The scriptures are an extraordinary collection of writings. Written by dozens of prophets over the course of many centuries, they have, for more than two millennia, been read, rehearsed, memorized, and analysed by billions of people—sceptics, believers, and scholars—and still they compel us to read them again. They instruct and correct us, comfort and exhort us, advise and direct us. And as God’s Spirit, who first breathed the words we have read many times before, speaks to us through them once more, we are transformed further. (The Bible Project’s ‘Ancient Jewish Meditation Literature’ video expounds this theme beautifully.)
A collection of writings this special has inspired teachers through the millennia to share their learning with others. This article introduces some of the classic books and free digital resources that share that learning with you.
Classic Print Tools
Over thirty-five years, interacting with pastors, scholars, and other students, I have found these print books to be essential tools for my own study of the scriptures.
A Study Bible
The basic tool for studying scripture is a good study Bible. Old and new classics include the NIV, ESV, Biblical Theology, and Cultural Backgrounds Study Bibles. My study Bible stands ready on my desk, with years of my own notes filling the margins and footnotes.
Reading Guides
For decades now, the classic tools for learning to read the scriptures well have been Gordon Fee and Doug Stuart’s How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth and How to Read the Bible Book by Book (Zondervan). Each time I return to these books I am struck by how simply these scholars in love with scripture can communicate their mature wisdom.
As students mature (or budgets enlarge), I recommend buying a good dictionary and one-volume commentary, like InterVarsity’s New Bible Dictionary and New Bible Commentary. From there, I would advise buying a decent commentary each time you began studying a book of scripture in depth.
Free Digital Tools
The spread of the Internet has transformed our study of scripture. Great works that have stood the test of time are now available for free at Christian Classics Ethereal Library and Internet Archive. And, in a spirit of generosity, other new, excellent resources are also available for free. This section sets out a menu of free tools to help you grow in your skills and knowledge.
Perspective and Sensibility
The new starting point for studying the scriptures well is the Bible Project’s growing collection of videos. Led by a Hebrew Bible PhD and a graphic artist, the Bible Project will give you the perspective from which to look at scripture (as a ‘unified story’) and the sensibility to recognize what all you are seeing.
Begin with their Story of the Bible video and watch it till you have memorized it. Then start working through How to Read the Bible, which comprises several episodes each on reading narrative, poetry, and prose discourse in the scriptures.
To deepen your knowledge watch their theme and word study videos. These videos model how to track a concept or term through the scriptures along the plot line of its one grand story.
Finally, as you begin to study a book of scripture, and as you read through it, watch and re-watch the book overviews. These videos introduce each book, show its structure, highlight its themes, and summarize its parts.
Reading and Listening
The standard answer to the standard question ‘which version of the Bible should I read?’ used to be ‘whatever’s in your hand … or still on your shelf’. The answer remains true, but, with mobile phones in our hands and computers on our desks, we now have ready access to dozens of translations. You can read excellent English versions like the CEB, ESV, NIV, NLT, and NRSV at Bible Gateway, on the Bible app, or at Bible.is. You can listen to audio recordings of scripture as you walk, drive, or, best of all, shut your eyes and imagine. And the Bible app hosts translations in over 1600 other languages (including Jamaican!).
Studying Simply
Free digital tools also help us study the meanings of phrases and words in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek, the ancient languages in which the prophets wrote the scriptures. One of the more intuitive tools for these tasks is STEP Bible, developed by scholars at Tyndale House in Cambridge.
STEP Bible includes the New English Translation and its 60,000 translators’ notes. While other translations are better for reading, I have found that the NET Bible’s notes give me the most sensitive feeling for what the original text says. Hover over a triangle beside a word in STEP Bible to read the note at the bottom of the screen.
STEP Bible also makes word studies simple. Choose ESV in the search bar. Hover over a word (like ‘light’ in Genesis 1.3 or in John 1.4) to see where all it occurs in the passage. Click on it to see the Hebrew (אור, or) or Greek (φως, fōs) term it translates and to read that term’s range of meaning. Click on the number of times the term occurs to read through a list of all the verses where that Hebrew or Greek word is used in the Hebrew scriptures or the New Testament. Or review related words, like or, to light or fōtizō, to illuminate.
Studying Seriously
For students who want to study seriously, the best tool is the generous collection of free resources in Logos’s Academic Basic. The downloadable app includes original language texts (of the Hebrew scriptures, the Greek Septuagint, and the Greek New Testament), lexicons (to define the meanings of Hebrew and Greek words), and powerful tools to study words, meanings, and patterns of use.
Several publishers offer scores of free books on Logos, and Logos gives away a free book each month. The free ‘book’ this month (May 2021) is N. T. Wright’s 6-hour course The Storied World of the Bible.
To get started with Logos, use the Quickstart guide, and then study through the excellent course LT271: Study the Bible with Logos: Jonah 1.
Dictionaries and Commentaries
When we study the scriptures, we join an ancient community, and many of their works are now available freely as well.
Good Bible dictionaries include Logos’s Lexham Bible Dictionary (2016) and Zondervan’s Encyclopedia of the Bible (1960s).
Excellent one-volume study Bibles or commentaries include ESV Global Study Bible (2018), Theology of Work Bible Commentary (2016), Reformation Study Bible (2015), Asbury Bible Commentary (1992), and Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown (1871). Good multivolume commentaries include IVP’s recent New Testament Commentaries, Keil and Delitzsch’s 1864 commentaries on the Hebrew scriptures, and Calvin’s commentaries.
Looking over the tools I selected to include in this article, I am overwhelmed. May this buffet of resources invite you to give thanks for and savour their richness, not numb you to the impossibility of using all of them to the full.
