Ezra Abbot (April 28, 1819,

Jackson, Maine Jackson is a town in Waldo County, Maine, United States. The town was named after General Henry Jackson of the Revolutionary War. The population was 610 at the 2020 census. Geography According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a ...

March 21, 1884,

Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. As part of the Boston metropolitan area, the cities population of the 2020 U.S. census was 118,403, making it the fourth most populous city in the state, behind Boston, ...

) was an American biblical scholar.

Life and writings

Abbot was born at

, April 28, 1819; son of Ezra and Phebe Abbot. He was educated at

Phillips Exeter Academy (not for oneself) la, Finis Origine Pendet (The End Depends Upon the Beginning) gr, Χάριτι Θεοῦ (By the Grace of God) , location = 20 Main Street , city = Exeter, New Hampshire , zipcode ...

and graduated from

Bowdoin College Bowdoin College ( ) is a private liberal arts college in Brunswick, Maine. When Bowdoin was chartered in 1794, Maine was still a part of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The college offers 34 majors and 36 minors, as well as several joint eng ...

in 1840. In 1847, at the request of Prof.

Andrews Norton Andrews Norton (December 31, 1786 – September 18, 1853) was an American preacher and theologian. Along with William Ellery Channing, he was the leader of mainstream Unitarianism of the early and middle 19th century, and was known as the "Unitari ...

, he went to

where he was principal of a public school until 1856. He was assistant librarian of

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

from 1856 to 1872, and planned and perfected an alphabetical card catalog, combining many of the advantages of the ordinary dictionary catalogs with the grouping of the minor topics under more general heads, which is characteristic of a systematic catalogue. From 1872 until his death he was Bussey Professor of

New Testament The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Christ ...

Criticism and Interpretation in the

Harvard Divinity School Harvard Divinity School (HDS) is one of the constituent schools of Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The school's mission is to educate its students either in the academic study of religion or for leadership roles in religion, gov ...

. Abbot's studies were chiefly in Southwest Asian languages and textual criticism of the New Testament, though his work as a bibliographer showed such results as the exhaustive list of writings (5300 in all) on the doctrine of the future life, appended to W. R. Alger's ''History of the Doctrine of a Future Life, as it has prevailed in all Nations and Ages'' (1862), and published separately in 1864. Abbot's publications, though always of the most thorough and scholarly character, were to a large extent dispersed in the pages of reviews, dictionaries, concordances, texts edited by others, Unitarian controversial treatises, etc. However, he took a more conspicuous and personal part in the preparation (with

Baptist Baptists form a major branch of Protestantism distinguished by baptizing professing Christian believers only (believer's baptism), and doing so by complete immersion. Baptist churches also generally subscribe to the doctrines of soul compete ...

scholar Horatio Balch Hackett) of the enlarged American edition of Dr. (afterwards Sir) William Smith's ''Dictionary of the Bible'' (1867–1870), to which he contributed more than 400 articles, as well as greatly improving the bibliographical completeness of the work. He was an efficient member of the American revision committee for the Revised Version (1881–1885) of the

King James Bible The King James Version (KJV), also the King James Bible (KJB) and the Authorized Version, is an Bible translations into English, English translation of the Christian Bible for the Church of England, which was commissioned in 1604 and publis ...

, and helped prepare

Caspar René Gregory Caspar René Gregory (November 6, 1846 – April 9, 1917) was an American-born German theologian. Life Gregory was born to Mary Jones and Henry Duval Gregory in Philadelphia. He was the brother of the American zoologist Emily Ray Gregory. After ...

's Prolegomena to the revised

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

New Testament of

Constantin von Tischendorf Lobegott Friedrich Constantin (von) Tischendorf (18 January 18157 December 1874) was a German biblical scholar. In 1844, he discovered the world's oldest and most complete Bible dated to around the mid-4th century and called Codex Sinaiticus a ...

. He was one of the 32 founding members of the

Society of Biblical Literature The Society of Biblical Literature (SBL), founded in 1880 as the Society of Biblical Literature and Exegesis, is an American-based learned society dedicated to the academic study of the Bible and related ancient literature. Its current stated mis ...

in 1880. His principal single work, representing his scholarly method and conservative conclusions, was ''The Authorship of the Fourth Gospel: External Evidences'' (1880; 2nd ed. by J. H. Thayer, with other essays, 1889), originally a lecture. In spite of the compression due to its form, this work was up to that time probably the ablest defense, based on external evidence, of the Johannine authorship, and certainly the most complete treatment of the relation of

Justin Martyr Justin Martyr ( el, Ἰουστῖνος ὁ μάρτυς, Ioustinos ho martys; c. AD 100 – c. AD 165), also known as Justin the Philosopher, was an early Christian apologist and philosopher. Most of his works are lost, but two apologies and ...

to this gospel.

Honors

Abbot was elected a Fellow of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and ...

in 1861. Though a layman, he received the degree of S.T.D. from Harvard in 1872, and that of D.D. from

Edinburgh Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian ...

in 1884.

Works

Books

* - revised by Ezra Abbot * * *

Journal articles

References

Attribution * Endnote: **See S. J. Barrows, ''Ezra Abbot'' (Cambridge, Mass., 1884). *

External links

* * * * Th
historical records
of Ezra Abbot are in the Harvard Divinity School Library at

. {{DEFAULTSORT:Abbot, Ezra 1819 births 1884 deaths 19th-century biblical scholars American religion academics American religious writers Bowdoin College alumni Harvard Divinity School faculty Harvard University staff People from Waldo County, Maine Writers from Cambridge, Massachusetts Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences American biblical scholars New Testament scholars Translators of the Bible into English 19th-century translators Harvard University librarians Phillips Exeter Academy alumni