Search

[German Version] 1. Hermann Daniel (Jan 24, 1731, Piaseczno [Petznick], Poland – Nov 12, 1807, Kiel[?]), the brother of 2. Hermes studied in Halle from 1750 before teaching in Berlin and serving as a pastor in Dierberg from 1756 and in Zossen from 1760. He became a professor at a Gymnasium in 1766, provost in 1771, and senior councilor of the consistory in Breslau in 1787. Called to Berlin as a councilor of the consistory in 1791, he became president of the Geistliche Immediat-Examinationskommission there in 1792.…

[German Version] (Sep 21, 1738, Züllichau – Feb 3, 1809, Frankfurt an der Oder), was educated in the school at Kloster Bergen; he counteracted its culture of Pietism and transitional theology by privately reading the philosophers of the Enlightenment, including J. Locke and Voltaire. He went on to study theology in Halle (S.J. Baumgarten) and Frankfurt an der Oder ( J.G. Toellner). After teaching in Berlin and Züllichau, in 1774 he was appointed director of the Züllichau orphanage as well as professor of philosophy and associate professor of theology in ¶ Frankfurt; he was promoted t…

[German Version] 1. Romanus (Feb 21, 1703, Leipzig – Apr 5, 1750, Leipzig), began studying philosophy and theology in Leipzig in 1719, receiving his M.A. in 1721. In 1723 he was appointed catechist at the church of St. Peter and in 1727 Saturday preacher at the church of St. Thomas, both in Leipzig. In 1730 he was appointed deacon at the church of St. Maximus in Merseburg, in 1731 catechist at the church of St. Peter, in 1737 deacon, and in 1745 pastor of St. Thomas in Leipzig. After receiving his B…

[German Version] (baptized Dec 8, 1723, Edesheim – Jan 21, 1789, Paris). Holbach studied law and natural sciences in Leiden from 1744 to 1748 and lived the rest of his life as a wealthy man in Paris. Holbach's Paris townhouse and his country residence Granval were meeting points of pre-revolutionary Enlightenment (I) and were frequented by D. Hume, J.-J. Rousseau, D. Diderot, Claude Adrien Helvetius, and others. Holbach wrote over 400 (perhaps as many as 1,100) articles for Diderot's Encyclopédie (Encyclopedia, Encyclopedists), which he probably helped finance to a conside…

[German Version] (Aug 24, 1736, Magdeburg – Jan 6, 1822, Quedlinburg), was raised in the Pietist tradition in Bergen monastery under the abbot Johann Adam Steinmetz, but turned to the Enlightenment during his studies in Halle. Beginning in 1757 he held various pastoral positions in Mecklenburg and in 1765 became provost in Waren. His neological restatement of the doctrine of justification, presented in his Wöchentliche Beiträge zur Beförderung der Gottseligkeit [weekly contributions for the promotion of godliness] (2 vols., 1771f.) led in 1773 to conflict with th…

[German Version] (Jun 24, 1561, Lorch – Oct 22, 1619, Tübingen) studied philosophy and theology in Tübingen and became a deacon in Herrenberg in 1586, pastor in Ehningen in 1588, and court preacher and consistorial counselor in Stuttgart in 1590. He received his doctorate in theology and became professor of theology in Tübingen (1592) and then chancellor (1617) and provost of the university. He was an important representative of post-Concord Lutheran theology. In contrast to J. Kepler, who valued …

[German Version] (Apr 10, 1730, Stendal – Mar 8, 1792, Berlin) studied theology in Halle an der Saal, initially with S.J. Baumgarten, then, after participating in the Seven Years War as a chaplain, under the definitive influence of J.A. Nösselt. In 1765, he became deacon, then archdeacon at St. Nicholas (Berlin). Through his writings and, even more, through his many contributions to F. Nicolai's Allgemeine deutsche Bibliothek ( Comprehensive German Library, nearly 1000 reviews), Lüdke became an important proponent of neology (Enlightenment, The: II, 4, c). His ess…

[German Version] (c. 1488, York – Jan 20, 1569, London), OSA in 1514, studied philosophy and theology at Cambridge. In 1528 Coverdale left the order under the impact of Luther's theology, which had been taught him by Robert Barnes. In 1534–1535 Coverdale published the first English complete Bible (Bible translationsβ : II, 1.b.). From 1540 Coverdale lived under the pseudonym of Michael Anglus on the continent, in Tübingen and elsewhere and as pastor in Bergzabern from 1543–1547. Coverdale returned to England …

[German Version] (Sep 15, 1756, Hamelin – Jun 26, 1793, Berlin), writer and versatile philosophical essayist who paradigmatically embodied the intellectual contradictions of his time. Following a depressing childhood, shaped by his separatist and quietist father, Moritz became apprentice to a hatter in 1768; he ended his apprenticeship in 1770 with an attempted suicide. He entered the Hannover Gymnasium in 1771. The year 1776 marked the beginning of several unsuccessful attempts to become an actor…

[German Version] (Aug 1, 1723, Coburg –Mar 29, 1778, Halle/Saale), began studies in 1742 in Jena and Leipzig, gained his M.A. (1745), became a teacher in the acadmeic gymnasium in Coburg (1747) and, on the recommendation of J.S. Semler, professor ¶ of theology in Halle (1764), received the Dr.theol. (1766), and married Christine Sophie Francke, a granddaughter of A.H. Francke (1767). Gruner was an independent proponent of neology (Enlightenment: II, 4.c); he sought to return the teaching of the church, transformed by Platonism and Aris…

[German Version] (“the three impostors”). In continuation of the religion-critical motif of deceit, known since antiquity, the claim that the three religion-founders Moses, Jesus, and Muḥammad deceived humanity has been in circulation since the Middle Ages (thus in the charge brought by Gregory IX against Emperor Frederick Hohenstaufen). In the late Middle Ages, rumors concerning the existence of a tractate entitled De tribus impostoribus began to spread, leading to numerous attributions and suspicions. The first attested text is the pamphlet De impostoris religionum, which w…

[German Version] (Dec 11, 1714, Seyringen, Principality of Oettingen – Nov 4, 1789, Büt-¶ zow) was inspector of the Halle orphanage in 1752 and deacon at St. Moritz (Halle) in 1753. In 1758 Döderlein was called by Duke Friedrich v. Mecklenburg to Rostock as professor and consistory councillor. Owing to unanimous opposition to the installation of the Pietist Döderlein on the part of the cleri…

[German Version] (Sep 29, 1699, Goslar – Jun 6, 1768, Weimar) gained his M.A. in Jena in 1725, became a Gymnasium teacher in 1737, becoming director in Weimar in 1745. The first of the theological Wolffians (C. Wolff) to do so, Carpov developed his entire dogmatics in a strictly mathematical and demonstrative manner. While in material respects he held fast to orthodox doctrine by explicitly confessing the symbolic books, he wanted to assure the academic standing of theology by applying the methodus scientifica. With the aid of a rational theory of revelation, he sought…

[German Version] (Nov 22, 1709, Osnabrück – Sep 2, 1789, Braunschweig), leading proponent of neology (Enlightenment: II, 4.c). Jerusalem studied philosophy, theology and oriental languages in Leipzig (1727–1730, with Johann Christoph Gottsched, among others), received the M.A. (1731, Wittenberg), undertook a two-year study journey through Holland, and was a private tutor in Göttingen (1734–1737). After several years in England, to which he owed important impulses, and work as a tutor in Hannover (…

[German Version] (Oct 9, 1693, Lübeck – Sep 9, 1755, Göttingen) studied in Kiel from 1716 onward and became professor for controversial theology in Helmstedt in 1723 (for church history in 1725), also abbot of Marienthal and Michaelstein from 1727, general inspector of schools in Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel from 1729, and president of the Leipzig “Deutsche Gesellschaft” from 1732; he played a major part in the founding of Göttingen University (authoring, inter alia, the statutes of the theological school), where he was professor of theology from 1747, and the univer…

[German Version] (Aug 12, 1521, Giengen/Brenz – May 22, 1600, Tübingen), studied philosophy and theology in Wittenberg (1538–1543, with Luther and Melanchthon, among others), became dean in Tübingen (1543), was removed from office (1548; Augsburg Interim), became pastor and superintendent in Herrenberg and received the Dr.theol. (1551), was professor of theology in Tübingen (1557–1598), while also serving as superintendent after 1561, chancellor of the university (1590–1599), provost and ducal adviser. Heerbrand was a signatory to the Confessio Virtembergica (1551) and w…

[German Version] (Aug 14, 1755, Hiltpoltstein – Jan 13, 1806, Heidelberg). From 1789 professor of eloquence, oriental studies, and ethics and from 1793 professor of Biblical Exegesis at Altdorf. From 1805 professor of oriental studies and practical exegesis; and member of the church council in Heidelberg. Within the theology of the Enlightenment, Bauer was the most important exponent of a strictly historical “biblical theology.” He was the first to call this approach programmatically “historical-critical” ( Historisch-kritische Einleitung in das Alte Testament, 1794, 31806). …

[German Version] (Jan 31,1741, Zheleznodorozhny [Gerdauen], Russia – Apr 23, 1796, Kaliningrad [Königsberg], Russia). Hippel studied theology in Königsberg from 1756 to 1760, journeyed to Russia from 1760 to 1761, and was tutor in Königsberg from 1761 to 1762. He studied jurisprudence there from 1762 to 1765, became barrister at the municipal court of Königsberg, and later director of the criminal court and city councillor. A member of the Prussian Landrechtskommission (commission for regional law) from 1780 onward, he was then appointed mayor of ¶ Königsberg and war councillor,…

[German Version] Beginning in the 17th century, the early modern notion of progress took on a dynamic that increasingly permeated ethical, religious, and political theory, making the idea of perfectibility a fundamental thought form of the era. In France the word perfectibilité quickly came into use after 1750 and became a guiding principle of the French Revolution. Borrowed into German in the mid-18th century, the concept of anthropological, ethical, and religious perfectibility, extended around 1800 to cultural (Christianity, science…

[German Version] (“Friends of Truth”). In 1736, Ernst Christoph Graf von Manteuffel, sometime cabinet minister of Saxony, J.G. Reinbeck, provost of Berlin, and Ambrosius Haude, a bookseller, founded the Societas Alethophilorum in Berlin. There were soon daughter societies, especially in the territory of Saxony (including Weissenfels, Leipzig, and …