Principles of Biblical Interpretation

by Johann August Ernesti, Charles H. Terrot

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work.

This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.

As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

274 pages, Hardcover

First published May 1, 2006

About the author

Johann August Ernesti was a German Rationalist theologian and philologist. Ernesti was the first who formally separated the hermeneutics of the Old Testament from those of the New.

Apart from the quality of his own writing, Ernesti is notable for his influence on sacred and profane criticism in Germany. With JS Semler he co-operated in the Rationalist revolution of Lutheran theology, and in conjunction with Gesner he instituted a new school in ancient literature. He detected grammatical niceties in Latin, in regard to the consecution of tenses which had escaped preceding critics.

As an editor of the Greek classics, Ernesti does not compare with his Dutch contemporaries, Tiberius Hemsterhuis, L.C. Valckenaer, David Ruhnken or his colleague J.J. Reiske. The higher criticism was not even attempted by Ernesti. But to him and to Gesner is due the credit of having formed, by discipline and by example, philologists greater than themselves, and of having kindled the national enthusiasm for ancient learning.

It is chiefly in hermeneutics that Ernesti has any claim to eminence as a theologian. But here his merits are distinguished, and, at the period when his Institutio Interpretis Novi Testamenti (Principles of New Testament Interpretation) was published (1761), almost peculiar to himself.

Ernesti's most notable follower was the German theologian Samuel Friedrich Nathanael Morus.
His work influenced Johann Gottfried Herder and Friedrich Schleiermacher.