Julius Wegscheider

Julius August Ludwig Wegscheider (27 September 1771 – 27 January 1849), was a German Protestant theologian.

He was born at Küblingen (now a part of Schöppenstedt, Lower Saxony). He studied theology at the University of Helmstedt, where he was a pupil of Heinrich Philipp Konrad Henke. From 1795 to 1805, he worked as a tutor to the family of a wealthy Hamburg merchant. In 1805 he was repentant at the University of Göttingen with a dissertation titled Graecorum mysteriis religioni non obtrudendis, he then served as a professor of theology at the University of Rinteln (1806–1810), and at the University of Halle from 1810 onwards.^[1]

Wegscheider was a leading figure of dogmatic theological rationalism — for instance, he considered supernatural revelation to be an impossibility.^[2] Because of his rationalist teachings, he, along with his colleague Wilhelm Gesenius, were attacked by followers of Supernaturalism, creating a situation that led to a government investigation (1830).^[3] Ultimately, he retained his office at Halle, but lost his former influence.

Principal works

• Über die von der neuesten Philosophie geforderte Trennung der Moral von der Religion, 1804 - On the latest philosophy requiring separation of morality from religion.
• Versuch einer vollständigen Einleitung in das Evangelium Johannis, 1806 - Attempt of a complete introduction to the Gospel of John.
• Institutiones theologicae dogmaticae, 1815; to which Wilhelm Steiger's Kritik des Rationalismus in Wegscheiders Dogmatik (1830) was a reply.
• Books about Wegscheider
  • "Leben und Werk des Hallenser Theologen Julius Wegscheider (1771-1849) : mit unveröffentlichten Briefen an Eduard Reuss"; by Jean Marcel Vincent, Waltrop : Spenner, 1997. Series: Wissen und Kritik, Bd. 13.^[4]

References

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. 

External links

• WorldCat Identities (publications)