Gottlieb Christoph Adolf Von Harless - Works

Works

His three most important works were written while professor at Erlangen, as his later public activity left him little time for literary work. They are: Commentar über den Brief Pauli an die Ephesier (Erlangen, 1834); Theologische Encyclopädie und Methodologie vom Standpunkte der Protestantischen Kirche (Nuremberg,-1837); and Christliche Etik (Stuttgart, 1842; Eng. transl., Edinburgh, 1868). The commentary and the work on ethics marked an epoch in their respective spheres. The encyclopedia is less important for its methodological arrangement than for Harless' clear and energetic views of the Church, the main points being the close relation of theology to the Church; the unity of theory and practise in a common living faith; the living continuity of the Church from her very foundation as an ideal factor of history, the emphasis of a common faith as the basis of Protestant theology; the entire transformation of this theology by the principle of justification; the necessity of preserving the principles of the Reformation in their purity; the obscurity caused by the later Protestant scholasticism, which considered the dogmas laid down in the confessional writings of the Church as the final conclusion of all dogmatic knowledge; and the sound reaction against this tendency by the Pietistic movement. The Christliche Etik (Eng. transl., System of Christian Ethics, Edinburgh, 1868) is without doubt Harless' most important work. Its chief excellence are its scientific structure, the emphasis and consistent application of the Christian ethical principle, and the interrelation and connection of the Biblical factor with the historical factor in the more general sense of the word. He died on the 5th of September 1879, having, a few years earlier, written an autobiography under the title Bruchstücke aus dem Leben eines süddeutschen Theologen.