Quantitative Semantics in 18th Century Sweden

Abstract

IN 1743 a collection of 90 hymns, entitled Songs of Zion, was published in Sweden. This publication soon became the storm center of a religious controversy which is of particular interest to the social scientist because in the course of it there were foreshadowed many of the methods of content analysis which have found systematic expression only during the past decades. In fact, if not in name, participants in this debate were concerned with many of the problems which concern today's content analyst: the identification of key symbols, the division of content into favorable, unfavorable and neutral categories, the coding of values, and other related problems. Indeed, the controversy revolved around the formula which has become so familiar to students of communication-who said what to whom, how and with what effect? The Songs of Zion appeared at a time when the powerful State Church (Lutheran) was struggling against German pietistic influences. Pietism, stressing faith rather than ritual, was making substantial inroads among the orthodox in Sweden, when the influences of still another German religious movement began to be felt. This movement was that of the Moravian Brethren, led by the Count von Zinzendorf. At first the orthodox Lutheran clergy welcomed the Moravian ideas, believing that they might provide a spiritual means of bringing the pietistic dissenters back into the fold. It was not long, however, before the State Church recognized the Moravians as enemies rather than allies.