Christian Thomasius

Christian Thomasius (January 1st 1655; September 23rd 1728), was a Juriste and German Philosophe .

Biography

Christian Thomasius was born with Leipzig. His/her father, Jakob Thomasius (1622-1684), then chief of Thomasschule, directs his education. Through the lessons of his father, Christian grows under the influence of the political Philosophie of Hugo Grotius and Samuel Pufendorf, it continued the study of the Droit to Frankfurt-on-the Oder. In 1864 he becomes professor of natural Right to Leipzig and quickly draws the attention by his talents, and more particularly by his attacks dared against the traditional Préjugé S, in Théologie and Philosophie of the right. In 1687 it innovates with audacity by discoursing in German rather than in Latin, and the following year it publishes a monthly magazine ( Scherzhafte und ernsthafte, vernüftige und einfältige Gedanken über allerhand lustige und nutzliche Bücher und Fragen ) in which it ridicules the weakness pedant scientists, taking to the party of the pietist S in the controversy the opponent with orthodoxy Lutheran, and defending the free marriage between luther iens and Calvin ists. Consequently of these opinions but also for others, Christian Thomasius is denounced , interdict to give lessons or to write (May 10th 1690), and its arrest is ordered. He flees with Berlin where the voter Frederic Ier of Prussia offers to him refuge with Halle, with a revenue of 500 Thaler and the permission to give course. He helps to found the Université of Market (1694), where he becomes second then first law professor and vice-chancellor of the university. He was more famous among the professors of university and the influential writers of his time.

Thought

Although he is not a deep philosopher, Thomasius opened the way with great reforms in philosophy, right, literature, life in society and theology. Its goal was to introduce a rational point of view, common direction, and to lead the social sciences and divine to be interested in a world plus ground-with-ground. It thus created an era in German literature, philosophy and right, and, with Spittler, the modern period of the ecclesiastical history initiated . One of its objectives of its life was to release political and philosophy of the right of theological control and it fought permanently and with enthusiasm for freedoms of thought and of expression on the religious questions. One often speaks about him in German works like the author of the " system territorial" or of the theory erastienne of the ecclesiastical government; but he taught that the State could possibly intervene with the legal or public duties but only those, not those moral or private. Even the atheistic S should not be punished, although they should be expelled of the country, and it was a precursor by precociously denouncing the legal proceedings against the Sorcière S and the use of the Torture. In theology he was neither a naturalist, nor a deist but a believer in the need for the revealed religions, for safety. He was strongly influenced by the pietist S, particularly of Spener, and one finds a vein mystical in its thought; but of other elements of its thought were too powerful so that it can stick entirely to this party.

He is the first philosopher, before Emmanuel Kant to separate right and morals.

Works

Most popular and influential German publications of Thomasius were its already quoted periodicals (1688-1689); Einleitung zur Vernunftlehre (1691, 5th ED. 1719); Vernünflige Gedanken über allerhand auserlesene und juristische Handel (1720-1721); Historie der Weisheit und Torheit (3 flights., 1693); Kurze Lehrsätze van dem Laster der Zauberei put dem Hexenprozess (1704); Weitere Erläuterungen DER neueren Wissenschaft anderer Gedanken kennen zu lernen (1711).

Giovan Paolo Lancellotti, Institutiones iuris canonici (comments and notes by Thomasius, Market, 1710-1715, 4 volumes)

Reference

Britannica 1911
Lukas Sosoe, " Thomasius Christian, 1655-1728" , in Monique Canto-Sperber (to dir.), Dictionary of ethics and moral philosophy , Paris, PUF, ED. 2004, p. 1954-1958.

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