Archives For Bible reading

By using various capabilities of BibleWorks 7, Microsoft Office Word 2007, and Microsoft Excel 2007, I recently created a unique resource that should prove helpful for learning the Spanish vocabulary words with marked accents that occur 50 or more times in the Reina-Valera 1960 New Testament (R60NT).

Using BW7, I generated a list of the 25,733 words that occur in the R60NT and their frequencies. Pasting that list first into Word and then into Excel, I created a spreadsheet in Excel that listed all the words in one column and their frequencies in the next column.

Sorting that list by frequency, I produced a list of the 1186 words that occur 50 or more times. Using various macros that I created[i] in Microsoft Visual Basic 6.5 in Excel, I then identified the 259 words that have a marked accent on them.

Each word was then analyzed to determine the following:

—Length of the word

—Syllables in the word

—Diphthongs in the word

—Which vowel was accented and its exact location in the word

—Final letter, final two letters, final three letters, and final four letters of each word

By sorting this data, I produced the following listing of the words that categorizes and alphabetizes[ii] them by number of syllables, word length, accented syllable, vowel accented, and final letters (1-4, as applicable), respectively:

Analysis of Words with a Marked Accent That Occur 50 or More Times in the R60NT

One Syllable:

Letters Words Alphabetically by Accented Syllable, Vowel, and Final Letters
2 dé  sé mí sí tú;
él
3 más

 

Two Syllables:

2
3 acá noé iré qué así oyó;
día mía oíd mío río oír aún
4 judá allá dará hará será dirá está daré haré seré josé esté allí leví sacó echó dejó tomó miró juró pasó mató cayó huyó jehú;
cuál amán cuán joás amén país león amón saúl;
días míos ríos sólo cómo;
ésta éste
5 habrá podrá quedó mandó llegó habló halló llamó reinó entró sentó llevó;
labán harán serán verán dirán basán están jamás demás harás serás dirás atrás rubén quién belén botín simón varón según algún jesús;
dónde;
ángel árbol éstas éstos
6 saldrá pondrá tendrá vendrá pondré;
jordán moisés hebrón ningún;
cárcel
7 tendrán vendrán pondrás tendrás

 

Three Syllables:

4 aquí esaú oído
5 caerá josué subió salió abrió hirió murió envió;
había hacía decía tenía venía maría impío aarón;
seáis elías caído;
oídos
6 tomará estará lavará comerá morirá vivirá jehová traeré jericó durmió cubrió volvió habitó apartó;
canaán caerán además efraín cabrío faraón simeón nación visión;
hagáis estáis habéis sabéis tenéis haréis seréis habían decían tenían josías traído judíos impíos cuándo;
líbano límite músico número;
ídolos
7 llevará volverá enviaré neftalí entregó levantó comenzó;
estarán comerán jonatán capitán satanás tomarás también manasés después porción reunión absalón salomón corazón;
prójimo;
cámaras cántico séptimo jóvenes púrpura;
ángeles árboles
8 engendró preguntó destruyó;
benjamín;
tendréis;
príncipe
9 destruiré;
príncipes

 

Four Syllables:

6 isaías
7 edificó sucedió; alegría todavía oración
8 extendió;
profecía posesión;
comeréis jeremías zacarías;
altísimo espíritu;
imágenes ejército
9 levantará descendió respondió;
jerusalén aflicción bendición expiación maldición salvación;
levántate;
ejércitos apóstoles
10 discípulos
11 destrucción

 

Five Syllables:

8 ezequías
9 aconteció;
sabiduría;
sedequías;
acuérdate
10 generación;
tabernáculo; primogénito
11 congregación
12 levantándose

 

Six Syllables:

11 abominación

 

I hope that this resource will help me and others to master the vocabulary of the R60NT and thereby in some way better minister to Spanish-speaking people!

 


[i] These macros are revisions of macros that I had originally created (with much help from my brother-in-law, Dr. Satya Narimetla, to whom I am very indebted for his help with that project) several years ago in a similar study of all the accented words in the Greek New Testament.

[ii] The words are alphabetized in this “reverse” way: by the last letter, last two letters, last three letters, and last four letters, respectively (as applicable), and then by the starting letter.

Copyright © 2011-2025 by Rajesh Gandhi. All rights reserved.

With a little more than 3 ½ months to go in 2012, I have made it through the book of Psalms 15 times. Today, I finished going through the Psalms in the LXX.

I am also nearly halfway done reading through the book again in English. After I finish that reading, I will need to read through the book 9 more times this year to reach my goals of 25 times through the Psalms in 2012 and 50 times overall.

I hope to set aside one day later this year, probably on a Saturday, and read through the whole book on that day. As God directs, I am also thinking of trying to read through the book in Spanish once by the end of the year.

Praise God for this marvelous book!

Copyright © 2011-2025 by Rajesh Gandhi. All rights reserved.

Evangelist Robert L. Sumner, in his book The Wonder of the Word of God, tells of a man in Kansas City who was severely injured in an explosion. His face was badly disfigured, and he lost his eyesight as well as both hands. He had just become a Christian when the accident happened, and one of his greatest disappointments was that he could no longer read the Bible. Then he heard about a lady in England who read braille with her lips. Hoping to do the same, he sent for some books of the Bible in braille. But he discovered that the nerve endings in his lips had been too badly damaged to distinguish the characters. One day, as he brought one of the braille pages to his lips, his tongue happened to touch a few of the raised characters and he could feel them. Like a flash he thought, “I can read the Bible using my tongue.” At the time Robert Sumner wrote his book, the man had read through the entire Bible four times. If he can do that, can you discipline yourself to read the Bible?

—Donald S. Whitney, Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life, 35; bold text is in italics in the original

Copyright © 2011-2025 by Rajesh Gandhi. All rights reserved.

This year, my Bible reading project is to read through the book of Psalms 25 times. After six months, I have made it through the book 10 times.

My tenth time was through the Books of the Bible version, which does not have any verse numbers. Using that version, I was able to read through the book in 2 days. Reading through the book in such a short time was very helpful in letting me see some things about the book that I have not seen before.

I’m planning to read through Psalms at least 3x in July.

Copyright © 2011-2025 by Rajesh Gandhi. All rights reserved.

Today, I analyzed all the books of the Bible for the number of chapters, verse, and words in each book. These data and some derivative information bring out some interesting statistics for Bible readers.

I. Using the numbers of chapters, verses, and words in each book, I calculated three other statistics: average number of verses/chapter; average number of words/chapter; and average number of words/verse.

-Psalms has the most chapters (150), verses (2,461), and words (43,738)

-Five books have only one chapter (Obadiah; Philemon; 1 John; 2 John; and Jude); 2 John has the fewest verses (13), and 3 John has the fewest words (294)

The following chart shows the derivative statistics for the book having the highest number in each category and the book having the lowest:

Book Verses/Chap Book Words/Chap Book Words/Verse
Luke 47.96 I Kings 1114.23 Esth 33.73
Jonah 12.00 Psalms 291.59 Prov 16.43

 

The differences between the highest and lowest values in each category are remarkable.

II. A comparison between Psalms and each of the books with the highest values in the derivative categories likely explains why Psalms is one of the easiest books to read:

-Luke (47.96 verses/chapter) vs. Psalms (16.41 verses/chapter; 13th lowest)

-1 Kings (1114.23 words/chapter) vs. Psalms (291.59 words/chapter; lowest)

-Esther (33.73 words/verse) vs. Psalms (17.77 words/verse; fourth lowest)

 III. A different comparison should help put reading through the Psalms into better perspective:

Book

Words

Verses

Chapters

Psalms

43738

2461

150

Luke

25939

1151

24

Acts

24245

1007

28

50184

2158

52

Luke

25939

1151

24

John

19094

879

21

45033

2030

45

John

19094

879

21

Acts

24245

1007

28

43339

1886

49

 

This data shows that reading through either Luke-Acts or Luke-John entails reading more words than Psalms (6446 more words for Luke-Acts; 1295 more words for Luke-John). Reading John-Acts, you read 399 fewer words than reading Psalms.

Many people may have read Luke-Acts, Luke-John, or John-Acts through in a week. If so, you should be able to read the Psalms through in a week with a similar amount of effort!

For more information, see my PDFs: Statistical Analysis of the Books of the KJV Bible and my Six-fold Analysis of the Books of the KJV Bible. The first one gives the information for all the books in Bible order; the second lists the books in order from lowest to highest in each category.

Copyright © 2011-2025 by Rajesh Gandhi. All rights reserved.

I am anticipating reading through the Psalms once a week for the next 3-5 months. Based on the number of verses in each Psalm, here is a reading schedule that divides the Psalms into 7 roughly even sections:

 

Psalms Verses
1-26 346
27-47 349
48-70 342
71-88 350
89-106 373
107-119 375
120-150 326
Total 2461

See my post Insights from a Graphical Analysis of the Psalms

Copyright © 2011-2025 by Rajesh Gandhi. All rights reserved.

Prior to this year, I had read through the book of Psalms 25 times, including twice in the LXX. This year began with my reading through the book in January and in February.

Because of a work project concerning Christian music, I have read through Psalm 101 again so far in March. At this pace, I expect to finish the book by the end of this week, which would bring my total times through the book to 28. Reading through one more time by the end of March would make my total 29 times.

Then, to get to 50 times through the book, I would need to read through the book 21 more times by the end of the year. With 9 more months left in 2012, I would need to read through the book at least twice a month each month and also read through it a third time in at least 3 of the 9 remaining months.

Reading through twice a month requires reading an average of 10 chapters a day for 30 days. Three times a month would require reading 15 chapters a day for 30 days.

Although 10-15 chapters a day sounds like a lot, many of the chapters are fairly short, so it is not as much as it might seem initially. If God leads me to persevere with this project and enables me to do so, I will have read the book through 25 times in 2012.

I look forward to seeing how God is going to open my understanding of this marvelous book through this intensive study!


Update: Praise God that I made it through the Psalms 25 times in 2012!

Copyright © 2011-2025 by Rajesh Gandhi. All rights reserved.

For several years now, I have not read through the NT in the order that most Bibles today have for the books of the NT: Gospels; Acts; Epistles; Revelation. Instead, I have been reading through the NT in the following order, which is likely the chronological order in which the books were first given to the Church by God:

James

Galatians

Matthew

1 & 2 Thessalonians; 1 & 2 Corinthians; Romans

Luke

Ephesians; Colossians; Philemon; Philippians

Acts

1Timothy

1 Peter

Titus

2 Peter

2 Timothy

Mark

Hebrews

Jude

John

1 & 2 & 3 John

Revelation

Reading the NT in chronological order repeatedly, I hope to have a better sense of how the early Church would have understood the relationship between various books of the NT. In particular, reading in this way has helped me, I believe, to have a greater understanding of the contemporary value of Acts and John.

For example, a strong contemporary emphasis on the current topical order of the NT books can easily lend itself to a flawed perspective that the Pauline Epistles somehow are more important than Acts for our understanding of what the actual gospel message was that the apostles preached. On the contrary, Acts was written after perhaps as many as ten of Paul’s Epistles had already been written and careful attention to this fact and the full content of Acts corrects some wrong notions about apostolic ministry of the gospel message that some have espoused through their placing undue emphasis on selected teachings of the Synoptics and the Pauline Epistles.

In a related manner, a lumping of John with the Synoptics lends itself to a lack of appreciation that John is a Gospel that was written many years after all the Pauline Epistles were written. We should then take care that our handling of the Gospel of John informs our understanding of apostolic ministry of the gospel at least as much as the Synoptics and the Pauline Epistles do.

Copyright © 2011-2025 by Rajesh Gandhi. All rights reserved.

I praise the Lord that He has sustained me throughout this year and allowed me to make it through the Bible this year in both Greek and English!


Section Greek English
OT 929/929 929*/929
NT 260/260 260/260
Bible 1189/1189 1189/1189


*Includes listening to 410 chapters of the OT from the Bible on MP3

Counting these two times through the Bible, God has now allowed me to make it through the Bible in English 24 times and in Greek twice since I was saved in January of 1990!

There were many times when it seemed that there would be no way that I would make it through in either Greek or English this year. Two changes that I made late in the year helped me to catch up and finish:

(1) Listening to the KJV on CD, including many times at fast speed; and,

(2) Reading many chapters in the GNT one verse at a time using BibleWorks 7.

As God directs and grants grace, I hope to read through the Bible again in both Greek and English each year for the next several years.

Copyright © 2011-2025 by Rajesh Gandhi. All rights reserved.

Almost Done!

December 21, 2011

Ten more days to go, and I am getting close to making it through the Bible in both Greek and English in 2011!


Section Greek English
OT 929/929 889*/929
NT 194/260 260/260
Bible 1123/1189 1149/1189


*Includes listening to 369 chapters of the OT from the Bible on MP3

Copyright © 2011-2025 by Rajesh Gandhi. All rights reserved.