Introduction

Biography

Christian was the son of Christ­ian Scriver, a Rends­burg mer­chant. His fa­ther died of the plague, in 1629, but with the help of a rich great-un­cle, he was able event­ual­ly to ma­tri­cu­late at the Uni­vers­ity of Ros­tock in Oc­to­ber, 1647 (MA 1649).

In 1650 he be­came tu­tor to a fam­ily at Se­ge­berg. While vis­it­ing a mar­ried half-sister at Sten­dal, he preached there with much ac­cept­ance, and was ap­point­ed, in 1653, ar­chi­dia­co­nus of St. James’ Church there.

In 1667, he be­came, pas­tor of St. James’ Church at Mag­de­burg, where he was al­so ap­point­ed, in 1674, as­sess­or at the con­sis­to­ry, in 1676 as Schol­arch, in 1679 as Sen­ior; and in 1685, became in­spect­or of the par­ish­es and schools of the so-called Holz­kreis.

At length he found his work too hea­vy, and, in 1690, ac­cept­ed an in­vi­ta­tion to Qued­lin­burg as Con­sis­tor­ial­rath and chief court preach­er at the Church of St. Ser­va­ti­us, and as pri­vate chap­lain to An­na Do­ro­thea, Du­chess of Sax­ony and Ab­bess of the Lu­ther­an Stift at Qued­lin­burg.

Scriver was a po­pu­lar, use­ful, and in­flu­en­tial preach­er, his ear­nest­ness be­ing deep­ened by his me­mo­ry of ma­ny won­der­ful es­capes from ac­ci­dent and pe­sti­lence.

Works

• Gottholds 300 Zu­fäll­ige An­dach­te (Mag­de­burg: 1663, 1671, and lat­er edi­tions)

Scriver al­so wrote ap­parent­ly about ten hymns. He re­fers to one or two in his Seel­en­schatz and his An­dacht­en, but does not give the full texts. A num­ber are in­clud­ed, as by him, in C. Weise’s abridg­ment of the Seel­en­schatz, pub­lished at Wit­ten­berg, in 1704, as the Seel­en­schatz­es Kraft und Safft. C. O. Weins­chenk, pas­tor of St. Ul­rich’s in Mag­de­burg, in his Er­bau­liche Leb­en of Scriver (Mag­de­burg and Leip­zig, 1729), gives a list of those he con­sid­ers gen­uine.