The 2019 Liverpool Lecture of the Jonathan-Edwards Centre, UK
The 2019 Liverpool Lecture of the Jonathan-Edwards Centre, UK, will take place on Monday 17th June, 15:30-17:00, Lecture Theatre 1 in the Rendall Building
We are looking forward to welcoming Prof. Mark W. Elliott, Professor of Divinity and Biblical Criticism at Glasgow, and Professorial Fellow at Wycliffe College, Toronto. He will speak on ‘Jonathan Edwards and his “biblical Aesthetic” in the light of his exegetical tradition.’
Prof. Elliott has served as Assistant Director at the Whitfield Institute in Oxford, has held teaching posts at Liverpool Hope University College and, most recently, at St. Andrews University, where he taught for fifteen years. While there he served for three years as the Head of the School of Divinity. He is a Member of the Working Group, La Bible et ses traditions, L’Ecole Biblique, Jerusalem, and serves on the editorial board of Renaissance and Reformation Review. He has held fellowships at Theologische Universiteit, Kampen, and Keble College, Oxford, and is currently Honorary Supervisor at Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam.
For the last decade Professor Elliott has been the Chair of the History of Interpretation Section of the Society for Biblical Literature, and has also served as Director of the Institute for Bible, Theology and Hermeneutics at St. Andrews. He is collaborating with Professor David Fergusson on a project on the History of Scottish Theology. He is in demand as a speaker internationally and has lectured in Canada, the US, Australia, and across Europe (in both French and German). His authored books include: Providence: a biblical theology (Baker, forthcoming); The reality of Biblical Theology (Peter Lang, 2001); Isaiah 40-66 in the Ancient Christian Commentary Series (IVP, 2007) and The Song of Songs and Christology in the Early Church, 381-451 (Mohr Siebeck, 2000). Prof. Elliott is also a volunteer with the Langham Partnership, which offers free theological tuition to scholars from the developing world. Prof. Elliott has published numerous articles and book chapters for such reference works as Das Handbuch der Bibelhermeneutiken (2016), The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Bible and Theology (2016), The Oxford Handbook of Christology (2015), The New Cambridge History of the Bible (2015, 2013), The Oxford Encyclopedia of Biblical Interpretation (2013), and The Cambridge Dictionary of Christian Theology (2011). He holds a BA in Jurisprudence from the University of Oxford, a BD from Aberdeen University and a PhD from the University of Cambridge.
Prof. Elliott has chosen this title and abstract:
Jonathan Edwards and his ‘biblical Aesthetic’ in the light of his exegetical tradition.
Framed on one side by theological investigations by the likes of Sang Hyun Lee, Oliver Crisp, and Gerald McDermott, and on the other a more ‘cultural history’ angle proceeding from Perry Miller through Harry Stout and George Marsden, a certain turn towards Edwards exegesis in the last two decades has had the advantage of being able to relate both Edwards’ historical context and his theological approach, since his exegesis bears the marks of a strong influence of the philosophy of European biblical humanism. The volume Jonathan Edwards and the Bible by Robert Brown in 2002 (Indiana University Press, 2002) marked a trail that would be taken advantage of by a newer generation of those primarily, although not restrictively, focused on Edwardsian exegesis and hermeneutics (e.g. Sweeney, Barshinger. The work by Amy Plantinga Pauw is possibly the best example of an attempt to show the relationship of biblical theology to that of Dogmatics in Edwards.) Whatever the extent of Edwards' debt to the exegesis of Grotius to Cotton Mather, the Scriptural aesthetic—both the bible’s idea of beauty and the beauty of the bible’s form -- may be a key consideration for any evaluation.
This is a public lecture and all are invited to attend.
For further information and enquiries, please contact Dr Daniel Hill.