Theodosius Harnack

Theodosius Harnack

Theodosius Harnack (* December 22, 1816 ^July / January 3,  1817 ^reg. In Saint Petersburg ; † September 11, ^July / September 23,  1889 ^reg. In Dorpat , Estonia , then the Livonia Governorate of the Russian Empire ) was a German- Baltic Evangelical Lutheran theologian .

Theodosius Harnack studied at the University of Dorpat from 1834 to 1837 and, after being a private tutor, continued his studies in Berlin , Bonn and Erlangen from 1840 to 1842 .

In 1843 he became a private lecturer in church history and homiletics in Dorpat and was a university preacher there from 1847. In 1848 he was appointed full professor of practical and later systematic theology . He was a devout Luther researcher and became known for his work on Luther's theology , in which he called for the Lutheran Free Church to be the realization of the Lutheran understanding of the church.

From 1853 he taught in Erlangen . From 1866 to 1875 he was again a professor in Dorpat.

His first wife was Marie Harnack, née Ewers, who died very early (*  May 22, 1828 , †  November 23, 1857 ). He was the father of Anna Harnack (1849–1868), Adolf von Harnack , Axel Harnack , Erich Harnack and Otto Harnack .

On May 17, 1864, he married Helene Baronesse von Maydell (1834–1923), a cousin of his first wife, in Eisenach. This marriage remained childless.

Publications

• The basic creeds of the Evangelical Lutheran Church. 1845.
• Christian church service in the apostolic and old catholic age. 1854.
• The original version of M. Luther's Small Catechism has been critically examined and published. 1856.
• The Lutheran Church of Livonia and the Moravian Brethren. 1860.
• The church, its office, its regiment. 1862.
• Luther's theology with special reference to his doctrine of reconciliation and redemption.  I, 1862; II, 1886.
• The Free Lutheran People's Church. 1870.
• Liturgical forms to complete and revise the agendas for the Evangelical Church in Russia. 1872-74.
• Practical theology. Two volumes, 1877/78.
• Catechetics and Explanation of the Small Catechism of Luther. Two volumes, 1882.
• About the canon and inspiration. 1885.

literature

• Alexander von Oettingen :  Harnack, Theodosius . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 50, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1905, pp. 8-16.
• Martin Doerne :  Harnack, Theodosius Andreas. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 7, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1966, ISBN 3-428-00188-5 , p. 690 f. ( Digitized version ).
• Bernd Schröder : The science of the self-building church - Theodosius Harnack. In: Christian Grethlein , Michael Meyer-Blanck: History of Practical Theology. Shown using their classics. Leipzig 2000, ISBN 978-3-374-01767-6 , pages 151-206.
• Timothy CJ Quill: An examination of the contributions of Theodosius Harnack to the renewal of the Lutheran liturgy in the nineteenth century . Madison; Drew University, Thesis (Ph. D.), 2002.
• Friedrich Wilhelm Bautz :  HARNACK, Theodosius. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 2, Bautz, Hamm 1990, ISBN 3-88309-032-8 , Sp. 568-569.

Web links

• Literature by and about Theodosius Harnack in the catalog of the German National Library
• Baltic Historical Commission (ed.): Entry on Theodosius Harnack. In: BBLD - Baltic Biographical Lexicon digital
• Album academicum of the Imperial University of Dorpat , Dorpat 1889