Zephanyah Bible Study
Our
Sources
The following is an incomplete list, but should give you a sense of the
materials we use.
The
Bible
We study Scripture
primarily from the King James Version (KJV) of the Bible. Our
reason is simple. The
Strong's Concordance edition we use and recommend defines every word in
the KJV. This cannot be said for other translations.
Occasionally, we read them for their annotations and to
analyze difficult passages, although sometimes they obscure them
even more.
The
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible
Without a thorough understanding of Scripture,
other works cannot be intelligently compared with the Bible to see if they have merit. The Strong's helps
us better understand the Bible by giving us a way to trace all the
English words back to definitions of their originial language words.
The English reader has little hope of understanding the meat
of Scripture without this tool. It
is indispensable to
the serious Bible student - an absolute must. No
other
Concordance will do.
We recently purchased a copy of the
so-called, Strongest Strong's,
(SS) which purports to be a corrected
version of the original. We found that the editors did
not limit
their revision to correcting the few minor errors in Doctor
Strong's universally lauded and copiously quoted original work.
Rather, the SS omitted key definitions
from the Hebrew and Greek dictionaries. The result is that
the true meanings of
certain words have been lost. They claim to have subjected the
original text to some kind of computer "verification and
correction." We wonder if
their program was written with bias for their own preferred doctrines.
For this reason, we do not recommend the Strongest Strong's, nor
do we recommend any of the various less exhaustive (partial) modern
editions of the Strong's. They are simply
incomplete, unreliable, and therefore, completely useless.
See below for more information about the Strong's we do recommed.
The
Book of Enoch
The Book
of Enoch remains in our library.
The Council of
Laodicea (A.D. 364,) banned it as
the work of an unknown Christian author impersonating Enoch,
the grandfather of Noah. This, they believed because
of its
strong Messianic character. Thereafter it was
lost until 1773. Forty-eight years later
the first
English translation was published, and finally, Aramaic fragments were
found in Cave 4 at Qumran with the Dead Sea Scrolls in the mid-20th
Century. Partly because of its proximity to other Old
Testament scrolls, this find
convinced most scholars of its pre-Christian origin.
Jude 1:14 quotes The Book of
Enoch and Hebrews 11:5 indirectly
refers to it. We, therefore, consider it to be tentatively
authoritative. The
fact that the Jews do not include it in their Old Testament
Canon
is a concern, but that could have its foundation in the 1st Century
Roman political appointments of Jewish priests.
Read
our article on The Book of Enoch here.
Deuterocanonical
Books
These
are known collectively as the Apocrypha,
consisting of a group of interesting, if not
sacred, books I and II Esdras (Greek for Ezra,) and
the
books of the Maccabees, fill in late preChristian histories.
Also in this group, we find the poetic book
of Wisdom and
an account of life under the Assyrian captivity of
Israel by
Tobit, as well as object lessons like the one in the book of
Susanna. While we don't take the Apocrypha as Scripture, it
provides cultural and historical background.
We prefer Goodspeed's translation, but the
Catholic
Canon includes another, which may be interesting by
comparison.
Other Books
We've also collected a few books
by Christian writers, links to some Internet sources and
two software products, which are all listed on the Links page. The
software is described below.
Ancient History
Ancient and medieval historians,
both sacred and secular, continue to contribute to our
understanding of the ancient world and its peoples,
especially those who interacted with the ancient
Hebrews, Israelites, and early Christians.
Much insight has come to us through their records.
Remarkably, we find nothing to disagree
with Biblical history.
We do have a problem, however, with modern historians, and the
so-called "higher critics" on television programs like those aired on
The History Channel. See out article entitled, "Revisionism on The History
Channel."
Modern Archaeology
Middle-Eastern Archaeology over the past hundred years invariably
confirms Biblical history, so we look forward to each new discovery.
How
We Study
The most learned Bible
student will be able to read Scripture in the original languages of
the manuscripts, that is, in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek. Far
short
of ever achieving expertise in these ancient tongues, we
ordinary
persons are still not left without hope.
We
can at
least identify Hebrew/Aramaic and Greek words of Scripture
before
they were translated into English, and we can find their definitions.
Thus, their connotations, which in many
cases have been diluted or obscured by translation, can inform our
study. Also, we value the scholarship of eminent
writers,
particularly of the
past two
centuries. The works of
these men, particularly
Bullinger, and a few contemporary writers we know, can be quite helpful.
We highly recommendations the following, our favorite study
tools:
- The
Companion Bible, Authorized
(King James) Version of 1611 "with the Structures and Critical
Explanatory and Suggestive Notes, and with 198 Appendixes," by E.W.
Bullinger, Kregel Publications, Grand Rapids Michigan ISBN
0-8254-2099-7 (Hardcover Large Print) and 0-8254-2240-x (Black genuine
leather, indexed.)
- The
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible,
"Showing every word of the text of the Common English Version of the
Canonical Books (King James Version,) and every occurrence of each word
in regular order, together with Dictionaries of the Hebrew and Greek
words of the original, with references to the English words": by James
Strong, S.T.D., LL.D, Henderson Publishers, Peabody Massachussetts,
ISBN 0 917006-01-1 (Hardcover)
- This book gives us
two huge
advantages. First, it contains every word of the KJV
arranged in alphabetic order, and within that, arranged in the order
the word appears in the Bible. The book, chapter and
verse
are identified for each occurence of the word, along with the Strong's
word number pointing to an entry in Hebrew/Aramaic or Greek
dictionaries, also included. At that point, definitions are
given
for each original language word, cross-referencing its root
word(s) by number, so the English student can trace the
etymology
of any word and determine it's various shades of meaning in the context
of a particular Bible verse. In that way, it's like a 10
pound,
super-triple, Websters unabridged dictionary at the Public Library -
meets Berlitz language courses in Hebrew and Greek.
Thus we
have one reason for the title, "Exhaustive."
Secondly,
"the Strong's" provides in the English dictionary, an overview
of
all the verses containing a given word, a very handy feature for
topical studies and for comparing an interpretation of a verse
against other usages of the same word in Scripture. We don't
say
that this is a 100% foolproof way of interpreting Scripture, but
combined with commentaries, critical notes, and
prayer, it is truly invaluable.
- There are several newer editions,
all
but one of which are abridged and hardly useful. The
only
one that seems comparable is The
Strongest Strong's,
but we haven't yet had a chance to compare it with our older version.
Supposedly, the few errors in the older
edition corrected by
means of a computer scan.
How this
was done without risk of new errors is not clear. We have
this
book on order, so look for an upcoming review.
- Some students who like the NIV
and
other translations for their daily study complain that the older
Strong's is primarily keyed to the KJV. Because we
prefer
the Companion Bible, which is a KJV, this is not a problem for
us,
and we have been well acquainted with its poetic style from childhood.
One
problem we have found becomes an issue with translations other than the
KJV. It is the total absence of certain phrases in the
English
dictionary that we find in some Bible translations, so that we
are left
with gaps in the verse with no Hebrew equivalent. In at least
one such case, the real meaning of the passage was entirely lost.
- Green's
- The Interlinear Hebrew-Greek-English Bible,
Coded with Strong's Concordance Numbers, Four Volume, Revised Second
Edition, by J.P. Green, 1985, Sovereign Grace Publishers, Lafayette,
Indiana, ISBN 1-878442-00-7 (Hardcover)
- The third edition may
now be available.
- This four volume
Bible is
unique,
in that it reveals the actual Hebrew letters, along with a
close translation of them in the side column, and a
literal
translation in the rows, read from right to left.
This
can be quite valuable. Indeed, the first verse of Genesis
holds a
secret.
The
literal
translation reads "In the beginning created God -- the heavens
and the earth." Much to our surprise, there stood
between "God" and "the heavens" the first and last letters of
the
Hebrew alphabet, the Aleph and the Tahv, as the Alpha and Omega, the
First and the Last. These two letters (represented above by
--)
are never translated in our English Bibles, and we had no idea they
were there until we received our copy of Green's Interlinear
Bible.
- This program contains many
features;
commentaries, sermons, dictionaries, maps and charts, most of which are
highly useful, though some are not. This software is so
comprehensive and complex, it can be overwhelming
for a
beginner. It comes with a hefty price tag of $159 (last time
we
checked.) We recommend it for the pastor, deacon, advanced
Bible
student, and those wishing to own all of the most popular
orthodox Protestant commentaries.
- Here is a staple we keep handy
for everyday study. Like the PC Study Bible, we can
author
and store our own study notes with copied verses, and Strong's
definitions. A large number of optional Bible versions in
multiple languages can be included, all free for downloading, and
its searchable Bibles and Strong's reference leave little to
be
desired. It runs very fast and has a handy, clickable Bible
book
list in its own left-frame for easy navigation. We
wouldn't
want to do without it.
If
you read the long description (above) of the advantages of
using
the Strong's Concordance, you may have noticed that we mentioned prayer
in connection with Bible study. We know from personal
experience
that prayer is essential to understanding Scripture.
Prayer requires
faith, and Christian faith is not merely an abstract idea, nor is it
simple belief in an intangible God. Rather, faith in the Christian
sense becomes the more difficult virtue of trust in God, and its
practice is honored by Him with efficacious study, ever
increasing
faith, and lasting spiritual fruit.
We pray that God will bless
you abundantly.
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