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Friedrich Schleiermacher emerged as a prominent advocate for German nationalism in the Wars of Liberation from Napoleonic domination in the early nineteenth century. Alongside his work as a pastor and theologian in Berlin, and also as the co-founder of the University of Berlin, Schleiermacher developed German nationalism from a distinctly Protestant perspective, one that sought the preservation of Protestantism in the German lands under Napoleonic domination. While it would be an overstatement to suggest that Schleiermacher's nationalism was anti-Catholic, he certainly sought to preserve and maintain Protestantism in the German lands. His vision of the German nation-state emphasized Germany's role as a divine instrument of God's will in the world. He assumed the cultural unity of the peoples in German lands, that is, an area of land in which the peoples are bound together by the common use of the German language. In his distinct role as a pastor, theologian, and academic, he was devoted to the cultivation of German national consciousness and the establishment of a German nation-state. Schleiermacher's work would help to provide a cultural foundation for the emergence of the German nation-state more than half a century before the establishment of the German empire. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rosenzweig's principal interlocutors are commonly taken to be idealist and existentialist philosophers. Rosenzweig's disparaging remarks at the beginning of Part Two of The Star of Redemption regarding modern theology and its progenitor, Friedrich Schleiermacher, strengthen the view that the Star is best understood in a philosophical context. However, a close reading of the Star alongside Schleiermacher's main doctrinal work, The Christian Faith, reveals surprising points of similarity on a wide range of topics. Furthermore, the points of contradiction between the two works can illuminate Rosenzweig's contributions to modern theology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]