Johannes Opstraet

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Johannes Opstraet (born October 3, 1651 in Beringen , † November 29, 1720 in Leuven ) was a Flemish Jansenist theologian .

Life

Johannes Opstraet attended the College of the Trinity in Leuven and then studied philosophy in this city from 1669 to 1671 . He then attended theological lectures at the University of Leuven until 1675 and then taught Latin language and poetry at the College of the Trinity there. In 1680 he became a priest, in 1681 a licentiate in theology and in May 1685 the Jansenist writer Gommaire Huygens appointed him vice-president of the papal college ( Collège du pape Adrien VI ) in Leuven. Alphonsus de Berghes , Archbishop of Mechelen , appointed him to his seminary as professor of theology in 1686. After the death of this prelate, however, the new archbishop, Humbertus Guilielmus de Precipiano (since Opstraet was a follower of the teachings of Jansen and Quesnel ), withdrew his favor and adopted him. He returned to Leuven and was again teaching courses at the papal college. As a result, he prepared to obtain a doctorate in theology and defended his theses for the first time in 1698 with some success. But because of his Jansenist views he got into theological disputes with the Vaticanist Martin Steyaert and other scholars. In 1704 Philip V forbade him to stay in the entire Spanish Netherlands . Two years later, when the country came under the control of Austria after the battle of Ramillies , he returned to Leuven, where in 1709 he became principal of the college of Faucon. In 1713 he spoke out against the publication of Pope Clement XI's bull Unigenitus . in lions off. He died in Leuven in 1720 at the age of 69 and was buried in the Saint-Michel church.

Opstraet was the head and model of the Jansenists in Holland, a man of talent and more enlightened in theology than many of his contemporaries, a contestant of papal infallibility and a few other dogmas. He took a lively interest in the disputes prevailing at his time, and he wrote many pamphlets against the Dutch theologians Liévin de Meyer , Daelmann, Martin Steyaert, Antoine Parmentier, Bernard Désirant and others. a. He was best known through the two often printed writings Pastor bonus seu idea, officium, spiritus et praxis pastorum (Mecheln 1689; translated into French by Godefroy Hermant under the title Le bon pasteur ou l'idée, le devoir et la conduite des pasteurs , 3 vols., Rouen 1703) and Theologus christianus, sive ratio studii et vitae instituenda a theologo (Löwen 1692). In both writings he denied several Jesuit maxims and in the first mentioned work he designed the ideal of a pastor.

Many other writings were also written by Opstraet, including a .:

  • Dissertatio theologica de conversione peccatoris , Löwen 1687; French by de Natte, Paris 1731
  • Dissertatio theologica de praxi administrandi sacramentum poenitentiae , 1692 (Opstraet accuses Steyaert of too loose morality in this work)
  • Institutiones theologicae de actibus humanis , 3 vols., 1709
  • Theologiae dogmaticae, moralis, practicae et scholasticae pars prima , ed. posthumously Löwen 1726 (the sequel did not appear)

Three of his works were put on the index by decrees of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith : Assertio opusculi quod inscribitur (1708), Antiquae Facultatis theologicae lovaniensis (1732) and De Locis theologicis dissertationts (1737).

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Opstraet, John. In: Jesús Martínez de Bujanda , Marcella Richter: Index des livres interdits: Index librorum prohibitorum 1600–1966. Médiaspaul, Montréal 2002, ISBN 2-89420-522-8 , p. 665 (French, digitized ).
personal data
SURNAME Opstraet, Johannes
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Flemish Jansenist theologian
DATE OF BIRTH October 3, 1651
PLACE OF BIRTH Ringing
DATE OF DEATH November 29, 1720
Place of death Lions