Everything about Herman Van Breda totally explained
Herman Leo Van Breda (born Leo Marie Karel) (
28 February,
1911,
Lier,
Belgium –
4 March,
1974,
Leuven) was a
Franciscan, philosopher and founder of the Husserl archives at the
Higher Institute of Philosophy of the
Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium.
On
19 August 1934, he was ordained as a priest and in
1936 he started studying
philosophy at the Catholic University of Leuven, where he obtained a PhD in
1941 with a dissertation on the
phenomenology of
Edmund Husserl. Later he became a professor at the Catholic University of Leuven, where he stayed until his death in 1974.
Husserl Archives
Van Breda saved the extensive writings and manuscripts of
Edmund Husserl from destruction by the
Nazis.
For the preparation of his PhD thesis he traveled to
Freiburg,
Germany in 1938, where he found, in the legacy of Edmund Husserl (1859-1938), more than 40000
Gabelsberger stenography manuscripts and his complete research library. The political situation in
Germany at that time convinced him of the necessity to transport these manuscripts and Husserl’s private library to
Leuven. In order to smuggle the documents out of
Nazi Germany, he needed the support not only of the rector of the Catholic University of Leuven, but also of the Belgian government. The Belgian Prime Minister at that time,
Paul-Henri Spaak, allowed van Breda to bring the documents from Freiburg to the Belgian embassy in Berlin and diplomatic couriers to bring them to Leuven in Belgium.
Van Breda also was able to convince Husserl's former assistants,
Eugen Fink and
Ludwig Landgrebe, to collaborate on the editing of these documents in Leuven. At the beginning of
World War II the documents were being kept in the university library in Leuven, which burned to ashes on
17 May 1940. Fortunately, one week before the fire Van Breda decided to bring the documents to the Higher Institute of Philosophy.
In
1943 the documents were, for safety, distributed over different locations in Leuven, including a shelter in the cellar of the Institute of Philosophy and the
Abbey of Postel. After the war they were brought back to the Institute of Philosophy, where they form the basis for the
Husserliana, the complete works of Edmund Husserl.
For his work on spreading Husserl’s work he was awarded a
honoris causa doctorate from the
Albert Ludwigs University of Freiburg.
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