Franz Overbeck's Inaugural Lecture in Basel (1870)

Protestantism has forced the Catholic Church, in the Tridentine Confession of Faith, to erect an insurmountable wall between itself and the fulfillment of the endless task, embracing all earthly life, that it has set itself. Since Trent, Catholicism has simply been living from its own inflexible, do...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inProceedings of the American Philosophical Society Vol. 158; no. 3; pp. 248 - 277
Main Authors HENRY, MARTIN, OVERBECK, FRANZ
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Philadelphia THE AMERICAN PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY 01.09.2014
University of Pennsylvania Press
Subjects
Bible
Catholic churches
Christian history
Christianity
Churches
Criticism
Logic
New Testament
Protestant theology
Protestantism
Rationalism
Sacred texts
Theology
Translations
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Summary:Protestantism has forced the Catholic Church, in the Tridentine Confession of Faith, to erect an insurmountable wall between itself and the fulfillment of the endless task, embracing all earthly life, that it has set itself. Since Trent, Catholicism has simply been living from its own inflexible, dogmatic logic, and has finally withered away, ending in a series of dogmas such as the one that is to be produced today before our very eyes.37 To preserve Protestantism from such a fate is the best outcome Protestantism can strive for in pursuing modern biblical criticism, even if such biblical criticism abolishes to some extent the authority of the past. [...]whatever the legitimacy and necessity of modern biblical criticism in other respects may be, whoever works with the intention of fulfilling its goals will be least assailed by doubts in his labors, so long as he still has a moral relationship to Protestantism, and so long as he still has a lively sense of the inestimable benefits of purer faith and deeper insight that we owe to Protestantism and its first intrepid champions.
ISSN:0003-049X
2326-9243