This is going to make me sound super-nerdy, but I found this cool website the other day.

In 1844 a guy called Constatin von Tischendorf found a 4thC copy of the entire Bible in a monastery in Sinai. Since then it – the Codex Sinaiticus – has ended up in 3 parts in various libraries and museums in Europe. It’s interesting because it’s an important example of how the Bible was put together when there wasn’t yet an agreement on which books were canonical. It’s full mistakes and corrections as the three scribes who worked on it tried to get it right. Now you can check out the 1600 year old document for yourself, because they’ve scanned in the pages and put them on a website!

John Dickson and Greg Clarke discuss the Codex on their CPX website, including some of the controversies surrounding it. It’s pretty easy just to live in the moment, but looking at the pages of the Codex is a good reminder of the rich Christian history we’re a part of and how much we have to thank God for.

interesting fact: The Codex is made from pages of goat skin – apparently over 300 goats were ‘harmed’ in it’s making.

If you’re new to Bible software and low on cash, there’s really no reason not to start here. Free. Everybody likes free stuff and there’s no reason not to give it a go.

What are the options?

This is obviously not an exhaustive list, there are other options out there but these are the main players.

E-Sword (Windows)

The Sword Project:

• Xiphos (formerly GnomeSword, Windows and Linux)
• MacSword (MacOS X)

Web-based options:

• Biblegateway.com
• Zhubert.com

What all these programs have in common

These programs have several things in common so it would be worth starting there. They are all quite simple. They don’t do a whole lot compared to the costly stuff but that also means there fairly easy to use. There’s not a lot in the way of frills here, the interfaces are usually a bit clunky compared to the bigger programs but at the end of the day they are free, they’re not trying to do a lot but they do it well.

The biggest drawback the free options have in common is the lack of contemporary resources. They are all modular and allow you to download and install dozens of different bible versions, commentaries, dictionaries and devotional material, but is almost entirely limited to resources that are available in the public domain. This is not surprising, the reason the expensive stuff costs so much is that you’re paying publishers for current books. This is not the end of the world, there is plenty of good stuff there. They all have ESV and KJV, greek texts if you’re so inclined (textus receptus and Westcott-Hort texts), whole bible commentaries by Barnes, Clarke, Henry and numerous others, and some old school dictionaries and encyclopaedias.

Comparison

The main advantage E-Sword has is the availability of current resources to purchase if you want them. So if you want to get other contemporary English translations you can pay $10-$30 to get what you want. There are also various commentaries and dictionaries, though besides Baker’s New Testament Commentary I don’t think there’s much there worth paying for.

The Sword Project has the advantage of being free and open source. This means its code is freely available and is being developed by a community, rather than one person; it should be upgraded and improved more rapidly and it uses a shared code-base across multiple platforms so it feels pretty similar across different operating systems and will be easily ported to new ones.

The Web-based Options

The online options are a different kettle of fish entirely. Because you are not downloading entire books, they are able to offer free access to contemporary resources. So for example, you can access any of the contemporary english translations at Biblegateway.com. It’s not designed for extensive study but is very useful for comparing translations and you can also listen to an audio version for free. If you want to study the bible in Greek you can’t go past Zhubert.com, it is much better for this purpose than any of the free programs that you can install.

Conclusions

As I mentioned previously, the best option for you will depend on what you want to use it for, your proficiency with computers and how much you’re willing to spend. These programs are about as elementary as it gets in terms of what bible software can do, but they’re free! If you’re into ratings heres my attempt:

E-Sword: Interface 2/5, Capability 1/5, Resources 2/5, Cost 5/5

Sword Project programs: Interface 3/5, Capability 1/5  Resources 1/5, Cost 5/5

Biblegateway.com Interface N/A, Capability 1/5, Resources 3/5, Cost 5/5

Zhubert.com Interface 3/5, Capability 3/5, Resources 2/5, Cost 5/5