RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Ecclesiologji Eck
University of Heidelberg, which he left in the following year for Tubingen. After taking his master's degree in 1501, he began the study of theology under Johann Jakob Lempp, and studied the elements of Hebrew and political economy with Konrad Summenhart. He left Tubingen in 1501 on account of the plague and after a year at Cologne
finally settled at Freiburg-im-Breis-
i. Educa- gau, at first as a student of theology
tion. and law and later as a successful
Teacher teacher. In 1508 he entered the
at Ingol- priesthood and two years later ob-
stadt. tained his doctorate in theology. At
Freiburg in 1506 he published his first work, Ludicra logices exercitamenta and also proved himself a brilliant and subtle orator, although obsessed by an untamable controversial spirit and unrestrained powers of invective. At odds with his colleagues, he was glad to accept a call to a theological chair at Ingolstadt in Nov., 1510, receiving at the same time the honors and income of a canon at Eichstadt. In 1512 he became prochancellor at the university and from that time until his death he was in complete control of the destinies of Ingolstadt, on which he impressed the character of ultracatholicism which made it a bulwark of the ancient faith in Germany. His wide knowledge found expression in numerous writings. In the theological field he produced his Chrysopassus (Augsburg, 1514), in which he developed a Semi-Pelagian theory of predestination, while he obtained some fame as commentator on the Summulce of Peter of Spain and on Aristotle's De ccelo and De anima. As a political economist he defended interest, despite the opposition of the bishop of Eichstadt.
As early as the spring of 1517 Eck had entered into friendly relations with Luther, who had regarded him as in harmony with his own views, but this illusion was short-lived. In his Obelisci Eck attacked Luther's theses, which had been sent
him by Scheurl, and accused him of
2. Disputa- promoting the heresy of the Bohemian
tions with Brethren and of fostering anarchy
Luther and within the Church. Luther replied in
Carlstadt. his Asterisci adversus obeliscos Eccii,
while Carlstadt defended Luther's views of indulgences and engaged in a violent controversy with Eck. A mutual desire for a public disputation led to a compact between Eck and Luther by which the former pledged himself to meet Carlstadt in debate at Erfurt or Leipsic, on condition that Luther abstain from all participation in the discussion. In Dec, 1518, Eck published the twelve theses which he was prepared to uphold against Carlstadt, but since they were aimed at Luther rather than at the ostensible opponent, Luther addressed an open letter to Carlstadt, in which he declared himself ready to meet Eck in debate.
The disputation between Eck and Carlstadt began at Leipsic June 27, 1519. In the first four sessions Eck maintained the thesis that free will is the active agent in the creation of good works, but he was compelled by his opponent to modify his position so as to concede that the grace of God IV.— 5
and free will work in harmony toward the common end. Carlstadt then proceeded to prove that good works are to be ascribed to the agency of God alone, whereupon Eck yielded so far as to admit that free will is passive in the beginning of conversion, although he maintained that in course of time it enters into its rights; so that while the entirety of good works originates in God, their accomplishment is not entirely the work of God. Despite the fact that Eck was thus virtually forced to abandon his position, he succeeded, through his good memory and his dialectic skill, in confusing the heavy-witted Carlstadt and carried off the nominal victory. He was far less successful against Luther, who, as Eck himself confessed, was his superior in memory, acumen, and learning. After a disputation lasting twenty-three days (July 4- 27), Eck was greeted as victor by the theologians of the University of Leipsic, who overwhelmed him with honors and sent him away with gifts. The impression produced by Eck upon his auditors during that momentous time may be best learned from the account of the humanist Peter of Moselle, who described him as tall, stout, and squarely built. His voice was full and rolling, and of an admirable quality for an actor, or even for a public crier, while the sum total of his features would seem to argue the butcher or the professional soldier rather than the theologian. As far as his intellectual gifts were concerned, he had a wonderful memory, which, if supplemented by other talents in like proportion, would have made him a marvel, but he lacked swiftness of apprehension and deep insight, so that his masses of arguments and citations were indiscriminate, and he was filled with an inconceivable impudence though he had the cleverness to conceal it.
Soon after his return to Ingolstadt, Eck attempted to persuade Elector Frederick of Saxony to have Luther's works burned in public, and during the year 1519 he published no less than eight writings against the new movement. He failed, however, to obtain a condemnatory decision from the universities appointed to pronounce on the outcome of the Leipsic disputation. Erfurt returned the proceedings of the meeting to the Saxon duke without signifying its approval, while Paris, after repeated urging, gave an ambiguous decision limited to " the doctrine of Luther so far as investigated." Eck's only followers were the aged heretic-hunter Hoogstraten and Emser of Leipsic, together with the allied authorities of the universities of Cologne and Louvain. Luther returned Eck's assaults with more than equal 3. Attacks vehemence and about this time Meon Luther lanchthon wrote QEcolampadius that
and Me- at Leipsic he had first become dislanchthon. tinctly aware of the difference between true Christian theology and the scholasticism of the Aristotelian doctors. In his Excusatio (Wittenberg? 1519?) Eck, irritated all the more because early in the year he had induced Erasmus to caution the young theological student against precipitating himself into the religious conflict, retorted that Melanchthon knew nothing of theology. In his reply to the Excusatio, Melanchthon
Eck Eckhart