Everything about Johann Arndt totally explained
Johann Arndt (or
Arnd) (
1555–
1621) was a
German Lutheran theologian who wrote several influential books of devotional Christianity.
He was born at
Ballenstedt, in
Anhalt, and studied in several universities.
He was at
Helmstedt in 1576 and at
Wittenberg in 1577. At Wittenberg the
crypto-Calvinist controversy was then at its height, and he took the side of
Melanchthon and the crypto-Calvinists. He continued his studies in
Strasbourg, under the professor of
Hebrew,
Johannes Pappus (1549-1610), a zealous Lutheran, the crown of whose life's work was the forcible suppression of
Calvinistic preaching and worship in the day, and who had great influence over him.
In
Basel, again, he studied theology under
Simon Sulzer (1508-1585), a broad-minded divine of Lutheran sympathies, whose aim was to reconcile the churches of the Helvetic and Wittenberg confessions. In 1581 he went back to Ballenstedt, but was soon recalled to active life by his appointment to the pastorate at Badeborn in 1583.
After some time his Lutheran tendencies aroused the anger of the authorities, who were of the
Reformed Church.
Consequently, in
1590 he was deposed for refusing to remove the pictures from his church and discontinue the use of
exorcism at
baptism. (Anhalt would become Calvinist in 1596.) He found an asylum in
Quedlinburg (1590), and afterwards was transferred to St Martin's church at
Brunswick in 1599. He later worked in
Eisleben, and until 1621 as
Generalsuperintendent in
Celle.
Arndt's fame rests on his writings. These were mainly of a mystical and devotional kind, and were inspired by
St Bernard,
Johannes Tauler and
Thomas Kempis.
His principal work,
Wahres Christentum (book 1: 1605; books 1-4: 1606-1610), which has been translated into most European languages, has served as the foundation of many books of devotion, both
Roman Catholic and
Protestant. Arndt here dwells upon the mystical union between the believer and Christ, and endeavours, by drawing attention to Christ's life
in His people, to correct the purely forensic side of the reformation theology, which paid almost exclusive attention to Christ's life
for His people. Like
Luther, Arndt was very fond of the the little anonymous book,
Theologia Germanica. He published an edition of it and called attention to its merits in a special preface. After
Wahres Christentum, his best-known work is
Paradiesgärtlein aller christlichen Tugenden, which was published in 1612. Both these books have been translated into English:
Paradiesgärtlein with the title
the Garden of Paradise, and
Wahres Christentum as
True Christianity. Several of his sermons are published in R. Nesselmann's
Buch der Predigten (1858).
Arndt has always been held in very high repute by the German
Pietists. The founder of Pietism,
Philipp Jakob Spener, repeatedly called attention to him and his writings, and even went so far as to compare him with
Plato.
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