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In die Sprachen der modernen Kulturwissenschaften hat der seit dem 18. Jh. nachweisbare Begriff der E. v. a. durch Max Weber Eingang gefunden. Im berühmten Aufsatz Die protestantische Ethik und der Geist des Kapitalismus sprach der Heidelberger Gelehrte 1904/05 vom »großen religionsgeschichtlichen Prozeß der E. der Welt«, der in der altjüd. Prophetie eingesetzt und in der harten innerweltlichen Askese des Puritanismus kulminiert habe. Alle magischen Mittel der Heilssuche seien hier als Aberglaube und Frevel verworfen worden [1]; [3].Den typologischen Kontrast von Askes…

1. Problemanzeige 1.1. BegriffDer Begriff S. (»Verweltlichung«, von lat. saeculum, »Zeit«, »Zeitalter«; kirchenlat. »Welt«) ist jünger und weniger eindeutig als der kirchen- und der staatsrechtliche Begriff der Säkularisation. Seit seinem Auftauchen in der dt. aufklärungskritischen Publizistik des frühen 19. Jh.s (Gegenaufklärung), d. h. im Streit um die Deutung der relig.-kulturellen Gesamtlage nach der Französischen Revolution, handelt es sich stets um eine »Interpretationskategorie« [53]; [43]; [8], um einen strittigen »ideenpolit. Begriff« [30]. Sein Verstän…

Der dt. Begriff der D. entstand im späten 18. Jh. im Kontext religionspolitischer Debatten über die Französische Revolution. Dort wurde déchristianisation als Kampfbegriff zur Bezeichnung zunächst spontaner gewalttätiger Aktionen kleinbürgerlicher Gruppen gegen die Römisch-katholische Kirche und ihren Klerus, für den Raub von Kirchengut sowie die Verwüstung von Kirchen, anderen kirchlichen Gebäuden und Kunstschätzen verwendet (Ikonoklasmus). Anhänger der Revolution gebrauchten den Begriff außerdem sowohl zur Beschreibung des Bruchs mit kirchlicher Tr…

Der Begriff der A. (vom v. a. in politischen Zusammenhängen verwendeten griech. Begriff autonomía, »Selbstgesetzlichkeit«, »Selbständigkeit«), dessen erstmalige dt. Verwendung auf die konfessionellen und verfassungspolitischen Auseinandersetzungen im Anschluss an den Augsburger Religionsfrieden (1555) zurückgeht [3], erlangte seine verschiedenen Bedeutungsebenen im Kontext der nzl. Philosophie-, Rechts- und Religionsgeschichte. Als Rechtsbegriff bedeutete er zunächst Freiheit vor staatsgewaltlichem Zugriff, bes. nach 1648. Von …

Der Begriff E. wurde spätestens im frühen 19. Jh. geprägt. Im Kontext eines breiten Diskurses über die religionspraktischen Folgen der Aufklärung, der radikalen Katholizismus- und Kirchenkritik der Französischen Revolution sowie der Formierung einer neuen bürgerlichen Öffentlichkeit stritten europ. Gelehrte um 1800 intensiv über die Frage, ob der alte Kirchenglaube in der erhofften »neuen Welt« von bürgerlicher Freiheit, Brüderlichkeit und Gleichheit des Rechts noch Bestand haben könne. Eine zentrale Rolle nahmen dabei die Auseinandersetzungen um das 1788 für Preußen er…

1. Mittelalter und Frühe NeuzeitSchon im MA und in der Frühen Nz. lässt sich sowohl bei den gebildeten Ständen als auch in den diversen Sozialgruppen des »gemeinen Volkes« harte Kritik an den Klerikern beobachten (Geistliche). Aus religiösen Gründen, um des wahren Glaubens willen, warf man den »Mönchen« und »Pfaffen« Doppelmoral, Herrschsucht, Habgier und Wollust vor. Der Reichtum zahlreicher Klöster, das von Nahrungssorge unberührte, nicht steuerpflichtige, daher vergleichsweise bequeme und nicht selten luxuriöse Leben vieler…

1. BegriffA. (von griech. átheos, »ohne Gott«, »gottlos«) bezeichnet einerseits in komplexer Vielfalt Weltdeutungen und Lebensentwürfe, welche durch die bewusste Ablehnung der Existenz eines oder mehrerer Götter, transzendenter Wesen oder Mächte geprägt sind (positiver A.), andererseits die bewusste Verneinung der irdischen Wirksamkeit solcher Götter oder Mächte bei gleichzeitiger Anerkennung der theoretischen Möglichkeit ihrer Existenz (negativer A.). Weil jedoch Ausdrücke wie Gott, Schöpfer, Absolutes, höchstes Wesen, Ursprung alles Seienden, letztes Pr…

1. Begriff und historischer KontextDer dt. Kollektivsingular P. kam erst im 18. Jh. auf, während das engl. und das franz. Wort ( protestantism, protestantisme) schon im 16. Jh. gebräuchlich wurden. Aber auch P. bezieht sich auf die reformatorischen Protest- und Reformbewegungen des 16. Jh.s und bezeichnet alle christl. Kirchen, Freikirchen und Gruppen, die daraus hervorgegangen sind und sich meist auf die Reformatoren Martin Luther, Philipp Melanchthon, Martin Butzer, Ulrich Zwingli und Johannes Calvin berufen (Reformation 2.). Der Begriff betont das den Konfessionen (Luthertum, Calvinismus, Anglikanismus, Baptisten) und religiösen Reformbewegungen (Pietismus, Methodisten, Puritanismus, Erweckungsbewegung) Gemeinsame, welches die Lehrunterschiede übergreift, die in den Bekenntnis-Schriften des 16. und frühen 17. Jh.s fixiert waren.Die facettenreiche Geschichte des Begriffs ist kaum erkundet; auch für die Äquivalente in anderen europ. Sprachen fehlen begri…

1. BegriffF. ist ein Begriff aus der Zeit der nordamerikan. Religionskämpfe des frühen 20. Jh.s. Für die Nz. hat er insoweit Bedeutung, als die Erschließung von spätmodernen Religionskonflikten dazu beitragen kann, die für die nzl. Gesellschaften Europas typischen religiösen Auseinandersetzungen, konfessionellen Antagonismen und dogmatischen Kontroversen über religiöse Identitäts-Konstruktionen neu zu verstehen.…

The debates on essence are classified as the discussions held at the beginning of the 20th century, both on the Christian and the Jewish sides, concerning the fundamental questions of the "essence" of each confession. Triggered by lectures of the theologian Adolf von Harnack on  Das Wesen des Christentums  (“The Essence of Christianity”), the critique published in 1905 by the liberal rabbi Leo Baeck, Das Wesen des Judentums ("The Essence of Judaism", 1936), ranked as one of the most important contributions to the debate on essence. In the disputes on the politics of ideas about the importance of the Christian and the Jewish tradition as well as the relationship between the two, the struggle with the loss of the significance of religion in modernity and the precarious situation of the Jewry in Germany are reflected. …

Als Wesensdebatte gelten die zu Anfang des 20. Jahrhunderts sowohl auf christlicher als auch auf jüdischer Seite geführten Diskussionen um grundsätzliche Fragen des »Wesens« der jeweiligen Konfession. Ausgelöst durch die Vorlesungen des Theologen Adolf von Harnack über Das Wesen des Christentums, zählte die 1905 veröffentlichte Kritik Das Wesen des Judentums des liberalen Rabbiners Leo Baeck zu den gewichtigsten Beiträgen der Wesensdebatte. In den ideenpolitischen Auseinandersetzungen über die Bedeutung der christlichen und der jüdischen Trad…

1. The problem 1.1. TerminologyThe verb “secularize” is first attested in English in the early 17th century in the sense of “put [church property] to profane use,” the derivative noun  secularization in 1706. This sense, which derives from canon law ( …

1. Terminology The word atheism (from Greek átheos, “without  God”, “godless”) denotes both a complex variety of interpretations of the world and life-designs shaped by conscious reje…

1. The term and its historical contextThe collective singular noun Protestantism and its French equivalent  protestantisme were already in use in the 16th century; the German  Protestantismus did not come into use until the 18th century. The term refers to the protest and reform movements of the 16th-century Reformation and denotes all the Christian churches, free churches, and groups that emerged from it, most of which appealed to the Reformers Martin Luther, Philipp Melanchthon, Martin Bucer, Huldrych Zwingli, and Jo…

One consequence of the general secularization underway in the late 18th and 19th centuries was a process that in German came to be known around 1800 as  Entkirchlichung (approx. “dechurching”), and that may be characterized as a secularization of and within the churches themselves.Around the year 1800, European scholars were engaged in intensive debate, as part of a broad discourse on the practical religious consequences of the Enlightenment, the radical anti-Catholicism and anti-clericalism of the French Revolution (1789), and the for…

1. The term The term  fundamentalism…

The term déchristianisation (German  Dechristianisierung…

The term autonomy (from Greek autonomía, “self-determination, independence”) appeared for the first time in German (as Autonomie) in the context of the confessional and constitutional disputes following the Peace of Augsburg (1555) [3]. Its earliest use in English (with reference to states) dates from the 1620s. It arrived at its various semantic levels in the history of philosophy, law, and religion during the early modern period. As a legal term, it initially meant freedom from interfe…

The term disenchantment, documented from the 18th century, came into the languages of the modern science of culture through Max Weber in particular. In the famous essay, “Die protestantische Ethik und der Geist des Kapitalismus” (“The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism”) the Heidelberg scholar spoke in 1904/05 of the “great religio-historical process of disenchantment of the world,” which had begun in ancient Jewish prophecy and had culminated in the hard, this-worldly asceticism of P…

1. Middle Ages and early modern period In the Middle Ages and the early modern period, we already find harsh criticism of the clergy among both the educated classes and the various social groups of the “common people.” On religious grounds, for the sake of the true faith, the “monks” and “priests” were accused of a double moral standard, high-handedness, greed, and concupiscence. The wealth of many monasteries, the relatively comfortable and often luxurious lifestyles of many occupants of benefices , w…

[German Version] The origins of the concept of transfert de sacralité are obscure. The earliest known occurrence is in the works of the historian Mona Ozouf, who since 1976 has studied the symbolic worlds, rituals, and “implicit theologies” (Assmann) in the festivals celebrated by the French Revolution. Syncretistic combination of pagan, Christian, and Masonic symbols and ceremonies, she believes, created a post-Christian politico-religious cult in which the revolutionary nation staged and constituted its…

[German Version] (Sep 1, 1839, Stetten im Remstal – Jul 18, 1908, Groß Lichterfelde near Berlin). As the last ¶ representative of F.C. Baur’s Tübingen school, Pfleiderer developed models of the history of primitive Christianity which stressed Jesus’ Jewish identity, and declared Paul the decisive founder of the Christian religion, thanks to his critique of the “orientalisms” in Jesus’ preaching, and his determined “Hellenization.” Using the historical methods of the comparative study of religion, Pfleiderer set out…

[German Version] I The origins and the formation of the composite term “history of ideas” have hardly been investigated. Early attestations point to the late 18th century. In the centers of the Enlightenment, scholars wrote “history of ideas,” employing teleological interpretation models, in order to legitimize the emergence of the new middle-class consciousness as a progress in the awareness of freedom. The literary hist…

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[German Version] (Feb 25, 1939, Vienna – Nov 18, 1998, Vienna) was brought up in a middle-class family. After studying Protestant theology, primarily with H.W. Wolff and Wolfhart Pannenberg, and philosophy, especially with T.W. Adorno and Wolfgang Cramer, he quickly became active in the biblicistic, socially conservative Heliand scouting association. In 1969 he received his Dr.theol. at Munich with a thesis entitled Der Gedanke der Persönlichkeit Gottes bei Fichte und Hegel. His habilitation followed in the winter semester of 1971/1972 with a critical interpretati…

[German Version] ( Jan 27, 1808, Ludwigsburg –Feb 8, 1874, Ludwigsburg), Protestant theologian and writer. The son of a struggling merchant, Strauß attended the Latin school in Ludwigsburg and in 1821 entered the minor seminary in Blaubeuren. There he met F.C. Baur, whose teaching left a deep impression on him. With his friends C. Märklin, F.T. Vischer, and Wilhelm Zimmerman (later a prominent liberal historian of the German Peasants’ War), he began his theological studies in 1825 at the Tübingen …

[German Version] (Jan 30, 1810, Friedewald, Hessia – Jun 2, 1872, Bonn). Although as a student of theology Hundeshagen was expelled from the university in Giessen in 1828 for participating in certain fraternity activities, he was still able to attain his Habilitation there in 1831, after which he became a professor of theology specializing in exegesis and church history. In 1834 he received an appointment in Bern (becoming a full professor in 1845), then in 1847 in Heidelberg, and in 1867 in Bonn, also serving as the editor of the ThStKr. As an advocate of mediation theology, he emphasized over against lib…

[German Version] (Feb 17, 1865, Haunstetten near Augsburg – Feb 1, 1923, Berlin-Charlottenburg) is considered one of the leading theological diagnosticians of crises in the German classical modernity of the period around 1900. The author of a wide-ranging oeuvre, he pushed back the boundaries of systematic theology and transformed it into a cultural science (Cultural studies) of Christianity that was to demonstrate the compatibility of Christian faith with the modern standards of scientific ration…

[German Version] I. Philosophy – II. Church History – III. Systematic Theology I. Philosophy The concept of historicism came into currency in the 19th century and soon assumed critical and even polemical significance. Indeed, also G.W.F. Hegel's concept of reason freely actualized in history could be called historicism (J. Braniss, Die wissenschaftliche Aufgabe der ¶ Gegenwart als leitende Idee im akademischen Studium [The scientific task of the present as a leading idea in academic studies], 1848); but the understanding of historicism as a mode of tho…

[German Version] (Nov 16, 1837, St. Petersburg – Jun 26, 1905, Basel), son of a German Protestant merchant and a Roman Catholic mother from a French family, after his initial schooling Overbeck studied in St. Petersburg, Paris, and Dresden; beginning in 1856, he studied Protestant theology at Leipzig, Göttingen, and Berlin, receiving his habilitation at Jena in 1864. In 1870 he accepted a call to Basel as associate professor of New Testament and early church h…

[German Version] The term patriotism first appeared in the 16th century, as a borrowing from Neo-Latin (derived from patria) and French ( patriotisme); in the classic discussions of political virtues, it stands for the close moral bond uniting the citizens with their homeland, to which they owe devotion, selflessness, loyalty, and love. The popularity of the term in the 18th century, especially in the moral weeklies, was closely connected with the invocation of public spirit, civic virtue, and national morality: beyo…

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[German Version] In the wake of the

[German Version] I. General – II. Church History – III. Systematics – IV. Practical Theology – V. Missiology I. General The expression liberal theology became prevalent in the “Saddle Period” (Reinhart Koselleck) of Neo-Protestantism between 1780 and 1820; it denotes a type of “modern theology” that combines strong demands for individual freedom through criticism of religious tradition, differentiation of subjective faith from ecclesiastically defined confessions of faith, an individualistic understanding of reli…

[German Version] I. …

[German Version] (Oct 20, 1802, Fröndenberg near Unna – May 28, 1869, Berlin), Protestant theologian and church politician. After intensive private tutoring from his father, a Reformed pastor, Hengstenberg studied oriental and classical philology in Bonn. Thanks to his mildly rationalist upbringing, he became enthusiastic about fraternities. He experienced an awakening in 1823/1824 in the neo-Pietist circles of the Basel Mission. Hengstenberg obtained his Habilitation in oriental studies in Berlin in 1824, but because of his close contacts with leading propo…

[German Version] I. Sociology and Social History First attested in the writings of R. Pannwitz ( Die Krisis der europäischen Kultur, 1917), the concept of postmodernism spans …

[German Version] 1. Reinhold (Apr 5, 1859, Pööravere, Livonia – Oct 23, 1935, Ahrenshoop). After receiving his master’s degree, habilitation, and paid lectureship at Dorpat (Tartu), Seeberg was considered the great hope of theological conservatives. In 1889 he was appointed to a full profes-¶ sorship of theology, New Testament history, and patristics at Erlangen. After the death of F.H.R. Frank in 1894, he also lectured in systematic theology. As a late aftereffect of the Apostolicum controversy, Seeberg, who had written a massive Lehrbuch der Dogmengeschichte (2 vols., 1895/1898; ET: Text-Book of the History of Doctrines, 1904), was appointed to a chair of systematic theology, philosophy of religion, ethics, and NT exegesis in Berlin as a staunchly cons…

[German Version] (May 25, 1821, Hamburg – Feb 2, 1899, Alsterdorf, Hamburg). Sengelmann, brought up in an atmosphere of evangelistic Pietism, was a student and friend of F.A.G. Tholuck. As pastor in Moorfleet since 1846, in 1850 he opened a Christian Arbeitsschule (“activity school”) in his parsonage to help young people who had received no…

[German Version] I. Politics and Culture On Nov 9, 1918 the foundation of a parliamentary and democratic form of government was laid for the first German republic. On Jan 19, 1919, still in the radicalizing phase of the revolution, the National Assembly was elected to draw up a constitution. It included the “Weimar Coalition,” in which Majority Social Democracy, the German Democratic Party and the Center Party formed a majority. On Aug 11, 1919 the Weimar Constitution came into force. It had been larg…

[German Version] (Jul 11, 1899, Schreibendorf, Silesia [Pisary, Poland] – May 2, 1960, Bonn), systematic theologian and politically involved churchman. After studying theology at Breslau and Halle, he was appointed superintendent of studies at the Lutherheim in Königsberg. He received his doctorate in 1924 and gained his …

[German Version] (Aug 12, 1808, Flensburg – Feb 3, 1884, Copenhagen), Danish theologian and churchman. Influenced by the works of N.F.S. Grundtvig as ¶ a young student, he later turned to German Idealism. During a study tour in 1834, he made contact with such figures as P.K. Marheineke, F.W.J. Schelling, F.X. v. Baader, and N. Lenau. After receiving his doctorate in 1836, in 1840 he was appointed professor of systematic theology int Copenhagen. The politically divisive clergyman was appointed court chaplain in 1845 and…

[German Version] After the end of the old Reich and the associated dissolution of the Corpus evangelicorum the regional churches ( Landeskirchen) of the German Protestant church no longer had a joint representative body. Following controversies in the ¶ media about a new all-Protestant body and negotiations moderated by M.A. v. Bethmann Hollweg which took place after 1846 in Berlin between representatives of the regional churches, in 1850 a number of church …

[German Version] (Jan 17, 1804, Thalheim, near Tuttlingen – Jun 3, 1848, Bern), elder brother of the writer Max Schneckenburger, author of the 1840 “Die Wacht am Rhein” (“The Watch on the Rhine”), the most important German patriotic anthem during the 1870/1871 Franco-Prussian War. Matthias rapidly completed all the stages of theological education in Württemberg. In Berlin in 1826 he attended the lectures of F.D.E. Schleiermacher, P.K. Marheineke, J.W.A. Neander, and G.W.F. Hegel. As a lecturer at the Tübingen Stift at the age of 23, he belonged to the Geniepromotion class that included D.F. S…

[German Version] (Mar 27, 1792, Großosterhausen – May 13, 1863, Wrocław [Ger. Breslau], Poland), Protestant theologian. At the age of…

[German Version] I. History of the Concept – II. Concept in Cultural Studies I. History of the Concept …

[German Version] I. History – II. Philosophy – III. Social Sciences and Ethics – IV. Religion I. History 1. General Since the 18th century, European liberalism has fought for a civil society, demanding three kinds of civil rights: (1) equality before the law, guaranteed by the rule of law; (2) equal opportunity for political participation, made possible by the right to vote and free access to the public arena; (3) provision of basic social opportunities. Legal equality was the first of these demands put forward…

[German Version] (June 10, 1892, Rothenfluh, Switzerland – Nov 6, 1970, Basel), Reformed theologian. Lieb, who was fascinated by the religious socialism of H. Kutter and L. Ragaz, studied Assyriology and then (1915) theology. After joining the Swiss Social Democratic Party, he was involved in demonstrations against the war and clashes in Basel during the general strike of 1919. In 1920, impressed by the October Revolution, the Slavophile joined the Communist Party and collected books and liturgical objects of Russian Orthodoxy. Lieb, also a friend of K. Barth, received his Habilitati…

[German Version] 1. Ludwig Friedrich Leopold von (Oct 17, 1790, Berlin – Jan 10, 1861, Potsdam). In 1806, after graduating from ¶ the Prussian military academy, Gerlach fought against Napoleon. Following the Prussian defeat, he studied law (in particular with F.K. v. Savigny and Gustav Hugo), joining the Christlich-deutsche Tischgesellschaft and the Maikäferei group that grew out of it. Promoted to officer status in the Wars of Liberatio…

[German Version] This expression was coined in 1896 by the liberal Protestant clergyman Arthur Bonus, who combined old antithetical notions of “Romanism” and “Germanism” with P.A. de Lagarde's call for a new “national religion” in a program designed to “modernize” the traditional elements of Christianity on the basis of German national culture. His modern neo-Germanic concept of Christianity was intended to infuse a uniform ethos into the disintegrating society of imperial Germany. Especially among the culturally critical haute-bourgeoisie, a feeling of distress in the f…