Johannes van den Driesche

Johannes van den Driesche [or Drusius] (28 June 1550 – February 1616) was a Flemish Protestant divine, distinguished specially as an Orientalist, Christian Hebraist and exegete.

Intended for the church, he studied Greek and Latin at Ghent, and philosophy at Leuven; but his father having been outlawed for his religion, and deprived of his estate, retired to England, where the son followed him in 1567.

[1] He was learned in Hebrew and in Jewish antiquities; and in 1600 the states-general employed him, at a salary of 400 florins a year, to write notes on the difficult passages in the Old Testament; but, this work was not published until after his death.

As the friend of Jacobus Arminius, he was charged by the Contra-Remonstrant party with unfairness in the execution of the task, and the last sixteen years of his life were therefore marred by controversy.

[1] He carried on an extensive correspondence with the learned in different countries; for, besides letters in Hebrew, Greek and other languages, there were found amongst his papers upwards of 2000 written in Latin.