Peter Hauptmann (theologian)

Peter Hauptmann (born March 25, 1928 in Chemnitz ; † June 23, 2016 in Überlingen ) was a German Lutheran theologian, professor of church history in Eastern Europe and the history of theology of the Lutheran denominational churches at the Westphalian Wilhelms University of Münster , and pastor of the independent Evangelical Lutheran Church and later the Evangelical Lutheran Free Church .

Life and Academic Work

Peter Hauptmann was born in Chemnitz in 1928, where he was also given Holy Baptism. From 1947 to 1953 he studied theology in Berlin, Rostock and Münster. In 1953 he received his doctorate in Münster with a thesis on the old Russian faith. During his studies was Peter Hauptmann, in protest against the accession of the Lutheran state churches of the EKD , the Independent Evangelical Lutheran Church in Hesse joined a predecessor of today's Church Independent Evangelical Lutheran Church is (SELK). From 1954 to 1955 he worked as a vicar and teacher at the mission seminar of the Bleckmar Mission under Friedrich Wilhelm Hopf . At the Lutheran Theological College in Oberursel he passed the second theological exam in November 1955 and was ordained to the Holy Office of the Church by Superintendent Martin on December 4, 1955 in Rodenberg am Deister . Following his ordination , Peter Hauptmann worked as a parish administrator in the communities of Höchst , Usenborn and in the Franconian town of Mühlhausen .

In 1958 Hauptmann went back to the University of Münster and worked there at the Eastern Churches Institute under the direction of Robert Stupperich , whose successor he later became. He completed his habilitation in 1968 on the catechisms of the Eastern Church and was given a chair in the history of churches in Eastern Europe and the history of theology of the Lutheran denominational churches. He held this chair until 1990. His main focus was on Eastern Church Studies and research into the history of the Lutheran Free Churches. During his time in Münster he was not the only holder of a theological chair who was a member of the old Lutheran congregation there. This also included his colleagues Ernst Kinder ( Systematic Theology ) and Karl Heinrich Rengstorf ( New Testament ).

The central subject of his research on the Eastern Churches was essentially the Russian Orthodox Church and, above all, the opposition persecuted movement of the Old Believers , to which he devoted several lectures in the Yearbook Church in the East and finally devoted a late overall presentation. In them he found a home that reflected his old Lutheran community.

When the subject of women's ordination was repeatedly discussed in the SELK, to whose ministry Peter Hauptmann belonged, in the 1990s , he resigned from the SELK and joined the Evangelical Lutheran Free Church (ELFK) because he was disappointed that his Church and also at the faculty in Oberursel “foreign ideas” spread. In the ELFK he was involved until his death as theological advisor at pastoral conferences and synods, as a guest lecturer at the Lutheran Theological Seminary in Leipzig and through preaching services in the southern German diaspora.

Publications (selection)

• Old Russian belief. The struggle of the Protopope Avvakum against the church reforms of the 17th century. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht , Göttingen 1963.
• The catechisms of the Russian Orthodox Church. History of origin and teaching content. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1971, ISBN 978-3-52556-426-4 .
• Saved Church. Studies on the concerns of the Wroclaw Lutheran Johann Gottfried Scheibel (1783–1843). Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1987, ISBN 978-3-52556-438-7 (as editor).
• August Vilmar's legacy . In: Lutheran Contributions, Vol. 5, No. 4/2000, pp. 277–299.
• Russia's Old Believers. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2005, ISBN 978-3-52556-130-0 .
• Johann Gottfried Scheibel. From the innermost essence of Christianity. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2009, ISBN 978-3-89971-527-9 (as editor).

literature

• Who is who? LII (2015/16) 366.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d} Peter Hauptmann passed away. In: Independent Evangelical Lutheran Church . May 31, 2016, accessed November 16, 2016 . 
2. ↑ ^{a b} Peter Maser: The Evangelical Theological Faculty of the Westphalian Wilhelm University mourns the loss of Professor i. R. Dr. theol. Peter Hauptmann. (pdf, 47 kB) Evangelical Theological Faculty of the Westphalian Wilhelms University, July 4, 2016, accessed on November 16, 2016 . 
3. ↑ ^{a b} Prof. Peter Hauptmann called home. Evangelical Lutheran Free Church , May 24, 2016, accessed on November 16, 2016 . 
4. ↑ See the foreword to his 2005 monograph in more detail.