The Church is indebted to men such as O. T. Allis for their diligent labors in defending the faith. Allis was born to Julia Waterbury and Oscar Huntington Allis on September 9, 1880, in Wallingford, PA. As a young boy, Allis enjoyed the blessings of a Christian home and sound church family.In 1897, Allis entered the University of Pennsylvania and gave himself to diligent studying. In 1902, he entered Princeton Theological Seminary and came under the influence of eminent, conservative theologians such as J. A. Alexander, William Henry Green and Robert Dick Wilson. Of this period of his life Allis wrote,
It was the privilege of the writer to study at Princeton Seminary under men who held firmly to the great tradition on which that institution was founded, men who not merely believed but gloried in that pervasive supernaturalism which alone can be called truly biblical.(From the Preface to The Old Testament: Its Claims and Its Critics, as quoted by John H. Skilton in his essay "Oswald T. Allis" in Bible Interpreters of the Twentieth Century, edited by Walter A. Elwell and J. D. Weaver, 1999.)
Upon his return from Germany Allis took up a position teaching Semitic Philology in the Old Testament department of Princeton Seminary assisting John D. Davis and later Robert Dick Wilson. Allis held his position here until his resignation in 1929 over the modernist takeover of the seminary. He left Princeton along with J. Gresham Machen, Robert Dick Wilson and Cornelius Van Til to form a new seminary in Philadelphia, Westminster Theological Seminary. Some interesting facts about the formation of this new seminary is that Allis not only provided a building to serve as the schoolhouse and rented it out to the school at the price of one dollar per year, but the building was that of his childhood home (1604 Spruce Street).
Having been trained firsthand from those with whom he would contend he was able to argue with greater understanding of his opponents position. Among his writings is The Five Books of Moses in which Allis defended the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch against the modernist critics. He also countered the rejection of biblical supernaturalism and affirmed the predictive nature of prophecy in his work The Unity of Isaiah.
Among his writings were books dealing with the plethora of modern versions of the Bible being offered to Christians. He was not against modern translations, but found that many of the versions were in fact paraphrases, rather than faithful translations. He also noted that the RSV
is not merely a 'modern speech' but a 'modernist' or 'higher critical' revision of the version of 1611....It makes many changes in the text of the Bible, either on the authority of the ancient versions or simply on the basis of conjecture. And its marginal notes are at times inaccurate, inadequate, and misleading; and they tend quite definitely to undermine confidence in the authority and trustworthiness of the Bible.(As quoted by John H. Skilton in his essay "Oswald T. Allis" in Bible Interpreters of the Twentieth Century, edited by Walter A. Elwell and J. D. Weaver, 1999.)
Allis, well aware of the gravity of the critics' attack on the Bible, recognized how important it is for Christians to stand together against destructive forces from without. He feared that the dispensationalism of his day was separating Christians and weakening their power to fight unitedly against their real enemies.(John H. Skilton in his essay "Oswald T. Allis" in Bible Interpreters of the Twentieth Century, edited by Walter A. Elwell and J. D. Weaver, 1999.)
I've not read this book, so I can't offer my impression, however, Skilton's observation here is something worth considering with great sobriety. It's not so much his criticism of dispensationalism that concerns me, but rather what he identifies as something else that destroys unity among believers and weakens a collective witness for the truth. I tend to be a pacifist of sorts. I don't like battles or even arguments. However, defending the Christian faith is essential if I would be obedient to Christ. There is a battle raging for the souls of men, women and children. Our enemies are cunning and their ways are subtle. We need to resolve to take up this charge and oppose those who would undermine and destroy the gospel. We really do need a greater sense of unity among our churches in order to be effective at this task.
Biographies of Oswald T. Allis -
- PCA Historical Center - Oswald T. Allis Collection (offers a very short biographical sketch)
- Wikipedia - Oswald T. Allis
- Moyer, Elgin. The Wycliffe Biographical Dictionary of the Church. Revised and enlarged by Earle E. Cairns (Chicago: Moody Press, 1982) - "Allis, Oswald Thompson" (p. 10; very brief) [Amazon, out of print]
- John H. Skilton, "Oswald T. Allis" in Bible Interpreters of the Twentieth Century, edited by Walter A. Elwell and J. D. Weaver, (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1999) pp. 122-130. [Amazon, now out of print]
- Strangely enough there is not an entry for Oswald T. Allis in Timothy Larsen's Biographical Dictionary of Evangelicals.
- The Seminary Faculty. Biblical and Theological Studies: A Commemoration of 100 Years of Princeton Seminary (1912. Reprint. Solid Ground Christian Books, 2004) [CBD | WTS]
- The Five Books Of Moses. (Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1943; Reprint. Wipf & Stock Publishers, 2001). [ WTS]
- Prophecy and the Church (Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1945; Reprint. Wipf & Stock, 2001) [WTS]
- Revision or New Translation? "The Revised Standard Versionof 1946": A Comparative Study. (Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1948) [out of print; Amazon]
- Unity of Isaiah. (Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1950; Reprint. Wipf & Stock Publishers, 2001) [Amazon]
- God Spake by Moses: An Exposition of the Pentateuch. (Nutley, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1951) [P&R | CBD | WTS]
- Revised Version or Revised Bible? A Critique of the Revised Standard Version of the Old Testament (1952). (Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1953) [out of print]
- The New English Bible, the New Testament of 1961: A Comparative Study. (Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1963) [out of print; Amazon]
- The Old Testament: Its Claims and Its Critics. (Nutley, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1972) [out of print; Amazon]
- The Law and the Prophets: Old Testament Studies In Honor of Oswald Thompson Allis. Edited by John H. Skilton. (Nutley, N.J.: Presbyterian & Reformed, 1974) [out of print; Amazon]
Good article, Jason. I haven't heard that much about Allis, but you've got me wanting to learn more. I want to learn about those who are defending the gospel, especially when it costs them.
ReplyDeleteI didn't always feel this way. I used to be suspicious of him and others who opposed Dispensationalism. Charles Ryrie frequently quoted Allis' book Prophecy and the Church, maybe not in an overly critical way, but at that young age I still mistrusted Allis. I was becoming too staunch a defender of a system I didn't understand well enough yet. I still hold loosely to a form of Dispensationalism, though not exactly as Ryrie, Scofield, Chafer, and others taught it.
I agree heartily with what you said: "We need to resolve to take up this charge and oppose those who would undermine and destroy the gospel. We really do need a greater sense of unity among our churches in order to be effective at this task." I've come to see that there are much larger issues than a particular scheme of prophecy.
What you said echoes what Lloyd-Jones said about the Puritans leading up to the Great Ejection of 1662, that they were divided over secondary things, though they were in agreement in the major doctrines. Because of their divisions they were easy prey for their enemies, who were united in their purpose. May the Lord help us to see the bigger picture and to stand united with like-minded brethren in what matters most: the defense and propagation of the Gospel.
The other day my wife asked me if I had watched the Together for the Gospel video recently posted on the T4G site. She was curious because she knew I would enjoy C.J. Mahaney's bit about Dr Mohler's library.
ReplyDeleteThey shot the video in Dr Mohler's personal library (well, part of it) which contains approximately 30,000 volumes. C.J. wanted everyone to know that Dr Mohler was not just a collector of books, but that he had read about 90% of the books he owned. He said that he was told by someone to randomly select a book from the shelves and ask Dr Mohler what it was about and he would invariably be able to summarize the book for you. C.J. did this and providentially chose The Presbyterian Controversy by Bradley Longfield.
What I found interesting was that the story this book contained was that of the modernist takeover of Princeton Seminary. Dr Mohler briefly explained that this book contains "Longfield's theses that the Presbyterian controversy actually was lost to conservatives, not because the left had so many, but because the middle eventually acquiesced to the left.... So, you see the subtitle of that is modernists, moderates and conservatives, and it's the moderates who lost it all."
The actual subtitle is "Fundamentalists, Modernists and Moderates." Allis, Machen and the others were in the fundamentalist position. They would not bend on the essentials and found it necessary to leave when the middle-riding-moderates gave way.
I was glad to learn a little more about this event. I'm putting this book on my wish list.