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Biblical Studies
The Bible, or holy scriptures, is understood to be the Word of God as expressed in human words. It is the Orthodox belief that Jesus Christ is the "Word of God made flesh", and therefore those writings known as the scriptures are the "verbal icon (or image)" of the Word Himself. The Bible is held to be the "Book of the Church" and therefore cannot be properly understood apart from the Church itself. It is now commonly understood that the Church existed for almost two centuries before the "Canon" or list of books of the Bible was finalised. The Bible as we have it, therefore, is the product of the Tradition of the Church (Tradition here understood as the life of the Holy Spirit concretely expressed in the Church). The text of the Bible is given by the Church -- modern textual (lower) criticism is an interesting study providing crucial insights, hypotheses and theories about the nature and origin of the texts, but can never claim any ultimate objectivity nor any finality about what is and is not the "original" text of the scriptures. The so-called science of hermeneutics or interpretation, taken as a secular enterprise can likewise claim no ultimate objectivity or finality about the meaning of any text sacred or secular. In our time the philosophy of Deconstruction has essentially taken secular hermeneutics to its reductio ad absurdam. All interpretation is interpretation from a "point of view" and the point of view of the Church is expressed in the life of the Holy Spirit.
The modern "problematic" of Biblical Studies in contemporary Orthodoxy concerns the tensions which are manifested by the understanding, on one hand, that the Bible is "the Book of the Church" which can only be properly understood and interpreted within the ongoing life of the Church -- its prayer, liturgy, spirituality, etc. On the other hand there is the attempt to treat it as a work which can stand alone like any other piece of literature (and therefore subject to the same kinds of critical analysis as any other piece of literature) or as the unique criterion by which all else is judged in the Church. "Modern" Biblical studies in western Europe usually take up the latter two points of view. The Problem for the Orthodox student of the Bible is to know modern critical methods sufficiently well so that he cannot be dismissed as a "fundamentalist" (or by some similar intellectual pejorative), yet not allow his vision to be clouded by the intellectual and methodological shortcomings of literary criticism.
The Bible Browser Basic Home Page: look up passages of your choice in KJV, RSV or the Latin Vulgate
The Bible in English: A database contaning twenty-one different versions of the English Bible. from the University of Michigan
Bible Gateway: Search the Bible according to the language of your choice and according to the English translation of your preference.
The Bible in English: The full text of 21 editions of the Bible beginning with the 10th Century West Saxon (Old English) versions through the Good News Bible of the 20th Century
Biblical Resources: Officially called Orthodox Biblical Resources. It also contains such useful material as links to the various books of the secondary kanon, articles on the scriptures from an Orthodox perspective, and useful dictionaries.
Canon of the New Testament: An Ultramontane presentation, but references most of the principal patristic testimony
Canon of the Old Testament: From the same source as the above link.
Chronology of the Synoptic Problem: A summary of the various theories about this scholarly conundrum by Stephen Carlson.
Church Fathers and Patristic Citations, The: An essay on how the Church fathers are "used" in textual criticism as currently practiced. By Robert B. Waltz
Development of the Canon of the New Testament, The: Collected and organized by Glenn Davis
Early Church Fathers: Who Did They Think Wrote Hebrews?
Fathers of the Church on the Bible, The. Links to patristic Bible Commentaries on the W3.
The Latin Vulgate Bible Non-Canonical Homepage: Documents to aid scholars and students in scriptural interpretation. The "Non-Canonical" in the title refers to any and all writings which do not appear in the protestant canon of the Bible -- including the Deuterocanonical Books, Fathers of the Church, etc. A fairly comprehensive set of links.
The Papias tradition: a brief account of an even briefer sentence of Papias concerning the transmission of the synoptic tradition through the evangelist Matthew.
Russian Bible: Does not include the secondary canon, and there is no indication of what is being translated.
Shamash Tanach Directory: Sources for studying the Old Testament in Hebrew
TC: A Journal of Biblical Textual Criticism
Web Chapel Bible Concordance: KJV and Deuterocanonical Works (a.k.a. apocrypha) Interpreting Ancient Manuscripts Homepage: All about textual criticism
Which Came First:The Church Or the New Testament? A Conciliar Press Publication by Fr. James Bernstein
World Wide Study Bible: The Study Bible developed and located around the world!
Society of Biblical Literature: Homepage with links to publications by the Society
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