Background

Baur was born June 21, 1792, in the village of Schmiden, near Stuttgart, the son of a Protestant minister.

Education

After a period of study in the seminary of Blaubeuren, he was appointed professor of theology there.

Career

In 1826 he was made a professor at the University of Tübingen, Tubingen, where he remained until his death, December 2, 1860. In his early manhood Baur was a rationalistic supernaturalist; that is, he attempted to prove by reason the supernatural facts in the New Testament: the Incarnation, the Atonement, the Trinity, the miracles, and the resurrection, ascension, and glorification of Jesus Christ. In his latter years at Blaubeuren, however, his philosophical and theological views were changed by the study of Friedrich Schleiermacher's Glaubenslehre (1821) and by Hegel's conception of history. The change in his viewpoint and in his method of interpreting Christianity is apparent in a book entitled Symbolik und Mythologie oder die Naturreligion des Altertums (1824) ("Symbolism and Mythology, or the Nature Religion of Antiquity"). His greatest books came later: Die christliche Lehre von der Versohnung in ihrer geschichtlichen Entwicklung bis auf die neueste Zeit (1838) ("The Christian Doctrine of Reconciliation in its Historical Development Down to the Most Modern Times") and Die Christliche Lehre von der Dreieinigkeit und Menschwerdung Gottes in ihrer geschichtlichen Entwicklung (3 vols. , 1841 - 1843) ("The Christian Doctrine of the Trinity and the Incarnation in its Historical Development"). Baur was considered the foremost historian of dogma of his age. In a volume on Das Christenthum und die christliche Kirche der drei ersten Jahrhunderte (1853) ("Christianity and the Christian Church of the First Three Centuries") Baur followed the Hegelian triad of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis. Petrine or Jewish Christianity was the thesis; Pauline Christianity was the antithesis; and Catholic Christianity was the synthesis. But this mode of procedure required a new chronology for the New Testament writings, and Baur thus came to recognize only four of the Pauline letters as having been written by Paul: Galatians, I and II Corinthians, and all but the last two chapters of Romans. The other writings of the New Testament, except the Apocalypse, he transferred to the second century. By this interpretation the Gospel of Matthew was Jewish Christian; Luke was Pauline; and Acts and the Gospel of John were the result of the reconciliation of the Jewish and Pauline interpretation of Christianity. Thus Baur interpreted ancient Catholicism as the product of a modified Jewish and Pauline Christianity. Albrecht Ritschl was the first outstanding theologian to dissent from this theory of the rise of the ancient Catholic Church. For many years his method of interpreting the history of Christianity prevailed in Europe and America. To Baur, however, historians are indebted for the application of the idea of historical development to the successive ages of the Church.

Achievements

• Baur's views were revolutionary. He had a number of followers, who in many cases modified his positions, and the groundwork laid by Baur continues to be built upon in the twenty-first century.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Das Manichã¤ische Religionssystem Nach

    (This book, "Das Manichäische Religionssystem Nach Den Qu...)

  • History of Christian Dogma

    (History of Christian Dogma is a translation of Ferdinand ...)

  • Die Epochen Der Kirchlichen Geschichtsc

    (This book, "Die Epochen Der Kirchlichen Geschichtschreibu...)

  • Der Gegensatz des Katholicismus und Protestantismus nach den Principien und Hauptdogmen der beiden Lehrbegriffe (German Edition)

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

  • Paul the Apostle of Jesus Christ: His Life and Works, His Epistles and Teachings

    ("One hundred and sixty years ago F. C. Baur posed, in ine...)

  • Symbolik und Mythologie oder die Naturreligion des Altertums. 2 Teile (German Edition)

References

• Ferdinand Christian Baur and the History of Early Christianity
• The Formation of Historical Theology: A Study of Ferdinand Christian Baur