Erik Kristian Johnsen

Background

Johnsen was born on September 20, 1863, in Stavanger, Norway, the son of Erik Johnsen, a builder and contractor, and Else Kristine (Finkelsen) Johnsen.

Education

From the Stavanger Latin school he went to the university of Christiania (Oslo), and after graduation in theology (1887) spent three years tutoring in Oslo. At this time he learned his favorite avocation, wood-carving.

Career

In 1892 Johnsen married deaconess and emigrated to America. He became professor of theology in Red Wing Seminary, supported by the Hauge's Synod at Red Wing, Minnesota, but owing to a theological controversy between two of his colleagues, resigned in 1897, was ordained, and became pastor of three congregations in and near Hudson, Wisconsin, transferring his membership to the United Norwegian Lutheran Church. In 1900 he accepted the professorship of Old Testament exegesis in the seminary of his denomination at St. Paul.

After the merging (1917) of his church with several other bodies in the Norwegian Lutheran Church of America, he continued as professor in the institution, now Luther Theological Seminary, until his death. From time to time he taught, in addition to Old Testament, the Pauline Epistles, homiletics, even dogmatics. For more than twenty years he was chief literary consultant of the Augsburg Publishing House, Minneapolis. His book reviews, numbered by the hundreds, were always fresh and discriminating. Every year he edited Folke Kalender and Julebog for barn. He also edited Hoymes efterladte skrifter (1904); two collections of sermons, Fredstanker (1901) and Kors og Krone (1909); and Vor Herres Jesu Kristi Lidelses historie (1909); and contributed to the periodicals Ungdommens Ven and Lutheraneren. His first notable theological contribution in the United States, En kort udredning (1895), an effort to shed light on the theological controversy at Red Wing, brought him ingratitude.

In 1915 he toured Europe, and subsequently published Paa Reise gjennem England, Norge, Danmark, Tyskland, Schweiz og Italien (1918), which is filled with interesting observations and racy comments. In 1917 he was chief editor of Fire hundredaarig Lutherdom, a collection of twenty essays, by several authors of Norwegian antecedents, to which he contributed two clear and cogent essays: "Introduction, " a survey of the Church until the Reformation, and "The Church in Norway 1814-1917. "

His ablest work, Brevet til Hebrierne (1922), which was also his last, included an original translation in Norwegian of the Epistle to the Hebrews, accompanied by a searching commentary, calling attention to the difference between Paul's method of treating the atonement and that of the unknown author of the epistle.

In his last year, while traveling on the Pacific Coast, Johnsen received an injury which left him with an affection of the heart; but he was about his labors as usual until his sudden death, in St. Paul, on January 21, 1923.

Achievements

• Johnsen was an important figure in Lutheran church during his time. He was for years a member of a committee negotiating with other church bodies for organic union. He favored mergings, but at heart cared little for the hair-splitting doctrinal formulations which were offered as bases for a merger. Deploring the poverty of the average American seminary library and the difficulties under which a theologian therefore had to labor, he did much to improve the condition.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Lykke I Livet: AF M.O. Bockman Og E. Kr. Johnsen... (Danish Edition)

    (This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)

  • Paulus, Volumes 1-2... (Danish Edition)

    (This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)

  • Paul of Tarsus: I. Paul a Character Sketch; II. Paul's Epistles (Classic Reprint)

    (Excerpt from Paul of Tarsus: I. Paul a Character Sketch; ...)

Personality

Johnsen was an excellent teacher, possessing sympathy, kindliness, and humor, and an amusing but wholesome directness of speech. Though he conversed in fluent English, he preferred to use his mother tongue in public; he spoke and wrote a beautiful Norwegian.

Connections

In 1892 Johnsen married Amunda Sorensen, a deaconess, which allowed him to go to the United States. His first wife had died in 1912, and in 1915 he married Helen Nilsen, who, with three children of his first marriage, survived him.

Father:

Erik Johnsen

Mother:

Else Kristine Finkelsen

Spouse:

Helen Nilsen

Spouse:

Amunda Sorensen

References

• Norsk Lutherske Prester I Amerika, 1843-1915... (Norwegian Edition)
• Norske Studenter: Der Har Absolveret Examen Artium Ved Christiania Universitet Eller de Artiumsberettigede Skoler... (Norwegian Edition)