Peter Schegg, Sechs Bücher des Lebens Jesu. (The Life of Jesus in Six Books.) Freiburg, 1874-1875. c. 1200 pp.
Joseph Grimm, Das Leben Jesu. Würzburg, 2nd ed., 1890-1903. 6 vols.
Richard von Kralik, Jesu Leben und Werk. Kempten-Nürnberg, 1904. 481 pp.
W. Capitaine, Jesus von Nazareth. Regensburg, 1905. 192 pp.
How narrow are the limits within which the Catholic study of the life of Jesus moves even when it aims at scientific treatment, is illustrated by Hermann Schell's Christus (Mainz, 1903. 152 pp.). After reading the forty-two questions with which he introduces his narrative one might suppose that the author was well aware of the bearing of all the historical problems of the life of Jesus, and intended to supply an answer to them. Instead of doing so, however, he adopts as the work proceeds more and more the rôle of an apologist, not facing definitely either the miracle question or the Johannine question, but gliding over the difficulties by the aid of ingenious headings, so that in the end his book almost takes the form of an explanatory text to the eighty-nine illustrations which adorn the book and make it difficult to read.
In France, Renan's work gave the incentive to an extensive Catholic “Life-of-Jesus” literature. We may name the following:—
Louis Veuillot, La Vie de notre Seigneur Jésus-Christ. Paris, 1864. 509 pp. German by Waldeyer. Köln-Neuss, 1864. 573 pp.
H. Wallon, Vie de notre Seigneur Jésus-Christ. Paris, 1865. 355 pp.
A work which met with a particularly favourable reception was that of Père Didon, the Dominican, Jésus-Christ, Paris, 1891, 2 vols., vol. i. 483 pp., vol. ii. 469 pp. The German translation is dated 1895.
In the same year there appeared a new edition of the “Bitter Sufferings of Our Lord Jesus Christ” (see above, p. [109] f.) by Katharina Emmerich; the cheap popular edition of the translation of Renan's “Life of Jesus”; and the eighth edition of Strauss's “Life of Jesus for the German People.”