Combine Clause, Passage List, and LN Numbers for a Unique Search

Today’s post is from Morris Proctor, certified and authorized trainer for Logos Bible Software. Morris, who has trained thousands of Logos users at his two-day Camp Logos seminars, provides many training materials.

A Logos user recently emailed me this question:

Is there any way to use Logos 5 to locate every place where Jesus talks about sin? I know I can simply search Jesus AND sin and that will get me some (21) hits, but I am sure there are allusions and alternate words (for sin) that would not be included in that search.

I informed him that by combining several Logos tools, we can get very close to what he wants. One of the current solutions to the question involves several steps—please note: depending on your base package, you may not be able to complete this exercise.

But let’s have a go at answering this excellent question:

• Click the Search icon
• Select Clause as the search type (A)
• Select The Greek New Testament: SBL Edition from the resource drop-down list (B)
• Type this text in the Find box: person:Jesus (C)
• Press the Enter key to generate the search, which locates all the places in the New Testament where Jesus is mentioned regardless of the words used to reference him (D)

• Choose the Search panel menu (E)
• Select Save as Passage List (F)

• Notice that Logos creates a new Passage List document containing all of the verses from the search results (G)
• Click the Search tab to return to the Search panel (H)

• Change the search type to Bible (I)
• Select from the resource drop-down list a Bible, such as the ESV (J)
• Select from the range drop-down list the Passage List that was just created (K)

• Type this in the Find box: < LN 88.105 – LN 88.318 >, which represents all of the Greek words in the New Testament that according to the Louw-Nida Lexicon have “negative” or unethical meanings (L)

• Press the Enter key to generate the search, which locates the verses in which both the person Jesus and an “unethical” word appear in the same verse (M)

As you look at the results, some of the verses will not apply directly to the user’s specific question, but many will be exactly what he was looking for!