Das liturgische Erbe des Protestantismus

The article reconstructs the development of the protestant liturgical life. The notions Leiturgia, martyria, koinonia as well as diakonia belong to the notae ecclesiae, the signs of the church. Surprisingly, the notion “liturgy” was originally used in the public sphere, not the religious one. The Protestant Church of the 16th century preserves almost all the liturgical traditions of the ancient Christianity. The Protestant order of a religious service from the 1520s created by Johannes Bugenhagen, who was a close friend of Martin Luther, is the best testimony to this idea. Luther himself published the new order of a liturgical service in Deutsche Messe (The German Mass) in 1526. What is really exceptional in this paper is the collection of new original liturgical melodies for the life of the congregation. The most important for the development of the Protestant music and liturgy was the work of Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750). From the Protestant point of view, it is both the acts of worship and the Sunday service that express the God service for the world.