Rudolph Zacharias Becker
Rudolph Zacharias Becker (* April 9, 1752 in Erfurt, † March 28, 1822 in Gotha ) was a German folk writer, teacher, journalist and a publisher of the Enlightenment.
Life
His father was Johann Balthasar Becker school teachers in Erfurt. Becker was a Lutheran denomination, visited the Evangelical Ratsgymnasium Erfurt and studied philosophy and theology in Jena. He was then Hofmeister, who exercised in Erfurt, where he associated much with Karl Theodor von Dalberg a significant influence on his education. In 1782, he came to teach at the Philanthropinum in Dessau, which was co-founded by Johann Bernhard Basedow. In the same year the Enlightenment Masonic Lodge in Gotha " Ernst to the compass " and Illuminat under the religious name of Henricus Stephanus was. Towards the end of 1784, he was included in the Illuminati in the Minervalen Magistrate and later became at least " Regent ". In the box " to compass ," he was in 1786 and 1789/90 the speaker. On the occasion of a birthday celebration of Duke Ernst in 1790 he was a guest speaker in the run by Illuminati Gotha Masonic lodge and demanded that a " mason " should not remain indifferent because of what happened in France, but he had to take the side of freedom. In 1782, he was also the weekly Dessauische newspaper for the youth and their friends out ( until 1786 ), which he moved in 1784 to Gotha and continued under the title German newspaper for the youth and their friends, and, as one of the first existing youth magazines, and 1787 was. 1786, he attacked with his writing principles, constitution and fate of the Illuminati order resolutely for the side of the proponents of the Illuminati in the press war for secret societies. He raised the German newspaper for the youth and their friends 1796 National newspaper of the Germans. In 1791 he was next to the German newspaper as recon sheet under the heading indicator out which was collected in the following year under an imperial privilege to the General Reichs- Anzeiger and finally in 1806 the title of the German General Anzeiger received ( until 1829, from 1830 to 1848 udT General Gazette and National newspaper of the Germans).
Friedrich Schiller wanted the publicist Becker 1792 with the translation of its written defense of Louis XVI. , Which must be considered lost, entrust. He was Becker 1788 in Rudolstadt through the mediation of the family of his future wife met (see: letter from Schiller to grains of 21 December 1792 in which he acknowledges explicitly that he was working on a speech in defense of Louis XVI. ).
In 1797 Becker founded the Becker'sche bookstore in Gotha to his magazines and books better able to market and carried them off until his death. In the Becker'schen bookstore he published the writings of the Seeberg Observatory, of which fame is that the edited by Franz Xaver von Zach Monthly correspondence to transportation of natural gas and astronomy from 1800 European significance.
In 1802 he was appointed royal Councilor of Schwarzburg- Sondershausen. On November 30, 1811, the French police arrested him for an essay in the National Gazette and brought him to Magdeburg, where he remained until April 1813 to the intercession of the Duke Augustus of Saxe -Gotha - Altenburg near Napoleon Bonaparte him again the freedom brought.
His son Peace Gottlieb ( born November 9, 1792 in Gotha, † 1865) took over after his death the bookstore. He had in Leipzig and Göttingen, where he mainly operational language and history lesson, studied and participated in the journalistic and booksellers work of his father since 1814. In 1830, he combined the two in his publisher, and published by him Magazines National Newspapers of the German and General Gazette under the title General Gazette and National Newspaper of the Germans and changed the title to 1849 in the German Reich Gazette. 1848 and 1849 he represented the Duchy of Gotha as a deputy in the National Assembly in Frankfurt to Frankfurt, where he was part of the so-called Gotha party. Also, the Directorate of Fire Insurance Company in Gotha, he dedicated his work.
Family
He married in 1787, Sophie Karoline Dobling ( 1765-1828 ), the daughter of the pastor Johann Christoph Dobling. The couple had three sons and three daughters, including:
- Friedrich Gottlieb (1792-1865)
- Amalie Wilhelmine (1787-1879) ∞ Johann Franz Encke June 17, 1823 ( 1791-1865 ) astronomer
- Charlotte Friederike (1794-1874)
- Auguste Friederike Johanne (1787-1842) ∞ Georg Christian Hornbostel (1778-1841), a textile manufacturer
Works
He wrote other than those referred journals:
- Principles, constitution and fate of the Illuminati order. Gotha 1786.
- Noth and Hülfsbüchlein for peasants, or educational joys and sorrow stories of the village mildness home; described for Young and Old '.' 1788/1798, 2 vols - herewith a leading " revivalists " of his time, who introduced the ideas of the Enlightenment in wider strata of the population.
- The right of property in mind works. 1789, several editions.
- Lectures on the Rights and Duties of Man. 1791-92, 2 vols
- Mild Native Songs - book of five hundred and eighteen funny and serious songs about all things in the world and all the circumstances of human life that can sing. Collected allowed for friends happiness and CONTROLLER virtue that does not depend on the head. Gotha in 1799, several editions. Important source of Kommers books.
- Derschau 's woodcuts of old German masters. From 1806 to 1816.
- Sorrows and joys in 17monatlicher French captivity. , 1814.
- Mild Native Gospel book. In 1816.