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Bible API

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Re: Bible API

#121

Post by take_a_breath »

karaterobot wrote: post #101
wcarey wrote: post #58

One of the most interesting things to happen to the scriptures is their balkanization into verses. We generally don't atomize other writings that way, and when folks read the scriptures as a series of disconnected logical propositions all sorts of wackiness ensues. What would it look like to have an API for the collected works of Jane Austen that returned snippets (some of which are not even complete sentences)? How…

Good observation, but I think it's overstated. I don't know many people who read the bible as a series of disconnected logical propositions, they mainly read it in much longer sections covering some topic. Chapter and verse come in when you want to quote something, or shorthand something, or refer someone to a specific and narrow section. In this usage, it's very similar to the way we cite Shakespeare, Homer, Chaucer…

You make a good point, but I think your making the academic argument rather than the practical argument. Yes, scholars and avid Bible readers understand the exact location of a verse based on its Biblical coordinates, but plenty of others don’t. In practice, it is far more common to see the Bible quoted as a small snippet meant to re-enforce some other point. The Twitter feed of Senator Marco Rubio is a good example.

Re: Bible API

#122

Post by sb057 »

skissane wrote: post #73
sb057 wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem (which Shakespeare also has[1]) is that there are numerous versions of the texts in their original languages, with no particularly definitive or even consistent editions of the Old Testament in Hebrew or the New Testament in Greek AFAIK. Not to mention, the original Mosaic writings have been completely lost to time, having been written in Ugaritic and not Hebrew. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_te…

> Not to mention, the original Mosaic writings have been completely lost to time, having been written in Ugaritic and not Hebrew. Where did you get the bit about the Torah originally being written in Ugaritic? What scholarly sources say that?

I was speaking slightly out-of-hand, but it's the natural conclusion if you take the writings to have been authentically authored by Moses.

Religious traditions place him in approximately the middle of the 2nd millenium BC, while secular scholarship, when they assume he even existed, put him in the 13th century BC. There are numerous scholarly sources attesting to the fact that Hebrew only began to exist as a language in about the 10th century BC. Ergo, Moses must have written in a pre-Hebrew language, which would have very likely been Ugaritic, or at least a related dialect.

This is backed up by the fact that there are certain portions of the Old Testament that are written in a form of Hebrew which is comparatively archaic, such as the Song of Moses in Deuteronomy and the middle chunk of the Book of Job. You can see this reflected in the 2nd century BC Greek translation, the Septuagint, wherein various chunks of these texts are skipped, apparently on account of the translators being unsure how to translate what would be comparable to Middle English to us.

Re: Bible API

#123

Post by jacquesm »

ducaale wrote: post #98
nurettin wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's amazing how most don't read their "most important book". They just wait for others to tell them the pretty verses they found. It's sort of like modern day social media. People don't actually read the content, they wait for others to comment on the headline only. This is the case for every major religion out there. I live in the middle east. I've known hundreds of people personally in my life. How many have act…

Well, In Somalia we do read the Quran. In fact, virtually every child memorizes it from cover to cover before starting school. But if you mean understanding what it says, then you have a point.

What a complete waste of time. If you're going to be forced to cram a book that size it would be great if it contained knowledge rooted in science. Think about it: you could start today and within two decades you'd have a generation of actual scholars. Somalia would leap ahead.

Re: Bible API

#125

Post by jacquesm »

wcarey wrote: post #109
jacquesm wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Christianity is also man made.

Christians, in particular, would believe Christianity man made. After all, God became incarnate and fully human!

There is a good reason why scammers always filter out for religious affiliation first before spending a lot of of time on their victims. Gullibility is a desirable property in marks.

Re: Bible API

#126

Post by jariel »

goto11 wrote: post #119
jariel wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So tell us about Jesus' 'atrocities'. If you're reference them, surely you be able to at least give us some examples?

You seriously want examples of atrocities from the Bible? How about the law that homosexuals should be stoned to death? Or that rape victims should be either killed or forced to marry the rapist? The command that slaves should obey their masters?

Yes, reference for us when Jesus did those things.

Re: Bible API

#127

Post by wcarey »

eeereerews wrote: post #103
wcarey wrote: post #58

One of the most interesting things to happen to the scriptures is their balkanization into verses. We generally don't atomize other writings that way, and when folks read the scriptures as a series of disconnected logical propositions all sorts of wackiness ensues. What would it look like to have an API for the collected works of Jane Austen that returned snippets (some of which are not even complete sentences)? How…

> That hermeneutic - texts are collections of independent logical propositions - was essentially unknown in the ancient world On the contrary, the atomization and recombination of the text into new meanings is highly characteristic of Midrash. Of course, this isn't the same as the "prooftext" hermeneutic I think you're criticizing.

Fascinating! Do you have a good book recommendation that introduces that? It's not something I know much about.

Re: Bible API

#128

Post by jacquesm »

Mediterraneo10 wrote: post #67
millerm wrote: post #47

Would be nice if The Skeptic's Annotated Bible could be added to the API. Doubt that though. http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/

It has been years since I last looked at the Skeptics Annotated Bible, but when it launched there were a number of claims based purely on the standard English translations of the Bible. I remember especially how it was claimed that Jesus was "disrespectful of his mother" (and therefore not a morally good person) by addressing her as "woman", even though gunê in Greek was a totally normal form of address with no disre…

Spending time on annotating it either in English or the original is giving it too much credibility to begin with. If we're going to go to the source let's look at the Torah instead, not at a bunch of pull requests with bug fixes against the original.

Re: Bible API

#129

Post by nwatson »

josh_fyi wrote: post #5

Nice API. Still, it's a little like a Shakespeare API that supports only Portuguese and Chinese. It would be great to include the original languages.

While not an API with multiple translations, there are sophisticated desktop software packages like "Accordance Bible" (https://www.accordancebible.com/) that will let one view any chosen, supported, English translation side-by-side with the original language (usually Hebrew or Greek) for that same passage. The software also will follow quasi-word-for-word the text your cursor hovers in one view to the analog in the other view it's translated from or to. This shows there's been considerable effort in mapping the translations and original languages back and forth and making them easily accessible.

For an example of a direct use of this feature, reference Chris Roseborough's "Fighting for the Faith" YouTube series where he often uses this feature of Accordance Bible, along with his knowledge of the original languages and the built-in original-language dictionaries and thesaurus to analyze heretical or erroneous interpretations and applications of biblical text made by what he deems the myriad "false teachers" in current "evangelical" preacher-dom. For example of use of this particular word-for-word feature look at the video shortly after https://youtu.be/tFeF04F8Tf8?t=828 (a critique of Joel Osteen's "prosperity preaching"). At around 14:01 in the video you'll start seeing the Greek text analogs highlight as the cursor drifts around the English text. In this section of the video he's not explicitly using the feature, but he often does ... hmmm, at around 16:30 or so he does, showing the original text for "I AM" and "do not be afraid."

In any case, there's been much work in software such as "Accordance Bible" and others to make "translation mapping" more apparent, and to expose any "translation issues" ... this necessarily would require the user to be very familiar with the original languages.

Chris Roseborough himself is very conservative (young-earth creationist; women should not be pastors; ... etc., many views that would not be popular). The most frequent targets of his criticism are those who preach "prosperity gospel" (e.g. Joel Osteen); those who believe apostles and prophets still exist and can write "scripture" today with as much authority as the original Hebrew and Greek texts (e.g., New Apostolic Reformation / NAR / Bethel / Hillsong); those who believe they can "decree and declare" God to steer hurricanes, heal people of their sicknesses (I don't think C.R. would object to the possibility of healing, just that there are no guarantees this side of eternity and God's purpose isn't to alleviate all suffering here and now), cause career success and wealth, and that believe if you aren't blessed you don't have enough faith.

EDIT: clarification, deleted repeated phrase

Re: Bible API

#130

Post by RobertRoberts »

wcarey wrote: post #83
goto11 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Bible was not written as single work the way novels like Persuasion are though. It is really a collection of books of very different origins and genre. Some books are laws where individual rules can be examined and there are collections of proverbs. But there are also parts which are longer narratives.

I think my point, though, that the unit of thought in the scriptures is not the atomic verse, still stands. If you'd like to emend "collected works of Jane Austen" to "collected works of 19th century authors", feel free.

A few things to consider:

1. Many of the writings are letters, and therefore short.

2. Many of the writings, though grouped together by books, their chapters really are often distinct documents written at different times. (some are even historical logs like Kings and Chronicles)

3. There are _many_ sections that really do break down by lines and sections. The best examples are Proverbs and Psalms.

4. It's a huge document, and much of it is useful to reference later, and having a system in place for this (of any kind) is helpful for many reasons.

Last, I agree with your general sentiment.

The first time I read sections of the bible without the artificial breaks and numbers getting in the way gave me a completely different perspective on the _content_. So I make a point to read like this when I feel the numbers may be in the way of comprehension.

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