The Encyclopedia Americana (1920)/Robinson, Edward (scholar)

ROBINSON, Edward, American Biblical scholar: b. Southington, Conn., 10 April 1794; d. New York, 27 Jan. 1863. He was graduated at Hamilton College in 1816 and went in 1821 to Andover to publish his edition of books i-ix, xviii and xix of the ‘Iliad’. There he aided Moses Stuart (q.v.) in the preparation of the second edition (1823) of the latter's ‘Hebrew Grammar,’ and rendered into English (1825) Wahl's ‘Clavis Philologica Novi Testamenti.’ After European study, largely in Halle and Berlin (1826-30), he was professor extraordinary of sacred literature in the Andover Theological Seminary in 1830-33, and professor of Biblical literature in Union Theological Seminary from 1837 until his death. In 1838 and 1852 he visited Palestine with the scholarly missionary, Eli Smith, and there made careful surveys and investigations. His chief work, ‘Biblical Researches’ (1841; 3 vols. compressed into 2, with a 3d 1856), which obtained for him the Royal Geographical Society's gold medal, was based on these studies. He was a leading member of the American ethnological, geographical and Oriental societies, and edited in 1831-34 the ‘Biblical Repository,’ in 1843 the ‘Bibliotheca Sacra,’ with which the ‘Repository’ was incorporated, and for which he continued to write until 1855. Among his other publications are ‘A Dictionary of the Bible’ (1883); editions of Buttmann's ‘Greek Grammar’ (1833; 3d ed., 1851) and Gensenius' ‘Hebrew Lexicon’ (1836; 5th ed. 1854), and Greek (1845; 2d ed., 1851) and English (1846) ‘Harmonies of the Gospels.’ Consult Hitchcock, ‘Life, Writings and Character of Edward Robinson’ (1863).