Johann Heinrich Callenberg (January 12, 1694 – July 11, 1760) was a GermanOrientalist,Lutheran professor oftheology andphilology, and promoter ofconversion attempts amongJews andMuslims.[1]
Callenberg was born inMolschleben and attended school inGotha.[2] Beginning in 1715 he studied philology and theology at theUniversity of Halle. Sometime before 1720Salomon Negri, professor ofSyriac andArabic atRome, stayed in Halle for six months. Callenberg studiedArabic under him. Besides Arabic, Callenberg also studiedPersian andTurkish.[3]
From his youth he cherished the idea of working for the conversion of the Muslims in theMiddle East,Russia andTartary, but later he devoted himself tomissionary work among the Jews. In 1728 he established theInstitutum Judaicum, the first German Protestant mission to the Jews. He also set up a printing-office.[4] In this office he printed theGospel and otherChristian books in theJudæo-German dialect, and distributed them among the Jews, with the assistance of the Jewish physician Dr. Heinrich Christian Immanuel Frommann. Frommann translated the Gospel of Luke with commentary which was revised and reprinted by Raphael Biesenthal in the 19th century.
Callenberg also sent missionaries to otherEuropean countries.[1] One of his students wasJohann Salomo Semler.[2] He was a patron of converted Jews. His plans for the conversion of Muslims were resumed somewhat later, but in these he utterly failed.
From 1730 onwards, the Institutum Judaicum sent out more than 20 missionaries[5] and existed until 1791.
In 1727 Callenberg was appointed extraordinary professor of theology at the University of Halle, and in 1735 professor of philology.[1]
In 1733, Callenburg married Beata Amalia Gasser, the daughter of a law professor at Halle.[4]
He died, aged 66, atHalle.
Among the works Callenberg published are the following:
This article incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Crawford Howell Toy and A. Rhine (1901–1906)."Callenberg, Johann Heinrich". InSinger, Isidore; et al. (eds.).The Jewish Encyclopedia. New York: Funk & Wagnalls.
