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Christian History

Today in Christian History

September 17

September 17, 1179: Hildegaard of Bingen, a German abbess, mystic, author, and preacher who received visions of God from the age of 5, dies at age 82 (see issue 30: Woman in the Medieval Church).

September 17, 1575: Swiss reformer Heinrich Bullinger dies. Next to John Calvin, Bullinger exerted the most influence over the second-generation Reformers (see issue 12: John Calvin).

September 17, 1630: English settlers change the name of Trimountain, Massachusetts, to Boston in honor of pastor John Cotton, formerly of St. Botolph's Church in Boston, England.

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April 27, 1667: Blind, bitter, and poor, Puritan poet John Milton sells for ten pounds the copyright for Paradise Lost—a book that would influence English thought and language nearly as much as the King James Version and the plays of Shakespeare. The theme of the epic appears in its opening lines: "Of man's disobedience, and the fruit / Of that forbidden tree, whose mortal taste / Brought death into the world, and all our woe, / With loss of Eden.

April 27, 1775: Moravian minister ...

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