Moffatt, James

▪ British biblical scholar

born July 4, 1870, Glasgow, Lanarkshire, Scot.

died June 27, 1944, New York, N.Y., U.S.

      Scottish biblical scholar and translator who singlehandedly produced one of the best-known modern translations of the Bible.

      Educated at Glasgow Academy and Glasgow University, Moffatt was ordained in the Church of Scotland in 1896 and immediately began a career of pastoral service that was to last 16 years, during which time he produced his first scholarly writings. His Introduction to the Literature of the New Testament, a comprehensive survey of contemporary biblical scholarship, appeared in 1911, while he was pastor of a church at Broughton Ferry, Scot. The next year he joined the faculty at the University of Oxford and in 1913 published his translation of the New Testament. From 1915 to 1927 he was professor of church history at the University of Glasgow, publishing his Old Testament in 1924, and in 1927 he took a similar position at Union Theological Seminary in New York City. Although his own chief interest was in church history, he is better known for his New Testament criticism; he edited a series of commentaries on the New Testament, published 1928–49. After his formal retirement in 1938, he continued teaching and served as a consultant to a radio serial dramatization of the Bible.

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