How should churches and seminaries handle textual variants in preaching and teaching?

Churches and seminaries should approach textual variants with strategic transparency—educating congregations about textual reality while maintaining confidence in Scripture’s reliability.

Preachers and teachers who regularly work with the New Testament need foundational knowledge of textual criticism.[1] This is not optional. Pastors or teachers who bypass textual criticism in exegesis risk relying on inferior texts unknowingly, and ignorance becomes a serious obstacle when unable to answer parishioners’ questions about translation differences or respond to skeptical challenges.[2]

However, the approach matters enormously. Keep discussions brief and accessible to lay audiences unfamiliar with Greek, helping them understand that most variants are insignificant and no Christian doctrine rests solely on disputed passages.[1] The reassurance here is crucial: more than 99 percent of the original Greek New Testament can be reconstructed beyond reasonable doubt, only about four hundred variants have significant bearing on meaning, and no mainstream Christian doctrine is founded solely on any textually disputed passage.[2]

Most text-critical work should occur behind the scenes rather than in extended pulpit discussion, though as congregations become familiar with the discipline, pastors can simply reference “the oldest and most reliable texts” or explain scribal changes—while remaining alert to newcomers and young Christians unfamiliar with variants.[2]

When major textual issues arise—such as the woman caught in adultery or Mark’s ending—these provide opportunities to address textual criticism from the pulpit, since faithful Bible readers encounter it through footnotes and translation differences.[3] Textual matters can unsettle the unaware, and it is less than ideal that they first encounter these challenges from skeptics.[3]

Consult Metzger’s Textual Commentary and other scholarly resources before expressing opinions on textual variations.[1] This disciplined approach—combining pastoral sensitivity with intellectual honesty—builds congregational confidence that Scripture’s reliability doesn’t depend on pretending textual complexity doesn’t exist.

[1] David Alan Black, New Testament Textual Criticism : A Concise Guide (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1994), 55–56.
[2] Craig L. Blomberg and Jennifer Foutz Markley, A Handbook of New Testament Exegesis (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2010), 26–27.
[3] Timothy E. Miller, “Pastoral Pensées: Text-Criticism and the Pulpit: Should One Preach about the Woman Caught in Adultery?,” Themelios (2020), 45:2:381.