Carlsson, Dr. Eric

Dr. Eric Carlsson

 

University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA

 

Stipendium für Aufklärungsforschung

 

Kurzvita

geboren 1969 Stanford, CA, USA

1987-1991      University of Michigan (B.A.)

1991-1994      Trinity Evangelical Divinity School (M.Div.)

1995-1998      University of Wisconsin-Madison (M.A.)

1999-2006      University of Wisconsin-Madison (Ph.D.)

 

Wissenschaftliche Anstellungen

2007                Edgewood College (Madison, WI), Visiting Lecturer

2008                University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, Visiting Lecturer

2009-2016       University of Wisconsin-Madison, Associate Lecturer

2016-              University of Wisconsin-Madison, Lecturer

 

Wissenschaftliche Mitgliedschaften

American Academy of Religion; American Historical Association; American Society of Church History; International Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies; International Society for Intellectual History

 

Laufzeit des Stipendiums

29.05.2023 bis 30.07.2023

 

Forschungsprojekt

Demonology and Johann Salomo Semler’s Construction of a Liberalis Theologia

 

My project develops the premise that Halle theologian Johann Salomo Semler forged what he termed a liberalis theologia or a freie theologische Lehrart while “thinking with demons” (a concept drawn from Stuart Clark). Semler framed his biblical hermeneutics and his distinction between Theologie and Religion in the midst of a wide-ranging controversy in the German press over the possibility of present-day demonic possession, to which he contributed three major volumes in 1759-1762. He would eventually write or edit a dozen books on the subject and discuss it in many others. My project explores how key Semlerian concepts—divine accommodation, theological anti-Judaism, historicization of the biblical canon, and a parsing of the moral and the external histories of Christianity—were decisively shaped by his career-long engagement with demonology and spirit belief. By placing Semler’s work within wider European (particularly Dutch and English) debates on the topic, I aim to show connections between the theological Aufklärung and the broader Protestant Enlightenment and to highlight the centrality of demonology to Semler’s epoch-making construction of liberal theology.

Veröffentlichungen aus dem Bereich der Aufklärungsforschung

“The Protestant Enlightenment.” In The Oxford History of Modern German Theology, vol. 1, ed. Grant Kaplan and Kevin Vander Schel. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2023.

“The Eighteenth Century,” “The Enlightenment,” “Johann Lorenz von Mosheim,” “Johann Salomo Semler,” and “Rationalism.” In Dictionary of Luther and the Lutheran Traditions, ed. Timothy Wengert et al. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2017.

“Eighteenth-Century Neology.” In The Oxford Handbook of Early Modern Theology, 1600-1800, ed. Ulrich Lehner, Richard Muller, and A. G. Roeber. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2016.

“Pietism and Enlightenment Theology’s Historical Turn: The Case of Johann Salomo Semler.” In The Pietist Impulse in Christianity, ed. Christian T. Collins Winn, Christopher Gehrz, G. William Carlson, and Eric Holst, 97-106. Eugene, OR:Pickwick Publications, 2011.

“Johann Salomo Semler, the German Enlightenment, and Protestant Theology’s HistoricalTurn.” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2006.