19 May, 2008

Theodore Beza, Meet David Engelsma

The Protestant Reformed Theological Seminary recently received the private library of Dr. Theodore Letis. In the personal library was a very rare copy of Theodore Beza's New Testament in Greek and Latin. Apparently Dr. Letis (I have never heard of him, have you?) was a New Testament scholar who wrote to defend the Textus Receptus (the Greek text behind the Authorized Version and the New King James Version).

This is a very special addition to any library. The Prots should be happy with this rare volume. The article is here and begins on PDF page number 95. It is worth reading because it gives a short personal narrative of David Englesma's time in seminary in the basement of 1st Prot Church. The article also shows that they are not interested in too much reading beyond their tradition (Englesma says that there were a number of books about evangelical feminism and they are going in the dumpster! Those would be useful for reference in a paper, at least... you would think!)

Congratulations to the Protestant Reformed Seminary on their recent addition to their library.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

"The article also shows that they are not interested in too much reading beyond their tradition"

We hope that will someday be amended.

Benjamin P. Glaser said...

Did you find out who Dr. Letis was?

NPE said...

Ben: I have no idea who he is.


Anon: I am glad to hear that.

Reformed Renegade said...

Very interesting. Years ago I had contact with Letis when he was living and studying in Edinburgh. He was a great defender of the Textus Receptus (not one of these fruitcake KJV Only people). He was extremely intelligent and could argue his case quite proficiently. His one downfall was that he was arrogant and had no problem offending Christian brothers who disagreed with him. (OK, that's two). I still have some of his writings and speeches in my files here. In that they now have his library I can only assume that he has died.