CONCORD, BOOK OF, the collective documents of the Lutheran confession, consisting of the Con f essio Augustan, the Apologia Con f essionis Augustanae, the Articula Smalcaldici, the Catechismi Major et Minor and the Formula Concordiae. This last was a formula issued on the 25th of June 158o (the jubilee of the Augsburg Confession) by the Lutheran Church in an at tempt to heal the breach which, since the death of Luther, had been widening between the extreme Lutherans and the Crypto Calvinists. Previous attempts at concord had been made at the request of different rulers, especially by Jacob Andrea with his Swabian Concordia in 1573, and Abel Scherdinger with the Maul bronn Formula in 1575. In 1S76 the elector of Saxony called a conference of theologians at Torgau to discuss these two efforts and from them produce a third. The Book of Torgau was evolved, circulated and criticized; a new committee, prominent on which was Martin Chemnitz, sitting at Bergen near Madgeburg, consid ered the criticisms and finally drew up the Formula Concordiae. It consists of (a) the "Epitome," (b) the "Solid Repetition and Declaration," each part comprising twelve articles ; and was ac cepted by Saxony, Wurttemberg, Baden among other states, but rejected by Hesse, Nassau and Holstein. Even the free cities were divided, Hamburg and Lubeck for, Bremen and Frankfort against. Hungary and Sweden accepted it, and so finally did Den mark, where at first it was rejected, and its publication made a crime punishable by death. In spite of this very limited recep tion the Formula Concordiae has always been reckoned with the five other documents as of confessional authority.
See P. Schaff, History of Creeds ch. vi., and Creeds of the Evangel ical Protestant Churches; W. A. Curtis, art. "Confessions" in Hasting's, Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics (§ 13, "Confessions in the Lutheran Churches") with references.