Jean Frederic Ostervald

Jean-Frédéric Osterwald (or Ostervald) (25 November 1663 – 14 April 1747) was a Swiss Protestant pastor.

He was born at Neuchâtel in 1663 in a patrician family, a son of the Reformed pastor Johann Rudolf Ostervald. He was educated at Zürich and at Saumur (where he graduated), studied theology at Orléans under Claude Pajon, at Paris under Jean Claude and at Geneva under Louis Tronchin, and was ordained to the ministry in his native place in 1683.

He spent most of his life at Neuchâtel, first as a deacon, then from 1699 a pastor, and finally he was elected deacon. Besides this he gave lectures at the academy of theology. As preacher, pastor, lecturer and author, he attained a position of great influence in his day, he and his friends, J. A. Turretini of Geneva and S. Werenfels (1657-1740) of Basel, forming what was once called the Swiss triumvirate. He was thought to show a leaning towards Socinianism and Arminianism.

His innovative proposals embraced dogmatics, exegesis (his important translation of and commentary on the Bible), liturgy (Bible reading instead of preaching), hymnology and moral theology (importance of good deeds and moral life). His writings had a great influence, bearing spiritual renewal among Waldensian, Dutch, German, Hungarian and Scandinavian Protestants. Moreover, the English Royal Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts – of which he was a member – brought his teachings to the countries of the Middle East, India, Canada and the West-Indian Islands. His highly influential oeuvre was later called "the second Reformation".

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