Nicolaes Boddingius
Encyclopedia
Nicolaes Boddingius, or Bodding van Laer (Christened 2 August 1605 in Haarlem, Netherlands – died 1669 in Bakel, Netherlands) was a schoolmaster, writer and minister in the Netherlands
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...

.

Biography

He was born as the fifth child of Jacob Claesz Bodding and Magdalena Heyns. He came from a well to do family and his parents operated a private school in Haarlem started by Magdalena's father, the well-known writer and publisher Peeter Heyns. His older brothers were the Dutch painters Roeland van Laer and Pieter van Laer
Pieter van Laer
Pieter van Laer was a Dutch Golden Age painter of genre scenes, active for over a decade in Rome, where his nickname was Il Bamboccio...

. He became a calligrapher and writing teacher in Haarlem.
For most of his life he lived in Haarlem, where after the death of his parents, sometime before 1628, he took over the school "inde Laurier Boom" which was founded by his grandfather Peeter Heyns around 1593. He also wrote several books about learning how to write, amongst them one called "Stightigh A.B.C.".
In 1655 he was appointed as rector and principal of the Latin school in Helmond, Netherlands, which position he held until 1659.
In that year, through a resolution by the "Raad van State", he was appointed as minister in Bakel, Netherlands. It is believed he studied theology in Leiden, Netherlands.

In the Brouwerskapel of the "Grote Kerk", also named St. Bavochurch, in Haarlem
Haarlem
Haarlem is a municipality and a city in the Netherlands. It is the capital of the province of North Holland, the northern half of Holland, which at one time was the most powerful of the seven provinces of the Dutch Republic...

, hangs a plaque with inscriptions of names of ministers who served the church since the Reformation
Protestant Reformation
The Protestant Reformation was a 16th-century split within Western Christianity initiated by Martin Luther, John Calvin and other early Protestants. The efforts of the self-described "reformers", who objected to the doctrines, rituals and ecclesiastical structure of the Roman Catholic Church, led...

. The plaque was made and signed by Nicolaus Boddingius, "Anno 1652".

The bottom of the plate contains two phrases, one in Greek and the other in Hebrew. The Greek text resembles Philippians 3:7, "but whatever was to my profit, I now consider loss for the sake of Christ", while the Hebrew text comes from Psalm 121:2, "My help comes from the Lord". The apparent essence of both phrases is to identify that the listing of names of ministers is not for the glory of them, but for their service to God.

External links

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