 Today my special guest is Peter Williams and we're discussing the Greek New Testament produced at Tyndale House, Cambridge Peter thanks for joining us on today's show great to be with you Well first off what are a few things we need to know about your background? Maybe tell us a bit about your education and some of your expertise So I'm 47 and I've been studying the Bible and languages to do with the Bible since I was aged 18 so close on 30 years now Did my degrees through to PhD at Cambridge University in England and I've been researching and teaching in universities since then and For those of us here in the States if I say Tyndale House a lot of folks will think of a publisher or here in Illinois But the Tyndale House we're referring to here is a little bit different So tell us about the work you're doing over there in the UK and what's the mission and vision that's driving your important work? Yeah, thank you. So Tyndale House in Cambridge. It's the oldest Tyndale House in fact began in 1944 and it was you know before even D-Day the Normandy landings in the Second World War where Some people with real vision wanted to set up a Bible research institute and it's been doing that for over 70 years now and it's the leading research institute of the Bible for Bible believers in the entire world and so We're delighted that we welcome people from around the world to study in our library and also we sponsor all sorts of research projects we publish a journal and We are trying to foster Bible believing servant-hearted scholars. We're excited to do that Tell us about the origins of this particular Greek New Testament project How many years has this been in the making and what was the vision that got it all started? Well, I think we're told in Matthew 4 that you know Man should not live by bread alone But by every word that comes from the mouth of God and that means that as humans our job is to be obsessed with a question What does God say and if we're really obsessed by that question and we want to have as Accurate a possible copy of that as we possibly can now God spoke his words and he spoke them in the Bible in the Old Testament Hebrew New Testament Greek and We want to make sure we have access to as accurate a copy of that as we possibly can so What you do with an addition is you look at all the manuscripts that there are and you try to bring together from them the Most accurate choice of wording that really reflects what was first given and that's what we've been working on for a decade on just because it's an act of love for God an act of trying to serve the church and We want people to engage with the Bible as much as they can in its original languages Obviously, I know most of us come to Christ because we're reading it in a modern translation. That's great I did too, but if the church is really obsessed with the question What does God say to me then more of us are actually going to be obsessed by the question about the original languages as well And Peter tell us about your specific role in this project. What sort of things have you been working on? Well, I mean, I've been taking the institutional lead on making sure we keep to time and We've had over 30 people involved, but I've been the number two researcher on the project So we've had a guy called Dirk Jankent. He's a Dutch guy who? Actually used to be in charge of the earliest complete manuscript of New Testament codex Sinaiticus in the British Library and he's been working Leading on that and I've just been his researcher system, which has been really great fun looking at manuscripts morning noon and night For those of the the folks listening who have a background in study in Greek Most of us are familiar and probably have in our library either a Nestle Aland or a UBS texts How specifically does this new edition differ from those texts that we're familiar with? What are some of the additional benefits we're going to realize there? Well, I want to start with what's the same because one of the great things we find is that we're working independently from the people who made the Nestle Aland edition or the United Bible Society's edition and we're coming to Pretty similar results. So the first 14 verses of John's Gospel 182 words 812 letters. We're actually identical. And in fact, we're also identical to what Erasmus did in 1516, I mean, there just isn't a letter difference and that's pretty amazing because Erasmus didn't have manuscripts earlier than the 12th century and we've got manuscripts going back to the third century for that So that's one encouragement, but then There are these little differences which we're finding and we're excited about so with our edition every single Paragraph is not a modern editorial decision like they tend to be we've actually taken the from ancient manuscripts and One of the things we found for instance is you take the parable of the Sower in Mark chapter 4 verse 3 and We're putting the paragraph mark not before Jesus's first word, but after his first word So literally what Jesus says is he says listen and then he says behold the Sower went out to sow So we've got that paragraph mark after the listen and before the behold and we've done that because four of the five earliest manuscripts do it That tells us quite a few things one is that the way we should read it is Jesus says listen up guys and Then you have to pause and then you let your mind's imagination Visualize the Sower going out to sow and then of course the whole thing ends with whoever has ears to hear let him hear That's a nice way of putting it and it's quite striking that the early manuscripts we have which we find in different cities They've emerged in different places They actually all have the same paragraph mark or four of the five to that's amazing because it shows that the early scribes are caring about these little details Not that we can be sure that comes from Mark himself, but we can be sure that early Heroes of the Gospels early copious to the Gospels saw that as being the break point So that's just a small example. I can give many more I'd be curious if you'd be able to expand a little bit more about the study of scribal habits That seems to be something that's really come into its own in the last several years Why is it important as we're studying to try to get inside of their heads if you will? Well, I think it's really fascinating now that we're able We've got enough manuscripts to try and get quite specific about what an individual scribe might do some of them are Very careful about copying spelling some of them aren't some of them are mitwords some of them are more careful and really get to know the characters of the different writers and manuscripts before you start trying to use Them as witnesses to the New Testament because if you don't the danger is You are just picking a manuscript because it's earlier or it's convenient and saying well This is what we should put in the Bible And I think you need to be a lot more careful about that And so we're trying to if you like filter all of that information that comes Get to know as far as we can these people who wrote a long time ago Get to know the sort of mistakes they made and that helps us not Sit in our arm chairs and decide what's earlier, but actually to Work out using the brains that God's given us what's likely to be earlier and what's likely to be later and tell us about the the concise textual apparatus that's paired with the text for people that Study and are going to use that sort of a thing. What are some of the things that make it stand out? So the apparatus at the bottom of the page doesn't take up a lot of the page because we want people to read the text I would love to have a million people read the Greek New Testament through the entire thing I don't think that's a an unreasonable desire And so one of the things about our apparatus is we don't want it to be Obscure full of lesson of abbreviations and lots of science you need to learn We want actually this to be available for ordinary people to read so we made it so that When you're reading the main text you don't have any distractions That stop you reading. We don't allow lots of editorial science in there But if you look down to the bottom of the page the really important variations there are we're going to signal in the manuscripts And we're going to signal them in quite a simple way And and you already touched on this a little bit earlier, but I wanted to go back to it I mean we're at a time where we've got numerous English translations available But why is it critical for us to continue pursuing Bible study in the original languages? Because we've seen kind of an ebb and flow where this is as an area of focus It's definitely gone down at a lot of seminaries and Bible schools So talk to us about why we really need to keep pursuing that as a foundation of our studies Well, I think it's really interesting that we at least in the West have never had greater access to God's word or information about God's word and just on your cell phone You can get all sorts of information about the Bible and all sorts of apps that will help you on that So it's never been easier, but the other side is that we've never been quite so distracted You know, we've got so much entertainment that we're actually forgetting what God said now What's our job in life? Our job in life is not to be successful our job is to listen to what God says and Heed it and to be faithful to that God may give a success in all sorts of areas, but that's not our actual job So our job is to say master speak. We're listening and so that does mean that Actually listening to what God says is even more important than praying and that may shock people But surely we got to give what God says to us priority about what over what we say to God even though prayer is incredibly important so that does mean that just as today we're quite obsessed about what we eat and we have therefore all the lists of ingredients on all sorts of packets and Parents see it as their job To read the packets to know what ingredients they're giving their kids even though most parents don't think they're dietary specialists, right? so Similarly, I think ordinary Christians don't need to think of themselves as Greek scholars But they do want to take an interest in the precise Details of what God says just as we take interest in the precise number of calories and something we eat We want to know that sort of stuff So I think it's part of being a part of loving God is Really wanting to know in really precise terms. What exactly is he telling me? And why should this Greek New Testament be on the desk of every scholar and every pastor? Well, I'm not saying every pastor in the world because you know, there are all sorts of pastors with not many resources at all but I do think that What's a pastor's job? Well a pastor is a shepherd and There are a few jobs for a shepherd. The shepherd is to protect the flock But a key thing that the shepherd does is they feed the flock and so that means that just as say with a parent They are checking the ingredients before they feed their kids a responsible parent doesn't just give their kids junk food a Responsible pastor doesn't give their congregation junk food They actually are trying to make sure that what gets through nutritionally spiritually For their flock is as good as it can be and so I think that just means that of course The shepherd has to do due diligence on the nutrition content of what they pass on they need to be able to check those sort of things and They're not doing the job if they're not doing that. Does that make sense? Yeah, that makes total sense Thank you tell us about some of the different editions that are available Crossways got a couple editions. It's available online You're also working with Cambridge as well And if I remember correctly there's also going to be an audio edition and partnership with Bible Mesh So tell us kind of the vision for publication. We're just beginning out on this and we've only got one Edition, but it's got five different bindings. So it's the same wording inside and the same page layout But there are a few the three different linings or covers with Cames University Press two of them quite high-end leather ones and There's also with Crossway. There are a couple of different ones and so there's a range of beautiful Products we really want this to be beautiful, you know for the glory of God And then we got our friends at Bible Mesh who've got Some folk from a monastery in Greece to be reading this out loud So you can get the audio of that as well. The text is free They're online It's going to be available in a lot of the major Bible software as well as on apps So we're trying to push forward on that and we're going to try and produce more and more bindings more and more different Look so people can avail themselves of that. Yeah, it is nice that it's available in a range of options and prices I had a chance to look at the hardcover edition from Crossway and that actually comes with a Very nice slip case that that is in so it'll look nice on your shelf and Crossway also has a true-tone edition That's available here in the States as well Peter if the listeners want to find out more about the work of Tyndale house if they want to find out more about this Greek New Testament were a couple of places they can go on the web to do that Well to find out about Tyndale house just go simply to Tyndale house comm Tyndale house comm that's our website and that will tell you about what we do and Then for the Greek New Testament, they just go to the Greek New Testament comm So tinder house comm and the Greek New Testament comm they will tell you what you need to know Once again our book today was the Greek New Testament produced at Tyndale house Cambridge You can find out more at the Greek New Testament comm and also at Tyndale house comm Peter I just want to say thanks so much for sharing with us today. It has been a great pleasure speaking with you Thank you