Hermann von der Hardt

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Hermann von der Hardt

Hermann von der Hardt (born November 15, 1660 in Melle , † February 28, 1746 in Helmstedt ) was a German historian and orientalist .

Life

Von der Hardt studied oriental languages ​​first in Jena and for a year with the private scholar Esra Edzard in Hamburg . In 1683 he obtained his master's degree in Jena and began to give private lectures. After three years, however, he went to Leipzig , where he also obtained his master's degree. Here he made friends with August Hermann Francke and like him became a member of the Pietistic Collegium philobiblicum . In 1687, he went for a year to Dresden to Philipp Spener to hear, and then together with Francke of Lüneburg to the superintendent Kaspar sand Hagen , a famous exegetes .

This gave him to the court of Rudolf August (Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel) , of the Hardt 1688 librarian of the University Library Helmstedt appointed and in 1690 as professor of Oriental languages at the local university gave. In 1699 he also became provost of the Marienberg monastery .

As a professor in Helmstedt, von der Hardt quickly became known for his extensive teaching, publication and research activities. His lectures dealt not only with the oriental languages ​​and the exegesis of the Old and New Testaments , but also the Hebrew and ecclesiastical antiquities (what is now called Biblical Archeology ) and auxiliary biblical sciences.

He maintained an intensive and extensive correspondence, among others with Leibniz and Spener.

In his research and teaching, however, von der Hardt soon turned away from Pietism and towards rationalism . Because of his interpretation of the Bible, which anticipated elements of the historical-critical method , there were repeated disputes that led to the ban on exegetical lectures in 1713 and culminated in his forced retirement in 1727. Von der Hardt remained in Helmstedt until his death.

meaning

As a scientist, Von der Hardt stood on the threshold from the Baroque to the early Enlightenment . Even if he played an important role in the beginnings of historical biblical exegesis and approaches of source research and source criticism can be found in his historical works, the theses that he concluded from them were often adventurous. A contemporary, the orientalist Christian Benedikt Michaelis (the father of Johann David Michaelis ) said: Hardt had a lot of ingenium (imagination) , but very little iudicium (judgment) ; therefore he seize and defend all the fantasies of his dissolute mind.

He was considered eccentric and loved the grand entrance. So he burned eight volumes of his biblical interpretations after they were banned and sent the ashes to the government agency. He commemorated the 200th anniversary of Johannes Reuchlin's death in 1722 in his lecture hall with an impressive staging: he had the rudimenta hebraica of the celebrated scholar placed on a table and covered with a blanket with red velvet; above the book stood a silver crown, below a coral tree; wax lights burned on either side; there was no lack of incense either; the professor had heavy incense in honor of Reuchlin. After explaining the importance of the celebration to his listeners, he offered a prayer of thanks for the knowledge that Reuchlin brought forward. When he finally had to give up his professorship in 1727, he anointed the Old Testament in the edition of Ximenes and the New Testament in the edition of Erasmus of Rotterdam with rosemary oil in his farewell lecture .

plant

Numerous works by him have survived, both on historical and oriental subjects. Möller (Lit.) lists approx. 560 printed documents, 47 preserved manuscripts and 49 documented but not preserved documents. Von der Hardt's major works include:

  • 1690/91: Autographa Lutheri aliorumque celebrium virorum, from 1517 ad annum 1546, Reformationis aetatem et historiam egregie iliustrantia (1690–1691) (document collection)
  • 1693: Elementa Chaldaica (1693)
  • 1694: Hebraeae linguae fundamenta (1694)
  • 1694: Syriacae linguae fundamenta (1694)
  • 1697/1700: Magnum oecumenicum Constantiense concilium (6 volumes 1697–1700) (on the Council of Constance )
  • 1700: De Universali Ecclesiasticae Disciplinae Reformatione
  • 1717: Historia litteraria reformationis (1717)
  • 1723: Enigmata prisci orbis (1723) (on the riddles of antiquity )

Library

Books in his library and his extensive collection of letters were auctioned off with the library of his nephew Anton Julius von der Hardt (1707–1785) in 1786 in Helmstedt, where they were acquired by various libraries. Among other things, some volumes and an extensive bundle of letters came to the then Margravial Badische Hofbibliothek in Karlsruhe; they are now part of the holdings of the Baden State Library .

His extensive collection of Luther's writings (1500 titles) is now in the Herzog August Library in Wolfenbüttel.

literature

Web links

swell

  1. ↑ quoted from Klippel / Tschackert, p. 419
  2. ↑ quoted from Klippel / Tschackert, p. 419
  3. ↑ Digitized version , accessed on February 27, 2014


personal data
SURNAME Hardt, Hermann von der
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German orientalist and historian, professor in Helmstedt
DATE OF BIRTH November 15, 1660
PLACE OF BIRTH Melle
DATE OF DEATH February 28, 1746
Place of death Helmstedt