Hans Lassen Martensen

Hans Lassen Martensen,
1808–1884

Hans Magnus Lassen

Hans Lassen Martensen (born August 9, 1808 in Flensburg , † February 4, 1884 in Copenhagen ) was a Danish theologian and Lutheran bishop of Zealand (Denmark) .

Life

Martensen's father, the seaman and later writer Hans Andersen Martensen (1782-1822), moved to Copenhagen in 1817 , where Martensen attended high school in Nørrebro and studied Protestant theology from 1827 . A particularly influential teacher was Henrik Nicolai Clausen .

His trip abroad from 1834 to 1836 took him to Berlin (heard from Philipp Konrad Marheineke and Henrich Steffens ), Heidelberg ( Karl Daub ; specialization in Meister Eckhart and Dante ), Munich ( Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling , Franz Xaver von Baader ), Vienna (friendship to the poet Nikolaus Lenau , from which the treatise on Lenaus Faust (1836) grew, Martensen's first writing) and Paris (meeting with the Danish writer Johan Ludvig Heiberg and his wife, the actress Johanne Luise Heiberg ). On a later trip to Kiel (1839) Martensen met Isaak August Dorner , with whom he was to be in lively correspondence from now on.

Returned to Copenhagen he received his doctorate in 1837 for licentiate of theology in 1838 and 1840 lecturer Associate Professor. It was here that his influential textbooks on moral philosophy and dogmatics were created , with which he became one of the main representatives of mediation theology . In 1845 he was appointed court preacher (part-time) by King Christian VIII and in 1850 he was promoted to full professor. From 1854 until his death he worked as Bishop of Zealand (Sjælland) and thus primate of the ( Lutheran ) Danish People's Church .

Martensen's funeral sermon for his predecessor in the episcopate Jacob Peter Mynster , in which he described him as an “irreplaceable” bishop and “real witness to the truth”, prompted Søren Kierkegaard to make his last sharp attack on the Danish state church. A bitter opponent of Martensen was also the Icelandic theologian Magnús Eiríksson (1806–1881), who lived in Copenhagen .

Major works

De autonomia conscientiæ sui humanæ, in theologiam dogmaticam nostri temporis introducta. Licentiate dispute. Copenhagen 1837. (Danish: Den Menneskelige Selvbevidstheds Autonomie i before Tids dogmatic theology. Copenhagen 1841. German: The autonomy of human self-consciousness in dogmatic theology of our time. Kiel 1844).
Mester Eckart: et Bidrag til at oplyse Middelalderen's mysticism. Copenhagen 1840.
Grundrids til moral philosophy system. Copenhagen 1841. 3rd edition 1879.
The Christian Daab is with Hensyn paa det Baptistiske Spørgsmaal. Copenhagen 1843. (German: Christian baptism. Gotha 1844. 2nd edition 1860).
Christian dogmatics. Copenhagen 1849. 4th edition 1881. (German: Die Christian Dogmatik. 3rd edition. Leipzig 1886).
Til Erindring om JP Mynster. Copenhagen 1855.
The Christian ethics. 2 volumes. Copenhagen 1871–1878 (German edition organized by the author: Die Christliche Ethik. 2 volumes. Rudolf Besser, Gotha 1878; 5th edition. Karlsruhe 1887).
Catholicism and Protestantism. Et leilighedsskrift. Copenhagen 1874.
Af with Levnet. Meddelelser. Autobiography. 3 volumes. Copenhagen 1882–1883 (German: From my life. 3 volumes. Karlsruhe 1883–1884).
Correspondence with Isaak August Dorner . 2 volumes. Berlin 1887.
Sermon collection. Gotha 1859.
Jacob Bøhme . Leipzig 1882.

literature

Hans Hohlwein: Martensen, Hans Lassen. In: RGG. Volume 4. Col. 777-778.
Friedrich Wilhelm Graf : Martensen, Hans Lassen. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 5, Bautz, Herzberg 1993, ISBN 3-88309-043-3 , Sp. 894-901. ( Article / beginning of article in Internet archive )
Friedrich Wilhelm Graf: Martensen, Hans Lassen. In: RGG . Volume 5. 2002, Col. 856.
Curtis L. Thompson: Following the Cultured Public's Chosen One. Why Martensen Mattered to Kierkegaard . Museum Tusculanum Press, Copenhagen 2008, ISBN 978-87-635-1097-4
Curtis L. Thompson: Hans Lassen Martensen: a speculative theologian determining the agenda of the day . In: Jon Stewart (Ed.): Kierkegaard and his Danish Contemporaries… Tome II: Theology . Ashgate, Aldershot 2009, ISBN 978-0-7546-6873-2 , pp. 229-266
Jon Stewart (Ed.): Hans Lassen Martensen. Theologian, Philosopher and Social Critic. Museum Tusculanum Press, Copenhagen 2011, ISBN 978-87-635-3169-6
Thorsten Wagner: Martensen, Hans Lassen. In: Wolfgang Benz (Hrsg.): Handbuch des Antisemitismus. Hostility to Jews in the past and present . Vol. 2/2: People L – Z. De Gruyter Saur, Berlin 2009, ISBN 978-3-598-24072-0 , p. 523f.

Web links

Commons : Hans Lassen Martensen - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

^ C. With: Martensen, Hans Andersen . In: Carl Frederik Bricka (Ed.): Dansk biografisk Lexikon. Tillige omfattende Norge for Tidsrummet 1537-1814. 1st edition. tape 11 : Maar – Müllner . Gyldendalske Boghandels Forlag, Copenhagen 1897, p. 160 (Danish, runeberg.org ).
↑ See correspondence between Martensen and Dorner 1839–1981. 2 volumes. Berlin 1888.
↑ See the section “The Persecution of the Baptists” in the article on Magnús Eiríksson .

predecessor	Office	successor
Jacob Peter Mynster	Bishop of Zealand 1854 - 1884	Bruun Juul Fog

personal data
SURNAME	Martensen, Hans Lassen
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	Danish theologian
DATE OF BIRTH	August 9, 1808
PLACE OF BIRTH	Flensburg
DATE OF DEATH	February 4, 1884
Place of death	Copenhagen

[1] C. With: Martensen, Hans Andersen . In: Carl Frederik Bricka (Ed.): Dansk biografisk Lexikon. Tillige omfattende Norge for Tidsrummet 1537-1814. 1st edition. tape 11 : Maar – Müllner . Gyldendalske Boghandels Forlag, Copenhagen 1897, p. 160 (Danish, runeberg.org ).

[2] See correspondence between Martensen and Dorner 1839–1981. 2 volumes. Berlin 1888.

[3] See the section “The Persecution of the Baptists” in the article on Magnús Eiríksson .