Newsletter Highlights - March 2024

Many things have transpired at the CNTR since my last newsletter, so let me try to get everyone caught up to speed:

• My paper entitled “The First Computer-Generated Greek New Testament” was published in TC: A Journal of Biblical Textual Criticism in November (http://jbtc.org/v28/TC-2023_Bunning.pdf). The paper goes into greater detail about the methodology involved in creating the Statistical Restoration (SR) Greek New Testament which was published by GlossaHouse in October (https://glossahouse.com/products/statistical-restoration-greek-new-testament-srgnt).
• The CNTR project is now more intentional on utilizing volunteers and has held several callouts for those who have expressed interest. There are now 10 volunteers who have agreed to help out in various aspects of the project in keeping with their skill sets, with several actively involved in current tasks.
• My book entitled “Restoration of the New Testament: The Case for Scientific Textual Criticism” was published by GlossaHouse in February (https://glossahouse.com/products/restoration-of-the-new-testament-the-case-for-scientific-textual-criticism). This book includes an overview of textual criticism and explains the rationale and principles behind making texts like the SR. From the blurb on the book cover, scientific textual criticism “represents a fundamental paradigm shift from the past, where subjective decisions on variant readings are replaced with advanced statistics and algorithms rooted in the fields of data science and computer science, conforming to the scientific principles of objectivity, plausibility, transparency, and reproducibility.” The book is also available on Amazon.
• Two separate proposals by the CNTR were accepted by the Lightsys Code-a-Thon. A team of students from Calvin University will be working on an open-source Text-to-Speech engine solution so that Greek texts on the website can be read out loud. And a team of students from Covenant College will be working on a Koine Greek Orthography program that will statistically try to derive the most probable spelling of words.
• I will be presenting two different papers at the Midwest Regional Meeting for Biblical Studies March 16. One is entitled “Early Scribes and Textual Criticism” and the other is entitled “Determiners in the New Testament”.
• The popularity of the CNTR project continues to grow at a rapid pace as the website is now averaging over 6000 hits a day. According to Similarweb, it is the #1 website for textual criticism by both volume and duration of visits.

But perhaps the biggest news is that I am no longer receiving funding from my main supporter, unfoldingWord, because they experienced a financial crisis and had to make some cutbacks. As a result, I am looking for a new Christian organization to take in the CNTR project, and eventually take over the CNTR project. If you have any suggestions along those lines, please let me know. In any case, I no longer personally have a source of income, and thus I am appealing to you to please consider giving, especially if you have never given before. The CNTR has moved to a donation only model now, and thus the donation page on the website has accordingly been redesigned. I would remind you that I do not receive any income from the sale of any of the CNTR books or materials, as they have all been freely given as a ministry to the Body of Christ, so it is only your gifts that will keep the project alive. I do not want to resort to putting ads and pop-ups on the site to generate revenue if I can help it, so please consider giving to keep the website ad free.