Johan Edvard Sverdrup (22 June 1861 – 21 January 1923) was a Norwegian educator, author and church leader. Sverdrup was one of the key theologians in the

Church of Norway The Church of Norway ( nb, Den norske kirke, nn, Den norske kyrkja, se, Norgga girku, sma, Nöörjen gærhkoe) is an Lutheranism, evangelical Lutheran denomination of Protestant Christianity and by far the largest Christian church in Norway. ...

in the first few decades of the 1900s.

Biography

Sverdrup was born in Balestrand in

Sogn og Fjordane Sogn og Fjordane (; English: "Sogn and Fjordane") was, up to 1 January 2020, a county in western Norway, when it was merged to become part of Vestland county. Bordering previous counties Møre og Romsdal, Oppland, Buskerud, and Hordaland, the c ...

, Norway. He was the son of Harald Ulrik Sverdrup (1813–1891). His father was a vicar and served as a member of the

Norwegian Parliament The Storting ( no, Stortinget ) (lit. the Great Thing) is the supreme legislature of Norway, established in 1814 by the Constitution of Norway. It is located in Oslo. The unicameral parliament has 169 members and is elected every four years base ...

. His uncle

Johan Sverdrup Johan Sverdrup (30 July 1816 – 17 February 1892) was a Norwegian politician from the Liberal Party. He was the first prime minister of Norway after the introduction of parliamentarism and served as the 4th prime minister of Norway. Sverdrup ...

(1816–1892) founded the

Liberal Party The Liberal Party is any of many political parties around the world. The meaning of ''liberal'' varies around the world, ranging from liberal conservatism on the right to social liberalism on the left. __TOC__ Active liberal parties This is a l ...

and became

Prime Minister of Norway The prime minister of Norway ( no, statsminister, which directly translates to "minister of state") is the head of government and chief executive of Norway. The prime minister and Cabinet (consisting of all the most senior government department ...

in 1884. His brother Jakob Sverdrup (1845-99) was Bishop of the Diecese of Bjørgvin and served as a member of the

. His brother

Georg Sverdrup Georg Sverdrup (born Jørgen Sverdrup; 25 April 1770 – 8 December 1850) was a Norwegian statesman, best known as one of the presidents of the Norwegian Constituent Assembly in Eidsvoll in 1814. He was a member of the Norwegian Parliament and ...

(1848-1907) was a Norwegian-American Lutheran minister who founded the

Lutheran Free Church The Lutheran Free Church (LFC) was a Lutheran denomination that existed in the United States, mainly in Minnesota and North Dakota, from 1897 until its merger into the American Lutheran Church (ALC) in 1963. The history of the church body predates ...

and served as president of Augsburg Seminary. Edvard Sverdrup
at the Sogn og Fjordane County Encyclopedia (

Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation NRK, an abbreviation of the Norwegian ''Norsk Rikskringkasting AS'', generally expressed in English as the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation, is the Norwegian government-owned radio and television public broadcasting company, and the larges ...

) Edvard Sverdrup attended

Bergen Cathedral School Bergen Cathedral School ( Norwegian: ''Bergen Katedralskole'', Latin: ''Schola Cathedralis Bergensis'', formerly known as Bergens lærdeskole and Bergen latinskole and colloquially known as Katten) is an upper secondary school in Bergen, Norway. Lo ...

and took his final exams in 1880. He graduated as

cand.theol. Candidatus theologiæ (male), Candidata theologiæ (female), abbreviated cand. theol. is an academic degree with a long tradition, awarded after a six-year higher education in theology in Iceland, Denmark, and Norway. In Norway, the title has r ...

in 1885. From 1885 to 1893 he worked as a teacher at the

folk high school Folk high schools (also ''Adult Education Center'', Danish: ''Folkehøjskole;'' Dutch: ''Volkshogeschool;'' Finnish: ''kansanopisto'' and ''työväenopisto'' or ''kansalaisopisto;'' German: ''Volkshochschule'' and (a few) ''Heimvolkshochschule ...

Sogndal Sogndal is a municipality in Vestland county, Norway. It is located on the northern shore of the Sognefjorden in the traditional district of Sogn. The village of Hermansverk is the administrative center of Sogndal municipality. Other villages ...

which had been established by his brother, Jakob Sverdrup. In 1903, he was appointed

vicar A vicar (; Latin: '' vicarius'') is a representative, deputy or substitute; anyone acting "in the person of" or agent for a superior (compare "vicarious" in the sense of "at second hand"). Linguistically, ''vicar'' is cognate with the English pr ...

(''sogneprest'') in Sulen (now

Solund Solund is a municipality in the county of Vestland, Norway. It is located in the traditional district of Sogn. Solund is the westernmost island municipality in Norway. Holmebåen on the island of Steinsøy is the westernmost point in all of Nor ...

)] in the county of

. In 1908, he was among the first teachers at the newly established

MF Norwegian School of Theology MF Norwegian School of Theology, Religion and Society ( no, MF vitenskapelig høyskole for teologi, religion og samfunn), formerly the Free Faculty of Theology ( no, Det teologiske menighetsfakultet) and MF Norwegian School of Theology, is an accr ...

in Oslo. He was professor there from 1918. He also published several books, many on church history. From 1910 to 1918, he was co-editor with theologian, Christian Ihlen (1868–1958) of the periodical '' Lutheran Church Official Journal '' (''Luthersk Kirketidende'') which had been founded in 1863 by theologian and educator,

Gisle Johnson Gisle Christian Johnson (10 September 1822 – 17 July 1894) was a leading 19th-century Norwegian theologian and educator. Biography Gisle Christian Johnson was born at Fredrikshald (now Halden) in Østfold, Norway. He grew up at Kristiansand ...

(1822–1894). He was chairman of the board of The Norwegian Lutheran Inner Missionary (''Det norske lutherske Indremisjonsselskap'') from 1911 to 1923. The organization had been founded in 1868 with the primary goal of promote Christian enlightenment, especially in the proliferation of Christian literature.

Personal life

He was married in 1886 to Maria Vollan (1865-1891). After her death, he was married in 1893 to Agnes Vollan (1866-1952) who was the sister of his first wife. He was the father of educator Mimi Sverdrup Lunden (1894-1955), Einar Sverdrup (1895–1942) CEO of

Store Norske Spitsbergen Kulkompani Store Norske Spitsbergen Kulkompani (SNSK), or simply Store Norske, is a Norwegian coal mining company based on the Svalbard archipelago. It was formed in 1916, after a Norwegian purchase of the American Arctic Coal Company (ACC). The company ...

, oceanographer Harald Ulrik Sverdrup (1888-1957) and United States Army General Leif Sverdrup (1898-1976).

Selected works

*''Det menneskelige legeme med en kort oversigt over dyrene og planterne. En lærebog for høiere skoler, seminarier, amts- og folkehøiskoler'', (1890) *''De sidste ting. Fire foredrag'', (1912) *''Den evangelisk lutherske tro. Dens historiske gjennembrud og dens grundsandheter efter den augsburgske bekjendelse'', (1915) *''Hvorledes Luther blev reformator'', (1917) *''Luther som bibeloversætter'', (1917) *''Fra Norges kristenliv. Den norske lutherstiftelse og Det norske lutherske indremissionsselskap 1868–1918'', (1918) *''Luthers kamp med Rom. Efter dens historiske forløp til og med Riksdagen i Worms'', (1922) *''Fader vor. Tanker ved Herrens bøn'', (1922) *''Hauge och Haugeanism'', (ed. by T. A. J. Carlson, 1925)

References

External links

Family genealogy
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sverdrup, Edvard 1861 births 1923 deaths Academic staff of the MF Norwegian School of Theology, Religion and Society Norwegian theologians 20th-century Norwegian Lutheran clergy People from Balestrand People educated at the Bergen Cathedral School 20th-century Protestant theologians