Albertus (Albert) Stephanus Geyser (10 February 1918 – 13 June 1985) was a South African cleric, scholar and anti-apartheid theologian. Geyser became an outcast in the white Afrikaner community because of his theological opposition to apartheid and to the Broederbond, the secret male Calvinist organisation that covertly steered South African politics during the apartheid era. He obtained master's and doctoral degrees cum laude, specializing in Greek and Latin. At the age of 27 he was appointed lecturer, and a year later, professor in the Theological Faculty of the Nederduitsch Hervormde Kerk at the University of Pretoria. Geyser contributed to the first annotated edition (1953–1958) of the Bible in Afrikaans, founded the Christian Institute, and was the first South African to be elected as a member of Studiorum Novi Testamenti Societas.
Family background and early life
Albert Geyser was born to Maria Johanna Albertina ("Nina") Lamprecht and Petrus Geyser on 10 February 1918 on a farm near Naboomspruit, Transvaal province (now the town of Mookgophong in the Limpopo Province). Petrus and Maria had three children, including Albert's brother, Hendrik Johannes Geyser. The Geyser progenitor had immigrated to South Africa in 1725, and Albert's great-grandfather and grandfather had been among the founding members of the Nederduitsch Hervormde Kerk (NHK).
Albert Geyser attended primary school in Ermelo, and matriculated from the Hoërskool (High School) ErmeloBy contrast, Van Aarde (1992:160) states that Geyser "matriculated at Pretoria". in 1935. With his brother, Hendrik, he was admitted to the University of Pretoria, with both intending to become ministers in the NHK. Albert earned his BA degree in Greek and Latin cum laude in 1938, followed by a BD in 1940. As denominational regulations required a minimum age of 23 years for appointment as a minister, Geyser worked in Cape Town until he became eligible in 1941. He was then invited to serve the congregations at Heilbron and at Parys in the Free State, where he was ordained and ministered from 1941 to 1943.
In the early 1940s Geyser married Cecilia Margaretha van der Westhuysen in Rustenburg and the couple had three sons and two daughters.
Geyser continued his studies at Pretoria and earned an MA in Greek and Latin in 1943.According to Van Aarde (1992), Geyser gained his MA in 1943, while Oberholzer (2010) lists both 1942 and 1943. He served as minister of the NHK's Pretoria North-West congregation from 1944–1945.According to Dreyer (2015), Geyser's ministry at Pretoria-Northwest lasted until 1946. He completed additional courses in Aramaic and Syriac in 1945, adding these to his sound knowledge of Afrikaans, Hebrew, Greek, Latin, French, German, Dutch and English; meaning that he could "read 10 languages."
He earned a Doctor Divinitatis degree with distinction in 1946 on the topic of the genealogy of Jesus, also at the University of Pretoria. Geyser's was the first doctorate to be awarded by the Theology Faculty.
Academic career Geyser's academic career included professorial appointments at the University of Pretoria (1946-1961) and, subsequently, at the University of the Witwatersrand (1962-1983).
In August 1944 Geyser was nominated by the Theology Faculty as professor of New Testament Exegesis and successor to Professor J H J A Greyvenstein in the NHK's section at the University of Pretoria. Greyvenstein had reached retirement age in 1943, but the Faculty had permitted him to continue teaching until Geyser had obtained his doctorate. Geyser had registered in 1943 for a doctorate in Church History, but in September 1944 switched to New Testament studies with Professor Berend Gemser as doctoral advisor.
Geyser's appointment as professor produced controversies from the outset, relating to other faculty members, his lack of a doctorate, the selection of a rector for the University and, later, his theological interpretations and political views. His appointment had been subject to the completion of his doctorate.
Since 1944 Greyvenstein had wanted his successor to be either his student, S P J J van Rensburg, or the Dutch Dr Adrianus van Selms, lecturer in Semitic languages and Old Testament Studies in the Faculty since 1938. But by 1945 Van Rensburg lacked a doctorate, and although Van Rensburg had been given similar conditions to Geyser's, he fell out of contention as he took much longerVan Rensburg completed his dissertation only in 1958, with Geyser as his promoter, receiving final confirmation that he had obtained it cum laude in January 1959 (Oberholzer 2010). than Geyser to complete his doctoral examinations. Van Selms was a prisoner of war in Japanese-held Indonesia, and would only return in 1946.Van Selms had a leave of absence from the Faculty to serve as a lieutenant in the Royal Dutch Army during World War Two. Interned by the Japanese in the former Dutch colony of Indonesia from March 1942 to March 1945, he only resumed his duties in the Faculty in May 1946.
At the May 1945 general assembly of the NHK Greyvenstein requested to continue teaching beyond 1947 and mobilized some of his former students in support. Greyvenstein was particularly reluctant to surrender two of his three courses to Geyser, one of which he had handed off to C H Rautenbach in 1939. Another group solidified around Professor S P Engelbrecht in support of Geyser, who would have been left with only one course to teach if Greyvenstein had been allowed to continue. The NHK's General Assembly rejected Greyvenstein's position by a vote of 70 to 55, revealing that Geyser's ascension was far from unanimous. Disputes about Geyser's appointment continued through various official meetings until September 1946, when Greyvenstein abruptly retired, rendering it moot.
With regards to Geyser's academic qualifications, a Professor H P Wolmarans was concerned that Geyser's studies neglected theology in favour of classical languages. While Geyser completed the oral and written examinations well in August 1945, his examiners were divided about the quality of his doctoral dissertation. Only one of his three examiners, Professor J. De Zwaan of the University of Leiden, recommended that the degree should be granted cum laude, but this was the option endorsed by the council of the Faculty of Theology in March 1946.
After an initial appointment in 1946, Geyser was permanently appointed in September 1947Dreyer notes 1946 as the date of Geyser's appointment as professor. as professor and head of the Department of New Testament Science. Geyser insisted on taking all of Greyvenstein's subjects, including practical theology, Christian ethics, and dogmatics, forbidding students from attending Rautenbach's ethics class. Rautenbach aired his displeasure at Geyser's actions in various meetings. According to Adriaan Pont, former undergraduate of Geyser's and later his fiercest adversary, Rautenbach had opposed Geyser's appointment.
By 1948 Geyser, along with Gemser, was involved in the administration and maintenance of the official scholarly journal of the Faculty, Hervormde Teologiese Studies/Reformed Theological Studies. Meanwhile, Rautenbach was confirmed as rector of the University in March 1948.
Geyser's position at the University of Pretoria afforded him the opportunity to study in Europe and to broaden his perspectives. The Rijksuniversiteit of Utrecht invited Geyser to lecture in New Testament studies for six months in 1951. Recognition of his academic stature is revealed by his election in 1951 as one of five international members on the Utrecht Theological Society's committee. He served on the editorial boards of Novum Testamentum and of Supplements to Novum Testamentum. He worked for six months in 1959 at the Faculté de Libre du Protenstantisme at the Sorbonne on the concept of "The Church in the New Testament". In 1959 he was invited to the Papal Institute in Rome to visit the excavations under St. Peter's Basilica.
As a result of disputes raised by colleagues such as Pont, and some of Geyser's students about his political views and theological interpretations, Geyser was forced to resign from the University of Pretoria in 1961. Rautenbach was instrumental in dismissing Geyser.
In 1964 Geyser became the first professor and head of the Department of Divinity (later renamed the Department of Religious Studies) at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg.
Theological rejection of apartheid Geyser's first years at the University of Pretoria (i.e. 1946-1952) continued his support for the racial policies of the South African government and of his denomination, which was evident during his ministry. Writing about the evolution of Geyser's thinking, Pieter de Villiers comments that "Geyser’s support of apartheid [at this time] is not surprising, since a racist lifestyle was firmly embedded in South African social life and accepted as self-evident." The NHK's missionary policy proceeded from the position that as only whites could be members of the denomination, missionary work should aim to establish separate churches for each people group ("nation"). The NHK would be such a volkskerk, providing an exclusive ecclesiastical home for white Afrikaners while adhering to " 'conservative Christian-national values'", as the Commission of the NHK's General Church Assembly noted in June 1967.
Geyser's personal political affiliation during this period is unclear. His lifelong adversary, Pont, accused Geyser of having then been aligned with the United Party. The United Party, led by former Field Marshal Jan Smuts, was for co-operation with Britain, while at home it stood for an informal segregation, opposed geographic separation and, by the 1960s, wanted a single citizenship for all South Africans. By contrast, the National Party came to power in 1948 on the basis of a rejection of co-operation with Britain and proposals to implement apartheid formally. J P Oberholzer argues that by 1956 Geyser was a member of the Suid-Afrikaanse BondThe Suid-Afrikaanse Bond drew only 0.1% of the total vote in South Africa and South-West Africa in the 1958 general election, according to Groenewald (2013). and the Suid-Afrika Eerste Beweging, without providing further explanation. Pont himself helped to form the Herstigte Nasionale Party in 1969, and unsuccessfully stood for the HNP in the 1970 city council election in Waterkloof, Pretoria.
Geyser's actions and writing after 1952 suggest that two factors in post-Second World War Europe may have contributed to his abandonment of race-based nationalism and his lifelong commitment to ecumenism. German churches were having to deal with their support for an ethnic nationalism and with the subsequent genocide of Jews that followed. In response to a rising need for ecumenism, the World Council of Churches (WCC) was established in 1948 in Amsterdam. During his European stay Geyser was increasingly influenced by progressive ecumenists who had emerged in the Netherlands and elsewhere.
Following his return from Europe, Geyser became increasingly critical of the use of theology as a basis for apartheid. In reaction to a government proposal which in effect would forbid blacks from attending churches in white areas, Geyser warned in a July 1957 letter to Die Vaderland newspaper that "The church must seriously reconsider whether it will allow the re-erection of barriers that have been broken down by Christ." Portions of Geyser's letter were republished in The Star of 24 July 1957. Geyser's Pretoria colleague Ben Marais had made similar statements during the annual Peter Ainslie Memorial Lecture at Rhodes University on 10 September 1957.