bookslover
Puritan Board Doctor
New Testament scholar P. T. O'Brien has been accused of plagiarism in three of his commentaries: (1) his 1991 commentary on Philippians, (2) his 1999 commentary on Ephesians and, most prominently, (3) his 2010 commentary on Hebrews. All three books are published by Eerdmans.
Eerdmans has had all three commentaries checked by prominent scholars and editors (especially his Hebrews commentary, the volume the accusations were originally leveled at). Problems were found in all three volumes.
When presented with this evidence, O'Brien issued the following statement: "In the New Testament commentaries that I have written, although I have not deliberately misused the work of others, nevertheless I now see that my work processes at times have been faulty and have generated clear-cut, but unintentional, plagiarism. For this, I apologize without reservation."
Eerdmans will now take all three commentaries out of print, pulping the remaining copies that they have.
Writing a serious, scholarly, detailed exegetical commentary is a complicated, labor-intensive process that is usually years in the doing. O'Brien is a recognized scholar, and I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt on this. I can see how easy it would be to copy the wording of someone else's work and failing, in the process, to provide attribution. I'll pray for him, and hope that it doesn't turn out that the plagiarism was deliberate.
Statements about this can be found at the Aquila Report and at Eerdman's website.
Eerdmans has had all three commentaries checked by prominent scholars and editors (especially his Hebrews commentary, the volume the accusations were originally leveled at). Problems were found in all three volumes.
When presented with this evidence, O'Brien issued the following statement: "In the New Testament commentaries that I have written, although I have not deliberately misused the work of others, nevertheless I now see that my work processes at times have been faulty and have generated clear-cut, but unintentional, plagiarism. For this, I apologize without reservation."
Eerdmans will now take all three commentaries out of print, pulping the remaining copies that they have.
Writing a serious, scholarly, detailed exegetical commentary is a complicated, labor-intensive process that is usually years in the doing. O'Brien is a recognized scholar, and I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt on this. I can see how easy it would be to copy the wording of someone else's work and failing, in the process, to provide attribution. I'll pray for him, and hope that it doesn't turn out that the plagiarism was deliberate.
Statements about this can be found at the Aquila Report and at Eerdman's website.