KJV+TVM Is there a legal module for theWord?

[Kristofer]

Is there a legal KJV+TVM module for theWord? I don't want to break a copyright law to get it on theWord. I figure if the book has a copyright still and you get it for free, it's probably an illegal pirate module, right?

[csterg]

I have no idea about the copyright status of this module, and this is why you will not find it in the official repo
Costas

[Kristofer]

Thanks for the reply. I keep seeing this module offered in different places. Someone with the username PastorDave on an e-Sword forum said that he was offering it for free back in 2009 I think, but apparently all he did was take an existing e-Sword KJV+TVM and turn it into a theWord module and said he was offering it for free because it was the KJV and he can not put a price on it. That is nice of him, and I mean to show him a lot of respect for his desire to contribute, but I am just wondering if he ever checked the copyright status of that work. It's the KJV and as I understand anyone can make copies of the KJV, but if the person who turned the KJV into the KJV+TVM has royalties on their work that they put into incorporating a copy of the KJV with the TVM dictionary than I don't want to risk being guilty of using something that is illegal to use unless you pay for it. I wonder if there is some way to verify who created the TVM and if it is copyrighted. Who put together the first KJV+TVM module to begin with? This is so confusing. It makes me want to just invest in a $350 program. What's the use of trying to save the hundreds of dollars on freeware when you can't even enjoy it because you feel like a criminal. I mean what kind of holy Christian preacher uses contraband Bibles to do his research? I mean I want powerful research tools to do my Bible research, but I find myself tempted to download questionable resources in order to fulfill my research requirements. For instance, there is no Old Testament module on theWord in Hebrew or English that I know of that is connected to Robertson's Morphological Analysis Codes. I know I shouldn't complain. May God bless the ones who have produced such powerful programs such as theWord and e-Sword and offered them for free. I should just take the time to master Greek and Hebrew and then I guess I wouldn't need all these myriad modules!

[Kristofer]

Also, I can't help but think about two things I read combined which make me draw a disheartening conclusion. I read on the BibleWorks website that they discourage people from amassing large libraries on their computers, and encourage buying more hard books, because there is no guarantee that the computers in 10 years will be able to run them. Then I read on someone's e-Sword modules site that they foresee in the future companies charging people for using their programs PER USE! Just like we rent movies and pay per view! Then I thought about how that the owners of these bible programs continually upgrade. I know that you have to pay a hefty fee already to upgrade to the newer versions when you own some of the expensive Bible programs. It seems to me that when you depend on these programs you are at their mercy if you want the latest and greatest modules if they only work on the most up-to-the-minute program version. Who is to stop them from even charging more and more as the years go by, until the books that you have invested thousands of dollars on now can only be used if you are willing to pay an obscene amount of money! They would have us Bible students and scholars and pastors, etc. hijacked! I remember Maurice Robinson saying that he prefers regular books to computer books. Maybe there is some legitimate wisdom in that. But it sure is cool to be able to just click on something and see the answer in less than a second!

[csterg]

Thanks for the reply. I keep seeing this module offered in different places. Someone with the username PastorDave on an e-Sword forum said that he was offering it for free back in 2009 I think, but apparently all he did was take an existing e-Sword KJV+TVM and turn it into a theWord module and said he was offering it for free because it was the KJV and he can not put a price on it. That is nice of him, and I mean to show him a lot of respect for his desire to contribute, but I am just wondering if he ever checked the copyright status of that work. It's the KJV and as I understand anyone can make copies of the KJV, but if the person who turned the KJV into the KJV+TVM has royalties on their work that they put into incorporating a copy of the KJV with the TVM dictionary than I don't want to risk being guilty of using something that is illegal to use unless you pay for it. I wonder if there is some way to verify who created the TVM and if it is copyrighted. Who put together the first KJV+TVM module to begin with? This is so confusing. It makes me want to just invest in a $350 program. What's the use of trying to save the hundreds of dollars on freeware when you can't even enjoy it because you feel like a criminal. I mean what kind of holy Christian preacher uses contraband Bibles to do his research? I mean I want powerful research tools to do my Bible research, but I find myself tempted to download questionable resources in order to fulfill my research requirements. For instance, there is no Old Testament module on theWord in Hebrew or English that I know of that is connected to Robertson's Morphological Analysis Codes. I know I shouldn't complain. May God bless the ones who have produced such powerful programs such as theWord and e-Sword and offered them for free. I should just take the time to master Greek and Hebrew and then I guess I wouldn't need all these myriad modules!

Well, if this may help you:
to be honest, the KJV+TVM is not that useful according to me. The TVM part is only 'trimmed down' information from the Morphology codes that accompany several NT Greek texts. So, as i am concerned, it's not really worth the effort.
Concerning OT: there is no free OT morphology, but there is the WHM you can get for a fee which includes full Hebrew parsing information and allows you to do complex searches on the morphology.
Very soon a free Hebrew OT with Strong numbers, xlit and glosses will be added for free in the library (it's actually ready to publish, just need some time to get it up)

If you try to describe what you are trying to achieve, probably you will get answers on how to do it with the tools already available for free.
Costas

[csterg]

Also, I can't help but think about two things I read combined which make me draw a disheartening conclusion. I read on the BibleWorks website that they discourage people from amassing large libraries on their computers, and encourage buying more hard books, because there is no guarantee that the computers in 10 years will be able to run them. Then I read on someone's e-Sword modules site that they foresee in the future companies charging people for using their programs PER USE! Just like we rent movies and pay per view! Then I thought about how that the owners of these bible programs continually upgrade. I know that you have to pay a hefty fee already to upgrade to the newer versions when you own some of the expensive Bible programs. It seems to me that when you depend on these programs you are at their mercy if you want the latest and greatest modules if they only work on the most up-to-the-minute program version. Who is to stop them from even charging more and more as the years go by, until the books that you have invested thousands of dollars on now can only be used if you are willing to pay an obscene amount of money! They would have us Bible students and scholars and pastors, etc. hijacked! I remember Maurice Robinson saying that he prefers regular books to computer books. Maybe there is some legitimate wisdom in that. But it sure is cool to be able to just click on something and see the answer in less than a second!

Well, not wanting to defend anyone, and of course talking from a different perspective (since theWord is free), we need to realize that there is an ongoing cost in maintaining and developing a program. Also, don't forget that a book will tear down with usage and i am sure that most of us have teared down more than one Bibles, don't we? I am not sure i know many that own only a single copy of a printed Bible
Costas

[Kristofer]

Okay, Costas, I see what you mean. A quick review after reading your post and I saw that the TVM module on e-Sword seems to only conjugate the verbs, but neglects the description of nouns. Though the verb parsing is valuable and seems to be what I usually am analyzing anyway, it does leave out quite a bit.

So, if I understand you correctly, you are saying that if I was to explain what I want, there is probably a way to accomplish it for free? Thank you for the help in that. I have to say, I don't know how that is possible though in light of what I want. I am sure that I will have to pay for modern Bible versions and commentaries and BDAG and HALOT. I have not looked at these, but apparently they are the authority in lexicons. I want to do accurate Bible interpretation and use the methodology prescribed in "Introduction to Biblical Interpretation" by Klein, Blomberg, and Hubbard, Jr.

I want to first research in modern commentaries and bible dictionaries and encyclopedias the culture and history behind the passages and words used and idioms in the passages. To do this, I should also compare modern translations as well.

Then I want to analyze the context of the english translations, looking at the paragraph and determining the theme for the passage.

Then I want to analyze the lexical meanings of the pertinent words in the original languages and the grammar, and determine the best definitions based on the theme of the paragraph that the text being studied is found in. This is where using Louw and Needa (sp?) apparently would come in handy as it groups the definitions of the words into different themes. Also, if I wanted to be accurate, the scholars suggest using BDAG and HALOT for lexical meanings. And of course, I should have a reference to help me analyze the grammatical morphemes of both Old and New Testament words.

Thanks for whatever help you can offer.

God bless you.

[csterg]

OK, this is a lot of info.
let me start somewhere and others can provide help.
I would suggest that you could start with an Interlinear like the ABP where you can have the english and greek text along with the strong definition.
In parallel, you can have a WHNU Greek text that has strong definition and morphology. So, it's easy to find the original Greek word and from there find exactly the morphology that you want.
The ABP uses the LXX for the OT. To use the OT Hebrew you will need:
- the WHM for moprhology (it's not free)
- an OT with strong numbers (there are unofficial ones, but one will be added officially soon).

You should also try to utilitize the search capabilities of theWord that allow you to do morph searches and strong searches. This will allow you (for example) to find all places where a verb is used in the NT in the same TVM.

Let's see where you get with these and i can suggest more.

Concerning dictionaries: The BDAG will be available soon, but not the HALOT (the publisher has asked for an enormous amount that we cannot afford at this moment)
Costas

P.S.: although not necessary, the NA27 (which is NOT free) contains the lemmas of the words which are also searchable, but Strong numbers can give a similar result.

[Kristofer]

Okay, I am trying some of your suggestions now. Thanks for the help. I will post back here after I have a chance to try it out.

God bless you.

[Kristofer]

Okay and so basically I will have to wait for an OT to be available with morph codes to be able to use any of the Morph code dictionaries in the OT?

[Kristofer]

Well, not wanting to defend anyone, and of course talking from a different perspective (since theWord is free), we need to realize that there is an ongoing cost in maintaining and developing a program. Also, don't forget that a book will tear down with usage and i am sure that most of us have teared down more than one Bibles, don't we? I am not sure i know many that own only a single copy of a printed Bible
Costas

I definitely can appreciate the cost that it must take to keep such an advanced program as theWord running. I hope I didn't come across as if I was being critical. I have a habit of not being careful enough about what I say. I did not actually intend to criticize any one of the Bible program providers (free ones or paid-for ones) especially not theWord and e-Sword (as they seem to really be targetted towards keeping the study of God's word affordable). I must commend the likes of BibleWorks, Accordance, and Logos as well, and I hope to move up to one of them eventually, when I get about a thousand dollars to build up a decent library on one of them. I was only speaking hypothetically about the future, that IF they did choose to do what one man suggested that they might do, THEN we would be at their mercy and might have to pay exorbitant fees to continue to view our books that we have already shelled out hundreds of dollars for (possibly thousands), whereas if we have hard copies of all of them, it may take hours to do some basic searches, but at least we would be guaranteed to be able to use them as long as we want, and would only have to pay one time for them. Even after saying this though, I have to say I think it is still worth it to have a good amount of quality books on a bible program that allows you to do so much more than hard books can. Even if computers were totally different 10 years from now, and we lost all our books, I think I could do more in those 10 years than I could do in 50 years with hard books.

[mathetes]

For original language Greek studies hard-copy books is still the only way for me to be able to study. I would love to see the "Analytical Lexicon of the Greek NT" by Friberg and the "Analytical Lexicon to the Septuagint" by Taylor. Needing to have the Strong's numbers and Robinson's morphology encoded into the modules leaves a lot to be desired and isn't always accurate. It would really be nice to click on the word in whatever Greek module and have it bring up the morphology.

[Kristofer]

I compared the King James with Strong's in theWord to e-Sword and found that e-Sword has numbers for more words in a single passage than theWord in the Old Testament. I am new to this. I wonder if it is like this throughout the Old Testament or if I just found one of the few places where it is lacking. The example is Amos 4:12. I found 12 strong's numbers in that verse in the e-sword version versus only 8 in theWord's version. I guess theWord is kind of in it's still under construction stages as far as it's Hebrew language tools.

[mathetes]

For Hebrew studies you will need to use the Groves-Wheeler Westminster Hebrew morphology module. The Strong's numbering system isn't perfect. I've learned if I want to research the original languages I at least need to know something about reading them and not depend upon numbering systems.

[Kristofer]

Ya, Disciple, I agree. That is why I have made a humble attempt so far, but I see that it would greatly benefit me to continue this effort. As soon as I am done with my Biblical Interpretation book that I am about 4/5 of the way done with, I intend to pick up my Mounce's Basics of Biblical Greek book again and finish that. No matter how cool your bible software, you will eliminate alot of hours of reading little windows over and over again if you just take the time to learn the rules of grammar and syntax, and THEN use the bible reference materials to ENHANCE your already acquired basic knowledge of the ancient languages. At least that is my theory, and I think it is pretty much a no-brainer. The pop-up windows will just serve as an aid at that point, and I think should be used as a check on your own personal deductions in grammar morphemes, etc., not always as the primary source of that information.

So, how will the westminster morphology dictionary work if I don't see the morph numbers in any of the Old Testament books in any of my downloaded Bibles? Will they just appear in the KJV after I download the dictionary? or do I need to download a particular compatible Bible version? Thanks for the help.