Sinndeutung und Periodisierung der Geschichte: Eine systematische UEbersicht der Theorien und Auffassungen

In this study the author presents a systematic and thematic overview of all concepts and ideas, that are basic and gave shape to Western thinking about history: Jewish and Christian concepts of redemptive history; particularism versus universal concepts; ethnocentric concepts; typology; eschatology; and the apocalyptic. He considers concepts of history in the Classical Age, the Middle Ages, Reformation, the Age of Enlightenment, the Romantic Age, Humanism, Positivism, the impact of the Holocaust and Postmodernism. He offers a critical treatment of themes as the periodizing of history, continuity and discontinuity, optimistic and pessimistic theories, repetitive and non-repetitive theories.