Patriarchs and Profits
Chapter 9 - William Hanna
by Dirk Anderson
William Hanna (1808–1882) was an Irish-born Scottish Presbyterian minister, theologian, and author. Hanna occupies a unique place among Ellen White’s literary sources. His Life of Christ has long been recognized as one of the principal books behind Marian Davis’ The Desire of Ages. But Hanna also wrote a lesser-known Old Testament commentary, The Patriarchs (1879), covering Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. That book was in Ellen White’s library.
Parallels with Hanna
Hanna is important because he does more than provide occasional wording. He supplies new pieces of the story — chronology, motives, settings, and even the circumstances in which biblical characters received divine direction. These details are absent from Ellen White’s 1864 account but appear in the expanded Patriarchs and Prophets of 1890, after Hanna’s book was available to her.
1. Bethel
Hanna’s wording about Abraham’s first encampment at Bethel is remarkably close to White’s:
| William Hanna, The Patriarchs, 1879 | Patriarchs and Prophets, 1890 |
|---|---|
| Bethel. “It was here that, 120 years before, his grandfather had made his first halt and reared his first altar in the Land of Promise.”1 | “It was here that Abraham, more than a hundred years before, had made his first encampment and erected his first altar in the Land of Promise.”2 |
Genesis does not give this chronology. It simply says that Abraham built an altar at Bethel. Hanna supplies the historical calculation and the description of Abraham’s first encampment. Eleven years later, White gives essentially the same detail, with the same opening and closing words, and the same sequence.
2. Abraham’s Call
Hanna also describes what Abraham had to overcome when God called him:
| William Hanna, The Patriarchs, 1879 | Patriarchs and Prophets, 1890 |
|---|---|
| “It had been strong enough to break the ties that bound him to country, home, and kindred.”3 | “There were strong ties to bind him to his country, his kindred, and his home.”4 |
Genesis records the command to leave, but it does not describe Abraham’s emotional struggle with the ties of home and family. Hanna does. Patriarchs and Prophets then gives the same idea in nearly the same language.
3. A Vision of the Night
| William Hanna, The Patriarchs, 1879 | Patriarchs and Prophets, 1890 |
|---|---|
| Command to sacrifice Isaac. “It is in a dream or vision of the night the command comes.”5 | “In a vision of the night he was directed...”6 |
This one deserves special attention. Genesis tells us that God commanded Abraham to offer Isaac, but it does not tell us how the command was delivered. Hanna supplies the setting: a dream or “vision of the night.” White later supplies the same detail.
Genesis does not say it. White does not say it in 1864. Hanna says it in 1879. White adds it in 1890.
4. In Egypt
| William Hanna, The Patriarchs, 1879 | Patriarchs and Prophets, 1890 |
|---|---|
| Concern about mixing with idolatrous Egyptians. “Joseph's anxiety now was to secure to his people a separate settlement in Egypt, where they would not be mingled with the idolatrous Egyptians.”7 | “...would enable them to remain a distinct and separate people and would thus serve to shut them out from participation in the idolatry of Egypt.”8 |
| Jacob in Egypt. “These closing years in Egypt offer a striking contrast to those which preceded them.”9 | “These years were in happy contrast to those that had preceded them.”10 |
Neither detail is stated in Genesis. Hanna explains why Joseph wanted the family kept separate from Egyptian idolatry, then describes Jacob’s final years in Egypt as a contrast to the years before them. Patriarchs and Prophets supplies both ideas in essentially the same form.
Conclusion
Taken separately, each addition might be dismissed as an author's interpretation. Taken together, the pattern is harder to explain: Hanna supplies the chronology, the emotional struggle, the circumstances of a revelation, the concern over Egyptian idolatry, and the evaluation of Jacob’s final years. White's expanded account contains the same additions after Hanna's book was available.
The chronology is difficult to ignore. In 1864, these details are absent. Hanna's The Patriarchs appears in 1879. In 1890, the same details appear in White's book.
References and Notes
- William Hanna and J. P. Norris, The Patriarchs (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1879), 119. The book was first released in London in late 1878, but appeared in America in 1879, hence the 1879 publication date.
- Patriarchs and Prophets, 203.
- Hanna, The Patriarchs, 39.
- Patriarchs and Prophets, 125.
- Hanna, The Patriarchs, 38.
- Patriarchs and Prophets, 147.
- J.P. Norris, The Patriarchs, 165.
- Patriarchs and Prophets, 232.
- Hanna, The Patriarchs, 130.
- Patriarchs and Prophets, 233.