Eduard Lenz

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Eduard Lenz (born June 18, 1901 in Bad Brückenau , † November 8, 1945 near Omsk ) was a German priest of the Christian community and writer.

Life

Eduard Lenz, who grew up in a “strict Catholic family”, attended the humanistic grammar schools in Erlangen and Würzburg and graduated from the Maximiliansgymnasium in Munich . Then he began an apprenticeship as a bookseller and studied at the University of Munich ; one of his fellow students was Werner Heisenberg . He was also a leading member of the Wandervogel movement.

In 1922 he took part in the establishment of the Christian community and was ordained a priest. In 1925 he was sent to Prague by Friedrich Rittelmeyer , learned Czech and built the first Slavic community there. From 1934 he worked in Dresden ; In 1938 he was appointed "Lenker" and accepted into the seven-member management committee of the Christian Community - the so-called "Seven Circle". He was now often in Berlin to negotiate with the Nazi leadership about the persecution and the threatened ban on the Christian community.

After the ban, he was imprisoned there at Pentecost in 1941, and all his books and manuscripts were confiscated by the Gestapo . Briefly submerged after his release, he was drafted into the Wehrmacht in 1942 and sent to the Eastern Front . In May 1945 he was taken prisoner by the Soviets and came to a Siberian coal mine via Auschwitz . From there, exhausted and put in a cattle wagon to be transported home, he died on the way and was buried near Omsk.

Eduard Lenz had been married to the anthroposophical storyteller and researcher Friedel Lenz (1897–1970) since 1920; they had four children, two of whom died in Dresden in March 1945 and their son Johannes (* 1927) also became a priest and “head of the community” in the Christian community.

Works

  • Opponent of Christianity. On the godless movement , Verlag der Christengemeinschaft, Stuttgart 1932.
  • Departure for religious renewal. Letters and essays , ed. by Friedel Lenz, Urachhaus, Stuttgart 1959.
    • extended new edition as: Lived Future. Articles, letters, documents , ed. by Johannes Lenz, Urachhaus, Stuttgart 1982.
  • Reflections on the Gospel of Matthew. Studies on Composition and Initiation in the First Gospel , ed. by Johannes Lenz, Urachhaus, Stuttgart 1990.

literature

  • Rudolf F. Gädeke: Eduard Lenz , in: The Founders of the Christian Community, Verlag am Goetheanum (Pioneers of Anthroposophy 10), Dornach 1992, pp. 440–451.
  • Ellen Huidekoper: In silver darkness. Eduard Lenz - A life in the upheavals of the twentieth century , Urachhaus, Stuttgart 2003, ISBN 3-8251-7384-4 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Afterword by Johannes Lenz in reflections on the Gospel of Matthew , p. 139 f.
personal data
SURNAME Lenz, Eduard
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German priest, anthroposophist and writer
DATE OF BIRTH June 18, 1901
PLACE OF BIRTH Bad Brueckenau
DATE OF DEATH November 8, 1945
Place of death Omsk