Wetzer, Heinrich Joseph
Wetzer, Heinrich Joseph
Learned Orientalist, born at Anzefahr in Hesse-Cassel, 19 March, 1801; died at Freiburg in Baden, 5 November, 1853. He studied theology and Oriental languages at the universities of Marburg (1820-3), Tübingen (1823), and Freiburg (1824), and was graduated as doctor of theology and philosophy at Freiburg in 1824. He continued the study of Arabic, Persian and Syriac for eighteen months at the University of Paris, under the celebrated Orientalists De Sacy and Quatremere. At the royal library of Paris he discovered an Arabian manuscript containing the history of the Coptic Christians in Egypt from their origin to the fourteenth century, which he afterwards edited in Arabic and Latin: “Taki-eddini Makrizii historia Coptorum Christianorum in Ægypto” (Sulzbach, 1828). In 1828 he became professor-extraordinary, and in 1830 professor-ordinary, of Oriental philology at the University of Freiburg. His interest in preserving the Catholic character of Freiburg, which had been founded and endowed as a Catholic university, incurred for him the odium of the Protestant professors, who, being in the majority since 1846, excluded him from all academic positions. He was nevertheless appointed chief librarian of the university library in 1850. With a view to maintaining the Catholic character of the university, he composed anonymously the little work “Die Universitat Freiburg nach ihrem Ursprunge…” (Freiburg, 1844). He had also begun a history of the controversy between Arianism and the Catholic Church in the fourth century, but only a small part of it was completed and published as “Restitutio verae chronologiae rerum ex controversiis Arianis, inde ab anno 325 usque ad annum 350 exortarum…” (Frankfort, 1827). His greatest achievement is the part he took in the production of the first edition of the “Kirchenlexikon” for which he drew up the “Nomenclator” and which he edited conjointly with Benedict Welte.
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GYORY in Allgemeine deutsche Biographie, XLII (Leipzig, 1897), 261-3.
MICHAEL OTT Transcribed by Michael T. Barrett Dedicated to Thomas M. Barrett
The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume XVCopyright © 1912 by Robert Appleton CompanyOnline Edition Copyright © 2003 by K. KnightNihil Obstat, October 1, 1912. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., CensorImprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York
Fuente: Catholic Encyclopedia
Wetzer, Heinrich Joseph
chief editor of the Encyclopedia of Roman, Catholic Theology, was born in 1801 at Anzefahr, in Electoral,Hesse. His early instruction was obtained of pastor Kaiser, at Niederklein; thence he went to the Psedagogium, and subsequently (1820) to the University of Marburg. Under Arnold’s and Hartmann’s tuition, he devoted himself especially to the study of the Hebrew and Arabic languages. In 1823 he was at Tbingen, engaged in the study of Oriental languages, and in 1824 he received at Freiburg the doctorate of theology and canon law. He then visited Paris, and prosecuted the study of Arabic and Persian under De Sacy, and of Syriac under Quatremere. While in Paris he published from an Arabic manuscript The History of’ the Coptic Christians down to the 14th Century (1828), as written by a learned imaum of Egypt, accompanying the Arabic text with a Latin version. He had already published A Latin Treatise on the Arian, Controversy, A.D. 325-350 (1827).
In 1828 he became tutor and extraordinary professor, and in 1830 ordinary professor, of Oriental philology at Freiburg. In 1831 he married. He delivered interesting lectures on the grammar of the Hebrew and Arabic languages, and on the interpretation of Scripture and introduction to the Old Test. etc. In 1840 he published, in connection with L. Van Ess, the Sulzbach edition of the Bible. In the internal disputes which agitated the University of Freiburg, he held strictly Roman Catholic ground. When in 1844 a motion was made in the Chambers of Baden to discontinue that institution of learning, ho wrote an essay advocating its preservation. His principal importance, however, grows out of the assent he gave to the plan of publishing a cyclopedia of Roman Catholic theology, as conceived by the bookseller Herder. He was given the direction of the work, and industriously prosecuted it from 1846 until his death in November, 1853. The work is thoroughly Roman Catholic in tone and spirit, and has doubtless contributed greatly towards fixing the tendency of that theology of late years in Germany. Its treatment of Protestantism, the institutions growing out of it, and the men connected with it is naturally biased; but its polemics are never bitter or extreme. Significant are the brevity and superficial treatment accorded to Sailer (q.v.), and curious the mildness which Fenelon’s mystical quietism receives in the article Bossnet. The immaculate conception of the Virgin is not at all approved of, though it was not yet a dogma of the Church when the Encyclopaedia appeared. The entire work, including Supplement, consists of 12 volumes (1847-1856). A complete Index facilitates its use. A new edition is at this writing (1881) in course of publication. Herzog, Real- Encyklop. s.v.