
Joseph Barber Lightfoot (13 April 1828 – 21 December 1889), known as J. B. Lightfoot, was an
English theologian
Theology is the systematic study of the nature of the divine and, more broadly, of religious belief. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing th ...
and
Bishop of Durham
The Bishop of Durham is the Anglican bishop responsible for the Diocese of Durham in the Province of York. The diocese is one of the oldest in England and its bishop is a member of the House of Lords. Paul Butler has been the Bishop of Durha ...
.
Life
Lightfoot was born in
Liverpool
Liverpool is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the List of English districts by population, 10th largest English district by population and its E ...
, where his father John Jackson Lightfoot was an accountant. His mother, Ann Matilda Barber, was from a family of Birmingham artists. He was educated at
King Edward's School, Birmingham, under
James Prince Lee. His contemporaries included
Brooke Foss Westcott and
Edward White Benson. In 1847, Lightfoot went to
Trinity College, Cambridge
Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge or Oxford. ...
, and read for his degree along with Westcott. He graduated senior classic and 30th
wrangler, and was elected a fellow of his college. From 1854 to 1859 he edited the ''Journal of Classical and Sacred Philology''. In 1857, he became tutor and his fame as a scholar grew. He was made
Hulsean professor in 1861, and shortly afterwards chaplain to the
Prince Consort and honorary chaplain in ordinary to
Queen Victoria
Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death in 1901. Her reign of 63 years and 216 days was longer than that of any previ ...
.
In 1866, he was Whitehall preacher, and in 1871 he became canon of
St Paul's Cathedral
St Paul's Cathedral is an Anglicanism, Anglican cathedral in London and is the seat of the Bishop of London. The cathedral serves as the mother church of the Diocese of London. It is on Ludgate Hill at the highest point of the City of London ...
. ''
The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' ...
'' wrote after his death that
In 1875, Lightfoot became
Lady Margaret's Professor of Divinity in succession to
William Selwyn. In 1879, he was consecrated bishop of Durham in succession to
Charles Baring; he was enthroned at
Durham Cathedral
The Cathedral Church of Christ, Blessed Mary the Virgin and St Cuthbert of Durham, commonly known as Durham Cathedral and home of the Shrine of St Cuthbert, is a cathedral in the city of Durham, County Durham, England. It is the seat of ...
on 15 May. He soon surrounded himself with a band of scholarly young men.
Lightfoot was never married. He died at
Bournemouth
Bournemouth () is a coastal resort town in the Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole council area of Dorset, England. At the 2011 census, the town had a population of 183,491, making it the largest town in Dorset. It is situated on the English ...
and was succeeded in the episcopate by Westcott, his schoolfellow and lifelong friend. He served as
President of the first day of the 1880
Co-operative Congress.
He is buried in Durham Cathedral close to the choir stalls.
Work
Lightfoot wrote commentaries on the
Epistle to the Galatians
The Epistle to the Galatians is the ninth book of the New Testament. It is a letter from Paul the Apostle to a number of Early Christian communities in Galatia. Scholars have suggested that this is either the Roman province of Galatia in south ...
(1865),
Epistle to Philippians (1868) and
Epistle to the Colossians
The Epistle to the Colossians is the twelfth book of the New Testament. It was written, according to the text, by Paul the Apostle and Timothy, and addressed to the church in Colossae, a small Phrygian city near Laodicea and approximately ...
(1875). In 1874, the anonymous publication of ''Supernatural Religion'', a
skeptical work by
Walter Richard Cassels, attracted much attention. In a series of rebuttals published in the ''Contemporary Review'', between December 1874 and May 1877, Lightfoot undertook the defense of the
New Testament
The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Christ ...
canon. The articles were published in collected form in 1889. About the same time he was engaged in contributions to
William Smith's ''Dictionary of Christian Biography and Dictionary of the Bible'', and he also joined the committee for revising the translation of the New Testament.
The corpus of Lightfoot's writings include essays on biblical and historical subject matter, commentaries on
Pauline epistles
The Pauline epistles, also known as Epistles of Paul or Letters of Paul, are the thirteen books of the New Testament attributed to Paul the Apostle, although the authorship of some is in dispute. Among these epistles are some of the earliest ext ...
, and studies on the ''
Apostolic Fathers
The Apostolic Fathers, also known as the Ante-Nicene Fathers, were core Christian theologians among the Church Fathers who lived in the 1st and 2nd centuries AD who are believed to have personally known some of the Twelve Apostles or to have b ...
''. His sermons were posthumously published in four official volumes, and additionally in the Contemporary Pulpit Library series. At Durham he continued to work at his editions of the ''Apostolic Fathers'', and in 1885 published an edition of the ''Epistles of
Ignatius and
Polycarp
Polycarp (; el, Πολύκαρπος, ''Polýkarpos''; la, Polycarpus; AD 69 155) was a Christian bishop of Smyrna. According to the '' Martyrdom of Polycarp'', he died a martyr, bound and burned at the stake, then stabbed when the fire failed ...
'', collecting also materials for a second edition of ''
Clement of Rome'', which was published after his death (1st ed., 1869). He defended the authenticity of the ''Epistles of Ignatius''.
In 2014, it was announced that
InterVarsity Press had agreed to publish about 1500 pages of previously unpublished biblical commentaries and essays by Lightfoot found in
Durham Cathedral
The Cathedral Church of Christ, Blessed Mary the Virgin and St Cuthbert of Durham, commonly known as Durham Cathedral and home of the Shrine of St Cuthbert, is a cathedral in the city of Durham, County Durham, England. It is the seat of ...
. The first of the three volume set covers the
Acts of the Apostles, the second is a commentary on the
Gospel of John
The Gospel of John ( grc, Εὐαγγέλιον κατὰ Ἰωάννην, translit=Euangélion katà Iōánnēn) is the fourth of the four canonical gospels. It contains a highly schematic account of the ministry of Jesus, with seven "sig ...
and the third is on the
Second Epistle to the Corinthians
The Second Epistle to the Corinthians is a Pauline epistle of the New Testament of the Christian Bible. The epistle is attributed to Paul the Apostle and a co-author named Timothy, and is addressed to the church in Corinth and Christians in t ...
and the
First Epistle of Peter
The First Epistle of Peter is a book of the New Testament. The author presents himself as Peter the Apostle. The ending of the letter includes a statement that implies that it was written from " Babylon", which is possibly a reference to Rome. ...
.
[Lightfoot, J. B. (2016). The Epistles of 2 Corinthians and 1 Peter: A Newly Discovered Commentary. InterVarsity Press. ]
Family
Lightfoot was the nephew of the artists
Joseph Vincent Barber and
Charles Vincent Barber and grandson of the artist and founding member of the Birmingham School of Art,
Joseph Barber and great grandson of the founder of Newcastle's first library, Joseph Barber whose tomb is in
Newcastle Cathedral.
Bibliography
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References
Sources
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External links
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Bibliographic page on Lightfoot Project Canterbury
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Lightfoot, Joseph Barber
1828 births
1889 deaths
Evangelical Anglican biblical scholars
Evangelical Anglican bishops
Evangelical Anglican theologians
English evangelicals
Clergy from Liverpool
English Christian theologians
English Anglican theologians
British biblical scholars
New Testament scholars
British historians of religion
People educated at King Edward's School, Birmingham
Alumni of Trinity College, Cambridge
Bishops of Durham
19th-century Church of England bishops
Presidents of Co-operative Congress
English sermon writers
Hulsean Professors of Divinity
English male non-fiction writers
Anglican biblical scholars
Lady Margaret's Professors of Divinity
19th-century Anglican theologians