Charles Augustus Briggs

Charles Augustus Briggs (January 15, 1841 – June 8, 1913 ), American Presbyterian (and later Episcopalian) scholar and theologian, was born in New York City, the son of Alanson Briggs and Sarah Mead Berrian. He was excommunicated from the Presbyterian Church for heresy due to his liberal theology regarding the Bible.

Early life Briggs was educated at the University of Virginia (1857–1860); graduated at the Union Theological Seminary in 1863; and, after the American Civil War during which he served in the 7th Regiment of the New York Militia, studied further at the University of Berlin from 1866 to 1869. In 1870, he was appointed pastor of the First Presbyterian Church of Roselle, New Jersey which post he held until 1874, when he accepted the professorship of Hebrew and cognate languages at Union Theological Seminary in which he taught until 1891, and of Biblical theology there from 1891 to 1904, following which he became their professor of theological encyclopaedia and symbolics. At the Union Theological Seminary, he also served as head librarian for the Burke Library. From 1880 to 1890 he was an editor of the Presbyterian Review. Some have argued that General Assembly's finding of heresy was influenced, in part, by Briggs' belligerent manner and militant tone of expressions and by what his own colleagues in the Union Theological Seminary called the dogmatic and irritating nature of his inaugural address. and was ordained as a priest of the Protestant Episcopal Church in 1899. and that of D.Litt., from the University of Oxford (1901). With Francis Brown and S. R. Driver he prepared a revised Hebrew and English Lexicon (1891–1905, commonly known as Brown Driver Briggs or BDB)

Works His publications included the following: Biblical Study: Its Principles, Methods and History (1883) A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Book of Psalms (2 vols., 1906–7), in which he was assisted by his daughter The Virgin Birth of Our Lord (1909) Theological Symbolics (1914, posthumous)