OSIANDER, ANDREAS

Nuremberg reformer; b. Gunzenhausen in Frankish Brandenburg, Dec. 19, 1498; d. Königsberg, Oct. 17, 1552. Osiander was a classical student at Leipzig, Altenburg, and Ingolstadt, and became an accomplished linguist, but did not obtain a degree. He was ordained in 1520, taught Hebrew in the Augustinian Cloister at Nuremberg, and was later identified with Lazarus Spengler (1479–1534), Wenceslaus Linck (1483–1547), and Willibald pirkheimer as a Nuremberg reformer. In 1522 he published his Biblia sacra, a version of the Vulgate based on original texts. A Lutheran, he married in 1525.

Osiander opposed Zwingli's view of the Lord's Supper. He was invited to the Marburg Colloquy (1529) and to Augsburg (1530). He assisted in church visitations in lands of Markgrave George of Brandenburg-Ansbach and, with Johann brenz, drafted the Brandenburg-Nuremberg Church Ordinance (1532). He was a discussant at Schmalkalden (1537), Hagenau, Worms (1540), and Regensburg (1541), where his criticism of Melanchthon brought about his recall.

Although he was unusually gifted, Osiander's haughty, overbearing, disputatious, and unrestrained manner irritated his enemies and alienated his friends. Although adept at pointing out error, he rarely contributed constructive solutions. He could not forego polemics. When asked by Rhäticus (Georg Joachim von Lauchen 1514–76) to edit and publish Copernicus's De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (1543), Osiander added his own preface in which he claimed the work was based on hypotheses. Although Copernicus's adherents were furious, the claim kept the book off the Index until the 17th century.

Although he was nominally Lutheran, Osiander's teachings, because of certain mystical assumptions, had a strange twist on sin, grace, and, particularly, justification, which he regarded not as a forensic act, as did Luther, but a gradual process resulting from Christ's indwelling in the sinner. He differed also with Luther's teaching on church discipline and private confession.

After his abrupt departure from Nuremberg (1548), Osiander remained in Königsberg in the service of Duke Albert of Prussia, first as pastor of the Altstädtische Kirche, and later, as professor primarius at Königsberg. His lack of academic degrees aroused the jealousy of older professors, and his dissident views caused friction with the orthodox younger men who had studied under Luther and Melanchthon. Particularly divisive was Osiander's strange view of justification, an argument in which Melanchthon and Flacius were eventually embroiled; but Duke Albert continued his confidence in Osiander and even elevated him in 1551 to president of the bishopric of Samland. At Osiander's death the duke honored him with a royal funeral.

Bibliography: w. mÖller, Andreas Osianders Leben und ausgewählte Schriften (Väter und Begründer der Lutherischen Kirche 5; Elberfeld 1870); Allgemeine deutsche Bilgraphie (Leipzig 1875–1910) 24:473–483. w. mÖller and p. tschackert, j. j. herzog and a. hauck, eds. Realencyklopädie für protestantische Theologie (Leipzig 1896–1913) 14: 501–509. e. bizer, Die Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart (Tübingen 1957–65) 4:1730–31. p. meinhold, Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche, ed. j. hofer and k. rahner (Freiberg 1957–65) 7:1261–63.

[e. g. schwiebert]