Gunkel, Hermann

This article does not cite any references or sources. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (September 2008)

Hermann Gunkel

Born	1862
Died	11 March 1932 Halle
Church	Lutheran
Education	Göttingen and Giessen
Offices held	Professor of Old Testament in Berlin
Title	Doctor

Hermann Gunkel (1862-1932) was a German Protestant Old Testament scholar. He is noted for his contribution to form criticism and the study of oral tradition in biblical texts. He was an outstanding representative of the "History of Religion School."

[edit] Biography

Gunkel was born in Springe, Kingdom of Hanover, where his father was a Lutheran pastor. He studied theology in Göttingen and Giessen, and in 1895 became a professor of Old Testament in Berlin. In the same year his book Schöpfung und Chaos in Urzeit und Endzeit (Creation and Chaos) was published. In 1901 the first edition of his Genesis commentary appeared. In 1926 he published another standard work, his commentary on the book of Psalms (Die Psalmen).

For health reasons Gunkel retired and became professor emeritus in 1927. His Einleitung in die Psalmen (Introduction to the Psalms) was his last major project, brought to completion with the help of Joachim Begrich, who was both his former student and his son-in-law.

Hermann Gunkel died on 11 March 1932 in Halle.

[edit] Achievement

Gunkel became an outstanding representative of the "History of Religions School" (die religionsgeschichtliche Schule), which addressed the history of traditions behind the biblical text. In addition to Gunkel, the original group also included Albert Eichhorn, William Wrede, Wilhelm Bousset, Johannes Weiss, Ernst Troeltsch, Wilhelm Heitmüller, and Paul Wernle. In the beginning they were primarily concerned with the origins of Christianity, but this interest eventually broadened to include the historical backgrounds of ancient Israelite and other Near Eastern religions.

His "Creation and Chaos in the Beginning and at the End of Time"( 1895) compared the biblical creation/destruction myths from Genesis 1 to Revelation 12. His most important work was probably his commentary on Genesis (1901), in which he applied to that book the new critical methodology of form criticism (German, Formgeschichte). Form criticism examined the genres used in the biblical text to identify the Sitz im Leben ('setting in life') that produced the text. This approach was based on the assumption that each genre is organically associated with a particular social and/or historical situation. Gunkel and his circle believed that this was an improvement upon source criticism. Nineteenth-century source criticism had examined the biblical text (especially the Pentateuch) on the basis of style, vocabulary, theology, and other criteria to identify the basic literary sources used to create the text. To give one example, the source critics argued that the Pentateuch—the first five books of the Hebrew Bible—was created by combining four basic literary works known by the sigla J, E, D, and P. Form criticism allowed scholars to go behind these larger literary sources by identifying the smaller and older sources used by their authors. Because of its utility, form criticism became immensely influential in Germany and Europe during the 20th century, being applied and developed by important scholars like Gerhard von Rad and Martin Noth. By the end of the 20th century, however, scholars commonly identified flaws in the approach and called for adjustments to it (such as one finds in Rhetorical Criticism) or total replacements of it (such as postmodern Genre Criticism).

[edit] Major works in English

• Creation and Chaos in the Primeval Era and the Eschaton. Translated by K. William Whitney Jr. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006. German ed. 1895.
• The Folktale in the Old Testament. Translated by M. D. Rutter. Sheffield: Almond Press, 1987. German ed. 1921.
• Genesis. Translated by Mark E. Biddle. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 1997. German ed. 1910.
• The History of Religion and the Old Testament. London: Williams & Norgate, 1910.
• The Influence of the Holy Spirit. Translated by Roy A. Harrisville and P. A. Quanbeck II. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1979. German ed. 1888.
• An Introduction to the Psalms. With Joachim Begrich. Translated by James D. Nogalski. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 1998. German ed. 1933.
• Israel and Babylon. Translated by E. S. B. Philadelphia: McVey, 1904. German ed. 1903.
• The Legends of Genesis. Translated by W. H. Carruth. Chicago: Open Court, 1901; reprinted, with Introduction by W. F. Albright. New York: Schocken, 1964. German ed. the introduction to his Genesis commentary, 1901.
• The Psalms: A Form-Critical Introduction. Introduction by James Muilenburg. Translated by T. M. Horner. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1967. German ed. 1927.
• The Stories of Genesis. Translated by John J. Scullion. Edited by W. R. Scott. Vallejo, CA: Bibal, 1994. German ed. 1910.
• Water for a Thirsty Land. Edited by K. C. Hanson. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2001.
• What Remains of the Old Testament and Other Essays. Introduction by James Moffatt. Translated by A. K. Dallas. New York: Macmillan, 1928. German ed. 1916.

[edit] See also

• Sitz im Leben

[edit] External links

• 1901: The Legends of Genesis