Reihing, Jakob

REIHING, rai´hing, JAKOB: German Lutheran; b. at Augsburg Jan. 6, 1579; d. at Tübingen May 5, 1628. He was educated at the Jesuit University of Ingolstadt, and in 1597 became a novice in the Society of Jesus. He taught at Munich and Ingolstadt until 1613, when he was transferred to Dillingen. In the same year he was professed and was then appointed chaplain to the count palatine, Wolfgang Wilhelm, whose conversion to the Roman Catholic faith he justified in his Muri civitalis sanctæ, hoc est religionis Catholicæ fundamenta duodecim (Cologne,1615), Excubiæ evangelicæ civitatis sanctæ (1617), and his German Enchiridion Catholicum. Reihing gave valuable assistance to the count palatine in the Counter-Reformation in Pfalz-Neuburg, but his own convictions were changed by the sturdy Protestantism of the artizans, by his study of the Bible, and by reading Luther's Postils. On Jan. 15, 1621, he fled to Stuttgart, where he was examined for four days, after which he was sent to Tübingen. There, on Nov. 23, 1621, he formally renounced his former faith, publishing his reasons in his Laquei pontificii contriti (Tübingen, 1621). The Roman Catholics sought to win him back by flattering promises, but when these failed, they attacked him with unfounded charges and with scurrilous pamphlets. Reihing was now appointed assistant professor of polemics at Tübingen, where he became full professor of theology, as well as superintendent of the theological seminary, in 1625, 449holding both these positions until his death, three years later.

G. Bossert.

Bibliography: The funeral sermon by Lukas Osiander, Tübingen, 1628; J. M. Rauscher, Laudatio funebris, ib. 1629; Oehler, in Der wahre Protestant, iii. 1 (1854), which is of high value; ADB, xxvii. 698–700.