Background

Johann Heinrich Bisterfeld was born around 1605 in Siegen, Germany. Bisterfeld’s father, Johann, was a minister and professor of theology. He published a book on Ramist dialectics and died while attending the Synod of Dort in 1619. The mother’s maiden name was Schickard, and she appears to have been a sister of Martin Schickard, also of Siegen, professor of jurisprudence at Heidelberg and later at Deventer.

Education

As a student at the reformed University of Herbom, Bisterfeld studied under Comenius’ teacher, Johann Heinrich Alsted, whose Encyclopaedia he is said to have known by heart at the age of sixteen. He may have studied in England in the middle 1620s, but in any case, he matriculated at the University of Leiden on 3 November 1626, where he made the acquaintance of Andre Rivet, with whom he later corresponded.

Career

Early in 1629, Bisterfeld and Alsted were invited by Gabriel Bethlen, Prince of Transylvania, to join the newly established (1622) academy in Weissenburg. Under the pressure of the dislocations caused by the Thirty Years’ War in Nassau, they accepted the call to Transylvania, where Bisterfeld was a professor of philosophy and theology until his death. His successor was the French-English traveler and divine Isaac Basire. During the late 1630’s and the early 1640s, Bisterfeld also performed diplomatic duties for Gyorgy Rakoczy I, in order to secure an alliance with France and Sweden against the Holy Roman Empire. Owing to the hesitation of Sweden, this alliance was not effected until 1643. In late July 1638, he arrived in Paris, where he conferred with Marin Mersenne. He spent the remainder of the year in western Europe, including Hamburg and Amsterdam.

Owing to the efforts of Rivet, Bisterfeld received a call to the University of Leiden, a position that would have satisfied his desire to return to “the more cultivated parts of Europe,” but Rakdczy did not wish to lose so useful a man. Bisterfeld corresponded with Samuel Hartlib, John Dury, Theodore Haak, and others of their circle, and like them, he looked forward to the union of the divided Protestant churches. A projected visit to Hartlib in London late in 1638 did not occur, but Bisterfeld’s name figures in Hartlib’s plans for an office of correspondence.

The author of a number of key publications, Bisterfeld maintained correspondences with a number of key scholars in the universities and learned circles of Western Europe, something his work and missions as a diplomat help to foster and maintain, and his correspondents included Claude Saumaise, Andre Rivet, Marin Mersenne, Joachim Jungius, Johannes Clauberg, Samuel Hartlib, Johann Amos Comenius, and John Dury. The two-volumed Bisterfeldius redivivus: seu Operum Joh. Henrici Bisterfeldii Magni Theologi ac Philosophi, posthumorum, which was published posthumously in 1661 in The Hague, proved a significant influence on Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz.

Achievements

• Johann Heinrich Bisterfeld was one of the most prominent theologians of his time. He is regarded for his extensive service as a professor of philosophy at the Academy of Weissenburg, as well as for his diplomatic work for Gyorgy Rakoczy I, in order to secure an alliance with France and Sweden against the Holy Roman Empire.
  
  Another Bisterfeld's achievement was in his key publications, the two-volumed Bisterfeldius redivivus: seu Operum Joh, and Henrici Bisterfeldii Magni Theologi ac Philosophi, posthumorum, which was published posthumously in 1661 in The Hague.
  
  
  
  

Works

More photos

• book

  • Elementorum logicorum libri tres: accedit ejusdem authoris Phosphorus catholicus, seu Artis meditandi epitome, cui subjunctum est consilium de studiis feliciter i 1657
  • Bisterfeldius redivivus 1661

Views

The philosophical basis of Bisterfeld’s thought was the Ramism that reigned at the University of Herbom, and he also had much in common with Alsted and Comenius on other points: He shared their respect for Bacon, Ramón Lull, and Campanella, as well as their chiliasm and their belief in the universal harmony of all creation; universal knowledge, or pansophy, was their common aim. The Trinity was the source, norm, and end of all order. Philosophy was the pedagogue to theology, and Scriptures were the foundation of philosophy.

Bisterfeld differed from Alsted and Comenius in his greater insight into the philosophical requirements of the system that would reveal the universal harmony and thus put a man in control of nature. “Whatever is most true in philosophy,” Bisterfeld said, “is also most useful in practice.” He criticized Bacon and Campanella for failing to pay sufficient attention to Lull’s Arsmagna, and Comenius for ignoring metaphysics, for the lack of a strict method that would tie his system together.

Bisterfeld was strongly impressed by the need for consistent terminology and precise definitions. It was not enough to “open the door to languages,” as Comenius had done; Bisterfeld’s nomenclature would be a “new door” (“nomenclátor meus sit porta linguarum reformata”). On this point, Bisterfeld may have influenced projects for a philosophical language through his Alphabet i philosophici lihri tres (1661). But he also saw the need to go beyond terminology. He realized more fully than his contemporaries the value of an ars combinatoria, or logic of relations, as an Ariadne thread to serve as a guide in the labyrinth of the encyclopedia of knowledge. It was the chief aim of philosophy to reduce all the principles of particular areas of knowledge to the fewest possible common principles; it was the soul of practical theology to demonstrate that all things could be referred back to God.

Personality

Quotes from others about the person

• Bisterfeld’s work had a strong effect on the young Leibniz, who read and commented upon Bisterfeld’s most important philosophical writings during his student years at Leipzig. He noted that the Philosophiae primae seminarium was “a most brilliant little work whose equal in this kind I have not seen,” and called the Phosphorus catholicus, seu artis meditandi epitome “a most ingenious little book.”

Connections

In 1628 Bisterfeld traveled in the Netherlands and married Alsted’s daughter Anna, but it is not known exactly when or where.

Father:

Johann Bisterfeld

c. 1568–1618

Mother:

Gertrud Schickhart

Wife:

Anna Bisterfeld

teacher:

Johann Alsted

Acquaintance:

Andre Rivet

André Rivet (Andreas Rivetus) (August 1572 – January 7, 1651) was a French Huguenot theologian.

References

• Dictionary of scientific biography
  1981