The Most Influential People Across History
Find the most influential people in 24 academic disciplines and numerous subdisciplines
Find famous and important people related to your research. This is an excellent tool for research papers, topic papers, and building a bibliography. Using our influence-based algorithm, our rankings synthesize data from Wikipedia, Wikidata, Semantic Scholar, and CrossRef.
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List of the most influential people in Theology,
#3001
Alec Vidler
1899 - 1991 (92 years)
Alexander Roper Vidler , known as Alec Vidler, was an English Anglican priest, theologian, and ecclesiastical historian, who served as Dean of King's College, Cambridge, for ten years from 1956 and then, following his retirement in 1966, as Mayor of Rye, Sussex.
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Giovanni Diodati
1576 - 1649 (73 years)
Giovanni Diodati or Deodati was a Genevan-born Italian Calvinist theologian and translator. His translation of the Bible into Italian from Hebrew, Greek, Latin, and Syriac sources became the reference version used by Italian Protestants.
Go to Profile#3003
Edgar J. Goodspeed
1871 - 1962 (91 years)
Edgar Johnson Goodspeed was an American theologian and scholar of Greek and the New Testament, and Ernest DeWitt Burton Distinguished Service Professor of the University of Chicago until his retirement. He taught for many years at the University of Chicago, whose collection of New Testament manuscripts he enriched by his searches. The University's collection is now named in his honor.
Go to Profile#3004
Johannes Crellius
1590 - 1633 (43 years)
Johannes Crellius was a Polish and German theologian. Life Johann Crell's father, Johann Crell Sr., was pastor of the church at Hellmitzheim, , in Franken, northern Bavaria. His son Krzysztof Crell-Spinowski , and his grandsons Christopher Crell Jr. M.D. of London , Samuel Crellius and Paweł Crell-Spinowski , as well as his great-grandsons in Georgia, United States, were all proponents of Socinian views.
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John Lightfoot
1602 - 1675 (73 years)
John Lightfoot was an English churchman, rabbinical scholar, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge and Master of St Catharine's College, Cambridge. Life He was born in Stoke-on-Trent, the son of Thomas Lightfoot, vicar of Uttoxeter, Staffordshire. He was educated at Morton Green near Congleton, Cheshire, and at Christ's College, Cambridge, where he was regarded as the best orator among the undergraduates. After taking his degree he became assistant master at Repton School in Derbyshire; after taking orders, he was appointed curate of "Norton-under-Hales" in Shropshire. There he att...
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Geert Groote
1340 - 1384 (44 years)
Gerard Groote , otherwise Gerrit or Gerhard Groet, in Latin Gerardus Magnus, was a Dutch Catholic deacon, who was a popular preacher and the founder of the Brethren of the Common Life. He was a key figure in the Devotio Moderna movement.
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Franz Pieper
1852 - 1931 (79 years)
Franz August Otto Pieper was a Confessional Lutheran theologian who also served as the fourth president of what was known at that time as the German Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Missouri, Ohio, and Other States .
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Lyman Abbott
1835 - 1922 (87 years)
Lyman J. Abbott was an American Congregationalist theologian, editor, and author. Biography Early years Abbott was born at Roxbury, Massachusetts, on December 18, 1835, the son of the prolific author, educator and historian Jacob Abbott, and his mother being Harriet Vaughan. Abbott grew up in Farmington, Maine, and later in New York City. Abbott's ancestors were from England, and came to America roughly twenty years after Plymouth Rock.
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Park Yun-sun
1905 - 1988 (83 years)
Park Yun-Sun was a Korean biblical scholar born in Cholsan, North Pyongan Province. After completing his undergraduate studies at Soongsil University, he enrolled at Westminster Theological Seminary in the US. Then, he went on to Holland for further theological training . In 1979, he completed his voluminous and historic scholarly work on the commentaries of all sixty-six books of the Old and New Testaments. Park has been considered to be the pre-eminent Calvin scholar in Korea. He taught at Kosin University , Chongshin University , and Hapdong Theological Seminary . He introduced to Koreans the works of C.
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Friedrich Samuel Bock
1716 - 1786 (70 years)
Friedrich Samuel Bock was a German philosopher and theologian. In 1753 he was appointed first professor of Greek, then theology at the University of Königsberg, though he resigned both positions in 1770 due to the university's failure to pay a salary, plus the onerous duty that the professor of Greek had to lecture on the whole of the New Testament annually.
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Amalric of Bena
1150 - 1206 (56 years)
Amalric of Bena was a French theologian, philosopher and sect leader, after whom the Amalricians are named. Reformers such as Martin Luther considered him to be a proto-Protestant. Biography Amalric was born in the latter part of the 12th century at Bennes, a village between Ollé and Chauffours in the diocese of Chartres.
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Natanael Beskow
1865 - 1953 (88 years)
Fredrik Natanael Beskow was a Swedish theologian and school headmaster. He was also active as a preacher, writer, artist, pacifist and social activist. Beskow published a number of collections of sermons. He also made substantial contributions as a hymn writer.
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Gerhard Wolter Molanus
1633 - 1722 (89 years)
Gerhard Wolter Molanus was Lutheran theologian and abbot of Loccum. Biography He studied theology at Helmstedt; and in 1659 was appointed professor of mathematics and theology at University of Rinteln. 1671 Molanus became conventual of a Lutheran Loccum Abbey and 1672 coadjutor of the abbot. There he lived in celibacy according to the Rule of St. Benedict. In 1674 Duke John Frederick called him to Hanover as director of the consistory after Justus Gesenius . 1677 he became abbot of Loccum under title Gerhard I, one of the most influential offices in the duchy.
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Daniel Day Williams
1910 - 1973 (63 years)
Daniel Day Williams was a process theologian, professor, and author. He served on the joint faculty of the University of Chicago and the Chicago Theological Seminary, and later at Union Theological Seminary in New York City. Williams was a member of the United Church of Christ.
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Caspar Schwenckfeld
1489 - 1561 (72 years)
Caspar Schwenkfeld von Ossig was a German theologian, writer, physician, naturalist, and preacher who became a Protestant Reformer and spiritualist. He was one of the earliest promoters of the Protestant Reformation in Silesia.
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Wilhelmus à Brakel
1635 - 1711 (76 years)
Wilhelmus à Brakel , also known as "Father Brakel", was a Reformed minister and theologian in the Netherlands. He was a contemporary of Gisbertus Voetius and Hermann Witsius and a major representative of the Dutch Further Reformation .
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Christoph Moufang
1817 - 1890 (73 years)
Franz Christoph Ignaz Moufang was a German Catholic theologian and diocesan administrator. Life Education Moufang was born at Mainz, where he also received his primary education. In 1834 he entered the Rhenish Frederick William's University of Bonn, first taking up medicine, but soon turning to theology. Among his masters were Klee, Windischmann, and Walter. In 1837 he went to Munich, and then next year took the prescribed theological examinations at Gießen, after which he entered the ecclesiastical seminary at Mainz, where he was ordained to the priesthood on 19 December 1839. His first ap...
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Stevan Dimitrijević
1866 - 1953 (87 years)
Stevan Dimitrijević was a Serbian theologian, historian and pastor to Chetnik freedom-fighter in Ottoman-occupied Old Serbia and Macedonia during the beginning of the 20th century. Biography He graduated from the theology department of the University of Belgrade and the Kiev Theological Academy. Upon his return in 1894 he was a professor in Skopje and Salonica, the rector of the Theology school in Prizren, a full-time professor of the University of Belgrade from 1920 to 1936 and the founder and first dean of the Theological Faculty in Belgrade. His students include bishop Nikolaj Velimirović,...
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Benedict Joseph Flaget
1763 - 1850 (87 years)
Benedict Joseph Flaget was a French-born Catholic bishop in the United States. He served as the Bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Bardstown between 1808 and 1839. When the see was transferred to Louisville in 1839, he became Bishop of the Diocese of Louisville where he served from 1839 to 1850.
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John Tulloch
1823 - 1886 (63 years)
John Tulloch was a Scottish theologian. Life Tulloch was born at Dron, south of Bridge of Earn, Perthshire, one of twin sons of Elizabeth , the daughter of a Perthshire farmer, and William Weir Tulloch, parish minister of Tibbermore, near Perth.
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Georg Christian Adler
1734 - 1804 (70 years)
Georg Christian Adler was a German scholar. Adler was born in Brandenburg, and studied theology at the University of Halle. In 1755, he was appointed preacher in Arnis, Schleswig; in 1758 in Sarau; and in 1759 in Altona. He remained in Altona, where he became provost in 1791, and died in 1804.
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Henry Eyster Jacobs
1844 - 1932 (88 years)
Henry Eyster Jacobs was an American religious educator, Biblical commentator and Lutheran theologian. Biography Jacobs was born in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, the son of professor Michael and Juliana M Jacobs. His sister Julia Jacobs Harpster became a missionary in India; his brother Michael William Jacobs became a judge. He graduated from Pennsylvania College in 1862 and from the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg in 1865. Between 1870 and 1883, he was professor at Pennsylvania College. He was then appointed professor of systematic theology in The Lutheran Theological Seminary in Mount Airy, where he also assumed the office of dean in 1894.
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John Duncan
1796 - 1870 (74 years)
John Duncan , also known as 'Rabbi' Duncan, was a minister of the Free Church of Scotland, a missionary to the Jews in Hungary, and Professor of Hebrew and Oriental Languages at New College, Edinburgh. He is best remembered for his aphorisms.
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Christian Frederick Boerner
1683 - 1753 (70 years)
Christian Frederick Boerner , professor of theology at Leipzig. Boerner was born in Dresden, and lived most of his life in Leipzig. Boerner had two sons, Christian Frederic, and Frederic , who were both physicians.
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Paul Wilhelm Schmiedel
1851 - 1935 (84 years)
Paul Wilhelm Schmiedel was a German theologian and professor of New Testament exegesis born in Zaukeroda near Dresden. He studied theology in Jena, where he had as instructors Otto Pfleiderer and Richard Adelbert Lipsius . In 1879 he received his habilitation, and from 1893 to 1923 was a full professor at the University of Zurich.
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Francis Alison
1705 - 1779 (74 years)
Francis Alison was a leading minister in the Synod of Philadelphia during The Old Side-New Side Controversy Biography Early life and education Alison was born in Donegal, Ireland and studied at the University of Glasgow. It appears he arrived in the United States in 1734 or 1735 in order to help the fledgling Presbyterian Church as a minister. He was ordained a full-fledged minister in 1737 and served the New London congregation.
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Elisabeth Schmitz
1893 - 1977 (84 years)
Elisabeth Schmitz was a German Lutheran theologian, teacher, and author of "On the Situation of German Non-Aryans", a memorandum that attempted to persuade those in the Confessing Church to stand against the persecution of Jews in 1930s Germany. She also sheltered Jews and was granted the title of "Righteous Among the Nations" in 2011 by the Commission of Yad Vashem.
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Frederick William Robertson
1816 - 1853 (37 years)
Frederick William Robertson , known as Robertson of Brighton, was an English divine. Biography Born in London, the first five years of his life were passed at Leith Fort, where his father, a captain in the Royal Artillery, was then resident. The military spirit entered into his blood, and throughout life he was characterised by the qualities of the ideal soldier. In 1821 Captain Robertson retired to Beverley, where the boy was educated. At the age of fourteen he spent a year at Tours, from which he returned to Scotland, and continued his education at the Edinburgh Academy and university.
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Saint Eligius
588 - 660 (72 years)
Eligius , venerated as Saint Eligius, was a Frankish goldsmith, courtier and bishop who was chief counsellor to Dagobert I and later Bishop of Noyon–Tournai. His deeds were recorded in Vita Sancti Eligii, written by his friend Audoin of Rouen.
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Hermann Witsius
1636 - 1708 (72 years)
Hermann Witsius was a Dutch theologian. Life He was born at Enkhuizen. He studied at the University of Groningen, Leiden, and Utrecht. He was ordained in the ministry, becoming the pastor of Westwoud in 1656 and afterwards at Wormer, Goes, and Leeuwarden. He became professor of divinity successively at the University of Franeker in 1675 and at the University of Utrecht in 1680. Witsius became Chancellor of Utrecht University in 1686. In 1698 he was appointed to the University of Leiden as the successor of the younger Friedrich Spanheim. He died in Leiden.
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Johannes Maccovius
1588 - 1644 (56 years)
Johannes Maccovius , also known as Jan Makowski, was a Polish Reformed theologian. Early travels and personal life Makowski was born in Lobzenica, Poland. After visiting various universities and as the tutor of young Polish nobles, holding disputations with Jesuits and Socinians, Maccovius entered the University of Franeker in the Netherlands, in 1613. There he became privat-docent in 1614 and professor of theology in 1615. In later years, the fame of Maccovius attracted many students to Franeker, where he spent the rest of his life.
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Joseph Langen
1837 - 1901 (64 years)
Joseph Langen was a German theologian and priest, who was instrumental for the German Old Catholic movement. Langen was born at Cologne, studied at Bonn, and was ordained priest for the Roman Catholic Church in 1859. He was nominated professor extraordinary at the University of Bonn in 1864, and a professor in ordinary of the exegesis of the New Testament in 1867—an office which he held till his death. He was one of the band of professors who in 1870 supported Döllinger in his resistance to the Vatican decrees, and was excommunicated along with Döllinger, Johann Nepomuk Huber, Johann Friedrich, Franz Heinrich Reusch, Joseph Hubert Reinkens and others, for refusing to accept them.
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Pope Urban V
1310 - 1370 (60 years)
Pope Urban V , born Guillaume de Grimoard, was the head of the Catholic Church from 28 September 1362 until his death, in December 1370 and was also a member of the Order of Saint Benedict. He was the only Avignon pope to be beatified.
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Richard Sibbes
1577 - 1635 (58 years)
Richard Sibbes was an Anglican theologian. He is known as a Biblical exegete, and as a representative, with William Perkins and John Preston, of what has been called "main-line" Puritanism because he always remained in the Church of England and worshiped according to the Book of Common Prayer.
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Abraham Scultetus
1566 - 1625 (59 years)
Abraham Scultetus was a German professor of theology, and the court preacher for the Elector of the Palatinate Frederick V. Biography Early life Abraham was born in Grünberg in Schlesien in Silesia and was brought up as a Lutheran. He began his studies in theology in 1588 in Wittenberg and then in 1590 in Heidelberg. When he became Reformed and gave up his Lutheranism is unknown. By 1595 he was working for the Elector of the Palatinate, who at that time was Frederick IV. He continued to serve the churches of the Palatinate and accompanied Frederick V on his honeymoon with his wife Elisabeth, daughter of King James I of England, in 1613.
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William George Ward
1812 - 1882 (70 years)
William George Ward was an English theologian and mathematician. A Roman Catholic convert, his career illustrates the development of religious opinion at a time of crisis in the history of English religious thought.
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Reginald of Piperno
1230 - 1290 (60 years)
Reginald of Piperno was an Italian Dominican, theologian and companion of Thomas Aquinas. Biography Reginald was born at Piperno about 1230. Since 1927 this town of the Lazio region in central Italy is Priverno. He entered the Dominican Order at Naples. Thomas Aquinas chose him as his socius and confessor at Rome about 1265. From that time Reginald was Aquinas's constant and intimate companion.
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Johann Melchior Goeze
1717 - 1786 (69 years)
Johann Melchior Goeze was a Lutheran pastor and theologian during the period of Late Orthodoxy. From 1760 to 1770 he served as senior of Hamburg presiding as spiritual leader over the Lutheran state church of the city-state.
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John Brown
1784 - 1858 (74 years)
John Brown was a Scottish minister and theologian, known for his exegesis as a preacher. Life The grandson of John Brown of Haddington, he was born at Whitburn, Linlithgowshire. He studied at Glasgow university, and afterwards at the divinity hall of the Burgher branch of the Secession church at Selkirk, under George Lawson. In 1806 he was ordained minister of the Burgher congregation at Biggar, Lanarkshire, where he laboured for sixteen years. While there he had a controversy with Robert Owen the socialist.
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Karl Theodor Keim
1825 - 1878 (53 years)
Karl Theodor Keim was a German Protestant theologian. He was born at Stuttgart. His father, Johann Christian Keim, was headmaster of a gymnasium. Here Karl Theodor received his early education, and then proceeded to the Stuttgart Obergymnasium. In 1843 he went to the university of Tübingen, where he studied philosophy under J. F. Reiff, a follower of Hegel, and Oriental languages under Heinrich Ewald and Heinrich Meier. F. C. Baur, the leader of the new Tübingen school, was lecturing on the New Testament and on the history of the church and of dogma, and by him in particular Keim was greatly ...
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Dominic Barberi
1792 - 1849 (57 years)
Dominic Barberi, CP was an Italian theologian and Passionist priest who was prominent in spreading Catholicism in England. He contributed to the conversion of John Henry Newman. In 1963, he was beatified by Pope Paul VI.
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Edmond Richer
1559 - 1631 (72 years)
Edmond Richer was a French theologian known for several works advocating the Gallican theory, that the pope's power was limited by authority of bishops, and by temporal governments. He was born in Chaource.
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Gottlob Christian Storr
1746 - 1805 (59 years)
Gottlob Christian Storr was a German Protestant theologian, born in Stuttgart. He was the son of theologian Johann Christian Storr and the older brother of naturalist Gottlieb Conrad Christian Storr .
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Jean-Alphonse Turrettini
1671 - 1737 (66 years)
Jean-Alphonse Turrettini was a theologian from the Republic of Geneva. The son of François Turrettini, he was born in Geneva. He studied theology at Geneva under Louis Tronchin , and after travelling in Holland, England and France was received into the "Vénérable Compagnie des Pasteurs" of Geneva in 1693. Here he became pastor of the Italian congregation, and in 1697 professor of church history, and later of theology.
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Andrew Willet
1562 - 1621 (59 years)
Andrew Willet was an English clergyman and controversialist. A prolific writer, he is known for his anti-papal works. His views were conforming and non-separatist, and he appeared as a witness against Edward Dering before the Star-chamber. Joseph Hall eulogised Willet in Noah's Dove, and Thomas Fuller modelled 'the Controversial Divine' of his Holy State on him.
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Erich Sauer
1898 - 1959 (61 years)
Erich Sauer was a German dispensationalist Christian theologian associated with the Plymouth Brethren. His various books have sold around one million copies. Early life Sauer was born in Berlin in 1898, his mother was already a Christian and he attended Open Brethren congregations.
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Zacharias Ursinus
1534 - 1583 (49 years)
Zacharias Ursinus was a sixteenth-century German Reformed theologian and Protestant reformer, born Zacharias Baer in Breslau . He became the leading theologian of the Reformed Protestant movement of the Palatinate, serving both at the University of Heidelberg and the College of Wisdom . He is best known as the principal author and interpreter of the Heidelberg Catechism.
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Campegius Vitringa
1659 - 1722 (63 years)
Campegius Vitringa Sr., or Kempe Vitringa was a Dutch Protestant theologian and Hebraist. His youngest of four children was Campeius Vitringa . Vitringa, a follower of Johannes Cocceius, was a supporter of prophetic theology. He was educated at the universities of Franeker and Leiden, and became professor of Oriental languages at the former in 1681. When locating prophetic outcomes, he would associate events to the near rather than the far-off future, placing a distinct focus on the period of the Maccabees . Like Joseph Mede , Vitringa believed wholeheartedly that the Millennium was yet to come, but did not expect any immediate changes.
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Edmund Bonner
1500 - 1569 (69 years)
Edmund Bonner was Bishop of London from 1539 to 1549 and again from 1553 to 1559. Initially an instrumental figure in the schism of Henry VIII from Rome, he was antagonised by the Protestant reforms introduced by the Duke of Somerset and reconciled himself to Catholicism. He became notorious as "Bloody Bonner" for his role in the persecution of heretics under the Catholic government of Mary I of England, and ended his life as a prisoner under Queen Elizabeth I.
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Georg Fritze
1874 - 1939 (65 years)
Georg Fritze was a German theologian, Protestant pastor, religious socialist and anti-fascist. Career Fritze studied Evangelical Theology in Halle and Marburg. He sat his first theological exam in the Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg in 1896, and his second exam in the University of Marburg in 1898. He then did military service from 1889 to 1890. He became an assistant preacher, and later "second pastor" in the Belgian Mission Church in Charleroi , where he ordained on September 30, 1900 . After four years he returned to the Prussian Provincial Church in Saxony, where he made up the vicariate.
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