Karl Immanuel Nitzsch

Who was Karl Immanuel Nitzsch?

Karl Immanuel Nitzsch, was a German Lutheran church leader.

He was born at the small Saxon town of Borna near Leipzig. His father, Karl Ludwig Nitzsch, at that time pastor and superintendent in Borna, later became professor at Wittenberg and director of the seminary for preachers. He was sent to study at Schulpforta in 1803, going on to the University of Wittenberg in 1806. In 1800 he graduated, and in 1810 he became a Privatdozent at the university. Having become a deacon at the Schlosskirche in 1811, he showed remarkable energy and zeal during the bombardment and siege of the city in 1813. In 1815 he was appointed a preceptor in the preachers' seminary which had been established at Wittenberg after the suppression of the university. From 1820 to 1822 he was superintendent in Keinberg, and in the latter year he was appointed professor ordinarius of systematic and practical theology at Bonn. Here he remained until called to succeed Philip Marheineke at Berlin in 1847; subsequently he became university preacher, rector of the university, provost of St Nicolai and member of the supreme council of the church, in which last capacity he was one of the ablest and most active promoters of the Evangelical Union. He represented the Vermittelungstheologie of the school of Friedrich Schleiermacher.