Metzger, Bruce Manning 1914-2007 (Bruce M. Metzger)

OBITUARY NOTICE—

See index for CA sketch: Born February 9, 1914, in Middletown, PA; died of respiratory failure, February 13, 2007, in Princeton, NJ. Minister, educator, and author. Metzger was a New Testament scholar well known for his work in creating the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible and other updated translations. An erudite academician, he spoke many ancient tongues fluently, including Greek, Latin, Hebrew, and Coptic, as well as several modern languages. His educational background included an A.B. from Lebanon Valley College in 1935, Th.B. and Th.M. degrees from Princeton Theological Seminary earned in 1938 and 1939, respectively, and an M.A. in 1940 and Ph.D. in 1942 from Princeton University. Metzger was ordained in the United Presbyterian Church in 1939. He then spent his academic career teaching the New Testament at Princeton Theological Seminary from 1940 until his 1984 retirement as professor emeritus. Metzger was asked to lead a team of Christian and Jewish scholars to update the Revised Standard Version of the Bible, drawing on recently discovered Greek and Hebrew texts. An expert on translating ancient Greek, Metzger strove to make the language of the New Revised Standard Version more modern and remove unnecessarily gender-specific pronouns and nouns. Although he kept the standard He in reference to God and Jesus, other text using "he" or "man" was replaced with more neutral words, such as "one." Because he took this middle approach, Metzger was sometimes criticized by feminists for not taking gender-neutrality far enough, while conservatives criticized him for going too far. The new version was published in 1990 after about two decades of work; it is now used widely among Protestant, Catholic, and Eastern Orthodox faithful. Metzger also worked on other translations and versions of the Bible and related texts. For example, he oversaw the editing of the condensed Reader's Digest Bible (1982). He also wrote many scholarly texts about translating and interpreting the Bible and has written on Apocryphal books. Among his other books are An Introduction to the Apocrypha (1957), The Early Versions of the New Testament: Their Origin, Transmission, and Limitations (1977), The Making of the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible (1991), Breaking the Code: Understanding the Book of Revelation (1993), and The Bible in Translation: Ancient and English Versions (2001).

OBITUARIES AND OTHER SOURCES:

BOOKS

Metzger, Bruce, Reminiscences of an Octogenarian, Hendrickson (Peabody, MA), 1997.

PERIODICALS

Los Angeles Times, February 16, 2007, p. B8.

New York Times, February 16, 2007, p. C11.

Washington Post, February 17, 2007, p. B6.