Dr. Robert Smith Candlish (Articles)

Dr. Robert Smith Candlish

Robert Candish (March 23, 1806 October 19, 1873), Scottish divine, was born at Edinburgh, and spent his early years in Glasgow, where he graduated in 1823. In 1847 Candlish, who had received the degree of D.D. from Princeton, New Jersey, in 1841, was chosen by the Assembly of the Free Church to succeed Chalmers in the chair of divinity in the New College, Edinburgh. After partially fulfilling the duties of the office for one session, he was led to resume the charge of St Georges, Edinburgh. His theology was that of the Scottish Calvinistic school, but his sympathetic character combined with strong conviction gathered round him one of the largest and most intelligent congregations in the city. In 1842 he published the first volume of his Contributions towards the Exposition of the Book of Genesis, a work which was completed in three volumes several years later. In 1854 he delivered, in Exeter Hall, London, a lecture on the Theological Essays of the Rev. F. D. Maurice, which he afterwards published, along with a fuller examination of the doctrine of the essays. In this he defended the forensic aspect of the gospel. A treatise entitled The Atonement; its Reality, Completeness and Extent (1861) was based upon a smaller work which first appeared in 1845.