Franke/Spener - two lesser-known Christian influences

Suggest and discuss books to read (all languages welcome!)
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mightyfelix
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Post by mightyfelix »

A good friend of mine (and one of the best people I know for a good book-y conversation) just posted his list of 2019 reads on social media. There's no reason to share all of it, but he makes this interesting comment:
The most intriguing biography of the year was undoubtedly that of August Hermann Francke (1663-1727). I am sure most Americans have never heard of him, and yet we owe a lot of our modern Christian practices to Francke and his close friend Philipp Spener. Francke's autobiography (Footsteps of Divine Providence) was long considered a classic, was well-known to John Wesley (who published Francke's works), and was an inspiration to George Müller, but has not been in print in English in about a century. If someone takes the time to make Frankce and Spener known to a modern audience, it will be a great achievement.
The Life of Augustus Hermann Francke: https://archive.org/details/augustushe00guer
Memoirs of Augustus Hermann Francke: https://archive.org/details/memoirsofaugustu00amer
Philip Jacob Spener and His Work: https://archive.org/details/philipjacobspene00rich
ZackPreston
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Joined: August 23rd, 2020, 11:01 am

Post by ZackPreston »

Thank you for sharing these notes and links! This is my first post on the esteemed LibriVox Forum -- long time listener, first time poster -- and how amusing the sequence of events that led to this post. As a new user, I was reading through the FAQ and the etymology of "LibriVox" led to a tangent of reading Latin phrases. "Pia desideria" had a nice ring to it and its translation, "pious longings", isn't exactly making headlines, so curiosity soon found me reading about Philipp Spener and his work with that phrase as its title. That got me curious as to whether anyone had read his works for LibriVox which in turn found me reading this post which substantially enriches my new found quest with works by Augustus Francke who is also new to me and just as interesting.
mightyfelix
LibriVox Admin Team
Posts: 11104
Joined: August 7th, 2016, 6:39 pm

Post by mightyfelix »

ZackPreston wrote: September 20th, 2020, 3:59 pm Thank you for sharing these notes and links! This is my first post on the esteemed LibriVox Forum -- long time listener, first time poster -- and how amusing the sequence of events that led to this post. As a new user, I was reading through the FAQ and the etymology of "LibriVox" led to a tangent of reading Latin phrases. "Pia desideria" had a nice ring to it and its translation, "pious longings", isn't exactly making headlines, so curiosity soon found me reading about Philipp Spener and his work with that phrase as its title. That got me curious as to whether anyone had read his works for LibriVox which in turn found me reading this post which substantially enriches my new found quest with works by Augustus Francke who is also new to me and just as interesting.
:lol: You're right, what a cool chain of events! "Pious longings" is certainly a very evocative phrase. I have yet to read either of these authors, but they came recommended to me by a friend whom I greatly admire and respect (especially when it comes to his opinions on books and Christian authors). Two of the projects I'm running currently are also his recommendations. I hope to open a group project of one of these books sooner or later.

So many books, so short a lifetime. :D
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