Baltzer, Johann Baptist

Baltzer, Johann Baptist one of the most promi. nent Roman Catholic theologians of Germany in the 19th century, was born July 16, 1803, at Andernach on the Rhine. He studied at Bonn under Hermes, graduating in 1827; was ordained as priest, in 1829 at Cologne, made doctor of divinity in 1830, and appointed ordinary professor of dogmatics at Breslau in 1831. In 1843 he became a member of consistory, in 1846 canon, and in 1861 honorary doctor of philosophy of the Breslau faculty. His interest in the Hermesian, and afterwards in the Gintherian, controversy, SEE HERMES; SEE GUNTHER, was the cause of his being suspended in 1860 by the princebishop of Breslau; but he was afterwards reinstated by the government. He died Oct. 1, 1871, at Bonn. He wrote, Litterarum Sacrarum Doctrina de Conditione Moadi, in qua Primi Homines ante Lapsum et post eundem Vicerint (Breslau, 1831): — Hinweisung auf den Grundcharakter des hermesianischen Systems (Bonn, 1832): — Ueber die Entstehung der in neuerer Zeit im Protestantismus und inz Katholicismus hervorgetretenen Gegensitze, etc. (ibid. 1833): — De Modo Propagationis Animarum in Genere Hlumano (ibid. eod.): — Beitrdge zur Vermittelung eines richtigen Urtheils iiber Katholicismus und Protestantismus (Breslau, 1839, 1840): — Das christlichev Seligkeits-Dogma, nach:katholischem und protestanti schenzm ekenntnisse (2d ed. Mentz, 1844): — Theologische Briefe (1st series, ibid. eod.): — Neue theologische Briefe (1st and 2d series, Breslan, 1853): — Die biblische Schapfuings geschichte, insbesondere die darin enthaltene Kosmiogonie und Geogonie in ihrero Uebereinstimmung mit den Naturwissenschaften (Leipsic, 1867). See Literarischer Handweiser fur das kathol. Deutschland, No. 42, col. 55; No. 43, col. 105; No. 110, col. 525; Zuchold, Bibl. Theol. i, 67; Franz, Johannes Baptista Baltzer (Breslau, 1873); Metzer, Johannes Baptista Baitzer's Leben, Wirken, und wissenschaftliche Bedeutung auf Grund seines Nachlasses tund seiner Schriften dargestellt (Bonn, 1877), reviewed in Schitrer's Theolog. Literaturzeitung, 1879, col. 228. (B. P.)