How Textual Criticism Became Relevant

COMMENT: Dr. Ehrman, I am an enormous fan of you and your work. Truly. But some of the recent claims you've made in your  blog posts seem rather grandiose. You're saying that the field of textual criticism was all but dead before you showed up and imparted your uncommon wisdom?   RESPONSE: WHOA!!!   That’s not what I’ve been saying (or *trying* to say) (evidently unsuccessfully!) at all!   I’m not claiming that I myself am personally responsible for turning around the discipline.   I’m glad this reader has made this comment, because others might be thinking the same thing, and so I need to clarify. What I *am* saying is that when I got into the field it was moribund.  And now it’s vibrant.  I was very lucky to get in when I did, as it was at the beginning of a resurgence of interesting and a new direction that the field has since taken.  If it had kept on going the way it had, it may well have died out.   But things have happened that have [...]