; .D. D. Demarest, Reformed Church in America, New York, 1889.2. Western: This seminary, which is under the control of the Reformed Church in America, is located at Holland, Ottawa Co., Mich., and was formally organized by the General Synod of the church in 1869, after special instruction had already been given in theology for three years in connection with Hope College, and a class of seven was ready to graduate. The necessity for such a school grew largely out of conditions arising from the settlement of a large colony from the Netherlands, whose attachment to the Reformed Church in their native country led to their uniting with the Reformed Church in America. The desire to extend its own influence in the West, where many of its members