4 Differences Between the Telephone Game and the Transmission of the New Testament Manuscripts

Dan Wallace—New Testament scholar, textual critic, and founder and executive director of the Center for the Study of New Testament Manuscripts (which seeks to digitize all known Greek manuscripts of the New Testament)—identifies four differences between the Telephone Game and the ancient transmission of New Testament manuscripts.

I’ve turned Wallace’s summary into a little chart, which may make it easier to process at a glance and to pass along to others:

 The Telephone GameNew Testament Manuscripts




Goal of transmissionto see how badly the story can get misrepresentedmainly to produce very careful, accurate copies of the original


Lines of transmissiononly onemultiple


Means of transmissionoral (recited once in another person's ear)written (copied by a faithful scribe who then would check his or her work or have someone else do it)


Checking the transmissiononly the wording of the last person in the line can be checkedNew Testament textual critics have access to many of the earlier texts; even the ancient scribes had access to earlier texts, and would often check their work against a manuscript that was many generations older than their immediate ancestor