Briggs, Charles Augustus

BRIGGS, CHARLES AUGUSTUS: Protestant Episcopalian; b. at New York City Jan. 15, 1841. He was educated at the University of Virginia (1857–60), Union Theological Seminary (1861–63), and the University of Berlin (1866–69). From 1863 to 1866 he was in business with his father. He was ordained to the Presbyterian ministry and was pastor at Roselle, N. J., from 1870 to 1874, when he was appointed professor of Hebrew at Union Theological Seminary. In 1891 he was transferred to the chair of Biblical theology, and since 1904 has been professor of theological encyclopedia and symbolics. In 1892 he was tried for heresy by the Presbytery of New York, but was acquitted, although in the following year he was suspended by the General Assembly. In 1899 he was ordained to the priesthood in the Protestant Episcopal Church. He is a member of the American Oriental Society, the Deutsche Morgenländische Gesellschaft, and the Society of Biblical Literature and Exegesis. He was editor of the Presbyterian Review from 1880 to 1890, and collaborated with S. D. F. Salmond in editing the International Theological Library (New York, 1891 sqq.), with S. R. Driver and A. Plummer in editing the International Critical Commentary (1895 sqq.), and with F. Brown and S. R. Driver in preparing the Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (12 parts, Oxford, 1891–1906). In addition to numerous studies in various theological periodicals, he has written Biblical Study (New York, 1883); American Presbyterianism (1885); Messianic Prophecy (1886); Whither? A Theological Question for the Times (1889); The Authority of Holy Scripture (1891); The Bible, the Church, and the Reason (1892); The Higher Criticism of the Hexateuch (1893); The Messiah of the Gospels (1894); The Messiah of the Apostles (1895); General Introduction to the Study of Holy Scripture (1899); The Incarnation of the Lord (1902); New Light on the 271Life of Jesus (1904); Ethical Teachings of Jesus (1904); and Critical Commentary on the Psalms (1906).