15. století
Unity of the Brethern
Evangelical Church
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The Unity of the Brethern was founded during the troubled period of the Hussite wars. The incentive for its creation was the will to find a pacific path between the Utraquists and the Catholics, which had become possible after the defeat of the Hussite radicals in the battle of Lipany. The Unity of the Brethern was founded in 1457 as a consequence of the disappointment brought by the Hussite revolution. It promoted the three ideals of faith, love and hope, and it always considered that the actual Christian life was more important than precepts or religious traditions. It spread over Bohemia, Moravia and Poland and strongly influenced the reformist theology and Czech culture. One of its greatest deeds was the translation of the bible. The so-called Bible of Kralice (Kralická Bible) was translated from its original languages and had an immeasurable importance for the preservation and the purity of the Czech language over the next four centuries. Some of its leading representatives wereLukas
Prazsky, Jan Augusta, Jan Blahoslav and the teacher of nations Comenius (J. A. Komensky).
The consequence of the persecution of the Protestants by the Catholics following the battle on the White Mountain (1620) was that tens of thousands of people fled their homeland. Others stayed and tried to secretly save their faith and at least pass it on to their children. They were boosted by the secret reading of the Holy Scripture and by the encouragements of preachers who visited them from abroad. The evangelic Protestants managed to survive this way during a whole century. Later, the Unity’s activity moved to Germany. The Unity of the Brethern dispatched missionaries all over the world (the Caribbean, Saxony, Greenland, America). The Church is still active today and is known, primarily abroad, as the Moravian Church. In the Czech Republic, the following Churches have roots in the Unity of the Brethern: the Church of the Brethern, the Baptist Union and the Evangelical Church of Czech Brethren.
