The Wendish Research Exchange - Roggan, Alfred: The Sorbian/Wendish Missionary Maria Lobak/Marija Lobakojc from Turnow, called Maria Lobach (1798–1853).

Lětopis Abstract 2016 2: Roggan, Alfred: The Sorbian/Wendish Missionary Maria Lobak/Marija Lobakojc from Turnow, called Maria Lobach (1798–1853).

Maria Lobak died in 1853 in Paramaribo from the after-effects of a serious tropical disease. Her deeply religious way of life as well as her work as a preacher, in community building and caring for the sick, which was conducted in the spirit of the Moravian Brotherhood message, was given immediate acknowledgement by the local missionary organization of the Brotherhood in Herrnhut. When an official obituary was due to be written in 1856, it became clear that much about her life’s work was known, however hardly anything was known about the period before she entered the service of the Moravian Brotherhood in Herrnhut. There was particular uncertainty about her family background and the first part of her life in her Peitz/Turnower homeland. Knowledge about Maria Lobak/Marija Lobakojc, who served as a missionary between 1844 and 1853, has here been supplemented with the current article about her childhood and youth. In this, particular attention has been given to her family origins, her upbringing in the Sorbian/Wendish cultural sphere in Lower Lusatia, as well as to the decisive influence of the Herrnhut revivalist movement.