Johann Gerhard’s Transitional Concept of Theologia

Abstract

Students of seventeenth century Lutheran history often find themselves in a quandary when they encounter Johann Gerhard (1582–1637). On the one hand, they are told that after Martin Luther (1483–1546) and Martin Chemnitz (1522– 1586), Gerhard is to be recognized as the third preeminent theologian of the Lutheran Reformation. On the other hand, they are confronted by a wide range of interpretations from those labeling him as “dead orthodoxist” to those promoting him as “proto-pietist.” The truth of the matter is that this wide variance of views is due in large part to the fact that Gerhard is a man between eras, a bridge of sorts between the first and second waves of “orthodoxy,”3 who possessed a certain proclivity for integrating the old with the new, faithful to the legacy of the reformers, yet responsive to contemporary concerns. Such a scenario calls for a careful reading and close analysis of the texts produced by Gerhard in order to more accurately define his theological views, more precisely situate him in the existing historio-