Theodosius Andreas Harnack (russian: Феодосий Карлович Гарнак, translit=Feodosij Karlovič Garnak; ,

St. Petersburg Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...

– ,

Dorpat Tartu is the second largest city in Estonia after the Northern European country's political and financial capital, Tallinn. Tartu has a population of 91,407 (as of 2021). It is southeast of Tallinn and 245 kilometres (152 miles) northeast of ...

(now )) was a

Baltic German Baltic Germans (german: Deutsch-Balten or , later ) were ethnic German inhabitants of the eastern shores of the Baltic Sea, in what today are Estonia and Latvia. Since their coerced resettlement in 1939, Baltic Germans have markedly declined ...

theologian Theology is the systematic study of the nature of the divine and, more broadly, of religious belief. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing the ...

. A professor of

Divinity Divinity or the divine are things that are either related to, devoted to, or proceeding from a deity.divine< ...

, he started his career as a Privatdozent for

church history __NOTOC__ Church history or ecclesiastical history as an academic discipline studies the history of Christianity and the way the Christian Church has developed since its inception. Henry Melvill Gwatkin defined church history as "the spiritua ...

and

homiletics In religious studies, homiletics ( grc, ὁμιλητικός ''homilētikós'', from ''homilos'', "assembled crowd, throng") is the application of the general principles of rhetoric to the specific art of public preaching. One who practices or ...

at the

University of Dorpat The University of Tartu (UT; et, Tartu Ülikool; la, Universitas Tartuensis) is a university in the city of Tartu in Estonia. It is the national university of Estonia. It is the only classical university in the country, and also its biggest ...

(in what is today Tartu,

Estonia Estonia, formally the Republic of Estonia, is a country by the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, a ...

) in 1843, he was further appointed university preacher in 1847. Since 1848 he held an ordinary chair (tenure) as professor for

practical Pragmatism is a philosophical tradition that considers words and thought as tools and instruments for prediction, problem solving, and action (philosophy), action, and rejects the idea that the function of thought is to describe, represent, ...

and

systematic theology Systematic theology, or systematics, is a discipline of Christian theology that formulates an orderly, rational, and coherent account of the doctrines of the Christian faith. It addresses issues such as what the Bible teaches about certain topic ...

. Between 1853 and 1866 Harnack was professor at Frederick Alexander University (merged in the

University of Erlangen-Nuremberg A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, ...

since 1961) in

Erlangen Erlangen (; East Franconian: ''Erlang'', Bavarian: ''Erlanga'') is a Middle Franconian city in Bavaria, Germany. It is the seat of the administrative district Erlangen-Höchstadt (former administrative district Erlangen), and with 116,062 inhab ...

, Bavaria,

German Confederation The German Confederation (german: Deutscher Bund, ) was an association of 39 predominantly German-speaking sovereign states in Central Europe. It was created by the Congress of Vienna in 1815 as a replacement of the former Holy Roman Empire, w ...

(now Germany). Harnack was a staunch

Lutheran Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and Protestant Reformers, reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Cathol ...

and a prolific writer on theological subjects; his chief field of work was practical theology, and his important book on that subject summing up his long experience and teaching appeared at Erlangen (1877–1878, 2 vols.). The liturgy of the then Lutheran church in

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eig ...

has, since 1898, been based on his ''Liturgische Formulare'' (1872). His twin sons were the German

Adolf von Harnack (1851–1930) and

mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, structure, space, models, and change. History On ...

Carl Gustav Axel Harnack Carl Gustav Axel Harnack (, Dorpat (now ) – 3 April 1888, Dresden) was a Baltic German mathematician who contributed to potential theory. Harnack's inequality applied to harmonic functions. He also worked on the real algebraic geometry of pla ...

(1851–1888). His other two sons were also successful scientists, with the pharmacology and physiological chemistry professor Erich Harnack (1853–1914) and the history of literature professor

Otto Harnack Rudolf Gottfried Otto Harnack (23 November 1857, in Erlangen – 22 March 1914, near Besigheim) was a German literary historian, best known for his writings on Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. He studied history and philology at the universities of ...

(1857–1914), father of Arvid Harnack and

Falk Harnack Falk Harnack (2 March 1913 – 3 September 1991) was a German director and screenwriter. During Germany's Nazi era, he was also active with the German Resistance and toward the end of World War II, the partisans in Greece. Harnack was from a fam ...

Books by Theodosius Harnack

* Der christliche Gemeindegottesdienst im apostolischen und altkatholischen Zeitaltern (Erlangen, 1854) * Tabellarische Uebersicht der Geschichte der Liturgie der christlichen Hauptgottesdienstes (Erlangen, 1858) * Die lutherische Kirche Livlands und die herrnhutische Brüdergemeinde (Erlangen, 1860) * Luthers Theologie: mit besonderer Beziehung auf seine Versöhnungs- und Erlösungslehre (2 vols., Erlangen, 1862, 1886) * Praktische Theologie (4 vols., Erlangen, 1877-8) * Ueber den Kanon und die Inspiration der Heiligen Schrift: ein Wort zum Frieden (Erlangen, 1885)

Sources

''die erfurt enzyklopädie''
* * * Bernd Schröder, „Die Wissenschaft der sich selbst erbauenden Kirche – Theodosius Harnack“, in: ''Geschichte der Praktischen Theologie. Dargestellt anhand ihrer Klassiker'', Christian Grethlein and Michael Meyer-Blanck (eds.), Leipzig: Evangelische Verlags-Anstalt, 2000, , pp. 151–206. {{DEFAULTSORT:Harnack, Theodosius 1817 births 1889 deaths Clergy from Saint Petersburg People from Sankt-Peterburgsky Uyezd Baltic German people from the Russian Empire German Lutheran theologians German male non-fiction writers 19th-century German Protestant theologians 19th-century German male writers Academic staff of the University of Tartu Academic staff of the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg 19th-century Lutherans

Books by Theodosius Harnack

Further reading

Sources