ERASTUS, Thomas (a Latin translation of his name LIEBLER or LIEBER), German theolo gian and physician: b. Auggen, near Miihlheim, 1524; d. Basel, Switzerland, 1583. He studied theology at Basel (where he Grecized his name), and philosophy and medicine at Bologna and Padua. After nine years in Italy, he was appointed physician to the counts of Henneberg. In 1558 he received an invitation to go to the court of the Elector Palatine, and accepted it. There he became first physician and Privy Councilor and professor of medicine at Heidel berg. He removed from Heidelberg to fill the chair of medicine at Basel in 1580. Shortly before his death he had been appointed profes sor of ethics. Erastus was a skilful physician and a man of upright charatter, an equally vigorous writer against "the new medicine of Philip Paracelsus° (1572) holding that the only true road to knowledge is to be found in ex perimental investigation, and not in astrology, magic and other obsolete practices. In theology he was a follower of Zwingli, and his fame now rests on his strenuous opposition to Calvinist discipline and Presbyterian order. In 1564 he
maintained the Zwinglian doctrine of the Lord's Supper at the conference of Maulbronn, and it was in defense of it that he wrote 'Vora Verstand der Wort Christi "Das ist Mein Leib"' (1565). Erastus was excommunicated on a false suspicion of heresy, founded on a correspondence with Unitarians of Transyl vania, but was restored in 1575. His chief work is a treatise on excommunication entitled 'Ex plicatio gravissimm quaestionis utrum Excom municatio mandato nitatur divino, an excogitata sit ab hominibus.' This was answered by Beza in his 'De vera Excommunicatione et Christi ano Presbyterio) (1590). Erastus maintained that no member of the church should be ex cluded from her communion as a punishment for sin. Punishment is "the special duty and office)) of the civil magistrate. Consult Bon nard, 'Thomas Eraste et la discipline ecclesi (1894) ; Lee, 'The Theses of Erastus Touching (Edinburgh 1844).
See ERASTIANS.