Johann August Eberhard, the German theologian and "popular philosopher," was born in Halberstadt. He studied theology at Halle, and became a preacher at Halberstadt in 1763 and at Charlottenburg in 1774. In 1778 Frederick II of Prussia appointed him professor of theology at Halle. Eberhard became a member of the Berlin Academy in 1786 and a privy councilor in 1805. He wrote on theology, epistemology, ethics, aesthetics, philology, and the history of philosophy.

Eberhard received a Wolffian education, but, under the influence of Moses Mendelssohn and Christian Friedrich Nicolai, he soon developed a personal point of view. As a popular philosopher, Eberhard was averse to abstract speculation and interested in natural theology, psychology, ethics, and aesthetics. He opposed enthusiasm, sentimentalism, and occultism, and favored the empirical approach.

In his Neue Apologie des Socrates (New Apology of Socrates; 2 vols., Berlin, 1772–1778) Eberhard denied that salvation depended on revelation, and...