Your input needed: Faithlife Study Bible
Comments
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Bob Pritchett said:
If you "emptied your mind" and visited only http://faithlifebible.com/features would it at least make sense as a single product -- a Study Bible -- or is even that confusing?
I think Faithlife is a surprisingly good study Bible, especially given how short it has been out. I refer to it often already because I like how it gives me a good overview quickly. Community studying for me, beyond the basic Study Bible, is well below other features\functions in my priority list for Logos though.
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Bob Pritchett said:Ed Blough said:
Bob with all due respect take this simple test. Empty your mind of all you know about Faithlife
This is a good suggestion, and we're taking it to heart. We're also working to improve the messaging for both products. (Part of the problem is that they are at different levels of completion... Faithlife.com has lots of stuff that's still coming in order to deliver its full promise. We also built the web sites and marketing while both products were still in development.)
Is the primary confusion that we're using the same brand name on both the Study Bible and the online community? If you "emptied your mind" and visited only http://faithlifebible.com/features would it at least make sense as a single product -- a Study Bible -- or is even that confusing?
First a forum quirk. The link you gave was cut off and sent me to a fujitsu web site... Text for your link works fine though.
Now that I am actually there, I went through the tabs and looked at a few of the videos. Impression is that it LOOKS slick. It does seem to be some form of study bible, but I am confused when I go to the "Works Anywhere" tab. I would recommend writing out "Faithlife Study Bible" instead of FSB. Yes, there is a place for abbreviations, but they can also turn into a confusing mess. As a side issue, that is one GREAT thing about the Logos version of Anchor-Yale Bible Dictionary as well as many other resources - mouse over the abbreviations and you can see what they mean without feeling stupid.
While I am on that page, I find myself asking why I would want to read the FSB in so many ways. Why would I want the FSB app or Vyrso on my phone, for example? And this is from a user who is somewhat familiar with your offerings. A truly NEW user would be overwhelmed.
In addition, I find myself wondering HOW to use this. The videos do help somewhat, but make me wonder if there is truly useful information in there. In old dead tree study bibles, there would often be some sample pages - sometimes extended excerpts of the actual material from the product. The videos are a bit fast to actually read when the text is actually visible.
It is certainly possible that people will be curious enough to try a free trial. Personally I was, way back when. But I was already invested in the Logos system.
I already have a decent library with most of the translations you include. But new users do not. I understand that you need to make money and are being quite generous in offering the Lexham Bible for free. I understand being proud of your work on this. I am personally impressed at how the notes can switch between multiple translations so easily.
But perhaps new users would find it appealing if a familiar translation were included - or at least a translation a truly new user had heard of before. Admittedly there are copyright issues.
Does this help?
The Gospel is not ... a "new law," on the contrary, ... a "new life." - William Julius Mann
L8 Anglican, Lutheran and Orthodox Silver, Reformed Starter, Academic Essentials
L7 Lutheran Gold, Anglican Bronze
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Bob Pritchett said:
If you can provide more specifics about what you were expecting, what was promised, and which books we're discussing, I can provide more detail.
I believe Daniel is talking about the Ugaritic Library. Part of the description says:
[quote]While most of the Ugaritic in this product is transliterated, which is easier to read than the cuneiform letters, Logos Bible Software is able to display and search on cuneiform Ugaritic text. Above is a sample of the font we designed for this project. Find out why this ancient language is important to you by reading Dr. Michael Heiser's article on Ugaritic studies.
I dont understand it personally. Its all Greek Ugaritic to me. [:P]
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Since you want people to purchase one of the base packages, you might also want to put reference that are part of different levels of base packages instead of mostly a few expensive resources like, ISBE, YABD and C etc.
So when you click on them and the other screen comes up that says you don't have this resource but you could, instead of needing to buy addition resources, it should be more of an incentive to buy one of the base packages. I doubt a starter wants to buy a base package and then still not be able to use FSB to a high level.
So instead of just saying you could have this resources, include a quick pitch that many of the extra resources that it links to are part of different level of base packages.
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alabama24 said:
I believe Daniel is talking about the Ugaritic Library. Part of the description says
Okay, that helps. Here is a link to some of the text in cuneiform.
logosres:ut;ref=Page.p_297;off=1052
This text is displayed in cuneiform, and you can search it. (Select some of the text, right-click, and search for it.) There are limited amounts of text in cuneiform, though, as mentioned. ("While most of the Ugaritic in this product is transliterated...")
We don't ship a cuneiform keyboard by default, but our free Shibboleth application supports it: http://www.logos.com/shibboleth
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Bob Pritchett said:
Is the primary confusion that we're using the same brand name on both the Study Bible and the online community? If you "emptied your mind" and visited only http://faithlifebible.com/features would it at least make sense as a single product -- a Study Bible -- or is even that confusing?
Personally, I've never had much confusion between the two. But I can see how it might be confusing to some, especially since there isn't much linking between the two (cannot easily/obviously access the normal Faithlife site from the Faithlifebible site, and vice versa). I can see this making a person who's been told of something "faithlife" confused as to if they are in the right place because of this lack of accessibility to the other site.
With that said, I would suggest that the two don't have to have the same "Faithlife" name. I could see a "____-Life" brand where you have a number of different things with the ending "life" attached to some prefix which describes the item. Like a "Word-Life Study Bible" and a "Faith-Life Community" or something like that. Just a thought. Might be a terrible suggestion, I dunno.
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Daniel Reed said:Daniel > It's not about how to use the searchable cuneiform fonts, they do not exist. It's a question of why you advertize searchable cuneiform fonts when all that exist are some individual images with links. That's not a 'font' by definition.
It's not your software that's a problem, it's your deceptive advertizing. The Logos marketing team is of little faith when it comes to marketing your products. Why trick folks? Honest Christianity will sell itself.Hello, Daniel.
Our searches are not font specific - we use Unicode (www.unicode.org), the international standard for encoding a dizzying variety of scripts, ancient and modern. Generally, this means that, other than some fonts looking better than others, it doesn't matter what font we display in (but more on this in a bit), the underlying codes for each character are standardized. This also means that there is no difference between searching cuneiform and searching anything else. It's just searching. If you want to type in characters to search (rather than highlighting, copying/pasting, etc.), you will need to install a software keyboard that knows how to interpret your keystrokes as the proper Unicode characters - and that is the same as searching Hebrew, Greek, Russian, etc. Or you can use a product like Shibboleth (Windows only, found at: www.logos.com/shibboleth), if you prefer that to learning a new keyboard.
If you open Gordon's Ugaritic Textbook to Chapter 18, you will find a whole chapter of Ugaritic in searchable cuneiform script. (There are also links to the original hand-drawn images for comparison.)
Our default search behavior is to search whole words, so if you're looking for a group of letters but don't care about prefixed or suffixed elements, you'll need to use the wildcard operator * before and/or after the string you are searching for. As you may know, Ugaritic has a word-divider character, but it is inconsistently used, which may warrant using wildcards more often. Note also that Dr. Smick's transcriptions in Gordon's Textbook do occasionally split words across lines, even where the tablets do not. New lines are word-breaking in our software, so it is possible to miss a few hits on a search if one of them spans a line. (Of course, if you know that the word is split, you can use a phrase search (which does search across newlines) to find it - and even if you don't know that such a split occurs, it is possible to string together a series of phrase searches for each potential break, like: dbr OR "d br" OR "db r", but it isn't a perfect solution (probably would fail if a line number intervened, and might not catch a hit if certain editorial marks appeared inside a word).
(I do notice that we're not displaying the Ugaritic properly in the search results window or on right-click menus in Windows - Mac does this fine. I'll make sure there's a dev ticket in for that, if there isn't already.)
Ugaritic has a lot of variant letter shapes, which Unicode doesn't assign unique code points to (which was by design, and makes a lot of sense for modern languages, but I think a case could have been made for Ugaritic to be handled differently...). For a number of technical reasons, we put those variant glyphs in the Private Use Area, which means to see those marks, one needs to use our font, but we handle those marks in our search indexer as identical to the canonical characters, so this presents no problems for searching, and doesn't require a non-standard keyboard to interact with. Where some of the variant signs have been interpreted as more than one letter (reflecting either real change over time or uncertainty as to what the proper value is), we index them as equivalent to all the canonical options (cool, no?). (Unicode theoretically specifies the use of a variant glyph selector mark for handling this issue, but the order of variants isn't specified in the Standard, so it ends up creating a world where the fonts aren't standardized or interchangeable anyway - and at the time we were developing this product, those glyph variant features weren't supported (at least for Ugaritic) in Windows, so PUA with a customized indexer was the best solution.)
Searching cuneiform has challenges that are different than searching Bibles, because of the often fragmentary nature of the texts, the diverse interpretive options regarding how to break the text into discrete words (or sometimes even what an individual letter is), the fact that the citation system is based on physical lines (which sometimes span multiple tablet fragments with different identifying numbers) instead of being more content-based, the diversity of glyphs representing a single letter/sound. (This is without getting into the issues with syllabic cuneiform where the same word can be spelled with a dizzying number of different signs - there's a good reason why most cuneiform texts are published in transliterations.) It's not difficult to imagine what the perfect search engine for tackling these difficulties would look like (the Madrid group that provided the UDB have a pretty decent tool for searching transliterations (if I remember rightly, it doesn't do cuneiform transcriptions - I haven't looked at it in years, though) that gives an idea of the types of features one might want), but I'm guessing we'd have to sell rather a lot more cuneiform transcriptions to justify writing a custom search engine for them.
All that said, I believe everything in the Ugaritic Library that was in cuneiform script in the print books, rather than transliteration, was encoded in a searchable Unicode text, not just as images (this would not apply to photos of tablets, but we did transcribe hand-drawn cuneiform). If we missed a spot, let me know.
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Vincent,
Thank you very much! This is the kind of support I was looking for.
It needs to be pointed out that I contacted Logos directly and went into the forums for support on this problem. I was pretty much cast down by the Logos staff and told to watch the videos or contact Morris Proctor for help. Morris Proctor still hasn't returned my email. Even in the forums some like alabama24 are too quick to say, Logos is wonderful, I don't know what I'm doing so just go away and leave us be.
After stumbling through the forums I finally dug in and stated my problems here, because I couldn't find help anywhere else. Now Vincent has provided the information I need. Why couldn't Kathy Richardson have pointed me in the right direction? Why did I have to make a big stink here about support?What should I have done differently? After all I did contact Logos directly.
Thank you Vincent,
Dan Reed0 -
Daniel Reed said:
Even in the forums some like alabama24 are too quick to say, Logos is wonderful, I don't know what I'm doing so just go away and leave us be.
Daniel - I am sorry that I offended you in some way. I am not sure what I did! I believe criticism of Logos is appropriate at times, and have done so myself. I don't, however, appreciate you bashing down people. You did so by naming out a Logos employee, and have done so again by calling me out. I spend a considerable amount of time on these forums volunteering my time. In the case of your issues, I took time out of my day to write to Bob Pritchett to make sure that your concerns were addressed. As for the Logos employee that you named… I am not sure why certain advice was given. The truth is that Logos employees and forum users (including MVP's) all have different knowledge, skill sets, and interests. Often times the forums are the most efficient way to get the information you need. In this case, the issue was a bit more technical.
Daniel Reed said:What should I have done differently? After all I did contact Logos directly.
Go up the food chain if you need to, but do so with respect. Embarrassing someone doesn't benefit anyone and is not Christlike. If you feel that an employee handled a situation improperly, humbly let management know (after all, if no one else points it out, it reflects poorly on the company and the employee doesn't learn anything). But remember, you never really know about a person until you walk around in their skin.
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Daniel Reed said:
What should I have done differently?
I'd have started a new forum thread with a descriptive title like "Ugaritic Searching Help". Few (no?) Logos employees have the time to read every forum post - instead we skim for threads related to our areas of expertise and influence. Since I'm not very involved with Faithlife, I never saw this discussion until someone else (Bob in this case) asked me to respond, but there's a fairly good chance I'd have read a new thread with 'Ugaritic' in the title. (A more descriptive thread title might also have gotten a quick answer from one of your fellow customers.)
Glad I could help.
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Just thought I'd put in my 2c as well.
I think it's not so much the brand, it's just that I've already invested much of my hard earned cash into a product like Logos.
So when a new product comes along from the same company, I want to know not only what it is but how it links in with what I've already got.
My first question was whether I might be able to e.g. lead a bible study in my home group with my friends using FSB and the community features online, while I weigh in with extra/'value added' stuff from my extensive Logos library.
Some other comments about the iPod/iPhone application :
1. I downloaded FSB straight away and found that while it looks good, it is back to the same old performance problems that plagued the Logos iPhone application when I first got that. Logos really needs to address this kind of issue up front when a new product is released, rather than waiting until people complain about it. Microsoft finally realised that performance should be a first class design issue for Windows 2 or 3 years ago, and Logos should be the same.
2. I like the extra menus (access to other resources such as images) in FSB and also the colour coding on the verse selection screen. I am however, disappointed that I don't already have these features on the Logos application as well.
- I love the sheer power and the breadth and depth of the desktop application, but I am longing for the day when I can use the majority of the functions on my iPod (or other mobile device), or even on Biblia.com as well e.g. search ranges, collections, etc. I second the previous post about the speed of search too.
One simple suggestion (slightly off topic): can the verse selection screen in both Logos and FSB applications have a 'Go'/'OK' button on each screen? because sometimes I just want to go to the beginning of a book or chapter in the bible, without having to select a specific verse.
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Tim Bader said:
I downloaded FSB straight away and found that while it looks good, it is back to the same old performance problems that plagued the Logos iPhone application when I first got that.
What device do you have?
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Bob Pritchett said:Ed Blough said:
Bob with all due respect take this simple test. Empty your mind of all you know about Faithlife
This is a good suggestion, and we're taking it to heart. We're also working to improve the messaging for both products. (Part of the problem is that they are at different levels of completion... Faithlife.com has lots of stuff that's still coming in order to deliver its full promise. We also built the web sites and marketing while both products were still in development.)
Is the primary confusion that we're using the same brand name on both the Study Bible and the online community? If you "emptied your mind" and visited only http://faithlifebible.com/features would it at least make sense as a single product -- a Study Bible -- or is even that confusing?
Bob
Thank you for taking the time to address my concerns
[quote]If you "emptied your mind" and visited only http://faithlifebible.com/features would it at least make sense as a single product -- a Study Bible -- or is even that confusing?
Yes it did and I downloaded it and hence my involvement in this forum. It was only after I downloaded and played with the faithlife bible that I saw everyone talking about the Faithlife. It was then that I became lost. They were mentioning things separate from a study bible. I started to explore. One place I looked offered a few textblocks filled with ad type information but no real user info. Another site presented me the opportunity to sign up. But when I tried to find out what I was being asked to sign up for I found nothing and was taken back to the site the contained the textblocks of Ad hype.
So I started checking out the forums on Faithlife and I found many and varying opinions on what it is and what it does. I have found flowing and gushing praise but so far no one has offered any real tangible use. Most comments are prefixed with " I can see where ....". Well so do I however I'm also aware of in many of those "I can see" scenarios that there are already numerous existing solutions. So there must be something that I'm missing and everyone else knows the secret or everyone is just talking.
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My device is an iPod touch: any particula reason?
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Tim Bader said:
My device is an iPod touch: any particula reason?
Sure. I have an iPod touch that is several years old. It will barely run the app. I have an original iPad, and it runs the app ok, but is sluggish at times. I have an iPhone 4s, and the response is nimble. What generation iPod touch do you have?
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Ah, I see where you're coming from now.
No, my iPod is fairly recent (4 I think).
My main point was really that I have both applications: Logos and Faithlife.
Logos runs fine and I hardly ever have a problem with it.
However, Faithlife is slow (particularly on start-up) and I found was crashing out on me quite often.
That said, since my original post, I "cheated" a bit by using Logos to download the Lexham bible for offline use.
Once I did that, Faithlife opens and runs much better.
...but please note also my other comments which were that the Faithlife application has some features and improvements which are not in the Logos application : a situation which I find a little disappointing too.
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Tim Bader said:
Faithlife is slow (particularly on start-up) and I found was crashing out on me quite often.
This very well may be due to the fact that faithlife has not finished downloading everything. The faithlife app automatically downloads all of the faithlife resources, including photos & videos. Once the app actually finishes the downloads, it should run better.
Tim Bader said:That said, since my original post, I "cheated" a bit by using Logos to download the Lexham bible for offline use.
Once I did that, Faithlife opens and runs much better.
I dont understand the connection between the two. I believe that the Lexham products are automatically downloaded to faithlife.
Tim Bader said:please note also my other comments which were that the Faithlife application has some features and improvements which are not in the Logos application : a situation which I find a little disappointing too.
I am unsure of your "disappointment." Bob has said that the faithlife app will drive the development of the other apps in the near future. If you are upset because the app hasn't been updated presently, you need to remember that the development of apps takes time. Logos can't just snap their fingers and make all apps look and function the same.
FYI - There is a forum for the Logos iOS apps. In the future, it would be a great place to get help with the apps (such as the crashing that you mentioned earlier).
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Thanks for your reply.
alabama24 said:I dont understand the connection between the two. I believe that the Lexham products are automatically downloaded to faithlife.
I didn't realise this (and the Faithlife application doesn't make it obvious that is what it is doing). I just know that after I had downloaded the Lexham bible within the Logos iPhone application then Faithlife seemed to open up much more quickly.
...but then maybe it was just that it had already downloaded everything as you suggest.
alabama24 said:I am unsure of your "disappointment." Bob has said that the faithlife app will drive the development of the other apps in the near future. If you are upset because the app hasn't been updated presently, you need to remember that the development of apps takes time. Logos can't just snap their fingers and make all apps look and function the same.
I think 'upset' is too strong a word, but I was a little bit disappointed.
I work in a software company myself so I appreciate the issues involved.
I just felt that Logos have created another new application which already seems slightly ahead of the Logos iPod application in certain basic areas (not all, by any means).
I think Logos is a fantastic product overall, and I get very excited every time a new update comes through on the desktop application.
I would like to see as much attention given to the Logos iPod application as is given to the desktop and IMO there are certain basic functions missing from the iPhone application which make it difficult to use to it's best ability.
The addition of Faithlife iPhone application could therefore be a concern in terms of time and resources available for development, etc.
However, if Bob has said that Faithlife will drive the development of the other apps then I look forward to the changes.
Thanks
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Well, I'm a very new user of Logos having made my first investment through a very small package and then adding on the Perseus collection. It's a great way to get started on trying to figure out how the tool works. The idea of a (1) free (2) community (3) study-bible was very interesting to me and I figured I'd give it a shot.
- I hemmed and hawed over signing up for FSB, knowing that I'd likely get charged an annual subscription, but since March 2014 was nearly 2 years away (or so), I figured I'd have the option to cancel that subscription some time between now and then. I'm VERY concerned that I see no way to CANCEL that subscription now. If the product truly is going to be subscription based, we need to be able to cancel it.
- I echo the concerns about not knowing who the contributors to the FSB are and what their qualifications are. There are many study bibles out there that I've perused in the book store and decided on examination that having to filter through the chaff and garbage of notes just to find the few golden nuggets wasn't worth it to me. Therefore I didn't buy them. I did not have the opportunity to (1) review the names and qualifications of the contributors, nor (2) examine several example notes, commentary and/or other additional resources. Having now signed up for the "free" trial subscription (*cough* with no way to cancel it *cough*) I've now spent maybe an hour examining some of the study notes. Some interesting tidbits, but the overall feel is fluffy and certainly not in line with Catholic teaching and therefore something I not all that interested in. Yeah I know Logos has a Catholic products division and I didn't really expect FSB to align directly with that product set, but as an idea, it was certainly worth evaluating. Just not my cup of tea.
- It was not until after I signed up for the subscription and played around before I got confused and found this forum thread that I learned that FSB does not INCLUDE the community aspect, but that faithlife.com is a separate (but related) tool. Sure my logos.com id works on faithlife.com, but it doesn't do anything. I think having a study bible is great. I think having a study bible community is great. Having the two work together is great. And that was/is my expectation. Others may want only one or the other. But for those who expect both, there needs to be some immediate setup on the faithlife.com site, for example, suggesting that the user choose whether or not to be added to a beginners group.
- Now as far as groups, I wanted to find a "beginner's" group to see how the community aspect works. It's not obvious how to find groups, but it's VERY obvious on how to create groups. Eventually I found how to search for groups on the Help page. And then I started searching ... and searching ... and searching ... and finding THOUSANDS of groups, all of which had ZERO members. Ridiculous.
So where am I? I have a subscription that I can't cancel. I have a study bible with unknown and questionable (from my perspective) content. And I have a non-existent study bible community. I'll play with it some more, but it hasn't been a good start so far.
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Scott W Fischer said:
- Now as far as groups, I wanted to find a "beginner's" group to see how the community aspect works. It's not obvious how to find groups, but it's VERY obvious on how to create groups. Eventually I found how to search for groups on the Help page. And then I started searching ... and searching ... and searching ... and finding THOUSANDS of groups, all of which had ZERO members. Ridiculous.
So where am I? I have a subscription that I can't cancel. I have a study bible with unknown and questionable (from my perspective) content. And I have a non-existent study bible community. I'll play with it some more, but it hasn't been a good start so far.
Peace to you, Scott! *smile* and ... Always Joy in the Lord!
Please don't worry about your "subsciption that you can't cancel." It's extremely (indeed!) unlikely that you'll be charged if you want out. I've been a customer of Logos for almost 19 years now, and Bob Pritchett and the Logos People are A-OK! They can be trusted!
I'm a recent begining user of FaithLife.com. Took me a while to get the hang of it! I'd love to invite you to join my group that I'm forming called: A Shepherd's Scrolling.
I'm retired now; but, still like to do a little sharing. As I send this out this evening, I'd love to invite you to join my new group. A Shepherd's Scrolling
I'm excited about the prospects of using FaithLife.com and I'd like you to be part of my group. You'd be the first member! Others are also welcome, of course!
*smile*
Although retired, I'm still pretty busy so would only promise to "tend" my grouip once or twice a day. Lynden Williams has permitted me to be part of his group -- Focus on the Word -- for a while and now I'm anxious to form my own group. So I've had my feet wet and am anxious to splash right in!
Philippians 4: 4 Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. 5 Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand..........
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Milford, thanks for the welcome.
I'm a fairly trusting individual and truly I'm not worried about whether my credit card will be charged or not, or whether or not I'll be able to cancel my subscription. I was trying to relay a real perception problem based on my experience. For many people, not finding the ability to cancel a subscription will bring about an immediate call to the Better Business Bureau and that's the last thing anyone at Logos would want.
You've ALSO proven my point on the complete unusableness of the faithlife.com groups function. You invited me to join your group, not through FSB itself, or even through the faithlife.com website, but through a forum response (rather than a classified advertisement) on a COMPLETELY separate website (community.logos.com). That ability to "advertise" the existence of a group should be obvious, apparent and intergrated directly within faithlife.com.
I also wanted to reinforce another poster's comment about the difficulty of establishing a new REAL group. It IS asking a lot for a bible study leader to get all his/her members to 1) go to website and enter the FREE code for FSB, 2) sign up for Logos (have to do that to complete your $0 transaction), 3) download the app (or try to figure out whether or not Biblia.com is the same thing as the app), 4) set up their preferences on faithlife.com and 5) find and join their particular group. That process is not intuitive or feasible. I'm a VERY technically savvy individual; if I wasn't, I wouldn't have been able to figure out that process. You can't expect people to jump through those hoops.
Since my first posting I've spent another hour reviewing the study content of FSB. There's lots of interesting stuff, but I will re-iterate that it's still too fluffy for me. Here's one simple example: The comment on Isaiah 7:12 "not put Yahweh to the test: Ahaz’s refusal to ask for a sign is rebellious, not pious." is presented without explanation. Who's making this assertion? Why? What is the basis of this opinion? I'm not disputing it, I'm just looking for more.
There's a lot of cool "stuff" here, but it's not obvious what is integral, what is required, what is optional, or what is superflous. Case in point, I was irritated by the thousands of pre-populated zero-member groups. Those appear to have been pre-loaded from wiki.faithlife.com. A Wiki for faithlife.com??!?! Cool!! Use a recognized web community development tool to develop a bible study community. Good idea. POOR execution. They're using the wiki as an RDBMS of church records and nothing else. Wrong tool for the purpose; and wrong purpose for the tool.
I will say this, if the FSB had the fidelity to the Magisterium that I'm looking for, or cross-references to the basis of commentary (be they Matthew Henry, Haydock, Ignatius of Antioch, whomever) I don't think I'd have a problem paying $30 a year for it, especially if Logos exhibits success and continually updating the completeness of their notes.
The one thing that I have NOT figured out yet is whether or not the FSB is an integrated tool within Logos or not. It doesn't show up in my list of documents on Logos 4. It's a separate app than Logos is on my Android phone, and Kindle Fire. But it does appear to show up as a "document' on Biblia.com. But that inconsistency doesn't answer my question, or rather, flies in the face of an answer.
As an experiment, Milford, I'll join your group and see how the logistics work, but beyond that, I don't know.
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Scott W Fischer said:
I also wanted to reinforce another poster's comment about the difficulty of establishing a new REAL group. It IS asking a lot for a bible study leader to get all his/her members to 1) go to website and enter the FREE code for FSB, 2) sign up for Logos (have to do that to complete your $0 transaction), 3) download the app (or try to figure out whether or not Biblia.com is the same thing as the app), 4) set up their preferences on faithlife.com and 5) find and join their particular group. That process is not intuitive or feasible. I'm a VERY technically savvy individual; if I wasn't, I wouldn't have been able to figure out that process. You can't expect people to jump through those hoops.
Very good point. I have always said that Logos has some good ideas, but their execution of their ideas has been very poor. It appears to me that they do very little research at times.
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Scott,
Your comment regarding The passage in Isaiah and the word "fluffy" makes me wonder exactly what you want from this product. It almost sounds like you expect it to be a full commentary.
Lighten up a bit. You make some good points but to me it feels like you write with a clenched fist. Just so you know I am writing with a smile on my own face and have no intention of trying to pick a fight!
From my perspective I think UR right when u say that by asking someone to join a group is in reality invitin them to jump through a lot of hoops.
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Scott,
I think your descriptions still show a lot of the confusion around understanding FSB the resource package and faithlife.com the community website. That's not your fault - the threads in the FSB and the faithlife forums are to a large percentage wrong (moderated forums that care for consistency in this area would move maybe a third of them each to the respective other forum).
First of all, you are absolutely right that searching for groups on faithlife.com is a pain. To find out that the big input box searches somehow for groups is not too hard, but not intuitive either. The idea to prepopulate churches as zero-member groups may have been good or not, but it's ridiculous that you can't specify the type of groups you are looking for, exclude zero-member ones or limit to "active groups only". I don't understand why they didn't include any of the Logos search logic. Right now, FSB could be totally dead or there could be dozens of very active groups - there's no indication if there are and how to find them. (hint: one active group some weeks ago was "Logos page turners", don't know about current level of activity). It doesn't really help that church names and the like are often very very similar and the hit list is not really sorted nor sortable.
Second: Establishing a group and having others join is less complex than you think. Of course, the leader as well as potential members need to go to faithlife.com and they need to register. I'd assume that most people these days know how to do this. But unless you want to base the group discussions on the FSB, no one needs to worry about the coupon code, a download or anything. You can simply stay within faithlife.com - and when someone posts a bible reference, the site will automatically carry people to biblia.com.
From my link above you can see how easy it is for a group leader or anyone to show a group to others - often they can now read everything, but need to sign in to be able to join the group and post. That's all and it's not too unusual for community websites.
There's the slightly more complicated area of closed groups. From its direction, Logos4Catholics may be one for you - unfortunately it's rather dormant in terms of postings - there you need to apply for membership to be granted access.
Third: FSB is fully integrated into Logos
I don't know about a list of documents - do you mean the library? Just type "faithlife" into the library find box and most of the FSB content resources will show up (the Lexham dictionary has no direct association, unless you tag it yourself, but should be in your library as well ). Note that the FSB itself is of type "bible notes" as it is study notes to the bible and not a bible itself.Scott W Fischer said:I have NOT figured out yet is whether or not the FSB is an integrated tool within Logos or not. It doesn't show up in my list of documents on Logos 4.
Or type "open FSB" into the command field in L4.
Users may prioritize the FSB along with other bible notes resources they may own (such as e.g. the ESV SB). The FSB itself does link to a wide array of Logos resources that may or may not be part of your libray yet - it even shows this fact with the lock/book symbol you may have seen.
Scott W Fischer said:There's lots of interesting stuff, but I will re-iterate that it's still too fluffy for me. Here's one simple example: The comment on Isaiah 7:12 "not put Yahweh to the test: Ahaz’s refusal to ask for a sign is rebellious, not pious." is presented without explanation. Who's making this assertion? Why? What is the basis of this opinion?
Well, IMHO this is the way study bibles present their explanations (as opposed to full-fledged commentaries). Maybe future updates to the FSB will flesh out such things - I'd expect this especially in the areas where opinions differ, whereas here the next vers suggests this explanation very strongly and I'm not aware of disputes to this. If so: the FSB editors are happy for suggestions where to deepen explanations.
Hope this helps,
Mick
Have joy in the Lord!
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Scott W Fischer said:
The one thing that I have NOT figured out yet is whether or not the FSB is an integrated tool within Logos or not. It doesn't show up in my list of documents on Logos 4. It's a separate app than Logos is on my Android phone, and Kindle Fire. But it does appear to show up as a "document' on Biblia.com. But that inconsistency doesn't answer my question, or rather, flies in the face of an answer.
As an experiment, Milford, I'll join your group and see how the logistics work, but beyond that, I don't know.
Scott, this is all new to me also. Am not quite sure I know what I'm doing. I sent you a welcome when you joined my group; however, it doesn't seem to show up? Will keep on looking.
Also, I made a couple of comments to this group using the right-click in Phil 4:4 - and again in 4:8 - both of which show up as comments in my L4.
Am going to have my second coffee here in Eastern Canada in a few minutes and see if some of this showed up on my iPad2 FaithLife app ...
I do enjoy coming across comments from groups like the FaithLife Beta and Focus on the Word as I read my various Bibles.
Anyway, if all of a sudden I don't see you continue as part of my experimental group, I will most certainly understand that "the grass is always greener" on the other side of the marker.. *smile* Peace!
Meanwhile, if you -- or others!! -- have any good ideas on how to maintain a good "group site," I'd be trulyl appreciative of any ideas!
Philippians 4: 4 Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. 5 Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand..........
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I'll accept that maybe I have unreasonable expectations for what's included in a study bible, as opposed to a bible commentary, but there are no clenched fists here. These are perceptions from a brand new FSB user and an almost brand new Logos user. My last comment on this is that with all the different brand names here (Logos, Biblia, Faithlife, FSB), and technologies (windows client, web client, two different Android clients) it's very confusing what's what.
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Scott W Fischer said:
These are perceptions from a brand new FSB user and an almost brand new Logos user.
This makes your comments especially valuable since FSB intends to bring in a new group of users.
Orthodox Bishop Alfeyev: "To be a theologian means to have experience of a personal encounter with God through prayer and worship."; Orthodox proverb: "We know where the Church is, we do not know where it is not."
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Bob,
Just noticed this thread. Life is crazier than usual so I've not had time to fully dig in. But there's one thing I'd encourage as far as the "forget everything you already know" concept.
Subscriptions is perhaps a bigger conceptual/marketing/etc deal than Logos leadership may realize. No, I'm not talking about the financial implications. I'm talking about the radical change in the product/service delivery model for your customer base.
Until now, Logos has been the Nikon of the eBooks marketplace. My father-in-law's investment in Nikon lenses back in the 1960's is still valuable today. My wife's pro-level DSLR supports her dad's old manual lenses better than the older cameras did!
Likewise, any resources purchased in the Logos environment have always been usable forever, and we your customers have had increasing confidence over time that you will eventually provide support for use of resources on whatever new platform comes out.
So now, along comes a radically different kind of resource, a time-limited subscription-based resource. There's not such thing as getting it "forever on all platforms." This is "might be free for now but you will eventually be paying a regular subscription fee."
Here's the bottom line: "Get this resource" means something ENTIRELY different in a very deep way for normal Logos resources vs these new subscription-based resources.
And that is why I strongly recommend changing the button from "Get It Free" to "Subscribe Free".
Think about it from a new subscriber's perspective: do you really want those who come into the fold on the basis of a time-limited subscription... to assume that ALL logos resources work the same way? They'll see $200 or $700 or whatever, and wonder "how much time does that buy me?"
Please keep the two payment distinctly different, from top to bottom. I recommend distinct wording, colors, separate invoice sections... anything you can imagine to keep them separate.
That's honest consumer marketing according to the principles espoused by Henry Parsons Crowell, the godly man who invented it 100 years ago. Serving the customer well by openly / honestly showing them what they are getting. Nothing hidden or hyped.
(BTW if you've not already absorbed it, I highly recommend "Made To Stick" which among other things discusses the "curse of knowledge" concept...)
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Scott W Fischer said:
Case in point, I was irritated by the thousands of pre-populated zero-member groups. Those appear to have been pre-loaded from wiki.faithlife.com. A Wiki for faithlife.com??!?! Cool!! Use a recognized web community development tool to develop a bible study community. Good idea. POOR execution. They're using the wiki as an RDBMS of church records and nothing else. Wrong tool for the purpose; and wrong purpose for the tool.
Our expectation was the people wouldn't be browsing for random groups containing members, but would rather be looking for "my church." By pre-loading all the churches, we reduce the work of creating your church (and remembering to add the city, state, etc. that help other people know it's "my" First Baptist, and not the one in another town), and we reduce the incidence of duplicate new groups. (I went to a church that was easy to type wrong: "North Shore Community Church". Or "Northshore Community Church". Or "Northshore Church". All things people might type, or even create as a new group if what they typed didn't match.)
We also assumed (maybe incorrectly) that people would visit via Faithlife.com on the web; there it's easy to email invites to a group directly to users. And, of course, the FSB and Faithlife.com don't require each other -- you can invite people to join a group without their ever needing to get the FSB.
We're working on improving the discovery and sign-up process, and this feedback is helpful. Thanks!
-- Bob
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Would there be any plans to make this a part of the base packages and not charge those of us who have already bought base packages extra?
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David Taylor Jr said:
Would there be any plans to make this a part of the base packages and not charge those of us who have already bought base packages extra?
While I am not Bob, he has stated that this product was not designed for or targeted for people with base packages.
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tom collinge said:
- Theological position (Way TOOOOOOOOOOOO conservative!!!!!!!!!)
- Do not know anything about the authors.
- (This could also be part of number 4 above.) Creditably of the authors NOTE: (This is just for me), authors MUST have a PhD after their name. None of the "Major Contributors" that I looked up have a PhD.
- Do not know who wrote what part of the study bible (author's name should be linked to what she/he wrote somehow).
- It is linked into yet another social media website - not going to use another social media site.
- I still do not trust Logos with my notes/personal data after (1) loosing so much of my notes from L3 to L4, (2) Being forced to upload my sermons in L3 (had to set the option every time I added a sermon, if I forgot - everything was again uploaded to Logos), and (3) having to tell Logos not to put my stuff on their website numerous times (sermons). (FYI...Because of #3 - I have more trust with Facebook and Google in keeping my personal information quite.)
- For the mobile device (Android) Why does a Study Bible need to where I am at (GPS) and also read and write to my contacts?
This may not be the place, but I must ask why must a major contrubutor have a PH D after their name? After all, the original writers of the Bible, for the most part, were just common people. God doesn't require a PH.D. for someone to have great insight, so why should we expect the same out of commentaries. I can guarantee you there are people with just as much, if not more, insight into the Bible and the the interpretation of it than people who have spent their whole lives in a classroom.
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Hi Bob,
I just noticed this thread. Here's a few things that have kept me from talking too much about the Faithlife Study Bible.
- Name recognition - not necessarily who is promoting it publicly (like Matt Chandler) but who did the work on the study notes themselves? Honestly from the names of the editors, etc. I didn't know anybody on that list. That's not to say they've done a poor job - I just don't know who they are. So I'm leary of recommending a product if I don't know the background of the people writing it.
- ANOTHER iOS App. This one in its implementation is really, really good. But so far now we have Logos app, Vyrso app, and now a Faithlife Study Bible App. Again all nice - but the fragmentation is a little too much (maybe). I've used the Faithlife at church as a reader bible but my Logos app is where I'm doing some of the more serious studying.
- Ho-hum notes. The interface and the links to other resources in the app is spectacular. I love that I can click a plus sign and get a link to another commentary that I have in my library - that's really useful. However some of the content in the notes isn't, by comparison to other study bibles, that theological or even helpful. Unfortunately the ESV Study Bible has set the bar very high in terms of theological precision and succinct notes. That strongly jades my view of a study Bible. I am going to recommend to other Christians and new believers the notes from the ESVSB before I would Faithlife mainly because as I've looked at Faithlife's notes they aren't as helpful or robust. I could point out examples of this but I think you get the idea.
- Another web-community based group thing. Our church currently uses The City as a social, community platform. We aren't going to recreate that in Faithlife because we already have a strong user base and group there. Using Faithlife would be a huge redundancy and we don't want that.
Hope those things are helpful. I like where Logos is headed, and I do like the design and relative ease of use with the FLSB. There are a few app bugs to work out but overall it's pretty good. Thanks for asking!
Jeremy
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"I can guarantee you there are people with just as much, if not more,
insight into the Bible and the the interpretation of it than people who
have spent their whole lives in a classroom."Insight, maybe. But understanding of the original languages, culture, and history? Doubtful, and thus more likely to lead astray. Context is king when understanding, and without a knowledge of original language, culture, and history, you're missing the context.
"The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of Conservatives is to prevent mistakes from being corrected."- G.K. Chesterton
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Thanks for the feedback. Some links that may help:
- The editor list and contributor sample list for Faithlife Study Bible is here: http://faithlifebible.com/contributors
- The editor and contributor list for Lexham Bible Dictionary, which comes with the Faithlife Study Bible, is here: http://lexhambibledictionary.com/contributors/
- The Statement of Faith for Faithlife Study Bible is here: http://faithlifebible.com/details
- Logos' publishing philosophy is here: http://www.logos.com/about/publishing-philosophy
- For more about the editors, check out some of these links:
- Michael S. Heiser, Academic Editor: http://www.logos.com/academic/bio/heiser
- For Michael R. Grigoni (Theological Editor), Miles Custis, Douglas Mangum, and Matthew M. Whitehead (Contributing Editors), see their bios near the bottom of this page: http://www.logos.com/product/20888/abraham-following-gods-promise-complete-church-curriculum-for-leaders-and-pastors
- I serve as the General Editor--my bio info is here: http://www.logos.com/academic/bio/barry & here: http://www.linkedin.com/in/johndbarry
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John D. Barry said:
Thanks for the feedback. Some links that may help:
- The editor list and contributor sample list for Faithlife Study Bible is here: http://faithlifebible.com/contributors
- The editor and contributor list for Lexham Bible Dictionary, which comes with the Faithlife Study Bible, is here: http://lexhambibledictionary.com/contributors/
- The Statement of Faith for Faithlife Study Bible is here: http://faithlifebible.com/details
- Logos' publishing philosophy is here: http://www.logos.com/about/publishing-philosophy
- For more about the editors, check out some of these links:
- Michael S. Heiser, Academic Editor: http://www.logos.com/academic/bio/heiser
- For Michael R. Grigoni (Theological Editor), Miles Custis, Douglas Mangum, and Matthew M. Whitehead (Contributing Editors), see their bios near the bottom of this page: http://www.logos.com/product/20888/abraham-following-gods-promise-complete-church-curriculum-for-leaders-and-pastors
- I serve as the General Editor--my bio info is here: http://www.logos.com/academic/bio/barry & here: http://www.linkedin.com/in/johndbarry
Hello John,
Thanks for the links, and thanks for your effort on the content of the FSB along with the other contributors. I applaud the content (at least what I've seen so far [:)] ), and I encourage you to "stay by the stuff". Don't feel pressured to move away from your conservative, evangelical handling of the Scriptures. I expect there are many who appreciate it, though we might not be too vocal about it!
There are some things that could be improved with the mobile app and how the web site is set up, as communicated in other posts. Hopefully progress on those fronts will be made in due time!
Regards,
Paul
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alabama24 said:Tim Bader said:
please note also my other comments which were that the Faithlife application has some features and improvements which are not in the Logos application : a situation which I find a little disappointing too.
I am unsure of your "disappointment." Bob has said that the faithlife app will drive the development of the other apps in the near future. If you are upset because the app hasn't been updated presently, you need to remember that the development of apps takes time. Logos can't just snap their fingers and make all apps look and function the same.
This is a late response to your comment, alabama24, but part of the disappointment on my part is that, as you said, "the development of apps takes time," but rather than spending the time to add basic functionality to the Logos app (that we've been asking for for a long time--e.g., offline search improvement, ability to set search ranges for the Bible searches, etc.) Logos has chosen to divert the precious time of its developers to a second app (Vyrso) and now a third app (FSB). So while we have perpetual innovation, it almost feels like we aren't quite getting out of beta-stage with these apps. (That's a bit of an exaggeration, but perhaps it serves to make the point.)
Regards,
Paul
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John D. Barry said:
Thanks for the feedback. Some links that may help:
- The editor list and contributor sample list for Faithlife Study Bible is here: http://faithlifebible.com/contributors
- The editor and contributor list for Lexham Bible Dictionary, which comes with the Faithlife Study Bible, is here: http://lexhambibledictionary.com/contributors/
- The Statement of Faith for Faithlife Study Bible is here: http://faithlifebible.com/details
- Logos' publishing philosophy is here: http://www.logos.com/about/publishing-philosophy
- For more about the editors, check out some of these links:
- Michael S. Heiser, Academic Editor: http://www.logos.com/academic/bio/heiser
- For Michael R. Grigoni (Theological Editor), Miles Custis, Douglas Mangum, and Matthew M. Whitehead (Contributing Editors), see their bios near the bottom of this page: http://www.logos.com/product/20888/abraham-following-gods-promise-complete-church-curriculum-for-leaders-and-pastors
- I serve as the General Editor--my bio info is here: http://www.logos.com/academic/bio/barry & here: http://www.linkedin.com/in/johndbarry
Hello John, I have seen the these pages before, and IMHO, it is not that impressive. For an example, you list a major contributor who does not even have a master's degree. You also do not list everyone who has wrote for this study bible. Why? What are you hidding?
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David Taylor Jr said:
This may not be the place, but I must ask why must a major contrubutor have a PH D after their name? After all, the original writers of the Bible, for the most part, were just common people. God doesn't require a PH.D. for someone to have great insight, so why should we expect the same out of commentaries. I can guarantee you there are people with just as much, if not more, insight into the Bible and the the interpretation of it than people who have spent their whole lives in a classroom.
Here are the five items right off the top of my head.
- Because we do not live in 1st century Palestine.
- Because we do not speak ancient Hebrew
- Because we do not speak 1st century Greek
- Because all the bibles that we read is a commentary of what the writers and editors of the bible translation team think what the text means. And at times, they do not do a good job in translating.
- I have used this example here before. I have seen people with a very limited skill set when it comes to the original languages get it wrong, very very very wrong. For an example, I have heard people state that Jude 7 to support the idea that the sin of Sodom was men were in same-sex sexual relationships. The Greek text simply does not and cannot support this understanding for the sin of Sodom.
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tom collinge said:
Here are the five items right off the top of my head.
- Because we do not live in 1st century Palestine.
- Because we do not speak ancient Hebrew
- Because we do not speak 1st century Greek
- Because all the bibles that we read is a commentary of what the writers and editors of the bible translation team think what the text means. And at times, they do not do a good job in translating.
- I have used this example here before. I have seen people with a very limited skill set when it comes to the original languages get it wrong, very very very wrong. For an example, I have heard people state that Jude 7 to support the idea that the sin of Sodom was men were in same-sex sexual relationships. The Greek text simply does not and cannot support this understanding for the sin of Sodom.
I guess my point is you do not have to have a P.H. D. to grasp those concepts or obtain those skills. It is unfortunate that we have become so reliant on Academia that we fail to credit the leading and wisdom given by the Spirit. Tragic really.
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David Taylor Jr said:
I guess my point is you do not have to have a P.H. D. to grasp those concepts or obtain those skills. It is unfortunate that we have become so reliant on Academia that we fail to credit the leading and wisdom given by the Spirit. Tragic really.
Exactly! The Pharisees lived in 1st century Palestine, spoke ancient Hebrew and 1st century Greek and were highly educated. (Tom, I am not attacking you or your ideas, merely clarifying what I believe to be true. I have a masters degree and am not putting down education.)
"For the kingdom of God does not consist in words but in power"
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Grace, mercy, and peace, Tom,
I share the desire to know who contributed what to the FSB. But IMHO, the query, "What are you hiding?" seems to me an assault upon siblings in Christ who are doing their level best to serve our Lord by drawing folk deeper into the Word..
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tom collinge said:
I have seen people with a very limited skill set when it comes to the original languages get it wrong, very very very wrong.
This same argument also applies to people with extensive qualifications, just look at some of the wild claims made by the highly qualified experts about the Dead Sea Scrolls. Demanding that someone have a PHD before they can have a valid opinion feels like a step backwards to me.
God Bless
Graham
Pastor - NTCOG Basingstoke
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The FaithLife Study Bible is massive project, and each of us can jump on our hobby horse and find things with which we disagree. However, attributing false motives to the editor at this point is unchristian. If you disagree with something, then revise the article and submit it to the editor.
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[quote]
For an example, you list a major contributor who does not even have a master's degree. You also do not list everyone who has wrote for this study bible. Why? What are you hidding?
Tom, to answer your questions:
- We include a sample list (rather than the full list) of contributors at http://faithlifebible.com/contributors and http://lexhambibledictionary.com/contributors/ because the amount of contributors is so massive and always growing (see the amount of Sidebars). Anyone who authored notes in FSB is listed in the front of the book--navigate to Gen 1:1 and scroll back to the beginning of the book to see the title page--and on the "Contributors" page at FSB's site (http://faithlifebible.com/contributors). Authors of notes include the general editor, theological editor, academic editor, contributing editors, and major contributors. In addition, if you would like to look further into who the contributors of the articles are, each article in FSB is attributed. So feel free to look at the names following the articles. (You can see all the articles by opening the book in Logos 4, and then opening the table of contents view and clicking "Sidebars.")
- In FSB, we include contributions and work from people with academic educations and practical (on the job) educations, like well-known Bible teachers, highly capable academics (without the degree [yet] to affirm that), and pastors. This is to provide the kind of detail and depth the reader wants in notes, while providing the devotional takes in sidebars labeled as such, as well as the easy-to-understand explanations that media and curated links provide.
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Hi Bob,
Thanks for the clarification of the difference between the "Faithlife Community" and the "Faithlife Study Bible". It has been very helpful as I initially thought the Faithlife Community to be one of the features of the Faithlife Study Bible.
I would, however, ask that you word the free subscription promotion on faithlifebible.com (it is fine on faithlife.com) more carefully as I do find it misleading "Get the Faithlife Study Bible for Free!" to me conveys a purchase, rather than a subscription service.
Another point is that, I do not see a subscription fee as the right option in order to have someone access the same content that they have been accessing (despite updates). Imagine paying $30 for a book that you read daily, after a year, you were told you were not allowed to read it anymore because an updated version has been released. Perhaps an initial purchase and subsequent smaller voluntary purchase fee for each update would be more practical? Subscription fees usually apply for services that provide completely new content each time they update (think newspapers, Times magazine). In contrast, the Word of God is set and does not change, and so I would expect little change in the commentary/notes, with the majority of the content staying the same, and occasional updates to media, infographics and articles.
Blessings,
David
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Bob Pritchett said:
I’d appreciate hearing your thoughts, as well as feedback on the FSB itself.
Thanks!
-- Bob
A lot of my thoughts have probably already been spoken, but if people keep coming back to you with the same issues, that is probably saying something.
First though I would like to make is I would love to see the FSB and the Faithlife communities succeed. I realize specifically you are asking about the FSB at this point so I'l stick to that as much as possible.
The issues I see facing FSB in no particular order of priority
1. No clear purpose given as to what the purpose of this product. Until I recently read this post I had no idea you were marketing this primarily at non-logos users.
2. We were told to keep quite about it and that's about all we heard, there was no clear - hey everyone start spreading the word about FSB.
3. "We know that some free mobile Bible apps have had as many as 40 million downloads. With a great study Bible, media, Bible dictionary, devotional content, and more, the FSB is an even more useful tool " - for the non-bible study software user, I am not sure they are looking for anything more than a basic bible app. The battle with people in that demographic - and even for us, is simply to get people to read their bible, let alone do bible study, they would not see a need for a bible dictionary, if they feel the need for a commentary, more likely will just gloss over the issue, ask their pastor or 'bible study group' what that means - rather than seek out a commentary or bible dictionary.
4. For those that do see a bible dictionary and commentary useful, there is an existing app out there that comes to mind that uses a standard study bible known to the lay person, and it can be used on mobile, pc and mac platforms. I don't think it so much that FSB content is written or not written by well known PhD's (that's an issue for Logos type users), its the simple fact FSB is not an establish study bible, people will tend to turn to a SB that is familar to them.
5. "and it is also free - bottom line is that it is not free is a delayed subscription program - and customers don't like subscriptions where they don't get to keep at least something - subscribe to a magazine and you get to keep the magazines you received while your subscription was active - with electronic subscriptions like FSB - this simply does not happen, end your prescription and you loose everything. People want to pay once, not every month.
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With some of the concerns given above, I wonder if it would be useful to tie http://www.logos.com/product/20466/abraham-following-gods-promise into FSB with FSB providing supplemental material. That could make FSB the obvious next step for the Bible Study small group over achiever.
Orthodox Bishop Alfeyev: "To be a theologian means to have experience of a personal encounter with God through prayer and worship."; Orthodox proverb: "We know where the Church is, we do not know where it is not."
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Thanks John,
John D. Barry said:
We include a sample list (rather than the full list) of contributors at http://faithlifebible.com/contributors and http://lexhambibledictionary.com/contributors/because the amount of contributors is so massive and always growing (see the amount of Sidebars). Anyone who authored notes in FSB is listed in the front of the book--navigate to Gen 1:1 and scroll back to the beginning of the book to see the title page--and on the "Contributors" page at FSB's site (http://faithlifebible.com/contributors). Authors of notes include the general editor, theological editor, academic editor, contributing editors, and major contributors. In addition, if you would like to look further into who the contributors of the articles are, each article in FSB is attributed. So feel free to look at the names following the articles. (You can see all the articles by opening the book in Logos 4, and then opening the table of contents view and clicking "Sidebars.")I have seen this. Let me put it this way. Who wrote the notes for Gen 1:1? I did see the author getting credit for the 'sidebars,' but I do not see anyone getting credit for the actual notes for verses.
John D. Barry said:
In FSB, we include contributions and work from people with academic educations and practical (on the job) educations, like well-known Bible teachers, highly capable academics (without the degree [yet] to affirm that), and pastors. This is to provide the kind of detail and depth the reader wants in notes, while providing the devotional takes in sidebars labeled as such, as well as the easy-to-understand explanations that media and curated links provide.I am not sure how you are classifying 'well-known,' but I can tell you that I do not know them. Because of this, I want to see some credentials. Someone who does not have a Mdiv does not have the credentials in my eyes. They could be very good at what they do; but the person does not have the experience (IMO) of working with the original languages.
Because this is a study bible, and because I do not know the authors, I expect people with phd's because they have the credentials of working with the biblical text in the original languages.
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David Taylor Jr said:
I guess my point is you do not have to have a P.H. D. to grasp those concepts or obtain those skills. It is unfortunate that we have become so reliant on Academia that we fail to credit the leading and wisdom given by the Spirit. Tragic really.
I believe that the Holy Spirit works through organizations like academia and the church; not individuals.
For an example, I have witness a person saying that spirit has given him this 'wisdom.' And this wisdom didn't make any sense. Later, it was discovered that this person had a mental illness, and this person had stop taking his medications.
I want all 'wisdom' to be tested to be ensured that the Holy Spirit provided the 'wisdom.' Because of this, I like academia's testing of things.
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