RELIGIOUS MOVEMENTS AND CONGREGATIONS IN WEST ESTONIA FROM THE MID-18th TO THE BEGINNING OF THE 20th CENTURY: THEIR INFLUENCE ON THE ESTONIAN AND ESTONIAN-SWEDISH POPULAR CULTURE

Plaat, Jaanus (2001) RELIGIOUS MOVEMENTS AND CONGREGATIONS IN WEST ESTONIA FROM THE MID-18th TO THE BEGINNING OF THE 20th CENTURY: THEIR INFLUENCE ON THE ESTONIAN AND ESTONIAN-SWEDISH POPULAR CULTURE. Acta Ethnographica Hungarica, 46 (1-2). pp. 161-174. ISSN 1216-9803

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Abstract

From the 16th century, Estonia has been a predominantly Lutheran country. Nevertheless, since the 1740s several religious movements have occurred in Estonia occasionally conflicting with the established Lutheran Church. More serious Christianisation among the Estonians began with the Moravian movement which spread widely in Estonia during the 18th and 19th centuries. The Moravian congregations stayed inside the Lutheran Church. The next influential religious movements in the 19th century were the movement of the Heaven-Travellers and shifting from the Lutheran to the Russian Orthodox Church. After the 1880s, various Protestant congregations sprang up in Estonia and developed into a considerable power alongside the Lutheran and Orthodox Churches. Throughout the period, discussed in this paper (from the 1740s to the beginning of the 20th century), the main centres of the new religious movements have been in the counties of West Estonia inhabited not only by the Estonians, but also by the community of the Estonian Swedes. The paper discusses the religious movements in West Estonia and the influence of these movements on the popular culture of the Estonians and the Estonian Swedes.

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