MEDAL FOR CANON SANDAY,

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1126, 13 May 1911, Page 7

MEDAL FOR CANON SANDAY,

HIS FORTHCOMING LIFE OF CHRIST.

To do honour to tho distinguished Biblical scholar, Canon Sanday, was the main and central purpose of tho meeting of the Society for Biblical Study which crowded thn spacious council room at the Bible House, London, recently. Canon Kennett, Regius Professor of Hebrew at Cambridge', was chairman, while tho two chief speakers were wellknown Free Church professors. Professor J. H. Moulton and Principal Adeney. Tho interest of the meeting culminated when Dr. Burkitt rose to present the- Dyke Acland medal for Biblical Research (1911) to Canon Sanday. The medal, he explained, was only given to thoso of the highest excellence. Their society was not a Iwirnucl society—it was designed to fill a gap between the learned and tho people who wished to find out what 'the conclusions of scholarly research meant to them. It had been determined therefore to givethe medal to thoso who had mado the , now knowledge coino home to the people. Amid tho widespread disturbing inllucnce of criticism, Dr. Sanday had shown that fearless investigation could help tho Christian conception of the Bible. '

Canon Sanday ■ did not like the idea <if too conspicuous rewards for work of that kind. He had received too many. In one of the "Alice" books the punishments canio before the crimes—so his rewards had been heaped upon him, and ho had had to earn them as best he could.' He had always been behind, and now he should bo worse than ever. He thanked them with all his heart. Ho r.honld quite agree with tho critic of a new generation who would say that he had been over-rated. Speaking of his various books, Dr. Sanday said that in his opinion "Old Latin Biblical Texts, Part 11," of which less than a hundred copies wero sold, was the best thing ho ever did. His scientific career culminated ten years ago, and what he had been doing in recent years would not be good for his reputation. But he bad settled long ago that that did not mattor. Towards the end of the eightios, under pressure from Dr. Briggs, ho committed himself to tho work of writing a life of Christy but ho did not begin to think seriously about it till 1895. His article on "Christ" in Dr. Hastings's Dictionary, and other articles and books, worn the outcome of his preliminary studies. Although ho had amassed a good deal of material, not a single chapter of tho larger book was yet ready for publication. Tho book was designed for two volumes. Tho first would bo preparatory, critical, and historical. In the second he could not bo content with describing tho world into which Christ came. Looking in a broader light, ho asked, What did Greece, what did Home, what did the Jewish people stand for? How had they been brought to a head in Christianity? He had been greatly fascinated by the spectacle of Grceco and Rome; but bow were they to be kept in duo subordination to the central theme? In conclusion, Dr. Sanday liegged his friends not to expect too much from him.