James Bannerman (theologian)
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James Bannerman | |
|---|---|
 photograph of Bannerman by David Octavius Hill & Robert Adamson c. 1843-1847 | |
| Born | 9 April 1807 |
| Died | 27 March 1868 (aged 60) |
| Education | University of Edinburgh, Princeton University |
| Occupations | Pastor, Theologian |
| Years active | mid 19th-century |
| Notable work | The Church of Christ, Inspiration |
| Theological work | |
| Tradition or movement | Free Church of Scotland (1843–1900) |
| Main interests | Ecclesiology, Biblical inspiration |
James Bannerman (9 April 1807 – 27 March 1868) was a Scottish theologian.[1] He is best known for his classic work on Presbyterian ecclesiology, The Church of Christ.
Bannerman was the son of James Patrick Bannerman, minister of Cargill, Perthshire. He was born at the manse of Cargill on 9 April 1807, and after a distinguished career at the University of Edinburgh, especially in the classes of Sir John Leslie and Professor Wilson, became minister of Ormiston, in Midlothian, in 1833, left the Established Church for the Free Church in 1843, and in 1849 was appointed professor of apologetics and pastoral theology in the New College, Edinburgh, which office he held till his death, 27 March 1868, at his home, 7 Clarendon Crescent, near Dean Bridge.[2]
In 1850 he received the degree of D.D. from Princeton College, New Jersey. He took a leading part in various public movements, especially in that which led in 1843 to the separation of the free church from the state, and subsequently in the negotiations for union between the nonconformist presbyterian churches of England and Scotland.
Works
His chief publications were:
- Letter to the Marquis of Tweeddale on the Church Question, 1840[3]
- The Prevalent Forms of Unbelief, 1849[4]
- Systematic Theology, 1851[5]
- Apologetical Theology, 1851[6]
- Inspiration: the Infallible Truth and Divine Authority of the Holy Scriptures, 1865[7]
- The Church of Christ, also known as The Church: a Treatise on the Nature, Powers, Ordinances, Discipline, and Government of the Christian Church, 2 vols. 8vo; published after his death in 1868, and edited by his son[8][9][10]
- A volume of sermons (also posthumous) published in 1869[11][12]
Rosemary Mitchell asserts: "Bannerman published several theological works: one of the most significant, Inspiration: the Infallible Truth and Divine Authority of the Holy Scriptures (1865), was criticized by the theologian A. B. Davidson (1831–1902) for calling forth 'no opposition and no assent' (Drummond and Bulloch, 263). Nevertheless, it sounded a cautious retreat from the fundamentalism of Free Church orthodoxy, as Bannerman dissociated himself from the theory of verbal inspiration and accepted translations (and even paraphrases) as equally valid with the Greek and Hebrew scriptural originals."[13]
