Heinrich Gottlieb Schellhaffer

Heinrich Gottlieb Schellhaffer (born July 15, 1707 in Leipzig , † September 29, 1757 in Hamburg ) was a German philosopher , poet and professor of practical philosophy .

biography

Heinrich Gottlieb Schellhaffer was born the son of a wine tavern. Due to his talent, which was noticeable even in childhood, and the resulting support from Leipzig scholars, he was able to train at the Johanneum in Hamburg and then at the Academic Gymnasium . The quickly established friendship with Johann Richey (1706–1738), the son of the well-known professor Michael Richey , certainly contributed to Schellhaffer's support. So he was able to live in the house of Rector Huebner during his training. After successfully completing school, he studied law in Leipzig, which Schellhaffer completed in 1728 with a master's degree and a year later with a doctorate. In 1729 he joined the Leipzig German Society . From then on Schellhaffer taught in Leipzig as a private lecturer , from 1738 as a doctor of law. In 1742 the opportunity arose in Hamburg to succeed Joachim Dietrich Evers at the Academic Gymnasium as professor of practical philosophy . On October 18, 1742 he began his office with a speech "de sapiente Stoicorum optimi civis exemplo". Schellhaffer worked here for the last 15 years of his life alongside philosophical greats such as Michael Richey and Hermann Samuel Reimarus . During this time he gained the highest reputation far beyond the Hanseatic city. On June 11, 1743, Schellhaffer married Theta Catharina Hanneken, the eldest daughter of the famous Hamburg doctor Meno Hanneken . His sudden death was generally regretted among contemporary scholars: On September 29, 1757, Schellhaffer died of a stroke in Hamburg.

Work and meaning

Schellhaffer's diverse training, diverse relationships and the formative environment of two major cities led to the development of a particularly competent personality who responded sensitively to the difficult situation of the Enlightenment . The actual time of Schellhaffer's work began in Hamburg. He naturally benefited from the fact that he had already lived there as a teenager, knew the circumstances and was able to gain a foothold immediately with his rich experience from his time in Leipzig. Schellhaffer's main area of ​​expertise, rhetoric , made him the most important supplier of speeches for prominent occasions for the Senate of the Hanseatic city. Here he worked in close association with well-known Hamburg personalities such as the Syndici Petrus Amsingk and Jacob Schuback . At the Academic Gymnasium, Schellhaffer clearly distanced himself from Reimarus' thinking that was critical of religion and tried to strike a middle path between Lutheran orthodoxy and rationalism in his theology . As evidence for this, his work "Proof that it is better to glorify the glory of God from contemplating the order of salvation than from contemplating nature" can serve. Here he benefited from the collaboration with Georg Philipp Telemann , who worked as music director at the Johanneum and also worked as a lyricist for Schellhaffer. Later he extended this activity beyond Hamburg, he wrote a. a. also for Adolph Carl Kuntzen at the Mecklenburg court. The experience of Johann Sebastian Bach's church music activity in Leipzig will not have been without significance in this context. His students have always emphasized Schellhaffer's great educational quality. One should mention Heinrich Julius Tode , who like his teacher later worked as a lyricist for the Mecklenburg court. With the change in the general way of thinking in the course of the Romantic period , Schellhaffer's work, like that of many of his contemporaries, was largely forgotten.

Works (selection)

• Dissertation de indole legis permittentis sive principio actionem licitarum . Leipzig 1729
• Disputation Inaug. Meditationes de origine ac fonte juris circa mulieres diversi . Leipzig 1738
• Proof that it is better to glorify the glory of God from contemplation of the order of salvation than from contemplation of nature , in: Hamburgische Vermischte Bibliothek Vol. 2 (1744), pp. 242-259 ( Hamburger Reports 1744 pp. 365f. )
• Odes and poems , in the "Oden and Cantatas of the German Society of Leipzig", vol. 2, p. 502ff. and 529 ff.
• Heilig, Heilig ist Gott , text book for the ordination oratorio of the Hamburg St. Trinity Church in St. George , set to music by Georg Philipp Telemann (1747) ( TWV 2: 6)
• The Joy of the Shepherds , cantata on the birthday of Duke Christian Ludwig zu Mecklenburg, set to music by Adolph Carl Kuntzen (1750)
• Sentences of Oratory , printed by Piscator, Hamburg 1760 (published posthumously)

literature

• Johann Georg Meusel: Lexicon of the German writers who died from 1750 to 1800 , Vol. 12. Leipzig 1815, p. 129
• Johann Otto Thiess (en): An attempt at a scholarly history of Hamburg , Hamburg 1780, p. 158f.