#2001
Friedrich Smend
1893 - 1980 (87 years)
Friedrich Smend was a German Protestant theologian and librarian at the Preußische Staatsbibliothek in Berlin, publishing a catalogue of the writings of Adolf von Harnack. He was a liturgist, teaching as professor at the Kirchliche Hochschule Berlin. His publications focus on the work of Johann Sebastian Bach and Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.
Go to Profile#2002
Musa Bigiev
1874 - 1949 (75 years)
Musa Bigiev was a Tatar Hanafi Maturidi scholar, theologian philosopher, publicist and one of the leaders of the Jadid movement. After receiving his education in Kazan, Bukhara, Istanbul and Cairo, he became a political activist for the Ittifaq, the political organisation of the Muslims of Russia. He also taught in Orenburg, wrote journalistic texts and translated classic works into Tatar. After emigrating from the Soviet Union, he travelled Europe and the Middle and Far East while writing and publishing.
Go to Profile#2003
John Hewlett
1762 - 1844 (82 years)
John Hewlett was a prominent biblical scholar in nineteenth-century England. Hewlett was born in Chetnole, Dorset to Timothy Hewlett. In his early 20s he established a school in Shacklewell, Hackney. During this period, he became acquainted with the young Mary Wollstonecraft, then running her own school at nearby Newington Green. Hewlett persuaded her to write her first book, Thoughts on the Education of Daughters, and sold the yet-unwritten manuscript to the radical publisher Joseph Johnson. He also introduced her to the great lexicographer Samuel Johnson.
Go to Profile#2004
Walter Thomas Conner
1877 - 1952 (75 years)
Walter Thomas Conner was a prominent Baptist theologian and educator on the faculty of the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary at Fort Worth, Texas, from 1910 to 1949. He based his theological systems on those of his teachers, Benajah Harvey Carroll of Baylor University, Augustus Hopkins Strong at Rochester Theological Seminary, and Edgar Young Mullins, of Louisville. Conner was also influenced by personalism, His theology stressed the moral self consistency of the divine attributes. His writings emphasized the idea of "Christus victor" . Conner was a moderate Calvinist, but said little about the issue of biblical inspiration.
Go to Profile#2005
D. S. Amalorpavadass
1932 - 1990 (58 years)
Rev. Fr. Duraiswami Simon Amalorpavadass was a Catholic South-Indian theologian who played a vital role in the renewal of life and mission of the Roman Catholic Church in India, particularly after Vatican II. He was fluent in Tamil, French and English. He was the younger brother of Cardinal Lourdusamy.
Go to Profile#2006
Albert Eichhorn
1856 - 1926 (70 years)
Karl Albert August Ludwig Eichhorn was a German Protestant theologian. He was the author of Das Abendmahl im Neuen Testament and one of the founders of the history of religions school, an approach that sought to understand all religions, including Christianity and Judaism, as socio-cultural phenomena that developed in comparable ways. His pioneering work on the role of the contemporary needs, beliefs, and culture that shaped the New Testament reports of the Last Supper argued that this early Christian sacramental meal reflected the influence of Near Eastern gnostic ideas.
Go to Profile#2007
Nikephoros Theotokis
1731 - 1800 (69 years)
Nikephoros Theotokis or Nikiforos Theotokis was a Greek scholar and theologian, who became an archbishop in the southern provinces of the Russian Empire. A polymath, he is respected by the Greek Orthodox church as one of the "teachers of the nation".
Go to Profile#2008
Jean-Baptiste Cotelier
1626 - 1686 (60 years)
Jean-Baptiste Cotelier or Cotelerius was a Patristic scholar and Catholic theologian. Life His early education was under the personal direction of his father, at one time a Protestant minister, but later a convert to Catholicism. He was reportedly able to interpret the Bible in the original Hebrew and Greek before the General Assembly of the French clergy in Mantes ; he made such a favourable impression on the clergy that they increased his father's pension. During the period of his theological studies at Paris , Cotelier's intellectual qualities procured for him an introduction to the king .
Go to Profile#2009
Jaan Kiivit Sr.
1906 - 1971 (65 years)
Jaan Kiivit Senior was an Estonian prelate who was the Archbishop of Tallinn and the first primate of the Estonian Evangelical Lutheran Church from 1949 and 1967, after the break away from the exiled Estonian Evangelium's Lutheran Church.
Go to Profile#2010
Robert Knight Rudolph
1906 - 1986 (80 years)
Robert Knight Rudolph was an American Reformed Episcopal minister and theologian. He served as Professor of Systematic Theology and Christian Ethics at the Theological Seminary of the Reformed Episcopal Church in Philadelphia for forty-nine years before his retirement in 1981. Together Rudolph and his father trained men for the gospel ministry at this institution for a total of seventy-four years. Rudolph was known for his strict adherence to Calvinism and presuppositional apologetics.
Go to Profile#2011
Friedrich Spanheim the Younger
1632 - 1701 (69 years)
Friedrich Spanheim the Younger was a German Calvinist theologian of conservative views, son of Friedrich Spanheim. Life He was born in Geneva, and studied at the University of Leiden, graduating M.A. in 1648. He joined the faculty of the University of Heidelberg in 1655.
Go to Profile#2012
Eelco Alta
1723 - 1798 (75 years)
Eelco Alta was a Frisian clergyman, theologian, and veterinarian. Education Eelco Alta was born in 1723 in the coastal village of Makkum, and studied theology at the University of Franeker from 1737 until 1745, when he started as a minister in the nearby villages of Beers and Jellum. After nine years he moved to the main protestant church of Boazum, where he was to spend almost all of the next fifty years. He was politically active in the last years of the Dutch Republic, siding with the forces of republican "Patriotism", partly for religious reasons. During the royalist backlash of the late...
Go to Profile#2013
Mark Hopkins
1802 - 1887 (85 years)
Mark Hopkins was an American educator and Congregationalist theologian, president of Williams College from 1836 to 1872. An epigram — widely attributed to President James A. Garfield, a student of Hopkins — defined an ideal college as "Mark Hopkins on one end of a log and a student on the other."
Go to Profile#2014
Bernard Joseph Topel
1903 - 1986 (83 years)
Bernard Joseph Topel was an American prelate of the Catholic Church. He served as bishop of the Diopcese of Spokane in Washington State from 1955 to 1978. Biography Early life Topel was born on March 31, 1903, in Bozeman, Montana, the fourth son of Henry Albert and Mary Pauline Topel. Henry Topel was a tailor who had immigrated from Germany in 1878. Mary Topel immigrated from Switzerland at age nine. Bernard Topel attended grade school in Bozeman and, after graduating from St. Charles High School in Helena, studied at Mount St. Charles College in Helena, Montana. He then studied theology at the Grand Seminary of Montreal in Montreal, Quebec.
Go to Profile#2015
Alexander Henderson
1583 - 1646 (63 years)
Alexander Henderson was a Scottish theologian, and an important ecclesiastical statesman of his period. He is considered the second founder of the Reformed Church in Scotland. He was one of the most eminent ministers of the Church of Scotland in the most important period of her history, namely, previous to the middle of the seventeenth century.
Go to Profile#2016
Karl Gottfried Wilhelm Theile
1799 - 1854 (55 years)
Karl Gottfried Wilhelm Theile was a German theologian. From 1817 to 1823 he studied at the University of Leipzig, where he subsequently received his PhD and degree in theology . From 1826 to 1845 he was an associate professor of Evangelical theology at Leipzig, followed by a full professorship in the same discipline from 1845 up until his death in 1854. In 1851/52 he was dean to the theological faculty at Leipzig.
Go to Profile#2017
Robert Moberly
1845 - 1903 (58 years)
Robert Campbell Moberly was an English theologian and the first principal of St Stephen's House, Oxford . Life He was the son of George Moberly, Bishop of Salisbury, and faithfully maintained the traditions of his father's teaching. His sister was the writer Charlotte Anne Moberly. Educated at Twyford School, Winchester and New College, Oxford, he was appointed senior student of Christ Church in 1867 and tutor in 1869. In 1876 he went out with Bishop Copleston to Ceylon for six months.
Go to Profile#2018
Simon Goulart
1543 - 1628 (85 years)
Simon Goulart was a French Reformed theologian, humanist and poet. Life He was born at Senlis in northern France. He first studied law, then adopted the Reformed faith and became one of the pastors at Geneva in the Republic of Geneva . He was called to Antwerp, to Orange, to Montpellier and to Nîmes as minister, and to Lausanne as professor; but remained at Geneva and became a citizen.
Go to Profile#2019
Thomas Kerchever Arnold
1800 - 1853 (53 years)
Thomas Kerchever Arnold was an English theologian and voluminous writer of educational works. Life Arnold was born in 1800. His father, Thomas Graham Arnold, was a doctor of Stamford. He was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge, was seventh junior optime in the mathematical tripos of 1821, and was elected fellow of his college shortly afterwards. He took his degree of B.A. in the same year, and that of M.A. in 1824. In 1830 he was presented to the living of Lyndon, in Rutland, where his parishioners only numbered one hundred. He at first devoted his ample leisure to theology, and showed himself an obstinate opponent of the views advanced by the leaders of the Oxford movement.
Go to Profile#2020
Paul Wernle
1872 - 1939 (67 years)
Paul Wernle was a Swiss theologian, born in Hottingen, today part of the city of Zürich. He studied at the Universities of Basel, Berlin and Göttingen. At Basel he was a student of Bernhard Duhm , and in Göttingen was influenced by Wilhelm Bousset . In 1900 he became an associate professor at Basel, where in 1905 he was appointed a full professor of New Testament Studies. During the course of his career he also taught classes in dogmatics and church history.
Go to Profile#2021
George Bush
1796 - 1859 (63 years)
George Bush was an American biblical scholar, pastor, abolitionist, and academic. A member of the Bush family, he is a distant relative of both President George H. W. Bush and President George W. Bush.
Go to Profile#2022
Franz Anton Knittel
1721 - 1792 (71 years)
Franz Anton Knittel was a German, Lutheran orthodox theologian, priest, and palaeographer. He examined palimpsests' text of the Codex Guelferbytanus 64 Weissenburgensis and deciphered text of Codex Carolinus. He was the author of many works.
Go to Profile#2023
Julian Joseph Overbeck
1821 - 1905 (84 years)
Julian Joseph Overbeck was a Roman Catholic priest who converted to Eastern Orthodoxy and became a pioneer of Western Rite Orthodoxy. The modern re-emergence of an Orthodox Western Rite begins in 1864 with the work of Overbeck, a former Catholic priest. Overbeck had left the priesthood, converted to Lutheranism and married, though it is uncertain whether he ever functioned as a Lutheran pastor. He immigrated to England in 1863 to become professor of German at the Royal Military Academy, where he also undertook studies of the Church of England and Orthodoxy. Convinced that both the papacy and ...
Go to Profile#2024
Israel Gottlieb Canz
1690 - 1753 (63 years)
Israel Gottlieb Canz was a Protestant theologian and philosopher of Germany. Life Israel Gottlieb Canz was born on 26 February 1690, at Grünthal. He studied at Tübingen, and took, in 1709, the degree of doctor of philosophy. In 1720 he was deacon at Nürtingen, and was, in 1734, appointed professor of elocution at Tübingen. In 1739 he was made professor of logic and metaphysics, and in 1747 professor of theology. He died there, on 2 February 1753, at the age of 62.
Go to Profile#2025
Olive Winchester
1879 - 1947 (68 years)
Olive May Winchester was an American ordained minister and a pioneer biblical scholar and theologian in the Church of the Nazarene, who was in 1912 the first woman ordained by any trinitarian Christian denomination in the United Kingdom, the first woman admitted into and graduated from the Bachelor of Divinity course at the University of Glasgow, and the first woman to complete a Doctor of Theology degree from the divinity school of Drew University.
Go to Profile#2026
Jacob van Hoogstraaten
1460 - 1527 (67 years)
Jacob van Hoogstraten was a Flemish Dominican theologian and controversialist. Education, professor Van Hoogstraten was born in Hoogstraten, Burgundian Netherlands . He studied the classics and theology with the Dominicans at Old University of Leuven. In 1485 was among the first in the history of that institution to receive the degree of Master of Arts. He there entered the order, and after his ordination to the priesthood in 1496, he matriculated in the University of Cologne to continue his theological studies. At the general chapter held in 1498 at Ferrara he was appointed professor of theology at the Dominican college of Cologne.
Go to Profile#2027
Paul Drews
1858 - 1912 (54 years)
Paul Gottfried Drews was a German Lutheran theologian. He studied theology at the Thomasschule zu Leipzig and at the University of Göttingen, then served as a pastor in Burkau and Dresden . In 1894 he became an associate professor of practical theology at the University of Jena, followed by full professorships at Giessen and Halle .
Go to Profile#2028
Ericus Olai
1401 - 1486 (85 years)
Ericus Olai was a Swedish theologian and historian. He served as a professor of theology at Uppsala University and dean at Uppsala Cathedral. Ericus Olai was the author of the chronicle Chronica regni Gothorum and was an early proponent of Gothicismus.
Go to Profile#2029
Pedro de Soto
1493 - 1563 (70 years)
Pedro de Soto was a Spanish Dominican theologian. Biography De Soto was confessor to Holy Roman Emperor Charles V. Later, for six years, he served as senior chair of theology at the University of Dillingen, where he disputed with Protestants and worked with the Bishop of Augsburg to establish a Catholic academic stronghold. In May 1555 he was sent to London to take part in the late stages of the persecutions that led to the executions of the Oxford Martyrs, and was more generally involved in Reginald Pole's efforts to solidify England's return to Catholicism under Mary I. He served as theolo...
Go to Profile#2030
Guido de Bres
1522 - 1567 (45 years)
Guido de Bres was a Walloon pastor, Protestant reformer and theologian, a student of John Calvin and Theodore Beza in Geneva. He was born in Mons, County of Hainaut, Southern Netherlands, and was executed at Valenciennes. De Bres compiled and published the Walloon Confession of Faith known as the Belgic Confession still in use today in Belgium and the Netherlands. It is also used by many Reformed Churches all over the world.
Go to Profile#2031
Albin van Hoonacker
1857 - 1933 (76 years)
Albin-Augustin Van Hoonacker was a Roman Catholic theologian, professor at the Faculty of Theology, Catholic University of Leuven, a member of The Royal Academy of Belgium and Knight of the Order of Leopold.
Go to Profile#2032
Nicolae Colan
1893 - 1967 (74 years)
Nicolae Colan was an Austro-Hungarian-born Romanian cleric, a metropolitan bishop of the Romanian Orthodox Church. From a peasant background, Colan completed high school in Brașov, followed by a period of wandering during World War I that saw him in Sibiu, Bucharest, Moldavia, Ukraine and ultimately Bessarabia, where he advocated union with Romania. After the war, he completed university and taught New Testament theology at Sibiu from 1924 to 1936. Entering the clergy in 1934, he soon became bishop at Cluj, remaining there when Northern Transylvania temporarily became Hungarian territory during World War II.
Go to Profile#2033
Robert of Ketton
1110 - 1160 (50 years)
Robert of Ketton, known in Latin as Rodbertus Ketenensis , was an English astronomer, translator, priest and diplomat active in Spain. He translated several works of Arabic into Latin, including the first translation of the Quran into any Western language. Between 1144 and 1157 he held an archdeaconry in the diocese of Pamplona. In the past he has been confounded with Robert of Chester , another English translator active in Spain in the mid-twelfth century; and at least one modern scholar believes they are the same person.
Go to Profile#2034
Jakob Aleksič
1897 - 1980 (83 years)
Jakob Aleksič was a Slovenian theologian. He was professor at the high school for theology in Maribor. From 1947 to 1980 he was professor at the Faculty of Theology in Ljubljana. He studied the Bible and its history.
Go to Profile#2035
Pierre Caroli
1480 - 1546 (66 years)
Pierre Caroli was a French refugee and religious figure. He was a Doctor of theology of the University of Paris, and he was receptive to the ideas of the Protestant Reformation. However, he entered into open confrontation with John Calvin, the central figure of French Protestantism. In a theological dispute, Caroli accused Calvin and Guillaume Farel of Arianism and Sabellianism.
Go to Profile#2036
William E. Orchard
1877 - 1955 (78 years)
William Edwin Orchard was first a Presbyterian, then Congregationalist minister, who subsequently converted to the Roman Catholic Church and was ordained a priest of this Church. He was a renowned liturgist, pacifist and ecumenicist.
Go to Profile#2037
Friedrich Wilhelm Carl Umbreit
1795 - 1860 (65 years)
Friedrich Wilhelm Carl/Karl Umbreit was a German Protestant theologian and a Hebrew Bible scholar. He was a student at the University of Göttingen, where one of his instructors was Johann Gottfried Eichhorn . He then continued his studies in Vienna with Orientalist Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall . In 1820 he became an associate professor of Old Testament studies and Oriental philology at the University of Heidelberg, where in 1823 he received the title of professor. In 1829 he attained the chair of Old Testament studies at Heidelberg.
Go to Profile#2038
Christian Friedrich Schmid
1794 - 1852 (58 years)
Christian Friedrich Schmid was a German Lutheran theologian born in the village of Bickelsberg , Württemberg. Life He received his education at seminaries in Denkendorf, Maulbronn and Tübingen, later becoming an associate professor of practical theology at the University of Tübingen . In 1826 he was appointed a full professor at Tübingen, a position he maintained for the rest of his career. He was a member of the committee for the Württemberg liturgy and of the council for church organization .
Go to Profile#2039
Philippe Alegambe
1592 - 1652 (60 years)
Philippe Alegambe was a Belgian Jesuit priest and bibliographer. Biography After completing High School studies in Brussels, Alegambe went to Spain, in the service of the Duke of Osuna. When the latter was sent as Viceroy to Sicily Alegambe accompanied him as private secretary. There he entered the Society of Jesus at Palermo, on 7 September 1613. He further studied at the Roman College in Rome. After ordination to the priesthood Alegambe was sent to teach Philosophy and Theology at Graz, Austria, and for three years traveled through Europe , as preceptor of the Prince of Eggenberg's son. Back to Graz he taught Moral Theology to Jesuit students .
Go to Profile#2040
James Bethune-Baker
1861 - 1951 (90 years)
James Franklin Bethune-Baker was the Lady Margaret's Professor of Divinity at the University of Cambridge from 1911 to 1935. A Modern Churchman, Bethune-Baker was known for his work on the person and writings of Nestorius. He was co-editor of the Journal of Theological Studies from 1904 to 1935. He was a Fellow of Pembroke College, Cambridge for sixty years. His funeral service took place in Pembroke College Chapel on 17 January 1951, but he was buried in the Ascension Parish Burial Ground, Cambridge. He was a cousin of Arthur Christopher Benson, who is also buried in the Ascension Parish B...
Go to Profile#2041
Jean Bagot
1591 - 1664 (73 years)
Jean Bagot was a Jesuit theologian. Bagot was born at Rennes, France. He entered the Society of Jesus, 1 July 1611, taught belles-lettres for many years at various colleges in France, philosophy for five years, theology for thirteen years, and became theologian to the General of the Society. In 1647 he published the first part of his work Apologeticus Fidei titled Institutio Theologica de vera Religione In 1645 the second part, Demonstratio dogmatum Christianorum, appeared, and in 1646 Dissertationes theologicae on the Sacrament of Penance. In his Avis aux Catholiques, Bagot attacked the new doctrine on grace, directing against it also his Lettre sur la conformite de S.
Go to Profile#2042
Matthew Poole
1624 - 1679 (55 years)
Matthew Poole was an English Non-conformist theologian and biblical commentator. Life to 1662 He was born at York, the son of Francis Pole, but he spelled his name Poole, and in Latin Polus; his mother was a daughter of Alderman Toppins there. He was educated at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, from 1645, under John Worthington. Having graduated B.A. at the beginning of 1649, he succeeded Anthony Tuckney, in the sequestered rectory of St Michael le Querne, then in the fifth classis of the London province, under the parliamentary system of presbyterianism. This was his only preferment. He proceeded M.A.
Go to Profile#2043
Karl Heinrich Sack
1789 - 1875 (86 years)
Karl Heinrich Sack was a German Protestant theologian and university professor. Life Karl Heinrich Sack, son of Friedrich Samuel Gottfried Sack, was born at Berlin on 17 October 1789. He studied at Gottingen and Berlin, and commenced his lectures at the Berlin University in 1817. In 1818 he was made professor extraordinary, and in 1832 professor of theology in Bonn.
Go to Profile#2044
Paul Sutermeister
1864 - 1905 (41 years)
Paul Sutermeister was a Swiss theologian, pastor and contributing editor of the Berner Tagblatt. Biography Paul Sutermeister's father was Otto Sutermeister; his family came from Zofingen. He attended high school in Berne and studied theology at the universities of Basel and Göttingen. He began his sermon in the Appenzell region. “His popular book ‘Der Dorfkaiser’, in which he criticized sharply the lottery and the ruthless exploitation of vulnerable people by the village magnate [...] costed him his job as a pastor in Walzenhausen and led him to the activity in the daily press.” As foreign ed...
Go to Profile#2045
Johann Jakob Pfeiffer
1740 - 1791 (51 years)
Johann Jakob Pfeiffer was a German evangelical theologian, as well as a professor, and later, dean, at the University of Marburg. Life and career Pfeiffer was the son of Kassel master dyer, Hieronymus Pfeiffer and his wife Anne Elisabeth . He was educated in Kassel's preparatory schools, and in 1755 he enrolled at the Collegium Carolinum. There, he studied under Johann Gottlieb Stegmann and Justus Heinrich Wetzel. In 1757, Pfeiffer began his studies at the University of Marburg. At university, he studied theology, mathematics, logic, and metaphysics. By 1760 he was attending the University o...
Go to Profile#2046
Salomon Schweigger
1551 - 1622 (71 years)
Salomon Schweigger was a German Lutheran theologian, minister, anthropologist and orientalist of the 16th century. He provided a valuable insight during his travels in the Balkans, Constantinople and the Middle East, and published a famous travel book of his exploits. He also published the first German language translation of the Qur'an.
Go to Profile#2047
Rosa Gutknecht
1885 - 1959 (74 years)
Laura Elisabeth Rosa Gutknecht was a German-born Swiss theologian and cleric. In 1918, together with Elise Pfister, she was one of the first two women to graduate in theology. The same year, both were ordained as pastors of the Reformed Church of Zürich. They are considered to be the first women in Europe to be ordained as pastors.
Go to Profile#2048
Johann Funck
1518 - 1566 (48 years)
Johann Funck, Funk or Funccius was a German Lutheran theologian. He was beheaded after a court intrigue. Life Funck was born in Wöhrd, now part of Nuremberg. After obtaining an M.A. at the University of Wittenberg and preaching in several places, he was recommended to Albert, Duke of Prussia, by Veit Dietrich, and went to Königsberg in 1547. Initially the pastor at Altstadt Church, Funck was made court preacher in 1549.
Go to Profile#2049
Samuel Maresius
1599 - 1673 (74 years)
Samuel Des Marets or Desmarets was a French Protestant theologian. Life He was born in Picardy, northern France. He studied in Paris, in Saumur Academy under Gomarus, and in Geneva at the time of the Synod of Dort. He was ordained in 1620, and preached at Laon until a controversy with Roman Catholic missionaries. Feeling his life was in danger, he left in 1624. which led to an attack on his life.
Go to Profile#2050
Bartholomew Des Bosses
1668 - 1738 (70 years)
Bartholomew Des Bosses was a Jesuit theologian and philosopher, known mainly for his voluminous correspondence with Leibniz. Biography Des Bosses joined the Society of Jesus in 1686. In 1700, he taught at the Jesuit college in Emmerich, later moving to Hildesheim. He remained there until moving in 1710 to Cologne, taking up an appointment as professor of mathematics at the Jesuit college there. Apart from a stay in Paderborn in 1712 and 1713, he remained in Cologne for the rest of his life.
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