Editing Friedrich Schleiermacher (section)

=== Early life and development ===
Born in [[Wrocław|Breslau]] in [[Prussian Silesia]] as the grandson of Daniel Schleiermacher, a pastor at one time associated with the [[Zionites (Germany) |Zionites]],<ref>[http://people.bu.edu/wwildman/bce/mwt_themes_470_schleiermacher.htm Boston Collaborative Encyclopedia of Western Theology: Friedrich Daniel Ernst Schleiermacher (1768–1834)]</ref><ref>{{Cite CE1913| url = http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/15761a.htm | title = Zionites | access-date = June 18, 2014}}</ref> and the son of Gottlieb Schleiermacher, a [[Reformed Church]] chaplain in the Prussian army, Schleiermacher started his formal education in a [[Moravian Church|Moravian]] school at [[Niesky]] in [[Upper Lusatia]], and at [[Barby, Germany|Barby]] near [[Magdeburg]]. However, [[Pietism|pietistic]] Moravian theology failed to satisfy his increasing doubts, and his father reluctantly gave him permission to enter the [[University of Halle]], which had already abandoned pietism and adopted the [[rationalism|rationalist]] spirit of [[Christian Wolff (philosopher)|Christian Wolff]] and [[Johann Salomo Semler]]. As a [[theology]] student, Schleiermacher pursued an independent course of reading and neglected the study of the [[Old Testament]] and of [[Oriental languages]]. However, he attended the lectures of Semler and became acquainted with the techniques of [[historical criticism]] of the [[New Testament]], and of [[Johann Augustus Eberhard]] from whom he acquired a love of the [[philosophies|philosophy]] of [[Plato]] and [[Aristotle]]. At the same time, he studied the writings of [[Immanuel Kant]] and [[Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi]] and began to apply ideas from the Greek philosophers to a reconstruction of Kant's system.<ref name=EB1911/>

Schleiermacher developed a deep-rooted skepticism as a student and soon rejected orthodox Christianity.<ref>Michael A. G. Haykin, Liberal Protestantism, p. 3</ref>

Brian Gerrish, a scholar of the works of Schleiermacher, wrote:

{{blockquote|In a letter to his father, Schleiermacher drops the mild hint that his teachers fail to deal with those widespread doubts that trouble so many young people of the present day. His father misses the hint. He has himself read some of the skeptical literature, he says, and can assure Schleiermacher that it is not worth wasting time on. For six whole months there is no further word from his son. Then comes the bombshell. In a moving letter of 21 January 1787, Schleiermacher admits that the doubts alluded to are his own. His father has said that faith is the "regalia of the Godhead," that is, God's royal due.<ref name="A. Gerrish 1984">
B. A. Gerrish, ''A Prince of the Church: Schleiermacher and the Beginnings of Modern Theology'' (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press, 1984), p. 25.</ref>}}

Schleiermacher confessed:  "Faith is the regalia of the Godhead, you say. Alas! dearest father, if you believe that without this faith no one can attain to salvation in the next world, nor to tranquility in this—and such, I know, is your belief—oh! then pray to God to grant it to me, for to me it is now lost. I cannot believe that he who called himself the Son of Man was the true, eternal God; I cannot believe that his death was a vicarious atonement."<ref name="A. Gerrish 1984"/>