Lort, JMiCHAEL, D.D., an English theologian, was born in 1725 ; entered Trinity College, Cambridge, 1745 ; became professor of Greek at Cambridge in 1759 ; rec-
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tor of St. Matthew, London, in 1771 ; prebendary of St. Paul's in 1780. He died in 1790. His works were. Pa- pers in Archceolofjy, 1777, '79, '87 : — Short Comment on the Lord's Prayer, 1790 : — Inquiry Relative to the A u- thorship of^'- The whole Duty of Man ;" and a small vol- ume of Se}-mons. See Allibone, Diet, of Brit, and A mer. A iithois, yci\. ii, s.y.
Lo-ruha'mah (Heb. Lo-Rucha'mah, iT3tT1 N?, not pitied, as it is explained in both contexts, Hos. i, 6, Sept. Oi'ic )/X£»;jU£j'//, Vulg. Absque misericordia, and as it is rendered in the Auth.Yers., Hos. ii, 23, " not obtain- ed mercy"), the name divinely appointed for the first daughter of the prophet Hosea by the formerly disso- lute Gomer, a type of Jehovah's temporary rejection of his people by the Babylonian captivity in consecjuence of their idolatry (Hos. i, 6 ; ii, 23 ; comp. ii, 1). B.C. cir. 725. See Hosea.
Losada, Chuistopher, a martyr to the cause of Protestantism in Spain in the IGth century, was, at the time of his conversion under the preaching of Dr. Egid- ius [see Gil, Juan], an eminent physician and learned philosopher. He was chosen pastor of a Protestant Church in Seville, which met ordinarily in the house of Isabella de Baena, " a lady not less distinguished for her piety than for her rank and opulence." Among the members of note in his congregation were Don Juan Ponce de Leon, and Domingo de Guzman, and oth- ers equally well celebrated. Arrested by the Inquisition in consequence of his zeal in diffusing Protestant princi- ples among his countrymen, neither the prison nor the rack availed to make him renounce his convictions, and he was consequently condemned to the stake. He suf- fered death at an " auto-da-fe," solemnized at Seville Sept. 24, 1559, in the square of St. Francis, and attended by four bishops, the members of the royal court of jus- tice, the chapter of the cathedral, and a great assem- blage of nobility and gentry, the occasion of the death- penalty on twenty-one apostates from the Pomish be- lief. The most distinguished individual aside from Dr. Losada was one of his members, Don Juan Ponce de Leon, whom we have mentioned above. They both bore their trial with admirable Christian patience, commit- ting their souls to a faithful Creator. See Fox, Booh of JIurtyrs, p. 136 ; jNl'Crie, Reformation in Spain, p. 217, 300, 307. (J. H. W.)
Loscher, Johann Kaspar, a German theologian, was born at ^^'erden May 8, ItJoO, and was educated at the University of Wittenberg. He flourished succes- sively as superintendent of the churches of Sondershau- sen (1668), pastor at Erfurt (1676), superintendent at Zwickau (1679), and then as senior jjreacher in the ■west Prussian city of Dantzic. In 1687 he was made doctor and professor of theology at his alma mater, and he remained there until his death, July 11,1718. He wrote many theological dissertations, of but little value in our day.
Loscher, Valentin Ernst, a distinguished Ger- man theologian, was born at Sondershausen in 1673. He studied at the universities of Wittenberg (where his father, Caspar Loscher, was a professor) and Jena, and then went on a perigrinatio academica through the Netherlands and Denmark, and the cities Hamburg and Kostock. In the last-named place he connected himself with tlie anti-Pietist party, but after his return he de- voted himself to historical studies, and delivered lec- tures on genealogy and heraldry, as well as on exegesis, morals, etc. In 1698 he was appointed superintendent by the duke of Wcissenfels, and, some time after, began, in- connection with some friends, the publication of the first theological periodical in Germany, the Unschuldifje Nuchriehten von alien v. neuen thiohij. Sacheit (20 vols, to 1720; continued by Henry Keinhard until 1731). This became the organ of the orthodox "jiarty in Sax- ony, as opposed to the pietism and indifterentism pre- vailing at the time. His sphere of influence was after- wards enlarged, lirstas superintendent of Delitzsch, and,
later (1702), as professor in the University of Witten- berg. In 1704 he was appointed superintendent of Dresden and member of the supreme consistorial court. In this position his activity was soon manifested in the improved facilities for reUgious and secular instruction. Besides establishing several parish schools, he laid the foundation of a seminarium ministerii; at the same time he zealously instructed candidates for the ministry, preached both on Sundays and week-days, besides car- rying on an extensive correspondence with the princes, states, and pastors who held fast to the orthodox faith, and opposed, with him, the inroads of pietism and indif- ferentism. He died Feb. 12, 1741. Loscher left a col- lection of his letters forming five volumes folio, which are preserved in the Hamburg Library. His principal works are Histoi-iu mortuum (part i, 1707 ; pt. iii, 1722) : — Die Reformationsahta : — Timotheus Verinus (1718). See Herzog, Real-Encykl. s. v. -, Tholuck, Der Geist d. lu- therischen Theologen Wittenb. (1852); M. v. Engelhardt, Valentin Ernst Loscher nach s. Leben u. Wirken (Dorpat, 1853 ; 2d edit., Stuttg. 1856) ; Hurst's Hagenbach, Ch. Hist. ISth and I'Jth Cent, i, 109 sq., 116 sq., 130.