1835–1906

Historical criticism and the "quest for the historical Jesus": from Strauss to Schweitzer

In 1835 David Friedrich Strauss's Life of Jesus appeared, presenting the Gospel miracles as "myths." Ferdinand Christian Baur of the Tübingen School applied Hegelian dialectic to early Christianity and dated a number of New Testament books to the second century. Ludwig Feuerbach's The Essence of Christianity (1841) influenced Marx and later Freud.

Ernest Renan's Life of Jesus remained a bestseller for many years. In 1892 Johannes Weiss, and in 1896 Martin Kähler, challenged the earlier "lives of Jesus." In 1906 Albert Schweitzer drew the conclusions in The Quest of the Historical Jesus: in his view, the portraits of Jesus by 19th-century authors were projections of their own values.