Church history

After the Treaty of Trianon, the Transylvanian Reformed Church found itself in a completely new and unprecedented situation. In the years following the change of empires, there was an ideological search not only in literature and public life but also within the church. The intellectual elites of Hungarian Transylvania, including the leaders, theological professors, and ministers of the Reformed Church, significantly contributed to this quest, with their reflections and thoughts still holding significant content and influence today.

In this paper I summarise the ecclesiastical and social effects of the works on the life of the church and society of the Lutheran theologian (minister and dean in Kolozsvár-Cluj) Andor Járosi, who was born 125 years ago. It is the result of his efforts that the liturgical reform of the Lutheran church from Transylvania took place, even if it lasted longer than twenty years until a general decision was made regarding of its implementation to the whole church.

The main theme of my writing is Jonathan Edwards’ reflection on the beauty of God. In his writings and sermons, God’s beauty is not coherently defined, but fragments of his thinking on beauty can be found throughout in his works. My research does not aim at providing a coherent picture of Edwards’ views on God’s beauty. Edwards did not provide any consistent criteria of beauty and the qualities that are true of God, so that we have no easy task when we want to capture and summarise his views.