BIBLE SENSE LEXICON Tool

WHAT'S THE PURPOSE OF AN INTERLINEAR IF YOU DON'T KNOW THE ORIGINAL LANGUAGES!  IT ISN'T GOING TO DO ANYTHING FOR YOU. LEARN GREEK AND HEBREW YOU IMBECILES!

Woah! Good imitation of George. You may have a future in stand up comedy.

I never called anyone an ****.

True. At least you've never called me one. (Though none of us know what you are thinking.) [;)]

if you have some time, i'd be interested in hearing more how it was useful to you--not that you have to teach or lead a discussion ( not on the forums! ) but how it is impacting your learning, study, or opening new vistas for you.  

Here is an example of how this is could be useful (mainly when it is complete). Let's suppose I come across the word "master" or επιστατης, and want to go a little deeper. I open up a BWS on the word. To really use this tool, I found it helpful to open up a Bible Sense Lexicon next to the BWS. Here is how it looks:

At this point I have the same information on both sides. Just wait a second on that one. But I can see that this Greek word is used with the meaning of "master = superior" 7 times in the Gospel of Luke, and that's it within the New Testament.

Now, let's say I want to understand better other words that have to do with "master", and how they differ from επιστατης. In the Sense Lexicon I click on "master". Here is what we get now:

So, now we can see that while "master" in general is κυριος, master specifically meaning one who supervises a group is επιστατης. Nice. We also see that there are words in Hebrew which correspond to κυριος, but that there are no words classified to correspond to επιστατης. Whether that is because the database is not complete or not I am not sure, but either way, once the database is complete this information will be extremely useful.

Then I can look at the sub meanings below Master and go deeper. The first three clearly have to do with "master". The fourth, mistress, describes "a woman master who has a degree of authority over something." The fifth is, I imagine, simply a mistake. "singer" is defined by the Sense Lexicon as "one who sings", and does not seem to me to be a "person of authority -- master".

But I think the idea is a good one - by comparing different related word meaning, one can quickly get a grasp of the different nuances in the underlying Greek and Hebrew text and what other word choices the author had available.

So, there's one example for you, anyway. I'm sure as the tool becomes better developed and the databases more complete many more will become evident.

Generally I'm thinking that some want to take a short cut to the promised land without wandering in the wilderness for 40 years.

Well, honestly, those hours in Hebrew class did feel like wilderness wandering. I just don't think my prof knew where the Promised Land was!

I WANT THE LIKE BUTTON!!!!! No, wait, the DOUBLE LIKE button!

Really don't know where to stick this comment, here seemed good.

Logos clearly has a three-pronged strategy or approach.

1. Software. A sophisticated means for searching, arranging, and exploring the Bible and other related texts.

2. Publishing. Providing and ever expanding library of resources covering the broad field of "biblical studies." To this end they have agreements with publishers from the Gutenberg Galaxy, bringing those works into a fully functional digital library.

3. Hermeneutics. As Logos has incorporated more "academic" editors, produces more in-house works (Lexham), and develops the meta-tools for exploring the text (Bible Sense Lexicon,); It is clear that Logos is providing the umbrella of a conceptual exegetical/hermenutical process. It is a discourse driven model. (I would expect that I am not the firs person who became confused when I first looked at the syntax feature and found little that was familiar from my studies of Greek syntax. What Logos meant or was doing, was apply discourse methodology to the text. Once I realized that I was easier to make sense of the data and use it.) So Logos provides a suite of tools to investigate the discourse-driven functional meaning of words.

 

In an earlier post I mentioned that I was coming to understand that much of the upgrade pain for long-time users is that we are helping to invest in that third strategies. Those oft-mentioned databases/data-sets/meta-tools are hermeneutical tools,  Not the time or place to get into a philosophical discussion but my perspective is that understanding the big-picture, or grasping the whole model helps to understand some of the niggling details.

that's evidence of a lot of thought and reflection.  thanks, Robert.