Smalcius, Valentinus (d. 1622)

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Valentinus Smalcius (Schmalz) (died 1622), was a preacher of the Polish Brethren (Socinians) at Rakov, Poland. In 1610 Smalcius and the Socinian elder Moscorovius had a conversation at Lublin with three Mennonite leaders of Danzig and the surrounding congregations. Thereupon Smalcius drew up a confession of faith, which was widely spread among the Mennonites of Poland. The Socinians wished to have closer contacts and even a merger with the Mennonites, since they held that there were only slight differences between their doctrines; but the Mennonites opposed this union. Smalcius and other leaders of the Brethren, including Ulrich Pius Herwarth, a preacher of the Brethren at Danzig, insisted that Jan Gerrits van Emden, a Mennonite preacher at Danzig, and other Mennonite leaders in Poland have a debate with them in order to prepare the merger. Jan Gerrits wrote a number of letters to Hans de Ries, Leenaert Clock, Reiner Wybrands, and other Mennonite leaders in Holland, urgently asking them to come to Danzig to dispute with the Brethren leaders, because they felt unequal to the theologically well-trained polemical Smalcius and other Socinian leaders. The Dutch elders, however, declined, de Ries writing a letter to Jan Gerrits. The union of Mennonites and the Brethren did not come about; in 1628 the Polish Brethren church was dissolved by order of the Polish government.

Bibliography

Hoop Scheffer, Jacob Gijsbert de. Inventaris der Archiefstukken berustende bij de Vereenigde Doopsgezinde Gemeente to Amsterdam, 2 vols. Amsterdam: Uitgegeven en ten geschenke aangeboden door den Kerkeraad dier Gemeente, 1883-1884: v. II, Nos. 2928-36.


Author(s) Nanne van der Zijpp
Date Published 1959

Cite This Article

MLA style

Zijpp, Nanne van der. "Smalcius, Valentinus (d. 1622)." Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. 1959. Web. 21 Nov 2024. https://gameo.org/index.php?title=Smalcius,_Valentinus_(d._1622)&oldid=111017.

APA style

Zijpp, Nanne van der. (1959). Smalcius, Valentinus (d. 1622). Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. Retrieved 21 November 2024, from https://gameo.org/index.php?title=Smalcius,_Valentinus_(d._1622)&oldid=111017.



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Adapted by permission of Herald Press, Harrisonburg, Virginia, from Mennonite Encyclopedia, Vol. 4, p. 548. All rights reserved.


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