Siegmund Jakob Baumgarten

Baumgarten studied theology at the University of Halle, and in 1728 the 22-year-old Baumgarten, a Hallensian Pietist and bibliophile, was appointed as minister of the Marktkirche Unser Lieben Frauen (Market Church of Our Dear Lady).

At the end of his life, he translated encyclopedic articles and biographies from English into German.

[1] Baumgarten was a follower of the philosophical teachings of Christian Wolff (1679-1754), and is regarded as a transitional theologian from the Pietism of Philipp Jakob Spener (1635-1705) and August Hermann Francke (1663-1727) to that of modern rationalism.

He was a prodigious writer and published works on exegesis, hermeneutics, dogmatics and history.

He was the editor of the first sixteen volumes of the Allgemeine Welthistorie (General World History), which after his death, was continued by his assistant Johann Salomo Semler (1725-1791).