Georg Gustav Roskoff

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Georg Gustav Roskoff (born August 31, 1814 in Preßburg , † October 20, 1889 in Obertressen near Aussee , Styria) was an Austrian Protestant theologian , professor of Old Testament exegesis and a councilor and councilor. His main work was the historical development of dualism and the cultural-historical representation of the devil's ideas from the beginnings of mankind to the 18th century. He wrote this down in the standard work "The Devil's Story". Georg Gustav Roskoff came under fire when he took up the heavily controversial figure of nine million witch burnings , which was recorded by Gottfried Christian Voigt , and helped it to spread (this figure is considered outdated).

Life

After the Lyceum in Preßburg, Roskoff attended the law academy there and, after passing his legal examination, worked as an educator in the count's house of Raday for three years. He matriculated in Halle in 1839 and studied philosophy and theology. After Hegel's death, the university had become the academic headquarters of conservative Hegelianism . Johann Eduard Erdmann introduced him to Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel's philosophy of religion, which had a lasting impact on Roskoff's theology.

From Halle he went to Vienna and graduated from the Protestant theological faculty with the faculty examination. In 1846, on the recommendation of a paid private lecturer, he became an "assistant" for biblical exegesis. Just one year later, he was given the orphaned chair of the Old Testament subject as a substitute. The consistory praised his "precision of presentation, decisiveness of conviction, sharpness of mind, liveliness of lectures" and in 1850 appointed him professor for Old Testament exegesis. By order of July 12, 1850, he received the Ordinariate for the Old Testament and Biblical Archeology. In 1852 the Heidelberg faculty awarded him an honorary theological doctorate. From 1861 Roskoff also read ethics and held the Dean's office four times until his retirement in 1884 . His services were honored with his appointment to the Austrian teaching council and in 1869 with his appointment to the government council. Eventually Roskoff was awarded the Order of the Iron Crown , with the right to elevation to the knighthood, but which he did not make use of and preferred to remain in the civil status. In Vienna, Georg Gustav Roskoff was a member of the presbytery and in the municipal council of the orphans' welfare association, which he helped to establish.

Roskoff was a patron of the Transylvanian writer Michael Albert , whom he accompanied for many years in his literary works.

Works

  • The Hebrew Antiquities in Letters , Vienna 1857
  • The Samson question about its origin, form, etc. Meaning u. the Heracles myth , Leipzig 1860
  • Story of the devil. A cultural-historical satanology from the beginnings to the 18th century , Leipzig 1869 ISBN 978-3937229690 digitized version
  • The religious system of the rudest indigenous peoples , Leipzig 1880 digitized

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Nine Million Witches - Origins, Tradition, and Criticism of a Popular Myth
  2. ^ Paul Feine:  Roskoff, Georg Gustav . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 53, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1907, pp. 498-500.
  3. ^ Helge Dvorak: Biographical Lexicon of the German Burschenschaft. Volume II: Artists. Winter, Heidelberg 2018, ISBN 978-3-8253-6813-5 , p. 5.
personal data
SURNAME Roskoff, Georg Gustav
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian, Protestant theologian
DATE OF BIRTH August 31, 1814
PLACE OF BIRTH Bratislava
DATE OF DEATH October 20, 1889
Place of death Obertressen near Aussee , Styria