Born on 1 December 1912 at Tredindwydd, Bryncroes, Gwynedd. He studied Welsh and Welsh history at University College, Bangor and trained for the ministry at Headingley College. He quickly attained a position of leadership and influence in Welsh Methodism and recognition as an outstandingly versatile scholar and writer in several fields, including biblical studies and theology and the history of Methodism (both CM and WM) in Wales. He assisted A.H. Williams in founding and editing Bathafarn, succeeding him as editor (1970-90). In English he wrote on Howell Harris (WHS Lecture, 1951) and the chapter on Welsh Methodism in the History of the Methodist Church in Great Britain. In Welsh he produced a standard work on the controversies of early Methodism, many booklets and countless articles.
No less prominent as an ecclesiastical statesman, he was Chairman of the Second North Wales District 1962-1974 and President of the Welsh Assembly in 1968. He played a leading role in the unity conversations between the four nonconformist denominations (1957-1973), in the Anglican-Methodist Conversations and in the Covenanting in Wales conversations and subsequent Commission of Covenanted Churches (1964-1984), drafting and/or editing most of their bilingual reports. From 1961 to 1989 he was also secretary of the inter-Church Committee responsible for the new Welsh translation of the Bible (1988). He died at Botwnnog, Pwlleli, Gwynedd on 24 May 1991.