Macmillan wrote of Franz in his 1957 book - "Faith On The March": “he carried away the honors at the University of Cincinnati and was offered the privilege of going to Oxford or Cambridge in England under the Rhodes plan” (pg. 181). “Besides Spanish, Franz has a fluent knowledge of Portuguese and German and is conversant with French. He is also a scholar of Hebrew and Greek as well as Syriac and Latin, all of which contribute to making him a thoroughly reliable mainstay on Knorr’s editorial staff” (pg. 182).

So, here apparently was one source of the rumors regarding Mr. Franz’s intellectual and linguistic prowess that I had heard so much about as a young boy. However, the facts about his education prove problematic for the support of such claims. Scanned copies of the scholastic transcripts of Mr. Franz’s work as a student at the University of Cincinnati show that Mr. Fredrick William Franz quit his university education well before completing his bachelors’ degree (first tier 4 year degree).

So, how could it be true that Franz “carried away the honors of the University of Cincinnati” when he didn’t even graduate?
Franz seemed to try to run a little interference for himself when he wrote in his autobiography (in the article “Looking Back Over 93 Years of Living” for the May 1, 1987, Watchtower magazine):

“I had been chosen to go to Ohio State University to take competitive examinations with others to win the prize of the Cecil Rhodes Scholarship.”

Simply being told what a student must accomplish in order to be invited to Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar, is certainly not the same as “being offered the privilege of going to Oxford or Cambridge in England under the Rhodes plan”. This started me to thinking that there might be more to this story than met the eye. I wondered if there was anything else here that was different than what I’d been led to believe?

First, let’s consider the other linguistic claims about Mr. Franz that was distributed in all the Kingdom Halls in the late 1950’s. Macmillan wrote: “Franz has a fluent knowledge of Portuguese and German and is conversant with French. He is also a scholar of Hebrew and Greek as well as Syriac and Latin.”

However, according to Mr. Franz’s college transcript, his major language studies were in classical Greek (21 semester hours), not Koine Greek in which the New Testament was written. The Greek Franz studied has different grammar and syntax from that of biblical Greek.

At that time, there was only one course in biblical Greek even offered at the University of Cincinnati.

According to the 1911 university catalog, page 119, that course was titled: “The New Testament – A course in grammar and translation.” Although Franz did take this class, this was not a full 3-hour college credit course. This was simply a survey course of New Testament Greek. Therefore it could legitimately be said that Franz never completed not even one typical college course in New Testament Greek. The one short course he did take was in a sense, well….anti-typical; if I may use a favorite phrase of his.

As for Hebrew and Syriac, they were not even offered at the University of Cincinnati. Franz did take 15 hours of Latin, but that would not qualify him as a scholar of that non-biblical language. Since there is no record of Franz attending other universities and the one he did go to is easily checked, the additional claims of him being a scholar of “Hebrew, Syriac and Latin” are apparently not true either.

Franz himself seemed to hold an inflated estimation of his scholarship credentials all the way to near the end of his life evidenced by what he wrote in his autobiography in 1987 :

“What a blessing it was to study Bible Greek under Professor Arthur Kensella! Under Dr. Joseph Harry, an author of some Greek works, I also studied the classical Greek. I knew that if I wanted to become a Presbyterian clergyman, I had to have a command of Bible Greek. So I furiously applied myself and got passing grades” (The Watchtower, May 1, 1987, pg. 24).

You’ll note that this autobiography gives the impression that the majority of his Greek studies were ‘Bible Greek’ under ‘Professor Kensella’ and that classical Greek was secondary under ‘Dr. Joseph Harry.’ The only problem with this proclamation is that the opposite is the truth. Franz only took one, shortened 2-hour credit class of “Bible Greek.” The other 21 hours of Greek he took were Classical.

Also noteworthy, according to the course catalog of 1911, is that Arthur Kensella was not a professor of Greek as Franz claimed, but an “instructor in Greek.” The reason was that Kensella did not have a Ph. D. degree. Therefore, Kensella only taught entry-level courses.

As if Franz’s personal academic records weren’t embarrassing enough when compared with his self-perception; he also seems to have perjured himself in a 1954 Scotland courtroom when he claimed under oath that he could read Hebrew, but then failed to translate a short verse in Genesis when challenged by the prosecutor:

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Prosecutor:Have you also made yourself familiar with Hebrew?

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Franz: Yes …

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Prosecutor: So that you have a substantial linguistic apparatus at your command?

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Franz: Yes, for use in my biblical work.

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Prosecutor: I think you are able to read and follow the Bible in Hebrew, Greek, Spanish, Portuguese, German, French.

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Franz: Yes. . .

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Prosecutor: Can you, yourself translate that into Hebrew?

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Franz: Which?

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Prosecutor: That fourth verse of the second chapter of Genesis?

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Franz: No...

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(Cross Examination of Fred Franz. Pursuer’s Proof of Douglas Walsh v. The Right Honorable James Latham, Clyde , Scottish Court of Sessions, Wednesday, November 24, 1954 , p.7, pars. A-B. and p. 102, par. F.)

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Now with his scholastic record and testimony under oath in mind, please re-read Franz’s claims about himself:

“What a blessing it was to study Bible Greek under Professor Arthur Kensella! Under Dr. Joseph Harry, an author of some Greek works, I also studied the classical Greek. I knew that if I wanted to become a Presbyterian clergyman, I had to have a command of Bible Greek. So I furiously applied myself and got passing grades” (The Watchtower, May 1, 1987, pg. 24).

Does this seem like a man in touch with reality, in love with truth and animated by the humbling effect of the indwelt Holy Spirit? Or, does he appear to be a fleshly man playing fast and loose with the truth to cover over his real qualifications? You make the call.

For me, the reality is that Fred Franz, although apparently above average in intelligence and somewhat self-taught in Hebrew and other languages, was not a biblical scholar at all. He did not even complete a first tier Bachelors degree, much less a Masters’ degree or a Ph. D., which of course is needed for competent biblical language translation work. In the real world where you and I live, he would have simply been forgotten and would have probably had a hard time finding a good job with such incomplete college work. However, with the help of a religious publishing company he ended up being esteemed as much as many heads of state and revered as a quasi-prophet or “oracle” with multitudes hanging onto his every word at conventions. 

These findings raise important and troubling questions. Why did Franz never object to the false claims in "Faith on the March"? His later claims in his autobiography certainly suggest that he himself was the source of these statements distributed by the Watchtower since they closely mirror those in Macmillan’s book. So, why would someone take such a risk in promoting these claims that would someday surely be found out as false?

The answer is obvious to me as to why the risk was worth taking. It was at this time that the monumental task of translating the entire Words of God (as edited by Wescott and Hort in Greek) from the original languages into English was nearing completion at Watchtower headquarters. This “work” was being released piece by piece to all the members at this time and no doubt questions were naturally raised about the competency of this work. In my opinion, The Macmillan/Franz illusion served the purpose of creating an air of legitimacy surrounding the re-interpretation of Scripture by the Watchtower Translation Committee.

The New World Translation of the Christian Greek Scriptures was released at a convention of Jehovah's Witnesses at Yankee Stadium, New York, August 2, 1950. The translation of the Old Testament was released in five volumes in 1953, 1955, 1957, 1958, and 1960. The complete New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures was released as a single volume in 1961.