Search Atlas by biblical passage

Despite being sold to us in Logos 6 as a solution, the Atlas tool is very much a work in progress. Your best approach IMHO is to run search in media tool or setup a passage guide to search media and link that passage guide to your bible. Hopefully others will offer other suggestions of what they find to be the best solution for them. Through multiple people sharing how they do things we all learn so thank you for asking the question Harry.

Harry Hahne said:

I have been trying to figure out how to use the Atlas to find maps related to a particular biblical passage. It is not clear if it is supposed to be possible to search the Atlas on a biblical passage. Some biblical passages (e.g. Revelation 2 or John 3) bring up a map if I enter them in the location box, but many do not. Linking the Atlas to a Bible sometimes brings up a map, but often it does not.

I have been trying to locate the events of Numbers 22-24 without success. Entering Numbers 22 defaults to "God" and shows me Jerusalem, which is not helpful, since the events occur in Moab. None of the key players in the narrative bring up a map (e.g. Balaam, Balak). Moab works, but is too general. Oddly Balak is not listed among the kings of Moab in the Atlas, despite this title in Num 22:4. If I enter Pethor, it brings up a map and makes reference to Num 22:4-6, although this passage is not found if I enter it in the search box in the Atlas. Oddly entering Peor brings up a map related to "the Wise Men from the East." It appears that Numbers 22-24 and the events of Balaam's attempt to curse Israel are not labeled in the Atlas. There is nothing comparable to what you can find in a conventional Bible atlas, which shows the path of the Israelite journeys as they conquered the Transjordan region.

My greatest success was with a media search in all resources, which brings up a more traditional map from the old Biblical Places tool. I actually did better searching for Numbers 21, which found some nice maps in the neighborhood of the events of Numbers 22-24, but still nothing in the Atlas tool.

Am I doing something wrong? What is the best way to use the Atlas tool to find maps related to a biblical passage? Am I better just doing a media search in all maps? This interactive Atlas looks promising if I can reliably find what I want.

Harry Hahne said:

I have been trying to figure out how to use the Atlas to find maps related to a particular biblical passage. It is not clear if it is supposed to be possible to search the Atlas on a biblical passage. Some biblical passages (e.g. Revelation 2 or John 3) bring up a map if I enter them in the location box, but many do not. Linking the Atlas to a Bible sometimes brings up a map, but often it does not.

I have been trying to locate the events of Numbers 22-24 without success. Entering Numbers 22 defaults to "God" and shows me Jerusalem, which is not helpful, since the events occur in Moab. None of the key players in the narrative bring up a map (e.g. Balaam, Balak). Moab works, but is too general. Oddly Balak is not listed among the kings of Moab in the Atlas, despite this title in Num 22:4. If I enter Pethor, it brings up a map and makes reference to Num 22:4-6, although this passage is not found if I enter it in the search box in the Atlas. Oddly entering Peor brings up a map related to "the Wise Men from the East." It appears that Numbers 22-24 and the events of Balaam's attempt to curse Israel are not labeled in the Atlas. There is nothing comparable to what you can find in a conventional Bible atlas, which shows the path of the Israelite journeys as they conquered the Transjordan region.

My greatest success was with a media search in all resources, which brings up a more traditional map from the old Biblical Places tool. I actually did better searching for Numbers 21, which found some nice maps in the neighborhood of the events of Numbers 22-24, but still nothing in the Atlas tool.

Am I doing something wrong? What is the best way to use the Atlas tool to find maps related to a biblical passage? Am I better just doing a media search in all maps? This interactive Atlas looks promising if I can reliably find what I want.

Harry, I very much appreciate Logos.  Overall, it's my favorite Bible application.  But when it comes to effective searches, I often despair of ever getting the hang of it in Logos.  For now, I'll take the blame for that--I guess my head just doesn't work the same as the developers.

So, since I can't be of any help with Logos, I'll mention that I did purchase another Bible app with it's Atlas/Map features in mind.  Even though I use Logos 95% of the time, in 30 seconds, I was able to open the other app, open the Atlas, position a Bible to Numbers 22:1 and get the following instant info pane of which I'm showing the section that includes Atlas references.

Because you mention "Moab" in your original post and Moab was one of the cities listed in the Atlas section of the info pane for Numbers 21, I selected that and the following map popped up on the Atlas.

I have to leave for an appointment so don't have time to say much more than the fact that this all took me about 30 seconds.  There are many Atlas related options that can be used to tweak the map, but I didn't do anything with them--just went with the default that came up in a rather small window that I was using for the Atlas.

Perhaps this map doesn't provide anything of help or value for your purposes, but thought I should point out there might be an easier way to tie a Bible and Atlas together if you're willing to work with it in another app.