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101 RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA Eisenach Conference Elagabalns his travels he continued his studies for nineteen years, first at Heidelberg and later at Frankfort-on the-Main, availing himself of the services of Jews who little suspected the purpose for which they were engaged as his tutors. In 1700 he published his Entdecktes Judenthum, styling it " a truthful and authentic account of the horrible manner in which the obdurate Jews blaspheme and dishonor the moat Holy Trinity, God the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; insult the holy mother of Christ, the New Testament, the Evangelists and Apostles; mock ingly traduce the Christian Religion, and disdain and curse all Christianity to the utmost: where also are shown many other things and great errors of Jewish religion and theology hitherto either not at all or only partially known to the Christians, as well as numerous ridiculous and merry fables and follies." Prince Johann Wilhelm approved of Eiaenmenger's book, and appointed him professor of Oriental languages at Heidelberg, but at the request of the Jews the imperial government con fiscated the work, lest its publication cause dis turbances. Eisenmenger found that he might be able to publish his book ii. Holland. The Jews offered him 12,000 florins for the edition of 2,000 copies, but he asked 30,000, and died while nego tiations were still in progress. His heirs appealed to Frederick I. of Prussia, who carried their cause be fore the emperors Leopold and Joseph, but without success. At length Frederick I. (1711) decided to have the work published " outside the kingdom," ostensibly in Kbnigsberg but in reality in Berlin, and presented half the edition to Eisenmenger's heirs. Forty years later the Frankfort edition appeared. The Entdecktes Judenthum did not meet with the success which its author had hoped since it could no more be called a faithful representation of Judaism than an indiscriminate collection of everything superstitious and repulsive within Chris tian literature could be termed characteristic of Christianity. During recent decades August Roh ling and others have used the work in anti-Semitic propaganda, and a reprint of the portions most available for that purpose has been made by F. X. Schieferl (Dresden, 1893). Eisenmenger collab orated with Johann Leusden in the preparation of an edition of the unpointed Hebrew text of the Old Testament (Amsterdam, 1694), and also wrote a Lezicum Orientate Harmonicum, which is still unpublished. (G. DALMAN. ) BIHLIOGRAPHT: J. J. Sehudt, Jildischa MerkuHtrdspkeiten, i. 426-438, iii. 1-$, iv. 288-287, Frankfort, 1714; H. Graetz, Geachrochte der Juden, x. 273, 278, 281, Leipeie, 1897; KL, iv. 343-348; JE, v. 80,82. EKKEHARD, ek'ke-hart, OF AURA (Ekke hardus Uratigensis): Frankish Benedictine abbot of Aura (near Kissingen, 30 m. n.n.e. of Wiirzburg); b. in the eleventh century; d. Feb. 25 of some year after 1125. He was apparently a monk of the Bamberg monastery of Michelsberg, and in 1113 received benediction as abbot of Aura, which had been founded according to the rule of Hirschau, from Otto of Bamberg, who later became the apostle of the Pomeranians. He had previously lived in the monastery of Corvey, had visited Jerusalem sae a pilgrim in 1101, and had attended the Lateran
Council of April, 1102. He accompanied Otto of Bamberg on his visit to the pope in 1106, and was present at the Council of Guastalla. He apparently left his monastery in 1116, and attended the Lateran Council held in March. Ekkehard was the author of a universal chronicle, which he afterward revised four times. The original work extends to 1099, and is based on a similar work which originated in Wurzburg, although-he amplified it from other authors, such as Einhard, Widukind, Liutprand, and Richer, as well as from oral tradition and his own knowledge. He subsequently extended it to 1106, when he revised it twice, the last time on the basis of the chronicle of Sigibert of Gembloux, and carried it successively to 1114 and 1125. His work, which is not a mere compilation, is the most complete o£ all the medieval chronicles, although he is surpassed in depth and insight by Otto of Freising. (WILHELM ALTMANN.)
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Ekkehard'a Chronicon and Hieroeolimita, ed. G. Waits, are in MGH, vi (1844), 1-287. An excellent list of literature is given in Potthast, Wepweiaer, pp. 400-401, cf. Wattenbach, DGQ, ii (1894), 189-198. Consult N. Iteininger, in Archiv den hiatoriachen Vereina von Unterfranken and Aachafjenburp, avi. 1-98, Wtlraburg, 1862; G. Buchholz, Ekkehard -von Aura, Leipaic. 1888; J. Tessier, in Revue hiatoriQue, xlvii (1891), 287-277.
EB.BEHARD OF SAINT GALL. See SAINT GALL, MONASTERY OF.
ELAGABALUS, el"n-.gab's-Ivs (Varius Avitus Bassianus): Roman emperor; b. at Emesa, Syria, c. 201; killed by the pretoriane in Rome, 222. He was a son of the senator Varius Marcellus and Julia Soaemias, and a grandson of Julia Maesa (see ALEXANDER SEVERU$). Both mother and grandmother had retired to Emesa, and here they inculcated in the boy that Oriental religious fanaticism which was later to be the chief characteristic of the emperor. He was early consecrated as a priest of the sun-god at Emesa and later appropriated his name (Elagabalus=Syriac El gabal, " mountain [?] god "; by popular Greek etymologizing the name became Heliogabalus, from hellos, " sun "). The intrigues of his mother and the fall of Macrinus brought him to the throne in 218. His personal beauty impressed the soldiers, and his claim to be the son of Caracalla won their respect. He did not enter Rome till 219. Unnerved by indulgence of his passions and crazed by his practise of superstitious sorcery, he had now only two aims in life, to follow his own pleasure and to introduce into Rome the worship of the sun-god as the one supreme deity ruling throughout the whole world. All the attributes of other gods, even the sacra of the city, in so far as these were not profaned and put aside, were to be transferred to this one god.
This was the dream of a crazy boy in the year 219. Ninety years later the Church had to take account of a religious speculation essentially related to the views of this dissipated youth: viz. the idea of the oneness of God, as held by the emperor Alexander Severus (q.v.), and as represented in Neoplatonism (q.v.). At first Christianity was inclined to be peaceable toward this Neople,tonic speculation; but at the beginning of the fourth century it assumed an aggressive attitude and called