The Pauline Benediction

The Pauline Benediction is a short theological essay by James Drummond (1835-1918), the Irish-born Unitarian scholar and Principal of Manchester New College, Oxford. Drummond was one of the leading liberal Christian biblical scholars of the late Victorian period and a contributor to the wider debates on the historical Jesus and Pauline authorship that ran through English Nonconformist theology in the 1880s and 1890s. The essay treats the closing trinitarian formula of 2 Corinthians 13:14 and its place in Paul’s letter writing and in later Christian liturgical use. Drummond brings his Unitarian convictions and historical-critical method to a text that orthodox commentators had long read as proof of trinitarian doctrine. The essay is brief but characteristic of his careful biblical and historical scholarship. Free PDF download available on BDeBooks.