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Henry Melchior Muhlenberg (an anglicanization of Heinrich Melchior Mühlenberg) (September 6, 1711 – October 7, 1787), was a German Lutheran pastor sent to North America as a missionary, requested by Pennsylvania colonists. Integral to the founding of the first Lutheran church body or denomination in North America, Muhlenberg is considered the patriarch of the Lutheran Church in the United States. Muhlenberg and his wife Anna Maria had a large family, several of whom had a significant impact on colonial life in North America as pastors, military officers, and politicians. His and Anna Maria's descendants continued to be active in Pennsylvania and national political life. ==Early life in Germany== Muhlenberg was born in 1711 at Einbeck, to Nicolaus Melchior Mühlenberg and Anna Maria Kleinschmid in the German Electorate of Brunswick-Lüneburg (also known as Hanover). He studied theology at the Georg-August University of Göttingen. As a student, Muhlenberg came under the influence of the Pietist movement through fellow students from Einbeck who had worked at the Francke Foundations in Halle (Saale), an important Pietist institution. With two other men, Muhlenberg started a charity school in Göttingen that eventually became an orphanage.〔Frick, William K. ''Henry Melchior Muhlenberg: Patriarch of the Lutheran Church in America'' (Philadelphia, Pa.: Lutheran Publication Society, 1902), pp. 16-18〕 After completing his studies in spring 1738, Muhlenberg secured a teaching position at the Francke Foundation's Historic Orphanage. Its director, the theologian Gotthilf August Francke was the son and successor of the Foundation's founder, August Hermann Francke and a professor at the University of Halle. Muhlenberg was ordained in Leipzig in 1739,〔Frick, 22〕 and served as assistant minister and director of the orphanage at Grosshennersdorf from 1739 to 1741.〔Bowden, Henry Warner. ''Dictionary of American Religious Biography'', Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1977. ISBN 0-8371-8906-3.〕 In 1741 Gotthilf August Francke encouraged Muhlenberg to accept a call from German-speaking Lutherans in Pennsylvania. Accordingly, in 1742 Muhlenberg emigrated across the Atlantic Ocean, where he essentially founded the Lutheran Church as an institution in North America. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Henry Muhlenberg」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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