Martin Eisengrein

German Catholic theologian, university professor and polemical writer

Martin Eisengrein (28 December 1535 – 4 May 1578) was a German Catholic theologian, university professor, and polemical writer.

He was born of Lutheran parents, Martin and Anna Kienzer Eisengrein, at Stuttgart. He studied the humanities at the Latin school of Stuttgart, and the liberal arts and philosophy at the University of Tübingen. To please his father, who was burgomaster of Stuttgart, Eisengrein matriculated as student of jurisprudence at the University of Ingolstadt, 25 May 1553, but before a year had passed he was at the University of Vienna, where he took the degree of Master of Arts in May, 1554. During the tolerant rule of Ferdinand I, Eisengrein, though still a Protestant, became in 1555 professor of oratory and, two years later, of physics at the University of Vienna, a Catholic institution. His Catholic surroundings and frequent contact with the Jesuits of Vienna had great influence in bringing about his acceptance of the Catholic faith, and under the influence of his uncle, the Imperial Vice Chancellor Jakob of Jonas, his conversion took place about 1558. In 1559 he received a canonry at St. Stephen's in Vienna, and a year later he was ordained priest. In 1562 he went to the University of Ingolstadt whither he had been invited by the superintendent of the university, Frederick Staphylus. He was appointed pastor of the church of St. Moritz, which was incorporated with the university, and in April of the same year he was elected rector of the university. In 1563, he travelled to the shrine of Hohenwart. Upon his return, he preached a sermon later published as A Christian Sermon Concerning the Reasons Shrines Are Held in Such High Esteem in the Catholic Church, one of the first counter reformational defenses of the cult of the saints and pilgrimage. "[I]n his sermons, printed works, and pastoral ministrations Eisengrein strove to resurrect and reform the religious life of Bavaria's shrines." contained the exegeses of contemporary theologians and controversialists.