Rauwenhoff, Lodewijk Willem Ernst

RAUWENHOFF, rau´ven-hef, LODEWIJK WILLEM ERNST: Dutch Protestant; b. at Amsterdam July 27, 1828; d. at Moran (15 m. n.w. of Bozen), Austria, Jan. 26, 1889. He was educated at the universities of Amsterdam and Leyden (1846–1852), and was then minister at Mydrecht (1852–1856), Dort (1856–59), and Leyden (1859–60). In 1860 he was appointed professor of church history at Leyden, a chair which he exchanged in 1881 for that of encyclopedics and the philosophy of religion. The latter position he retained until his death. Theologically Rauwenhoff was a pronounced and optimistic radical, utterly contemptuous of orthodoxy; but he crystallized the vague tendencies and concepts of the critical school of Dutch theology, instead of himself becoming a pioneer worker and leader. He was thus a natural advocate of the separation of Church and State and of the purely scientific teaching of theology in the universities. His attitude toward church history-that the facts of history are valuable only in their philosophic implications-finds its expression in his Geschiedenis van het Protestantisme (3 vols., Haarlem, 1865–71), in which he proceeded from authoritative Christianity to an individualistic religion made to agree with science and the demands of modern life. The views of Rauwenhoff on the philosophy of religion were set forth in his Wijsbegeerte van den godsdienst (Leyden, 1887). He was also the author of many briefer contributions, one of the founders and editors of the Theologisch Tijdschrift, and for many years a member of the General Synod.