Gustav Siewerth

Gustav Siewerth (born May 28, 1903 in Hofgeismar ; † October 5, 1963 in Trient , Italy ) was a German philosopher and educator . Gustav Siewerth was considered an expert on the life and work of Thomas Aquinas and managed to build a pedagogical bridge to his teachers Martin Honecker and Martin Heidegger .

Life

After graduating from the Lessing Gymnasium in Frankfurt in 1922, he first studied philosophy and psychology at the University of Frankfurt . In 1924 he reached his " Philosophicum " at the Theological Seminary in Fulda . From 1926 to 1930 he studied philosophy, art history and history with Martin Honecker , Martin Heidegger and Edmund Husserl at the Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg . Among his fellow students at Professor Honecker were Max Müller , Eugen Seiterich and Karl Rahner . In 1930 he was promoted to Dr. phil. with the doctoral thesis The metaphysics of knowledge by Thomas Aquinas in Freiburg doctorate . After a research assignment from the Research Association of German Science on the subject of "The Thought of God in the Development of the Younger Hegel", Gustav Siewerth received in 1932 the habilitation permit from the University of Frankfurt am Main. In 1933 his habilitation and his appointment as professor at the Lyceum Hosianum in Braunsberg failed due to the political situation in 1933. Finally, Gustav Siewert completed his habilitation in 1937 with the habilitation thesis The Apriority of Knowledge as a Unified Basis of Philosophical Systematics according to Thomas Aquinas at the University of Freiburg . Nevertheless, he was denied the transfer of a lectureship. He was also not awarded the post of editor-in-chief. He had been denied another university career for political reasons. He bridged his inner emigration in the Third Reich with an industrial activity at the wire association in Düsseldorf and at the Düsseldorfer Mannesmannröhren-Werke .

Gustav Siewerth was appointed professor of philosophy and pedagogy as well as director at the Pädagogische Hochschule Rheinland , Aachen department, in 1945 - after approval by the military government - which later became part of the affiliation of the various pedagogical universities with the scientific universities of North Rhine-Westphalia was transferred to RWTH Aachen University with effect from April 1, 1980 . His philosophical worldview - a kind of Christian metaphysics  - was inspired by the ideas of Thomas Aquinas , which he wanted to expand with regard to Martin Heidegger and, in his early work, also to Hegel . In 1961 Gustav Siewerth became the founding rector and professor of education at the University of Education in Freiburg im Breisgau .

Siewerth died on October 5, 1963 during a conference of the Görres Society in Trento ; he was buried in the Bergäcker cemetery in Freiburg- Littenweiler .

literature

• Franz Pöggeler : Inwardness and Education. In Memoriam Gustav Siewerth. For the conversation between education, philosophy and theology. , Herder-Verlag, Freiburg, 1964
• Michael Schulz:  Siewerth, Gustav Franz. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 24, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-428-11205-0 , p. 394 f. ( Digitized version ).
• Johannes Schaber:  Siewerth, Gustav. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 15, Bautz, Herzberg 1999, ISBN 3-88309-077-8 , Sp. 1281-1297.
• Jan Bentz: Being and the history of being by Gustav Siewerth , Patrimonium-Verlag , Aachen 2018, ISBN 978-3-86417-112-3 .

Honors

Siewerth's student Alma von Stockhausen founded the Gustav Siewerth Academy named after him in 1988 .

Web links

• Literature by and about Gustav Siewerth in the catalog of the German National Library
• Gustav Siewerth Society
• Bibliography on the website of the University of Freiburg
• CV on the website of the University of Freiburg