Benjamin Boothroyd (1768 – 8 September 1836) was an English Independent minister and Hebrew scholar. He had the degrees of D.D. and L.L.D.

Life

Born at Warley Town, in the parish of

Halifax, Yorkshire Halifax () is a minster and market town in the Metropolitan Borough of Calderdale in West Yorkshire, England. It is the commercial, cultural and administrative centre of the borough, and the headquarters of Calderdale Council. In the 15th cent ...

, on 10 October 1768, Booth was the son of a shoemaker there. He was sent to the village school, leaving it when six years old. He helped his father to make shoes for a time, but when about 14 years old he ran away. In

Lancashire Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated Lancs) is the name of a historic county, ceremonial county, and non-metropolitan county in North West England. The boundaries of these three areas differ significantly. The non-metropolitan county of Lancashi ...

he found work with a

Methodist Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a group of historically related denominations of Protestant Christianity whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's b ...

; and later returned to Warley to superintend his father's trade. About 1785 Boothroyd devoted himself to religion, attended prayer meetings and spoke at them; he read

Philip Doddridge Philip Doddridge D.D. (26 June 1702 – 26 October 1751) was an English Nonconformist (specifically, Congregationalist) minister, educator, and hymnwriter. Early life Philip Doddridge was born in London the last of the twenty children of D ...

's works and was admitted a student of the North Howram dissenting academy. In 1790 he was chosen minister at

Pontefract Pontefract is a historic market town in the Metropolitan Borough of Wakefield in West Yorkshire, England, east of Wakefield and south of Castleford. Historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, it is one of the towns in the City of Wake ...

. Ordained there, he succeeded in filling his chapel and a new one was built. He also opened a shop as a bookseller and printer. In 1818 Boothroyd (who had accepted the degree of LL.D.) became co-pastor at Highfield Chapel,

Huddersfield Huddersfield is a market town in the Kirklees district in West Yorkshire, England. It is the administrative centre and largest settlement in the Kirklees district. The town is in the foothills of the Pennines. The River Holme's confluence into ...

, with the Rev. William Moorhouse. On 10 January 1836 he went down with a violent illness; he died on 8 September and was buried at Huddersfield.

Works

In 1807, having had materials for a history of the town given to him by a Richard Hepworth, Booth added to them, and brought out, at his own press, ''History of the Ancient Borough of Pontefract''. He then studied Hebrew, to produce a new Hebrew bible. He printed the work himself, and his wife helped him in correcting the proofs. It was brought out in quarterly parts, beginning in 1810, and finishing in 1813, under the title of ''Biblia Hebraica : or the Hebrew scriptures of the Old Testament, without points, after the text of Kennicott, with the chief various readings...accompanied with English notes, critical, philological, and explanatory, selected from the...Biblical critics'', and formed finally two volumes, as a project taking seven years. Boothroyd published standard works, and sermons of his own. His ''Sermon occasioned by the Death of Miss B. Shilito'' (1813) included Miss Shilito's

conversion narrative Broadly speaking, a conversion narrative is a narrative that relates the operation of conversion, usually religious. As a specific aspect of American literary and religious history, the conversion narrative was an important facet of Puritan sacred a ...

. In 1818 Booth completed his ''New Family Bible and Improved Version'' in three vols. 4to, which had been suggested to him on a visit to York by

Henry Tuke Henry Tuke (24 March 1755 – 11 August 1814) co-founded with his father, William Tuke, the Retreat asylum in York, England, a humane alternative to the nineteenth-century network of asyla, based on Quaker principles.Burial: "England & Wales, ...

, a Quaker. He printed many copies of it at his own press. It contained notes, and in recognition of his achievement the university of Glasgow conferred on Boothroyd the degree of D.D. in 1824. In 1835 he completed an octavo edition of the ''Family Bible''.

Family

In 1801 Boothroyd married a Miss Hurst of Pontefract; she died in 1832. They had four daughters and four sons.

Notes

Attribution * {{DEFAULTSORT:Boothroyd, Benjamin 1768 births 1836 deaths English Congregationalist ministers Christian Hebraists English antiquarians