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Theodor Ludwig Lau (Königsberg, East Prussia, 15 June 1670-Altona, February 1740) was a German lawyer and free thinker known for his radical writings.

Life

Theodor Ludwig Lau was the son of Philipp Lau (1622-1682), a lawyer and professor of law in Königsberg. From 1685 he studied philosophy, theology, and law in Königsberg. In 1694/95 he studied for a year in Halle with Christian Thomasius and then traveled to the Netherlands, England, and France. He then worked in the service of the Duke of Courland, Friedrich Wilhelm Kettler, until 1711. In 1717 he was raised to the imperial nobility under the name Lau von Löwenstern.

Lau published his Deist-Spinozist views in his 1717 and 1719 works in which he adopted a materialistic and pantheistic interpretation of Spinoza's Ethics shared by Friedrich Wilhelm Stosch. Lau's works were quickly banned. He returned to his hometown in 1727 and encountered difficulties when the authorship of his books became known. He lived in Altona under a false name beginning in 1736 and died in poverty.

Works

• Entwurf einer wohleingerichteten Polizey (1717).
• Meditationes philosophicae de Deo, Mundo, et Homine (1717).
• Meditationes, Theses, Dubia philosophico-theologica (1719).

References

1. Jonathan I. Israel Radical Enlightenment: Philosophy and the Making of Modernity 1650-1750 2001 Page v "Theodor Ludwig Lau (1670–1740) In the wake of Knutzen, Tschirnhaus, Stosch, and Wachter, the next radical thinker to provoke outrage in Germany was Theodor Ludwig Lau.163 Born and raised in East Prussia, Lau's father had been a ..."
2. Erich Donnert, Theodor Ludwig Lau : (1670 - 1740): Religionsphilosoph und Freidenker der Frühen Neuzeit. Frankfurt am Main 2011.
3. Erich Donnert, Theodor Ludwig Lau : (1670 - 1740): Religionsphilosoph und Freidenker der Frühen Neuzeit. Frankfurt am Main 2011.
4. David Bell, Spinoza in Germany from 1670 to the age of Goethe 1984 Page 15 "... it to be atheistic and hostile to religion and the established order. Similarly, the crass materialistic-pantheistic misinterpretation of the Ethics was shared by both Friedrich Wilhelm Stosch (1646-1704) and Theodor Ludwig Lau (1670-1740)"
5. Erich Donnert, Theodor Ludwig Lau : (1670 - 1740): Religionsphilosoph und Freidenker der Frühen Neuzeit. Frankfurt am Main 2011.

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• 1670 births
• 1740 deaths
• German ethicists
• Jurists from the Kingdom of Prussia
• 17th-century German philosophers
• 18th-century German philosophers
• 18th-century German writers
• 18th-century German lawyers
• 18th-century German male writers
• German philosopher stubs