Famous People

C H Dodd

Charles Harold Dodd was born in Wrexham on 7 April 1884, the eldest son of Charles Dodd, a local school headmaster and brother to Arthur Herbert Dodd. Dodd has been described as the most influential British New Testament scholar of the twentieth century. He began his education in Wrexham and went on to study Classics at University College, Oxford. After graduating, he held several academic posts and for a time was an Independent or Congregational Minister in Warwick.

In 1930 he became Rylands Professor of Biblical Criticism and Exegesis in Manchester where he remained until 1935. He was elected to the Norris Hulse Chair of Divinity at Cambridge becoming the first non-Anglican Professor of Divinity at both Universities. In 1936 he was elected a fellow of Jesus College and became honorary fellow on his retirement from the chair in 1949. He received numerous fellowships and honorary degrees and published many books and articles on biblical study. He is noted as the General Director of the translation of the New English Bible. For his work on the project, he was created a Companion of Honour in 1961. He was made a freeman of the Borough of Wrexham in 1963. He died on 25 September 1973.

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