Talk:Gerhard Tersteegen

Edit request: external link to complete English translation of the letters

I maintain gerhardtersteegen.com, a free, non-commercial archive presenting all 605 of Tersteegen's surviving letters in English translation (the article currently notes only Emily Chisholm's 1950 selections). The site has no advertising or paywall. Because I run it, I am not adding it myself and am requesting that an uninvolved editor consider adding the following to the External links section, alongside the existing archive links:

• Gerhard Tersteegen: The Letters – complete English translation of the 605 letters, free online

Thank you. ~~~~ FoxtrotMoravian (talk) 21:02, 23 September 2026 (UTC)

Hmm, translations are difficult because if we link a particular source that isn't clearly a canonical translation, we risk elevating that particular interpretation over others. I'm not necessarily opposed to this external link but I would like to see some evidence that this translation sees use - for instance, are there academic references to this translation? the source is also clearly presenting these from a didactic Christian perspective, e.g. "When a passage moves you to pray, take time to remain with the Lord." - this is obviously fine in context, but something that gives me second thoughts when linking from a Wikipedia page meant to present the subject in a general academic sense. Rusalkii (talk) 22:24, 23 September 2026 (UTC)

Thank you for looking at this so quickly — these are fair questions, and I'll answer them as plainly as I can.

On "elevating one translation over others": there is no other English translation of the collection to be elevated over. The only prior English is Emily Chisholm's The Quiet Way (Epworth, 1950), which the article already cites in Further reading — a devotional selection of roughly a hundred of the 605 letters, published by the Methodist press. This site is the sole complete rendering, so it doesn't compete with an alternative interpretation; if anything, it gives readers the whole of what Chisholm sampled.

On use: the translation went online in mid-2026, so academic citations don't yet exist, and I won't pretend otherwise. Independent library adoption has begun: the Digital Theological Library, the shared library serving its member seminaries, added it to its Wesleyan/Methodist Studies research guide on 23 September ([https://libguides.thedtl.org/c.php?g=1255185&p=9203587 Online Resources page]). Requests to other seminary library guides are under review, and I'm glad to come back with those rather than press now.

On the devotional register: the line you quote is from a "Start here" page written for first-time readers. The letter pages and the [https://gerhardtersteegen.com/about.html About the translation] page are documentary — each letter is translated from the 1773–75 first edition and the 1845 Gesammelte Schriften, collated against Bayerische Staatsbibliothek page images, with Benrath's 2008 critical edition used for dating and addressee identification, canonical Band·Theil·Brief identifiers, and the German incipit on every letter. Tersteegen's letters are themselves spiritual direction, so the reader guidance follows the genre, much as Chisholm's Epworth volume did. If it helps, the link could point to the About page rather than the home page, or carry a descriptor such as "complete translation; devotional site." Happy to leave the judgment to you either way. FoxtrotMoravian (talk) 00:40, 24 September 2026 (UTC)

I'm waffling, will leave this for a second opinion for another editor. Rusalkii (talk) 01:06, 24 September 2026 (UTC)

Thank you for looking at it. For whoever picks this up: since the note above about framing, the site's About page has gained a "Scholarly use" section (editions and sources used, citation form, stable letter URLs, reuse terms) at gerhardtersteegen.com/about.html#scholarly-use, which could serve as the link target if a neutral entry point is preferred. I'll leave it there. ~~~~ FoxtrotMoravian (talk) 01:24, 24 September 2026 (UTC)