| Notes |
- From "Licht am Abend"
Johann Christian Thomæ was born in the house of his grandfather in Heldburg on 5 April 1668. The father was Rev. Stephan Thomæ, formerly Pastor of Weisenfeld, later of Neuhaus, and finally Adjunctus of Sonnefeld. The mother Madame Cordula, daughter of Michael Buchenröder, Superintendent of Heldburg. After he was privately educated by Rev. Joh. Martin Seifert, now Pastor of Steinach, Rev. Georg Möring, now Third Class of [the Collegiate School of] Neustadt an der Aisch, Rev. Georgio Kochen, then Pastor of the Holy Cross in Coburg, now deceased, he came in late May 1679 to Coburg for the Primary Class [at the Collegiate School] and was promoted 1682 to the Great Princely Gymnasium. After he matriculated 1686 at the bottom of his class [de paupertate studio forum = Latin, “of the poverty of the study of the form”], he entered on 14 May 1688 the University of Jena. In the year 1697, on 25 February, he received a Vocation to the Rectory of this place [Neustadt an der Aisch], on 3 March, his pastor's uniform, and began the 5th of that month his work in the name of GOD. The Monday after Misericordia Sunday [15 or 22 April 1697], he was installed as the Cantor of the Spiritual Lower Court in the presence of the entire Collegiate Council, however has led his office for almost a fourth of a generation hopefully not without blessing, and it appears that he is consumed in this work as a light in the service of GOD, and yet taken without none of his predecessors dead in office, whom he would first make as a rule, “and the rectory makes a mortal immortal [Rectoratum hactenus immortalem mortalem].“ In print, he has (1) made in the honor of his blessed father Rev. Stephan Thomæ, and 1707 set the memorial, (2) published in 1720, Den in der Augen der Welt unglück seelige, in GOttes Augen höchst=seel. Zustand eines truen Schulmanns [The in the Eyes of the World tragically dead, in the Eyes of GOD most blessed State of a true Schoolmaster], a pamphlet for the funeral of the Kirchner, Rev. Eyring, and (3) this present work.
From Wikipedia:
Johann Christian Thomae (* 5. April 1668 in Heldburg, Duchy of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg; † 19. March 1724 in Neustadt bei Coburg, Duchy of Saxe-Coburg) was a German historian and a rector of Neustadt bei Coburg.
Life
Thomae was born on 5 April 1668 in Heldburg at the house of his grandfather. His father was Stephan Thomae, the pastor of Wiesenfeld and later of Neuhaus and Sonnefeld. His mother was Cordula Buchenröder, the daughter of the Superintendent Michael Buchenröder. In 1682, Thomae was admitted into the Hochfürstliche Gymnasium in Coburg. From 1688 he studied at the University of Jena. After graduation, he worked as a teacher. In 1697, he was appointed as the Rector for the parish of Neustadt bei Coburg. In 1722 ( ins XXVI. Jahr Rectore der Schul daselbst [ “in his 26th year as the Rector of the School” ] he published in Coburg his history of the Reformation of the Duchy of Coburg. He died on 19 March 1724.
Works
• Kind-schuldiges Ehren-Gedächtnis, dem weiland Wohl Ehrwürdigen, Großachtbahrn, und in Gott andächtig Wohlgelehrten Herrn Stephano Thomae [ A Repentent Son’s Memoir Honoring the Late, Most Venerable and Most Noble Servant of God Scholar, Mr. Stephan Thomae ] ( Coburg : Mönch, 1707 )
• Das der gantzen Evangelischen Kirchen, insonderheit in dem gesammten Fürstenthum Coburg aufgegangene Licht am Abend / das ist, Historische Beschreibung des heilsamen Reformations-Wercks und Lebens Lutheri, wie auch aller evangelischen Prediger und Stadt-Schul-Collegen des Coburgischen Fürstenthums, vom Anfang der Reformation biß hieher. [ The Entire Evangelical Church, featuring the whole Principality of Coburg, [ the ] Rising Light in the Evening / That is, the Historical Description of the Deeds and Lives of the Reformation of Luther, as well as all Evangelical Preachers and Cities, Schools and Colleges of the Coburger Principality, from the Beginning to the Present ] ( Coburg : Paul Günther Pfotenhauer und Sohn, 1722 ), popularly known as “Licht am Abend”
•
External Links
• (de) Complete online edition of Licht am Abend in the Digital Collection of the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek [ Bavarian State Library ]
The English translation of Thilo Krieg’s biography of Johann Christian Thomæ:
47. T h o m a e , Johann Christian, historian and biographer
( 1668 – 1724 ).
On 2 November 1717, an “Actus oratorius” [ oratorical ] took place in Neustadt to celebrate the “Jubilaeum Lutheranum Secundum” [ Luther Bicentennial ], designed by the rector of the town school Johann Christian Thomae. Among other things, in the church, a number of boys were told about the life and deeds of Luther to his death and burial. This process — as reported by Albrecht Meno Verpoorten, the then superintendent of Neustadt, in the preface to Thomae's Licht im Abend [ “Light in the Evening” ] — prompted good friends to propose that the speeches should be published with explanations. In this way, as Verpoorten continues, especially since there were not any particular accounts about the Reformation in Coburg, in Thomae the idea of “collecting the information about churches and schools, which are available since the Reformation, as much as possible, and thus to preserve the same against destruction or oblivion, and to facilitate the same work for the descendants [ die noch bey Handen habende Nachrichten von Kirchen und Schulen, seit der Reformation, so viel thunlich, zu samlen, mithin dieselbe vor gäntzlicher Zernichtung oder Vergessenheit desto eher zu bewahren, und den Nachkommen dergleichen Arbeit zu erleichtern ].” “It seems to me”, writes the Rector himself, “as an irresponsible impertinence against God, if we did not endeavor to preserve the blessings of our leaders, who have now been announcing the Word of God to us for two hundred years [ Mir kam es, als eine unverantwortliche Undanckbarheit gegen Gott vor, wenn wir nicht das Andencken unserer Lehrer, die uns nun zwenhundert Jahr das Wort Gottes verkündiget, im Segen zu erhalten uns bemühen wollten ].” The will turned into action, and a work came to light, which was at the core of a description of the lives of the Evangelical preachers and city schools and colleges in the Principality of Coburg, as well as yielding a rich trove to the friends of history as well as explorers of biography, and whose value as a reference will not fade away.
The outer life of Johann Christian Thomaes lacks remarkable experiences. In the house of his grandfather, the superintendent Buchenröder, he was born in Heldburg in 1668 ( 5 April ). His father, Stephan Thomae, was a pastor in Wiesenfeld, on his maternal side he could trace the family tree back to the Coburger Superintendent Dr. Maximilian Mörlin. A student at the Casimirianum in Coburg from 1682, he went to Jena in 1688 and followed his call as a rector to Neustadt in 1697. As for his activities as a teacher, we learn from the description of one's life, written by General-Superintendent Erdmann Rudolph Fischer. In 1701, Fischer went to the school in Neustadt. “Everywhere I go,” he continues, “I have enjoyed the faithful teaching of the frail but skillful and untroubled Rector, Johann Christian Thomae, of Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, to my great benefit [ Allwo ich, des treuen Unterrichts des, dem Leibe nach gebrechlichen, aber sehr geschickten und unverdrossenen Rectoris, Herrn Johann Christian Thomae im Lateinischen, Griechischen und Hebraeischen, zu meinem großen Nutzen genossen ].” A lengthy stay of the Rector in the sickbed caused this schoolmaster to retire from Neustadt earlier than he wanted. “For under Him,” he adds, “I could have done so much more [ Denn unter ihm, hätte ich noch vieles vor mich bringen können ].” In the Rectory, Thomae died, almost fifty-six, in 1724 ( 19 March ).
|
1668 - 1724 (55 years)
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7] 
