Lipsius, Richard Adelbert

LIPSIUS, RICHARD ADELBERT: German Protestant theologian; b. at Gera (34 m. s.s.w. of Leipsic) Feb. 14, 1830; d. at Jena Aug. 19, 1892. He descended from a family of Saxon theologians, and received his early education from his grandfather, A. G. W. Lipsius, preacher in Bernstadt, and in the "Thomana" of Leipsic where his father was teacher of religion. In 1848 he entered the University of Leipsic. Though he came successively under the influence of Fichte, Hegel, and Kant, the teachings of Schleiermacher and Rothe and the

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tenets of the Congregation of Brethren kept him from a one-sided moralism and induced him "to preserve a place for religious mysticism in the sanctuary of his heart." While Lipsius during the time of his studies stood for the views of the "mediating theology," he later followed the tendencies of historical criticism. The spirit of free investigation which he inherited from his father and his study of the writings of Baur exercised an irresistible influence upon him, although he was not a slavish follower of the latter. In 1855 he established himself as privat-docent at the University of Leipsic, and four years later was appointed adjunct professor there; in 1861 he was called to Vienna as professor of systematic theology, and in 1863 became a member of the Austrian Council of Education; in 1864 he was chosen deputy of the faculty to the first general synod and cooperated in the establishment of a liberal church constitution. The obdurate refusal of the government to incorporate the theological faculty in the university induced Lipsius in 1865 to accept a call to Kiel. At the Kiel assembly of 1867 he showed himself a champion of the Prussian Union. A polemical encounter with Bishop Koopmann, the head of the Holstein Lutherans, induced him to give up his position in Kiel, and to accept in 1871 a call to Jena, where he remained until his death. Besides his studies, he took a prominent part in the practical questions of the day, and was one of the founders of the Evangelical Alliance.

He devoted himself to the study of the documents of primitive Christianity and published numerous works on them. It was not as a historian, however, that he became the acknowledged leader of Jena theology, but as a systematic theologian. In his theological system he starts from the standpoint of the critical (though not unreservedly Kantian) theory of perception. He admits that perception of objects is subjectively conditioned, but rejects Kant's dualism of phenomena and "things-in-themselves"; he rather holds that by thought an objective order of law is grasped, and, applying the same contrast in the sphere of the philosophy of religion, he distinguishes between final and absolute being. The latter receives a positive content only through religious experience. The truth of religious concepts can not be demonstrated philosophically, but the unity of the human spirit demands the blending of the scientific and religious perceptions into a harmonious whole. In this connection metaphysics as a theory of the universe is indispensable, but the harmonious blending of those two perceptions can succeed only approximately, as may be seen from the idea of God; the scientific definitions remain here always negative, and the religious definitions figurative. No supernatural interference breaks the coherent development of the world, and that which on the basis of an inner need becomes for the religious man a divine revelation, represents for science nothing but a psychic phenomenon. The relation between God and man remains a holy "mystery." Hence it is evident that dogmatics is not a science without presuppositions, but can represent faith only from the standpoint of faith, although in a purified form.

Among the works of Lipsius may be named: Die paulinische Rechtfertigungslehre (Leipsic, 1853); De Clementis Romani epistola ad Corinthios priore disquisitio (1855); Ueber das Verh�ltnis der drei syrischen Briefe des Ignatios zu den �brigen Recensionen der Ignatianischen Litteratur (1859); Der Gnosticismus, sein Wesen, Ursprung und Entwickelungsgang (1860); Zur Quellenkritik des Epiphanios (Vienna, 1865); Die Papstverzeichnisse des Eusebios und der von ihm abh�ngigen Chronisten kritisch untersucht (Kiel, 1868); Chronologie der r�mischen Bisch�fe bis zur Mitte des vierten Jahrhunderts (1869): Die Pilatus-Acten kritisch untersucht (1871); Glaube und Lehre, Theologische Streitschriften (1871); Die Quellen der r�mischen Petrus-sage kritisch untersucht (1872); Die Quellen der �ltesten Ketzergeschichte (Leipsic, 1875); Lehrbuch der evangelisch-protestantischen Dogmatik (Brunswick, 1876); Dogmatische Beitr�ge zur Vertheidigung und Erl�uterung meines Lehrbuches (Leipsic, 1878); Die edessenische Abgar-sage kritisch untersucht (Brunswick, 1880); Die Apokryphen, Apostelgeschichten und Apostellegenden (1883-90); Philosophie und Religion (Leipsic, 1885). In connection with Die Apokryphen, Apostelgeschichten Lipsius edited together with M. Bonnet the Greek and Latin texts (Acta apostolorum apocrypha, part i., Acta Petri, Pauli, Petri et Pauli, Pauli et Theclae, Thaddaei, Leipsic, 1891, by Lipsius alone). He further published Hauptpunkte der christlichen Glaubenslehre (2 ed., Brunswick, 1891) and Glauben und Wissen (ed. F. R. Lipsius, Berlin, 1897). He founded in 1875 and edited the Jahrb�cher f�r protestantische Theologie, and from 1885 was editor of the Theologischer Jahresbericht.

(F. R. LIPSIUS.)

BIBLIOGRAPHY: G. Richter and F. Nippold, Zwei Ged�chtnisreden, Jena, 1893; A. Neumann, Grundlagen und Grundz�ge der Weltanschauung von . . . Lipsius, Brunswick, 1896; E. Pfennigsdorf, Vergleich der dogmatischen Systeme von . . . Lipsius und . . . Ritschl, Gotha, 1896; U. Fleisch, Die . . . Grundlagen der dogmatischen Systeme von A. E. Biedermann und . . . Lipsius, Berlin, 1901; H. L�demann, in Addition to M�nchener allgemeine Zeitung, xcii., no. 200; Eeke, in Kirchliche Monatsschrift, xciv. 798-817. Further references are given in Hauck-Herzog, RE, xi. 520.