Sir Robert Anderson

1841-1918. Lay theologian and Bible teacher. He was a barrister in Dublin and London, adviser to the British Home Office in matters relating to political crime (1868-88), and then assistant police commissioner for the metropolis and head of the criminal investigation department, Scotland Yard (1888-1901). A Presbyterian layman, he was active as a speaker and writer; his work centered principally on apologetics and Bible prophecy (i.e., eschatology). A leading popularizer of the dispensational* interpretation of Scripture, he taught that there was a radical distinction between the Pauline gospel (the gospel for the church) and the gospel of the kingdom (the gospel given to the apostles as a message for Jews), between the authority for the church of the Pauline letters and the rest of the Bible. His books, which were very popular, include The Gospel and Its Ministries (1876); The Coming Prince (1882); The Silence of God (1897); The Bible and Modern Criticism (1902); and Christianized Rationalism and the Higher Criticism.