FRIEDBERG, EMIL ALBERT. — Canonist, Protestant, and one of the most eminent representatives of the historical school. Born in Konitz on 22 December 1837, died in Leipzig on 7 September 1910. He taught ecclesiastical law ■ Berlin (1862) as a privat-docent ■ at Halle (1865) as an adjunct professor, then, as a full professor, at Freiburg (1868) and Leipzig (1869–1910).
From the time of his doctoral dissertation, F. accepted the regalist-Febronian postulates, defining the relations between State and Church on the basis of the jurisdictionalist principle of the superiority of the former over the latter. His writings exerted considerable influence on the attitude of the Prussian government and Parliament, at the time of the Kulturkampf, concerning the introduction of the ecclesiastical laws of 1873 (the May Laws), under Bismarck.
F. devoted most of his works to subjects in ecclesiastical law and the history of ancient and modern canon law. Among the principal ones are: Ehe und Eheschliessung im deutschen Mittelalter (Berlin 1864); Das Recht der Eheschliessung in seiner geschichtlichen Entwicklung (there 1865); Die evangelische und katholische Kirche der neu einverleibten Länder in ihren Beziehungen zur preuss. Landeskirche und zum Stante (Halle 1867); Der Staat und die katholische Kirche im Grossherzogthum Baden seit 1860 (Berlin 1871); Die Geschichte der Civitelle (there 1871); Die Grenzen zwischen Kirche und Staat und die Garantien gegen deren Verletzung (3 vols., Tübingen 1872); Sammlung der Aktenstücke zum ersten vatikanischen Concil (there 1873); Der Staat und die Bischofsmahlen (Leipzig 1874); Sammlung der Aktenstücke die altkatholischen Bewegung betreffend (there 1876); Verlobung und Trauung (there 1876). His Lehrbuch des katholischen und evangelischen Kirchenrechts (Leipzig 1880, Italian translation Turin 1893) is also very well known. He also wrote on the constitutions of the various German Protestant Churches: Die geltenden Verfassungsgesetze der evangelischen deutschen Landeskirchen (4 vols. of supplements, Freiburg 1885); Das geltende Verfassungsrecht der evangelischen deutschen Landeskirchen (Leipzig 1888). Of great importance is the critical edition
of the Corpus Juris Canonici (2 vols., there 1879–91) and of the Quinque compilaciones antiquae (there 1884). First with R. Dove and later with E. Schling, he directed the Zeitschrift für Kirchenrecht (from 1 July 1891: Deutsche Zeitschrift für Kirchenrecht).