Includes bibliographical references.

I. Needed: A realistic "model" of the Missouri Synod conflict -- Background -- II. The basic principle -- A. The confessional principle -- The Lutheran confessions -- Background: Europe -- Prussian Union -- Background: America -- The church in the confessions -- "More" than the confessions? -- A fatal fallacy: Doctrines or documents? -- A. The biblical principle -- The Bible in the confessions -- Rationalism, historical criticism, and Missouri -- Luther in fact and fiction -- Foreground -- III. The counter-confessional (Ecumenical) attack -- Sclerosis: Prelude to haemorrhage -- The collapse of confessional concepts of church and fellowship -- the use of the confessions as a rabbit's foot -- The question of church politics -- Center stage -- IV. The counter-biblical (critical) attack -- The critical contagion in stages: ULC -- ALC -- LC-MS -- Historical criticism: definitions and distinctions -- Gospel and incarnation -- Lutheran "controls": Law/gospel or Sola Scriptura? -- Theology of the cross -- or secular cringe? -- V. Epilogue.