Cramer, John Rodolphus

, a learned protestant divine, was born at Elcau, Feb. 14, 1678, and was first instructed in classical learning by his father, who was a pastor of the reformed church, and who intended him for the medical profession, but by the advice of his brother, professor of the oriental languages at Zurich, he studied divinity, after the death of his father, in 1693, and was admitted into the ministry in 1699. The same year he accompanied his brother to Herborn, where the latter had | been appointed professor of divinity, and pursued his studies in that place for two years, under the ablest professors. He then removed to Leyden, and having made great progress in Hebrew antiquities, he published there, in 1702, his “Seven Dissertations on the Hilcoth Biccurim.” His brother dying at Zurich the same year, he was unanimously chosen to succeed him as Hebrew professor, and on Sept. 18, he opened his lectures with a discourse “de philologis a reformatione in schola Tigurina claris.” In 1705 he was appointed to teach sacred and profane history, and the year following succeeded to the Hebrew professorship in the superior college. In 1725 he succeeded John James Lavater, the elder, as professor of theology, and after some other preferments, the duties of which appear to have affected his health, he died July 14, 1737. His works are very numerous: 1. “Decas Thesium Theologicarum,” 1704, 4to. 2. “Constitutiones de primitivis R. Mosis F. Maimonis, &c. cum versione et notis philologicis,” Leyden, 1702, 4to. 3. “De Summa pryedicationis apostolicae, quod Jesus sit Christus,” 1725, 4to. 4. “De genuina indole fidei Jesum ceu Christum recipientis,” two parts, 1726 and 1727, 4to. 5. “Dissertationes Theolog. VII. de benedictione Mosis in tribum Levi enunciata,” 1725, 1736, 4to. 6. “Positiones theolog. ex pastorali instructione sancti Pauli ad Titum data,” 1727, 4to. 7. “Demonstratio quibus in rebus S’erae religionis prsestantia ponenda sit,” 172H. 8. “De nonnullis Antichrist! characteribus,” 1729, 4to. He published, also, various other dissertations in Latin and German, and after his death appeared, “Meditatio sacra in verba S. Pauli, quee beatitudinem in Domino morientium veram ac certam demonstrat,” Zurich, 1737, 4to. His funeral oration was pronounced by John James Zimmerman. ¹