Albin van Hoonacker

Albin-Augustin Van Hoonacker (19 November 1857 in Bruges – 1 November 1933 in Bruges) was a Roman Catholic theologian, professor at the Faculty of Theology, Catholic University of Leuven, a member of The Royal Academy of Belgium and Knight of the Order of Leopold.

Albin van Hoonacker came from a respectable middle-class background. The family were religious Catholics; his two sisters became nuns and two of his brothers, like him, entered the priesthood. After primary school, Van Hoonacker attended his secondary education at the seminary in Roulers, where he mastered Greek and Latin. Thereafter, he entered the seminary of the diocese of Bruges. After his ordination as a priest in 1880, the Bishop of Bruges, Mgr Faict sent him to the Catholic University of Leuven, to continue his theological studies. In 1886 he obtained the doctorate in theology there, for his dissertation on the subject of the Creation.

After a short period of pastoral activity at Kortrijk Van Hoonacker returned to Louvain, where he worked as sub-regent at the Holy Spirit College. At the same time, Van Hoonacker deepened his knowledge of Orientalism, through attending university courses in Semitic languages (Hebrew, Syriac and Arabic). In July 1889, Van Hoonacker was invited by the redaction of Journal de Bruxelles, a Catholic newspaper to react upon some writings in the field of orientalism and biblical exegesis by the jurist, journalist and socialist senator Edmond Picard on the historical value of the Bible. As a result of his involvement in this polemic, Van Hoonacker earned great respect in Belgian Catholic circles, to the extent that Mgr. Abbeloos, then rector of the Catholic University of Leuven, and a biblical scholar himself, proposed to the Belgian bishops that Van Hoonacker be appointed to the newly created chair of Histoire critique de l'Ancien Testament. At a time when the historical-critical exploration of the Bible among Catholics was still highly controversial, Van Hoonacker thus became the first professor to teach the Critical History of the Old Testament. He remained in that post until 1927. Up to that time there had only been a single lecture-course at the university on biblical exegesis, that given by Thomas Lamy.

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