Our founder, Christian Renatus Zinzendorf, lived from 1727-1752. In proclaiming himself to be the living side wound of Christ, Christian Renatus made literal what others saw only as metaphor. It was said that by looking into his eyes, one saw the eyes of Christ at the moment of his death on the cross. In Christel, as he was affectionately known, combined the spirit and the body, the human and the divine. After Christel’s own death, his spirit was said to live in the spring of the community named for him,  thus transforming the god, the human and the earth into a healing wholeness and consciousness, a new enlightenment.

The entrance to the sacred spring inhabited by Christian’s spirit was through the lower cellar door. While the building is gone, the stone cellar and the spring remain.

The spiritual heart of Herrnhaag was this great hall, the scene of many elaborate rituals and festivals. The room was designed to incorporate a special balcony area which represented Heaven. This one room joined together Heaven and Earth, as did the entire community which unified the spiritual and the physical.

The settlement of Christiansbrunn (The Spring of Christian) in the Lehigh Valley of eastern Pennsylvania as it looked in the Eighteenth Century.

Most of Christel’s later years were spent here at a specially-constructed community called Herrnhaag, God’s Grove, outside Frankfort, Germany. Residents believed Christ led the community by working through Christian Renatus.