Nikolaus Hunnius

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Nikolaus Hunnius, portrait in the City Library (Lübeck)

Nikolaus Hunnius (born July 11, 1585 in Marburg , † April 12, 1643 in Lübeck ; also Nicolaus Hunn ) was a German Lutheran theologian.

Life

Nikolaus was born as the fifth child of Aegidius Hunnius the Elder and his wife Elenore Felder. Supported by his parents and taught by the theologian Johannes Schröder , he was registered at the University of Wittenberg on September 29, 1593 and began his studies there in 1600. During this time, he accompanied his father to the religious discussion in Regensburg in 1602 . March 1604 the degree of master's degree in the philosophy faculty of the university. There he was accepted as an adjunct on October 18, 1609 .

Through his theological teachers Leonhard Hutter and Friedrich Balduin , he was given the opportunity to find admission to the theological faculty and to hold lectures there. In 1612 he was called to Eilenburg as pastor and superintendent , for which he was ordained in Leipzig on April 27 and introduced to his office on July 22. In order to acquire the necessary academic prerequisites for the office, he became a licentiate on October 4, 1612 and received his doctorate on September 15 as a doctor of theology . In the same year, he married the daughter of Wittenberg professor Ernestus Hettenbach , Anna Hettenbach, excerpts from wedding poems on the occasion of the marriage of Nikolaus and Anna Hunnius (née Hettenbach) are now in the possession of the Berlin State Library . After Hutter's death, Hunnius was appointed to the fourth theological professorship at the theological faculty of the University of Wittenberg.

Nikolaus Hunnius at the age of 57, engraving by Joachim von Sandrart

On January 17, 1623, the election of the new pastor of the Marienkirche was initiated in Lübeck . On February 7th they spoke out in favor of Hunnius and officially called him to Lübeck on March 28th. After he had committed his Saxon Elector on April 12th to return to Electoral Saxony if necessary, Hunnius arrived in Lübeck on May 15th. There he was inducted into office on May 22nd and delivered his inaugural sermon on May 25th. The following year, on November 25, 1624, he was elected superintendent by the clergy and the magistrate of the city and on November 28, he was appointed to his office.

Hunnius saw his main task in keeping the Lutheran teaching pure, which he defended in numerous writings against the papacy (which he accused of apostasy ), Calvinism and mystical enthusiasm. In 1633 he was instrumental in the formation of the Convention of the three Spiritual Ministries of the cities of Lübeck, Hamburg and Lüneburg, the Ministry of Tripolitanum . The convent in Mölln on March 26, 1633 dealt primarily with the defense against mystical spiritualism , which had found supporters in northern Germany through the widespread distribution of Valentin Weigel's writings . Here Hunnius represented Lübeck's Spiritual Ministry, headed the convent and summarized its resolutions of March 29 in a document that appeared in 1634.

Together with the Lübeck Syndicus Hieronymus Schabbel , in 1637 he initiated the Schabbel Foundation of the Hamburg merchant Heinrich Schabbel as a scholarship foundation for theological offspring. Schabbel had previously awarded a scholarship to individual theology students, including Aegidius Ernst Hunnius (1614–1634), the son of the superintendent, who had died as a student in Konigsberg in 1634 as a result of an attack.

Hunnius had his own ideas of a Christian city, shaped by Johann Gerhard and the Lutheran three-tier teaching . He insisted on the clergy and the community's right of co-determination in questions of church order and public and private morality, but was unable to prevail in the dispute between himself and the Spiritual Ministry on the one hand and the council on the other over the sovereign church government . The council, advised by its syndic Otto Tanck , insisted that, according to the episcopal theory, he was entitled to the full extent of church rule, that is, that he was both an authority and a bishop and not dependent on the participation of the clergy. In 1635 the Lübeck Council took over the church regiment not only in fact but also under constitutional law and thus subordinated itself to the clergy in the city. When Hunnius delivered catechism sermons in 1640, which dealt critically with the decay of morals in the city and called on the council to step up, he was summoned to the town hall and received a sharp reprimand.

After almost all of his siblings and children had died, Hunnius died on April 12, 1643 and found his final resting place on April 16 in St. Mary's Church. His surviving daughter Anna Margaretha (* August 11, 1625, † October 17, 1660) married the businessman Heinrich Schlueter , in 1656 the mayor Johann Ritter . The epitaph placed by Hunnius in the north ambulatory burned during the air raid on Lübeck on March 29, 1942 .

Hunnius is one of the people who made the scientific movement of Lutheranism productive for the self-understanding of Reformation theology in the first quarter of the 17th century. His work, which was primarily carried out in Wittenberg, shaped the denominational doctrine of the foundation of faith and its fundamental articles and thus the theological understanding of Lutheranism.

Works (selection)

Portrait with the book title Epitome credendorum
Nikolaus Hunnius, engraving by Christian Fritzsch
  • Disputatio theologica de Baptismi Sacramento Photinianis erroribus oppos. 1618
  • Principia theologiae fanaticae, quam Theophrastus Paracelsus genuit, Weigelius interpolavit… Pro Impetrando gradu in theologiae summe Valentino Legdaeo . 1619
  • Examen errorum Photinianorum ex verbo Dei institutum . 1620
  • Canones logici,… Nunc vero secundum editi . 1621
  • Christian contemplation of the new Paracelsian u. Weigelian theology . 1622
  • Epitome credendorum or content of Christian teaching . 1625 u. ö. (also Dutch, Swedish, Polish and Latin; Neudr. 1844)
  • Diaskepsis theologica de fundamentali dissensu doctrinae Evangelicae-Lutheranae et Calvinianae seu Reformatae. Cum praemissa consideratione Calvinianae Dordrechtana Synodo proditae . 1626
  • Detailed report from Der Newen Prophepheten / (who call themselves enlightened / scholars of God / and Theosophus) religion / teaching and belief / so that Satan is subject to disturbing the Church of God on the newe: Necessary revelation of dangerous seduction / and a dignified warning / that himself all / who let their souls be dear to them forever Wolfarth / for it diligently foresee: Also more thorough refutation of their various harmful errors / provided by the preaching camp of the Christian community in Lübeck / Hamburg / and Lüneburg. Embs / Schmalhertz, Lübeck 1634

literature

Web links

Commons : Nikolaus Hunnius  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files
Wikisource: Nikolaus Hunnius  - Sources and full texts

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Markus Matthias: Johann Wilhelm and Johanna Eleonora Petersen: A biography until Petersen's impeachment in 1692. (= work on the history of Pietism. Vol. 30). Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1993, ISBN 3-525-55814-7 , p. 38
  2. ↑ Jubelfeyer of the Schabbelian scholarship , in: Acta historico ecclesiastica, or collected news and documents on the church history of our time. 7 (1737), p. 944
  3. ↑ See Ludwig Heller : Nikolaus Hunnius. His life and work; a contribution to ecclesiastical history of the seventeenth century, largely based on handwritten sources. Lübeck: Rohden 1843 digitized , p. 23
  4. ↑ See Wolf-Dieter Hauschild: On the relationship between the state and the church in Lübeck in the 17th century. In: ZVLGA. Volume 50, 1970, pp. 69-92.
  5. ↑ Ludwig Heller : Nikolaus Hunnius. His life and work; a contribution to the church history of the seventeenth century, mostly based on handwritten sources Lübeck: Rohden 1843 ( digitized version ), p. 199
predecessor Office successor
Georg Stampelius Superintendent of the Lübeck Church
1624–1643 		Meno Hanneken
personal data
SURNAME Hunnius, Nicholas
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Hunnius, Nicolaus; Hunn, Nikolaus; Hunn, Nicolaus
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Lutheran theologian, professor of theology at the University of Wittenberg and superintendent in Lübeck
DATE OF BIRTH July 11, 1585
PLACE OF BIRTH Marburg
DATE OF DEATH April 12, 1643
Place of death Lübeck