Who Was Handley Moule? Bishop of Durham and Keswick Teacher
Handley Carr Glyn Moule (1841–1920) was an English evangelical scholar, teacher and bishop. He spent most of his life at Cambridge, first as a fellow of Trinity College and then as the first principal of Ridley Hall, a college for training Church of England ministers. In 1901 he became Bishop of Durham, and he served there until he died. He was also one of the best-known speakers at the Keswick Convention, and his short books on holiness, prayer and Paul's letters are still read today. Most people know him as H. C. G. Moule, or simply Handley Moule.
Here's a fuller look at his life, what he taught, and which of his books to start with.
A vicar's son in Dorset
Moule was born on December 23, 1841, at Fordington in Dorset, in the south of England. His father, Henry Moule, was the vicar of Fordington for many years, a hard-working evangelical pastor who is also remembered as an inventor. Handley was the youngest of eight sons, and it was a remarkable family. Two of his brothers, George and Arthur, went to China as missionaries, and George became a bishop there. Another brother became head of a Cambridge college.
He was taught at home before going up to Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1860. He studied classics, took his degree in 1864 and was elected a fellow of Trinity the next year. He also won Cambridge's Seatonian Prize for sacred poetry several times. Poetry and hymn writing stayed with him all his life, and verses, his own and other people's, run through his books.
Doubt, and faith made sure
After Cambridge he taught for a time at Marlborough College, and in 1867 he was ordained and became curate to his father at Fordington. Around this time he went through a season of real doubt. Accounts of his life say it was resolved during the Christmas vacation of 1866, and that from then on his faith in Christ was settled and warm. Whether that was a conversion or the recovery of his childhood faith, he came out of it with the evangelical convictions of his father's home, held now as his own.
From 1873 to 1877 he was dean of Trinity College chapel.
Ridley Hall
In 1880 Moule was chosen as the first principal of Ridley Hall, a new evangelical college at Cambridge for men preparing for the ministry. He led it for nearly twenty years, and about five hundred men passed through it under him. He taught them the Greek New Testament, and he taught them to pray.
In 1881 he married Harriot Mary Elliott. They had two daughters. The elder, Tesie, died in 1905 as a young woman, and his wife died in 1914. Moule wrote about both sorrows, and they shaped his later books of comfort.
Many of his books began as talks to Cambridge students. Secret Prayer came from addresses to a university church society in 1888. It's plain and practical, and it warns students that good things can crowd out time alone with God:
Let not good books, be they what they may, oust the Book.
Secret Prayer, Methods and Helps
Keswick and holiness
In September 1884 a team of speakers from the Keswick Convention came to Cambridge. Keswick was a yearly gathering in the north of England that taught a life of holiness by faith: full surrender to Christ and trust in His power to keep a believer from sin day by day. At those meetings Moule came to accept its message, and it changed his life and his teaching. He first spoke at Keswick in July 1886 and went back about a dozen times, the last time in 1919.
Moule gave Keswick something it needed: a careful scholar who could show that its teaching came from the New Testament. He was always clear about the limits. A believer, he said, never claims to be sinless and never stops resting on Christ's righteousness alone. But the promises of God are to be taken as they stand. Thoughts on Christian Sanctity, from addresses given in 1884, opens with the heart of it:
It is nothing less than the supreme aim of the Christian Gospel, that we should be holy
Thoughts on Christian Sanctity, Aims, Limits, Possibilities
For Moule the secret of holiness was a Person. He wrote of Christ as the believer's Master, Keeper and Friend, dwelling in the heart by faith.
Scholar of Paul's letters
Moule was a New Testament scholar first, and he wrote more than sixty books and pamphlets. He wrote the volume on Romans for The Expositor's Bible (1893), a commentary series for general readers. He also wrote devotional studies on Philippians, Ephesians, Colossians, 2 Timothy and Hebrews. These books follow the Bible text closely, but they're written for the heart as much as the head. In 1899 he became Norrisian Professor of Divinity at Cambridge, though he held the post only a short time.
His commentary on Romans shows him at his clearest. He explains justification by faith with great care, and then insists it leads straight to a holy life:
Our justification is not an end in itself, but a means to an end.
The Expositor's Bible: Romans, Justification and Holiness
Bishop of Durham
In 1901 Moule was called to succeed Brooke Foss Westcott as Bishop of Durham, a large diocese in the industrial north of England. It surprised people. He was a quiet scholar and teacher, not a natural administrator, and he didn't care much for church politics, even though the post gave him a seat in the House of Lords. But he was a true pastor. He is said to have written about thirty letters a day, and he gave himself to the people of his diocese.
He also kept writing. During the First World War he wrote Christus Consolator for families who had lost loved ones in the fighting. In it he speaks as a man who has grieved himself:
Let me humbly affirm that in my own great grief Christ is the Consoler in deepest reality.
Christus Consolator, Note
Moule died at Cambridge in May 1920, still Bishop of Durham, at seventy-eight. Shortly before, ill and in pain, he had preached before the king and queen at Windsor.
What he taught
A few themes run through everything Moule wrote:
- Christ is the answer to every need. When faith is weak, the remedy isn't more effort but a fuller sight of Christ.
- Justification leads to holiness. God accepts the sinner for Christ's sake alone, and that acceptance is the start of a new, surrendered life.
- Holiness is by faith. The believer yields to Christ as Master and trusts Him as Keeper, day by day.
- Secret prayer cannot be replaced. Not by Christian work, not by public worship, not by good books.
- The Holy Spirit is a Person who loves to make Christ real to the soul.
Why he's still read
Moule wrote in long Victorian sentences, and he takes a little getting used to. But readers keep coming back to him because he joins two things that often come apart: careful study of the Bible and a warm, personal love for Jesus Christ. He never writes about holiness as a technique. He writes about a Lord who can be trusted.
Where to start
TheWay Library has ten of Moule's books, all free to read. If you're new to him, start with Thoughts on Christian Sanctity, a short book that holds the heart of his teaching. Follow it with Thoughts on the Spiritual Life, its practical sequel. If prayer is your need, read Secret Prayer. If you want a Bible study, try Philippian Studies or Messages from the Epistle to the Hebrews. If you're grieving, go to Christus Consolator.
Our guide to Handley Moule's books explains how all ten fit together, and our collection of Handley Moule quotes gathers his best lines. You'll find all his books on the Handley Moule author page.