Johann Michael Dilherr

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Dilherr as professor in Jena, copper engraving from 1640

Johann Michael Dilherr (born October 14, 1604 in Themar ; † April 8, 1669 in Nuremberg ) was a Protestant theologian and philologist at the University of Jena and in Nuremberg.

biography

Dilherr as a Nuremberg pastor, contemporary copper engraving

From 1623 he studied at the universities of Jena , Leipzig , Wittenberg and Altdorf near Nuremberg . At this time he also took a position as court master of noble students. In 1630 he received his doctorate in theology in Jena, where he worked from 1631 as professor of eloquence and from 1634 as professor of history and poetry. In 1640 he was appointed associate professor for theology in Jena. In 1642 he was appointed by the City Council of Nuremberg to take over the office of preacher at the Church of St. Lorenz . From 1642 to 1644 he was the rectorate of the Nuremberg grammar school . At the same time, he was supposed to reform the school system as an overseer. In 1644 he married the widow Anna Maria Deschauer, who died in 1664. In 1646 he took over the office of preacher at the Sebalduskirche . Dilherr also worked as the Nuremberg city librarian. Its extensive library has been preserved.

personality

He was a very self-confident, even vain person. Everything he said he had printed. His list of writings is very extensive, but only a few works are really important. His wife was a wealthy merchant widow and he seems to have put all of her fortune into his lavishly designed books and his private library.

meaning

Dilherr was one of the central figures of Nuremberg in the middle of the 17th century, both as a clergyman and as a promoter of literature. He is regarded as a representative of the Irish direction of theology, which strives for a reconciliation of the denominations. His edification writings enjoyed great popularity among contemporaries and were imitated by others. Soon after taking office, he founded the Auditorium Publicum at the Egidiengymnasium and had talented students give public speeches there. He was closely related to the Pegnese Flower Order . He took the destitute student Johann Klaj into his household and promoted him as a poet, as did the orphaned Sigmund von Birken . When Georg Philipp Harsdörffer died in 1658, he gave the funeral speech. When Dilherr died in 1669, the flower shepherds wrote a large funeral pamphlet in his honor.

Dilherr's library of several thousand volumes is now stored in the regional church archive of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bavaria. His correspondence with many important personalities of the epoch, comprising several hundred letters, has also been preserved.

plant

As the first preacher at the most distinguished Nuremberg church, St. Sebald, Dilherr had many other official duties in addition to the Sunday and feast day devotions. Several hundred printed funeral sermons from his hand are known. Almost all sermons from the Nuremberg era have been published, many in bulky collections, some in multiple editions. Dilherr had many of his works decorated with poems by well-known writers in Nuremberg and illustrated by artists such as Jacob von Sandrart . The poets involved include Harsdörffer , Johann Christoph Arnschwanger and especially Birken , who contributed well over 500 songs and devotional poems to his writings and designed emblems for them.

Works (selection)

  • Vitia Linguarum Praecipua , Jena 1640 ( digitized in the digital library Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania)
  • Christian Good Friday observation , Nuremberg 1642 ( digitized in the digital library Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania)
  • Confessio Augustana , 1643
  • Path to Bliss , Erbauungsbuch, 1646 (13 editions until 1752)
  • Evangelical closing rhymes , set to music by Johann Erasmus Kindermann , 1652
  • Holy Week , Sermons, 1653
  • Spiritual Wailing House, or Christian Funeral Sermons , 1655
  • Honor of Marriage , Illustrated Marriage Doctrine, 1662
  • Holy epistolic report , 2-part volume 1663/1661 ( digitized version )
  • Heart and soul food , Postille, 1661 (2nd edition 1663 with 450 poems by Birkens )
  • Three-permanent Sunday and feast day emblemata , ed. by D. Peil, Hildesheim 1994

literature

List of works and references

  • Gerhard Dünnhaupt : "Johann Michael Dilherr (1604–1669)", in: Personal bibliographies on the prints of the Baroque , vol. 2. Stuttgart: Hiersemann 1990, pp. 1256–1367. ISBN 3-7772-9027-0

Web links

Commons : Johann Michael Dilherr  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The library of the regional church archive ( Memento from October 26, 2013 in the Internet Archive )
personal data
SURNAME Dilherr, Johann Michael
BRIEF DESCRIPTION theologian
DATE OF BIRTH October 14, 1604
PLACE OF BIRTH Nuremberg
DATE OF DEATH April 8, 1669
Place of death Nuremberg