Last week marked the passing of one of the great NT textual critics of the 20th/21st-centuries. J. Keith Elliott has been a staple of textual criticism as long (and longer) than I’ve been a student of the subject. I first heard him at a conference on the ending of Mark at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in 2007 as an undergraduate. That conference, later published as a book, was instrumental in pushing me to become a text critic.
Speaking of typos, he was a very close reader, as any who read his book reviews will know. He had plenty of practice as as the long-time book review editor for Novum Testamentum. Receiving a positive review from Elliott gave one a sense, not so much of pride, as relief. I will never forget him referring to what he considered to be a book’s overly sanctimonious acknowledgements as “cringe-making and toe-curling.” Besides moving me to keep my own acknowledgments short, this particular line taught me that good academic writing did not have to be stiff and boring; it could be careful and still colorful. Elliott’s writing was both.
In my mind, his meticulousness as a scholar is encapsulated in two books on my shelf: his Bibliography of Greek New Testament Manuscripts and his Survey of Manuscripts Used in Editions of the Greek New Testament. The former he updated regularly and it is amazing to read it and see all that Elliott kept his pulse on. If readers would like a good sample of his work, Brill has kindly made his essay on thoroughgoing eclecticism open access.
Besides serving as an editor for Novum Testamentum and secretary of SNTS, Elliott served the IGNTP for 43 years in various roles as editor, secretary and member. (See the interview with Tommy at his retirement.) It surprised me to learn that Elliott was instrumental in the work of the Luke volumes as early as the 1970s. Much more surprising, but still indicative of the kind of person he was, Elliott was also a member briefly of the Majority Text Society for some years of the Dean Burgon society. Hixson will have to confirm this for me, but my understanding is that he was asked to give a talk at one of their meetings and he maintained his membership in order to get their newsletter and stay abreast of their work. He was ever the consummate bibliographer.
Elliott truly was a giant in our field. His passing feels like a great loss, one impossible to replace. But I take it as a moment to remind myself how important it is for those of us in the field to inspire the next generation. For myself, Elliott did that most of all through his speaking and writing. He remains for me a model of precision and thoroughness.
Posted below is a video of Elliott with Craig Evans to get a good sense of the man. (By the way, did you know Elliott has an IMDB page?)
I was once told that the majority of theology, church history, and general Christianity books for sale at St. Phillips used book store in Oxford came from Elliott’s personal library. They were books he’d receive to review or for other reasons.
ReplyDeleteI was able to confirm this with the manager of the bookstore earlier this year. While in the later years they’ve come from other sources, for a long time it was Elliot’s library that supplied the books at this famous used book store.
Wow! I've been to the shops many times.
DeleteCorrection : Elliott was never a member of the KJVO Burgon Society (they would not have let him join, for various reasons), but of the relatively short-lived "Majority Text Society" of Hodges, Farstad, and Pickering.
DeleteThanks for correcting that, MAR.
DeleteI have a few books with his name on a sticker on the inside cover that I picked up there.
DeleteR.I.P.
ReplyDeleteI'm curious as to what you know about his spiritual life, confessional beliefs. Did he see the Bible as Holy Scripture?
ReplyDeleteI don't know.
DeleteOne of the most enjoyable things I ever did when I worked at CSNTM was facilitating the digitization of Legg's unpublished manuscript of Luke, which was in his possession. While CSNTM was working at Lambeth Palace, I took the train up to Harrogate, had lunch with him and his wife, brought the manuscript back to be digitized during the week, then the following weekend took the train back up to give it back to him. He picked me up at the station, drove me around Harrogate, and took me to his house for half an hour or so before dropping me back off at the station. He had some fascinating stories and was an absolute delight of a person. A bit quirky in person but in a very formal British way. When he showed me his office. I said, "So this is where you find all the typos?" "Haha yes, something like that." Whether or not you agree with his thoroughgoing eclecticism, it's hard to imagine textual criticism without him.
ReplyDeleteOne fascinating story he told me as we were driving through Raleigh NC some years ago was that he grew up in Liverpool and went to the same high school as John Lennon and Paul McCartney, but chose a different and less income-worthy profession instead.
ReplyDeleteI heard the same story, though in the version I heard, it was Paul McCartney and George Harrison. Regardless of who the other Beatle was, there's a group photo that includes both Keith Elliott (in section 4) and Sir Paul (in section 5) here: https://www.liobians.org/panoramas/pan60Uv4.html
DeleteElijah is of course correct. My memory became confused by all those guys with mop-heads (as they were affectionately called in the 60s).
DeleteI knew Keith from the age of 13 to 18. We often played the piano on the duet form,and sometimes tennis . We both attended the Liverpool Institute high school. McCartneys ‘ & Harrison we’re also pupils in the 1950’
DeleteSic transit gloria Israel! I add my tribute to man who was not only a textual scholar but also a Christian gentleman, from whom, though I never met him face to face, I learned much. He allowed me, some years ago, many hours of telephonic conversation with him, not only guiding me in textual matters but also proffering much-needed personal advice. His truly broad and generous spirit was epitomised for me in an article that he sent to me, which he had written for The Majority Text Society in the Summer 2003 edition of their magazine — “John 1:18 - ‘God’ or ‘Son’ or ‘Stalemate’?”. In it, he said what was becoming clear to me, that “most theologically sensitive readings reflect early Christological debate”. And at the end of the article he wrote that “sometimes it may be wisest to print all the viable alternatives, without favouring any of them as the originals”. He had a deep desire to inform the ordinary Christian reader. RIP.
ReplyDeleteI was greatly saddened to learn of the passing of Prof.J. Keith Elliott. He and I were both supervised by G.D. Kilpatrick in Oxford. Elliott was Book Review editor for Novum Testamentum, and for 30 years he recruited me to review books for that journal, often speaking highly of my work. Over the years he allowed me to review books of my choosing, some of which proved to be some of the most important books in the field. His contribution to NT textual criticism was of considerable importance, advancing the approach of Thoroughgoing Eclecticism, an approach which I also have followed. Beyond Textual criticism his contribution to the study of the New Testament and early Christianity is evidenced, not least, by his valuable edition of New Testament Apocrypha, published by Oxford University Press.. I will miss Keith Elliott's encouragement and friendship. Peter Rodgers
ReplyDeleteJust reading this now.
ReplyDeleteIt is sad, of course, to hear of Elliott's passing. Like many others, I benefited greatly from his work. While I would never abandon external evidence to the extent that he did, I *thoroughly* believed that he offered a valuable corrective. Too often, too many textual critics are willing to accept a blindingly inferior reading simply because, by some fluke of uncontrolled transmission history, that reading happens to be found in an otherwise reliable manuscript. I see Elliott's work as a call to, in some cases, return to common sense.
That said, I remember and could not disagree more with his criticism of long and effusive acknowledgements! For too long scholars have tried to maintain some sort of mythical objectivity, even in our refusal to use the first person singular pronoun! It's like we want to give the impression that our scholarly work just dropped from the sky, unaided and untainted by human contribution. Effusive acknowledgements are a valuable corrective to that - they admit that our work had very human origins in a very human environment and so we want to acknowledge in a very human way all the other humans who had a part in it. Also, for the love of all things stiff upper lip, what is so wrong about expressing a few feelings in print? I say bring on the long acknowledgements. They enable us to contextualise the scholar's work. I've had the privledge of meeting a number of great textual critics socially, and whenever i have, the last thing i've wanted to talk about is textual criticism! Rather, i have always wanted to take that chance to get to know them as a person, so that i can better understand their work. I had one conversation with Bruce Metzger, and i think we spent the entire tim talking about his grandkids! If you're so british that you can't handle some long acknowledgments, then go ahead and turn the page. But i'm telling you, you're missing the most important part of the work.