Project Details
Projekt
Rational Christianity in the strained domain of esoteric-masonic development: Halle 1740%u20131800
Applicant
Professorin Dr. Monika Neugebauer-Wölk
Subject Area
Modern and Contemporary History
Term
from 2004 to 2011
Project identifier
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 5470689
In the second half of the 18th Century, Halle became a centre in the history of religion, its identity determined by the development of enlightened theology or Neology. The work of the most prominent representative of Halle´s Neology movement, Johann Salomo Semler, occupies the centre of the history of ideas component of this historical study.Parallel to this, the organization of esoteric movements by Halle´s Freemason scene constitutes a second historical-religious aspect. The foremost social reference of investigation is the setting within which the founding of freemasonry occurred. In the private association of the lodges, a segment of the learned milieu of the city, above all students but increasingly professors, began to organize themselves. With respect to Halle´s Neology, the aim of the project lies in supplementing the methodical text-analytical perspective of pertinent works through the investigation of social historical references. The concepts which newly emerge from within the reality of religious and social political confrontation must be claimed in their respective ways. The goal of this research project is the elaboration of spiritual and power-political concepts; namely the confines within which religious models straddling between Esotericism and Enlightenment compete for definitional authority in the politico-religious realm.
DFG Programme
Research Units
