ALTING, JACOB, son of the preceding, was born at Heidelberg in 1618. He studied theology and the Oriental languages at Groningen, and in 1638 he put himself under the tuition of a Jewish rabbi at Embden. In 1640 he went to England, and was admitted to clerical orders by Dr Pricleaux, bishop of Worcester; but an offer of the Hebrew professorship in the university of Groningen induced him to return to Holland in 1643. In 1667 he was appointed professor of theology in the university. In this office he gave great offence to his colleague, Samuel Desmarets, by his disuse of the scholastic method of teaching. Desmarets preferred a charge of heresy against him; but the divines at Leyden pronounced that Alting was not guilty of anything more serious than imprudent fondness for innovation. Alting died of a fever in 1679. The fondness which he showed for rabbinical learning gave birth to the general report that he was inclined to become a Jew. His opinions, which seem to have excited more general attention than they deserve, may be seen in his writings, which were collected a few years after his death, and published in five volumes folio, by his pupil, the well-known Balthasar Bekker.