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Christian Thomasius, portrait by Johann Christian Heinrich Sporleder.

Christian Thomasius (January 1, 1655–September 23, 1728), was a German jurist and philosopher.

He was born at Leipzig and was educated by his father, Jakob Thomasius (1622-1684), at that time head master of Thomasschule zu Leipzig. Through his father's lectures, Christian came under the influence of the political philosophy of Hugo Grotius and Samuel Pufendorf, and continued the study of law at Frankfurt (Oder). In 1684 he became professor of natural law at Leipzig, and soon attracted attention by his abilities, and particularly by his daring attack upon traditional prejudices, in theology and jurisprudence.

In 1687 he made the daring innovation of lecturing in German instead of Latin, and in the following year published a monthly periodical (Scherzhafte und ernsthafte, vernüftige und einfältige Gedanken über allerhand lustige und nutzliche Bücher und Fragen) in which he ridiculed the pedantic weaknesses of the learned, taking the side of the Pietists in their controversy with the orthodox, and defending mixed marriages of Lutherans and Calvinists. In consequence of these and other views, he was denounced from the pulpits, forbidden to lecture or to write (May 10, 1690), and his arrest was ordered. He escaped by going to Berlin, and the elector Frederick III offered him a refuge in Halle, with a salary of 500 thaler and the permission to lecture. He helped found the University of Halle (1694), where he became second and then first professor of law and rector of the university. He was one of the most esteemed university teachers and influential writers of his day.

Though not a profound philosophical thinker, Thomasius prepared the way for great reforms in philosophy, as well as in law, literature, social life and theology. It was his mission to introduce a rational, common-sense point of view, and to bring the divine and human sciences to bear on the everyday world. He thus created an epoch in German literature, philosophy and law, and, along with Spittler, began the modern period of ecclesiastical history. One of the aims of his life was to free politics and jurisprudence from the control of theology. He fought bravely and consistently for freedom of thought and speech on religious matters and mediated between the academic and the public sphere.

Thomasius is often spoken of in German works as the author of the "territorial system," or Erastian theory of ecclesiastical government; but he taught that the state may interfere with legal or public duties only, and not with moral or private ones. He would not have even atheists punished, though they should be expelled the country, and he came forward as an earnest opponent of the prosecution of witches and of the use of torture. In theology he was not a naturalist or a deist, but a believer in the necessity of revealed religion for salvation. He came strongly under the influence of the pietists, particularly of Spener, and there was a mystic vein in his thought; but other elements of his nature were too powerful to allow him to attach himself wholly to that party.

Thomasius's most popular and influential German publications were his periodical already referred to (1688-1689); Einleitung zur Vernunftlehre (1691, 5th ed. 1719); Vernünflige Gedanken über allerhand auserlesene und juristische Handel (1720-1721); Historie der Weisheit und Torheit (3 vols., 1693); Kurze Lehrsätze van dem Laster der Zauberei mit dem Hexenprozess (1704); Weitere Erläuterungen der neueren Wissenschaft anderer Gedanken kennen zu lernen (1711). Relevant in the German debate was the short article Von der Nachahmung der Franzosen (1687).

The first English translation of the works of Christian Thomasius: Essays on Church, State, and Politics is due to appear in 2007. The translators are Thomas Ahnert, Frank Grunert and Ian Hunter.

• This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.