Bundesarchiv Bild 194-1282-30A, Wuppertal, Evangelische Gesellschaft, Jahrestagung

Wilhelm Schneemelcher (21 August 1914,

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitu ...

– 6 August 2003,

Bad Honnef Bad Honnef () is a spa town in Germany near Bonn in the Rhein-Sieg district, North Rhine-Westphalia. It is located on the border of the neighbouring state Rhineland-Palatinate. To the north it lies on the slopes of the Drachenfels (“Dragon' ...

) was a German

Protestant Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...

theologian Theology is the systematic study of the nature of the divine and, more broadly, of religious belief. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing the ...

and expert on the

New Testament Apocrypha The New Testament apocrypha (singular apocryphon) are a number of writings by early Christians that give accounts of Jesus and his teachings, the nature of God, or the teachings of his apostles and of their lives. Some of these writings were cite ...

Career

He obtained through Hans Lietzmann a post researching Latin and Greek manuscripts at the Church Fathers Commission, however this came under the Prussian Academy of Sciences so in 1938 Schneemelcher was removed by the Nazi authorities due to being "politically unreliable", due to sympathies with the

Confessing Church The Confessing Church (german: link=no, Bekennende Kirche, ) was a movement within German Protestantism during Nazi Germany that arose in opposition to government-sponsored efforts to unify all Protestant churches into a single pro-Nazi German ...

, and was forced to turn to making a living as a bookseller's assistant. In 1939 he was conscripted into the

Wehrmacht The ''Wehrmacht'' (, ) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the ''Heer'' (army), the '' Kriegsmarine'' (navy) and the ''Luftwaffe'' (air force). The designation "''Wehrmacht''" replaced the previo ...

, and after the war he was a village pastor in Stöckheim near

Northeim Northeim (; nds, Nuurten) is a town in Lower Saxony, Germany, seat of the district of Northeim, with, in 2011, a population of 29,000. It lies on the German Half-Timbered House Road. History Northeim is first mentioned in 800 in a document ...

. From 1954 to 1979 he was professor of

patristics Patristics or patrology is the study of the early Christian writers who are designated Church Fathers. The names derive from the combined forms of Latin ''pater'' and Greek ''patḗr'' (father). The period is generally considered to run from ...

at the

University of Bonn The Rhenish Friedrich Wilhelm University of Bonn (german: Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn) is a public research university located in Bonn, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It was founded in its present form as the ( en, Rhine ...

. He was editor of the collection ''Festschrift für Günther Dehn'' in honour of the anti-Nazi pastor

Günther Dehn Günther Dehn (18 April 1882 in Schwerin, Germany – 17 March 1970 in Bonn) was a German pastor and theologian. He was an illegal instructor in the Confessing Church, and, after 1945, he was a professor of practical theology. Dehn was one ...

Works

He completely revised and enlarged the older collection of Edgar Hennecke (1865–1951) to produce the ''Neutestamentlichen Apokryphen in deutscher Übersetzung'' in 1964, which was then translated into English at ''The New Testament Apocrypha'' by R. McL. Wilson in 1965. As editor he coordinated the work of dozens of scholars including

Philip Vielhauer Philipp Adam Christoph Vielhauer ( Bali, Cameroon 3 December 1914- Bonn 23 December 1977) was a German Lutheran pastor, and scholar of early Christianity and the New Testament Apocrypha. He is notable for having been the first German scholar to reco ...

and Georg Streck. His work is today commonly referred to as the "standard edition" of the New Testament Apocrypha.Adelbert Denaux ''John and the Synoptics'' p. 147 1992 "revised fifth edition of the standard, German translation of these writings: Wilhelm SCHNEEMELCHER (ed.), Neutestamentliche Apokryphen in deutscher Übersetzung, 1. Band. Evangelien, Tübingen, 1987" In later years, Schneemelcher's co-editor was

Joachim Jeremias Joachim Jeremias (20 September 1900 – 6 September 1979) was a German Lutheran theologian, scholar of Near Eastern Studies and university professor for New Testament studies. He was abbot of Bursfelde, 1968–1971. He was born in Dresden and sp ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Schneemelcher, Wilhelm 1914 births 2003 deaths 20th-century German Protestant theologians Knights Commander of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany German male non-fiction writers