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Johann Heinrich Alting

1911 Encyclopedia Britannica

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JOHANN HEINRICH ALTING (1583-1644), German divine, was born at Emden,where his father, Menso Alting (1541-1612), was minister. Johann studied with great success at the universities of Groningen and Herborn. In 1608 he was appointed tutor of Frederick, afterwards elector-palatine, at Heidelberg, and in 1612 accompanied him to England. Returning in 1613 to Heidelberg, after the marriage of the elector with Princess Elizabeth of England, he was appointed professor of dogmatics, and in 1616 director of the theological department in the Collegium Sapientiae. In 1618, along with Abraham Scultetus, he represented the university in the synod of Dort. When Count Tilly took the city of Heidelberg (1622) and handed it over to plunder, Alting found great difficulty in escaping the fury of the soldiers. He first retired to Schorndorf; but, offended by the "semi-Pelagianism" of the Lutherans with whom he was brought in contact, he removed to Holland, where the unfortunate elector and "Winter King" Frederick, in exile after his brief reign in Bohemia, made him tutor to his eldest son. In 1627 Alting was appointed to the chair of theology at Groningen, where he continued to lecture, with increasing reputation, until his death in 1644. Though an orthodox Calvinist, Alting laid little stress on the sterner side of his creed and, when at Dort he opposed the Remonstrants, he did so mainly on the ground that they were "innovators." Among his works are: - Notae in Decadem Problematum Jacobi Behm (Heidelberg, 1618); Scripta Theologica Heidelbergensia (Amst., 1662); Exegesis Augustanae Confessionis (Amst., 1647).