PRETORIUS, ABDIAS (GOTTSCHALK SCHULZE): German Lutheran; b. at Salzwedel (54 m. n.n.w. of Magdeburg) Mar. 28, 1524; d. at Wittenberg Jan. 9, 1573. He was educated at Frankfort-on-the-Oder and Wittenberg, coming under the influence of Melanchthon and remaining an ardent Philippist (see PHILIPPISTS) throughout his life. After being teacher (1544-48) and rector (1548-53) in his native city, he was called to be rector of the Altstadtisches Gymnasium at Magdeburg, teaching Greek and Hebrew, preparing a new system of government for the school (1553), and holding public disputations, especially on theological topics; until, in 1558 or 1557, he went to Frankfort-on-the-Oder as professor of Hebrew. Here he soon became the theological protagonist of the Melanchthonian faction in the controversy between the Lutherans and Philippists (q.v.; and see MUSCULUS, ANDREAS), but with the triumph of Luther anism over Philippism in 1563, Praetorius' position in the university became untenable. Previous to this, however, he had been repeatedly employed by the elector, Joachim II., in affairs of Church and State, attending the three disputations held in Joachim's presence at Berlin with the papal legate Commendone and a Jesuit in Feb., 1561, as well as disputing on the Eucharist at Frankfort in November of the same year with envoys of the king of Hungary. In June of the following year he was sent to Warsaw as the elector's ambassador, and early in September, in a like capacity, signed the protocol of the convention held at Fulda, while in October Joachim took him and his opponent Agricola to the Diet of Frankfort. In 1563, with the fall of Philippism in Frankfort, Prætorius removed to Wittenberg, though he still remained on terms of personal friendship with the elector. He was a member of the philosophical faculty, and became dean in 1571.

(P. WOLFF†.)

BIBLIOGRAPHY: References to early literature are given in Hauck-Herzog, RE, xv. 612. Consult ADB, xxvi. 513-514; KL, x. 276; G. Holstein, Das altstädtiashe Gymnasium zu Magdeburg, in Jahrbuch für Philologie and Padapogik, cxxx (1884), 68 sqq.

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PRÆTORIUS, STEPHAN: German Lutheran; b. at Salzwedel (54 m. n.n.w. of Magdeburg), probably May 3, 1536; d. at Neustadt May 5, 1603. He was educated at the University of Rostock, where he also taught in the local schools; was ordained by Agricola at Berlin in 1565; became preacher in the same year at the monastery of the Holy Ghost at Salzwedel, and soon after deacon of the Church of St. Mary's; and from 1569 until his death pastor at Neustadt. A great admirer of Luther, and an opponent of Jesuitism and Calvinism alike, Praetorius laid great stress on the sacraments, though not in the Roman Catholic sense, and held to justification by faith, though he also insisted on purity of life. He was a precursor of J. Arndt and P. Spener (qq.v.), though not Pietist in the narrow sense. His lack of caution brought upon him the charges of antinomianism and perfectionism, the latter theory later even being called Praetorianism. Through his tracts, which he or his friends published after 1570, Praetorius exercised an influence far beyond his own congregation; these were collected and published by J. Arndt under the title Acht-und-fünfzig schöne, auserlesne, geist- und trostreiche Traktätlein (Lüneburg, 1622), containing also fourteen hymns with their melodies, one of them being " Was hat gethan der heilige Christ?"

Praetorius' tracts were later arranged in the form of dialogues, with certain moderations, by M. Statius in his Geistliche Schatzkammer der Gläubigen (Lüneburg, 1636, and often). There arose over his writings the Praetorian controversy, Abraham Calovius (q.v.) assailing the view of Praetorius and Statius that the faithful possess salvation not only in prospect but in reality. Spener's antagonist, G. C. Dilfeld, considered Praetorius akin to Esaias Stiefel (q.v.), and the general superintendent of Greifswald, Tiburtius Rango, secured the prohibition of the Schatzkammer in Swedish Pomerania. Despite all this, Praetorius' writings were continually read, and in the second quarter of the seventeenth century they influenced a circle of converts in Kottbus and vicinity. Spener frequently alludes to him admiringly, and the Schatzkammer has been revised by the Kornthal pastor J. H. Stoudt (Stuttgart, 1869).

(P. WOLFF†.)

BIBLIOGRAPHY: J. F. Danneil, Kirchengeschichte der Stadt Saltzwedel, Halle, 1842; C. J. Cosack, Zur Geschichte der evangelischen asketischen Litteratur in Deutschland, pp. 1 sqq., Basel, 1875; H. Beck, Die Erbauungslitteratur der evangelischen Kirche Deutschlands, pp. 222 sqq., Erlangen, 1883; C. Grosse, Die alten Tröster, p. 97, Hermannsburg, 1900. Earlier and less accessible literature is named in Hauck-Herzog, RE, xv. 615.