James Martineau

James Martineau (* April 21, 1805 in Norwich, † 11 January, 1900 in London) was an English philosopher and theologian of Unitarianism and one of the most famous English philosopher of religion of the 19th century

Life

Martineau was born on 21 April 1805 in Norwich. After leaving school in Norwich ( 1815-1819 ), he studied at Lant Carpenter ( 1780-1840 ) in Bristol history, geography, mathematics and biblical criticism, and then attended the Unitarian " Manchester College " (then in York situated ), where he primarily was influenced and encouraged by Charles Wellbeloved ( Biblical criticism ) and William Turner (mathematics). 1828 Martineau was appointed as a Unitarian clergyman, first to Dublin, where his uncle was head of the Unitarian church ( James Martineau, however, turned himself against the designation " Unitarian " and wanted to instead better than seeing " Presbyterian " or " free Christian" ). Great deal of interest in Ireland, its open advocacy of Catholic Emancipation.

From 1832 to 1857 he worked with major effect on the spiritual life of England as a Unitarian minister in Liverpool, next he taught from 1840, the " Manchester College " ( which had been moved back from York to Manchester ) philosophy. When the college was moved to London in 1857, he moved with and was mainly working as a teacher at the college from then. A lot of attention in 1872 his public debate with John Tyndall on issues of ( materialistic understood) natural sciences and the theory of evolution, in which Martineau was of the opinion that the matter can not be regarded as the sole basis for scientific knowledge.

Martineau was at a study visit to Berlin student of Friedrich Adolf Trendelenburg Aristotelian, represented initially a materialistic determinism in the sense of David Hartley and Joseph Priestley, and was philosophically influenced by James Mill and Thomas Brown. From 1839, he rejected the determinism than with Christianity from incompatible represented a philosophical theism that emanated from a dualism between mental phenomena and manifestations of the will, the latter of which refer back to God, each realized the ethical higher value in the moral life of man. During his lifetime was Martineau as one of the most influential beyond the boundaries of its community also theologians and religious philosophers of the Anglo-Saxon area and has been compared in this respect with the roughly the same Cardinal Newman.

Martineau died on 11 January 1900 in London.

Writings

Martineau published alongside scientific papers on philosophy of religion, in his capacity as a Unitarian clergyman also Sermons and other liturgical texts that have been repeatedly reprinted. He co-founded the Irish Unitarian Society and for a time one of the editors of the journal The Christian Teacher.

Main Works:

• A Collection of Hymns for Christian Worship. Dublin 1831 ( including five hymns his sister, the poet Harriet Martineau ).
• Hymns for the christian church and home. In 1840.
• Studies of christianity. 1858
• A world for scientific theology. 1868
• A Study of Spinoza. In 1882.
• Types of ethical theory. In 1885.
• A study of religion its sources and contents. , 1888.
• The seat of authority in religion. In 1890.
• Essays, Reviews and Addresses. 4 volumes. Collected and re-edited from 1890 to 1891.