Is it Possible to get a list of lemmas in a passage sorted by frequency in the whole Bible?

Robert Kelbe
Robert Kelbe Member Posts: 627 ✭✭✭

I'm continuing to read and study the original languages, reading a chapter a day in Old and New Testament. At this phase of my study, it would be helpful for me to get a word list of all the lemmas in a particular chapter, sorted by frequency in the whole Bible. That way, before I began reading, I could first study the words that I might not know, and familiarize myself with them. I could scan down the list until I got to the point where I knew most of the words, and then begin my reading.

Is this possible?

Here are some things I've tried:

  • Concordance. If I run a concordance for a particular chapter (which also takes a surprisingly long time to be feasible for what I'm looking for!) the frequency count is based on the particular chapter only, so this doesn't work. If I do a concordance for the entire Bible, I can't filter for all the lemmas in a particular chapter.
  • Important words. I thought Important Words had some kind of an algorithm to prioritize words that were unique to a particular chapter, which would have been useful to me. However, for the chapter I looked at, the "most important" word was a vav consecutive, which is not at all what I'm looking for.
  • Reader's Edition. This gives the gloss in an interlinear only for words that are below a certain frequency. This is OK, but I don't always know the exact frequency cutoff that I want, and I would prefer a list of words sorted by frequency where I could scan for the words I don't know.

Any help would be appreciated!

Best Answer

  • Dave Hooton
    Dave Hooton MVP Posts: 36,009
    edited February 16 Answer ✓

    Create a Word List for the lemmas in your passage.

    Then you need a Word List of all words in the NT or all words in the OT from an Original Language bible. I have put two Greek word lists in Public for your convenience** - All NA27 and All SBLGNT (your Word List must use the same bible).

    Merge your List with the appropriate "All..." list via Intersection. The merged list should have the same number of words as your list.

    The Count is affected by the merge, so you have to (mentally) subtract the count in your list from the count in the merged list. Keep them side by side.

    ** I can't vouch for a Hebrew list in Public.

    Dave
    ===

    Windows 11 & Android 13

Comments

  • PAMELA STROMAN
    PAMELA STROMAN Member Posts: 2

    Thank you for asking this question

  • Dave Hooton
    Dave Hooton MVP Posts: 36,009
    edited February 16 Answer ✓

    Create a Word List for the lemmas in your passage.

    Then you need a Word List of all words in the NT or all words in the OT from an Original Language bible. I have put two Greek word lists in Public for your convenience** - All NA27 and All SBLGNT (your Word List must use the same bible).

    Merge your List with the appropriate "All..." list via Intersection. The merged list should have the same number of words as your list.

    The Count is affected by the merge, so you have to (mentally) subtract the count in your list from the count in the merged list. Keep them side by side.

    ** I can't vouch for a Hebrew list in Public.

    Dave
    ===

    Windows 11 & Android 13