Center securitatis

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Title page of the 1785 edition, Kutná Hora. Moravian State Library, Brno

Centrum securitatis to jest Hlubina bezpečnosti , abbreviated to Centrum securitatis (German: Center of Security ), is a philosophical- theological treatise by Johann Amos Comenius .

The full long title in A. Macher's translation is:

“YES Comenii Centrum securitatis, or reason of true security. That is: a clear idea how in the one God, and in a humble surrender in all his will, the only real calm, security and pleasure of this present life can exist. "

“The whole wide world is a dangerous wheel that has
nothing but unsteadiness and unrest;
Anyone who does not remain in his God, as in the center,
throws him back and forth until he is atomized on it. "

Emergence

Comenius wrote this work in 1625. It is under the impression of the dire situation in which the Bohemian Brethren and Comenius personally found themselves after the defeat of the Protestants in the Battle of White Mountain (1620). The persecution of non-Catholics had severely affected the Brothers' Union, banning their meetings and expelling their preachers and teachers. Comenius also had to leave his previous place of work in Fulnek and hid in different places.

Centrum securitatis wrote Comenius in Czech (only the title is in Latin ). In the first two editions - Leszno 1633 and Amsterdam 1663 - he added a dedication in Latin to the Polish nobleman Rafael Leszczyński . He thanks Leszczyński for taking in the persecuted members of the Brotherhood on his estate in Leszno. Comenius has added a short treatise to both editions entitled Renuntiatio mundi (Rejection to the World) .

A German translation was published by Andreas Macher in Berlin in 1737 .

content

Representation of the world as a tree, from the 1663 edition

Comenius sums up the content of his writing in a letter to the Amsterdam publisher Peter van den Berge (1661) as follows: ... Then (I had to keep in secret because of personal persecution) I wrote the small text "Centrum securitatis" to comfort myself and others. which was later printed in Leszno . Here I showed how all human things turn in a circle and how all those who trust themselves to the extreme are grasped together with necessity, are painfully tossed back and forth and torn and thus ultimately fall and perish; on the other hand, in the only God, the eternal center of all things, there is eternal rest and security from perdition; this was illustrated in the book by a diagram and proven with examples.

In the Centrum Securitatis , Comenius develops thoughts from his earlier work Labyrinth of the World and Paradise of the Heart , especially from the second part, the Paradise of the Heart : Only the intimate connection with God can save people from their desperate situation and give them security and peace . While the labyrinth is in the form of an allegorical novel , Centrum securitatis is a systematically structured theological treatise. In thirteen chapters, Comenius proves the world's dependence on God. He shows how everything in the world flows directly or indirectly from God, from whose power, wisdom and goodness the universe grows. Comenius illustrates it with two images:

In the first chapter the world is compared to a tree, the visible parts of which are established with invisible roots in God. Comenius writes: So what we see in the world is also the sky, the earth, the sea, and the different creatures in them; But what we do not see, but nevertheless consider and understand it as the reason of all this, is God, the hidden being that is incomprehensible to our senses, without whom the world cannot possibly exist, indeed could not have come into being ... So comes from God, who eternal root, the essence of all things, which are divided into spiritual and physical; ...

The World Wheel, from the edition of 1663

In the second picture the world is compared with a wheel: God rests in the center of this world wheel, he is the center of the world. All things stand in relation to this center, are arranged on rays or spokes around this center and revolve around it. The present human distress is the result of a disturbance of the original harmony, the result of an unhappy turning away from God. Comenius writes: But it is this peculiarity when a person is disgusted with being bound by God and his order and only wants to be his own, namely his own adviser, his own guide, his own protector, his own master, and summa: his own God; and that's the beginning of all evil.

The only way out of human aberrations is to return to the Creator and to the merciful Christ , which happens through faith, through justice and through an honorable life. Using examples from the Old and New Testaments , Comenius shows three ways to God, he calls them the three guardians of our heart : vigilance, humility and prayer .

literature

  • Johann Amos Comenius: Center securitatis. Based on the German edition by A. Macher from 1737. Introduced and edited by Klaus Schaller . Quelle & Meyer, Heidelberg 1964 (156 pages).
  • ČSAV (ed.): Dílo Jana Amose Komenského - Johannis Amos Comenii opera omnia . tape 3 . Academia, Praha 1978 (Czech, online ). Contains Centrum securitatis on pages 473-548.
  • Jan Kumpera: Jan Amos Komenský, Poutník na rozhraní věků (= Johann Amos Comenius, wanderer in the upheaval of times) . Amosium Servis, Ostrava 1992, ISBN 80-85498-03-0 , p. 209 - 210 (Czech, 372 pp.).
  • Ctibor Salašovič: Komenského spisy útěšné. Bakalářská práce (= consolation writings by Comenius, bachelor thesis) . Univerzita Karlova v Praze, Husitská teologická fakulta, Praha 2014, p. 37-39 (Czech, online ). Retrieved January 22, 2019.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Johann Amos Comenius: Centrum securitatis. Based on the German edition by A. Macher from 1737. Introduced and edited by Klaus Schaller . Quelle & Meyer, Heidelberg 1964, p. 42 (156 pp.).
  2. ↑ Constantin von Wurzbach : Macher, Andreas . In: Biographisches Lexikon des Kaiserthums Oesterreich . 16th part. Kaiserlich-Königliche Hof- und Staatsdruckerei, Vienna 1867, p. 205 ( digitized version ).
  3. ↑ Quoted from: Jan Amos Komenský: The labyrinth of the world and other writings. Edited and translated from Czech and Latin by Ilse Seehase . Reclam, Leipzig 1984, p. 214 .
  4. ^ Johann Amos Comenius: Centrum securitatis. Based on the German edition by A. Macher from 1737. Introduced and edited by Klaus Schaller . Quelle & Meyer, Heidelberg 1964, p. 50-51 (156 pp.).
  5. ^ Johann Amos Comenius: Centrum securitatis. Based on the German edition by A. Macher from 1737. Introduced and edited by Klaus Schaller . Quelle & Meyer, Heidelberg 1964, p. 77 (156 pp.).
  6. ^ Johann Amos Comenius: Centrum securitatis. Based on the German edition by A. Macher from 1737. Introduced and edited by Klaus Schaller . Quelle & Meyer, Heidelberg 1964, p. 145 - 148 (156 pp.).

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