Hermann crowd

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Hermann crowd
Memorial stone in the Frankenberg Church in Goslar

Hermann August Quantity (born February 7, 1841 in Seesen , † January 9, 1939 in Goslar ) was a German classical philologist , educator and author of a Bible translation named after him , the so-called Quantity Bible .

Life

The son of a registrar at the District Court Seesen studied from 1860 to 1864 in Göttingen Classical Philology and History, where he 1860/61 Member of the winter semester progression - fraternity Hercynia , later Schwarzenburg Bund - connection Hercynia Heidelberg was, and was in 1863 with a study on Use of prepositions in Aeschylus for Dr. phil. PhD . In the following years he taught at high schools in Helmstedt and Holzminden . From 1887 to 1894 he was director of the grammar school in Sangerhausen and from 1894 until retirement he was director of the grammar school in Wittstock . In addition, the Prussian Ministry of Education awarded him the title of professor for his scientific merits . In 1900, health problems and disputes with the collegiate caused Hermann Menge to seek early retirement. He died on January 9, 1939 at the age of 97 in Goslar.

The crowd bible

During his retirement, crowd studied the Bible and its translations extensively . His own translation of the New Testament into modern German appeared in May 1909. For the next twelve years he devoted himself to an initially private translation of the Old Testament . However, the Württembergische Bibelanstalt persuaded him to publish this part as well, and brought the multitude Bible onto the market for the first time in 1926. Two years later he was awarded an honorary doctorate from the Theological Faculty of the University of Münster for his services to the translation of the Bible . Quantity revised his text again and again until shortly before his death.

He himself presented the criteria that guided him in his translations as follows:

“I have therefore ... tried everywhere to make the translation as faithful as possible in close connection with the biblical original text with the philological accuracy to which I have been accustomed during my many years of office and as a result of my literary work. H. not to stick to the letter in a fearful way, but rather to translate true to the meaning, without adding anything to what has been handed down or leaving something out.
Then it was my serious endeavor not only to dress my translation in understandable and clear German, also cleared of foreign words as far as possible, but also to pay attention to the mood and coloring of every book and section, indeed every passage, as well as the incomparable To express the simplicity and naturalness of the historical pieces, as well as to do justice to the various styles of the psalms and the speeches in the prophetic and didactic books. In addition, I have made it my business to make it easier to grasp the meaning by means of copious headings and to promote clarity by carefully structuring the parts, which is undoubtedly of great importance especially in speeches and in letters, as well as in the poetic, prophetic and didactic pieces Values ​​is.
There are a number of passages in the scriptures, the meaning of which cannot be ascertained with unquestionable certainty, and which have therefore always found different and equal explanations. I have consistently treated such passages in such a way that I reproduced the words of the original text with the greatest possible accuracy and left the reader with the task of finding out the meaning through their own thought and making their own judgment. "

- from the foreword of the Bible translation

The result is a philologically but also literarily valued biblical text. To indicate alternative translation options , a lot of footnotes , some in brackets, were used in the running text. To clarify the structure, he used a multi-level system of headings.

Excerpt ( Matthew 18: 23-24) from the 1940 version:

That is why the kingdom of heaven is comparable to a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants (servants or officials). When he began to settle the accounts, someone was brought before him who owed him ten thousand talents **).
**) about 75 million marks, cf. 25.15

Amount 2020

Since 2010, the Quantity Bible has been in the public domain under German copyright law .

The publisher CLV brought out a revised version of the quantity Bible in 2019, the "quantity 2020". The text has been adapted to the changed German language. Explanations and alternative translation options have been put in footnotes, which have also been significantly expanded. The New Testament is based on the Novum Testamentum Graece by Nestle-Aland (28th edition 2012), the Old Testament on the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia (5th edition 1997). According to their own statements, the reworkers have remained true to Menge's principles.

Textbooks

During his time as a grammar school teacher, Hermann Quantity wrote several text books and dictionaries for studying ancient languages, which are still trend-setting today. His manual and school dictionaries for Latin and Greek form the basis of Otto Güthling's revised large school dictionaries for both languages, which Langenscheidt- Verlag still publishes today.

His two repetitions of Latin and Greek syntax and style , with which Quantity presented an extensive and differentiated collection and description of complex grammatical phenomena, became standard works for academic training in Classical Philology .

The revision course in Latin syntax and style

In 1873 Quantity published a Latin revision course for the first time based on his experiences as a high school teacher. Initially intended only for school use, the extensive and high-circulation work, which is both an exercise book and grammar , quickly developed into a textbook for high school pupils and students alike. The last version published by Quantity itself was the 10th edition from 1914. As a problematic mixture of textbooks and scientific descriptions of the Latin syntax, it partially missed its intended target audience. Andreas Thierfelder created a textbook with his adaptation (11th edition 1953), which incorporates Menge's personal copy of the 10th edition with numerous changes and additions, but above all draws on the 7th edition (1900), which is even more tailored to teaching and learning purposes that has accompanied generations of Latin students. In the meantime, Menge's revision course, which was fundamentally revised in 1999 by Thorsten Burkard and Markus Schauer, is used as a standard work at universities. Many university lecturers, however, still prefer the version edited by Andreas Thierfelder.

The revision course in Greek syntax

In 1878 Quantity published the equivalent of his revision course for Greek lessons. Although the Greek exercise book neither achieved the number of copies nor the importance of the Latin revision course within the specialist field, it is still a fixture in academic training today.

Works (selection)

  • De praepositionum usu apud Aeschylum , dissertation, Göttingen 1863.
  • Review of Latin syntax and style 1873 ( Wolfenbüttel 1900 digital edition ); meanwhile reworked by Thorsten Burkard and Markus Schauer under the title Latin Syntax and Semantics. An author's grammar on Cicero and Caesar , Darmstadt 1999.
  • Review of Greek Syntax , 1878; 10th edition, revised by Jürgen Wiesner, Darmstadt 1999.
  • Pocket dictionary of Latin and German. Part I: Latin-German. Berlin-Schöneberg 1903.
  • Pocket dictionary of the Greek and German languages. Part I: Greek-German. Berlin-Schöneberg 1903.
  • Greek-German school dictionary, with special consideration of the etymology , Berlin-Schöneberg 1903 (ff.).
  • Latin-German school dictionary with special consideration of etymology , Berlin-Schöneberg 1907.
  • The New Testament (translation), Braunschweig 1909.
  • We do not fear death. A word of consolation for everyone, especially for the bereaved of those who fell in the field . Leipzig 1915. ( digitized version )
  • The Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments (translation), Stuttgart 1926.
  • Latin synonymy , 7th edition, Heidelberg 1999.

literature

  • Paul Olbricht: The Bible translator Hermann Menge. His life and work. Furche, Berlin 1939.
  • Fritz Schmidt-König: Hermann Quantity. From high school director to Bible translator. Brunnen, Gießen / Basel 1956. New edition: Johannis, Lahr-Dinglingen 1983.
  • Hermann Quantity 1841–1939. Festschrift with contributions by Gerhard Müller, Georg Strecker, Sabine Glasenapp, Christian Tegtmeier, Gerhard Hillbrecht, Hans Deppe. Ev.-luth. Parish office of the Frankenberge, Goslar 1989.
  • Berthold Lannert: Hermann Menges' translation of the Bible between philology and theology. A contribution on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of H. Menges death on January 9, 1989 . In: Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche 86 (1989), pp. 371–388.
  • Klaus-Gunther Wesseling:  Hermann Quantity. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 5, Bautz, Herzberg 1993, ISBN 3-88309-043-3 , Sp. 1257-1259.
  • Herbert W. Göhmann: Prof. D. Dr. Hermann viel Philologist, educator, Bible translator (published by the church council of the Luther church community in Holzminden). Holzminden 1993
  • Andreas Fritsch : Lot, Hermann. In: Peter Kuhlmann , Helmuth Schneider (Hrsg.): History of the ancient sciences. Biographical Lexicon (= The New Pauly . Supplements. Volume 6). Metzler, Stuttgart / Weimar 2012, ISBN 978-3-476-02033-8 , Sp. 810 f.

Web links

Commons : Hermann Menge  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Hermann Goebel (ed.): Directory of members of the Schwarzburgbund. 8th edition, Frankfurt am Main 1930, p. 106 No. 2038.
  2. ^ Foreword by the publisher. CLV, 2019, accessed January 28, 2020 .