Heinrich Ewald - Influence

Influence

In his public life Ewald displayed characteristics such as simplicity and sincerity, moral earnestness, independence, absolute fearlessness. As a teacher he had a remarkable power of kindling enthusiasm; and he taught many distinguished pupils, including August Schleicher, Ferdinand Hitzig, Eberhard Schrader, Theodor Noldeke, Diestel and Christian Friedrich August Dillmann. His disciples were not all of one school, but many eminent scholars who apparently have been untouched by his influence have in fact developed some of the many ideas which he suggested.

Ewald's Hebrew Grammar inaugurated a new era in biblical philology. Subsequent works in that department were avowedly based on his, and to him will always belong the honour of having been, to quote Hitzig, "the second founder of the science of the Hebrew language." As an exegete and biblical Critic no less than as a grammarian he has left his abiding mark. His Geschichte des Volkes Israel, the result of thirty years' labour, was epoch-making in that branch of research. While in every line it bears the marks of intense individuality, it is at the same time a product highly characteristic of the age, and even of the decade, in which it appeared. If it is obviously the outcome of immense learning on the part of its author, it is no less manifestly the result of the speculations and researches of many laborious predecessors in all departments of history, theology and philosophy.

Taking up the idea of a divine education of the human race, and firmly believing that to each of the leading nations of antiquity a special task had been providentially assigned, Ewald felt no difficulty about Israel's place in universal history, or about the problem which that race had been called upon to solve. The history of Israel, according to him, is simply the history of the manner in which the one true religion really and truly came into the possession of mankind. Other nations, indeed, had attempted the highest problems in religion; but Israel alone, in the providence of God, had succeeded, for Israel alone had been inspired. Such is the supreme meaning of that national history which began with the exodus and culminated (at the same time virtually terminating) in the appearing of Jesus.

The historical interval that separated these two events is treated as naturally dividing itself into three great periods,--those of Moses, David and Ezra. The periods are externally indicated by the successive names by which the chosen people were called—Hebrews, Israelites, Jews. The events prior to the exodus are relegated by Ewald to a preliminary chapter of primitive history; and the events of the apostolic and post-apostolic age are treated as a kind of appendix. The entire construction of the history is based, as has already been said, on a critical examination and chronological arrangement of the available documents. So far as the results of criticism are still uncertain with regard to the age and authorship of any of these, Ewald's conclusions must of course be regarded as unsatisfactory. But his work remains a storehouse of learning and is increasingly recognized as a work of rare genius.