Knowledge Library

Bible Encyclopedias

Long articles on books, doctrines, peoples and institutions.

Scripture first

Luke 1:1-4 · Acts 17:11

Luke traced everything carefully from the first so Theophilus might know the certainty of what he had been taught, and the Bereans searched the Scriptures daily to test what they heard. Careful, checkable work is not the enemy of faith.

What this shelf holds

  • Signed articles running to many pages, with argument and bibliography rather than a bare definition.
  • The place to go when a subject has a history of discussion behind it: the canon, the priesthood, the exile, the resurrection accounts.

How to use it

  • Read the article for the shape of the discussion, then go to the primary passages it cites and read those in full.
  • Note who wrote the article. Different contributors in the same volume hold different positions.

What this cannot settle

Length is not authority. An encyclopedia records where scholarship stood when it was written, and the assumptions of that moment are usually invisible to its authors.

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4 entries on these shelves

Reference works

Each of these is named so you can open it and check us. Each carries what it is good for and what it cannot decide.

Every entry below is labelled with the kind of evidence it is, so a lexicon is never mistaken for the text and a commentary is never mistaken for a conclusion Scripture has drawn.

  • International Standard Bible Encyclopedia

    Scholarly referenceSupports the text, never settles it · James Orr, editor, 1915 · Public domain

    Long, signed articles on books, doctrines, peoples, languages and customs.

    Use forWorking through a subject at length when a dictionary entry is too thin.

    CautionArticles differ in quality and outlook because they have different authors. Where one contributor states a critical theory, that is his judgement, not a finding.

  • An Introduction to the Critical Study and Knowledge of the Holy Scriptures

    Scholarly referenceSupports the text, never settles it · Thomas Hartwell Horne, 1818 · Public domain

    Canon, manuscripts, translation, geography and interpretation gathered in one work.

    Use forLearning how the Bible came to us and how it has been read.

    CautionIts manuscript evidence stops long before the great discoveries of the following century.

  • Smith's Bible Dictionary

    Scholarly referenceSupports the text, never settles it · William Smith, 1863 · Public domain

    Fuller entries than Easton, with the biblical references gathered under each heading.

    Use forSeeing every passage that mentions a person, place or practice in one list.

    CautionIts identifications of sites and its chronology predate modern archaeology and should not be quoted as settled.

Back to Scripture

The order of authority

Scripture · Biblical cross references · Original Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek · Historical, cultural, geographical and archaeological background · Trusted biblical reference works · Explanation and application

Read how Audela weighs each rung

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