John Tulloch

John Tulloch (1 June 1823 – 13 February 1886) was a Scottish theologian and Presbyterian minister.

Life Tulloch was born at Dron, south of Bridge of Earn, Perthshire, one of twin sons of Elizabeth (née Maclaren), the daughter of a Perthshire farmer, and William Weir Tulloch, parish minister of Tibbermore, near Perth.

He was educated at Perth Grammar School and studied Divinity at the universities of St Andrews and Edinburgh. He was licensed to preach by the Presbytery of Perth in March 1844. In March 1845 (following a period as assistant) he was ordained as minister of St Paul's church in Dundee, and in 1849 was translated to Kettins, in Strathmore, where he remained for six years. In 1854 he was appointed Principal of St Mary's College, St Andrews. The appointment was immediately followed by the appearance of his Burnet prize essay on Theism.

At St Andrews, where Tulloch was also professor of systematic theology and apologetics, his teaching was distinguished by several novel features. He lectured on comparative religion and treated doctrine historically, as being not a fixed product but a growth.

Tulloch was popular with his students. In 1862 he was appointed a clerk of the General Assembly, and from then on he took a leading part in the councils of the Church of Scotland. Tulloch was also deeply interested in the reorganization of education in Scotland, both in school and university, and acted as one of the temporary board which settled the primary school system under the Education (Scotland) Act 1872.

Tulloch died at Torquay, in 1886. A biography was written by Mrs Oliphant. His body was returned to Scotland for burial. He is buried beneath a large memorial at the centre of the Eastern Cemetery in St Andrews. His wife, Jane Anne Sophia (1826-1887) is buried with him.

Works Tulloch's best-known works are collections of biographical sketches of leaders in church history, including those of the Reformation and Puritanism. His major work, Rational Theology and Christian Philosophy (1872), treats the Cambridge Platonists and other 17th century latitudinarians in a similar way. He delivered the second series of the Croall lectures, on the Doctrine of Sin, which were afterwards published. He also published a small work, The Christ of the Gospels and the Christ of History, in which the views of Ernest Renan on the gospel history were dealt with; a monograph on Blaise Pascal for Blackwood's Foreign Classics for English Readers series; and a little work, Beginning Life, addressed to young men, written at an earlier period.

Books English Puritanism and Its Leaders: Cromwell, Milton, Baxter, Bunyan. Edinburgh: William Blackwood and Sons, 1861. Beginning Life a Book for Young Men. London: Alexander Strahan & Co., 1863. Rational Theology and Christian Philosophy, 2 vols. Edinburgh and London: William Blackwood and Sons, 1872; second edition, 1874. Luther and other Leaders of the Reformation. Edinburgh and London: William Blackwood and Sons, 1883 Modern Theories in Philosophy and Religion. Edinburgh and London: William Blackwood and Sons, 1884.