‘An Anchor for My Soul’: Man Spends 8 Months Handwriting Entire New Testament
Retired university administrator Don Ashely spent about eight and a half months this year handwriting his own copy of the entire New Testament, calling it "a mission" that anchored his soul.
Ashley, who moved from Anchorage, Alaska, to farmland in Arkansas, announced that he had completed his Scripture writing journey, which he initially began “on a whim” back in January of this year.
“I completed my handwritten copy of the New Testament today. I started on a whim on January. 5, 2026, and decided I liked it. Highly recommend as a daily practice,” he wrote on the social media platform Threads on Sept. 20. When one commenter asked how much time he spent writing each day, he said about “45 minutes to an hour,” while he told another user that he used the New International Version Bible translation (NIV)
Speaking with CBN News, Ashley shared how his experience went from an impulse to “a mission.”
“In all these life transitions, this really served as an anchor for my soul,” the former professor said.
Ashley explained that his idea came after he took a work trip to San Diego, California, for the Society of Biblical Literature conference. The organization is a nearly 150-year-old learning society whose aim is the academic study of the Bible and other ancient writings, according to Faithwire.
While in the Southern California city, Ashley came across a display of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Those ancient works were discovered in the 1940s and 50s, the outlet reported.
“I was so impressed by the artistry required … that I wanted to experience something about what the ancient scribes experienced,” he noted.
Ashley further stressed that handwriting a copy of the New Testament was a better use of his time than doomscrolling, which refers to scrolling aimlessly on social media, particularly looking at negative and depressing news content.
“I think the idea that, instead of doomscrolling, maybe you could do something more useful with your time,” he said. “The world is so fast-paced now, maybe it appeals to the idea of slowing down.”
Additionally, Ashley likened the process to “a starving man being invited into a banquet” and that it was also cathartic for him as he is currently recovering from major back surgery.
“I made mistakes on this page, and I didn’t worry too much about the mistakes,” he said, holding up a page from his journal where he’d marked over some errors. “I just lined through them and kept going.”
He concluded that it was spiritually encouraging for him to physically handwrite God’s Word on paper.
“I’ve experienced the Bible with my mind for my whole career and since my initial conversion experience in 1985,” he said, “but I wanted to experience it with my fingers. Putting a pen to paper is a different experience than reading it.”
The New Testament, originally written in Koine Greek, is the second half of the Christian Bible after the Old Testament. It comprises 27 books (Matthew to Revelation), totaling about 260 chapters and 7,957 verses and highlights the earthly ministry of Jesus and the early church in the first century.
Ashley has since continued his Scripture writing journey by recently beginning to handwrite the book of Psalms, which contains about 150 Psalms used as Hebrew hymns.
“I’m continuing my devotional practice by writing the Psalms. Experiencing them with my fingers. I can’t comfortably sit in a chair and write at a desk. The recliner and messy writing will do for now. Have you tried writing as a way to encounter God’s Word?” he said in a post on Threads on Sept. 25, which included a photo of his notebook of his handwritten copy.
Photo Credit: ©YouTube.com/CBNNews - ScreenGrab
Originally published October 02, 2026.
