Bible Mastery . .

Washington, D.C.: Merchants' Printing Co., Printers, 1907. Very good. 6 7/8" x 4 3/8". Blue cloth, title gilt. Pp. ix, [2], 244 + two unnumbered pages of charts. Very good: covers a bit scuffed and stained; one page with penciled scrawl across three lines of text not affecting legibility; a few tiny creases and a bit of scattered stray ink.

This is a book intended to assist with the study of the Bible, written by an African American minister and professor at Howard University, Sterling N. Brown.

Sterling Nelson Brown was born to enslaved parents in East Tennessee in 1858. He graduated from Fisk College in 1885 and from the Oberlin Theological Seminary in 1888. Brown was a pastor in Washington, D.C. for 25 years, simultaneously serving as a Bible professor at Howard University. He resigned from the ministry in 1913 to work solely at Howard, teaching and directing the School of Religion's Department of Extension Work and Correspondence Study. He wrote an autobiography in 1924 and died in 1929.

In this book's preface Brown lamented that in his "several years as teacher of the English Bible in the Theological Department of Howard University, I have not found in any one volume just what seemed to be needed by ordinary Bible students." He thus prepared this "compendium of the whole Bible in the briefest possible form . . . Many subjects are included, but not treated exhaustively. A general view of the whole, and not the details, is emphasized. The Bible itself is to be studied in connection with the text book."

The work includes tips and methods for reading and studying the Bible, as well as answers to "important questions" that would no doubt occur to "the thoughtful and intelligent student becoming acquainted with the Bible for the first time." It provides general outlines to the holy book itself as well as the "seven periods" of biblical history including creation, the interval between the old and new testaments and the "Life of Christ." One section is dedicated to the various "institutions of the Bible" and there are historical and chronological charts, including one focused on the principal persons, events and places of the "Period of the Jewish Province."

A brief but thorough overview of the Bible, authored by an African American dedicated to its study and teaching. OCLC shows 19 holdings over two entries.