DIECKHOFF, AUGUST WILHELM. - Protestant theologian, b. 5 February 1823 at Göttingen, d. 12 September 1894 at Rostock. Extraordinary professor of systematic and historical theology in 1854 at Göttingen, he became in 1860 ordinary professor of the same subject at the University of Rostock.

He wrote various works of a scholarly character, concerning himself in particular with the origins of Lutheranism. His first important work on the Waldensians in the Middle Ages (Die Waldenser im Mittelalter. Zwei historische Untersuchungen, 1851), dispelled the common opinion then prevailing that made of these heretics precursors of the Protestant Reformation, whereas according to D. they would be, in the speculative sphere, representatives of medieval Christianity, simply accepting Pelagian doctrines. In other works D. deepened the concept of the originality of the Lutheran Reformation. He published in 1870 a writing against pontifical infallibility.

Bibliography

BIBL.: K. Schmidt, s. v. in Realenc. f. prot. Theol. u. K., IV, pp. 641-44.

Silvio Furlani

@incollection{ec4_dieckhoff_august_wilhelm, author = {Furlani, Silvio}, title = {Dieckhoff, august wilhelm}, booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica}, volume = {IV}, pages = {1570--1571}, note = {Cited by column}, publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico}, address = {Città del Vaticano}, year = {1950}, url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/dieckhoff-august-wilhelm} }

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Dieckhoff, August Wilhelm

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