Leidsch Dagblad
- ANOTHER LETTER FROM MR. KNIBBE TO THE SYNOD AT ASSEN.
- ON THE ROAD TO SOCIALISM.
- NEIGHBOURHOOD ASSOCIATION “UNITY”.
This Leidsch Dagblad page of 29 October 1926 carried church, political and neighbourhood news. It printed an extract from a further reply by the jurist P. G. Knibbe, a Free University alumnus, to the Reformed Synod of Assen, remarking that his questions were at the centre of attention and had just been discussed again in De Heraut. A report on a well-attended meeting, mostly of students and chaired by Mr. Eisma, described a speaker who disclaimed any wish to rouse his audience and instead set out to trace society's development towards socialism. A third report described a ceremony of the neighbourhood association “Eensgezindheid”, where girls sang a song dedicated to the board and the chairman, visibly moved, received a flag whose golden letters he took to stand for the association's future.
Translation
ANOTHER LETTER FROM MR. KNIBBE TO THE SYNOD AT ASSEN.
Below we print an extract from the reply of Mr. P. G. Knibbe to the Synod of Assen. The questions raised by Mr. Knibbe, a pupil of the Free University, are at the centre of attention. In the latest issue of “De Heraut” yet another discussion is devoted to them.
ON THE ROAD TO SOCIALISM.
The well-attended meeting was opened a little after 8 o'clock by the chairman, Mr. Eisma, with a word of welcome to those present, for the most part students, after which he gave the floor to the speaker, who began by remarking that he did not mean his address as a call to rouse his listeners, but that he wished to sketch the development of society in the direction of socialism.
NEIGHBOURHOOD ASSOCIATION “UNITY”.
Each board member had meanwhile received a song bound in the association's colours, which, dedicated to the board, was sung impressively by the girls. The hall was completely silent, and the song invited the chairman to come onto the stage; after the flag had been handed to him, he expressed his surprise at this presentation and, visibly moved, said that he regarded this cloth as the association as it is today and the golden letters as the future. May we yet live to see the golden time. May all residents of the neighbourhood, as members, show a certain measure of loyalty to this flag.
Context
What the 1926 Synod of Assen decided
Knibbe's letter belongs to the doctrinal conflict that divided the Gereformeerde Kerken in 1926. That year the churches' synod at Assen dealt with a disciplinary case against Dr. Geelkerken. A minister who was himself suspended after Assen later recalled, in a 1959 memoir, that the decisive issue was whether the two trees of paradise, the serpent and the serpent's speaking in Genesis 3 had to be accepted as real events. The synod deposed Geelkerken, and the Amsterdam-Zuid congregation, which stayed loyal to him, was declared to have broken its bond with the Gereformeerde Kerken. The Leidsch Dagblad states only that Knibbe's questions stood at the centre of attention; the excerpt printed here does not show what his letter argued.
From the Assen ruling to the 1926 church split
After Assen, the classis of Alkmaar, a regional church assembly, demanded assent from its ministers. According to the same memoir, ministers were asked personally whether they agreed without reservation with the Assen decisions; the memoirist answered no and, after a heated debate, was suspended for three weeks. The synod also deposed all elders and deacons who sided with Geelkerken. The dispute produced the first split in the Gereformeerde Kerken: the more liberal wing, which treated the Adam and Eve account as allegorical, left to form the Gereformeerde Kerken in Hersteld Verband. The paper's description of Knibbe as a pupil of the Free University matters because that university, like the Anti-Revolutionary Party, belonged to the gereformeerde pillar, so his questions came from inside the movement itself. The GKN later renounced the historic position upheld at Assen, in 1971/1972.
The SDAP's democratic road to socialism in 1926
The speaker's insistence that he would sketch a development rather than rouse his listeners matches the reformist course of the main Dutch socialist party, the SDAP; the excerpt itself names neither the speaker nor his party. The SDAP sought a socialist society by democratic means, one in which the working class would enjoy better living conditions than under capitalism, and after universal male suffrage arrived in 1917 it consistently held about 20% of the electorate. The revolutionary alternative had failed in November 1918, when Troelstra, after revolution broke out in Germany, believed its moment had come in the Netherlands as well and proved mistaken. In 1925 Troelstra was succeeded as party leader by the engineer Willem Albarda, a convinced but pragmatic and moderate socialist valued even by political opponents. A lecture describing society's gradual movement towards socialism to a mostly student audience fits the period when this gradualist line dominated the party.
Original
WEER EEN BRIEF VAN MR. KNIBBE AAN DE SYNODE TE ASSEN.
Hieronder laten wij volgen een uittreksel van het antwoord van mr P. G. Knibbe aan de Synode van Assen. De kwesties door mr. Knibbe, een leerling van de Vrije Universiteit aangevoerd, staan in het cen trum der belangstelling In het laatste nummer van " de Heraut " wordt er nog een beschouwing aan gewijd.
OP WEG NAAR HET SOCIALISME.
De goed bezochte vergadering werd te ruim 8 uur met een woord van welkom tot de aanwezigen. voor ' t meerendeel studenten, door den voorzitter, den heer Eisma, geopend, waarna deze het woord gaf aan den spreker die aanving met op t «merken, dat hij met zijn rede geen opwekking bedoelde te geven. maar dat hij wilde schetsen de ontwikkeling van de maatschappij in de richting van het socialisme.
BUURTVEREEN. „EENSGEZINDHEID”.
Elk bestuurslid had intusschen een met de vereenigingskleuren ingebonden lied ontvangen. dat opgedragen aan het bestuur. op indrukwekkende wijze door de meisjes werd gezongen Het was muisstil in de zaal en het lied noodigde den voorzitter uit op het podium te komen en nadat hem de vlag ter hand was gesteld. sprak hij zijn verrassing uit over deze aanbieding, en zichtbaar aangedaan. zeide hij dit doek te beschouwen als de vereeniging op heden en de gouden letters als de toekomst. dat we nog eens den gouden tijd mogen medemaken. dat alle bewoners der buurt als lid een zekere mate van trouw aan deze vlag betoonen.
Source: Source: Erfgoed Leiden en Omstreken (leiden.courant.nu)