The Most Influential People Across History
Find the most influential people in 24 academic disciplines and numerous subdisciplines
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List of the most influential people in Theology,
#3651
Emanuel Hirsch
1888 - 1972 (84 years)
Emanuel Hirsch was a German Protestant theologian and also a member of the Nazi Party and the Nazi supporting body. He escaped denazification at the end of the war by quitting his professorship, allegedly for health reasons, losing the pension from his University.
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Joseph Parker
1830 - 1902 (72 years)
Joseph Parker was an English Congregational minister. Life Born in Hexham, Northumberland, Parker was the son of Teasdale Parker, a stonemason, and Elizabeth . He managed to pick up a fair education, which afterwards he constantly supplemented. In the revolutionary years from 1845 to 1850 young Parker as a local preacher and temperance orator gained a reputation for vigorous utterance. He was influenced by Thomas Cooper, the Chartist, and Edward Miall, the Liberationistist, and was much associated with Joseph Cowen, afterwards MP for Newcastle upon Tyne.
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Nicholas Eymerich
1320 - 1399 (79 years)
Nicholas Eymerich was a Roman Catholic theologian in Medieval Catalonia and Inquisitor General of the Inquisition in the Crown of Aragon in the later half of the 14th century. He is best known for authoring the Directorium Inquisitorum, that mostly summarized previous texts and mores.
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Louise Pettibone Smith
1887 - 1981 (94 years)
Louise Pettibone Smith was an American biblical scholar, professor, translator, author and social activist. She was the first woman published in the Journal of Biblical Literature in 1917. She later became chair of the American Committee for the Protection of Foreign Born and denounced the House Un-American Activities Committee for its "McCarthyism".
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Christian Friedrich Fritzsche
1776 - 1850 (74 years)
Christian Friedrich Fritzsche was a German Protestant theologian. He was the father of theologian Otto Fridolinus Fritzsche and of philologist Franz Volkmar Fritzsche. From 1792 he studied theology at the University of Halle, afterwards working as a pastor in Steinbach und Lauterbach . In 1809 he became a preacher and superintendent in the community of Dobrilugk. In 1827 he was named an honorary professor of theology at Halle, where in 1830 he gained a full professorship. He was interested in public school education, and he wrote monographs and articles on contemporary theological issues from...
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Abraham Heidanus
1597 - 1678 (81 years)
Abraham van Heyden or van Heiden was a Dutch Calvinist minister and controversialist, sympathetic to Cartesianism. Life He was born in Frankenthal in the Palatinate, son of Gaspar van der Heiden the Younger, a Reformed minister and Counter-Remonstrant who moved to Amsterdam in 1608. Abraham studied theology at the University of Leiden from 1617, travelled to Heidelberg, Geneva and Paris, and was influenced by Ramism and Jean Daillé. He returned to an appointment as minister in Naarden in 1623, moving to Leiden in 1627.
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Gustav Georg Zeltner
1672 - 1738 (66 years)
Gustav Georg Zeltner was a Lutheran theologian. Zeltner wrote numerous theological and historical writings. Life From 1689 to 1694 he studied philosophy and theology at the University of Jena. In 1695 he assumed the position of inspector of the alumni in Altdorf. In 1698 he moved to Nuremberg and worked as a vicar and as a professor of metaphysics at the Aegidianum. Two years later he was appointed deacon at St. Sebaldus Church, Nuremberg.
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Johann Gramann
1487 - 1541 (54 years)
Johann Gramann or Graumann , also known by his pen name Johannes Poliander, was a German pastor, theologian, teacher, humanist, reformer, and Lutheran leader. Life Gramann was born in Neustadt an der Aisch, Middle Franconia. He worked as rector of the Thomasschule in Leipzig. Poliander was Johann Eck's secretary at the 1519 Leipzig Debate, where he met Martin Luther and joined the Protestant Reformation. Poliander became pastor of Altstadt Church in 1525 in Königsberg , capital of the new Duchy of Prussia , succeeding the fiery Johannes Amandus. The humanist was well-regarded by his peers, including the Catholic Johannes Dantiscus.
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Tommaso Martinelli
1827 - 1888 (61 years)
Tommaso Maria Martinelli was a Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church who served as Prefect of the Congregation of Rites. Tommaso Martinelli was born in the parish of Sant'Anna, Lucca as the son of Cosma Martinelli and Maddalena Pardini. He was the brother of Cardinal Sebastiano Martinelli.
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Gottfried von Hagenau
1270 - 1313 (43 years)
Gottfried von Hagenau was a medieval priest, physician, theologian and poet from Alsace. As his name suggests, he was probably born in Haguenau, before 1275. After having studied medicine and theology in Strasbourg and in Paris, he worked as a headmaster in Basel, Switzerland, before settling as a physician in Strasbourg, where he applied for the post of canon at the St Thomas' Church. He was at first rejected but successfully sued against that decision before the Apostolic Signatura in Rome, and was instated as canon of St Thomas' Church in 1300. He died on 26 September 1313 and is buried in the church, where his ornate Gothic ledger stone is preserved to this day.
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Bartholomaeus Arnoldi
1465 - 1532 (67 years)
Bartholomaeus Arnoldi was an Augustinian friar and doctor of divinity who taught Martin Luther and later turned into his earliest and one of his personally closest opponents. Life Usually called Usingen, after his birthplace, Arnoldi received his master's degree in 1491 and was promoted to the doctorate of divinity in 1514. For thirty years he filled the chairs of philosophy and theology at Erfurt University, and, with Jodocus Trutfetter, was its leading teacher. He enjoyed the favour of the younger humanists.
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John Vidmar
1900 - Present (126 years)
John C. Vidmar, O.P. is an associate professor of history at Providence College, Rhode Island where he also serves as provincial archivist and teaches history. Prior to his work at Providence, he served as associate professor, academic dean, acting president and prior teaching history for 15 years at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington D.C.
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Willem Baudartius
1565 - 1640 (75 years)
Willem Baudaert or Wilhelmus Baudartius , born Willem Baudart, was a Dutch theologian. Baudartius College, a Christian secondary school in Zutphen, is named after him. He was the maternal grandfather of Dutch New Netherland colonist and mayor of New York City Wilhelmus Beekman.
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Ambrose of Alexandria
200 - 251 (51 years)
Ambrose of Alexandria was a friend of the Christian theologian Origen. Ambrose was attracted by Origen's fame as a teacher, and visited the Catechetical School of Alexandria in 212. At first a gnostic Valentinian and Marcionist, Ambrose, through Origen's teaching, eventually rejected this theology and became Origen's constant companion, and was ordained deacon. He plied Origen with questions, and urged him to write his Commentaries on the books of the Bible, and, as a wealthy nobleman and courtier, he provided his teacher with books for his studies and secretaries to lighten the labor of co...
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Daniel Waterland
1683 - 1740 (57 years)
Daniel Waterland was an English theologian. He became Master of Magdalene College, Cambridge in 1714, Chancellor of the Diocese of York in 1722, and Archdeacon of Middlesex in 1730. Waterland opposed the latitudinarians of his time. He was an acute controversialist on behalf of the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity, on which he wrote several treatises. He was also the author of a History of the Athanasian Creed .
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Martin of Cochem
1634 - 1712 (78 years)
Martin of Cochem was a German Capuchin theologian, preacher, and ascetic writer. Life He came from a Catholic family, and while still young entered the novitiate of the Capuchins. After his ordination to the priesthood, he was assigned to a professorship of theology.
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Ernest Barnes
1874 - 1953 (79 years)
Ernest William Barnes was a British mathematician and scientist who later became a liberal theologian and bishop. He was educated at King Edward's School, Birmingham, and Trinity College, Cambridge. He was Master of the Temple from 1915 to 1919. He was made Bishop of Birmingham in 1924, the only bishop appointed during Ramsay MacDonald's first term in office. His modernist views, in particular objection to Reservation, led to conflict with the Anglo-Catholics in his diocese. A biography by his son, Sir John Barnes, Ahead of His Age: Bishop Barnes of Birmingham, was published in 1979.
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Honoré Jozef Coppieters
1874 - 1947 (73 years)
Honoré Jozef Coppieters was a Belgian prelate who became, in 1927, the Bishop of Ghent. Life Honoré Jozef Coppieters was born at Overmere in East Flanders, the eldest son of Benedictus Coppieters and Maria Sidonia Verstraeten. His father was a farmer.
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Konrad Wimpina
1460 - 1531 (71 years)
Konrad Wimpina was a German Roman Catholic theologian and humanist of the early Reformation period. He was a quiet and stubborn conservative, considered quiet but somewhat narrow. In theology he was a pupil of Martin Polich of Mellerstadt and a Thomist.
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Hans Gerhard Stub
1849 - 1931 (82 years)
Hans Gerhard Stub was an American Lutheran theologian and church leader. He served as Bishop of the Norwegian Lutheran Church in America. Background Hans Gerhard Stub was born in Muskego, Wisconsin. His parents were Lutheran Pastor Hans Andreas Stub and Ingeborg Margrethe Arentz , both immigrants from Norway. Hans Stub was born in an immigrant cabin in Wisconsin. He was shaped from childhood by the life within the Norwegian Synod, which his father had help found in 1853. He studied for a time in Norway at the Bergen Cathedral School.
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Rowland Williams
1817 - 1870 (53 years)
Rowland Williams was a Welsh theologian and educationalist. He was vice-principal and Professor of Hebrew at St David's College, Lampeter, from 1849 to 1862 and one of the most influential theologians of the nineteenth century. He supported biblical criticism and pioneered comparative religious studies in Britain. He was also a priest in the Church of England, and the vicar of Broad Chalke in Wiltshire, where he is buried. Williams is also credited with introducing rugby football to Wales; Lampeter's team was the first to be established in the nation.
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Carl Clemen
1865 - 1940 (75 years)
Carl Christian Clemen , best known as Carl Clemen, was a German theologian and religious historian. He was a member of the history of religions school. Career Clemen was Professor of New Testament and religious history at the University of Bonn. He was a critic of the Christ myth theory and refuted the arguments of Arthur Drews, Peter Jensen and other mythicists. He was also critical of the ideas of Anthroposophy and Theosophy.
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Alan Richardson
1905 - 1975 (70 years)
Alan Richardson, was a British Anglican priest and academic. From 1964 to 1975, he served as Dean of York. Early life and education Richardson was educated at Liverpool University, Exeter College, Oxford and Ridley Hall, Cambridge.
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Anton Fridrichsen
1888 - 1953 (65 years)
Anton Johnson Fridrichsen was a Norwegian-born Swedish theologian. Biography He was born at Meråker in Trøndelag, Norway. He became cand. theol. in 1911 and then studied ancient Christian theology and classical philology at the University of Breslau and the University of Göttingen. In 1925 he received his theological doctorate from the University of Strasbourg. He was appointed professor of exegesis at the Uppsala University from 1928. Among his works are Hagios-Qadoš from 1916, and his thesis from 1925 Le Problème du miracle dans le christianisme primitif .
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Henry Augustus Boardman
1808 - 1880 (72 years)
Henry Augustus Boardman was an American minister and author. Boardman was born in Troy, N Y, January 9, 1808. His parents were John Boardman and Clarinda Starbuck, and he often said that he was the product of a Puritan father and a Quaker mother. He graduated from Yale College in 1829. In the fall of 1830 he entered the Theological Seminary in Princeton, N. J., and in April 1833, was licensed to preach. In September 1833, he was called to the pastorate of the Tenth Presbyterian Church of Philadelphia, over which he was duly installed, November 8, 1833, and of which he continued in charge until May 1876, when he became Pastor Emeritus.
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Leopold Ackermann
1771 - 1831 (60 years)
Leopold Ackermann , known by his cloistral name as Petrus Fourerius, was a professor of exegesis. He entered on 10 October 1790 in the choral order of Klosterneuburg and studied from 1791-1795 in Vienna. In the following, he became priest and professor for oriental languages at the Stiftshof in Vienna, in 1800 also librarian. He earned his doctorate in theology in 1802, and in 1806 a professorship in exegesis, continuing for 25 years.
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Karl Bornhäuser
1868 - 1947 (79 years)
Karl Bornhäuser was a German New Testament theologian. He studied theology at the universities of Halle and Greifswald, where he was a student of Hermann Cremer. He worked as a clergyman in Sinsheim and Karlsruhe , and as a regional pastor in Rastatt . In 1902 he became an associate professor of systematic and practical theology at the University of Greifswald, and from 1907 to 1933, he taught classes as a full professor at the University of Marburg. From 1912 onward, he was a member of the consistory in Kassel.
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John Brande Morris
1812 - 1880 (68 years)
John Brande Morris, known to friends as Jack Morris was an English Anglican theologian, later a Roman Catholic priest. He was a noted academic eccentric, but an important scholar of Syriac. Life He studied at Balliol College, Oxford, graduating in 1834 and 1837 . He was then elected Petrean Fellow of Exeter College, Oxford, lecturing on Hebrew and Syriac.
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V. A. Demant
1893 - 1983 (90 years)
Vigo Auguste Demant , known as V. A. Demant, was an English Anglican priest, theologian, and social commentator. He was one of the 14 committee members who served on the Wolfenden Report on Homosexual Offences and Prostitution.
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Johann Georg Conrad Oberdieck
1794 - 1880 (86 years)
Johann Georg Conrad Oberdieck was a German clergyman and pomologist. From 1812 to 1815 he studied theology at the University of Göttingen, and following graduation, served as a subconrector at Michaelisschule in Lüneburg. Several years later he became a pastor in Bardowick, and afterwards worked as an ecclesiastical superintendent in Sulingen and Nienburg/Weser . In 1853 he relocated to the community of Jeinsen as a superintendent.
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John Mason Neale
1818 - 1866 (48 years)
John Mason Neale was an English Anglican priest, scholar, and hymnwriter. He worked and wrote on a wide range of holy Christian texts, including obscure medieval hymns, both Western and Eastern. Among his most famous hymns is the 1853 Good King Wenceslas, set on Boxing Day. An Anglo-Catholic, Neale's works have found positive reception in high-church Anglicanism and Western Rite Orthodoxy.
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John Dick
1764 - 1833 (69 years)
John Dick was a Scottish minister and theological writer. Life He was born on 10 October 1764 at Aberdeen, where his father was minister of the associate congregation of seceders. His mother was Helen Tolmie, daughter of Captain Tolmie of Aberdeen. Educated at the grammar school and King's College, Aberdeen, he studied for the ministry of the Secession church, under John Brown of Haddington.
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Valentin Alberti
1635 - 1697 (62 years)
Valentin Alberti was a Lutheran, orthodox philosopher and theologian from Silesia and was the son of a preacher. He is known for defending Lutheran orthodoxy against the natural law views of Hugo Grotius, Samuel von Pufendorf and Christian Thomasius, and being an active polemicist against Roman Catholicism.
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Juan Luis Maneiro
1744 - 1802 (58 years)
Juan Luis Maneiro was a Mexican Jesuit teacher, scholar, biographer, theologian, and poet. After the expulsion of the Jesuits from Spanish provinces , he went to Italy, where he wrote Latin biographies of illustrious Mexican Jesuits.
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Willem Kremer
1896 - 1985 (89 years)
Willem Kremer was a Dutch pastor of the Christian Reformed Churches and a professor of practical theology at the Theological University of Apeldoorn. Life and work Willem Kremer was born in Zwolle. His father, Gerrit Kremer, worked as a gardener and inspired him to pursue gardening. After the completion of his studies, he worked in greenhouses in Wassenaar, where he contracted the Spanish flu. During his illness, he discovered a passion for religion. In 1926, he completed his studies of theology in Apeldoorn and became a Christian Reformed minister in Kornhorn. In Kornhorn he was confirmed by his mentor professor Jacob Jan van der Schuit.
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Johann Matthäus Meyfart
1590 - 1642 (52 years)
Johann Matthäus Meyfart, also Johann Matthaeus Meyfahrt, Mayfart was a German Lutheran theologist, educator, academic teacher, hymn writer and minister. He was an opponent fighter of witch trials. Career Meyfart was born in Jena, the son of a minister, and studied at the University of Jena from 1608, first the liberal arts graduating in 1603, then theology, continued at the University of Wittenberg from 1614. He taught from 1617 at the Gymnasium in Coburg, serving as its Rektor from 1623.
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Edward Cardwell
1787 - 1861 (74 years)
Edward Cardwell was an English theologian also noted for his contributions to the study of English church history. In addition to his scholarly work, he filled various administrative positions in the University of Oxford.
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Francis Lambert
1486 - 1530 (44 years)
Francis Lambert was a Protestant reformer, the son of a papal official at Avignon, where he was born between 1485 and 1487. At the age of 15 he entered the Franciscan monastery at Avignon, and after 1517 he was an itinerant preacher, travelling through France, Italy and Switzerland. Lambert's study of the Scriptures shook his faith in Roman Catholic theology, and by 1522 he had abandoned his order, and became known to the leaders of the Reformation in Switzerland and Germany. He did not, however, identify himself either with Zwinglianism or Lutheranism; he debated with Huldrych Zwingli at Zür...
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Jacobus Latomus
1475 - 1544 (69 years)
Jacobus Latomus was a Catholic Flemish theologian, a distinguished member of the Faculty of Theology at the University of Leuven. Latomus was a theological adviser to the Inquisition, and his exchange with William Tyndale is particularly noted. The general focus of his academic work centered on opposing Martin Luther and the Protestant Reformation, supporting the papacy and the hierarchy of the Catholic Church. Etymology: Latinized Latomus = Masson from Greek lā-tómos 'stone-cutter, quarryman', thus 'mason'.
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Hans von Campenhausen
1903 - 1989 (86 years)
Hans Erich Freiherr von Campenhausen was a German Baltic Protestant theologian. He is one of the most important Protestant ecclesiastical historians of the 20th century. Life and work Hans von Campenhausen came from the landowning nobility. Born in Rosenbeck, Livonia, Campenhausen's family escaped to Germany during the Russian Revolution. He graduated from high school in Heidelberg in 1922, and went on to study theology and history at the universities of Heidelberg and Marburg where he was particularly influenced by the theologians Rudolf Bultmann, Hans Freiherr von Soden and Martin Dibelius....
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Niels Hemmingsen
1513 - 1600 (87 years)
Niels Hemmingsen was a Danish Lutheran theologian. He was pastor of the Church of the Holy Ghost, Copenhagen and professor at the University of Copenhagen. The street Niels Hemmingsens Gade in Copenhagen is named in his honor.
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Feliks Suk
1845 - 1915 (70 years)
Feliks Suk was Croatian university professor and rector of the University of Zagreb. It was Zagreb archbishop and cardinal Juraj Haulik who enabled young Suk a study of theology in Innsbruck. He was ordained for a priest in 1868. He received his Ph.D. in 1870. He conducted various jobs in the Zagreb Archdiocese, before he became a professor of moral theology at the newly established Royal University of Franz Joseph I. He served as a dean of the Faculty of Theology in two mandates. In the academic year 1882/1883 he served as a rector of the University of Zagreb, and the following academic year...
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Hugh Broughton
1549 - 1612 (63 years)
Hugh Broughton was an English scholar and theologian. Early life He was born at Owlbury, Bishop's Castle, Shropshire. He called himself a Cambrian, implying Welsh blood in his veins. He was educated by Bernard Gilpin at Houghton-le-Spring and at Magdalene College, Cambridge, where he matriculated in 1570. The foundation of his Hebrew learning was laid, in his first year at Cambridge, by his attendance on the lectures of the French scholar Antoine Rodolphe Chevallier.
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Otto Flügel
1842 - 1914 (72 years)
Otto Flügel was a German philosopher and theologian. Biography He studied at Schulpforta and Halle, and took up pastoral work. He was made editor of the Zeitschrift für exacte Philosophie im Sinne des Neueren Philosophischen Realismus , and in 1894 was one of the founders of Zeitschrift für Philosophie und Pädagogik. He was a supporter of Herbartian realism, as opposed to New-Kantian speculations, yet he believed in the necessity of a revelation.
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Gustavus Waffelaert
1847 - 1931 (84 years)
Gustave Joseph Waffelaert was the 22nd bishop of Bruges in Belgium. Life Waffelaert was born in Rollegem on 27 August 1847. After attending St Vincent's college, Ypres, and the Minor Seminary, Roeselare he entered the Major Seminary, Bruges. He was ordained to the priesthood in Bruges on 17 December 1870, and from 1871 to 1875 served as an assistant priest in the parish of Blankenberge.
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Johann Bollig
1821 - 1895 (74 years)
Johann Bollig was a German advisor of Pope Pius IX in the lead up to the First Vatican Council. Bollig was born near Düren, Rhenish Prussia, and died in Rome, Italy. Prior to his time as a Pontifical Theologian he served as a theology professor in Syria.
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Georg Kükenthal
1864 - 1955 (91 years)
Georg Kükenthal was a German pastor and botanist who specialized in the field of caricology. He was the brother of zoologist Willy Kükenthal . From 1882 to 1885 he studied theology at the universities of Tübingen and Halle. He worked as a pastor in Grub am Forst, and later in Coburg. In 1913 he received an honorary degree from the University of Breslau.
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Thierry of Chartres
1100 - 1155 (55 years)
Thierry of Chartres or Theodoric the Breton was a twelfth-century philosopher working at Chartres and Paris, France. The cathedral school at Chartres promoted scholarship before the first university was founded in France. Thierry was a major figure in twelfth-century philosophy and learning, and, like many twelfth-century scholars, is notable for his embrace of Plato's Timaeus and his application of philosophy to theological issues. Some modern scholars believed Thierry to have been a brother of Bernard of Chartres who had founded the school of Chartres, but later research has shown that th...
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William Allen
1532 - 1594 (62 years)
William Allen , also known as Guilielmus Alanus or Gulielmus Alanus, was an English Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church. He was an ordained priest, but was never a bishop. His main role was setting up colleges to train English missionary priests with the mission of returning secretly to England to keep Roman Catholicism alive there. Allen assisted in the planning of the Spanish Armada's attempted invasion of England in 1588. It failed badly, but if it had succeeded he would probably have been made Archbishop of Canterbury and Lord Chancellor. The Douai-Rheims Bible, a complete translation into English from Latin, was printed under Allen's orders.
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Nathanael Emmons
1745 - 1840 (95 years)
Nathanael Emmons, sometimes spelled Nathaniel Emmons, was an American Congregational minister and influential theologian of the New Divinity school. He was born at East Haddam, Connecticut. Emmons graduated at Yale in 1767, studied theology under the Rev. John Smalley at Berlin, Connecticut, and was licensed to preach in 1769. After preaching four years in New York and New Hampshire, he became, in April 1773, pastor of the Second church at Franklin , of which he remained in charge until May 1827, when failing health compelled his relinquishment of active ministerial cares. He lived, however,...
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