Bibelrezeption in der Aufklärung

The reception history of the Bible is increasingly acknowledged to be an important aspect of 18th century intellectual developments. Controversies about the Bible and its relation to philosophical concepts of natural religion must be regarded as one of the defining features of the Enlightenment. While in the context of Enlightenment culture traditional Christian apologetics encountered a crisis, the historical investigation of biblical texts and traditions aroused new interest. Emphasis on the rational character of religion became a challenge to the authority of the historically contingent biblical texts. In this collection of essays, Christoph Bultmann compiles case studies related to authors such as Robert Lowth, Johann Gottfried Herder, Gotthold Ephraim Lessing and Alexander Geddes as well as some lesser known figures in whose writings the spirit of the cultural context for the interpretation of the Bible can be captured.