TUEBINGEN SCHOOL, NEW. See Baur, F. C.

TUEBINGEN, tii'bin-gen, SCHOOL, THE OLDER

Gottlob Christian Story (§ 1).

Doctrine of Story (§ 2).

Criticism of Story's Doctrine; Works (§ 3).

The School of Story; J. F. Flatt (§ 4).

F. G. SGskind; K. C. Flatt (§ 5).

Critical Review of the School (§ 6).

E. G. Bengel (§ 7).

The older Tübingen school of theology, important in the Protestant theology of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries through its concept of "Biblical supranaturalism," owed its rise to Gottlob Christian Story (b. at Stuttgart Sept. 10, 1746;

d. there Jan. 17, 1805). He was eau- :. Gottlob Gated at Tübingen (17638), where Christian he long devoted himself exclusively Story. to the study of the New Testament, and in 1769-71 made a tour of Ger many, Holland, England, and France, studying and pursuing researches in the libraries of Leyden, Oxford, and Paris. Returning to Tübingen, he em bodied his results in his Observationes super Novi Testaments versionibus Syriacis (1772) and Disserta tio de evdngeliis Arabicis (1775), the latter his in augural address as associate professor of philoso phy. He was transferred to the theological faculty, 1777; became fourth professor of theology, special superintendent, and city pastor, 1780; and full pro fessor, second superintendent of the theological seminary, and third morning preacher, 1786; and he was consistorial councilor and chief court chap lain at Stuttgart, 1797-1805. Characterized by unusual acumen, power of combination, and un wearying energy, though lacking in imagination and speculative talent, he acquired a comprehensive education and profound learning. This was sup ported by a personality distinguished for upright piety and moral earnestness, tempered with a win some gentleness and humanity, commanding the esteem of friend and adversary alike. Notwith standing, his sermons (3 vols., Stuttgart, 1806-10) lack warmth and depth of feeling, being dry, pro saic, didactic, and almost wholly constructed of Bible passages. The attention which they com manded can be explained only by the reflection of his venerable and sincere personality.

The accession of Story to the faculty marked the beginning of a new epoch in the history of the theology of Tübingen. The Lutheran orthodoxy established there late in the sixteenth century had

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z. Doctrine of Story.

retained unbroken sway. The Church of Wüttemberg had remained true to its Biblical trend, its essentially irenic position, and its desire to unite theological theory with practical religion, traits which it owed specially to the influence of Johann Brenz. In the controversies of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the theologians of Tübingen had stood by the Formula of Concord, without relinquishing their Biblical-practical point of view. Early .in the eighteenth century the chancellor of the university, J. W. Jager (1702-20), in dependence on the method of Johannes Cocceius , sought to introduce a system of greater vitality, and his efforts were carried still further by C .M. Pfaff and C. E. Weismann, Pfaff tending toward the school of Georg Calixtus, and Weismann toward that of Spener and J. A. Bengel. Nevertheless, neither the Bengel school nor the Wolffian philosophy could introduce a new phase of theology at Tübingen, though the former imparted its quiet Biblical stimulus. Meanwhile, in the second half of the eighteenth century, the Enlightenment began to assail all positive Christianity. It thus became necessary to gain a point of view which should retain the inalienable elements of the old truths while changing their forms in adjustment with the new normative influences. Such was the task which Story desired and sought to accomplish. Abandoning the orthodox substructure, he deemed it possible to lay a sure foundation for scientific theology and dogma, ties on the sole authority of divine revelation as contained in the Bible, and attempted to derive the Christian truth from these sources through grammatical and historical exegesis and through systematic logic. He aimed first to prove the authenticity and integrity of the New-Testament writings from historical evidences, and the credibility of the authors from their relation to the events reported, from their characteristic points of view to be identified in the writings, and from the inevitable controlling influence of partizans and opponents. These authenticated Scriptures afford as a result that upon Christ devolves, in the highest sense, the authority of a divine ambassador, which was substantiated by his perfect ethical thought and conduct, but particularly the divine miracles. From this authority follow in order, the truth of his doctrine, the authority of the apostles and the truth of their teaching, the inspiration of the apostolic writings, and, finally, the recognition and inspiration of the Old Testament, so far as the latter is attested by divinely accredited men. This position of Story was distinguished from orthodoxy by his substitution of the authority of Jesus and his apostles for the inspiration of the Scriptures, by making the Scripture the sole source, even the text-book, of Christian teaching, and by his derivation of not only "human faith" but indirectly also "divine faith" from empirical historical deduction, while in doubt about attributing the virtue of proof to the "testimony of the Holy Spirit." From the Enlightenment he differs sharply by the manner in which he employed historical and logical proofs in the service of the principle of authority. After the establishment of the authority of Christ and the Bible, he needed no further internal proof of Christian truth from reason or experience: Claiming to deal also reasonably in receiving implicitly upon the attested authority of Scripture what reason is unable of itself to establish out of the nature of the case, Story thus professes a merely formal principle of authority, the supernaturalism of the Christian truth, and a purely instrumental use of reason. This system was admirably earned out in his Annotationes theologicae ad philosophiaam Kantii de religione doctrinam (Tübingen, 1793; Germ. transl., 1794),'in which he maintained that he who refused to credit authorities that had shared the advantage of receiving special experiences, merely because their teachings could not be deduced from the principles of unaided reason, deserted the point of view of true criticism. Such testimonies, on the contrary, should be seriously considered, just so soon as their moral efficacy was firmly established. With yoaped to the latter, the Christian historical faith indubitably surpassed the pallid, blank belief of pure reason. Story also employed Kant's postulate of a necessary harmony between virtue and happiness to justify the New-Testament union of religion and morality.

3. Criticism of Story's Doctrine; Works.

For Story there can be no occasion for the material influence of any philosophy whatsoever on the content of Christian doctrine. According to him, dogmatics and ethics had simply to combine the results of exegesis, but this was to result largely, as F. C. Baur pointed out, in an artificial congeries of passages from all parts of the Old and New Testaments, without regard to the genetic evolution of Biblical truth. For him there are no writings of the canon but only passages without discrimination of value, which is due to the fact that the principle of unity is not organic but formal authority. With reference to the doctrine of sin and grace, the result of his work seems to be a Semipelagian simplification and moderating of the dogma, satisfying neither deep religious nor scientific interest. Thus he debased faith from divinely prepared receptivity for regenerating grace to an autonomous human moral relation, and regarded the Holy Ghost as a mere factor to aid and complete human activity. On the atonement he based the remission of punishment only on the passive obedience of Christ, accepting, unquestioningly the formal equivalence of the padaion of Christ with the sins of the world, and deducing from the active obedience of the Savior (to which he was also bound for himself) only the positive results of his exaltation and the beatification of his brethren. In his Christology, Story, professing to be in accord with orthodoxy on the deity of Christ, but avoiding the Communicatio idiomatum, and thus losing hold of the true ~ incarnation of the Logos, perhaps unconsciously approximated a Socinian view of the person of Christ (see Monarchianism; also Socinus, Faustus, Socinians). The dogmatic system of Story is set forth especially in his last important work, Doctrince Christiance pays theoreticne sacris litteris repetita. (1793; Germ. transl. enlarged by K. C. Flatt, Stuttgart, 1803), which

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long enjoyed official recognition in Württemberg. In exegesis he combated the accommodation hypothesis represented by J. S. Semler and A. Teller. His principal critical exegetical works are Neue Apologie der 0ffenbarung Johannis (Tübingen,1783); Zweck der evangelischen Geschichte und der Briefe Johannis (1786), a keen and far-sighted study in relation with the Synoptic Gospels, by which, according to Baur, the critical study of the Fourth Gospel was much advanced; and Erlkuterung an die Hebräer (1789), containing a treatment of the purpose of the death of Jesus.

The school of Storr, in the narrower sense, was composed of J. F. Flatt, F. S. Süskind, and K. C. Flatt, all his immediate pupils and successors, and in part his colleagues in the theolog-

4. The ical faculty. Johann Friedrich Flatt J. F. Flatt. School (b. at Tübingen Feb. 20, 1759; d. of Storr; there Nov. 24, 1821), educated at Tübingen, and appointed professor of philosophy in 1785, was an enthusiastic Kantian. Transferred to the theological faculty in 1792, he lectured principally on Christian ethics, and, besides, on New-Testament exegesis, apologetics, and practical theology, and, for a brief period, 1798, on dogmatics. From 1796 he edited the Magazin für Dogmatik and Moral. The Vorlesungen caber Christliche Moral was published (Tübingen, 1823), as were his lectures on the Pauline Epistles (1820 sqq.). Theological contributions were, De deitate Christi (Göttingen, 1788), a prize treatise assigned by the University of Göttingen, at the direction of George II. of England; and Beiträge zur christlichen Dogmatik and Moral (Tübingen 1792).

Friedrich Gottlieb Süskind (b. at Neuatadt-onthe-Linde Feb. 17, 1767; d. at Stuttgart Nov. 12, 1829), educated at Tübingen (1783-88), succeeded Storr as professor of dogmatics (1798);

5. F. G. and in 1805 as chief court chaplain and

Süskind; consistorial councilor at Stuttgart, K. C. Flatt. where he was appointed director of the council for higher education in 1814. As a theologian he was enlisted in the solution of the basal problems of apologetics and dogmatics, by the application of philosophy and exegesis. He sharply opposed the contemporary philosophy of religion set forth by Kant, Fichte, and Schelling; and finally name somewhat into accord with the theology of Schleiermacher. He was preeminently the dialectician of the older Tübingen school, but entirely lacking in the speculative power to grasp the organic unity from the point of view of a supreme idea. In his later official position his "categorical and dictatorial" resoluteness often caused offense, especially as redactor of the unpopular Württemberg liturgy of 1809, yet he was a man of the most rigid integrity, and far more stern to himself than to others. He was editor of Flatt's Magazin (1803-12), in which many of his apologetic and polemic articles appeared. Karl Christian Flatt (b. at Stuttgart Aug. 18, 1772; d. Nov. 20, 1843), the younger brother of Johann Friedrich, was educated at Tübingen, after which he traveled extensively in Germany, residing for some time at Göttingen. During this period he devoted himself to the Kantian philosophy, the results being set forth in his Philosophisch-ezegetische Untersuchungen über die Lehre von der Versohnung des Menschen mit Gott (2 parts, Göttingen and Stuttgart, 1797-98), in which he endeavored to show that the doctrine of the atonement resulting from Kant's system, whereby the forgiveness of sins is determined by the degree of moral improvement, is not only the sole reasonable one, but the only one based on the New Testament. This view he retracted on becoming professor of theology at Tübingen in 1804, apparently on Storr's demand. In his lectures and in his publications later he became in all respects a pliant adherent of the tendency represented by his brother and by Storr. His views appeared in timely articles in Flatt's Magazin. With his call to Stuttgart as collegiate preacher and supreme consistorial councilor in 1812, and with his appointment as director of higher education in 1829 (this carrying with it the general superintendency of Ulm), his literary activity ceased.

These three theologians, following in the steps of Storr, endeavored to wrench from the philosophy of the period concessions in behalf of their own theory of revelation. For the conceivableness of revelation, which they held to be the comb. Critical munication of higher truths, they

Review of appealed to the limits of human rea the School son, justifying faith in revelation by alleging its value for the furtherance of morality. This apologetic was inadequate to reveal to view the entire depth of the prevailing chasm, or to render justice to the set weight and independent peculiarity of Christian conviction. Their well-meant and not seldom acute defense was hampered in advance by their unvitalized concep tion of God, and, as a consequence, the externality of their theory of revelation. Another impediment was the absorbent relationship of their own method of demonstration with the leading motive of the very rationalistic mode of thought that they were assailing. Only one result could follow: the rational izing of their own dogma with increasing measure. The Biblical criticism and exegesis of Storr's school, in like manner, was essentially that of their master, a struggle against the accommodation hypothesis, against the derivation of fundamental Christian truths from contemporary ideas, and against the attacks on the authenticity of the Gospels.

Less intimately connected with this school was Ernst Gottlieb Bengel (b. at 7avelatein, 23 m. w.s.w. of Stuttgart Nov. 3, 1769; d. at Tii-

q. E. G. bingen Mar. 28, 1826), grandson of Bengel. the famous Johann Albrecht Bengel (q.v.). He became professor of the ology at Tübingen, 1806; and prelate, 1820; and chiefly represented historical theology. Even more than the rest of the school, Bengel approximated Socinianism, a result due to the inner relationship of the dogmatic point of view, specially since the su pernaturalistic apologetic, too, .laid essential stress on the credibility of the Biblical authors and on the purely supernatural character of the revelation im parted through them. The practical rationalism of Socinianism he sought to deepen and complement with the Kantian philosophy, the ethical basis of .-.aw~..

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which he had adopted more fully than the others of the school. Bengel's dogmatic system is there fore to be characterized by the so-called rational supernaturalism (see Rationalism and Supernaturalism, II., § 6), recognizing in revelation a supernatural corroboration and representation in fact of rational truth as also a certain amplification. All this is best represented in the ten dissertations on the development of belief in immortality and the relation of revelation to it (cf. Opuscula academ ics, Hamburg, 1834; also Reden über Religion and Offenbarung, Tübingen, 1831). Characteristic- also was his Pelagianism which held the divergency be tween Protestantism and Roman Catholicism re garding justification to be a mere logomachy, while the concept of faith was transposed to that of moral improvement and change of disposition (Archiv für die Theologie, L, ii. 469, the journal suc ceeding Flatt's Magazin in 1816; published by Bengel, 1816-26; and renamed Nettes Archiv, 1822). Obdurate in his position, Bengel stood at bay to every regenerating philosophical influence, taking notice of Schleiermacher only by reproaching him with " mysticism and pantheism "and suppressing the deviation of his junior colleague, G. F. Bocks hammer (1784-1822). This dominating preemi nence he was able to maintain by the formal device of satisfying the rationalistic party, by disguising, under the obvious attack upon rationalism, a vir tual material compromise with it, and, on the other hand, the Biblical positive view was conciliated by the overtowering supernaturalism. To this his im posing personality in the lecture-room and his com manding power at the head of the university added weight, so that upon his sudden death his loss was deemed irreparable. Other theologians of Tübingen and Witrttemberg, principally J. C. F. Steudel (d. 1837), C. F. Schmid (d. 1852), and C. -$* Klaiber (d. 1836), while clearly representing the influence of the older Tübingen school, yet manifest such a diversification of the original views, specially as affected by the theology of Schleiermacher, that they can scarcely be rated with that school. After its disappearance, the school was again revived and continued, in a certain sense, by the independent Biblical theologian J. T. Beck (q.v.) and his follow ers. For the later Tübingen School see Baur, Ferdinand Christian, and the Later Tübingen School.

(O. Kirn†.)

Bibliography: : Consult the works on church history (Kirchengeschichte) issued by the Calwer Verlagaverein, pp. 449 sqq., 566 sqq., Stuttgart. 1893; and F. C. Baur, p. 98, Leipsic, 1882; and those on history of doctrine or theology by F. C. Baur, iii. 308 sqq., Leipsic, 1867; W. Gals, iv. 141, 503 sqq. Berlin, 1887; M. A. Landerer, pp. 158 sqq., Altenburg, 1881; and G. Frank, iii. 383, Leipsic, 1905. Also, C. Weizsii,eker, Lehrer and Untemicht an der evangelisch-theologischen Fakultat der Univeraittit Tübingen, pp. 131 sqq., Tübingen, 1877.