Everything about Wilhelm Gesenius totally explained
Heinrich Friedrich Wilhelm Gesenius (
February 3,
1786–
October 23,
1842), was a
German orientalist and
Biblical critic.
He was born at
Nordhausen,
Thuringia. In 1803 he became a student of
philosophy and
theology at the
University of Helmstedt, where
Heinrich Henke was his most influential teacher; but the latter part of his university course was taken at the
Göttingen, where
J.G. Eichhorn and
T.C. Tychsen were then at the height of their popularity. In 1806, shortly after graduation, he became
Repetent and
Privatdozent at Göttingen; and, as he was later proud to say, had
August Neander for his first pupil in
Hebrew language. In 1810 he became
professor extraordinarius in theology, and in 1811
ordinarius, at the
University of Halle, where, in spite of many offers of high preferment elsewhere, he spent the rest of his life.
He taught for over thirty years, the only interruptions being that of 1813-1814 (occasioned by the
War of Liberation, during which the university was closed) and those occasioned by two prolonged literary tours, first in 1820 to
Paris,
London and
Oxford with his colleague
Johann Karl Thilo (1794-1853) for the examination of rare oriental manuscripts, and in 1835 to
England and the
Netherlands in connection with his
Phoenician studies. He became the most popular teacher of Hebrew and of
Old Testament introduction and
exegesis in
Germany; during his later years his lectures were attended by nearly five hundred students. Among his pupils the most eminent were
Peter von Bohlen,
A.G. Hoffmann,
Hermann Hupfeld,
Emil Rödiger,
J. F. Tuch,
Wilhelm Vatke and
Theodor Benfey.
In 1827, after declining an invitation to take Eichhorn's place at Göttingen, Gesenius was made a
Consistorialrath; but, apart from the violent attacks to which he, along with his friend and colleague
Julius Wegscheider, was in 1830 subjected by
E.W. Hengstenberg and his party in the
Evangelische Kirchenzeitung, on account of his
rationalism, his life was uneventful. He died at Halle.
Gesenius takes much of the credit for having freed
Semitic philology from the trammels of theological and religious prepossession, and for inaugurating the strictly scientific (and comparative) method which has since been so fruitful. As an
exegete he exercised a powerful influence on theological investigation.
Writings
Of his many works, the earliest, published in 1810, entitled
Versuch über die maltesische Sprache, was a successful refutation of the current opinion that the modern
Maltese was of
Punic origin. In the same year appeared the first volume of the
Hebräisches u. Chaldäisches Handwörterbuch, completed in 1812. Revised editions of this appear periodically in Germany. The publication of a new English edition was started in 1892 under the editorship of Professors
F. Brown,
S.R. Driver and
C.A. Briggs, now well known as the
Brown Driver Briggs lexicon. The
Hebräische Grammatik, published in 1813 (28th edition by
E. Kautzsch; English translation by
A.E. Cowley, 1910; 29th edition [incomplete] by
G. Bergsträsser, 1918-29), was followed in 1815 by the
Geschichte der hebräischen Sprache (now very rare), and in 1817 by the
Ausführliches Lehrgebäude der hebräischen Sprache.
The first volume of his well-known commentary on
Isaiah (
Der Prophet Jesaia), with a translation, appeared in 1821; but the work wasn't completed until 1829. The
Thesaurus philologico-criticus linguae Hebraicae et Chaldaicae V. T., begun in 1829, he didn't live to complete; the latter part of the third volume is edited by E. Rödiger (1858). Other works include:
De Pentateuchi Samaritana origine, indole, et auctoritate (1815), supplemented in 1822 and 1824 by the treatise
De Samaritanorum theologia, and by an edition of
Carmina Samaritana; Paläographische Studien über phönizische u. punische Schrift (1835), a pioneering work which he followed up in 1837 by his collection of Phoenician monuments (
Scripturae linguaeque Phoeniciae monumenta quotquot supersunt); an
Aramaic lexicon (1834-1839); and a treatise on the
Himyaritic language written in conjunction with E. Rödiger in 1841.
Gesenius also contributed extensively to Ersch and Gruber's
Encyclopädie, and enriched the German translation of
J.L. Burckhardt's
Travels in Syria and the Holy Land with valuable geographical notes. For many years he also edited the
Halle Allgemeine Litteraturzeitung. A sketch of his life was published anonymously in 1843 (
Gesenius: eine Erinnerung für seine Freunde), and another by H. Gesenius,
Wilhelm Gesenius, am Erinnerungsblatt an den hundertjährigen Geburtstag, in 1886.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Wilhelm Gesenius'.
|
External Link Exchanges
Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:
<a href="http://wilhelm_gesenius.totallyexplained.com">Wilhelm Gesenius Totally Explained</a>
Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned. |
