Franz Xaver Kraus


Franz Xaver Kraus was a German Catholic priest, and ecclesiastical and art historian.

Early life

Franz Xaver Kraus was born in Trier in 1840. He completed his studies in the Trier gymnasium, began his theology in 1858-60 in the seminary there, and finished it in 1862-64, having passed in France the time from the autumn of 1860 to the spring of 1862 as tutor in distinguished French families. He was ordained a priest by the suffragan bishop Matthias Eberhard of Trier, 23 March 1864. Even after he became a priest, he continued his studies in theology and philology at the universities of Tübingen, Freiburg — where he had received the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in 1862, and received that of Doctor of Divinity in 1865 — and Bonn.
In the autumn of 1865 he became beneficiary of Pfalzel near Trier, where he developed a zealous literary activity, interrupted by several journeys of the purpose of study to Paris, Belgium, and to Rome in January 1870. In the spring of 1872 he was attached to the faculty of philosophy at the university of Strasburg as professor extraordinary of the history of Christian art, and in the autumn of 1878 he succeeded Johann Alzog as Professor ordinary of Church history at Freiburg. In 1890 he was made grand-ducal privy councillor, and held the office of pro-rector of the university for the period 1890-1. He was also curator of religious antiquities in the Grand Duchy of Baden, and from 1883 a member of the Badern Historical Commission.

Views

He was a man of deep religious feeling and Catholic faith, but, from association with the Liberal Catholics in France, Italy, and Germany, he became imbued with their views on ecclesiastical polity. At the time of the Vatican Council, he entered into close connections with the opposition party, and kept up these relations for some time.
He remained in the Church, but the strife had engendered in his mind a certain bitterness. In many anonymous or pseudonymous articles written for the Liberal press, he gave vent to his dissatisfaction with certain ecclesiastical conditions. The "Kirchenpolitische Briefe" in the "Beilage zur Allgemeinen Zeitung", written under the pseudonym of "Spectator", created a great sensation.
It is to him that we owe the distinction between "religious and political Catholicism", a formula in which he imagined he had found the solution of many difficulties.
He died at San Remo in 1901.

Works

Kraus was a man of brilliant and versatile talents, a scholar of great learning, a clever and elegant writer, and, in spite of ill-health and the acute bodily sufferings of his closing years, an author of wonderful productivity, who delighted in his work. After a few translations from the French he began his independent literary career with small works on the history of early Christian literature in the first centuries and the Middle Ages, among them: "Ægidius von Rom" "Observationes criticae in Synesii Cyrenaei epistulas" ; "Studien uber Synesios von Kyrene", and later "Ueber das Martyrium des h. Ignatius von Antiochien".
Of the edition of the "Opera omnia" of Thomas à Kempis, undertaken by Kraus, only the first volume appeared. Another series of writings, published in the "Bonner Jahrbucher des Vereins von Alterthumsfreunden" and in the "Serapeum", deals with particular features of the history and archeology of Trier.
In this manner Kraus was led on to the study of Christian archaeology in general, and then to Christian art in all its aspects, thus reaching the field of research for which he seemed particularly qualified, and in which he was to accomplish his best work. Among other larger or smaller publications we may mention: "Beitrage zur Trierischen Archaeologie und Gesehichte. I, Der heilige Nagel in der Domkirche zu Trier" ; "Die Kunst bei den alten Christen" ; "Die christliche Kunst in ihren fruhesten Anfangen. Mit besonderer Berucksichtigung der neuesten Resultate der Katakomben-Forsehung popular dargestellt" ; "Ueber den gegenwartigen Stand der Frage nach dern Inhalte und der sedeutung der römischen Blutampullen "; "Das Spotterucifix vom Palatin" ; "Roma sotterranea: Die römischen Katakomben. Eine Darstellung der neuesten Forschungen, mit Zugrundelegung des Werkes von J. Spencer Northcote und W. R. Brownlow" ; "Ueber das Studium der Kunstwissenschaft an den deutschen Hochschulen" ; "Ueber Begriff, Umfang, Geschichte der christlichen Archaeologie und die Bedeutung der monumentalen Studien fuer die historische Theologie. Akademische Antrittsrede" ; "Synchronistische Tabellen zur christlichen Kunstgeschichte".
These were followed by the works which constitute Kraus's chief claim t fame: "Kunst und Alterthum in Elsass-Lothringen. Beschreibende Statistik im Auftrage des kalserlichen Oberprasidiums von Elsass-Lothringen herausgegeben" ; "Real-Encyklopaedie der christlichen Alterthümer" ; "Die Kunstdenkmäler des Grossherzogthurns Baden" ; "Die christlichen Inschriften der Rheinlande" ; and lastly his masterpiece: Geschichte der christlichen Kunst". The second half of volume two, which brings the description of the Italian Renaissance to a close, was published by Joseph Sauer in 1908. This work combined the results of all Kraus's labours in the field of art. Its chief merit lies in the description of the connection of art with the general and religious culture of the different periods.
Other important publications belong to the special history of art: "Die Wandgemälde der St. Georgskirche zu Oberzell auf der Reichenau" ; "Die Miniaturen des Codex Egberti in der Stadtbibliothek zu Trier" ; "Die Miniaturen der Manesseschen Liederhandschrift" ; "Die mittelalterlichen Wandgemälde im Grossherzogthum Baden" ; "Die Wandgemälde der Sylvesterkapelle zu Goldbach am Bodense".
Kraus's literary leanings were directed especially towards Italy. After a close study of Dante, covering years of labour, he published "Dante. Sein Leben und sein Werk. Sein Verhältniss zur Kunst und Politik". Somewhat earlier he had published "Luca Signorelli's Ilustrationen zu Dante's Divina Commedia".
His collected "Essays" belong to Kraus's most brilliant literary efforts ; they are of a literary, historical, and political character, and the majority appeared originally in the Deutsche Rundschau; particularly noteworthy are the essays "Antonio Rosmini" — for whom Kraus had a particular veneration — and "Francesco Petrarca in seinem Briefwechsel".
Compared with literature and art, Kraus's work on church history takes second place. His "Lehrbuch der Kirchengeschichte fur Studierende" contains much that is excellent, but has also serious defects. It is distinguished by clear and perspicuous arrangement, based more or less on that of the well-known manual of the Protestant historian Kurtz, and its narrative. One misses the objectivity of the historian, the author showing in many instances the influence which his liberalizing views exerted over his judgment. At the second edition of 1882, Kraus was compelled by the pope to withdraw and revise it. The revised edition appeared in 1887 with the ecclesiastical imprimatur.
The first edition of the church history was followed by the "Synchronistische Tabellen zur Kirchengeschichte" and "Charakterbilder aus der christlichen Kirchengeschichte", which were designated the fourth and fifth divisions of the ecclesiastical history, but had really the character of separate works.
Among his less important ecclesiastico-historical works are "Briefe Benedicts XIV. an den Canonicus Francesco Peggi in Bologna 1727-1758" : "Medicean Rome" in Cambridge Modern History, II, 1-35. Mention should also be made of his preparation of the tenth edition of Alzog's "Handbuch der allgemeinen Kirchengeschichte", and his "Gedachtnissrede auf Johannes Alzog, Professor der Theologie an der Universitat Freiburg". His political rather than his ecclesiastical views are reflected in "Die Erhebung Italiens im 19 Jahrhundert: Cavour".