The Reverend Professor Ernest Nicholson, who has
died aged 75, was a leading scholar of the Old Testament and served from
1990 to 2003 as Provost of Oriel College, Oxford.
An Ulsterman by birth, Nicholson made substantial contributions to the
study of the Pentateuch (the five books of Moses comprising Genesis,
Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy) . One of his main
preoccupations was the concept of the “covenant” which he saw as central
to the development of what is distinctive in the faith of Israel.
In a major survey, God and His People; Covenant and Theology in the Old
Testament (1986), Nicholson concluded that: “on the whole ... it is fair
to regard 'covenant’ as a theological theory about God’s relationship
with Israel ... Thus understood, 'covenant’ is the central expression of
the distinctive faith of Israel as 'the people of Yahweh’, the children
of God by adoption and free decision rather than by nature or
necessity.”
His biblical scholarship and his expertise in Latin, Hebrew and Semitic
languages brought Nicholson international renown and he travelled all
over the world. Yet he was always happy to admit that as a boy he had
failed his 11-plus, using the experience to encourage young people that
anything could be achieved through hard work and application.
The son of a farmer, Ernest Wilson Nicholson was born into a Protestant
family at Portadown, Co Armagh, on September 26 1938. After his
disastrous 11-plus , he was educated at the town’s technical school.
He spent four years there but wanted to enter the Church and eventually
mastered enough Latin to move to the grammar school, Portadown College.
From there, Nicholson went up to Trinity College, Dublin, where he
studied Theology and was greatly influenced by the Hebrew scholar Jacob
Weingreen.
Nicholson went on to Glasgow University, where he took a PhD under CJ
Mullo Weir. His thesis, on the literary history of the book of
Deuteronomy, accepted the widely-held belief that the core of the book
could be identified with the “book of the law” which was discovered in
the Jerusalem temple in 621 BC and which influenced King Josiah’s
reformation of worship in Judah. It was published in revised form (in
1967) as his first book, Deuteronomy and Tradition.
In 1962 Nicholson had returned to Trinity College as a lecturer in
Hebrew and Semitics. In 1967 he moved to Cambridge as University
Lecturer in Divinity with a fellowship at University (now Wolfson)
College. After his ordination in Ely Cathedral in 1969, he became
Chaplain, and later Dean, of Pembroke College. In Preaching to the
Exiles (1971), he traced the history of the “Deuteronomic” tradition
from its beginnings to the Babylonian Exile.
The Reverend Professor Ernest Nicholson,
born September 26th 1938, died December 22nd 2013.
Nicholson moved to Oxford in 1979 to take up the
post of Professor of the Interpretation of Holy Scripture, with a
fellowship at Oriel. As well as serving as college Provost he was
Pro-Vice-Chancellor of the university from 1993 to 2003.
As Provost of Oriel, Nicholson was known for his kindliness towards all
members of his college, while his concern for student welfare was
reflected in his appointment as chairman of a university committee on
student health. A dignified man who valued tradition, he was an
assiduous fundraiser and it was his idea to produce an official history
of the college. The book, a substantial collaborative effort, edited by
Jeremy Catto, was published in November last year.
At Cambridge, Nicholson had begun to turn his mind to wider issues
concerning the origins of Biblical traditions in such works as Exodus
and Sinai in History and Tradition (1973). At Oxford, in addition to God
and His People (1986), he published The Pentateuch in the Twentieth
Century: The Legacy of Julius Wellhausen (1998).
Ernest Nicholson was a Fellow of the British Academy, which awarded him
its Burkitt Medal for Biblical Studies in 2009.
He married, in 1962, Hazel Jackson, who survives him with their three
daughters. A son predeceased him.
Professor Ernest Nicholson was installed as Provost of Oriel College,
Oxford, by The Queen in 1990.
