CFD Moule

The New Testament professor C.F.D. Moule passed away in September 2007.  The Sermon for the Life and Work of the Revd Prof CFD Moule by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, is now available online.  It is a wonderful tribute to this outstanding NT scholar.

I met Professor Moule back in 1985 when I was doing doctoral research at Cambridge.  I had been invited to a NT Colloquium gathering, and he was there to present a paper.  At this time he had been retired almost a decade and was around seventy-seven.  During this same research time at Cambridge, while I was stumbling around in the library at St. John’s College, I found a book written by one of my seminary professors, David E. Garland, The Intention of Matthew 23 (Brill, 1979).  Extensively penciled throughout the margins, in wonderfully precise script, were Prof Moule’s personal comments.  It was interesting to read the reflections/critiques and “overhear” the ongoing dialogue between Prof Moule and the text. 

As almost all reviews, obituaries, and words of memorials noted, he was very much a gentleman and scholar.  He serves as a model for combining the head and heart as one leans into the vocation of NT studies:   “. . . theology and devotion can never, in fact, be separated” (C.F.D. Moule, “Acknowledgements,” The Holy Spirit [1978]).