Dead Sick: The Plight of Unregenerate Sinners

By nature, are human beings spiritually dead or spiritually sick? Traditionally, Reformed theology or Calvinism emphasises that by nature sinners are spiritually dead without the ability to respond positively to the gospel or the commands of God. Other Christian traditions tend to see the plight of the sinner as spiritually sick, badly in need to help, but not necessarily totally unable to respond to the gospel.

Biblically, the truth is that fallen human beings are spiritually dead and also spiritually sick. There is explicit teaching that both are a true picutre of unregenerate sinners.

Paul, writing to Christians in Ephesus, describes their former state by nature: "And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind." (Ephesians 2:1-3)

Paul wrote similarly to the Colossians: "And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses." (Colossians 2:13)

Other Scriptures are clear that human sinfulness also operates like a sickness. Consider these passages:

"There is no soundness in my flesh because of your indignation; there is no health in my bones because of my sin." (Psalm 38:3) 

"And when Jesus heard it, he said to them, 'Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.'" (Mark 2:17 - see also Matthew 9:12).

"But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed." (Isaiah 53:5) 

Sitnce the Bible teaches both and since we know the Bible cannot contradict itself, the only conclusion is that in one sense we are spiritually dead and in another sense we are spiritually sick. I suspect that both are metaphors describing something important about the sinful state all of humanity is in by nature.

Spiritual death emphasises the sinner's inability to respond positively to God's invitations or commands.

Spiritual sickness emphasises the sinner's own suffering and limitations because of his or her sinful nature.

The Bible also talks about sin in terms of slavery, which emphasises the sinner's lack of freedom and bondage to Satan and evil. Verses such as these make that clear:

"Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin." (John 8:34)

"Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed." (Romans 6:16-17). 

 "Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning" (1 John 3:8)

All of these are meant to show the seriousness of the sinner's plight and are not meant to stand in opposition to one another.

We are spiritually dead, we are spiritually sick, and we are spiritually enslaved.

The only source of life, health and freedom is in and through Jesus Christ and the gospel of salvation by grace, through faith, in him. 

 

Why Are So Many Churches Closing?

Scotland in 2026 is a country where many church congregations are being linked together and others are entering into unions, to form one new congregation. This is the case in my own denomination, the Church of Scotland, and may be true in other denominations as well. Because of this, a number of church buildings are now surplus to requirements and are being closed and where viable, sold off.

You know it has reached a significant point when stories about this are even appearing with regularity in the secular media. The usual story is a small group of "campaigners" railing against "the Church" for closing down their beloved building. Cue many irrate comment from others about how this is a "disgrace"—almost all of whom have never attended the congregation in question and may never have attended any place of worship for years.

What are we to make of all this? Why are so many churches being closed down?

At a human level, the answer is very straightforward. There are (or were) many more church buildings than could be sustained by the congregations who occupied them. Outsiders may think that the central church has massive amounts of money so that they can subsidise church congregations with so few members that they cannot afford to keep a building running and in repair on their own. In a sense this is true, and one of the strengths of the Presbyterian system of church governance. We are all one church and richer congregations do heavily and generously subsidise poorer congregations. However, even in this system, a point can be reached where there are simply too many separate congregations with their own buildings. The truth is we have now reached that point.

The membership of the Church of Scotland nationally has been in decline for many many years. At its peak in the 1950s, the Kirk had over a million members, roughly one in four of the population. By 1982, the Kirk had over 900,000 members, roughly one in six of the Scottish population. Today, the membership is around 280,000—about one in twenty of the population. That decline in membership has in no way been matched by a rationalisation of the Church's buildings, not to the same extent anyway.

The cost of maintaining buildings, many of which were built over a century ago or longer, is very high for a declining membership to bear.

This is the human explanation. But behind it is an even more important one—the theological or biblical explanation.

Why is God allowing this? 

Well, the truth is made plain in the Letters to the Seven churches in Revelation chapters 2 and 3. Christ promises that the gates of hell will not prevail against his church, but he does not give an unconditional pass to all congregations. Where congregations abandon God, fail to believe the biblical gospel, disobey the clear teachings on God's word, God is under no obligation to bless those churches. That he has permitted so many to survive this long is a testimony to the divine forbearance and sheer grace. Maybe today is a time of reckoning for the Church?

Some, no doubt, will advocate going further down the wrong path, to "keep the church relevant" and "to attract more people". The truth is that many churches in Scotland are healthy and growing, but I can assure you they are not the ones who have gone down the path of theological liberalism and ethical compromise with the world. That route we have been on for most of the last 100 years and it is a slow death march to oblivion. Nowhere are we commanded to be relevant in the New Testament. We are commanded to be obedient.

What the Church of Scotland needs most is a rediscovery of the truths of the Bible and a return to the message of the gospel. Thankfully there have always been and continue to be some congregations, many individual members and plenty of ministers who still hold to the old truths. My prayer is that God will continue to honour those who honour him and continue his work to reform the Church of Scotland according to the Word of God in 2026 and onwards as he did in centuries past.

Why I Value the Byzantine Text of the New Testament

 

I am certainly no expert on textual criticism, but I have been interested in the subject for many years. In a previous post, I outlined the case for reasoned eclecticism in New Testament textual criticism and I believe that approach is essentially valid. However, for a long time I'vne had some misgivings about the approach taken by current scholarship in how reasoned eclecticism treats the existing evidence.

New Testament textual criticism is a very complex and technical discipline. The fact is that there are around 5000 Greek manuscripts in existence at this time. They range from fragmentary scraps of papyrus with just a few verses through to a few containing all or almost all the New Testament. In age, they range from texts dating from the second century all the way through to some very late manuscripts dating from after the advent of the printing press. These Greek manuscripts are the most important witnesses to the original Greek readings. As no two handwritten manuscripts are exactly the same, the task of the critic is to assess what the most likely reading is in the original autographs (the documents the apostles originally wrote).

At the risk of oversimplifying matters, there are two broad approaches that are taken with the evidence. The vast majority of modern scholars favour what is called 'reasoned eclecticism.' There are a lot of principles and rules around this approach, but in practice, just as the scholarship has held since Westcott and Hort in the 19th century, the manuscripts are "weighted" rather than "counted" and so preference is given to the much smallers number of older manuscripts over the far greater number of later manuscripts. Time after time, when looking at places where there are textual variants, the modern critical Greek New Testaments (currently known as NA28 (Nestle-Aland 28th Edition) and UBS5 (United Bible Societies 5th Edition) go with the readings of three or four of what are deemed the most important manuscripts because they are older, against sometimes a thousand later manuscripts.

The second broad approach takes the opposite course, and gives greater weight to many later manuscripts against the very few earlier ones. Outside the Book of Revelation, which has its own particular textual issues, the split on textual variants is not even close. Most of the time fully 85-95% of the manuscripts point one way and 1-2% point the other way. This fact is probably at the heart of why I feel the original text is more likely, on some occasions at least, to be in the Byztantine text—the text supported by  85-95% of the evidence, though admittedly by later manuscripts, and not in the critical text with readings often supported by only handful (or even just one) of the oldest manuscripts.

The reasons for my valuing and in some cases preferring the Byzantine text is outlined as follows. Before going into that, we should make the point that the vast majority of the New Testament is the same whether we use the traditional Byzantine text or the critical editions that try to reconstruct the original text largely built on two manuscripts, known as Sinaiticus and Vaticanus along with some early supportive papyrii.

So here are my ten reasons:

1. The Text of the Vast Majority of the Manuscript Evidence

The first and most important reason for preferring the Byzantine or Majority Text over the critical text is that it is by far the text with the strongest support in the Greek manuscripts. The typical level of support in the manuscripts is 85-95% of the evidence being in its favour. By contrast, the critical text, in those places where there are meaningful textual variants, is often supported by less than 2% of the manuscripts and not infrequently by only one or two manuscripts. 

Absent some other intervening factor, the text that ended up in the vast majority of copies has an a priori claim to be most likely the original text.

This has been recognised at least implicitly by opponents of the Byzantine Text. For example, Westcott and Hort argued that the dominance of the Byzantine Text in the manuscript tradition and the comparative paucity of support for their favoured Alexandrian text had to be explained by there being an organised and deliberate recension of the text, making the most common Byzantine text and rejecting the Alexandrian text, which they believed was in fact closer to the original autographs. The problem is that there is no historical evidence that any such recension took place. Without it, there is no good reason to account for how the Byzantine text is so dominant in the manuscripts, unless it was the original text.

It is irksome that those who favour the critical text, which in many places, simply adopts the readings of two or three Alexandrian sources, especially Sinaiticus and Vaticanus and ignore thousands of Byzantine manuscripts, nevertheless trade on the fact that "we have 5000 manuscripts" of the New Testament when, in fact, they only really value a handful of early manuscripts where there are textual variants of note.

2. The Text Providentially Preserved by God 

We have not even begun to discuss the doctrine of "providential preservation" which is taught in the Reformed confessions. The Westminster Confession of Faith chapter 1.8 reads:

The Old Testament in Hebrew, (which was the native language of the people of God of old,) and the New Testament in Greek, (which, at the time of the writing of it was most generally known to the nations,) being immediately inspired by God, and by his singular care and providence kept pure in all ages, are therefore authentical;   so as in all controversies of religion, the Church is finally to appeal unto them. 

There are a couple of points worth noting here. The first and most important point is that for the Westminster divines, the inspired text of the New Testament was not a theoretical autograph that we are always aiming at, but never arriving at. When they talk about "the New Testament in Greek" they meant the Greek text they held in their hands and read. It was the actual text that existed at that time that they believed was "immediately inspired by God, and by his singular care and providence kept pure in all ages."

Now, while the textus receptus that underpinned the Geneva Bible, the King James Version and all the Protestant translations of the New Testament was the printed text of that time, the Byzantine Text found in the majority of manuscripts is only slightly different from this text, correcting the relatively few places where the TR does not have good Greek manuscript support.

However, this is quite different from the eclecticism of the critical texts, which require that far from the true text of the New Testament being "kept pure in all ages" this view requires that the true text was lost for almost 1500 years between the 4th century and the mid 19th century.

3. The Text with a wide geographical spread

The second arguement for the Byzantine text being the better text is that not only has it come down to us in the vast majority of manuscripts, but it also represents a wide geographical spread, being found in separate lines of transmission all over the Roman Empire, whereas the Alexandrian text in its older manuscripts has survived only in the area of Egypt, both in the great uncial manuscripts and the surviving papyrii.

Evidence from a wide geographical area is a second point in its favour. We may well ask why a text would be found over a wider geographical area as well as in most manuscripts reach that position unless it was copied many times and in many places by Christians who believed it to represent the true text of the New Testament. 

4. The Text that was actually in use by the Greek-speaking Church and Its Liturgy

Unlike the critical text which substantially relies on two obscure manuscripts, one rescued from destruction in a monastery in Egypt and the other kept in the Vatican library, the Byzantine text has been in use in the Greek-speaking church for over a thousand years. It is the text that has been influencing the life of the church all through the New Testament era. It is also the text that has been in use in the Protestant churches since the Reformation onwards.

5. The Text that has an internal consistency across sometimes hundreds of independent manuscripts 

The Byzantine text displays an extraordinary level of consistency and agreement across hundreds of manuscripts. While no two manuscripts are ever identical, each with its own scribal errors, nonetheless the Byzantine text is consistent. This is in sharp contrast with the two main Alexandrian uncials which hardly agree with one another in a single verse.

6. The Text that Fits the Fact that Scribes Tend to Omit Material More Often Than They Include Extra Material

One of the rules of modern textual criticism is that, all else being equal, the shorter text is to be preferred as more likely the original. However, many people are now questioning this. There is evidence that, in fact, scribes were more likely to omit material when copying rather than adding text. Such omissions would mostly be by accident, though perhaps sometimes deliberate.

The Byzantine readings are generally longer than the Alexandrian text. It seems quite arbitrary that assume the shorter reading is more likely original. In fact, I believe that the preference for the older manuscripts is the overarching reason that they are preferred. There are places where the longer reading is in the critical text. Here the critical text still goes with the older MSS.

The truth is that when handling what they believed was the Word of God, scribes were less likely to add to the text, which requires a deliberate action, whereas leaving something out can easily happen by accident. On this basis, we might infer that the longer text is more likely to be the original. 

7. The Text That Requires Unproven Conjectures to Undermine It

As we have already mentioned, unless there is some overriding reason to hold otherwise, the text that dominates the manuscripts—the text that has been copied the most—is statistically the most likely to be the original. Even the opponents of the Byzantine text recognise as much. This is why there have been a number of theories as to why they believe the secondary Byzantine text came to dominate whereas what they believe was the original text was all but lost. 

The most common of these theories is that at some point there was an official church recension or editing of the New Testament text, standardising it in the distinctly Byzantine direction.

However, no evidence of any such recension has been found. Absent this, there is no good reason to suppose that the vast majority of manuscripts are not the best indicator of the original text.

8. The Huge Amount of Comparatively Late Manuscripts Must Have Been Copied from Earlier Manuscripts

My next point is simply that the vast majority of manuscripts, representing the Byzantine text, did not come out of nowhere. Every manuscript that exists came from other earlier manuscripts. That is how copies are made. Studies show that the existing Byzantine manuscripts come from many lines of transmission. In other words, these manuscripts are not obvious copies of each other. They come form earlier, now lost, ancestor manuscripts.

An additional supporting point is that when written Greek shifted from the more difficult to read uncials (all written in capital letters with minimal punctuation and sometimes no spacing between words) to the more easy to read minuscules (such as the image at the top of this post), when copies were made into the minuscule form, scribes would then tend to destroy the earlier uncial version. This would explain why there are no existing Byzantine uncials.

The existence of some Byzantine readings among the papyrii is also an indication that the Byztantine text goes back in time much further than the existing manucscripts indicate.  

9. The Lack of Early Manuscripts Points to the Text Being in Constant Use 

Closely aligned with the previous point, as well as being deliberately destroyed when new copies were made, the text that was in constant use in the early church would naturally wear out and need replacing. The only reason the likes of Sinaiticus and Vaticanus survived was because they were not in constant use. They were not texts that the churches used.

Logically, we would not expect early manuscripts to survive of the text was being read and used in churches all over the Greek-speaking Roman Empire.

In other words, the lack of early manuscripts in the Byzantine form, is actually an argument in favour of the Byzantine text being in use at earlier points in church history prior to the dates of the surviving manuscripts.  

10. The Text of the Reformation and the Reformed Creeds

Though our final point is not a textual one and definitely the weakest of the arguments put forward, I do not think it insignificant that the Byzantine text was the one which God in his providence used throughout the Protestant Reformation and right through to the 19th century.

The fact is that in God's church, the Byzantine text was not really replaced in the churches until the 1950s when the RSV came into use.

The Reformed creeds are based around the New Testament text found in the Textus Receptus, itself a form of the Byzantine text.

Conclusions

At present, there are no committee translations of the Byzantine text (or Majority text). The only translatons are of the Textus Receptus, which departs from the majority Byzantine readings on a number of occasions. The main options are the King James Version and the New King James Version. The latter is particularly useful because the New Testament footnotes show there the majority text and the critical text differ from the TR.

There are two excellent translations produced by Robert Adam Boyd, a Wycliffe translator. One is a revision of the American Standard Version (1901) in which Boyd has changed the New Testament to conform to the Byzantine Text. The other is a fresh translation of the Byzantine Text into modern English, which Boyd calls the Text-Critical English New Testament: Byzantine Text Version. This version reads similarly to the ESV or Christian Standard Bible in terms of the translation style.

It would be very useful if a Byzantine version of the ESV or NIV could be produced. Most of the key readings would be found in the footnotes of these versions anyway.

The World English Bible (WEB) which is another public domain translation, is also based on the Byzantine text. 

Christmas 2025

 Wishing all our readers a happy and blessed Christmas season. 

  

Hell and the Fate of the Wicked

 

For many years, I have wrestled with hell. By that I mean the doctrine of the final state of the wicked.

There are a spectrum of views, of course, on this subject, but in my view it comes down to two main views among evangelicals. A third view, that ultimately everyone will be saved (known as "universalism") is not supported by more than a tiny minority of those claiming to be evangelical. That leaves two views among evangelicals.

First, there is what is known as the traditional view that the final state of the non-saved is eternal conscious torment and punishment in hell. This view is almost inconceivable for the human mind to comprehend. For a person to experience punishment and, in some sense, pain, for all eternity is an idea so horrific that I think few of us want to even contemplate it. The exact details are sketchy at best biblically - darkness, fire, pain, torment, certainly much less detailed than the vivid medieval depictions of the likes of Dante in writing and Bosch in art.

Nevertheless, it is the most common view held by Reformed and evangelical Christians and there are a number of strong biblical arguments in its favour. It is also the view taught in the Reformed confessions.

Several verses are difficult to reconcile with the idea that the punishment in hell is only temporary in duration.

Matthew 25:46 is one such verse where Jesus himself says: "These [the wicked] shall go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life."

Notice he does not say "eternal death" in contrast to eternal life, but "eternal punishment". At least on the face of it, if eternal life is never ending, it would appear that eternal punishment may be never ending also.

A second verse of relevance is Revelation 14:10-11, speaking of those who worship "the beast": "He also will drink the wine of God's wrath, poured full strength into the cup of his anger, and he will be tormented with fire and sulphur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment goes up for ever and ever, and they have no rest, day or night, these worshippers of the beast and its image, and whoever receives the mark of its name."

"The smoke of their torment goes up for ever and ever" does not sound like annihilation to me. 

A third relevant passage is Revelation 20:10 and 15. "The devil who deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet are also. They will be tormented day and night forever and ever.... If anyone was not found written in the book of life, he was cast into the lake of fire."

Again, on the face of it, it could be argued that since the lake of fire seems to inflict torment forever, and all the wicked are thrown in there, their suffering would be eternal.

The second view has several different names, but in essence it is that while there is punishment in hell for the wicked, at some point the conscious torment ends and the person in hell ceases to exist. This view is sometimes called "Conditional Immortality" or "Annihilationism". It is sometimes portrayed as if this view teaches that when the wicked die, they immediately cease to exist. There may be some who teach that, but the mainstream of this view is that the wicked are punished in hell for a period of time related to the punishment they deserve for their sins, but that this punishment does not continue forever, but eventually they cease to exist.

In the first view, if a sinner is tormented in hellfire for a million years, he is no nearer the end of his infinite punishment than when he first entered hell. In the second, if the just punishment is punishment for a million years, at the end of this time, the sinner ceases to exist and the active punishment ends, though the sentence of eternal death remains effective forever. 

Like many theological disputes, and perhaps more than most, there are good biblical arguments on both sides. Anyone who thinks that the opposite side in this discussion does not have good arguments, simply does not understand the best arguments of the other side.

It is unlikely we will ever be able to be certain about which view is correct this side of eternity. I admit that I cannot really conceive what eternal active punishment looks like. For that matter, I can hardly conceive what everlasting life looks like either. Part of me hopes that annihilationism is true. There may be people I love in hell after all. Eventual non-existence seems more attractive than eternal existence in suffering. As many have pointed out, how can the saints fully rejoice in heaven, knowing their loved ones are writhing forever in the pain of hell?

Yet we must not let our emotions guide our doctrine, but the teaching of the Word of God. And as we have seen, there are certainly verses that point in the direction of eternal conscious punishment. 

All I can say is: "Shall not the judge of all the earth do right?" (Genesis 18:25). Whatever God does with the wicked will be the right thing in the end and it will be marvellous in our eyes (Psalm 118:23) because the fate of the wicked whatever else it is, will be according to divine justice.

Advent 2025

 

Yesterday was the first Sunday of Advent. It marks the beginning of a new Christtian year and the start of the period of Advent leading up to Christmas.

Advent comes from the Latin "adventus" which means "coming" or "arrival". It refers to the period of waiting for the coming or arrival of Jesus Christ, both in terms of his first coming as a baby born in Bethlehem and his second coming in glory at the end of the world. A third sense, which we do not often focus on, is the coming of Christ to live in the hearts of believers through the Holy Spirit.

The long run up to Christmas, much longer in the world of modern commerce than in the church calendar, is one of my favourite seasons of the year.

The great advent hymn, "O come, O come, Emmanuel" can be sung with any of the three senses of the coming of Christ in mind.

I was very interested to learn recently that though the words and music of this great hymn are ancient, they were not joined together until the 19th century, when John Mason Neale translated a medieval Latin text into English in 1851 and then got his friend Thomas Helmore, who used a French medieval sacred tune and reharmonised it to work with Neale's words. For many years there was doubt as to whether had actually composed the tune and only claimed to have "discovered" it. However, in 1966 it was established that it was an ancient French tune. The tune is known as VENI EMMANUEL after the Latin text's opening words.

The resulting text and tune combine to make one of the greatest of advent carols. I could not imagine going through advent without singing this great hymn at least once.

 

The Case for Reasoned Eclecticism (in New Testament Textual Criticism)

Codex Sinaiticus, 4th Century Greek Manuscript

Few topics stir as much debate among Christians, historians, and biblical scholars as the question of how we determine the original text of the New Testament. I am certainly no expert on textual criticism, but I have been interested in the subject for many years and here are where my thoughts on this subject have taken me so far.

Let's start with a few facts that are not in dispute. The books of the New Testament were originally penned by the apostles and the originals they produced are called the autographs. In God's wisdom, we no longer possess the original autographs—all have been lost in time, and so none can be venerated by Christians. We do not possess the autographs, but we do possess over 5,800 Greek manuscripts and thousands more in ancient translations, especially Latin. 

The sheer abundance is a blessing and vastly exceeds the manuscript evidence for any other work of antiquity. Yet this abundance of manuscripts also presents a challenge. Prior to the advent of the printing press in the Renaissance period, every copy of the New Testament had to be laboriously copied by hand. As a result, all manuscripts differ in places with every other manuscript in thousands of ways. Most of these are tiny and largely inconsequential such that they would not even show up in an English translation (spellings, word order, etc.). However, there are hundreds of places where the manuscripts' differences do affect the text—none are so significant that they seriously affect any doctrine—but they do result in potentially different readings within the New Testament. These are known as "textual variants". In modern bibles, you will find them on most pages of the New Testament, where the main text reads one way, but footnotes present alternative possibilities. 

The question is: How do we decide which reading is most likely the original?

There are a number of different schools of thought among scholars as to how best to answer this question. 

The most widely used and academically respected approach today is known as reasoned eclecticism. This method stands behind the standard critical editions that lie behind almost all mainstream English translations. These are called the Nestlé-Aland 28th Edition and the United Bible Societies 5th Edition (known as NA28 and UBS5).

While no method is perfect, reasoned eclecticism offers the most balanced and historically sensitive way to reconstruct the earliest recoverable and most likely original text.

Though not an essential part of reasoned eclecticism per se I think it is also worth stating that my personal view is that the text of the autographs, the actual words of the apostles that are God-breathed (2 Timothy 3:16), have not been lost, but are to be found in the manuscript evidence God has providentially preserved. The true reading is to be found either in the main printed text or the footnotes of our bibles.

The other thing I would want to add is that there are sometimes when I believe the academic consensus on what the most likely original reading is may be incorrect. Reasoned eclecticism leaves it open to each person to study the evidence, consider the arguments, and make up their own mind. Some may complain this leaves uncertainty as to the original text, but I would simply reply that it is the existence of textual variants in the text that creates this uncertainty. Reasoned eclecticism simply embraces the facts. Other approaches seem to want to trade truth for certainty and may end up with neither.

The following are the main reasons why I believe that reasoned eclecticism is the best approach to New Testament textual criticism.

1. Reasoned Eclecticism Uses ALL the Manuscript Evidence, Not Just Part of the Evidence

Some approaches prioritize the numerical majority of extant manuscripts (known as the Majority Text or Byzantine Priority Approach), and others almost exclusively privilege a single text type (as in some Alexandrian-priority arguments). Reasoned eclecticism avoids both extremes.

It considers:

• External evidence: the age, geographical distribution, and textual relationships of manuscripts.
• Internal evidence: what scribes tended to do, and what an author is likely to have written.

By drawing from the full spectrum of available data: papyri, uncials, minuscules, versions, and patristic citations. It avoids the tunnel vision that comes from using only one subset of the evidence.

Reasoned eclecticism makes the simple but essential claim: the original reading is more likely to survive in the oldest manuscripts, all other factors being equal. Thus the witness of a few oldest sources is at least if not more valuable that a large majority of later manuscripts. Fundamental to this approach is the recognition that manuscripts must be weighed and not just counted. Secondly, where the external evidence is not clear-cut, we must examine the internal evidence and a judgment is needed to assess which reading is (a) least likely a scribal error or addition and (b) is the variant that most likely explains the existence of the other variants.

2. Reasoned Eclecticism Recognises That Manuscript Numbers Alone Cannot Determine Originality 

Most New Testament manuscripts were copied in the Byzantine Empire after the 9th century. They are numerous not because they preserve the earliest form of the text, but because Byzantine copying was prolific and stable. A reading supported by a thousand manuscripts from AD 1000 may be historically inferior to a reading supported by two manuscripts from AD 200.

Reasoned eclecticism therefore avoids the fallacy that “more manuscripts = more original.” Instead, it asks: Which manuscripts stand closer to the earliest recoverable stages of transmission? Often, the early papyri from Egypt represent earlier streams of copying, even if they are fewer in number.

Quality, not quantity, is what matters then sifting the available evidence.

3. Reasoned Eclecticism Acknowledges Scribal Habits (Both Errors and Expansions)

Copyists made predictable mistakes. For example, they tended to:

• Expand names and titles for clarity (“Jesus Christ” → “the Lord Jesus Christ”).
• Simplify grammar or wording.
• Harmonize parallel passages (both in the Gospels and in Paul's Letters).
• Add explanations to difficult verses or soften verese thought to be too hard.
• Add marginal notes into the body of the text for fear of leaving out anything important.

Reasoned eclecticism takes these tendencies seriously. A reading that is more awkward, shorter, or harder is often more likely to be original because scribes typically smoothed and expanded rather than created difficulties. No other method consistently accounts for this behaviour by those who copied the New Testament by hand.

4. Reasoned Eclecticism Takes Account of Authorial Style and Context

Not every variant is best explained by scribal habits alone. Sometimes one reading simply fits better with the vocabulary, theological themes, or narrative flow of the author.

For example, Johannine vocabulary is distinctive. If a variant reading uses terms foreign to John’s style, reasoned eclecticism recognises that it may be secondary. Likewise, if a variant disrupts the flow of argument, that too must be weighed.

Reasoned eclecticism gives us the freedom to integrate literary and contextual insights alongside manuscript evidence.

5. Reasoned Eclecticism Avoids Rigid Formulas and Instead Balances Probabilities

Some text-critical methods operate with simplistic rules, such as “prefer the shorter reading,” or “prefer the reading with majority support.” Reasoned eclecticism explicitly rejects such wooden approaches. Instead, it weighs evidence case by case, instance by instance, recognising that real historical transmission is complex.

This does mean scholars sometimes disagree. But disagreement is not a weakness—it’s a sign that the method is flexible, honest, and evidence-driven rather than ideology-driven.

Far from being a weakness, the fact that some conclusions have to be tentative and open to correction is a strength of the approach.

6. Reasoned Eclecticism Helps Explain Why Some Famous Passages are Disputed

Reasoned eclecticism is the method behind scholarly discussions of passages such as:

• Mark 16:9–20 ("The Longer Ending of Mark")
• John 7:53–8:11 ("The Pericope Adulterae"
• The Ending of the Lord’s Prayer in Matthew 6
• John 5:4 (The Pool of Bethsaida) 
• Luke 2:14 
• 1 Timothy 3:16
• Romans 8:1 
• 1 John 5:7-8 ("The Comma Johanneum") 

And many other passages. 

In each case, reasoned eclecticism weighs early manuscripts, later manuscripts, scribal habits, authorial style, and historical plausibility. Sometimes the result is that a well-known reading is judged secondary. That can be uncomfortable, but it is honest.

The methodology also allows scholars and readers to judge the evidence and make up their own mind. No one is forced to accept the majority opinion on any of these variants. 

A method that never challenges traditional readings is not a historical method; it is a theological one. Reasoned eclecticism prioritises evidence over tradition while still respecting the beliefs of the Christian community.

Again, we would point out that no doctrine relies solely on a particular variant in the manuscript tradition.

7. Reasoned Eclecticism Underlies All Modern Critical Editions of the Greek New Testament 

The NA28 and UBS5 — the two standard editions of the Greek New Testament used worldwide — are both products of reasoned eclecticism. These editions are the basis of almost every major modern translation (NIV, ESV, NRSV, CSB, NASB, and others). They represent over a century of collaborative international scholarship.

No other method has produced texts as widely accepted, rigorously tested, and transparently documented.

8. Reasoned Eclecticism Aligns with How Historians Approach Other Ancient Literature

Classical scholars who edit texts like Homer, Plato, or Tacitus also use eclectic principles: they weigh manuscript age, geographic spread, internal coherence, and scribal tendencies. Reasoned eclecticism places New Testament textual criticism within the mainstream of responsible historical method, not outside it.

This does not mean that Christians do not acknowledge a vast difference between Scripture and all other writings. Of course we acknowledge the New Testament is theopneustos ("God-breathed") and as such is inerrant and infallible.

Yet, the robust process of seeking out the original text from the manuscript evidence, and showing that it can be done to an extraordinary level of certainty, is immensely helpful apologetically when engaging with non-Christians. We do not rely on bare claims of faith when establishing the text of Scripture. It can be done using principles that are valid whether the textual critic is a believer or not. This means that the text of Scripture can be accepted as accurate by anyone coming to it honestly. The truth is that 94-95% of the text of the New Testament is beyond doubt original and certain. All major doctrines and practices are clearly taught whatever Greek Text we use. The question of which text is more likely original only has a bearing on 5-6% of the text, and of these perhaps only 1-2% have any real significance at all beyond spellings and word order or saying the same thing in slightly different words.

Conclusions 

Reasoned eclecticism is not perfect—no method is—and it does not claim to be. But it is the approach that most responsibly engages with the full range of available evidence. It avoids the pitfalls of majority-based methods, sidesteps the rigidity of one-text-type theories, and resists simplistic rules. By considering external evidence and internal probabilities together, it offers the most historically plausible reconstruction of the earliest recoverable New Testament text.

In short, reasoned eclecticism gives us the best chance of hearing the New Testament as the earliest Christian communities heard and read it.

It’s Time to Take a Stand Against Catholicism’s Push for Unity (YouTube)

Should City Churches Celebrate the Harvest Festival?

 

This may seem a strange question perhaps, especially as we still bask in the heat of summer here in the UK. The question is straightforward. Should an urban church celebrate the harvest festival or is this something only relevant for rural parishes surrounded by the farms?

Growing up in church, the Harvest Thanksgiving Service as a fixed point in the church calendar, though I grew up in the inner city. Each October we had a Harvest Weekend, which consisted of a Harvest Supper—a church meal held on the Saturday evening—and a Harvest Thanksgiving Service held on the Sunday. Produce that had been donated for the harvest service was then distributed to elderly and needy people in the parish as well as to local charities working with the homeless and foodbanks.

In the church I now attend, we do not mark harvest in any way and I have always thought that was strange. The answer I once received was that as we are a city parish, harvest is something for rural parishes and so it is not relevant to us.

I didn't agree with that thinking then and I don't agree with it now.

So here are my reasons why I think celebrating harvest should be a part of urban church life as well as in rural churches.

1. Harvest Thanksgiving is about giving thanks to God for his provision for us. Christians in city parishes have no less reason to thank God for the production and supply of crops, fruit, vegetables, meat, fish and dairy produce than anyone directly involved in the production of these foods. Likewise, we can thank God for fresh and clean water, essential to life.

2. A Harvest Thanksgiving service gives us an opportunity to speak about God's creation and creation care more widely, which is obviously of relevant to all Christians wherever they live.

3. Harvest Thanksgiving can also provide an opportunity to reflect on those parts of the world that do not have enough food or clean water and encourage Christians to support charities working in these areas.

4. In urban areas, the concept of thanksgiving for the Harvest, can be broadened to include the "Harvest" of all the talents and work done by others that are good gifts from God—teachers, doctors, nurses, manufacturers, tradespeople, etc.

5. Harvest Thanksgiving in urban areas gives an opportunity to remind children (and indeed all city dwellers) that food does not ultimately come from supermarkets, but from farms and fisheries, and ultimately from God's providing hand.

These are practical reasons and possibilities to make an urban harvest relevant. There is no particular need to gather food in church for the service, though there may be benefit in doing so to support local foodbanks and charities.

It just seems really restrictive to me to suggest that only farmers or fishermen have any reason to give thanks to God when the harvest of food comes in each year. As the harvest hymn says:

All good gifts around us are sent from heaven above;
Then thank the Lord, O thank the Lord for all His love. 

Christian Standard Bible Anglicised Edition

When the Christian Standard Bible came out in 2017 I thought it was one of the best English translations to come out in a while. It ticked pretty much every box for me in what I look for in an English translation, except that back then in was not available in a British English or anglicised edition. This is important to me as a reader as the American spelling of many important biblical words are jarring, especially Saviour and other "our" words.

 I actually wrote to Holman (the publisher) to ask if there were any plans to bring out a British English edition. Initially, there were no plans, but I was delighted when the CSB Anglicised edition came out about a year ago in summer 2024.

I really do think the CSB is an exceptionally readable and accurate translation that does not consider itself bound by Bible translation tradition. A good example would be John 3:16, which is traditionally rendered something like: "For God so loved the world that he have his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him would not perish but have eternal life.

 The CSB reads: " For God loved the world in this way: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life."

I would highlight three improvements in translation in this rendering.

1.  The Greek word Houtos normally refers to the manner in which something is done, not the degree to which something is done. Although "so" can used in either sense, the natural understanding in English of "For God so loved the world" would be that John was referring to the degree of God's love rather than the manner of God's love (which is what the Greek word means). Therefore the CSB's "For God loved the world in this way" is more accurate to the Greek.

 2.  Most scholars now recognise that monogenes does not refer to someone being only begotten, but to them being unique (literally one-of-a-kind). The CSB's "one and only" is therefore preferable to the traditional "only begotten".

3. The Greek literally refers to "every believing one" in the second half of the verse. There is no generic "whoever" in the Greek. The CSB's "everyone who believes" is much more accurate than "whoever believes".

This is just one verse, though a very famous verse. I'm sure similar points could be made throughout the CSB.

 I use the Bible Gateway website for much of my Bible study and I was delighted to see that the Christian Standard Bible Anglicised edition is now an option on the site. I haven't checked the app but I'm sure it will also be on there.

Having the CSB in British English is a great move by Holman and I now plan to use the CSB as my main Bible from now on.

On the translation spectrum, the CSB is somewhat more literal than the NIV and more natural than the ESV, which I think is an ideal balance. The footnotes in the CSB with alternative, sometimes more literal translations, are also excellent in this version.