You're listening to an airwave media podcast.

Ben Franklin's world is The podcast dedicated to helping you learn more about how the people

and events of our early American past have shaped the present day world we live in.

And I'm your host Liz Liz Covert. In 1682, the first assembly of Pennsylvania

and the Delaware counties met in Chester, Pennsylvania, and adopted the Great Law. The

Great Law was a humanitarian code that guaranteed the people of Pennsylvania, liberty of conscience.

The Great Law created an environment that not only welcomed William Penn's fellow Quakers to the colony, but also created a space for the migration

and establishment of unestablished religions, religions such as the Lutherans, Swankfelders, and Moravians.

Now Pennsylvania's great religious diversity has inspired you to write me many emails

to suggest that we cover some of the religious groups and dissenters who establish new lives

and communities in Pennsylvania.

So this, my friend, is an episode for you.

Paul Poaker, the director of the Moravian Archives in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania,

joins us to explore the history and settlement

of the Moravians in North America.

Now Paul is quite the historian of the Moravian Church.

He's published numerous essays, articles, and books,

including the edited collection,

Self-Commuity World, Moravian Education in a Transatlantic World,

and most recently, Hernhoot, the formation of a Moravian community 1722 to 1732.

Now during our investigation, Paul reveals, the origins of the Moravian Church in Europe and the creation of the first Moravian community in

Hernhoot, Germany. Information about the Moravians belief in Philadelphianism and why they adopted

...