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Bible Encyclopedias
Neander, Johann August Wilhelm
Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature
universally conceded to be by far the greatest of ecclesiastical historians, and surnamed the father of modern Church history, was born in the university town of Gottingen, Germany, January 15, 1789, a time memorable as introducing the fearful drama of the French Revolution, when the moral atmosphere was infected with deadly poisons, and black and thickening clouds were spread over the political and religious horizon. He was the son of a Jewish merchant, Mendel by name, who at one time had been prominent in commercial circles; but, reduced by reverses, was now travelling in little out-of-the-way country towns, selling such goods as could be easily carried about, and would find a ready market among the poorer classes. Mendel was honorably connected by blood-ties with some of the best of German Jewish families, among them the Mendelssohns. He was a pious Jew, and David; as the boy was named at circumcision, was carefully trained religiously and intellectually. At eight years of age he was admitted as student to the Johanneum Gymnasium at Hamburg, whither his parents had removed. At this place the Jewish boy enjoyed the friendship and daily association of Varnhagen von Ense, Chamisso, the poet, Wilhelm Neumann, the composer, etc. Already the abstract, lofty, and pure genius of Neander was beginning to show itself. It is related that a bookseller in the town was struck with the frequent visits to his shop of a bashful, ungainly boy, who used to steal in and seize upon some erudite volume that no one else would touch, and utterly lose himself for hours together in study.
This was no other than our David Mendel. Plato and Plutarch were his favorite classics; and many a spare hour out of school not spent in that old book-stall was devoted to the study of these ancient masters of wisdom. The modern writers also engaged his attention; and thoughtfully he perused several works on Christianity, among them that famous work of Schleiermacher entitled Discourses on Religion, which appeared in 1799, addressed to the cultivated despisers of religion, and aiming to show the evils arising in society out of indifference to the Christian faith and the practices which it demands. The thoughtful Jewish boy was struck with the reasonable demands made of humanity by a selfsacrificing Saviour; was convinced that he who taught such ethics and demanded of his followers such a life was more than man. Long was the struggle between a faithful adherence to what his parents, especially his pious mother, had taught him; but finally, convinced of his false position, no obstacles could hold him back and in 1806 he publicly renounced Judaism, and was baptized, adopting, in allusion to the religious change which he had experienced, the name of Neander (from the Greek νούος ἀνήρ , i.e., new man), and as his Christian or baptismal names those of his Christian teacher, Johann Gurlitt, then principal of the Johanneum, and of his friends August Varnhagen and Wilhelm Neumann. Neander's sisters and brothers, and later his mother also, followed his example. In the year of his admission into the Christian Church he went to Halle as a student of theology, devoting himself with wonderful ardor and success to his task. Neander's favorite professor was he whose work had caused the Jew to embrace Christ as the Messiah, and Schleiermacher in turn greatly interested himself in his convert and student. But much more intimate was Neander's relation to Prof. Knapp, then the only Pietistic representative at Halle. The sudden defeat of the Prussians at Jena, October 14, 1806, threw Halle open to the French invaders, and three days later the students of that high school were forced to quit it and seek elsewhere educational advantages.
Neander went to Gottingen, and there he studied for three years under Planck, then in the zenith of his reputation as a Church historian; he next returned to Hamburg, expecting to enter the ministry, but was prevented in this step by a call as lecturer to the University of Heidelberg. He had been here only a short time when he was appointed extraordinary professor of theology, so great was his success as a lecturer. In 1813 the then newly-established University of Berlin needed a professor of Church history. Neander had created considerable sensation by his monograph on Julian and his Times, and the well-informed king of Prussia selected Neander for the vacant chair. Schleiermacher, De Wette, and Marheineke were already engaged, and Neander soon figured as prominently as any of his colleagues. For the remainder of his life he was ardently at work for the advancement of Christianity and in the interests of the university. He especially enjoyed immense celebrity as a lecturer. Even Schleiermacher had a limited circle of auditors compared with the throngs who went to hear Neander. Students flocked to him not only from all parts of Germany, but from the most distant Protestant countries. Many Roman Catholics, even, were among his auditors; and it is said that there is hardly a great preacher in Germany who is not more or less penetrated with his ideas. Perhaps no professor was ever so much loved by his students as Neander.
He used to give the poorer ones tickets to his lectures, and to supply them with clothes and money. In 1822-3 Mohler, the distinguished Roman polemic, was one of Neander's hearers; and after paying a tribute to the different celebrated theologians of the university, he alludes in these highly eulogistic terms to the noted Church historian: "Neander embraces everything, even to the most profound. What study of original authorities, what judgment, what deep religiousness, what earnestness, what clearness and precision in the representation; how living, how attractive is the picture of the times which Neander delineates! In how masterly a manner does he know how to describe the men who were the ruling spirits of their times; with what undeviating justice does he apportion praise or blame to each!... Neander's prelections will be ever memorable to me; they will have decided influence on my Church historical labors. His private life is pervaded by enlightened piety; it is simple as the conduct of a village schoolmaster; his character is lovable and unassuming in the highest degree; he knows in Berlin no street but that which leads him to the university; he knows no persons but his professional colleagues; but Origen, Tertullian, Augustine, Chrysostom, St. Bernard, the letters of Boniface, and so on-he knows these profoundly. His demeanor is, on account of its total want of polish, laughable, but no one laughs at him for it; unbounded is the reverence and love which his students, the respect which his colleagues, the regard which the government, show towards him" (Worner, Joh. A. Mohler, ein Lebensbild [Regensb. 1866], pages 72-74).
Neander labored earnestly in many ways up to a few days of his death, and when the final earthly hour of work had passed he calmly said to the sorrowing friends who gathered about him, "I am weary; I will now go to sleep;" and, as they conducted him to his bed, the place of his last repose, he whispered, with a voice of mellowing affection, "Good-night, good- night." He slumbered for four hours, and then gently and almost inperceptibly "breathed himself into the silent and cold sleep of death." This occurred on July 14, 1850. In his death this good man was honored as in his life. The day of his obsequies was observed as a public holiday in Berlin. A vast procession followed the remains to the grave, stretching the length of full two miles.
'The hearse was surrounded by students bearing lighted candles; in front of the body, Neander's Bible and Greek Testament were carried. The carriages of the king and princess of Prussia followed in the procession; and at the grave a solemn choral was sung by a thousand voices, and a discourse was pronounced by his friend, the noted Dr. Krummacher.
In his outward appearance Dr. Neander was a real curiosity, especially in the lecture-room. Dr. Schaff thus described hint in his "Sketches of German Divines," as foreign correspondent of the New York Evangelist: "Think of a man of middle size, slender frame, homely, though a good- natured and benevolent face, dark and strongly Jewish complexion, deep- seated but sparkling eyes, overshadowed with an unusually strong, bushy pair of eyebrows, black hair flowing in uncombed profusion over the forehead, an old-fashioned coat, a white cravat carelessly tied — as often:behind or on one side of the neck as in front — a shabby hat set aslant, jack-boots reaching above the knees; think of him either sitting at home, surrounded by books on the shelves, the table, the few chairs, and all over the floor, or walking Unter den Linden and in the Thiergarten of Berlin, leaning on the arm of his sister Hannchen or a faithful student, his eyes shut or looking half-way up to heaven, talking theology in the midst of the noise and fashion of the city, and presenting altogether a most singular contrast to the teeming life around him, stared at, smiled at, wondered at, yet respectfully greeted by all who knew him; or, finally, standing on the rostrum, playing with a couple of goose-quills which his amanuensis had always to provide, constantly crossing and recrossing his feet, bent forward, frequently sinking his head to discharge a morbid flow of spittle, and then again suddenly throwing it on high, especially when roused to polemic zeal against pantheism and dead formalism, at times fairly threatening to overturn the desk, and yet all the while pouring forth with the greatest earnestness and enthusiasm; without any otler help than that of some illegible notes, an uninterrupted flow of learning and thought from the deep and pure fountain of the inner life, and thus, with all the oddity of the outside, at once commanding the veneration and confidence of every hearer: and you have a picture of Neander, the most original phenomenon in the literary world of this 19th century" (reprinted in his Germnanyits Universities, Theology, and Religion, pages 269, 270).
Neander was never married, and belonged to those exceptions where celibacy is a necessity and duty, and a means of greater usefulness in the kingdom of God. A congenial sister kept house for Neander, and attended to his wants with the most tender care. The childlike intercourse of this original couple had something very touching. He was almost as helpless as a child in matters of dress, and the story runs that he once started off for the lecture-room in his morning-gown and sans culottes, but was happily overtaken by the watchful sister; also, that once, ill trying a new pair of pantaloons, he kept on the old ones, drew the left half over the right leg, and cut the other off with a pair of scissors as superfluous! Si nono e veto, e ben trovato. His clothing was of the most simple sort, and hardly fit for a gentleman. His moderation in eating and drinking reminded one of the self- denial of old ascetics, like St. Anthony of Egypt, who ate only once every three days, and then felt ashamed, as an immortal spirit, to be in need of earthly food. Yet Neander was extremely hospitable, and invited his friends often to dinner, and while they were enjoying the provisions of the table he talked to them theology and religion, or branched out occasionally into harmless humor and the more trifling topics of the day, as far as they came to his notice. His heart was open to friendship, and his faithful memory seldom forgot one who once had made an impression upon him, though he were only a transient visitor. Every stranger with proper recommendations was cordially welcome in his study at the fixed hour of conversation (between five and seven in the evening), or at his table, and he showed himself as obliging as could possibly be expected from a man so unpractical and helpless as Neander. Generally he plunged at once into the deepest theological discussions, opening his mind most freely with little prudential regard to men or circumstances. So he shocked many a Puritan and Presbyterian by inviting them to dinner on Sunday, but always won their esteem and love by the ensemble of his theology and character. He spoke English fluently, although not quite correctly. The students he gathered around him one evening every week to a social tea and familiar conversation. There he gave free vent to all that agitated his mind, and rejoiced or troubled his heart, concerning the state of the Church and the movements of theological science.
As a man and a Christian, Dr. Neander was universally esteemed. Indeed his character, religiously considered, is of so noble a Christian type that it calls for special notice. Ardently and profoundly devotional, sympathetic, cheerful, profusely benevolent, and without a shadow of selfishness resting on his soul, he inspired universal reverence, and was himself, by the mild and attractive sanctity of his life, as powerful an argument on behalf of Christianity as his writings. The childlike simplicity of his character was beautiful. Everything like vanity and pretence was as foreign to him as if he dwelt on a different planet. A recent German writer calls him a "Protestant monk or saint, whose world was the cloister of the inner man, out of which he worked and taught for the good of the Church." We do not wonder when it is said that Neander's salutary influence on the religious sentiments and state of Germany are far above that of any other man in this century. He was one of the chief promoters of the changes introduced into the Protestant establishment of Prussia, and of the compromise of the Lutheran and Calvinistic confessions.
He is also believed to have contributed more than any other single individual to the overthrow, on the one side, of that anti-historical rationalism, and, on the other, of that dead Lutheran formalism, from both of which the religious life of Germany had so long suffered. His influence was so great as to lead very many of the young men of the fatherland to embrace the vital doctrines of Christianity, for his own theological views were more positive and evangelical than those entertained by any of his colleagues. He shared with the most orthodox of them the opinion that religion is based upon feeling.
The Christian "consciousness" was the sum of his theology. "By this term," said he, "is designated the power of the Christian faith in the subjective life of the single individual, in the congregation, and in the Church generally; a power independent and ruling according to its own law — that which, according to the word of our Lord, must first form the leaven of every other historical development of mankind." Neander's motto, "Pectus est, quod theologum facit," unfolds his whole theological system and life career. The Germans call his creed "Pectoralism," in view of the inner basis of his faith. With him, religion amounts to nothing without Christ. Nor must Christ be the mere subject of study; the soul and its manifold affections must embrace him. The barrenness of Judaism is done away in him, and the emptiness of rationalistic criticism is successfully met by the fuiness found in Christianity. Sin is not merely hurtful and prejudicial, but it induces guilt and danger. It can be pardoned only through the death and mediation of Christ. The illustrations of devout service to be found in the history of the Church should serve as examples for succeeding times. Neander therefore spent much of the careful labor of his life in portraying prominent characters; for it was his opinion that individuals sometimes combine the features of their times, the virtues:dr the vices prevalent; and that if these individualities be clearly defined the Church is furnished with valuable lessons for centuries. The work which he published when but twenty-two years of age, Julian the Apostate (Leips. 1812; transl. by G.V. Cox, N.Y. 1850, 12mo), was the beginning of a series of similar monographs designed to show the importance of the individual in history, and to point out great crises in the religious life of man. He subsequently produced St. Bernard (Berl. 1813):Gnosticism (1818): — St. Chrysostom (1821, 2 volumes): — Denkwurdigkeiten aus der Gesch. des Christenthums und des geistlichen Lebens (1822, 3 volumes; 3d ed. 1845-46); in an English dress, entitled The History of the Christian Religion and Church during the first Three Centuries, transl. by Henry John Rose (2d ed. Lond. 1842, 2 volumes, 8vo): — Tertullian (1826): — Geschichte der Pflanzung und Leitung der Kirche durch die Apostel (Hamb. 183233, 2 volumes; 4th ed. 1847; History of the Planting and Training of the Christian Church by the Apostles, transl. from the German by J.E. Ryland [Lond. 1851, 2 volumes, sm. 8vo]): — Das Leben Jesu Christi in seinem geschichtlichen Zusammenhange, written as a reply to Strauss's work (Hamb. 1837; 5th ed. 1853; The Life of Jesus Christ in its historical Connection and historiical Development, transl. from the 4th German ed. by John M'Clintock, D.D., LL.D., and Charles E. Blumenthal [N.Y. 1848, 8vo]): — Wissenschaftliche Abhandlungen, published by Jacobi (Berl. 1851): — Geschichte der Christlichen Dogmen, also published by Jacobi (1856); in English entitled Lectures on the History of Christian Dogmas (Lond. 1857, 2 volumes, 12mo). To these may be added a few practical commentaries and essays.
By far the most important of these works is his Life of Christ, which has a polemic aim against Strauss. This is, however, only a small part of its merits; and but for the notes an ordinary reader would not detect any such specific tendency. It unfolds the life of the Savior from the record with great clearness and skill; it invests the outlines thus obtained with the fresh colors of life, without resorting to forced constructions and vain imaginings; and, above all, it seeks, with childlike humility and reverence, to learn and exhibit the mind of the Spirit. The characteristic of spirituality, strongly stamped upon all the works of this great writer, is especially prominent here. None, we think, can read the book without becoming not nmerely acquainted with the facts of the life of Christ, but more anxious than ever to drink in its spirit. Nor let us forget, in our judgment of what may appear to us even grave errors of opinion in the book, that its author has fought for every step of ground that has been gained of late years by spiritual religion in Germany; and while we lament the "dimness" which this great man confesses with such Christianlike humility, let us acknowledge the grandeur of his idea of the kingdom of God, and the earnestness of his devotion to it. His starting-point and many of his paths are different from ours; it must therefore gladden one's heart, and may perhaps confirm one's faith, to see that Neander reaches, after all, the general results of evangelical theology.
Neander's greatest literary treasure to the world has proved to be, however, his Allgemeine Geschichte der christlichen Religion und Kirche (Hamb. 1825-52; 3d ed. 1851-56, 6 volumes, 8vo), which treats of the history of the Church from the apostolic age to the Council of Basle in 1430. It is accessible to English readers in the excellent translation of Prof. Joseph Torrey, under the title of General History of the Christian Religion and Church (from the second and improved edition [Boston, 1847, 5 volumes, 8vo]; and reprinted at Edinburgh and London). Neander sets out in this work with the idea that Christianity is a life-giving spirit, awakened in the mind by the influence of divine truth on the heart; that it recognises no distinction of spiritual authority among men, no priesthood, properly so called, no holy days, and no ordinances in the technical sense of the word; although it naturally assumes forms accommodated to the circumstances of the times, and adapts itself to every stage in human culture.
This Christianity is a leaven that takes hold of whatsoever is divine in man, quickening it, struggling with the contrary elements — with Judaism, with heathenism, with all the worldly and sinful propensities of the soul- gradually modifying or overcoming them, and destined eventually to ferment the whole mind of our race. The history of its workings, developments, and manifestations in these respects is the history of the Christian religion and Church. He exhibits extraordinary talent in bringing out, in a generic way, the hidden life of Christianity, and representing it as a leavenlike power that pervades and sanctifies society from within. He thus restores the religious and practical element to its due prominence in opposition to the coldly intellectual and critical method of rationalistic historians; yet without thereby wronging in the least the claims of science, or running into narrow sectarian extremes, like the pietistic Arnold. Says Dr. Hurst: "The various influences hitherto employed against rationalism had proceeded as far towards its extinction as it was possible for them to go. Philosophy and doctrinal theology had spent their efforts. The history of the Church having always been treated mechanically, it was now necessary that the continued presence and agency of Christ with his people should be carefully portrayed. The progress of the Church needed to be represented as more than growth from natural causes, such as the force of civilization and education. It was necessary to show that a high superintending Wisdom is directing its path, overcoming its difficulties, and leading it through persecution and blood to ultimate triumph. Nealider rendered this important service. He directed tie vision of the theologian to a new field, and became the father of the best Church historians of the nineteenth century" (Hist. of Rationalism, pages 252, 253). Neander no doubt sometimes went too far in his liberality; and by trying to do full justice even to heretics and sectarians, he was in danger sometimes — like Arnold and Milner, although of course in a far less degree of doing injustice to the champions of orthodoxy and the Church.
The cry is therefore, on the part especially of Churchmen, who would claim for the objectivity of the Church a like import with the objectivity of the Gospel, that there is in Neander a want of the proper appreciation of the objective, realistic element in Church history. Now it is true that Neander is more the historian of the invisible kingdom of Christ in the hearts of its individual mnembers than of the visible Church in its great conflict and contact with a wicked world. Yet one need but turn to Neander's pages for a delineation of ecclesiasticism in the Middle Ages — the time when objectiveness was most vigorous in the Church — to be convinced that Neander well understood how to value this quality, when it was the natural form of the growth of the Christian life. The internal and most personal were certainly of more importance to him than anything else. Says Jacobi, Neander's pupil and devoted follower: "When the predominant Christian power was connected with the objective forms of the Church, as in the time of Abelard, he regarded their ascendency as warranted, without justifying the contemporary suppression of the germs of truth, and the reprehensible mneans which were employed in particular cases. And is it not confirmed by the experience of all ages that there is no fault to which the traditionary Church party is more prone than suspicion of every deviation, and suppression of even such dissent as is legitimate? If in modern times individualism has increased to a bewildering excess, has it not been one principal reason why the rights of individuals to form their own views of the gospel were not acknowledged as they deserved, either in the Middle Ages or in the later decennia of the Reformation — to say nothing of the most flourishing period of Protestant orthodoxy? Would Dr. Kurtz be willing to defend the manner in which Wickliffe, Huss, and John Arndt were treated in the name of orthodoxy; and how, according to his notions, would Luther have been justified in setting himself against the objectivity of the Church, unless, with Neander and Luther himself, he holds higher still the objectivity of the Gospel? It was not Neander's wish to set aside the objectivity of the Church, or to subordinate it to the individual, but to contract its sphere, in order to give the latter liberty of action, and that the pious members of the Church might testify of the Gospel against the Church.
But it is not easy to perceive what is to be gained by the maintenance of the objectivity of the Church, especially in the department of historical study, if not a word is to be said for the other factor of [Christian] life... We know not why it should be a matter of reproach to Neander that he more or less contrasts what belongs to Christianity generally, with that which merely belongs to the Church. Is there an ecclesiastical communion which dare maintain that its system, taken as a whole, is in every particular a pure expression of the Gospel? Is it, therefore, a fact that these two — the Christian and the ecclesiastical — are everywhere striving at a reconcilement not yet completed, and therefore must be regarded more or less in contrast, relatively, and according to the stage of the Church's development?" (Preface to Lectures on Dogma by Neander, 1:9, 10). It must be confessed, too, that Neander's theology in many respects falls short of the proper standard of orthodoxy. He did not admit the binding authority of the symbolical books. His views on inspiration, on the sanctification of the Lord's day, and even on the Trinity, are somewhat loose and latitudinarian. His best disciples in this respect have gone beyond his position and become more churchly. But then it must be considered, 1st, that he rose in an age of universal rationalism, and was one of the earliest pioneers of evangelical faith and theology in Germany; 2d, that this very liberalism and, if we choose to call it, latitudinarianism, served as a bridge for many who could not otherwise have been rescued from the bonds of scepticism; 3d, that these defects did not weaken his general conviction of the divine character of Christianity, nor affect his unfeigned, deep-rooted piety. Many of his pupils and followers may surpass him in orthodoxy, but few can be found in any age in whom doctrine was to the same extent life and power, in whom theoretic conviction had so fully passed over into flesh and blood, in whom the love of Christ and man glowed with so warm and pure a flame, as in the truly great and good Neander. Any defects, if Neander's work can really be said to have defects, cannot blind any one to their real excellencesand immortal merits. He is emphatically the evangelical regenerator of this branch of theology, and has made it a running commentary on Christ's previous promise to be with his people to the end of the world, and even with two or three of his humblest disciples where they are assembled in his name. Thus Church history becomes to the intelligent reader a book of devotion as well as useful and interesting information, or to use Neander's own words in the preface to the first volume of his large work, "a living witness for the divine power of Christianity, a school of Christian experience, a voice of edification, instruction, and warning, sounding through all ages for all who wvill hear." He everywhere follows the footsteps of the Saviour in his march through the various ages of the Church, and kisses them reverently wherever he finds them. He traces them in the writings of an Origen and a Tertullian, a Chrysostom and an Augustine, a Bernard and a Thomas Aquinas, a Luther and a Melancthon, Calvin and a Fenelon. Christ was to him the divine harmony of all the discords of confessions and sects, or as he liked to repeat after Pascal, "En Jesus Christ toutes les contradictions sent accordees."
Neander, it must be conceded, is not a model as a writer of Church history. His style is too monotonous and diffuse, without any picturesque alteration of light and shade, flowing like a quiet stream over an unbroken plain. Yet did he so enrich the department of Church history with material contributions gained by a thorough mastery, independent investigation, and scrupulously conscientious use of the sources, and present a so much more methodical treatment of the subject as to gain for himself the approval of all, and he has come to be universally acknowledged the father of modern Church history, marking by his efforts in this field of sacred learning an epoch as clearly as Flacius (q.v.) did in the 16th, Arnold (q.v.) in the 17th, or Mosheim in the 18th century. "In spite of all faults," says Schaff, "Neander still remains, on the whole, beyond doubt the greatest Church historian thus far of the 19th century. Great, too, especially in this, that he never suffered his renown to obscure at all his sense of the sinfulness and weakness of every human work in this world. With all his comprehensive knowledge, he justly regarded himself as, among many others, merely a forerunner of a new creative epoch of ever-young Christianity; and towards that time he gladly stretched his vision, with the prophetic gaze of faith and hope, from amid the errors and confusion around him. 'We stand,' says he. ' on the line between an old and a new, about to be called into being by the ever-fresh energy of the Gospel. For the fourth time an epoch in the life of our race is in preparation by means of Christianity. We, therefore, can furnish, in every respect, but pioneer work for the period of the new creation,when life and science shall be regenerated, and the wonderful works of God proclaimed with new tongues of fire' (Leben Jesu, 1st ed. page 9 sq.)" (Hist. Apostol. Ch. page 106). A complete edition of Neander's writings has been brought out in recent years (Gotha, 1862-66, 13 volumes, 8vo); and his name will go down to future generations as the philanthropic founder of a home for little wanderers called the "Neander Haus." An American institution of learning, the Rochester Theological Seminary, prides itself on the possession of his library. See Farrell, Memorial of A. Neander (1851); Krabbe, August Neander, ein Beitrage z. dessen Karakteristik (Hamb. 1852); Kling, Dr. August Neander, ein Beitrag z.d. Lebensbilde, in "Stud. u. Krit." of 1851; Zum Gedachtniss August Neander, (Berlin, 1850); Neuer Nekrolog d. Deutschen (1850, page 425); Hagenbach, Neander's Verdienste um d. Kiurchengeschichte, in the "Stud. u. Krit." of 1851; Baur, d. Epochen d. Kirchlich. Geschichte; Schaff, Recollections of Neander, in "Mercersburg Review," January 1851; and in Kirchenireund (1851), 283 sq.; and Hist. Apost. Ch. pages 95-107; Uhlhorn, d. altere Kirchengesch. in ihren neueren Darstellungen, etc.; Saintes, Rationalism, page 265 sq.; Bib. Sacra, April 1851, art. 7; January 1850, page 77 sq.; Schwarz, Neueste Deutsche Theologie (Leips. 1864), chapter 1; Kahnis, Hist. German Protestantism, page 272 sq.; Hurst, Sist. of Rationalism, page 249 sq.; Farrar, Crit. Hist. Free Thought, page 251 sq.; Brit. Qu. Rev. November 1850; October 1868; Brit. and For. Ev. Rev. July 1868, page 601 sq.; New-Englander, 1865; Ch. Remembrancer, 1862, page 39; Meth. Qu. Rev. April 1848, page 248; 1847, page 308; January 1851, pages 143, 181; July 1852, page 485; January 1853, page 102; 1857, page 203; April 1865, page 469; North Brit. Rev. February 1851.
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McClintock, John. Strong, James. Entry for 'Neander, Johann August Wilhelm'. Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature. https://www.studylight.org/​encyclopedias/​eng/​tce/​n/neander-johann-august-wilhelm.html. Harper & Brothers. New York. 1870.