Daniel Bonifaz von Haneberg

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Bishop Daniel Bonifazius von Haneberg OSB
Daniel Bonifazius von Haneberg as Benedictine abbot, around 1870
Daniel Bonifazius von Haneberg as Benedictine abbot, around 1870

Daniel Bonifazius von Haneberg OSB (born June 17, 1816 in Tannen near Lenzfried , † May 31, 1876 in Speyer ) was a German Benedictine , abbot , theologian , orientalist and bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Speyer .

Life

Origin and youth

Daniel Haneberg - Bonifazius was added later as a religious name - was born as the son of the farmer Tobias Haneberg and his wife Franziska nee. Haibel on which Einödhof firs, parish of St. Magnus in Lenzfried born in Kempten. He was the third of the couple's four sons. The mother died when Daniel was nine years old.

First the boy attended the community school, then the high school in Kempten. As early as 1829 - when he was 13 years old - he began studying Hebrew there and contacted Rabbi Thannhäuser. He also began to learn Syrian, Arabic and Persian in Kempten. Soon, however, the provincial learning opportunities were no longer sufficient for the inquisitive boy. His high school professor Böhm therefore advised him to continue his high school studies in the capital Munich. Haneberg did this and from 1834 he attended the “Alte Gymnasium”, later the Wilhelmsgymnasium , and graduated from high school there in 1835.

After graduating from school, he began studying philosophy and theology in Munich in the same year, with Ignaz von Döllinger and Johann Adam Möhler among his professors. In 1837 Haneberg entered the Collegium Georgianum in Munich as an alumnus . In his language studies, the lectures on Hebrew, Syriac and Aramaic could not offer him anything new. All the more diligently he learned Chinese and Sanskrit as well as various modern languages. On August 13, 1839, he received his doctorate in theology in Latin and was ordained a priest on August 29 of the same year in his home diocese of Augsburg from Bishop Peter von Richarz .

Theology professor

As early as December 4, 1839, the new priest was admitted as a private lecturer, in 1840 he was appointed associate professor and in 1844 full professor at Munich University . He taught the subjects of the Old Testament and Oriental languages ​​here. From 1845, Haneberg also worked as a university preacher . In 1848 he was appointed a member of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences .

Haneberg was considered a linguistic genius; he mainly studied Hebrew , fluently speaking Arabic , Coptic , Ethiopian , Armenian , Persian , Sanskrit and Chinese . Knowledge of French , English , Portuguese and other languages ​​was a matter of course for him. He spoke modern Greek like his mother tongue, he could even make himself understood in Russian and Turkish .

Benedictine

After joining the Benedictine Abbey of St. Boniface in Munich in 1850 , he was elected abbot here in 1854 . He also retained his professorship as a Benedictine. When he entered the order he had received the additional name "Bonifazius". For the purpose of building a mission house, he traveled a. a. 1861 to Algeria and Tunis and in 1864 via Constantinople to Palestine . Due to his talent for languages ​​and the knowledge he gained about oriental churches on his travels, he was appointed consultor for the Vatican Council in 1868 , as a member of the commission for the oriental churches. At the council he belonged to the minority who spoke out against the dogmatization of papal infallibility . In contrast to his old friend and professor Ignaz von Döllinger , however, Haneberg accepted the council decision without ifs or buts and defended it emphatically.

In its 1850 first (and 1863 in the third) published edition history of the biblical revelation that as a defense of the Bible against anti-Catholic was intended attacks to Haneberg turned in return for a blanket condemnation of the Pharisees practice of faith, but also spoke condescendingly to certain Talmud ask . He described it as a “fundamental error” when Jews considered the revelation to be unchangeable, but when they developed it further, they cultivated “parasite plants of petty human effort in God's work”. According to Haneberg, non-Israelites are allegedly unclean according to the Talmud and are "not called people, but cattle". According to anti-Judaistic ways of thinking, he subordinated the rabbinical ethics, whose actions are "servile to very annoying exercises of an external nature", a lack of important moral principles in dealing with non-Jews.

Bishop of Speyer

Haneberg had repeatedly turned down appointments to vacant bishoprics, for example in Bamberg in 1858, in Trier in 1864, in Cologne in 1865 and in Eichstätt in 1866. In 1866 he was raised to the nobility. Finally, at the urging of the Pope, he accepted an election on August 25, 1872, which called him to the bishopric of Speyer . He received his episcopal consecration on August 25, 1872, the then Archbishop of Munich, Gregor von Scherr .

Haneberg found a diocese led by Bishop Nikolaus von Weis in an exemplary manner for decades. In his first pastoral letter of September 14, 1872, he confessed that he had "lively feelings of shyness" when he heard of his "great successes" and the "blessings that he spread throughout the diocese during his 27-year ministry “Think. The new head shepherd built on this activity and worked - despite his scientific genius - above all as a tireless “pastoral bishop” and less through outstanding deeds.

When he took office, he affectionately greeted everyone, including non-Catholics, and invited them, like a professor, to exchange their opinions with him:

“It encourages me to have heard from many, even to some extent myself, that one of the predominant characteristics of the inhabitants of these beautiful districts is to love an open, free exchange of opinions. Well then, I will have nothing to fear from the attitudes of those who do not stand on the ground and in the unity of the church but see their public teachings and customs and speak out about them. Let them do it… We do not despise anyone, including those who have been separated from the Church, we wish the full blessing of Christianity, especially we wish the children of Israel living among us the knowledge of Jesus Christ as the true Son of God and Savior of the world. "

- Bishop Haneberg in his pastoral letter on taking office, September 14, 1872

When cholera raged in Speyer in 1873 and many deaths were to be mourned, the bishop and his secretary Domvikar Schwarz, cathedral pastor Dietrich Becker and the cathedral chaplain Konrad Busch (later bishop) and Friedrich Molz personally cared for the sick in the apartments despite the highest risk of infection and hospitals.

Although he was sickly, he did not spare himself. He traveled to the local churches. He felt sick many times and fainted several times as a result of the exertion. Domdekan Weiß once said to him, full of concern: "If you continue like this, we will only have you for 3 years."

On October 7, 1874, Bishop Haneberg accepted Queen Marie of Bavaria's conversion to the Catholic religion in Hohenschwangau Castle .

The priest- writer Sebastian Brunner , who was a friend of Haneberg, visited him in Speyer in September 1875. He reports very vividly how he was received by his friend or how he met him:

"Haneberg met me at the door of his room, with his peculiar, extremely friendly and benevolent smile, whereby he used to utter a few laughs through his nose with his mouth closed. I hadn't seen him since August 31, 1872, that is, for three years. At first glance he seemed emaciated and aged. The conversation was soon in the cheerful way ... In the afternoon I made with Haneberg a walk on the banks of the Rhine ... Haneberg had a black, tight-fitting, with a cingulate girded robe on. Now the tall, slender man seemed noticeably emaciated. "

Brunner was shocked by the bad appearance of his friend and confided in Professor Benedikt Weinhart, who was also present:

“For Haneberg the pastoral office is absolutely grueling, he consumes himself relentlessly, I have heard that during visitations he often preaches two or three times in one day, but all ideas are useless. In addition, worries, grief and annoyance in abundance. He looks bad. He can't possibly endure it for long. "

- Sebastian Brunner : Denkpfennige , 1886
Bishop Haneberg on his deathbed, 1876

In May 1876 the shepherd fell ill with pneumonia . The three attending physicians agreed that it was not the disease itself that would lead to probable death, but rather the lack of resistance and the generally weakened organism. It actually happened. Bishop Haneberg died on May 31, 1876, at 9:15 a.m. He had worn himself out ruthlessly in the service of the Diocese of Speyer.

The funeral took place on June 2nd in Speyer Cathedral. Over 200 clergymen, Bishops Wilhelm Emmanuel von Ketteler from Mainz, Franz Leopold von Leonrod from Eichstätt and Abbot Benedikt Zenetti (from Speyer and Haneberg's successor in the St. Bonifaz Abbey) took part in the funeral service. Haneberg's former student in Munich, Cathedral pastor Dietrich Becker , gave him the funeral sermon. It appeared in print and forms a separate chapter in A. Huth's Haneberg biography. The final passage read:

“And now you high cathedral of Speyer, in which so many emperors and church princes find their final rest, be a peaceful grave for your bishop, who can no longer offer the holy sacrifice in you. Draw your high arches over his undisturbed resting place until on last day his body will rise again and we will move into the transfiguration with him. "

- Dietrich Becker, funeral sermon for Bishop Haneberg, 1876

After Jakob Bisson's 7 Speyer bishops and their time , Wilhelm Redelberger, then the oldest priest of the Speyer diocese (1853–1949), was still able to freely quote this particularly impressive section in 1945 as an ear witness. Bisson further reports in his book that Bishop Ketteler, sitting under the pulpit, wept while listening to Becker's funeral sermon and agreed to his words by repeatedly nodding his head. Wilhelm Emmanuel von Ketteler also said at the time: "Oh, what does God mean with his church that he has stolen a bishop like Haneberg from it!"

An Alsatian clergyman who knew him well wrote about the deceased in Pilger :

"Haneberg was tall and awe inspiring in form, powerful in spirit, strong in word, humble in disposition, condescending in kindness, abundant in science, strict against himself and loving towards others."

- Pilgrim No. 27, Speyer, 1876

dig

The words from Sirach 50: 9 were chosen as the grave inscription, alluding to his imposing tall figure, his lofty, ambitious spirit and his pious zeal : "Like the scent of incense in the fire, like a cedar tree in Lebanon."

Empress Elisabeth of Austria , known as "Sisi", visited the Speyer Cathedral on April 28, 1883, accompanied by her daughter Marie Valerie and her sister Sophie and her husband, Duke Ferdinand von Alençon . The Empress had the grave of Bishop Haneberg, whom she valued, and knelt in front of it for prayer.

Works

  • History of the biblical revelation , Regensburg 1850
  • The religious antiquities of the Bible , Munich 1869
  • Illumination of Renan's Life of Jesus , Regensburg 1864
  • Gospel according to John, translated and explained , 2 volumes; Munich 1878/1880

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Fir ( Blaichach ) is often mentioned, but this is confused with fir. Tannen is correct with Lenzfried.
  2. ↑ Max Leitschuh (Ed.): The matriculations of the upper classes of the Wilhelmsgymnasium in Munich , Volume 4. CH Beck, Munich 1976, ISBN 3-406-10900-4 , p. 7.
  3. ↑ Carsten Wilke: The heirs of the Pharisees: Elias Grünebaum and his draft of a common history of Judaism and Christianity. In: Elias Grünebaum: The moral doctrine of Judaism in relation to other creeds: in addition to the historical evidence of the origin and importance of Pharisaism and its relationship to the founder of the Christian religion . After the 2nd edition, Strasbourg, 1878, ed. by Carsten Wilke. Böhlau Verlag, Cologne 2010, ISBN 978-3-412-20316-0 , p. 16.
  4. ↑ Jakob Baumann : Joseph Georg von Ehrler, Bishop of Speyer: A picture of life . Herder, Freiburg i. Br., 1911, DNB 57914898X , page 228.
predecessor Office successor
Konrad Reither Bishop of Speyer
1872–1876 		Joseph Georg von Ehrler
Utto Lang Abbot praeses of the Bavarian Benedictine Congregation
1870–1872 		Rupert Mutzl
Paulus Birker Abbot of Sankt Bonifaz, Munich
1854–1872 		Benedict Zenetti
personal data
SURNAME Haneberg, Daniel Bonifaz from
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Haneberg, Daniel Bonifacius von; Haneberg, Daniel Bonifazius from
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German bishop, abbot, theologian and orientalist
DATE OF BIRTH June 17, 1816
PLACE OF BIRTH Fir trees at Lenzfried
DATE OF DEATH May 31, 1876
Place of death Speyer