Alexander, Joseph Addison

ALEXANDER, JOSEPH ADDISON: American Presbyterian; b. at Philadelphia Apr. 24,1809, third son of Archibald Alexander; d. at Princeton, N. J., Jan. 28, 1860. He was graduated at Princeton in 1826; became adjunct professor of ancient languages and literature there in 1830; studied and traveled in Europe in 1833 and 1834; on his return to America, became adjunct professor of Oriental and Biblical literature in Princeton Seminary. He was transferred to the chair of church history in 1851 and to that of New Testament literature in 1859. He was a remarkable linguist, assisted in preparing the first American edition of Donnegan’s Greek lexicon (Boston, 1840), and did much to introduce German theological learning into America. He wrote commentaries on Isaiah (2 vols., New York, 1846-47; ed. John Eadie, Glasgow, 1875) and the Psalms (3 vols., ib. 1850); with Prof. Charles Hodge he planned a series of popular commentaries on the books of the 123New Testament, of which he himself contributed those on the Acts (2 vols., 1857), Mark (1858), and Matthew. The last-cited was published posthumously (1861), as well as two volumes of sermons (1860) and Notes on New Testament Literature (2 vols., 1861).

Bibliography: H. C. Alexander, Life of J. A. Alexander, 2 vols., New York, 1869.