This page has information and updates about A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, published in July 2025 to accompany the sixth edition of the United Bible Societies Greek New Testament.
The full bibliographical reference is: H.A.G. Houghton, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament. A Companion to the Sixth Edition of the United Bible Societies' Greek New Testament. Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 2025. xvi+626pp. ISBN 978-3-438-05331-2.
The volume is available to purchase from the German Bible Society, ABE Books, Hendrickson, and numerous other websites.
This all-new Textual Commentary draws on the Greek text of the 29th edition of the Novum Testamentum Graece (NA29) and the sixth edition of the Greek New Testament (UBS6) and comments on all apparatus entries of UBS6 in concise and comprehensible language. The edition is also suitable for use with the Nestle-Aland, as the Nestle-Aland also contains all the apparatus entries of UBS6 (with a different selection of witnesses).
In addition, a detailed introduction provides key information on New Testament textual tradition, basic principles of textual criticism, and guidelines for using the UBS Greek New Testament.
The author is a member of the editorial committee for NA29 and UBS6 and is therefore ideally suited to explain the decisions made by the committee in its preparation of these critical editions. This edition replaces the commentary by Bruce M. Metzger, which has been regarded as the standard work for decades but is now outdated in terms of research history.
It is possible to download a PDF sample from the beginning of the book.
The book will be the subject of a panel review session at the SBL Annual Meeting in Boston (MA) in November 2025.
Reviews
"a great starting place for textual research ... Houghton's work will become a standard reference": Nelson Hsieh, 'Bring the Parchments' (July 2025)
"ein praktisches Nachschlagewerk": Tanja Bittner, Evangelium21.net (August 2025)
Corrigenda
p. 573 Now that the cover has been released, I see that the Oxford Handbook of Textual Criticism of the Bible should be indexed under 'White Crawford' rather than 'Crawford'.
p.589 Under Wasserman 2025, for Forthcoming (etc.), read: In Die Bibel zum Sprechen bringen. Festschrift zu Ehren von Holger Strutwolf, edited by Marie-Luise Lakmann, Gregory S. Paulson & Jan Graefe. ANTF 61; Berlin & New York: De Gruyter, 291–306.