Introduction

Biography

Johann was the son of Ae­gi­di­us Rothe, pas­tor at Lis­sa.

He en­tered the Uni­ver­si­ty of Leip­zig in 1708, as a stu­dent of theo­lo­gy. He gra­du­at­ed MA, then, in 1712, was li­censed at Gör­litz as a ge­ne­ral preach­er.

In 1718, Rothe be­came tu­tor in the fa­mi­ly of Herr von Schwein­itz at Len­be, a few miles south of Gör­litz. While there, he fre­quent­ly preached in neigh­bor­ing church­es. In 1722, Ni­cho­las von Zin­zen­dorf, hear­ing him preach at Groß­hen­ners­dorf, was great­ly im­pressed. When the pas­tor­ate at Ber­thels­dorf be­came va­cant short­ly there­af­ter in 1722, Zin­zen­dorf gave it to Rothe.

While in Ber­thels­dorf, Rothe took a great in­ter­est in the Mo­ra­vi­an com­mu­ni­ty at Herrn­hut, which formed part of his pa­rish. But when, in 1737, he had to re­port to the high­er ec­cle­si­as­ti­cal au­tho­ri­ties re­gard­ing the doc­trin­al view of the Mo­ra­vi­ans, Zin­zen­dorf showed his re­sent­ment in va­ri­ous ways, so that Rothe was glad to ac­cept a call to Herms­dorf, near Gör­litz.

Finally, in 1739, Count von Prom­nitz ap­point­ed Rothe as as­sist­ant pas­tor at Thom­men­dorf, near Bunz­lau, where he be­came chief pas­tor in 1742.