Frederic Charles Cook (1 December 1804– 22 June 1889) was an English churchman, known as a linguist and the editor of the ''Speaker's Commentary'' on the Bible.

Life

Born at Millbrook,

Hampshire Hampshire (, ; abbreviated to Hants.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Berkshire to the north, Surrey and West Sussex to the east, the Isle of Wight across the Solent to the south, ...

, and later moved to Berkshire, he was admitted as a sizar of

St John's College, Cambridge St John's College, formally the College of St John the Evangelist in the University of Cambridge, is a Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge, founded by the House of Tudor, Tudor matriarch L ...

, 8 July 1824, graduated B.A. with a first class in the classical tripos in 1831, and M.A. in 1844. After leaving Cambridge he studied for a while under Barthold Georg Niebuhr at the

University of Bonn The University of Bonn, officially the Rhenish Friedrich Wilhelm University of Bonn (), is a public research university in Bonn, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It was founded in its present form as the () on 18 October 1818 by Frederick Willi ...

. He was ordained by Charles James Blomfield in 1839, and a few years later was made her majesty's inspector of church schools. In 1857 Cook was appointed chaplain-in-ordinary to the queen, in 1860 he became preacher at Lincoln's Inn, in 1864 canon-residentiary at Exeter Cathedral (replacing Harold Browne), and in 1869 chaplain to the bishop of London. Cook was made precentor of Exeter Cathedral in 1872. He resigned his preachership at Lincoln's Inn in 1880. He was an invalid during the last years of his life, and died at Exeter on 22 June 1889. He left his library to the cathedral chapter.

Works

Cook issued in 1849 his ''Poetry for Schools''. Around 1864, when the liberal theology of the '' Essays and Reviews'' and John Colenso was prominent, John Evelyn Denison suggested the

Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the State religion#State churches, established List of Christian denominations, Christian church in England and the Crown Dependencies. It is the mother church of the Anglicanism, Anglican Christian tradition, ...

reply with biblical apologetics. A commission was formed, after consultation with the bishops, which divided the Bible into eight sections, and for each section chose scholars to provide commentary. The editorship of the whole work (10 volumes), which became known as ''The Speaker's Commentary'', was given to Cook, and it appeared 1871 to 1882. The

Apocrypha Apocrypha () are biblical or related writings not forming part of the accepted canon of scripture, some of which might be of doubtful authorship or authenticity. In Christianity, the word ''apocryphal'' (ἀπόκρυφος) was first applied to ...

were treated separately under the editorship of Henry Wace in 1888. The ''Commentary'' came under attack: the portions by Harold Browne on the Pentateuch were criticised by Colenso, Abraham Kuenen, and others. John Mee Fuller edited a ''Student's Commentary'' (1884) based on the work. Cook himself was a critic of the revised New Testament, in ''The Revised Version of the First Three Gospels'' (1882). In ''The Origins of Religion and Language'' (1884), he upheld the original unity of speech. He is said to have been acquainted with 52 languages.

Family

Cook married on 2 June 1846 at St Nicholas Church, Brighton, to Jessie Barbara, daughter of Alexander Douglas McKenzie of Bursledon,

, Will Probated: 7 January 1843 for Alexander Douglas McKenzie of Bursledon, Hampshire but left no issue. He was a brother-in-law to the Rev. Robert Montgomery and uncle to Jessie Montgomery. Cook died at Exeter on the 22 June 1889. His widow died at Exeter on 5 October 1889.

Notes

;Attribution

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Cook, Frederic Charles 1804 births 1889 deaths 19th-century English Anglican priests Linguists from the United Kingdom Alumni of St John's College, Cambridge People from Southampton (district)