Ekkehard W. Stegemann

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Ekkehard Wilhelm Stegemann (born November 8, 1945 in Barkhausen (Porta Westfalica) ) is a German Protestant theologian . He worked as a professor of the New Testament . His focus was on social history, theology of Paul , Jewish studies and Zionism . He campaigns against anti-Semitism and against Christian anti-Judaism in theology, church and society.

Live and act

Career

Ekkehard W. Stegemann is one of five children of master lathe operator Willi Stegemann and his wife Martha (née Nehlmeyer). His twin brother is the professor emeritus for New Testament Wolfgang Stegemann .

After graduating from the Friedrichs-Gymnasium Herford on February 25, 1965, he studied Protestant theology at the Bethel Church University and from the winter semester 1966/1967 at the theological faculty of the Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg , where he passed the faculty examination on May 13, 1970 .

After being employed as a full-time religion teacher at the Kurpfalz-Gymnasium in Mannheim, he was a research assistant at the theological faculty of Heidelberg University from 1971 to 1982. He was named Dr. in 1974 with a thesis on the Gospel of Mark. theol. PhD. In 1982, he was at the same university habilitation . Neither the doctoral thesis nor the habilitation thesis appeared in print. Shortly after his habilitation, he was appointed Professor of Biblical Theology at the University of Bayreuth and since 1985 he has been Professor of the New Testament at the University of Basel . One of his predecessors was the New Testament scholar Karl Ludwig Schmidt , who had to flee Germany because of his resistance against the Nazis, but from whom anti-Semitic statements have also been passed down.

On their 60th birthday Ekkehard W. Stegemann and his brother Wolfgang Stegemann were honored with a two-volume festschrift.

Stegemann remained in his professorship until he was 68. He intervened in his successor at the University of Basel by publicly criticizing the appointment process. The President of the Church Council of Basel Lukas Kundert also raised objections to the procedure. On December 9, 2013, he was adopted from his office at an international symposium. He was presented with a commemorative publication.

Research approaches

Stegemann's research interests are the social history of early Christianity, the theology of Paul , anti-Semitism, Christian anti-Judaism, the history of Zionism and Jewish studies.

Already in his dissertation , Stegemann demanded that New Testament exegesis not only face historical truth, but also take the Shoah into account. In his postdoctoral thesis, he proposes that Paul himself fought against the emerging Christian anti-Judaism. His work is shaped by the idea that historical and theological research has to make a contribution to dealing with anti-Semitism and anti-Judaism.

Stegemann is co-editor of the Theological Commentary on the New Testament series , the magazine Church and Israel . and the Biblical Encyclopedia . As co-editor of the Theological Commentary, he advocates an interpretation of the Bible that takes into account the Jewish background of the New Testament scriptures and works through the anti-Jewish history of interpretation. In the editorial team of the magazine Kirche und Israel, he works together with his brother Wolfgang Stegemann to ensure that articles are published that defend the politics of the State of Israel. The American lawyer and pro-Israeli political activist Alan M. Dershowitz also published an article there. The boundaries between Stegemann's scientific and theological work as a theology professor and his commitment to the State of Israel are not always clearly visible, especially when he speaks out in church debates. According to Stegemann, the theological Kairos-Palestine document of Palestinian Christians is “a pamphlet against Israel disguised under a pious guise” and serves to “defame and delegitimize Israel in the style of Hamas / Fatah”. The “Bethlehem Call” of the Christian Palestine Israel Ecumenical Forum, which is being disseminated in the World Council of Churches and in the Swiss churches, is nothing more than an “anti-Semitic pamphlet”.

Public effectiveness

Stegemann is committed to the State of Israel and Zionism. He addresses the public with public letters, opinion articles and letters to the editor and is a leader in various media organizations. In 2002 he was appointed President of the Swiss-Jewish Media Forum by the Swiss Association of Israelites (SIG) , whose task it was to accompany the Swiss media reporting on Israel. The fact that a Christian theology professor had taken over this office was considered a novelty in Swiss history. After the media forum was dissolved in 2004, Stegemann became involved in the successor organization Media Watch, which ceased its activities in 2008. Stegemann is now President of the private Audiatur Foundation, which claims to want to contribute to a differentiated view of the Middle East conflict on the basis of its commitment to the State of Israel. There he worked with the communications consultant Sacha Wigdorovits , who is considered a "PR professional for dubious cases". The editor-in-chief of the Swiss daily "Der Bund", Artur K. Vogel , who was the Middle East correspondent for the Tages-Anzeiger from 1988 to 1996 , describes Audiatur-Online as a "pro-Israel propaganda website". Audiatur online regularly accepts contributions from the US think tank Gatestone Institute. The institute, which is financed by US billionaires, is repeatedly accused of being anti-Islamic and pro-Israeli false reports.

In this activity as an active observer of the media, Stegemann repeatedly drew severe criticism from liberal Jewish Swiss. In the summer of 2006, Matthias Hagemann, publisher of the Basler Zeitung , criticized the "aggressive lobbying work of that informal networked group ... to which a Christian theology professor teaching in Basel belongs at the forefront". Stegemann then sued Hagemann for "violation of personal rights", but without success. On December 7, 2007, Yves Kugelmann , the editor-in-chief of the Jewish weekly newspaper Tachles , accused Stegemann of having co-founded a “system of intransparency”. Stegemann then reported the Jewish weekly magazine Tachles to the Swiss press council. The latter rejected Stegemann's complaint.

On July 9, 2010, the Zürcher Tages-Anzeiger reported that Stegemann had personally insulted the Israel correspondent of Swiss television, André Marty. In September 2010 he defended his brother Wolfgang Stegemann's statements about Palestinians in Gaza to the Palestine Portal.

On December 13, 2010, Stegemann, former German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt and former Federal President Richard von Weizsäcker, as "former German Wehrmacht officers" , denied the moral legitimation to express their views on Israeli politics. In February 2012, Stegemann and his brother Wolfgang sharply attacked the Baden regional bishop Ulrich Fischer in an open letter. Fischer defended the winner of the Aachen Peace Prize 2008 and the German Media Prize 2011, the Palestinian pastor Mitri Raheb from Bethlehem, against criticism from the Coordination Council for Christians and Jews (KJC) and the German Israeli Society . In the summer of 2012, Stegemann filed a lawsuit against the Swiss Protestant Churches' aid organization (HEKS) with the Federal Foundation Supervisory Authority. In a full-page advertisement in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung (NZZ), the aid organization praised the Swiss retail group Migros for its move to label the products that are produced in the areas occupied by Israel with “West Bank, Israeli settlement area” or “East Jerusalem, Israeli settlement area »To mark. The lawsuit was denied. In December 2014, Stegemann, in association with a Christian-Jewish working group, of which he is honorary president, accused the Swiss Protestant Churches (HEKS) of supporting the Israeli non-governmental organization Zochrot (Hebrew for “commemorate”), because it was critical of Israel. Stegemann also contributed to the suspension of the peace researcher Johan Galtung , winner of the alternative Nobel Peace Prize, from the Basel World Peace Academy (WPA). The director of the WPA, Professor Dietrich Fischer, who also resigned in August 2012, describes this process as an “encroachment on academic freedom”.

In May 2013 he and his brother Wolfgang accused the World Council of Churches (WCC) of “anti-Israeli anti-Semitism”. The WCC had called for "free and pro-active livelihoods" for Christians in the countries of the Middle East, pointing out the dire situation of Palestinian Christians in Israel and in the occupied territories. The general secretary of the WCC, Olav Fykse Tveit , rejected the criticism as unfounded and questioned how the two professors emeritus had dealt with the accusation of anti-Semitism. Professors Ekkehard W. Stegemann and Wolfgang Stegemann justify their accusation of anti-Semitism towards the World Council of Churches (ÖKR) in an article in the magazine Kirche und Israel (2.2013).

In August 2013, the Audiatur Foundation, of which Stegemann is president, prepared the letter templates for an organized protest action by the Switzerland-Israel society and the pro-Israel groups linked to it, about the renewed appointment of the Israel-critical sociology professor Jean Ziegler as the representative of Switzerland at the UN - Prevent Human Rights Council.

His criticism of Rudolf Steiner's literature received a great deal of attention .

Honors

  • Lady Davis Professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (2000/2001)
  • Gold medal "For Distinguished Leadership and Service for Humanity" from the European B'nai B'rith

Memberships

  • Society of New Testament Studies
  • Society of Biblical Literature
  • Foundation for Jewish Studies at the University of Basel (President)
  • Christian-Jewish Working Group of the Two Basels (President)
  • Board of Trustees of the CJP Christian Jewish Projects
  • Member of the Presidium of the Swiss-Jewish Media Forum (2002–2004)
  • Advisor to Media Watch of the Swiss Association of Israelites (SIG) (2004–2006)
  • President of the Audiatur Foundation
  • Member of the board of Tamach: The psychosocial counseling center for Holocaust survivors and their relatives in Switzerland

Publications (selection)

  • The Gospel of Mark as a call to discipleship. Heidelberg, Univ., Theol. Fak., Diss. 1974, 354 pp.
  • One God and one humanity. Israel's election and the redemption of Jews and Gentiles according to Romans. Heidelberg, Univ., Habil.-Schr., 1982, 325 pp.
  • 100 years of Zionism. About the realization of a vision. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 2000, ISBN 3-17-015577-6 .
  • Early Christian social history. The beginnings in Judaism and the Christ churches in the Mediterranean world. Together with Wolfgang Stegemann. 2nd edition, Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 1997 (first edition 1995), ISBN 3-17-015099-5 .
  • Paul and the world. Essays. TVZ, Zurich 2005.
  • The Letter to the Romans: Focal Points of Reception. Essays. TVZ, Zurich 2012.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. E. Stegemann: The Gospel of Mark as a call to the discipleship. Heidelberg, Univ., Theol. Fak., Diss. 1974, 354 pp.
  2. E. Stegemann: The one God and the one humanity. Israel's election and the redemption of Jews and Gentiles according to Romans. Heidelberg, Univ., Habil.-Schr., 1982, 325 pp.
  3. ^ Andreas Mühling: Karl Ludwig Schmidt. Berlin 1997 (Works on Church History 66), pp. 9–11.
  4. Contexts of Scripture . Stuttgart, 2005. Vol. 1. G. Gelardini (ed.): Text, Ethics, Judaism and Christianity, Society , Vol. 2. C. Strecker (ed.): Culture, politics, religion, language - text
  5. M. Mercier, theologians check applicants again, bz basel ( Memento from August 22, 2013 in the Internet Archive ), August 20, 2013
  6. C. Rácz, spat to professors selection in the Faculty of Theology, srf Wednesday, July 17, 2013
  7. C. Tuor-Kurth / L. Kundert (eds.): Erlesenes Jerusalem, Basel 2013
  8. ^ Ekkehard W. Stegemann: Paulus und die Welt , Zurich 2005.
  9. ^ Rolf Rendtorff , EW Stegemann (ed.): Auschwitz - Crisis of Christian Theology. A series of lectures, in: Treatises on Christian-Jewish Dialogue 10, Munich 1980.
  10. E. Stegemann: The Gospel of Mark as a call to the discipleship. Diss. Heidelberg 1974, p. II: "Only a contemporary interpreter will not only have to face this historical truth, but also have to consider the unfortunate history of Christian anti-Judaism, which imposes a frightening context on the antipharisean polemics of the Gospel of Mark."
  11. E. Stegemann: The one God and the one humanity. Israel's election and the redemption of Jews and Gentiles according to Romans. Habil. Univ. Heidelberg, S. XVIII: "It is the incipient theological anti-Judaism in the (pagan) church that Paul, I think, wants to overcome with the letter to the Romans."
  12. ^ Church and Israel
  13. kohlhammer.de ( Memento from September 5, 2012 in the web archive archive.today )
  14. ^ Church and Israel
  15. ^ Alan M. Dershowitz: WikiLeaks and the Goldstone Report. In: Church and Israel. 1/2011.
  16. World Council of Churches 2009 ( Memento of November 2, 2012 in the Internet Archive )
  17. Eckehard Stegemann, Die böse Saat geht auf, in Audiatur-Online on January 31, 2012
  18. vice versa 1/2012 (PDF; 850 kB)
  19. Eckehard Stegemann, Die böse Saat geht auf, in Audiatur-Online on January 31, 2012
  20. ^ NZZ on Sunday, May 28, 2002
  21. SIG Annual Report 2003, p. 13.
  22. ^ Swiss history online
  23. Tages-Anzeiger, May 1, 2008: "Umbrella organization of Jews blocking themselves" ( Memento from July 13, 2012 in the web archive archive.today )
  24. Audiatur Foundation,
  25. ^ Artur K. Vogel: "Perspektiven": Communication crisis, Der Bund, August 18, 2012
  26. David Vonplon, The PR professional for dubious cases, November 10, 2009, Tages-Anzeiger
  27. ^ Artur K. Vogel: "Perspektiven": Propagandakrieg, Der Bund on August 4, 2012
  28. Article from Gatestone in audiatur online
  29. Gatestone Institute website
  30. Danijel Majic, The Myths of the Right. Vandalized facts, Frankfurter Rundschau, April 1, 2016
  31. ^ Yves Kugelmann, tachles v. December 7, 2007
  32. ^ Yves Kugelmann, tachles v. December 7, 2007
  33. (Stegemann c. "Tachles") Statement by the Swiss Press Council of January 23, 2009
  34. Tages-Anzeiger, July 9, 2010: “Theology professor offends SF reporters” .
  35. Palestine Portal: The "Christian" Thoughts of Prof. Ekkehard Stegemann.
  36. ^ E. Stegemann's online letter to the editor from December 13, 2010.
  37. ^ Audiatur Online March 10, 2012
  38. ^ Epd Landesdienst Südwest, March 2, 2012 ( Memento from May 5, 2012 in the Internet Archive )
  39. reformiert.info on July 27, 2012 ( Memento from January 4, 2014 in the Internet Archive )
  40. Interview with E. Stegemann on the occasion of his retirement, bz on December 9, 2013
  41. ^ Zochrot Remembering
  42. Simon Hehli: “House noise among Reformed people because of aid organizations critical of Israel”, NZZ January 23, 2015
  43. Renato Beck, Galtung case: Did the university and the Basel government exert impermissible pressure ?, weekday on August 22, 2012
  44. ^ E. and W. Stegemann: "Luthers Erben", in: Jüdische Allgemeine, June 13, 2013
  45. On the Christian Presence in the Middle East
  46. ^ Jüdische Allgemeine, June 17, 2013
  47. [1]
  48. C. Mueller: Kesseltreiben against Jean Ziegler , Sunday, August 18, 2013. In: sperber info.
  49. C. Brönnimann: Commoners want to stop Ziegler , August 16, 2013. In: Tages-Anzeiger.
  50. Anti-Jewish stereotypes in the anthroposophical tradition? First in: Donnerstaghefte, Vol. 3. Alte Synagoge (Essen), 2000. ISBN 3924384347 . Out of stock
  51. Interview with Prof. E. Stegemann. In Jüdische Rundschau .
  52. Christian Jewish Projects (CJP) ( Memento from January 24, 2012 in the Internet Archive )
  53. ^ Audiatur Foundation
  54. Tamach