Ferdinand Hitzig

Who was Ferdinand Hitzig?

Ferdinand Hitzig, was a German biblical critic.

He was born at Hauingen, Baden, where his father was a pastor. He studied theology at Heidelberg under H.E.G. Paulus, at Halle under Wilhelm Gesenius and at Göttingen under Ewald. Returning to Heidelberg he became Privatdozent in theology in 1829, and in 1831 published his Begriff der Kritik am Alten Testamente praktisch erörtert, a study of Old Testament criticism in which he explained the critical principles of the grammatico-historical school, and his Des Propheten Jonas Orakel über Moab, an exposition of the 5th and 16th chapters of the book of Isaiah attributed by him to the prophet Jonah mentioned in 2 Kings xiv. 25.

In 1833 he was called to the University of Zürich as professor ordinarius of theology. His next work was a commentary on Isaiah with a translation, which he dedicated to Heinrich Ewald, and which Hermann Hupfeld, well known as a commentator on the Psalms, pronounced to be his best exegetical work. At Zürich he laboured for a period of twenty-eight years, during which, besides commentaries on The Psalms, The Minor Prophets, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Ecclesiastes, Canticles, and Proverbs, he published a monograph, Über Johannes Markus und seine Schriften, in which he maintained the chronological priority of the second gospel. He wrote works of archaeological interest, of which the most important are Die Erfindung des Alphabets, Urgeschichte und Mythologie der Philister, and Die Grabschrift des Eschmunezar.