Dean Alford

Dean Alford

20th January 1864

Frances inquired of her friend Caroline Dent, "Can you send me any printed papers about Dean Alford's view of the inspiration of scripture."

At this time most English Christians held that the Bible was inspired by God, although the work of Darwin had influenced some of the more educated to question the early chapters of Genesis. Frances wanted to know the Dean's opinion because this man had spent twenty years (1841-1861) producing a new edition of the Greek text of the New Testament. Its four volumes were swelled by extensive commentary and philological detail. Frances naturally looked to the Dean as an authority at a time she was thinking about Christ's use of  contemporary Hebrew and the New Testament writers' use of Greek.

The four volumes of Alford's Greek text constituted the greatest work of this variously talented man. "There can be little question that the work appreciably increased the aggregate amount of the biblical knowledge of Alford's immediate contemporaries. So carefully matured were his researches in the regions of exegesis, already crossed and recrossed by the footprints of countless commentators, that the work is regarded as in many respects authoritative even among those who differ from him widely on many important questions." (http://www.1902encyclopedia.com/A/ALF/henry-alford.html)

I'm sure Alford's talent as a poet increased his value in Frances' mind!

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