Theodor Nöldeke (; born 2 March 1836 – 25 December 1930) was a German orientalist and scholar. His research interests ranged over

Old Testament The Old Testament (often abbreviated OT) is the first division of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible or Tanakh, a collection of ancient religious Hebrew writings by the Israelites. The ...

studies, Semitic languages and Arabic, Persian and Syriac literature. Nöldeke translated several important works of oriental literature and during his lifetime was considered an important orientalist. He wrote numerous studies (including on the Qur’ān) and contributed articles to the

Encyclopædia Britannica The (Latin for "British Encyclopædia") is a general knowledge English-language encyclopaedia. It is published by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.; the company has existed since the 18th century, although it has changed ownership various t ...

. Among the projects Nöldeke collaborated on was

Michael Jan de Goeje Michael Jan de Goeje (August 13, 1836 – May 17, 1909) was a Dutch orientalist focusing on Arabia and Islam. Early life Michael Jan de Goeje was born in Dronrijp, Friesland. He devoted himself at an early age to the study of oriental lan ...

’s published edition of

al-Tabari ( ar, أبو جعفر محمد بن جرير بن يزيد الطبري), more commonly known as al-Ṭabarī (), was a Muslim historian and scholar from Amol, Tabaristan. Among the most prominent figures of the Islamic Golden Age, al-Tabari ...

's ''Tarikh'' ("Universal History"), for which he translated the

Sassanid The Sasanian () or Sassanid Empire, officially known as the Empire of Iranians (, ) and also referred to by historians as the Neo-Persian Empire, was the History of Iran, last Iranian empire before the early Muslim conquests of the 7th-8th cen ...

-era section. This translation remains of great value, particularly for the extensive supplementary commentary. His numerous students included

Charles Cutler Torrey Charles Cutler Torrey (20 December 1863 – 12 November 1956) was an American historian, archaeologist and scholar. He is known for, presenting through his books, manuscript evidence supporting alternate views on the origins of Christian and Isl ...

Louis Ginzberg Louis Ginzberg ( he, לוי גינצבורג, ''Levy Gintzburg''; russian: Леви Гинцберг, ''Levy Ginzberg''; November 28, 1873 – November 11, 1953) was a Russian-born American rabbi and Talmudic scholar of Lithuanian-Jewish desc ...

and Friedrich Zacharias Schwally. He entrusted Schwally with the continuation of his standard work "The History of the

Qur’ān The Quran (, ; Standard Arabic: , Quranic Arabic: , , 'the recitation'), also romanized Qur'an or Koran, is the central religious text of Islam, believed by Muslims to be a revelation from God. It is organized in 114 chapters (pl.: , sing.: ...

Biography

Nöldeke was born in Harburg, (Hamburg today). In 1853 he graduated from the Gymnasium Georgianum

Lingen Lingen (), officially Lingen (Ems), is a town in Lower Saxony, Germany. In 2008, its population was 52,353, and in addition there were about 5,000 people who registered the city as their secondary residence. Lingen, specifically "Lingen (Ems)" is ...

Emsland Landkreis Emsland () is a district in Lower Saxony, Germany named after the river Ems. It is bounded by (from the north and clockwise) the districts of Leer, Cloppenburg and Osnabrück, the state of North Rhine-Westphalia (district of Steinf ...

, and went on to study at the

University of Göttingen The University of Göttingen, officially the Georg August University of Göttingen, (german: Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, known informally as Georgia Augusta) is a public research university in the city of Göttingen, Germany. Founded ...

under

Heinrich Ewald Georg Heinrich August Ewald (16 November 18034 May 1875) was a German orientalist, Protestant theologian, and Biblical exegete. He studied at the University of Göttingen. In 1827 he became extraordinary professor there, in 1831 ordinary profess ...

, and later at the

University of Vienna The University of Vienna (german: Universität Wien) is a public research university located in Vienna, Austria. It was founded by Duke Rudolph IV in 1365 and is the oldest university in the German-speaking world. With its long and rich hi ...

, the

University of Leiden Leiden University (abbreviated as ''LEI''; nl, Universiteit Leiden) is a public research university in Leiden, Netherlands. The university was founded as a Protestant university in 1575 by William, Prince of Orange, as a reward to the city of Le ...

and the

Humboldt University of Berlin Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (german: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a German public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin. It was established by Frederick William III on the initiative ...

. In 1864 he became a professor at the

University of Kiel Kiel University, officially the Christian-Albrecht University of Kiel, (german: Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, abbreviated CAU, known informally as Christiana Albertina) is a university in the city of Kiel, Germany. It was founded in ...

and from 1872 at the

University of Strasbourg The University of Strasbourg (french: Université de Strasbourg, Unistra) is a public research university located in Strasbourg, Alsace, France, with over 52,000 students and 3,300 researchers. The French university traces its history to the ea ...

until he retired aged 70. Nöldeke had ten children, six of whom predeceased him. His son Arnold Nöldeke became a judge and was a Hamburg senator during the

Weimar period The Weimar Republic (german: link=no, Weimarer Republik ), officially named the German Reich, was the government of Germany from 1918 to 1933, during which it was a constitutional federal republic for the first time in history; hence it is als ...

. He died in

Karlsruhe Karlsruhe ( , , ; South Franconian: ''Kallsruh'') is the third-largest city of the German state (''Land'') of Baden-Württemberg after its capital of Stuttgart and Mannheim, and the 22nd-largest city in the nation, with 308,436 inhabitants. ...

Distinctions

*1859 – won the French ''

Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres The Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres () is a French learned society devoted to history, founded in February 1663 as one of the five academies of the Institut de France. The academy's scope was the study of ancient inscriptions (epigr ...

'' prize for his ''Histoire du Coran'' and ''Semitic languages, and the history and civilization of Islam''. *1860 – ''Geschichte des Qorâns'' German edition published with additions at Göttingen. *1861 – lectures at the university of Göttingen. *1864 – extraordinary professor at the university of Göttingen. *1868 – ordinary professor at

Kiel Kiel () is the capital and most populous city in the northern German state of Schleswig-Holstein, with a population of 246,243 (2021). Kiel lies approximately north of Hamburg. Due to its geographic location in the southeast of the Jutland ...

; ''Grammatik der neusyrischen Sprache'' published. *1872 – chair of

Oriental Languages A wide variety of languages are spoken throughout Asia, comprising different language families and some unrelated isolates. The major language families include Austroasiatic, Austronesian, Caucasian, Dravidian, Indo-European, Afroasiatic, Tur ...

Strassburg Strasbourg (, , ; german: Straßburg ; gsw, label= Bas Rhin Alsatian, Strossburi , gsw, label= Haut Rhin Alsatian, Strossburig ) is the prefecture and largest city of the Grand Est region of eastern France and the official seat of the E ...

, (resigns in 1906). *1874 – ''Mandäische Grammatik'' published. *1878 – Foreign member of the

Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences ( nl, Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen, abbreviated: KNAW) is an organization dedicated to the advancement of science and literature in the Netherlands. The academy is housed ...

*1879 – external member of the

Bavarian Academy of Sciences The Bavarian Academy of Sciences and Humanities (german: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften) is an independent public institution, located in Munich. It appoints scholars whose research has contributed considerably to the increase of knowledg ...

. *1881–1882 – translates

Tabari ( ar, أبو جعفر محمد بن جرير بن يزيد الطبري), more commonly known as al-Ṭabarī (), was a Muslim historian and scholar from Amol, Tabaristan. Among the most prominent figures of the Islamic Golden Age, al-Tabari ...

(

Arabic Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter ...

–

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ge ...

). *1888 – member of the

Order Order, ORDER or Orders may refer to: * Categorization, the process in which ideas and objects are recognized, differentiated, and understood * Heterarchy, a system of organization wherein the elements have the potential to be ranked a number of ...

Pour le Mérite The ' (; , ) is an order of merit (german: Verdienstorden) established in 1740 by King Frederick II of Prussia. The was awarded as both a military and civil honour and ranked, along with the Order of the Black Eagle, the Order of the Red Eag ...

for Sciences and Arts. *1892 – awarded an honorary doctorate by the

University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh ( sco, University o Edinburgh, gd, Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in post-nominals) is a public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Granted a royal charter by King James VI in 1 ...

. *1893 – appointed external member of the

Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei The Accademia dei Lincei (; literally the "Academy of the Lynx-Eyed", but anglicised as the Lincean Academy) is one of the oldest and most prestigious European scientific institutions, located at the Palazzo Corsini on the Via della Lungara in Rom ...

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus ( legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

. *1920 – associate member of the Heidelberg Academy of Sciences. *1926 – awarded honorary membership of the

Russian Academy of Sciences The Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS; russian: Росси́йская акаде́мия нау́к (РАН) ''Rossíyskaya akadémiya naúk'') consists of the national academy of Russia; a network of scientific research institutes from across t ...

–he had been a corresponding member since 1885; Honorary citizen of the city of Harburg (now part of Hamburg).

Selected works

*''

'', several early essays and article on the Qur'an, with others, republished in the journal ''Oriental Sketches''. *
Geschichte des Qorâns
' (1860;

Leipzig Leipzig ( , ; Upper Saxon: ) is the most populous city in the German state of Saxony. Leipzig's population of 605,407 inhabitants (1.1 million in the larger urban zone) as of 2021 places the city as Germany's eighth most populous, as ...

, Dieterich, 2nd rev. ed., 1909–38
pt. 1pt.2
; English translation by Wolfgang H. Behn: ''The History of the Qurʾān'', Leiden: Brill 2013) *
Das Leben Mohammeds
' ("Life of Muḥammad", German text; Hanover, Rümpler, 1863) *
Beiträge zur Kenntnis der Poesie der alten Araber
'. (Hanover, Carl Rümpler, 1864) * ''Die alttestamentliche Literatur'' (1868) *
Untersuchungen zur Kritik des Alten Testaments
' (1869) * * *
Histoire Littéraire de L'ancien Testament
'; French (Paris, Sandoz et Fischbacher, 1873) *
Geschichte der Perser und Araber zur Zeit der Sasaniden. Aus der arabischen Chronik des Tabari übersetzt
' (1879) * ** *** * * * Review of

Julius Wellhausen Julius Wellhausen (17 May 1844 – 7 January 1918) was a German biblical scholar and orientalist. In the course of his career, he moved from Old Testament research through Islamic studies to New Testament scholarship. Wellhausen contributed to t ...

's ''Reste Arabischen Heidentums'' (1887) in ZDMG, Vol. 41 (1887), pp. 707–26. *
Aufsätze zur persischen Geschichte
' (Leipzig, 1887); articles on

Persia Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

. *
Sketches from Eastern History
' (London & Edinburgh, Adam And Charles Black, 1892) *
A Servile War in the East [The Zanj Slave Uprising in 9th Century Mesopotamia]
' (English transl., John Sutherland Black; appeared as Chap. 5 in ''Sketches from Eastern History''; 1892) *
Iranische Nationalepos
' (Strassburg: Trübner, 1896). * ''Zur Grammatik des klassischen Arabisch'' (1896) * ''Fünf Mo'allaqat, übersetzt und erklärt'' (1899–1901) * Articles in the ''

Encyclopaedia Biblica ''Encyclopaedia Biblica: A Critical Dictionary of the Literary, Political and Religion History, the Archeology, Geography and Natural History of the Bible'' (1899), edited by Thomas Kelly Cheyne and J. Sutherland Black, is a critical encyclopedi ...

'' (1903) * ''Beiträge zur semitischen Sprachwissenschaft'' (1904) * ''Kalila wa Dimna'' (Strassburg, Trübner, 1912) *
Israel und die Völker nach jüdischer Lehre
' co-authored by August Wünsche; ed., Joseph S Bloch; (Berlin, Wien, 1922) He contributed frequently to the '' Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft'', the '' Göttingische gelehrte Anzeigen'' and the ''Expositor''.

Nöldeke Chronology

The Nöldeke Chronology is a "canonical ordering" of the 114

suras The Abhira kingdom in the Mahabharata is either of two kingdoms near the Sarasvati river. They were dominated by the Abhiras, sometimes referred to as Surabhira also, combining both Sura and Abhira kingdoms. Modern day Abhira territory lies wit ...

of the Qur'an according to the sequence of revelation. Intended to aid theological, literary, and historical scholarship of Qur'anic exegesis by enhancing structural coherence. The Nöldeke Chronology has been adopted for general guidance by some schools of current scholarship. The Egyptian Edition, crafted 1924, is an adaptation of Nöldeke's work. Nöldeke considered the suras from the perspective of content and stylistic development and linguistic origination to rearrange them in historical sequence of revelation. According to his system Sura 21: “The Prophets,” – 21st of 114 suras in the Qur'an – is renumbered '65'. His chronology further divided the suras into two periods: The Meccan (in three phases), and the Medina. The Nöldeke Chronology of the Qur'an: Four groups of the 114 Suras: *Group 1. First Meccan Period (48 Suras): Surahs 96; 74; 111; 106; 108; 104; 107;

102 102 may refer to: *102 (number), the number * AD 102, a year in the 2nd century AD *102 BC, a year in the 2nd century BC * 102 (ambulance service), an emergency medical transport service in Uttar Pradesh, India * 102 (Clyde) Field Squadron, Royal En ...

; 105; 92; 90; 94; 93; 97; 86; 91; 80; 68; 87; 95;

103 103 may refer to: *103 (number), the number *AD 103, a year in the 2nd century AD * 103 BC, a year in the 2nd century BC * 103 (Tyne Electrical Engineers) Field Squadron, a territorial regiment * 103 (Newcastle) Field Squadron, Royal Engineers *103 ...

; 85; 73; 101; 99; 82; 81; 53; 84;

100 100 or one hundred ( Roman numeral: C) is the natural number following 99 and preceding 101. In medieval contexts, it may be described as the short hundred or five score in order to differentiate the English and Germanic use of "hundred" to de ...

; 79; 77; 78; 88; 89; 75; 83; 69; 51; 52; 56; 70; 55; 112; 109; 113;

114 114 may refer to: *114 (number) *AD 114 *114 BC *114 (1st London) Army Engineer Regiment, Royal Engineers, an English military unit *114 (Antrim Artillery) Field Squadron, Royal Engineers, a Northern Irish military unit *114 (MBTA bus) *114 (New Je ...

; 1 *Group 2. Second Meccan Period (21 Suras): 54; 37; 71; 76; 44; 50; 20; 26; 15; 19; 38; 36; 43; 72; 67; 23; 21; 25; 17; 27; 18 *Group 3. Third Meccan Period (21 Suras): 32; 41; 45; 16; 30; 11; 14; 12; 40; 28; 39; 29; 31; 42; 10; 34; 35; 7; 46; 6; 13 *Group 4. Medinan Period (24 Suras): 2; 98; 64; 62; 8; 47; 3; 61; 57; 4; 65; 59; 33; 63; 24; 58; 22; 48; 66; 60; 110; 49; 9; 5

References

Citations

Sources

* * *

External links

* * *
History of Sasanian's State
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Noldeke, Theodor 1836 births 1930 deaths German orientalists German biblical scholars German male non-fiction writers Grammarians from Germany History of Quran scholars Humboldt University of Berlin alumni Leiden University alumni Linguists from Germany Old Testament scholars People from Harburg, Hamburg Syriacists Translators of the Quran into German University of Göttingen alumni University of Vienna alumni Members of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences Recipients of the Pour le Mérite (civil class) Shahnameh Researchers Scholars of Mandaeism Translators from Mandaic Grammarians of Aramaic Members of the Göttingen Academy of Sciences and Humanities