THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
Among his numerous writings special mention may be made of his How did they get there? or, The Non- Conforming Ministers of 1662 (London, 1862); Our Church and our Country; or, From A.D. 62 to A.D. 1862 (1862); Counsel for Communicants (1865); The Churchman’s Manual (1871); Unity and Uniformity (1892); Considerations on the Epistle to the Ephesians (1893); Thoughts at the Eventide concerning the Church of the Anglican Communion (1898); Up (1902); The True and Visible Unity of the Church (1903); My Church (1905); and Who and What am I? (1906).
VENANTIUS FORTUNATUS. See Forrunatus.
VENATORIUS, vi’’nd-t6’ri-us (GECHAUF, JAEGER), THOMAS: German Protestant and humanist; b. at Nuremberg about 1488; d. there Feb. 4, 1551. He seems to have received his humanistic training in Italy, probably at Padua; in 1522 he was called as preacher to the Neues Spital at Nuremberg, and from 1533 until his death was preacher at St. James’s in the same city, except during the summer of 1544, when he introduced the Reformation at Rothenburg-on-the-Tauber. Venatorius was, primarily, a humanist, the last among the clergy of Nuremberg. Even his Catechismus minor, hoc est de instituenda juventute in fide Christiana (Nuremberg, 1535) is essentially humanistic in spirit, and he edited the Plutus of Aristophanes (Nuremberg, 1531) and the first edition of the works of Archimedes (Basel, 1544).
The first independent theological production of Venatorius was his Aziomata quedam rerum Christianarum (Nuremberg, 1526), a compend of Evangelical doctrines in which special stress is laid on the permanent signification of baptism, while the Reformed theory of the Lord’s Supper is energetically rejected. In 1527 he wrote his Pro baptismo et fide parvulorum against the Anabaptists, and in 1527 a purely devotional work, Hin kurz Unterricht den sterbenden Menschen ganz tréstlich. Venatorius is best known, however, for his De virtute Christiana libri tres (Nuremberg, 1529), through which he became the real founder of Protestant ethics. With a careful avoidance of savage polemics, Venatorius discussed the theory of the sacraments in his Kurtze onterrichtung von beyden sacramenten, dem Tauff und Nachtmal Christi (Nuremberg, 1530); and in Sept., 1530, he published his Ermanung zum Creutz in der zeyt der verfolgung, apparently with allusion to the prospective decision of the Diet of Augsburg. A series of exegetical lectures seems to have been the basis of In divi Pauli apostoli priorem ad Timotheum epistolam distributiones viginti (Basel, 1533), which is dogmatic rather than exegetical in nature. His one polemic work is the De sola fide justificante nos in oculis Det, ad Johannem Hanerum epistola apologetica (Nuremberg, 1534), in which he defended the Lutheran point of view. (T. Koupe.) Brptiograpuy: J. CG. E. Schwartz, in TSK, 1850, pp. 79
sqq.; T. Kolde, in Beitrige zur bayerischen Kirchenge-
schichte, xiii. 97 sqq., 157 sqq., Erlangen, 1905.
VENEMA, vé-né’ma, HERMANNUS (HARM): Dutch Reformed; b. at Wildervank (14 m. s.e. of Groningen), Holland, 1697; d. at Leeuwarden May 25, 1787. He was educated at Groningen (1711-14)
RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Vehicles, Hebrew Veni, Creator
and Franeker (1714-18), and in 1719 became pastor at Dronrijp near Franeker. On the death of the younger Vitringa Venema was appointed to succeed him at Franeker, and this position he held until his retirement in 1774. Venema was especially distinguished as an Old-Testament exegete, his chief work being his Commentarius in Psalmos (6 vols., Leeuwarden, 1762-66); while among his writings on the prophets special mention may be made of his Dissertationes ad vaticinia Danielis emblematica (1745); his commentary on Jeremiah (2 vols., 1765); Sermones vice commentarit ad librum prophetiarum Zacharie (1787); his commentary on Malachi (1788); and his lectures on Ezekiel (ed. J. K. Verschuir, 1790). Of importance also for the period was his Institutiones historie ecclesiastice Veteris ac Novi Testamenti (7 vols., Leyden, 1777- 1783), in which he showed himself an impartial student of original sources.
Venema was independent in theology, constructing his system on the two bases of reason and the Bible. There is an Eng. transl. of his Inedited Institutes of Theology (Edinburgh, 1850). He was deemed the leader of the tolerants, and was the only Dutch professor to defend the Mennonite Jan Stinstra when the latter was charged with Socinianism. Venema was himself suspected of heretical tendencies, and was obliged to defend his orthodoxy in his Korte verdedigung van syne eere en leere (Leeuwarden, 1735) and Justa cum viro clarissimo Antonio Driessenio expostulatio (Franeker, 1736); and the charges being renewed, he was again forced to write in his own defense Hxercitationes de Christi vera divinitate (Leeuwarden, 1755), by which he secured immunity from further attack.
(S. D. van VEEN.) BrstiocRapHy: The Hlogium by J. H. Verschuir was published at Franeker, 1787, in Dutch transl. by J. Bakker, as Lofrede op Herman Venema, Amsterdam, 1801. Consult: B. Glasius, Godgeleerd Nederland, iii. 489-496, Boisle-Duc, 1851-56; C. Sepp, J. Stinstra en zijn tijd, Amsterdam, 1865; W. B. S. Boeles, Frieslands Hoogeschool en het Rijks Atheneum te Franeker, ti, 399-407, Leeuwarden, 1889.
VENEZUELA: South American republic; bounded on the north by the Caribbean Sea, on the east by the Atlantic and British Guiana, on the south by Brazil and Colombia, and on the west by Colombia; its area is estimated at 363,728 square miles; its population (1908) is estimated at 2,661,- 569. It became independent of Spain in 1823, but remained a part of the united republic which then embraced also Colombia and Ecuador. As a separate country it began its existence in 1829, though only to pass through a period of internal unrest and civil wars. In 1864 it became the United States of Venezuela. The population is very largely of a mixed race, the pure whites forming only about 10 per cent, negroes numbering 120,000 (slavery was abolished in 1833), and there are 325,000 Indians, 270,000 of whom are civilized. Nearly all are of the Roman Catholic faith, which is the state religion, with toleration for other forms. The organization of the Roman Catholic Church came relatively late, though in 1637 Caracas was the seat of a bishopric for the whole land, and in 1803 it was made the metropolitan city; it now has five suffragan sees, viz.:
XIT.—11
Barquisimeto (erected 1847, received a bishop 1868) ; Calabozo (erected 1863, received a bishop 1881); Sto. Guayana (erected 1791); Merida (erected 1777), and Zulia. There are 428 parishes. The Anglican communion is represented, as is the Presbyterian, with two congregations, the Methodists with one, the Reformed Church of the Netherlands with one, and the German Lutheran with one. Education is free and compulsory, with 2,000 public schools, 59 high schools and colleges, five teachers’ seminaries, two universities, and three lesser-developed high schools. Yet most of the population can neither read nor write. [A concordat was negotiated between Pius IX. and the president of Venezuela July 26, 1862.] (WILHELM GO6Tz7.) BrsiiocRaAPHy: R. M. Baralt and R. Diaz, Reswmen de la Historia de Venezuela, 3 vols., Curacao, 1887; W. Sievers, Venezuela, Hamburg, 1888; F. Tejera, Manual de Historia de Venezuela, Caracas, 1895; W. E. Curtis, Venezuela, London, 1896; T. C. Dawson, The South American Republics, part 2, New York, 1904; J. Humbert, Les Origines vénézuéliennes, Bordeaux, 1905; W. L. Scruggs, The Colombian and Venezuelan Republics, Boston, 1905. VENI, CREATOR SPIRITUS: An early hymn of disputed authorship. George Fabricius (1564) assigns it to Ambrose; Thomasius and Daniel, to Charlemagne; the Hncyclopedia Britannica (11th ed., xiv. 185-186), to Charles the Bald; and Mone, Wackernagel, and March, to Gregory the Great. It is first mentioned in the ASM in an account of the removal of the relics of St. Marculfus, 898 a.p. The Anglican Church retains it in the offices for ordering of priests and consecrating of bishops; the Roman Church, additionally, in the consecration of the pope and coronation of a king. It is found, generally, in the German breviaries and missals of the thirteenth to the fourteenth century. Its true author is doubtless Rabanus Maurus (q.v.), pupil of Alcuin, bishop of Mayence, and poet-laureate of the time of Charlemagne. The arguments in behalf of this view are: (1) The hymn can be attributable only to a scholar, a theologian, and a poet. (2) Its latest date is restricted by the considerations just offered, and its earliest date depends on the doctrinal point of the procession of the Holy Spirit from both the Father and the Son. This was affirmed (by adding Filioque to the Creed) by the Council of Toledo, 589, and reaffirmed by the Synod of Aquisgranum (Aachen), 809 a.p. (8) The word “naraclétos ’’ in the hymn is scanned differently from Prudentius and Adam of St. Victor, who in the usual manner make the penultimate syllable short. This would tend to establish the author as a person who pronounced Greek by quantity rather than by accent, and certainly shows him to have understood that language. (4) The hymn (divested of its modern stanza, Da gaudiorum, etc., and of Hinemar of Reims’ doxology, Sit laus, ete.) was found by Christopher Brower (1559-1617) in “ an approved and very ancient manuscript.” Brower was a Jesuit and the antiquarian and rector of the college at Fulda, and he published the poems of Rabanus Maurus as an appendix to those of Fortunatus (Cologne, 1617). Wackernagel (i. 75) admits that this assignment deserves ‘‘ some notice,” though he prefers the Gregorian authorship. (5) But this hymn does not appear among the eight which are included in the
Veni, Sancte Verbesserungspunkte
works of Gregory the Great and does appear in those of Rabanus Maurus (MPL, ecxii., 1657). (6) Charlemagne was not scholar enough to have composed it without Alcuin’s help (Wackernagel, i. 75). (7) The hymn is really a paraphrase of Rabanus Maurus’ own chapter on the Holy Spirit (MPL, exi., 25); and in his hymn Avterne rerum conditor, et clarus, etc.., Rabanus Maurus scans “ paraclétos”’ as in the Vent, Creator. ‘The best-known English translations are “Come, Holy Ghost, all quickening fire,”’ by John Cosin (1627), and ‘‘ Come, O Creator Spirit blest,” by Edward Caswall (1849). SamMuEL W. DuFFIELDs.
BrisriograPuy: S. W. Duffield, Latin Hymn-Writers and their Hymns, chap. xii., New York, 1889; Julian, Hymnology, pp. 1206-11; H. A. Daniel, Thesaurus hymnologicus, i. 218, iv. 124, 5 vols., Leipsic, 1841-56; R.C. Trench, Sacred Latin Poetry, pp. 184-186, London, 1864; P. Wackernagel, Das deutsche Kirchenlied, i. 75, Leipsic, 1864; Seven Great Hymns of the Medieval Church, pp. 134-139, New York, 1868; D. T. Morgan, Hymns of the Latin Church, pp. 153-154, 263-264 (London), 1871 (Eng. transl. and Latin text); N. Smith, Hymns historically Famous, pp. 15-17, Chicago, 1901; D. J. Donahoe, Harly Christian Hymns, pp. 107-108, New York, 1908 (Eng. transl.). VENI, SANCTE SPIRITUS: A sequence of un-
certain authorship. It is part of a manuscript of
the eleventh century in the British Museum, and is also in another manuscript of about 1100. Durand and the earlier writers ascribed it variously to
Robert II. and to Hermannus Contractus. Eng-
lish translations are by J. D. Chambers (1852), and
by Ray Palmer, ‘“‘ Come, Holy Ghost in love”
(1858).
VENIAMINOF, vé’ni-dm’indf, IVAN: Bishop of Alaska, archbishop of Kamchatka, and metropolitan of Moscow with the name of Innocent. See Eastern Cuurcga, IV.
VENN, HENRY: Church of England; b. at Barnes (a suburb of southwest London) Mar. 2, 1724-25; d. at Yelling (12 m. w.n.w. of Cambridge) June 24,1797. He entered St. John’s College, Cambridge, 1742, but changed to Jesus College (B.A., 1745-46; M.A. and fellow, 1749); was ordered deacon, 1747, and ordained priest, 1749; held several minor curacies; became curate of Clapham, 1754; vicar of Huddersfield, Yorkshire, 1759, whence he removed, in 1771, to become vicar of Yelling. Henry Venn stands alongside of the foremost workers in the Christian ministry in England of the eighteenth century. He was upon intimate terms with Whitefield and Lady Huntingdon, and his sympathies were broad and Evangelical. At Huddersfield he leavened the irreligious mass of the working population with Gospel truth, and was among the first to carry the Gospel with success to the manufacturing classes. He was an indefatigable preacher, delivering often eight or ten sermons a week. Hig most popular work was The Complete Duty of Man (London, 1763 and often). He wrote also Mistakes in Religion (1774, etc.), a collection of essays on the prophecy of Zacharias (Luke i. 68-79); and many sermons, including one on the death of Whitefield (1770).