Paul Schütz (theologian)

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Paul Wilhelm Lukas Schütz (born January 23, 1891 in Berlin , † July 26, 1985 in Söcking near Starnberg ) was a Protestant theologian , mission director , university professor , senior pastor at the St. Nikolai Church in Hamburg , influential publicist and theological representative of the conservative revolution .

Live and act

Schütz was one of four children of the Methodist preacher Wilhelm Michael Schütz (1858-1923) and his wife Martha (1867-1936), née Gönninger. He grew up in Berlin and studied Protestant theology and philosophy at the University of Berlin from 1910 . He continued his studies at the University of Jena and worked during this time in 1912 as a private tutor in Soldin . In 1914 he was at the Nobel Prize carrier Rudolf Eucken with the work The artistic element in metaphysics Schleiermacher Dr. phil. PhD .

As a war volunteer, Schütz took part in the First and was deployed to the front near Langemarck and Ypres ; in the Second World War he was used as an orderly officer in the Air Force. As a result, his experience and language were often militarily shaped. In 1918 he joined the Evangelical Church of the Old Prussian Union and passed the first theological exam in Koblenz . The second followed in 1922 in Magdeburg , where he was ordained in 1924 . In 1919 he worked as an inspector at Johannesstift in Berlin-Spandau and then to 1924 as director of studies at the theological seminary of the Cathedral Parish in Halle . In 1922 he received his doctorate from Ferdinand Kattenbusch's theological faculty for a licentiate in theology, with a thesis on Hooker , the fundamental theologian of Anglicanism . In December 1923 he married the artist Johanna Wolff . In 1924/25 he was assistant preacher in Magdeburg and in Neutz near Halle. In 1925 he received the pastor's post in Schwabendorf (Rauschenberg) in Hesse, which at that time comprised about 350 residents. He used the village parsonage to develop his theology and for other extensive literary activities.

From 1926 to 1928 he also headed the Dr. Lepsius Orient Mission and was a member of the Executive Committee of the International Near East Relief in 1927/28 . He traveled to Geneva and Paris. In 1928 he undertook a long trip to Egypt , Palestine , Syria , Iraq and Iran to Tabriz near the Russian border for the Dr. Lepsius Orient Mission . In 1930 he published his travel report on the religious and political situation in the Orient under the main title: Between the Nile and the Caucasus . The massive criticism presented here that Christian missionary work today does more harm than good to those affected; made him known at one stroke, determined the discussion in mission circles and led to his withdrawal from missionary work. From 1929 to 1934 he edited the magazine Orient und Occident together with Nikolai Berdjajew and Fritz Lieb . He published several times in Die Tat .

In 1930 he completed his habilitation in Gießen for practical theology . In 1937 his Venia was changed to systematics before he gave it up in the autumn of that year due to overload. In the " church struggle " Schütz turned neither to the Confessing Church nor to the German Christians . In 1935 the Secret State Police interpreted his book The Anti-Christ as a criticism of the National Socialist state and crushed the second edition. In the same year Schütz wrote a dispute on the subject of political religion , which, however, remained unpublished during his lifetime, although he continued to work on it after decades. Along with Eric Voegelin and Raymond Aron, he was one of the pioneers who dealt with this cultural-historical interpretation approach.

In 1940 Paul Schütz became senior pastor at Hamburg's St. Nikolai Church. The following year he was called up for military service; In 1946 he returned to Hamburg. Since that year he has taught general lectures at the university and within the framework of the church lectures. At the church university founded in 1948 , he became a full-time lecturer for systematic theology and philosophy in addition to his main pastorate, and in 1950 the church council awarded him the title of professor of theology at the church university in Hamburg . Dialogue with art and science was important to him. In the theological training he saw himself as a " Socratic troublemaker"; He had set up a seminar for Christian philosophy in which he intensively discussed current topics with a small group of students.

Teaching and criticism

Despite his pietistic parental home, Schütz was shaped by the idealism and romanticism that he had got to know in his youth. Due to the two world wars, however, his worldview broke and he found a somewhat different belief. In the years after the Second World War, his dissent to the Lutheran confession of the Hamburg regional church became increasingly clear to him; After a long struggle, he retired on May 1, 1952, at the age of 61. This is where his essential importance for the history of science and the church lies: He is the first and so far only chief pastor to leave office for reasons of confession. He no longer felt bound to the Christ -centered Reformation confessional writings , but primarily to the ancient church doctrine of the Trinity . He saw here a false reduction of theology to Christology.

After his retirement Schütz moved to Bavaria and devoted himself to working out his theology. As a result, his main work Parusia - Hope and Prophecy appeared in 1960 . Numerous other articles and books followed.

Schütz was strongly influenced by his experiences as a soldier in World War I and by the ideas of the anti-democratic conservative revolution of the Weimar Republic. In his work there are also stereotypical anti-Judaist statements that he did not correct, but retained after the Second World War. He saw the Jews as the founders of political religion, although it was they who worshiped a specific revelation from God. In the fifties, as a nationally conservative theologian, he represented a more restorative Western ideology. This assumed that the existence of the Christian West was threatened. Its preservation and salvation was seen as the task of the traditional Christian educated elite , who strived for a corporate social structure.

Honors

Trivia

The correspondence between Maria von Wedemeyer and her fiancé Dietrich Bonhoeffer during his detention in Berlin-Tegel contains the following passages about Paul Schütz:

“You - if you read my letters standing up, please sit down first. Honor your steadfastness, but the stone floor is not to be trifled with: I am in the middle of a thick theological book. And I don't find it as boring as I thought it would be. - Actually, you shouldn't know anything about it, I started it so that I could be a little closer to you. ... But now I read it with tension and eagerness. It is "the Gospel" from Paul Schütz. (Now all that's missing is that you don't like the book.) "

- Maria von Wedemeyer to Dietrich Bonhoeffer, February 7, 1944

“I think it's very nice that you read Schütz! But excuse me that I really had to laugh a little! for I have - among theologians and only among them! Lately he has been so scolded about few books as about this one. But I think it's only dangerous for theologians - why, that's not so brief to say - but not for you. However, I would be happy if you read a heavy dose of Kierkegaard (fear and trembling, practice in Christianity, illness leading to death) as an antidote. "

- Dietrich Bonhoeffer to Maria von Wedemeyer, February 18, 1944

“I laughed so much about your aversion to shooting that Hesi rushed up from the lower floor and thought I wasn't quite normal. My first act was to seal the thick book in my trunk with a sigh of relief. It may rest there forever! - In any case, you take me to a tough school when it comes to books. Soon I will always shyly ask you beforehand and finally read Kierkegaard with fear and trembling until illness and death. "

- Maria von Wedemeyer to Dietrich Bonhoeffer, March 2, 1944

Works (selection)

  • The artistic element in Schleiermacher's metaphysics. Bremen 1914, also Phil. Diss. Jena 1914
  • Richard Hooker. The basic theologian of Anglicanism. A monograph on the history of the Reformation and the beginnings of the Enlightenment. Theol. Diss. (Halle) 1922, as microfilm Göttingen 1952.
  • Between the Nile and the Caucasus. A travel report on the religious and political situation in the Orient. Munich 1930; 2nd edition 1930; 3rd edition Kassel 1953; 4th edition with a foreword by Hans Bürki, Moers 1991.
  • Secular religion. A study of their appearance in the present and their idea in Schleiermacher and Blumhardt dJ Tübingen 1932 (Contributions to systematic theology, 2).
  • The anti-Christ. A study about the ungodly power and the German broadcast. Berlin 1933, 2nd edition 1935 (voices from the German Christian student movement, 83).
  • Luther primer. Wroclaw 1934.
  • Why I am still a Christian. Letters to a young friend. Berlin 1937, 4th edition 1938,
    • Second version, 5th edition Hamburg 1946, 6th edition Kassel 1949
    • Third version: Why I am still a Christian. An existential experience. 7th edition. Hamburg 1969, new edition with an additional letter as a closing remarks from December 6, 1980. 8th edition Moers 1981, 9th edition 1984, revised. New edition with a foreword by the EKD Chairman, Regional Bishop Klaus Engelhardt. 10th edition Augsburg 1996 (Dutch The Hague 1970).
  • The gospel. Presented to the people of our time. Berlin 1940, 2nd edition 1940, Tübingen 3rd edition 1951
  • Parusia. Hope and prophecy. Heidelberg 1960, special edition Hamburg 1963
  • Collected works , edited by Hans Ferdinand Bürki
  • Gospel. Language and Reality of the Bible in the Present. Moers 1984
  • The mystery of history. From the presence of the healer in time. Moers 1987
  • Freedom - Hope - Prophecy. From the presentness of the future. Moers 1986
  • To the people. From understanding to being transformed. Moers 1985
  • Resistance and risk. About faith in the age of fear. Moers 1982
  • The political religion. An Inquiry into the Origin of Decay in History. 1935. Hamburg Historical Research, 4th ed. And introduction Rainer Hering. Hamburg 2009

literature

  • Rainer Hering:  Schütz, Paul Wilhelm Lukas. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 9, Bautz, Herzberg 1995, ISBN 3-88309-058-1 , Sp. 1080-1098.  ( Article / beginning of article in the Internet archive ) (with bibliography).
  • Rainer Hering : From Hesse to Hamburg: The theologian Paul Schütz in the “Third Reich”. In: Mitteilungen des Oberhessischer Geschichtsverein NF 84, 1999, pp. 1–39.
  • Rainer Hering: "Christ prophesies Judaism as the main enemy of his future community". Judaism with Paul Schütz. In: Yearbook of the Hessian Church History Association 52 (2001), pp. 143–165.
  • Rainer Hering (ed.): Paul Schütz: The political religion. An Inquiry into the Origin of Decay in History (1935). Hamburg Historical Research Volume 4, Hamburg University Press, Hamburg 2009.
  • Rudolf Kremers : Paul Schütz. In search of reality. A path of life and knowledge. Moers 1989.
  • Rudolf Kremers: The life and knowledge path of Paul Schütz. In: Zeitschrift für Religions- und Geistesgeschichte, Volume 46, No. 3 (1994), pp. 260–264.
  • Rainer Hering:  Schütz, Paul Wilhelm Lukas. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 23, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-428-11204-3 , p. 665 f. ( Digitized version ).
  • Heinrich Ott : Confessional or Universal Christianity? On the current topicality of Paul Schütz's criticism of Lutheranism. In: Theologische Zeitschrift 54 (1998), pp. 151-161.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Rudelf Kremers: The life and knowledge path of Paul Schütz. Zeitschrift für Religions- und Geistesgeschichte, 46 3. Brill, 1994, pp. 260–264.
  2. ^ Klaus Bambauer: The magazine Orient and Occident
  3. ↑ Hering 2009 .
  4. ^ Rainer Hering (ed.): Paul Schütz: The political religion. An Inquiry into the Origin of Decay in History (1935). Hamburg Historical Research Volume 4, Hamburg University Press, Hamburg 2009
  5. ^ Rainer Hering (ed.): Paul Schütz: The political religion. An Inquiry into the Origin of Decay in History (1935). Hamburg Historical Research Volume 4, Hamburg University Press, Hamburg 2009
  6. ↑ quoted from Ruth-Alice von Bismarck and Ulrich Kabitz (eds.): Bridal letters cell 92. Munich 1993, ISBN 978-3-406-42112-9 , p. 131.
  7. ↑ ibid., P. 139
  8. ↑ ibid., P. 145
  9. ↑ Online, full text see web links. Hering in detail on Schütz: see literature, more.
predecessor Office successor
Heinz Beckmann Chief Pastor to St. Nikolai in Hamburg
1940–1952 		Hans-Otto Wölber
personal data
SURNAME Schütz, Paul
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Schütz, Paul Wilhelm Lukas
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Protestant theologian, mission director, pastor, university professor and publicist
DATE OF BIRTH January 23, 1891
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin
DATE OF DEATH July 26, 1985
Place of death Söcking near Starnberg