Thomas Jackson Crawford (1812–1875) was born to Agnes Jackson and William Crawford in St Andrews on the east coast of Scotland, and later studied in the university of his hometown. He became a minister of the Church of Scotland in 1831 and after pastorates in Cults, Fife, and Glamis, Perthshire, was called to St Andrew’s Church, Edinburgh, in 1844.
He became Professor of Divinity in the University of Edinburgh in 1860, and was one of a number of competent conservative theologians who had remained in the established church after the Disruption of 1843. Crawford served as the Moderator for the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in 1867.
In 1874 he delivered the annual Baird Lectures, and these addresses were published as The Mysteries of Christianity. Prior to this, his other major writings were The Fatherhood of God (1866) and The Doctrine of Holy Scripture Respecting the Atonement (1871).
Crawford died in Genoa, Italy, in October 1875 but was buried beside his wife in Dean Cemetery in Edinburgh.
T.J. Crawford is the author of The Mysteries of Christianity.