»Aus Gottes Wort und eigener Erfahrung gezeiget«

The contributions to the conference proceedings determine, from an international and interdisciplinary perspective, the decisive role that Pietism, in its regional and territorial manifestations, played in making the Age of Enlightenment also the age of experience. 
Beyond its core areas of religious piety and social reform, Pietism, as a cultural force alongside the Enlightenment, shaped personal experience into a guiding principle. For theology and religious practice, science and art, but also for coping with everyday life, Pietism reflected on and used personal experience as a reliable point of reference. In addition, and sometimes in competition with this, experience has been placed in relation to the God revealed in the Bible; as an element of Christian wisdom, it has also taken on rational, enlightenment functions in educational theory and practice. It has set individualising and subjectivising accents in literary, musical, visual arts and architectural culture. Experience has served the critical examination of authoritative traditions and, at the same time, has advanced to become a legitimising authority. Theological or pedagogical-pietistic theories on the conceptualisation and systematisation of experience also make it clear once again that pietism and the Enlightenment, in addition to the differences long overemphasised by research, also exhibit striking congruences.

This book contains contributions in German and English.