Eugenios Voulgaris

Eugenios Voulgaris, Greek theologian, scholar and Archbishop of Kherson, Ukraine.

Eugenios Voulgaris (born August 10, 1716 in Corfu as Eleftherios Voulgaris , † June 12, 1806 in Saint Petersburg ) was a Greek monk (1739 adopting the name Eugenios), theologian , philosopher and writer of the early Enlightenment .

Life

After studying in Arta , Ioannina and Padua, he was a teacher in Ioannina and Kozani from 1742 , from 1753 head of the academy on Mount Athos at the Vatopedi monastery until its closure in 1759 and then temporarily head of the Patriarchal School in Constantinople . In 1763 he went to Leipzig , where he lived in the Greek House, and via Berlin at the invitation of Tsarina Katharina II. In 1771 to St. Petersburg. From 1775 to 1787 he was bishop , then until 1801 Archbishop of Kherson .

Voulgaris was one of the most important Greek enlighteners , scholars and theologians of his time. Strictly orthodox himself, he was committed to conveying the ideas of the European Enlightenment, especially in the Greek-influenced environment. He translated works by John Locke , Voltaire and Christian Wolff . One of his pupils was Christodoulos Pamplekis .

In the Greek language question , Voulgaris pleaded for a high-level language that was based on ancient Greek , and was thus an opponent of both Adamantios Korais ' and the representative of the Dimotiki . But he himself translated Voltaire's Memnon into modern Greek colloquial language.

literature

• Stephen K. Batalden: Catherine II's Greek Prelate. Eugenios Voulgaris in Russia, 1771–1806 (=  East European Monographs . Volume 115 ). Columbia University Press et al. a., New York NY u. a. 1983, ISBN 0-88033-006-6 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Maria A. Stassinopoulou, Ioannis Zelepos (ed.): Greek culture in Southeast Europe in the modern age (= Byzantina et Neograeca Vindobonensia. Vol. 26). Contributions to the symposium in Memoriam Gunnar Hering (Vienna, December 16-18, 2004). Publishing house of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, Vienna 2008, ISBN 978-3-7001-3829-7 , p. 170.