Heinrich Zeise (pastor)

Heinrich Zeise (born March 28, 1718 in Hadersleben , † March 16, 1794 in Altona ) was a German Protestant pastor.

Heinrich Heise on an engraving from 1788.

Live and act

Heinrich Zeise came from the Zeise family . He was a son of the pharmacist Carl Christian Zeise (* December 3, 1685 in Copenhagen ; buried on September 22, 1756 in Hadersleben) and his wife Salome, née Helms (* in October 1701 in Hadersleben; † March 1, 1781 ibid). The maternal grandfather was the Hadersleben pharmacist Heinrich Helms.

Zeise wanted to become a pharmacist following the example of his father. However, the father decided that his son should take up a ministry. Zeise therefore learned at the school of scholars in Hadersleben and began studying theology in Jena in the summer semester of 1736 . Here he mostly attended lectures by the moderate Orthodox Johann Georg Walch . In 1740 he returned to his parents' house in Hadersleben, where he was influenced by the pietistic chief pastor and provost Johannes Tychsen (1688–1750).

In 1741 Zeise passed the official examination at Tychsen. He then moved to Copenhagen and gave German and Danish sermons. The influential clergy there valued his personality and could easily have helped him to a preaching position. Zeise himself said that he never wanted to ask for such offices. In 1742 he went to Hadersleben again. In 1743, however, Zeise followed a call from Count Frederick Conrad von Holstein-Holsteinborg to Holsteinborg . Two years later he moved to Broacker as an adjunct to the provost Johannes Harboe (1681–1752) . Both got into an argument a little later. Zeise then moved back to his father's house in Hadersleben. In 1746 he went to the St. John's Monastery outside Schleswig as an afternoon preacher , where he became seriously ill. Since he assumed he would only live for a short time, he wanted to work as Jeremias Friedrich Reuss's secretary until his death . Reuss recommended that he continue to preach and offered him a job as pastor. Zeise refused because of his health problems.

Count Christian Detlev Reventlow (1704–1750), who held the office of patron of the Altona Heiliggeistkirche, knew Zeise from his sermons in Schleswig . Zeise followed Reventlow's call from 1748 as adjunct to Pastor Michael Hirschfeld (1677–1757) only two years later in order to take the previous adjunct into consideration. In 1757 Zeise succeeded Hirschfeld as pastor of the church.

In Altona, Zeise looked after a small community that included the residents of the poor house and some craft families living in the churchyard. He quickly became a well-known preacher and received visits from people from Hamburg and the surrounding areas. Zeise recognized that his listeners were better able to absorb sermons in Low German than those in High German. Therefore, he gave parts of his sermons, which he wanted to bring his church attendants closer to, in Low German, which caused a huge sensation. The majority of theologians of his time assessed this form of preaching positively, although Zeise was also often ridiculed.

Zeise was seen as a modest person who was satisfied with his poorly paid job and who always turned down more prestigious positions offered to him. Despite requests from his listeners, his sermons only rarely appeared in print. He rejected suggestions from patrons who wanted to donate him a larger church building. He only treated himself to a large library in which theological, mathematical and scientific literature could be found. He has been collecting literature since his stay at Holsteinborg. With the money of his second wife, he expanded the inventory on a larger scale. By the end of his life he had collected 7,500 works.

family

Zeise married on June 1st, 1752 in Altona Christina Johanna Bolten (born November 25th, 1725 in Altona). Her father was the theologian Johannes Bolten , who was married to Anna Gertrud, née Biester (1686–1764). Zeise's first wife, with whom he had a daughter, died in Altona on July 26, 1753, the year after the wedding.

In April 1755 Zeise married Margarethe Elisabeth Wiese (born January 6, 1729 in Hamburg ; † March 27, 1797). Her father Peter Theodor Wiese (1701–1771) worked as a lawyer in Hamburg. From this marriage there were eight daughters and four sons.

literature

• Fritz Treichel: Zeise, Heinrich . in: Biographical Lexicon for Schleswig-Holstein and Lübeck . Volume 8. Wachholtz Verlag, Neumünster 1987, pp. 395-397.
• Paul Tschackert:  Zeise, Heinrich . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 45, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1900, p. 2 f (short comment).