Results tagged “interlinear” from Logos Bible Software Blog

A few months back, we released the initial version of the Lexham Greek-English Interlinear Septuagint. That version included several books of the Septuagint (also known as the “LXX,” it is the Greek translation of the Old Testament, plus some apocryphal/deuterocanonical books). Our plan has always been to release more content as it becomes available.

Well, more content has become available, and we’ve updated the resource. If you already own a copy of the Lexham Greek-English Interlinear Septuagint, then all you need to do is run the resource auto-update script, or if you’re on a Mac, head to the product page and download the new file. If you haven’t purchased the Lexham Greek-English Interlinear Septuagint yet, then you can order your copy today. (Why would you want the Septuagint? Read this post for some answers.)

What has been updated?

Because we want to get more content out sooner, we are releasing the books in various stages of done-ness. There are two stages. The first stage is a “draft” stage, which represents the finished draft from the translator, supplied to Logos. The second stage is an “edited” stage, in which the general editor (Randall Tan) has reviewed and edited the draft-stage translation.

In the below lists, all available books are listed in their current stage.

If a title is bold, then it is new to that stage. So Genesis, Numbers, Job, Zechariah and Malachi are new to the edited stage; they were in a draft stage in the previous release. And Judith, II Maccabees, III Maccabees, Wisdom of Solomon and Jonah are new books altogether (added to the draft stage).

Books in an edited status are as follows:

• Genesis
• Exodus
• Numbers
• Ruth
• Job
• Psalms
• Additional Psalm (Psalm 151)
• Proverbs
• Ecclesiastes
• Song of Solomon
• Obadiah
• Haggai
• Zechariah
• Malachi
• Letter of Jeremiah

The following books are in draft status:

• Judith
• II Maccabees
• III Maccabees
• Wisdom of Solomon
• Psalms of Solomon
• Jonah
• Jeremiah
• Baruch
• Lamentations
• Ezekiel

There is still a decent amount of work left to do on the remaining books, but our translators and editor have been hard at work. As more content becomes available, we will update and re-release the updated resource so that registered users can have the latest material available—of course, at no additional charge.

I recently posted about the progress we've made on our The Lexham Greek-English Interlinear Septuagint (LXX), but that post was primarily about our progress. It didn't really answer the question, "Why should I worry about the Septuagint?"

Books have been written in attempts to answer that question; several are available for Logos Bible Software:

• The Use of the Septuagint in New Testament Research by R. Timothy McLay
• The Bible in Translation, Ancient and English Versions by Bruce M. Metzger
• The Septuagint by Jennifer Dines, in the Understanding the Bible and Its World Collection (4 vols.)
• The Septuagint as Christian Scripture: Its Prehistory and the Problem of Its Canon by Martin Hengel, in the Second Temple Period Collection (19 vols.)
• The Psalms in the New Testament edited by Steve Moyise and Maarten J.J. Menken, in Psalms: A Commentary, and Its New Testament Relevance (2 vols.)
• Commentary on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament, edited by D.A. Carson and G.K. Beale, in the Baker Hermeneutics Collection (14 vols.)
• There are many more; check out some of the JSOTS volumes and collections

As you can see, much ink has been spilled on the topic of the importance and role of the Septuagint (LXX) in Biblical Studies. I don't think I'll answer the question conclusively here, but hopefully I can shed some light on it.

So, why worry about the Septuagint?

Well, for starters, virtually every Bible study method I know of—particularly those geared to students without advanced training in Greek and Hebrew—recommend the consultation of several different Bible translations when examining a passage. Did you know that the Septuagint (LXX) is the oldest translation of the Hebrew Bible that we have? So, when examining a passage in the Old Testament, it can be helpful to examine the LXX as well because it is another translation. The Lexham Greek-English Interlinear Septuagint makes some of the differences between the Hebrew and LXX available through translation differences and also through notes. Used in conjunction with the Lexham Hebrew-English Interlinear Bible, with reputable commentaries on OT books, and with other English translations, The Lexham Greek-English Interlinear Septuagint can be a benefit to your study.

Second, if you're studying a New Testament passage that quotes the Old Testament, you should check out the source of that quotation. Many times, the NT author is likely using the Septuagint (LXX) and not the Hebrew Scriptures directly. This means examining the fuller context of the quote source is important to understanding how the NT author is using the passage. The Lexham Greek-English Interlinear Septuagint makes this larger context more accessible, particularly to those who may have only focused on the study of Greek in the New Testament.

(An aside, the best and most comprehensive treatment of the NT's use of the OT is Carson and Beale's Commentary on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament, edited by D.A. Carson and G.K. Beale, available for Logos Bible Software in the Baker Hermeneutics Collection (14 vols.))

Third, if you're studying an Old Testament passage that uses an obscure Hebrew word, looking to the Greek of the Septuagint can help in understanding what may have been in the underlying Hebrew text. This in turn can help in coming to a better understanding of the Old Testament text. Consult lexicon articles (such as those in HALOT) which also mention how these more obscure Hebrew words may have been translated in to Greek; use these as a base to track down other citations that use the Greek word in a similar manner.

The same can be said, perhaps to a greater degree, of obscure New Testament words. Examining the Septuagint use of an obscure NT word can be enlightening. Again, use a lexicon (like BDAG) which classifies senses and provides both LXX and NT citations to hunt down LXX citations to follow up on instances like this.

These are only a few reasons why the Septuagint (LXX) should play a role in one's study of both the Old Testament and the New Testament. So what are you waiting for? Subscribe to the pre-pub, lock in your low price, and reserve your copy of The Lexham Greek-English Interlinear Septuagint today!

The Lexham Greek-English Interlinear Septuagint is a project that we've been working on for some time. This is perhaps one of the largest projects we've taken on, involving 29 (at present) contributors and two editors (Randall Tan, the General Editor, and David A. deSilva, the Contributing Editor). Several of the contributors have also contributed copious notes covering different text-critical, translational and lexical issues. In this first release, a 20-book portion (see book list below), there are over 6700 notes.

In tandem with the development of the interlinear portions, we have also been working on a new morphology to the Septuagint (LXX) that will accompany the interlinear.

As mentioned on the pre-pub page, our plan all along has been to release portions as they are available. Those who have been Logos customers for awhile may recall that this is how we released the Lexham Hebrew-English Interlinear Bible. There is one resource; as new portions are available the resource will be updated to include those new portions, and released on FTP. Those who have the license simply download the update to get the revised and updated resource.

I'm happy to report that we finally have our first major chunk of The Lexham Greek-English Interlinear Septuagint just about ready to release. There are 20 books of the LXX included in this release. Books fall into two different categories, those in a draft status, and those in an edited status. The draft status means that by and large, the interlinear portions have been completed by the contributor but they have not yet been reviewed by the editor. The edited status means that the interlinear portions have been reviewed by the project general editor.

Books in an edited status are as follows:

• Exodus
• Ruth
• Psalms
• Additional Psalm (Psalm 151)
• Proverbs
• Ecclesiastes
• Song of Solomon
• Obadiah
• Haggai
• Letter of Jeremiah

The following books are in draft status:

• Genesis
• Numbers
• Job
• Jeremiah
• Lamentations
• Ezekiel
• Zechariah
• Malachi
• Baruch
• Psalms of Solomon

The interlinear has seven interlinear lines; these are:

• Manuscript
• Manuscript (Transliterated)
• Greek Lemma
• Greek Lemma (Transliterated)
• Morphology
• English Lexical Value
• English Literal Translation

Why are there two English entries for each word? The Lexham Greek-English Interlinear Septuagint, takes advantage of its digital environment to offer multiple layers of English glosses that reflect the complexity of the Greek language structure. Like the other Lexham interlinears (Hebrew-English Bible and Greek-English NT) there are two levels of interlinear translation. The first is the English Lexical Value, which is a gloss of the lexical or dictionary form of the word. The second is the English Literal Translation, a contextually sensitive gloss of the inflected form of the word. The difference in these glosses is subtle, but powerful. The first gloss answers the question, "What does this word mean?" The second gloss answers the question, "What does this word mean here?"

The English Literal Translation line also includes a word order number, where necessary, to allow the reader to re-assemble the text in an order more friendly to English readers. The below screen capture, with only the Manuscript and English Literal Translation lines shows how helpful this can be:

One would reassemble the text as follows:

¹ And (then) the Lord spoke all these words, saying, ² "I am the Lord your God who brought you out from the land of Egypt, out of the house of servitude. ³ There will be not to you other gods except me! (Exodus 20:1-3)

Somewhat rough, of course, but remember it is an interlinear translation. The goal is make it easier for the LXX to play a role in one's study of the Bible, both Old Testament and New Testament.

If you haven't subscribed to this pre-pub already, you may want to consider it sooner than later. Once the first portion ships, the pre-pub will be filled, and then the price will go up.

The recently-released Lexham Greek-English New Testament Interlinear has, as one of its primary distinguishing features, domain-article references to the Louw-Nida Greek Lexicon (info here, here and here). That's all well and good, but -- beyond keylinking to a specific Louw-Nida article -- what can we do with the references?

One thing that you can do (shown in the below-referenced video) is begin to explore using the concept of "semantic chaining" (also known as "semantic chunks" or "semantic clustering"). The idea is to explore how a section of text (a pericope or chapter or book) uses or repeats ideas found in particular domains or domain-subdomain references.

OK, I'll speak in English this time. You know how repeated words can be important when you're looking at a passage? Well, Louw-Nida references let you expand that notion to repeated concepts. The theoretical backgound for this concept is well-established in the literature* but as of yet has not really been available in a consumer-level Bible study product.

But you can do it with the Lexham Greek-English Interlinear New Testament if you've also got the Louw-Nida lexicon (Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament Based on Semantic Domains) and are willing to learn how to reference search using the Bible Speed Search dialog.

The video shows you how. Our sample passage is 1Ti 2.1, and our sample concept is prayer.

• Video: Flash, 13 megs, 9:50, with sound.

* Some references include:

• Reed, Jeffrey T. A Discourse Analysis of Philippians, pp. 296-331. This book will be available in the Studies in New Testament Greek and JSNTS Collection.


• Porter, Stanley E. and O'Donnell, Matthew Brook. "Semantics and Patterns of Argumentation in Romans: Definitions, Proposals, Data and Experiments", pp. 154-204 in Stanley E. Porter (ed.), Diglossia and Other Topics in New Testament Linguistics. This book will be available in the Studies in New Testament Greek and JSNTS Collection.


• Guthrie, George, The Structure of Hebrews: A Text-Linguistic Analysis.


• Van Neste, Ray, Cohesion and Structure in the Pastoral Epistles. This book is available in the Library of NT Studies: JSNTS on Paul collection.