Family Name: Barbeyrac
First Name: Jean
Birth Date: Sun, Dec 31, 1673
Birth Place: Béziers
Death Date: Mon, Mar 02, 1744
Death Place: Groningen
Main places of activity:
Place From To
Berlin 1692 1709
Place From To
Lausanne 1709 1716
Place From To
Groningen 1716 1743
Personal info:
Education

Although Barbeyrac's early education began in Montpellier, it was completed in Lausanne, where he took refuge with his family after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685). In 1688 he finished college as the first of his class and started his university studies in Geneva in theology and ancient languages such as Greek, Hebrew and Latin. Although his studies prepared him for an ecclesiastical career, the private lessons in natural law he took with Pierre Crousaz sparked Barbeyrac's lifelong interest in ius naturalis.

In 1693 he was forced to move again to Berlin, and in 1694 he briefly attended Frankfurt University on a scholarship granted by the Elector of Brandenburg.
Career

In 1697 Barbeyrac started teaching Latin and Greek at the French College in Berlin, and started dedicating most of his time to the study, interpretation and translation of natural law. Although Frederick I appointed him extraordinary pastor of the French Reformed church in 1699, the consistory opposed the decision on the basis of Barbeyrac's Arminian and Socinian positions, which contrasted with the Calvinist doctrine of predestination.

In 1710 he moved to Lausanne, where he was appointed Professor of history and civil law and became Rector of the University from 1714 onwards. In 1713, Barbeyrac was nominated corresponding member of the Prussian Academy of Sciences in Berlin. In 1717, Barbeyrac accepted an offer from Groningen University, where he taught jurisprudence until the end of his life.
Translations Other Works

translations activities

Barbeyrac was the foremost French translator of classical natural law treatises, such as those authored by Hugo Grotius, Samuel Pufendorf and Richard Cumberland. He also translated the religious works of John Tillotson from English.

He thouroughly considered all the editions of the volumes he translated before choosing his main source, and added several annotations and modifications in order to recontextualise the original texts. Besides being a widely appreciated cultural mediator, Barbeyrac directly engaged with the theoretical concepts he translated, creating new knowledge to be transmitted through his work, to the point of being defined an "activist translator, a political adjustor of his source" (Saunders).

Barbeyrac's translations can be seen as a cohesive intellectual project, where the liberal and latitudinarian moral theology of Tillotson constitutes the foundations of Barbeyrac's reinterpretation of the canonical texts of natural law. Strongly influenced by Locke, Barbeyrac reformulated Pufendorf's texts in order to purge them of Hobbes' negative judgement of human nature and moderate their original post-Westphalian and statist meaning. He thus furnished a reading that suited the context of the Huguenot diaspora of which he was part, reasserting his case for religious toleration. In so doing, Barbeyrac ideally combined Grotius and Pufendorf by minimising their differences in a conscious anti-Hobbesian attempt to conciliate Pufendorf's secularised natural law with sociability and individual liberty of conscience.

Barbeyrac's reading of natural law theories constituted a source of inspiration for modern republicanism and was widely influential during the American and French revolutions.

secondary bibliography references

P. Meylan, Jean Barbeyrac (1674–1744) et les débuts de l'enseignement du droit dans l'ancienne académie de Lausanne. Contribution à l'histoire du droit naturel, Lausanne, F. Rouge & Cie S. A. Librairie de l'Université, 1937.

T. Hochstrasser, "Conscience and reason: The natural law theory of Jean Barbeyrac",The Historical Journal, 36, n°2 (1993), pp. 289-308.

G. M. Labriola, Barbeyrac interprete di Pufendorf e Grozio: dalla costruzione della sovranità alla teoria della resistenza, Naples, Ed. Scientifica, 2003.

F. Lomonaco, 'Natural Right, Liberty of Conscience and "Summa potestas" in Jean Barbeyrac', in S. Pott, M. Muslow and L. Danneberg, eds., The Berlin Refuge, 1680-1780: Learning and Science in European Context, Brill, Leiden, 2003, pp. 137-152.

D. Saunders, The Natural Jurisprudence of Jean Barbeyrac: Translation as an Art of Political Adjustment, Eighteenth-Century Studies, 36, n°4 (2003), pp. 473-490.

G. P. Baldwin, 'The Translation of Political Theory in Early Modern Europe', in P. Burke and R. Po-chia Hsa, eds., Cultural Translation in Early Modern Europe, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2007, pp. 101-124 (esp. pp. 107, 120-123).

F. Palladini, Die Berliner Hugenotten und der Fall Barbeyrac. Orthodoxe und ‘Sozinianer’ im Refuge (1685-1720), Leiden, Brill, 2011.

M. Pälvärinne, 'Translating Grotius's De jure belli ac pacis: Courtin vs. Barbeyrac', Translation Studies, 5, n°1 (2012), pp. 33-47.

Id., 'Jean Barbeyrac, traducteur et homme de lettres', Unpublished PhD Thesis, Helsinki University, 2018.

Translations

  • De jure naturae et gentium libri octo

  • Translation Title: Le Droit de la nature et des gens, ou Système général des principes les plus importans de la morale, de la jurisprudence et de la politique
  • Original Author: Samuel von Puffendorf
  • Original title: De jure naturae et gentium libri octo
  • Publ. Year From: 1671 to:
  • lang: Latin
  • Title: Samuelis Pufendorfii De Jure Naturae Et Gentium. Libri Octo
  • Pub. Place: Amsterdam
  • Pub. Year: 1697
  • Lang: Latin
  • Translation: Le Droit de la nature et des gens, ou Système général des principes les plus importans de la morale, de la jurisprudence et de la politique
  • N° Editions: 12
  • Pub. Place: Amsterdam
  • Pub. Date: 1705
  • Lang: French
  • Note:

    This translation of Pufendorf was a huge international success and counted up to 12 different editions. For this volume, Barbeyrac used the most famous 1698 Amsterdan edition as his main source, but in the preface he confirms having kept the first edition of 1672 "always in front of my eyes". Additionally, he also consulted the latest editions to give a full and comprehensive translation of Pufendorf's most important work.

    Both Barbeyrac's translation and annotations were widely influential and served as sources for further translations, such as the English version. The conscious work of reinterpretation and correction of Pufendorf's original text resulted in a less statatlist and Hobbesian text than the original.

  • De officio hominis et ciuis juxta legem naturalem libri duo

  • Translation Title: Les Devoirs de l'homme et du citoien, tels qu'ils lui sont prescrits par la loi naturelle
  • Original Author: Samuel von Pufendorf
  • Original title: De officio hominis et ciuis juxta legem naturalem libri duo
  • Publ. Year From: 1672 to:
  • lang: Latin
  • Title: S. Puffendorffii De officio hominis et civis juxta legem naturalem libri duo
  • Pub. Place: Utrecht
  • Pub. Year: 1704
  • Lang: Latin
  • Translation: Les Devoirs de l'homme et du citoien, tels qu'ils lui sont prescrits par la loi naturelle
  • N° Editions: 11
  • Pub. Place: Amsterdam
  • Pub. Date: 1706
  • Lang: French
  • Note:

    As stated in the preface, Barbeyrac mainly used the eleventh edition printed in Utrecht in 1705 for his French version, alongside the first one.

    Barbeyrac's fourth edition of 1718 also included a translation of the famous 1701 letter from Gottfried Wilhelm Liebniz that attacked Pufendorf's work and two of his own discourses he delivered at the Lausanne academy in 1715 and 1716. As for the De jure, English editions of Pufendorf also used Barbeyrac's notes and recontextualisation as a source.

  • De religione ab imperio jure gentium libera

  • Translation Title: Du Pouvoir des souverains et de la liberté de conscience
  • Original Author: Gerhard Noodt
  • Original title: De religione ab imperio jure gentium libera
  • Publ. Year From: 1705 to:
  • lang: Latin
  • Translation: Du Pouvoir des souverains et de la liberté de conscience
  • N° Editions: 5
  • Pub. Place: Amsterdam
  • Pub. Date: 1706
  • Lang: French
  • Note:

    Barbeyrac's translation was published in 1707, and reprinted in 1714, 1717 and as late as 1775.

    But is was Barbeyrac's Recueil de discours sur diverses matières importantes, issued in 1731, to contain the most well known version of Noodt's original text. Enlarged with several annotations and comments, it had a huge influence of the reception of Noodt across Europe during the eighteenth century, as Barbeyrac's version also constituted a source text for an English version.

    In particular, Barbeyrac managed to show the continuity of the Dutch religious discourse on toleration by pointing at the references to Pierre Bayle's Commentaire philosophique and some arguments coming from John Locke's Epistola de Tolerantia present in Noodt's text.

  • The works of the Most Reverend Dr. John Tillotson, late Lord Archbishop of Canterbury: containing fifty four sermons and discourses, on several occasions. Together with The rule of faith. Being all that were published by His Grace himself. And now collected into one volume. To which is added, an alphabetical table of the principal matters

  • Translation Title: Sermons sur diverses matières importantes
  • Original Author: James Tillotson
  • Original title: The works of the Most Reverend Dr. John Tillotson, late Lord Archbishop of Canterbury: containing fifty four sermons and discourses, on several occasions. Together with The rule of faith. Being all that were published by His Grace himself. And now collected into one volume. To which is added, an alphabetical table of the principal matters
  • Publ. Year From: 1695 to:
  • lang: English
  • Translation: Sermons sur diverses matières importantes
  • N° Editions: 5
  • Pub. Place: Amsterdam
  • Pub. Date: 1707
  • Lang: French
  • Note:

    It was Pierre Des Maizeaux who gave Barbeyrac a copy of Tillotson sermons. Barbeyrac shared the latitudinarian views of Tillotson and appreciated his views in relation to predestination and the practical scope of Christian religion.

  • De foro legatorum tam in causa civili, quam criminali liber singularis

  • Translation Title: Traité du juge compétent des ambassadeurs, tant pour le civil, que par le criminel
  • Original Author: Cornelius van Bynkershoek
  • Original title: De foro legatorum tam in causa civili, quam criminali liber singularis
  • Publ. Year From: 1720 to:
  • lang: Latin
  • Translation: Traité du juge compétent des ambassadeurs, tant pour le civil, que par le criminel
  • Pub. Place: The Hague
  • Pub. Date: 1722
  • Lang: French

  • A discourse against transubstantiation

  • Translation Title: Discours contre la transubstantiation
  • Original Author: John Tillotson
  • Original title: A discourse against transubstantiation
  • Publ. Year From: 1683 to:
  • lang: English
  • Translation: Discours contre la transubstantiation
  • Pub. Place: Amsterdam
  • Pub. Date: 1725
  • Lang: French

  • De jure belli ac pacis libri tres, in quibus jus naturae et gentium

  • Translation Title: Le droit de la guerre, et de paix
  • Original Author: Hugo Grotius
  • Original title: De jure belli ac pacis libri tres, in quibus jus naturae et gentium
  • Publ. Year From: 1624 to:
  • lang: Latin
  • Title: Hugoni Grotii De jure belli ac pacis libri tres, in quibus jus naturae et gentium
  • Pub. Place: Amsterdam
  • Pub. Year: 1634
  • Lang: Latin
  • Translation: Le droit de la guerre, et de paix
  • Pub. Place: Amsterdam
  • Pub. Date: 1723
  • Lang: French
  • Note:

    In the prefae, Barbeyrac clarifies he mostly used the first original Paris edition of 1625 and the Amsterdam edition of 1632 as his sources, arguing that these were the only ones in which Grotius himself had a major role.

    Barbeyrac's translation was one of the most widely read across Europe.

  • De legibus naturae disquisitio philosophica, in qua earum forma, summa capita, ordo, promulgatio, et obligatio e rerum natura investigantur; quin etiam elementa philosophiae Hobbianae, cum moralis tum civilis, considerantur et refutantur

  • Translation Title: Traité philosophique des loix naturelles, ou l'on recherche et l'on établit, par la Nature des Choses, la forme de ces Lois, leurs principaux chefs, leur ordre, leur publication & leur obligation
  • Original Author: RIchard Cumberland
  • Original title: De legibus naturae disquisitio philosophica, in qua earum forma, summa capita, ordo, promulgatio, et obligatio e rerum natura investigantur; quin etiam elementa philosophiae Hobbianae, cum moralis tum civilis, considerantur et refutantur
  • Publ. Year From: 1671 to:
  • lang: Latin
  • Translation: Traité philosophique des loix naturelles, ou l'on recherche et l'on établit, par la Nature des Choses, la forme de ces Lois, leurs principaux chefs, leur ordre, leur publication & leur obligation
  • N° Editions: 2
  • Pub. Place: Amsterdam
  • Pub. Date: 1743
  • Lang: French
  • Note:

    Barbeyrac started translating Cumberland's treatise very early, using the first 1672 edition, but interrupted his work as an enlarged second edition was set to be issued in the 1730s. Although the second Latin edition was never printed, Barbeyrac eventually managed to obtain a transcription of the original manuscript by Johann Gaspar Wettstein in 1739, resuming his translation.



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By:

  • Giovanni Lista