RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Altar Altmann
Berlin in 1799. At the capital he gained the reputation of an authority in financial matters, and was made a privy councilor in the financial department in 1803, succeeding Stein as minister of finance in 1808. Unable to cope with the almost impossible task of satisfying the demands of Napoleon, he retired in 1810. Hardenberg, who had been compelled to join in overthrowing him, tried three years later to bring him back to public life, and in 1817 secured his appointment as head of the newly founded ministry of public worship, education, and medicine. These important branches of public administration had until then formed departments of the ministry of the interior, and had been badly managed.
Altenstein took up religious questions as a man who understood and cared for them, though his Christianity had a decidedly rationalistic tinge. Difficulties of many kinds beset him during his long tenure of office, arising partly from the determined and obstinate character of his sovereign and partly from demagogic opposition, as well as from the great Halle controversy of 1830 and from the vexed question of the Catholic attitude in regard to mixed marriages. When, in 1824, without his knowledge, the direction of education was taken from Nicolovius and given to Von Kamptz, Altenstein was on the verge of resigning his post, but he decided that It was histduty to remain. One of the great achievements of his administration was the systematic improvement to a remarkable extent of primary and secondary education. (F. Bosse.)
Bibliography : Freiherr von Stein, in Deutsche Revue, vol. vii., 1882; H. Treitschke, Deutsche Geschichte in 19. Jahrhundert, Leipsic, 1882; ADB, vol. xxxvi.
ALTHAMER, al'tham"er, ANDREAS (sometimes known by the Greek form of his name, Palaiosphyra): German Reformer; b. in the village of Brenz, near Gundelfingen (28 m. n.w. of Augsburg), Wurttemberg, c. 1500; d. at Ansbach, probably in 1519. He studied at Leipsic and Tubingen. In 1524 he is found settled as priest at Gmund in Swabia, where he was the leader of the evangelical party, and he remained there after he had been deposed and had married. He escaped with difficulty in the reaction of the Swabian League, and fled to Wittenberg, remaining there nine months and proceeding to Nuremberg in the summer of 1526. His Lutheran convictions were now mature, and he maintained a constant literary activity against both the Zwinglians and the Roman Catholics. He was pastor at Eltersdorf, near Erlangen, in 1527, deacon at St. Sebaldus's, Nuremberg, in 1528; he took part as an ardent Lutheran in the disputation at Bern, and in the same year was called to Ansbach to assist in spreading the Reformation in Brandenburg. In November he published a complete catechism, remarkable not only tor the clearness and precision of its teaching, but also as being the first work of the kind to take the title of catechism. For the next few years he was the soul of the Protestant party in that part of Germany, and by his untiring energy and gifts of organization did much in the development there °> the evangelical religion. Of his theological works may be mentioned his Annotations in Jacobi
Epistolam (Strasburg, 1527), which carried still further Luther's views of that epistle, though it was modified in the edition of 1533. His notes on the Germania of Tacitus, published in complete form 1536, have preserved his fame as a classical scholar even where the Reformer has been forgotten.
(T. Kolde.)
Bibliography: T. Kolde, Andreas Althamer, der Humanist und Reformator in Brandenburg-Ansbach, Erlangen, 1895 (contains a reprint of his catechism).
ALTHAUS, PAUL: German Protestant; b. at Fallersleben (17 m. n.e. of Brunswick) Dec. 29, 1861. He was educated at the universities of Erlangen and Gottingen, and held various pastorates from 1887 to 1897, when he was appointed associate professor of practical and systematic theology at the University of Gottingen, becoming full professor two years later. He has written Die historische und dogmatische Grundlage der lutherischen Taufliturgie (Hanover, 1893) and Die Heilsbedeutung der Taufe im Neuen Testament (Giitersloh, 1897).
ALTING, JOHANN HEINRICH : Reformed theologian; b. at Emden (70 m. w.n.w. of Bremen), East Friesland, Feb. 17, 1583; d. at Groningen (92 m. n.e. of Amsterdam) Aug. 25, 1644. He studied at Groningen and Herborn, acted as tutor for several German princes, and traveled as far as England. In 1613 he became professor of dogmatics at Heidelberg, and in 1616 director of the seminary in the Collegium Sapientim. Leaving Heidelberg because of the disturbances of the Thirty Years' war, he went to Holland, and in 1627 was appointed professor at Groningen. He was one of the delegates from the Palatinate to the Synod of Dort (1618-19) and was a decided but Biblical predestinarian. He collaborated on the Dutch Bible version. He published nothing during his lifetime; after his death his son, Jacob Alting (b. at Heidelberg 1618; d. at Groningen, where he was professor of Hebrew, 1679) published several of his works, the most noteworthy being the Theologia historica (Amsterdam, 1664), a pioneer work on the history of doctrine. (E. F. Karl Muller.)
ALTMANN, olt'man: Bishop of Passau 1065- 91; d. at Zeiselmauer (12 m. n.w. of Vienna), Lower Austria, Aug. 8, 1091. A Westphalian of noble birth, he became first a student and then head of the school of Paderborn. Later he was provost of Aachen, then chaplain to Henry III., after whose death he was attached to the household of the Empress Agnes. In 1064 he made the pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and was chosen bishop of Passau before his return. He adhered steadfastly to Gregory VII. in his conflict with Henry IV., and was the first of the German bishops to proclaim against the king the sentence of excommunication which had been pronounced in Rome. He allied himself with the South German princes, and acted as papal legate in the assemblies at Ulm and Tribur in the autumn of 1076. Rudolf of Swabia had no more faithful partizan. As a result of this attitude, Altmann had to leave his diocese, which suffered severely (1077-78) from Henry's resentment. He went to Rome early in 1079, and was there when
Altmann Amalarius