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Werner August Friedrich Immanuel Elert (19 August 1885 — 21 November 1954) was a German Lutheran theologian and professor of both church history and systematic theology at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg. His writings in the fields of Christian dogmatics, ethics, and history have had great influence on modern Christianity in general and modern Lutheranism in particular. == Life == Elert was born on 19 August 1885 in the village of Heldrungen〔Werner Elert, ''The Structure of Lutheranism'', Walter A. Hansen, trans., (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1962), ix.〕 in what is modern-day Thuringia, but he grew up in northern Germany. His parents were August Elert and Friederike, née Graf, Elert.〔Werner Elert, ''Rudolf Rocholls Philosophie der Geschichte'', Abhandlungen zur Philosophie und ihrer Geschichte, no. 12, (Leipzig: Verlag von Quelle & Meyer, 1910), 139.〕 After attending the Realgymnasium in Harburg and the Gymnasium in Husum, he studied theology, philosophy, history, German literature, psychology and law in Breslau, Erlangen, and Leipzig. He earned doctorates in philosophy and theology at Erlangen.〔As a source for his early and student years, see "Elerts Eintrag in das Goldene Buch der Universität Erlangen vom 5. Januar 1927," published in Thomas Kaufmann, "Werner Elert als Kirchenhistoriker," ''Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche'' 93 (1996), 236–238.〕 After working as a tutor for a short time in Livonia, he served as a pastor from 1912 to 1919 in Seefeld, Pomerania. During World War I he served as a field preacher on several fronts. In 1919 Elert became Director of the Old Lutheran Theological Seminary in Breslau. In 1923 he was appointed to the Chair of Church History at the Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen, now University of Erlangen-Nuremberg. With the death of Philip Bachman in 1932 he was appointed to the chair of Systematic Theology. In the academic year 1926/27 he was rector of the University and in 1928-29 and 1935-43 Dean of the Theological Faculty. As a young man and Lutheran pastor he had supported the constitutional monarchy. Like many other conservative Germans in 1933, he hoped that the government of Hitler would overcome the political, social, and economic problems that had become acute during the Weimar period. While he never joined the Nazi Party, he did exhort Christians to be obedient to the Hitler government on the basis of Romans 13:1-7, First Peter 2:13-17, and Luther's explanations to the Fourth Commandment and the Fourth Petition of the Lord's Prayer. Only late in the 1930s did Elert become disillusioned with the regime. During the Second World War his only children, two sons who served as officers in the German army, were killed in hand-to-hand combat on the Eastern Front. That the sons of several other theologians at Erlangen also died in the war affected him deeply. Because of Elert's conservative, traditional Lutheran understanding of government and his other theological convictions, especially regarding the distinction between the law and the gospel, he opposed what he perceived to be the theological errors in the Barmen Declaration. This 1934 statement of the so-called Confessing Church sought to counter the influence of Nazi ideology in the German Protestant churches. Elert thought the document did not acknowledge how God legitimately works in the world apart from the revelation of Jesus in the gospel, of how the law and the gospel are two different words of God, and of how God works in the world in more than one way. Elert attributed these errors to the influence of Karl Barth, the principal author of Barmen and Elert’s central theological opponent. Although Elert was also critical of the so-called German Christians, who freely and unabashedly mixed Nazi ideology with their understanding of Christianity, he also opposed Barth and the Confessing Church. After the war, Elert acknowledged his political misjudgments. He also joined a liberal political party. Elert retired in 1953. He died in Erlangen on 21 November 1954〔 in his 70th year due to complications following an operation. His former home in Erlangen, Hindenburgdamm 44, is now a theological study house "The Werner Elert Home," owned by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bavaria. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Werner Elert」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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