Divinity Hall (1826) is the oldest building in the Harvard Divinity School at Harvard University. It is located at 14 Divinity Avenue, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
The Hall was designed by Solomon Willard and Thomas Sumner, and dedicated on August 29, 1826, with William Ellery Channing giving the dedicatory speech, "The Christian Ministry." It was the first Harvard building constructed outside Harvard Yard. As George Huntston Williams wrote in his 1954 history of the Divinity School, theological students needed to be isolated from undergraduates lest they drink up "more of the spirit of the University than of the spirit of their profession."
A decade later, on July 15, 1838, Ralph Waldo Emerson delivered his famous Divinity School Address, "Acquaint Thyself at First Hand with Deity," in the Hall.
In its early days, Divinity Hall contained the entire Divinity School. It was later used as a dormitory, then classrooms. Notable residents have included Ralph Waldo Emerson, Theodore Parker, and philosopher George Santayana. Its chapel contains a fine organ by George S. Hutchings, recently restored.
Today, the building houses classrooms, faculty offices, and several administratie offices, including the Office of Student Life, the Office of Admissions and Financial Aid, the Office of the Registrar, the Office of Communications, and the Office of Development and External Relations.
Famous quotes containing the words divinity and/or hall:
“The divinity in man is the true vestal fire of the temple which is never permitted to go out, but burns as steadily and with as pure a flame on the obscure provincial altar as in Numa’s temple at Rome.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Having children can smooth the relationship, too. Mother and daughter are now equals. That is hard to imagine, even harder to accept, for among other things, it means realizing that your own mother felt this way, too—unsure of herself, weak in the knees, terrified about what in the world to do with you. It means accepting that she was tired, inept, sometimes stupid; that she, too, sat in the dark at 2:00 A.M. with a child shrieking across the hall and no clue to the child’s trouble.”
—Anna Quindlen (20th century)