Heiko Oberman; History Professor, Biographer of Martin Luther

Heiko Oberman, 70, a noted scholar and expert on the Reformation, the Renaissance and the late Middle Ages, died April 22 in Tucson of melanoma.

Born in the Netherlands, Oberman’s father was imprisoned by the Nazis during the war for helping Jews find safe haven. Oberman graduated from the University of Utrecht and studied at Osford University. He was an ordained minister and taught at Harvard divinity school before taking a professorship in church history at the University of Tubingen in Germany.

A prolific writer in Dutch, German and English, Oberman is best known for an 1982 biography of Martin Luther titled “Luther: Man Between God and the Devil.”

In 1984, Oberman moved to Tucson to accept a position as Regents’ professor of history at the University of Arizona.