Bruce Metzger died on Tuesday, February 13. Anyone who went to seminary has probably used his A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament. Certainly, many have used UBS 3 and 4 which he was the editor. I knew someone who at one time was doing his quiet time (he did them using UBS3 in the Greek) and found an error in the manuscript. He wrote to Dr. Metzger and then received a really nice letter in return. He framed the letter and when we saw it, there were many oohs and aaahs. Dr. Metzger had that rare place, of teaching at a school as liberal as Princeton, but admired but many people conservative and liberal alike. Most people were moved by his humble character in Christ, despite his world-renowned intellect and scholarship. Biblical scholarship will miss his skills and biblical wisdom.
John Piper has an interesting post about Dr. Metzger and some funny stories:
1. His book, The New Testament: Its Background, Growth, and Context was the text I used each time I taught the basic New Testament course at Bethel from 1974 to 1979. It was short, careful, solid, and readable.
2. He came to Fuller Seminary during my studies there (1968-71) and taught a class on Galatians, which I took with great enjoyment. I was so helped by his teaching and so impressed with him as a man, I applied to Princeton to do my graduate work with him when I was finished at Fuller in 1971. I was rejected. He wrote me a personal letter to ease my disappointment, saying that only four people were accepted. It helped (a little).
3. He told us the story that when the Concordance to the Revised Standard Version of the Bible was published, the publisher offered $25 for every mistake people found. He told of sitting up in bed at night reading the concordance noting errorsâ€â€more for enjoyment than money.
4. Only when the Bible Societies’ Greek New Testament and the Aland Greek Testament coincided in wording did I make the change to use the small pocket size Aland Greek New Testament. Until then my ragged old Greek Testament was the Bible Societies’ editionâ€â€the one edited by Bruce Metzger.
5. He quoted a Chinese proverb: “The faintest ink is more lasting than the strongest memory.� Accordingly, he said in his Memoir (Reminiscences of an Octogenarian, p.229) that he made notes of noteworthy sayings on 3 by 5 cards as he read throughout his life. There are over 20,000 of these which were left to the archives at Princeton. One of them from R. W. Sockman says, “Time is the deposit each one has in the bank of God, and no one knows the balance.� (Until the note falls due.)
Several years after graduating from Fuller (I had missed out on the Colossians course), I spent a day at a pastor’s school studying the Book of Revelation with Dr. Metzger. We had one pastor who thought himself an intellect (and maybe he was–I do not know!), who would ask Dr. Metzger a question at every opportunity. This individual always started out his question with the qualifiers, “When I studied this text in the Greek, or Sanskrit, or whatever….” His questions usually showed his ignorance rather than his intelligence! We would groan! But Dr. Metzger gave us a lesson in being a gentleman scholar. He was never discourteous. He never put the man down. He would always take the question, listen intently, and then say something like, “I had never considered it that light.” That happened 30 plus ago and I can still see it vividly in my mind! What a true lesson we learned that day! Several years after graduating from Fuller (I had missed out on the Colossians course), I spent a day at a pastor’s school studying the Book of Revelation with Dr. Metzger. We had one pastor who thought himself an intellect (and maybe he was–I do not know!), who would ask Dr. Metzger a question at every opportunity. This individual always started out his question with the qualifiers, “When I studied this text in the Greek, or Sandscrit, or whatever….” His questions usually showed his ignorance and not his intelligence! We would groan! But Dr. Metzger gave us a lesson in being a gentleman scholar. He was never discourteous. He never put the man down. He would always take the question, listen intently, and then say something like, “I had never considered it that light.” That happened 30 plus ago and I can still see it vividly in my mind! What a true lesson we learned that day!
Posted by larry e. ramsey | April 7, 2007, 5:59 amSeveral years after graduating from Fuller (I had missed out on the Colossians course), I spent a day at a pastor’s school studying the Book of Revelation with Dr. Metzger. We had one pastor who thought himself an intellect (and maybe he was–I do not know!), who would ask Dr. Metzger a question at every opportunity. This individual always started out his question with the qualifiers, “When I studied this text in the Greek, or Sanskrit, or whatever….” His questions usually showed his ignorance rather than his intelligence! We would groan! But Dr. Metzger gave us a lesson in being a gentleman scholar. He was never discourteous. He never put the man down. He would always take the question, listen intently, and then say something like, “I had never considered it that light.” That happened 30 plus ago and I can still see it vividly in my mind! What a true lesson we learned that day! Several years after graduating from Fuller (I had missed out on the Colossians course), I spent a day at a pastor’s school studying the Book of Revelation with Dr. Metzger. We had one pastor who thought himself an intellect (and maybe he was–I do not know!), who would ask Dr. Metzger a question at every opportunity. This individual always started out his question with the qualifiers, “When I studied this text in the Greek, or Sanskrit, or whatever….” His questions usually showed his ignorance rather than his intelligence! We would groan! But Dr. Metzger gave us a lesson in being a gentleman scholar. He was never discourteous. He never put the man down. He would always take the question, listen intently, and then say something like, “I had never considered it that light.” That happened 30 plus ago and I can still see it vividly in my mind! What a true lesson we learned that day!
Posted by larry e. ramsey | April 7, 2007, 5:59 amLarry, thank you. That is a great story about Dr. Metzger. It would be so easy for him to cut down a guy like that into little shreds. So many others would have. But just shows the grace he had.
Posted by admin | April 18, 2007, 9:15 am