Leonhard Dober
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[edit] Leonhard Dober
[edit] His background
Leonhard Dober was born on March 7, 1706, in Mönchsroth, a small village in Franken (now part ofnBavaria, Germany). Like his father, Johann, Leonhard was trained as a potter. In 1725, when he was nineteen years old, Leonhard walked 315 miles to join his older brother, Martin, in Herrnhut, the community founded by Protestant refugees from Moravia and Count Nicholas Ludwig von Zinzendorf, just a few years earlier. The Dobers were not the only non-Moravians living in Herrnhut. In 1727 about half of the population of Herrnhut (ca. 300) came from other parts of Germany.
[edit] Call for Mission
An important event in Leonhard’s life took place in 1731 when Anton, a former African slave from St. Thomas, visited Herrnhut. Zinzendorf had met Anton in Copenhagen, Denmark, where he was employed as a servant. Anton, who was baptized, impressed Zinzendorf and his traveling companions with his accounts of the situation on St. Thomas where Africans lived under the harshest of conditions. Zinzendorf sent Anton to Herrnhut where he told the congregation about his sister on St. Thomas who was “eager to learn about Christianity if only God would send someone to teach her”. Leonhard felt he should be the person to go to the Caribbean island and tell the slaves “about their Saviour”. The Church, however was not quick to rush into such an enterprise, and it took another year until Dober and David Nitschmann, his fellow missionary, received permission for travel to St. Thomas. August 21, 1732, the day they left Herrnhut, marks the beginning of mission work of the Moravian Church.
[edit] St. Thomas
Leonhard Dober and David Nitschmann arrived on St. Thomas on December 13, 1732. David Nitschmann returned to Europe four months later. Dober has preached the Gospel to the slaves there until 1734 when he was called back to become General Elder, a position he would hold until September of 1741.
[edit] His other positions in the Moravian church
Dober served the Moravian Church in many places. He worked in Amsterdam where he tried to evangelize the Jewish inhabitants of that city (1738/39). He was appointed head of Moravian activities in the Netherlands (1741-45), in England (1745-1746) and later in Silesia (1751-58). He was also ordained a bishop of the Church in 1747. After Zinzendorf's death Dober became a member of the Directorate of the Unity – a position he held until he passed away in Herrnhut on April 1, 1766.
