Renowned Professor, New Testament Scholar Gordon Fee Passes Away at 88

Renowned Professor and New Testament scholar Gordon Fee passed away on Tuesday in New York at the age of 88.

“Yesterday, my father, Gordon Fee, died. He was 88 years old and had lived with Alzheimer’s for about 15 years,” his son Benjamin wrote on Facebook Wednesday afternoon. “We were blessed that in spite of this terrible disease, he was able to live in his own home, and he could recognize us and communicate with us for most of that time. He was an internationally recognized and influential voice in the academic world of Biblical textual criticism, among many other things.”

Fee, who was an ordained minister of the Assemblies of God (USA), taught at several Christian schools, including Wheaton College, Vanguard University of Southern California and Gordon-Conwell Seminary. He later moved to Vancouver, British Columbia, where he taught the New Testament at Regent college from 1986 to 2002. He was then appointed as Professor Emeritus and taught at Regent as a sessional instructor until 2009.

Regent College published a statement on Wednesday announcing Fee’s death.

“Gordon brought a remarkable store of intellect and pastoral concern to New Testament scholarship and to his teaching,” the statement reads in part. “He was often quoted as saying, ‘The concern of the scholar is primarily with what the text meant; the concern of the layperson is usually with what it means. The believing scholar insists that we must have both.’”

According to Christianity Today, Fee co-authored the best-selling book “How To Read The Bible For All His Worth”with Old Testament Professor Douglas Stuart of Gordon-Conwell Seminary. He also wrote “God’s Empowering Presence: The Holy Spirit in the Letters of Paul.”

Fee further wrote New Testament commentaries on 1 and 2 Timothy, 1 Corinthians, 1 and 2 Thessalonians and Revelation.

In 1990, Fee succeeded the revered F. F. Bruce as the editor of the New International Commentaries series, a position he held until 2012 after he was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease.

Fee was born in Ashland, Oregon, in 1934. His father was an Assemblies of God pastor and a skilled carpenter. He graduated with BA and MA from Seattle Pacific University and a Ph.D. from the University of Southern California.

According to Charisma News, Fee is predeceased by his wife, Maudine, who died in 2014. He leaves behind three adult children, thirteen grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

Photo courtesy: ©Getty Images/People Images

Milton Quintanilla is a freelance writer. He is also the co-hosts of the For Your Soul podcast, which seeks to equip the church with biblical truth and sound doctrine. Visit his blog Blessed Are The Forgiven.

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