Bible Study Library User Guide

The Bible Study Library (BSL) is the most efficient place to begin web based Bible study.  The key word in that sentence is "begin" since there is so much more on the open web as well as on the invisible web.  Furthermore, as biblically related thought becomes more abstract it is less directly connected to the Bible.  The BSL only attempts to include web sites that overtly reference the Christian Bible in some way and are indexed by Google (since this customized search engine - CSE - is made possible by them), and it selects only English language sites (where possible) and those that are freely available without registering or requesting further permission to view them.  In some cases permission may be needed to re-publish the materials, however.

One can easily jump back and forth between BSL searches and full web searches using the same search terms by using the "button" option under the CSE search box that appears after you have made your first search selection.  You can sometimes almost forget which type of search you are doing, except that the refinements in the BSL offer unique advantages over general Google searches.

The Bible Study Library is an ongoing project, so users are encouraged to suggest additional sites to include in the BSL by sending them to the email address on the BSL homepage.  Other suggestions, including how to improve this user guide, may also be sent. All points of view are represented in the BSL, but the main criteria is that the sites included should in some way be interpreting the Bible or providing background information that would help Bible readers to understand the issues involved in Bible interpretation.  Because of the way some web sites are structured, however, unintended information is sometimes included in the BSL; but every reasonable attempt is made to include only those parts of web sites having to do with interpreting and applying the Bible to everyday life.

HOW TO PERFORM BASIC SEARCHES

Selecting Terms for the Search Box

Google searches by words, not by subject or by meaning, and it searches the full text of each web page.   The following are some of the basic strategies for using the BSL custom search.  Most of these approaches can be used in any of the refinements, although some are more useful in some refinements than in others.

KEYWORD SEARCH: You can enter any words you want in the search box, but Google does not look for common words, and there is a 32 word limit; but it is often best to only include the most significant terms. Google is case insensitive, so you do not have worry about whether or not you are using capital letters. Google will search not only for your search terms, but also for words that are similar to some or all of those terms. Google will only return pages that include every search term. 

Basic Principles:  Enter the most important keywords first.  Enter as few terms as possible on the first try, and be as specific as possible.  Add additional terms on a second try if needed.  Selecting terms and searching in BSL is more efficient than usual web searches because everything in the BSL is Bible related.

ALTERNATIVE WORD SEARCH:  You can get Google to search web pages that have either one word or another word, but not necessarily both of them, by inserting an OR between them, e.g. devil OR satan OR lucifer 

EXCLUDING WORDS: You can exclude words from search results by placing a minus sign before the word you want to exclude:

Mary -Magdalene -Magdala  returns sites on Mary that exclude reference to Mary Magdalene

"trumpet of the lord" -Paul   returns sites with that phrase that do not also mention Paul

PHRASE SEARCH:  Google ignores common words and characters such as "where", "to", "or", and "how", as well as certain single digits and single letters, because they tend to slow down your search without improving the results.  For Bible study purposes, you may find it more effective to enter short phrases in quotation marks, in which case even the usually ignored words are included in the search results, and pages with the exact phrase are returned. e.g. "a little strength"

Basic Principle:  Try searching phrases with and without quotes

PARTIAL PHRASE SEARCH:  When you are not sure of a word in a quote or when a biblical translation may vary the quote slightly and you want to include all variations, you may substitute an asterisk for each word that may vary in the quote.  This is particularly useful in searching in texts or other sources when you think you forget part of a quote or want to discover alternative phrase constructions.

 "do not be afraid *"  under "texts" will find endings to this phrase in various versions

 "peace * war"  under "texts" finds passages with this word sequence in various versions

Searching for Scripture References

Google has become quite adept at handling scripture references, and does not usually require quotation marks to ensure continuity of a biblical citation.  You can usually shorten the book names, as well, e.g. 1 Cor for 1 Corinthians, Heb for Hebrews, Hag 2 for Haggai 2, Song 11 for Song of Solomon 11/Song of Songs 11

Google can also provide similar search results for references at the verse level (e.g. Gal 3:10); but that is not as much help as it might seem because webpage writers are not consistent among themselves in how they present biblical citations.  Some older works still use Roman numerals.  Some web pages do not repeat the name of the book when subsequent citations are made to the same book on the same page (e.g. a web site on Romans consisting of many pages may refer only to verses such as 6:4; 7:2; which means the citation Romans 6:4 may not recover that specific page).  Some websites also insert the word "chapter" between the name of the book and the rest of the citation.  For a hit or miss approach that usually works for a simple search to find the text of that verse, use full citations (e.g. Neh 5:5), but in most cases where you are looking for discussion and commentary, you will probably want to only search by book and perhaps chapter number..

Further complicating verse level searching is that most translations include verse references in footnotes and many articles include verses as references, which usually yields irrelevant search results.  Another problem: You enter Is 48:6 and you get texts for Psalm 48, Jeremiah 48, Genesis 48, etc, probably because Google has made the complicated programming adjustment so you don't have to use quotes, but each web page just has three separate elements, one for 48, one for 6, and one for Isaiah - nothing referring to Isaiah 48:6 exists on those pages. When it works it looks great because it can lead you to articles that just happen to use the citation format, but a lot of the time verse level searching just adds layers of useless search results to sort through. 

Basic Principle:  The text of the Bible is often best searched by the single name of the book of the Bible you want to examine, without quotes - then carefully select from the list of search results - and then navigate on the web site when you get there to reach the passage you want.  See "texts" below for further pointers, e.g. 1 Cor or 1 Corinthians

Finding the Desired Information

When you peruse a list of search results, notice the underlined headings for each entry, and the two line description under that line.  This information will give you a clue whether you should bother with that source.  For example, if you are looking for entries completely devoted to Bethlehem, there is no sense opening one labeled "Rachel, International Standard Bible Encyclopedia."  That just means that the word Bethlehem appears in the article about Rachel.  However, if you are interested in the OT events that involved Bethlehem, then you might well want to open that article.  If so, then you will want to use your browser's "find" option to locate the word Bethlehem in the article on Rachel.  The "find" option on your toolbar will be a timesaving device once you reach many web pages.  You are actually doing a second word search once you reach the web page you selected.

HOW TO REFINE SEARCHES

After you enter your terms in the search box and click "Search," you are presented with the initial list of results from the entire BSL.  You are also presented with what Google calls a set of "refinements" and an invitation to narrow your search as follows - "Refine results for [your search] "

When you click one of these refinements, you will find your search results listed only for that category.  When you are done looking at one category, you can then click another category.  This way you can go through your search results looking only at those categories that are most appropriate for the search you are doing, which shortens the search time and reduces the tedium of searching.  For example, if you are doing a word study, then perhaps only the "word study" and "quick reference" categories might be needed, although in many cases the "word study" category may be enough. 

The descriptions in the list that follows explain what to expect from each refinement.  Each web site in the BSL has been assigned one of these categories, and occasionally more than one.  Most subjects are covered in more than one category; but how sites are best organized for information retrieval determines which category they will be placed in. In theory the distinctions between categories may seem rather clear cut; but the boundaries are often unclear and materials at different levels within a web site may fall into different categories, further complicating the classification of that web site.  The main thing to keep in mind is that the purpose of the category assignment is not so much to describe the web site as it is to aid in finding the information on it.  So although classifying involves examining the qualities of the web site, the label is chosen more on the basis of how helpful it will likely be in refining searches.

commentaries  

Commentaries are significant discussions of biblical content closely following the order of the biblical text, often verse by verse.  A source that surveys biblical content at the broad level of the biblical book has been placed in the "summaries" category.  Survey articles that are part of standard dictionaries and encyclopedias are usually in the "quick reference" category.  See the note for "books" below for an additional clarification. 

A great many commentaries may show in your search results.  You might notice that many are from a website labeled bible.org and decide you want to see only non-bible.org commentaries.  In that case just add -bible.org to the search box just after your original search terms, e.g. Psalm 21 -bible.org  -crosswalk  [in this example a second website was also eliminated from the search]

For the most part, searching first by book and chapter and then by book alone is recommended in the commentary category, e.g. Job 34  (for a few pages of search results ) then try Job

sermons  

Sermons are orations that are written out and that have not been placed in some other written category (an expository sermon that has been edited for print that reads like a commentary is categorized as a commentary and not as a sermon).  Some sermons are also available in either audio or video, or both.  Sermons may usually be accessed by scripture text and by topic, and some also by phrases and keywords, depending on how they are stored on their web sites.

books  

Books were originally print monographs that are now available online and are not placed in some other category.  If a book is categorized as a commentary, it is not usually also categorized as a book.  Usually only books with biblical content are added, but in the case of the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL), however, practicality dictated that we include the entire collection, so everything in it is in the book category even though not everything is entirely oriented to the biblical text. Many of the books in the CCEL are commentaries or different editions of the biblical text, however.  Sometimes no title appears on the search result line in the list of search results, but clicking that empty line will still lead to the correct title.  Some books in the CCEL are scanned and are difficult to search with your "find" tool because scanning errors have resulted in distorted characters - others are perfectly good copies.  The "books" category may be searched with good results using every search approach available.

 "Books" are considered a separate category because they usually have a less compact writing style than reference sources.  Often people prefer to consult reference sources before consulting books on a topic. Usually books are the last choice when researching a topic unless a book was especially recommended by a respected authority for that topic.  From a Christian perspective, listening to God's Spirit is not just a matter of giving attention to the Bible and those around us, but also involves listening to those who preceded us, who now speak to us through their writings.  To find a particular book, just enter the title and/or author as phrase searches in quotes, e.g. watchman nee "love not the world"

articles_essays  

Many of the articles are standard periodical articles that are now available free online, and many are of a scholarly character.  Others are free online articles from various web pages.  Articles are not included from journals and periodicals that charge for access unless they are designated as free.  Some periodicals that provide free online access do not do so in a way that allows for selective inclusion in the BSL, so unless the bulk of a publication's web site concerns itself with biblical interpretation, it is not included here.  We only include freely accessible articles related to biblical interpretation and application.  The articles in the BSL are from a wide variety of sources, from lay level to the scholarly.  Review articles are also included since these provide biblical background information and current scholarly thinking in the field of biblical studies.  All search strategies apply to this category.

quick reference  

This category primarily, though not exclusively, includes online reference books and glossaries of word definitions related to biblical and theological studies, early church history, and the biblical world.  The reference books include dictionaries, handbooks, encyclopedias, and bibliographies.  The extensive reference system of The Blue Letter Bible is also included in this category.  All search strategies apply to this category.

texts  

This section is mostly comprised of the 21 English versions available on BibleGateway.com. At the time of this writing, the additional English versions accessible in this category are the NRSV , New Jerusalem Bible (with some RSV) and the NAB . (Although the Duoay version with Apocrypha is included on the Bible Gateway site, it is not searchable there but is searchable in the BSL and is included under this category. 

Most translations include verse references in footnotes which complicates Google style searching.  You enter "Joel" and you get texts for "Amos" or some other book because Joel references appear in the footnotes somewhere on the page.  This category is best searched by the name of the Bible book you want to examine - then navigate the web site when you get there to reach the passage you want.  For example, if you search for Matthew 15 but choose Matthew 3 for BibleGateway in the Amplified Version, you can easily change the settings on that page to the desired chapter number (in the box) and desired version (in the drop down menu).  

If you know what version you want before you start, you might try including that in the BSL search box, e.g. Revelation TNIV or "1 Samuel" "New American Standard" or Joel 2 "new jerusalem".   If you search for Mark NRSV (the Oremus site), then you can select the first NRSV page you see and then go to the bottom of the page to select the exact passage you want.  The New American Bible  is the most web-search friendly of all the versions: entering Hab 2 NAB  or 1 Cor 11 NAB or Ezek 14 NAB in either the BSL or the Google web search box  will take you right to that chapter as one of the first selections (no quotes needed).    

NOTE:  Select the "texts" category in the BSL if you want to more quickly locate phrases in various translations of the Bible.  This category can also be useful for locating passages which share word groups: the cross-searching of translations helps escape the limitations of studying only in English or working with only a single English translation; e.g. searching love justice kindness under "texts" will list a variety of passages that include all three concepts; but if you had limited yourself to just one version you might have only found a very few selections because that version did not choose those exact words.  Another example:  husband wife love -Ephesians under "texts" finds passages outside the book of Ephesians where all three words occur on the same page.

bible studies  

Group or individual Bible studies which may be freely used without registering are included in this section.  There are many other Bible studies available on the web, but many of them cannot be included here without also including a great deal of extraneous data that would make sorting through search results much more cumbersome than it already is.  Only those web sites whose content is primarily the Bible studies themselves are included.  Many online Bible studies are part of the invisible web mentioned in the first paragraph above.  Bible Studies may be best searched by book of the Bible and by topic.

web pages  

For the most part, the web pages category contains resources for advanced study, and is a section that some users might want to check in the course of some searches. It is not selected to further focus searches, but rather to expand them. Simply choose this option on any search to see what it might suggest, if you are interested. Each web page covers a specialized biblical topic and usually has many other links for further study.  Links to a variety of web pages are included even though the average user is unlikely to discover them in normal BSL searches; e.g. Google Books, Technorati, and WorldCat.  For the most part, these sites provide indirect access to the invisible web or to non-web resources, and do not provide information for immediate use in Bible study.  For example, users would have to explore Google books for commentaries and Technorati (1  2 ) for blog bible studies as separate searches.

video  

This category includes any web site that offers a video option, so it may stand alone, or it may be combined with another category.  For example, a site categorized as basic theology + video means the presentation is written and may be viewed as well.  It is not always possible to notice all the video options that are available on a web site, so it is quite likely many video tags are missing.  This is a fairly small category compared to others, so there is not a lot of variety in it at this point, and they are not always well described on their web pages for search purposes, though the best sites do include scripture text and topics, which allows for both kinds of search access. 

audio  

This category includes web sites that offer an audio option, so it may stand alone if there is no print option as well, or it may be combined with another category.  For example, sermon + audio means the sermon is written and may also be listened to. In some cases radio programs are included, although users will not likely find them unless they include scripture references or topics in their descriptions. Audio + video means that each capacity is available as a separate option.  Audio may be accessed by scripture text and by topic.

people  

A small selection of sites have been selected to provide reference coverage for biblical people, but they cover the field fairly well. Since these sites are not limited to biographical coverage, however, you need to notice the titles of articles before choosing them.  Simply enter the name you want in the search box and limit the search to "people".  Notice the titles of articles supplied, however, since, for example, you will not want the article for Jesus if you are looking for the article on Mary, though both will be listed if you enter her name, since her name will appear in both articles

The sites in this category provide easy access to biographical information and also have links to further information on each person if you pay attention to the contents of each page. In some cases you will need to use the "find" option for the person's name when you first reach the web site. For more sources of articles on people, go to "quick reference."  

summaries  

This is a catch-all category that comes somewhere between "quick reference" and "articles and essays."  This category includes lists, charts, brief articles that summarize a topic, outlines, study guides, and the like.  This category is not as formal or complete as the "quick reference" section, but this section can be more interesting when it has the topic you are looking for.  This category is worth jumping to when "quick reference" gets too tiring.  Or sometimes you might want to begin here, especially when you are looking for a list or a chronology... or a summary!  Searching by Bible book name and topic is especially useful in this section, although any type of searching may be done here.

places  

The web sites in this category provide articles, maps, tours, and pictures of Bible lands, for the most part cross-referenced to Bible passages and events.  For more sources of articles on places in the Bible, go to "quick reference."  You can obviously search place names for this category, but you can also try geographically related topics like Paul's missionary journeys, feeding of the 5000, or Roman empire.

word studies  

A selection of web sites is provided for those who only want to study the meaning of specific words in the English Bible.  Simply enter the word in question, no matter how seemingly insignificant, and select "word studies". Some of these sites include more than just word studies, so one still needs to be selective in choosing which articles to consult.  One should not be hesitant to consult the Greek and Hebrew lexicons that might show up - they have definitions in English. For more sources of articles on words, go to "quick reference."  

Q & A's  

This is one of the most interesting and controversial areas of the BSL.  Many web site services offer answers to questions their readers ask, and post them on the web.  This category provides easy access to them.  Often all you need to do is enter a question in the search box, or the key phrase or key word from a question, or a general topic, and then choose this refinement, and you will find an assortment of questions and answers with biblically based reasoning.  Remember to try searching your phrase with quotes if search results without quotes left you wanting more.

basic theology   

One might argue that all interpretation and application of the Bible in theological; but this category as used here refers to traditional theology in its most elementary forms, for the most part.  Included here are all the major creeds and various articles and presentations giving instruction in basic evangelical theology.  For the most part, materials that make use of the Bible rather than philosophical speculation have been included.  Philosophical theology that attempts to reference its biblical roots is placed under "articles and essays," along with a representative sampling of various other theological articles representing major current viewpoints.  The basic theology category may be most profitably searched by topic and scripture passage.

STRENGTHS AND LIMITATIONS OF THE BSL

The BSL is too new for a user evaluation survey, but here are some preliminary thoughts. The BSL allows users to zero in on web sites focusing on Bible-related materials, so it reduces (but does not eliminate) the amount of sorting through irrelevant references that web searching through generic search engines involves.  The BSL also provides a context in which people at various stages of educational development can become oriented to the jargon of biblical and theological studies, since the word oriented environment of this search engine will enable them to develop in this area to the fullest extent of their capacity and interest.

This word-oriented approach is also one of the biggest drawbacks since Google searches by words rather than by topic, which makes searching cumbersome and does not efficiently meet the need of those doing Bible study.  The BSL attempts to take advantage of the structural possibilities of a customized search engine to offset these disadvantages sufficiently enough to make web based Bible study a more efficient experience.

FUTURE DIRECTIONS

The BSL will continue to develop in response to user input if it continues to serve user needs.  But hopefully it will also encourage other ministries to envision new directions for making use of the web for serving upcoming generations. Anyone can create a customized search engine.  There are already some other related but less inclusive search engines already available: worship, apologetics, creeds, and Bible. The BSL is more comprehensive than these but it still follows a fairly simple structure. Quite imaginative ways of making use of this basic CSE framework are possible if time, effort and technical skill are employed.  See for example, the range of examples at this link.