Johann Arndt's (1555-1621) Four Books of True Christianity (1610): A Critical Hybrid Edition with Commentary

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Johann Anselm Steiger
• Subject Area: Protestant Theology ; German Literary and Cultural Studies (Modern German Literature)
• Term: since 2017
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 387900492

Johann Arndt (1555-1621) is regarded as one of the most important and prolific Protestant theologians of the early modern period. His Four Books on True Christianity are without doubt the most successful and influential of Arndt's publications. The first edition, which included only the first book, was published in 1605. However, Arndt thoroughly revised the first book and added three more. The four books appeared as a complete edition in 1610. It later went through hundreds of editions and was translated into different languages across Europe and abroad, gaining international, even global stature. The goal of this project is to develop for the first time a commentated, historical-critical hybrid edition of Arndt's work that will document the origins of the text and his multifaceted reception of patristic, medievalmystical, and paracelsic-hermetic traditions. This critical edition will address the pressing need in scholarship for interpretive aids to Arndt's work. It will also serve as a unique and compelling memorial to a highly influential opus of early-modern literature. Thus, future researchers in church history and German studies will have access to very best textual analysis and interpretive aids to Arndt's work to date. The edition will appear gradually, both as a printed work and as a hypertextversion in Open Access. The Universitäts- und Landesbibliothek Darmstadt will provide for the electronic publication and the long-term digital archiving. The edition of BWC I is already in print (cf. attachment 1); the edition of BWC II will be completed until the beginning of the second funding period. During the funding applied for here, the BWC III and IV editions will be finalized and the project will be completed.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants