The Scholar Who Knelt

In 1881, the great Princeton theologian B. B. Warfield — whose towering intellect defended the absolute inerrancy of Scripture against a generation of skeptics — did something that startled his colleagues. During a faculty dispute over curriculum, a younger professor publicly challenged Warfield's position with arguments that were, by all accounts, poorly reasoned and theologically thin. Those present expected the formidable apologist to dismantle the critique with his characteristic precision.…