Johann Friedrich Oberlin

Oberlin, Johann Friedrich (Strasburg, 1740-1826, Waldersbach), was from 1767 until his death Protestant pastor in Waldersbach in the Steintal at the foot of the Vosges between Strasburg and Colmar. Oberlin made it his task to improve the lot of the villages in his cure materially, culturally, and spiritually. He introduced cotton weaving, founded nursery centres (Kinderbewahranstalten, the first of their kind), for which he trained women teachers, and offered asylum to French refugees during the revolutionary years. His Lebensgeschichte and Gesammelte Schriften were published in four volumes in 1843 (ed. W. Burckhardt, Hilpert, and D. E. Stöber). Several notable men of letters and learning were counted among his friends (J. C. Lavater, J. H. Jung). G. H. von Schubert, who in 1835 published Züge aus dem Leben von Oberlin, published the third edition of Die Symbolik des Traumes Mit einem Anhange aus dem Nachlasse eines Visionärs des J. F. Oberlin, gewesenen Pfarrers im Steinthale (1840; in accordance with Schubert's wish the Anhang was not included in the fourth edition of 1862).

Oberlin's life and work have been the subject of various works of literature (among them the novel Oberlin, 1910, by F. Lienhard) especially since the revival of interest in J. M. R. Lenz and G. Büchner. In his Novelle Lenz Büchner follows Oberlin's record of Lenz's stay with him early in 1778. This record was first published by A. Stöber (son of D. E. Stöber, the co-editor of Oberlin's works and author of a biography of Oberlin, 1831) in 1839 in the journal Erwina. The father of Büchner's fiancée, J. J. Jaeglé (see Jaeglé, M.), delivered the funeral sermon on Oberlin at Fouday, where he was buried.