Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition/Simon Grynæus

GRYNÆUS, Simon (1493-1541), a learned theologian of the Reformation, was born in 1493 at Vehringen, in his fourteenth year was sent to school at Pforzheim, and sub sequently studied at the university of Vienna, where he graduated as master of arts, and for some time acted as tutor. He next became rector of a school at Ofen (Buda), but as an avowed sympathizer with Reuchlin and Erasmus lie was not permitted by the Dominicans to retain this post long. After an interval spent at Wittenberg with his old school friend Melanchthon, he became professor of Greek in the university of Heidelberg in 1525; with the duties of this post he from 1526 combined those also of the Latin chair. In 1529 the friendship of CEcolampadius obtained for him a call to Basel as successor of Erasmus ; the com pletely disorganized state of the university at that time gave him abundant leisure not only for private study but also for a tour to England, where he charged himself with the task of obtaining the opinions of the Reformed theologians upon the subject of the king s divorce. On his return to Basel in 1531, the year of the death both of Zwingli and of CEcolampadius, he began as theological professor to give exegetical lectures on the New Testament ; and in 1534 he was summoned by Duke Ulrich of Wiirtemberg to assist in the reformation there, and especially in the reorganization of the university of Tiibingen. In 1536 he took an active part in the framing of the first Helvetic confession, and also in the conferences held with the purpose of inducing the Swiss to accept the concord of Wittenberg, which had also been drawn up in that year. He was the sole repre sentative of the Swiss churches at the conference of Worms in 1540. His death took place suddenly at Basel on August 1, 1541. In Greek philology Grynseus was one of the first scholars of his day. In theology he was more of a theoretical than of a practical turn ; but his profound erudition and singularly penetrating judgment gave him great influence among the more active spirits of the time. In literature his chief contributions were translations into Latin of Plutarch, Aristotle, and Chrysostom. See Streu- ber s Simonis Gryncei Epistolce (1847), where a full list of his works is given.