Mike Holmes informs me that Bruce Metzger died yesterday (Feb. 13 2007). An obituary will appear here shortly. As a textual critic he has had an outstanding influence and an impeccable reputation. It is hard to do justice to his achievement in words now as I write and so I will reserve further comment till I have had more time to reflect. I'm profoundly grateful to God for his writing.
Update: NewsDay, Home News Tribune (courtesy of Novum Testamentum blog, which also records what various blogs are saying), The Trentonian, Christianity Today, Iain Torrance (president of Princeton Theological Seminary), PTS newspage, NJ.com. Press of Atlantic City, John Piper. Memorial service in Princeton 20 Feb, 2 p.m.
A forum for people with knowledge of the Bible in its original languages to discuss its manuscripts and textual history from the perspective of historic evangelical theology.
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This AP article seems to be to first to announce his death. It doesn't scratch the surface of his importance as a scholar.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/newjersey/ny-bc-nj--obit-metzger0214feb14,0,2607775.story?coll=ny-region-apnewjersey
Much could be said, and I'm not the person to say it. But perhaps I could mention that, in addition to his vast importance as a text critic scholar, he seemed to have a concern for the non-scholar in the church pew.
ReplyDeleteThis is reflected particularly in his little book on the John's Revelation entitled, Breaking the Code. It is quite the antidote to the "Left Behind" approach infecting soooo many churches and lay leaders in North America.
Yes, we are rightly impressed--even overwhelmed--with his 50+ year bibliographic record. But along with his works of such towering scholarship, we find that he also had a concern to make the Bible accessible to non-scholars in the Church.
Jim Leonard
Aberdeen
Dan Wallace has offered his thoughts on Dr. Metzger's passing at http://www.reclaimingthemind.org/blog
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