I have a question about how to avoid plagiarism and give sufficient attribution. I'm writing a series of Bible studies on the Book of Revelation. These studies will be printed and given to people. I also plan to upload them onto my website. In preparing these, I use various commentaries, other books, and articles. My studies are written at a popular level, and I make no income from them. My question is this: to what extent I need to attribute sources?
(1) Firstly, and naturally, I will attribute direct quotations. But may I give (a) only the author's name; (b) the author's name plus the title of the book/article in a footnote/endnote, but not a complete bibliographic reference; (c) a complete bibliographic reference?
(2) Secondly, when I use writers’ ideas (for example, their interpretation of specific Bible passages), but don’t actually quote their exact words but, instead, adapt them in some way (e.g. by rewording them, abbreviating or summarising them, or adding ideas from other authors), how do I attribute? Scholarly writers provide clear attribution. But my studies are for a general audience. Too much attribution will appear tedious to them. For example, in the commentary by Tom Schriener on Revelation in Crossway’s ESV Bible Expository Commentary series, (written at a popular level, but nonetheless based on scholarly research) there are few references to other authors. However, on page 527, Dr Schreiner lists a number of commentaries that he stands “in debt to” and two books by Richard Bauckham that “influenced” him. Dr Schreiner (and, I guess, Crossway) has thus, it seems, taken the approach of not attributing sources of ideas or interpretations. Instead Dr Schreiner has given a general acknowledgement of indebtedness to certain authors. This is the approach I would like to take when I myself use books or commentaries – in my case, I would place my general attribution of indebtedness at the end of the last of my series of studies on Revelation. Using this method saves a great deal of time, and eliminates a lot of footnotes or references in the text, which readers would probably find intrusive and perhaps tedious. But is this the right approach? With many thanks, Rob Betts
