Friedrich Schleiermacher, (born Nov. 21, 1768, Breslau, Silesia, Prussia—died Feb. 12, 1834, Berlin), German theologian, preacher, and classical philologist. A member of the clergy from 1796, he taught at the University of Berlin from 1810 to his death. In On Religion (1799), he contended that the Romantics were not as far from religion as they thought. In 1817 he helped unite Prussia’s Lutheran and Reformed churches. His major work, The Christian Faith (1821–22), is a systematic interpretation of Christian dogmatics. His work influenced theology through the 19th and early 20th centuries; he is generally recognized as the founder of modern Protestant theology.
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