Herder, Johann Gottfried von

Herder, Johann Gottfried von (yō`hän gôt`frēt fən hĕr`dər), 1744–1803, German philosopher, critic, and clergyman, b. East Prussia. Herder was an enormously influential literary critic and a leader in the Sturm und Drang movement. After an impoverished childhood, he studied theology at Königsberg and came under the influence of Kant. During an appointment at Riga, Herder gained attention with his Fragmente über die neuere deutsche Literatur [fragments concerning current German literature] (1767). In 1776 he became court preacher at Weimar through the influence of Goethe, whose work was greatly affected by Herder's ideas, particularly by his Über den Ursprung der Sprache [on the origin of language] (1772). In this treatise Herder held that language and poetry are spontaneous necessities of human nature, rather than supernatural endowments. At Weimar, Herder became the leading theorist of German romanticism and a contributor to the most brilliant court of the era. There he produced his anthology of foreign folk songs, Stimmen der Völker (1778–79) and also made some of the earliest studies of comparative philology, comparative religion, and mythology. His vast work Ideen zur Philosophie der Geschichte der Menschheit (1784–91; tr. Outlines of the Philosophy of Man, 1800) developed a major evolutionary approach to history in which he propounded the uniqueness of every historical age.

Bibliography

See biography by W. Koepke (1987); study by F. M. Barnard (1965, repr. 1989).

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Herder, Johann Gottfried von

(born Aug. 25, 1744, Mohrungen, East Prussia—died Dec. 18, 1803, Weimar, Saxe-Weimar) German critic and philosopher. Trained in theology and literature, he initially worked as a teacher and preacher at Riga. As court preacher at Bückeburg, he produced works, including Plastik (1778) and Essay on the Origin of Language (1772), that made him the leading figure of the Sturm und Drang literary movement. In 1770 he met Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, who would be his associate for many years and with whom he would help lay the groundwork for German Romanticism. With Goethe's help, he received an appointment at Weimar in 1776; his Sporadic Papers (1785–97) and the unfinished Outlines of a Philosophy of the History of Man (1784–91), attempting to show that nature and history obey one system of laws, mark him as an innovator in the philosophy of history and an early proponent of the idea that a common culture, rather than political boundaries, defines a people. His later estrangement from Goethe resulted in a bitter enmity toward the whole Classical movement in German poetry and philosophy.