Johann Albrecht Bengel - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Johann Albrecht Bengel Lutheran pietist clergyman and Greek-language

Koine Greek

Koine Greek is the universal dialect of the Greek language spoken throughout post-Classical antiquity , developing from the Attic dialect, with admixture of elements especially from Ionic....

scholar known for his edition of the Greek New Testament and his commentaries on it.

Life and career

Bengel was born at Winnenden

Winnenden

Winnenden is a small town in the Rems-Murr district of the Stuttgart Region in Baden-Württemberg in southwest Germany. It lies in a wine-growing area approx. northeast of Stuttgart and has a population of less than 28,000...

in Württemberg

Württemberg

Württemberg , formerly known as Wirtemberg or Wurtemberg, is an area and a former state in southwestern Germany, including parts of the regions Swabia and Franconia....

, Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

.
Due to the death of his father in 1693, he was educated by a family friend, David Wendel Spindler, who became a master in the gymnasium at Stuttgart

Stuttgart

Stuttgart is the capital of the state of Baden-Württemberg in southern Germany. The sixth-largest city in Germany, Stuttgart has a population of 600,038 while the metropolitan area has a population of 5.3 million ....

. In 1703 Bengel left Stuttgart and entered the University of Tübingen as a student at the Tübinger Stift
Tübinger Stift
The Tübinger Stift is a hall of residence and teaching; it is owned and supported by the Evangelical-Lutheran Church in Württemberg, and located in the university city of Tübingen, in South West Germany. The Stift was originally founded as an Augustinian monastery in the Middle Ages...

, where, in his spare time, he devoted himself especially to the works of Aristotle

Aristotle

Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...

and Spinoza, and, in theology, to those of Philipp Spener

Philipp Jakob Spener

Philipp Jakob Spener was a German Christian theologian known as the "Father of Pietism."...

, Johann Arndt

Johann Arndt

Johann Arndt was a German Lutheran theologian who wrote several influential books of devotional Christianity...

and August Francke. His knowledge of the metaphysics

Metaphysics

Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy concerned with explaining the fundamental nature of being and the world, although the term is not easily defined. Traditionally, metaphysics attempts to answer two basic questions in the broadest possible terms:...

of Spinoza was such that he was selected by one of the professors to prepare materials for a treatise, De Spinosismo, which was afterwards published.

After acquiring his degree, Bengel devoted himself to theology

Theology

Theology is the systematic and rational study of religion and its influences and of the nature of religious truths, or the learned profession acquired by completing specialized training in religious studies, usually at a university or school of divinity or seminary.-Definition:Augustine of Hippo...

. Even at this time he had religious doubts; it is interesting in view of his later work that one cause of his perplexities was the difficulty of ascertaining the true reading of certain passages in the Greek New Testament. In 1707 Bengel entered the ministry and was appointed to the parochial charge of Metzingen

Metzingen

Metzingen is a Swabian city with about 22,000 inhabitants, in the state of Baden-Württemberg in the southwest of Germany, south of Stuttgart.-History:The city is mentioned for the first time in documents from 1075...

-unter-Urach. In the following year he was recalled to Tübingen to undertake the office of Repetent (theological tutor).

He remained at Tübingen until 1713, when he was appointed head of a seminary recently established at Denkendorf

Denkendorf

Denkendorf may refer to two municipalities in Germany:*Denkendorf, Baden-Württemberg*Denkendorf, Bavaria...

as a preparatory school of theology.
Before entering into his new duties he travelled through the greater part of Germany

Germany

, studying the systems of education which were in use, and visiting the seminaries of the Jesuits as well as those of the Lutheran and Reformed churches. Among other places he went to Heidelberg

Heidelberg

-Early history:Between 600,000 and 200,000 years ago, "Heidelberg Man" died at nearby Mauer. His jaw bone was discovered in 1907; with scientific dating, his remains were determined to be the earliest evidence of human life in Europe. In the 5th century BC, a Celtic fortress of refuge and place of...

and Halle

Halle, Saxony-Anhalt

Halle is the largest city in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt. It is also called Halle an der Saale in order to distinguish it from the town of Halle in North Rhine-Westphalia...

, and had his attention directed at Heidelberg

Heidelberg

to the canons of scripture criticism published by Gerhard von Maastricht, and at Halle to Campeius Vitringa

Campeius Vitringa

Campegius Vitringa Sr., or Kempe Vitringa was a Dutch Protestant theologian and Hebraist. His youngest of four children was Campeius Vitringa ....

's Anacrisis ad Apocalypsin. The influence exerted by these upon his theological studies is manifest in some of his works.

For 28 years, from 1713 to 1741, he was master of the Klosterschule at Denkendorf, a seminary for candidates for the ministry established in a former monastery of the canons of the Holy Sepulchre.
To these years, the period of his greatest intellectual activity, belong many of his chief works.

In 1741 he was appointed prelate (i.e. general superintendent) at Herbrechtingen

Herbrechtingen

Herbrechtingen is a town in the district of Heidenheim in Baden-Württemberg in southern Germany. It is situated on the river Brenz, 7 km south of Heidenheim, and 28 km northeast of Ulm.-References:...

, where he remained till 1749, when he was raised to the dignity of consistorial counsellor and prelate of Alpirsbach

Alpirsbach

Alpirsbach is a town in the district of Freudenstadt in Baden-Württemberg in southern Germany. It is situated in the Black Forest on the Kinzig river, 13 km south of Freudenstadt.Alpirsbach is twinned with the French commune of Neuville-sur-Saône....

, with a residence in Stuttgart

Stuttgart

. He devoted himself to the discharge of his duties as a member of the consistory. A question of considerable difficulty was at that time occupying the attention of the church courts: the manner in which those who separated themselves from the church were to be dealt with, and the amount of toleration which should be accorded to meetings held in private houses for the purpose of religious edification. The civil power (the duke of Württemberg was a Roman Catholic) was disposed to have recourse to measures of repression, while the members of the consistory, recognizing the good effects of such meetings, were inclined to concede considerable liberty. Bengel exerted himself on the side of the members of the consistory. In 1751 the university of Tübingen conferred upon him the degree of Doctor of Divinity

Doctor of Divinity

Doctor of Divinity is an advanced academic degree in divinity. Historically, it identified one who had been licensed by a university to teach Christian theology or related religious subjects....

.

Bengel carried on an 18-year-long controversy with Nicolaus Ludwig, Count von Zinzendorf

Nicolaus Ludwig Zinzendorf

Nikolaus Ludwig von Zinzendorf und Pottendorf, Imperial Count of Zinzendorf and Pottendorf, , German religious and social reformer and bishop of the Moravian Church, was born at Dresden....

, leader of the Moravian Brethren from Herrnhut

Herrnhut

Herrnhut is a municipality in the district of Görlitz, in the Free State of Saxony, Germany.It has access to Bundesstraße 178 between Löbau and Zittau...

in Saxony

Saxony

The Free State of Saxony is a landlocked state of Germany, contingent with Brandenburg, Saxony Anhalt, Thuringia, Bavaria, the Czech Republic and Poland. It is the tenth-largest German state in area, with of Germany's sixteen states....

. This led to a break between the Moravian Brethren and the dour Pietism typical of Wuerttemberg, represented by Bengel. With his determined certainty giving him systematic insight into the divine Plan of Salvation, Bengel dogmatically opposed the dynamic, ecumenical, missionary efforts of Zinzendorf, who was indifferent to all dogmatism and intolerance. As Bengel did not hesitate to manipulate historical calendars in his chiliasm attempts to predict the end of the world, Zinzendorf rejected this as superstitious “interpretation of signs.”

The works on which Bengel's reputation rests as a Biblical scholar and critic are his edition of the Greek New Testament, and his Gnomon or Exegeticat Commentary on the same.

Greek New Testament

His edition of the Greek Testament was published at Tübingen in 1734, and at Stuttgart in the same year, but without the critical apparatus. So early as 1725, in an addition to his edition of Chrysostoms De Sacerdotio, he had given an account in his Prodromus Novi Testamenti Graeci recte cauteque adornandi of the principles on which his intended edition was to be based. In preparation for his work Bengel was able to avail himself of the collations of upwards of twenty manuscripts, none of them, however, of great importance, twelve of which had been collated by himself. In constituting the text, he imposed upon himself the singular restriction of not inserting any various reading which had not already been printed in some preceding edition of the Greek text. From this rule, however, he deviated in the case of the Apocalypse

Apocalypse

An Apocalypse is a disclosure of something hidden from the majority of mankind in an era dominated by falsehood and misconception, i.e. the veil to be lifted. The Apocalypse of John is the Book of Revelation, the last book of the New Testament...

, where, owing to the corrupt state of the text, he felt himself at liberty to introduce certain readings on manuscript authority. In the lower margin of the page he inserted a selection of various readings, the relative importance of which he denoted by the first five letters of the Greek alphabet in the following manner: α was employed to denote the reading which in his judgment was the true one, although he did not venture to place it in the text; β, a reading better than that in the text; γ, one equal to the textual reading; and δ, readings inferior to those in the text. R Etienne's division into verses was retained in the inner margin, but the text was divided into paragraphs.

The text was followed by a critical apparatus, the first part of which consisted of an introduction to the criticism of the New Testament

New Testament

The New Testament is the second major division of the Christian biblical canon, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament....

, in the thirty-fourth section of which he laid down and explained his celebrated canon, Proclivi scriptioni praestat ardua (The difficult reading is to be preferred to that which is easy), the soundness of which, as a general principle, has been recognized by succeeding critics. The second part of the critical apparatus was devoted to a consideration of the various readings, and here Bengel adopted the plan of stating the evidence both against and in favor of a particular reading, thus placing before the reader the materials for forming a judgment. Bengel was the first definitely to propound the theory of families or recensions of manuscripts.

His investigations had led him to see that a certain affinity or resemblance existed amongst many of the authorities for the Greek text manuscripts, versions, and ecclesiastical writers; that if a peculiar reading, e.g., was found in one of these, it was generally found also in the other members of the same class; and this general relationship seemed to point ultimately to a common origin for all the authorities which presented such peculiarities. Although disposed at first to divide the various documents into three classes, he finally adopted a classification into two: the Africa

Africa

Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...

n or older family of documents, and the Asiatic, or more recent class, to which he attached only a subordinate value. The theory was afterwards adopted by JS Semler

Johann Salomo Semler

Johann Salomo Semler was a German church historian and biblical commentator.-Youth and education:He was born at Saalfeld in Electoral Saxony, the son of a poor clergyman. He grew up in pietistic surroundings, which powerfully influenced him his life through, though he never became a Pietist...

and JJ Griesbach

Johann Jakob Griesbach

Johann Jakob Griesbach , German biblical textual critic, was born at Butzbach, a small town in the state of Hesse, where his father, Konrad Kaspar , was pastor...

, and worked up into an elaborate system by the latter critic.

Bengel's labors on the text of the Greek Testament were received with great disfavour in many quarters. Like Brian Walton and John Mill

John Mill

John Mill was an English theologian. He is noted for his critical edition of the Greek New Testament which included notes on many variant readings.-Biography:...

before him, he had to encounter the opposition of those who believed that the certainty of the word of God was endangered by the importance attached to the various readings. JJ Wetstein, on the other hand, accused him of excessive caution in not making freer use of his critical materials. In answer to these strictures, Bengel published a Defence of the Greek Text of His New Testament, which he prefixed to his Harmony of the Four Gospels, published in 1736, and which contained a sufficient answer to the complaints, especially of Wetstein, which had been made against him from so many different quarters. The text of Bengel long enjoyed a high reputation among scholars, and was frequently reprinted. An enlarged edition of the critical apparatus was published by Philip David Burk in 1763.

Gnomon Novi Testamenti

The other great work of Bengel, and that on which his reputation as an exegete is mainly based, is his Gnomon Novi Testamenti, or Exegetical Annotations on the New Testament, published in 1742. It was the fruit of twenty years labor, and exhibits with a brevity of expression, which, it has been said, condenses more matter into a line than can be extracted from pages of other writers, the results of his study. He modestly entitled his work a Gnomon
Gnomon
The gnomon is the part of a sundial that casts the shadow. Gnomon is an ancient Greek word meaning "indicator", "one who discerns," or "that which reveals."It has come to be used for a variety of purposes in mathematics and other fields....

or index, his object being rather to guide the reader to ascertain the meaning for himself, than to save him from the trouble of personal investigation. The principles of interpretation on which he proceeded were, to import nothing into Scripture, but to draw out of it everything that it really contained, in conformity with grammatico-historical rules not to be hampered by dogmatical considerations; and not to be influenced by the symbolical books. Bengel's hope that the Gnomon would help to rekindle a fresh interest in the study of the New Testament was fully realized. It has passed through many editions, has been translated into German

German language

German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....

and into English

English language

English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

, and is still one of the books most valued by expositors of the New Testament--John Wesley

John Wesley

John Wesley was a Church of England cleric and Christian theologian. Wesley is largely credited, along with his brother Charles Wesley, as founding the Methodist movement which began when he took to open-air preaching in a similar manner to George Whitefield...

made great use of it in compiling his Expository Notes upon the New Testament (1755).

Besides the two works already described, Bengel was the editor or author of many others, classical, patristic, ecclesiastical and expository. The more important are: Ordo Temporum, a treatise on the chronology of Scripture, in which he enters upon speculations regarding the end of the world, and an Exposition of the Apocalypse which enjoyed for a time great popularity in Germany, and was translated into several languages. His fame was such that almost 200 years later, Hermann Hesse

Hermann Hesse

Hermann Hesse was a German-Swiss poet, novelist, and painter. In 1946, he received the Nobel Prize in Literature...

has the hero of The Glass Bead Game

The Glass Bead Game

The Glass Bead Game is the last full-length novel and magnum opus of the German author Hermann Hesse. Begun in 1931 and published in Switzerland in 1943, after being rejected for publication in Germany, the book was mentioned in Hesse's citation for the 1946 Nobel Prize for Literature."Glass Bead...

discuss Bengel's writings.

External links

Gnomon Novi Testamenti Vol. 1. (English translation)
Gnomon Novi Testamenti Vol. 2. (English translation)
Exposition of the Apocalypse (English translation)
A Memoir of the Life and Writings of John Albert Bengel (English translation)

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.