Warfield, B. B. – Power of God unto Salvation

Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield

Biography of Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield

Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield (November 5, 1851 – February 16, 1921) was professor of theology at Princeton Seminary from 1887 to 1921. He served as the last principal of the Princeton Theological Seminary from 1886 to 1902. After the death of Warfield in office, Francis Landey Patton took over the functions of the office as the first president of seminary. Some conservative Presbyterians[1] consider him to be the last of the great Princeton theologians before the split in 1929 that formed Westminster Theological Seminary and the Orthodox Presbyterian Church.

Biography of BB Warfield

Warfield was born near Lexington, Kentucky on November 5, 1851. His parents were William Warfield and Mary Cabell Breckinridge, originally from Virginia and quite wealthy. His maternal grandfather was the Presbyterian preacher Robert Jefferson Breckinridge (1800–1871), the son of John Breckinridge, a former United States Senator and Attorney General. Warfield's uncle was John C. Breckinridge, the fourteenth Vice President of the United States, and a Confederate general in the American Civil War. His brother, Ethelbert Dudley Warfield was a Presbyterian minister and college president. His fourth cousin twice removed was Wallis Warfield Simpson, whom Great Britain's King Edward VIII abdicated his throne in order to marry.

Education of Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield

Like many children born into a wealthy family, Warfield's childhood education was private. Warfield entered Princeton University in 1868 and graduated in 1871 with high honors. Although Warfield studied mathematics and science in college, while traveling in Europe he decided to study theology, surprising even many of his closest friends. He entered Princeton Seminary in 1873, in order to train for ministry as a Presbyterian minister. He graduated in 1876.

Ministry of Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield

For a short time in 1876 he preached in Presbyterian churches in Concord, Kentucky and Dayton, Ohio as a "supply pastor" — the latter church calling him to be their ordained minister (which he politely refused). In late 1876 Warfield and his new wife moved to Germany where he studied under Christoph Ernst Luthardt and Franz Delitzsch. Warfield was the assistant pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Baltimore, Maryland for a short time. Then he became an instructor at Western Theological Seminary, which is now called Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. He was ordained on April 26, 1879.

In 1881 Warfield wrote a joint article with A. A. Hodge on the inspiration of the Bible. It drew attention because of its scholarly and forceful defense of the inerrancy of the Bible. In many of his writings, Warfield attempted to demonstrate that the doctrine of Biblical inerrancy was simply orthodox Christian teaching, and not merely a concept invented in the nineteenth century. His passion was to refute the liberal element within Presbyterianism and within Christianity at large. Throughout his life, he continued to write books and articles, which are still widely read today.

Taken from Wikipedia.org article on Warfield

Works of Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield

• Dr. Edwin A. Abbott on the Genuineness of Second Peter (1883)
• Some Difficult Passages in the First Chapter of 2 Corinthians (1886)
• The Canon of the New Testament: How and When Formed (1892)
• The Witness of the Stars (1893)
• Number in Scripture (1894, 1921 4th revised edition)
• The Right of Systematic Theology (1897)
• Acts and Pastoral Epistles Timothy, Titus, and Philemon, Vol. 26 of The Temple Bible (1902)
• The Power of God Unto Salvation (1903)
• The Lord of Glory : A Study of the Designations of Our Lord in the New Testament with Especial  reference to His Deity, (1907)
• The Westminster Assembly and its Work (1908)
• Commentary on Revelation (1909, revised and corrected)
• The Religious Life of Theological Students (1911)
• Concerning Schmiedel's "Pillar-passages." (1913)
• The Plan of Salvation (1915)
• The Bible, The Book of Mankind (1915)
• Faith and Life (1916)
• The Saviour of the World (1916)
• Counterfeit Miracles (1918)
• Are They Few That Be Saved? (1918)
• The Divine Origin of the Bible
• Biblical Doctrines
• Augustine and the Pelagian Controversy
• Studies in Theology
• The Inspiration and Authority of the Bible
• The Making of the Westminster Confession
• The Emotional Life of Our Lord
• The Person of Christ According to the New Testament
• Counterfeit Miracles
• An Introduction to the Textual Criticism of the New Testament
• Are They Few that Be Saved?
• The Lord of Glory: A Study of the Designations of Our Lord in the New Testament with Especial Reference to His Deity
• Perfectionism: Articles reprinted from periodicals, etc. edited by Ethelbert Dudley Warfield, William Park Armstrong, and Caspar Wistar Hodge (1931)
• Calvin and Calvinism (1931)
• The Inspiration and Authority of the Bible, edited by Samuel G. Craig; with an introduction by Cornelius Van Til. (1948)
• Biblical and Theological Studies, edited by Samuel G. Craig (1952)
• Sermons and Articles by Warfield
• A Brief and Untechnical Statement of the Reformed Faith
• Authority, Intellect, Heart - In Warfield's Authority, Intellect, and Heart, he identifies these three channels through which the truth of God is brought to man, and truth then owns that person.
• The Formation Of The Canon Of The New Testament - Warfield's The Canon of the New Tesatment is a brief article by Warfield (Presbyterian) explaining the Canon of the New Testament.
• The Rights of Criticism
• The Theology of John Calvin
• The Theology of Grace - Warfield's Theology of Grace is a short work on Augustine & the Pelagian Controversy.

Works of B.B. Warfield in our Library

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