Bible dictionary

A Bible dictionary is a reference to the Bible.

Reasons for publishing

As recent biblical writings were written in the 2nd century AD at the latest, and thus at least nearly two millennia between the collected stories in the Bible and the present are, many people mentioned in the Old and New Testament, conditions, terms and objects no longer necessarily familiar to every reader. Also most of the people mentioned there, places and kingdoms ceased to exist a long time and are often themselves historically well-educated people hardly known. In addition, the events mostly played from the eastern Mediterranean and the Near and Middle East, whose geography is not taught at schools in general. Moreover, it is not easy to keep an overview of the 3000 treated in the Bible people, especially because it is including a number with the same name.

Design and construction differences

Some Bible encyclopedias, such as Rienecker or the Jerusalem Bible dictionary are written primarily for non-theological Bible readers. You tell people, places and regions, concepts, objects, food, plants and animals that occur in the context of the various books of the Bible. In such works today include the use of photos of the standard, particularly with regard to archaeological remains, which are associated with a keyword in the lexicon, as well as the presentation of historical maps to locate places and landscapes geographically.

Other encyclopedias have focused on certain aspects. These are for use partly rather to students and theologians.

  • The Archaeological Bible dictionary devoted exclusively to the archaeological aspects of biblical concepts.
  • Kittel's Theological Dictionary of the New Testament deals with theological concepts of the New Testament and makes their use as well as Hebrew parallel expressions in detail dar.
  • The IVP Dictionary of the New Testament deals with themes and describes their treatment in the various books of the New Testament. Contrary to popular science encyclopedias, it also contains extensive references.
  • The Dictionary for Theological Interpretation of the Bible contains detailed articles on topics and books of the New Testament and describes their impact and history of interpretation. Again, there is detailed information on further reading. The articles were written by well-known authors such as NT Wright, Robert AJ Gagnon or Alister McGrath.

Under www.wibilex.de developed the German Bible Society since 2008 a scientific Bible dictionary on the web, which is written by German theologian and freely accessible.

Selection of Bible encyclopedias

  • Otto Betz, Beate Ego, Werner Grimm: Calw Bible Encyclopedia, 2nd edition, Calw, Stuttgart 2006, ISBN 3-7668-3838-5.
  • Walter Dietrich, Wolfgang Stegemann: Biblical Encyclopedia, 12 volumes, carbon hammer, Stuttgart 1996ff, ISBN 3-17-012330-0 (Volume 1); 1998, ISBN 3-17-012334-3 ( Volume 5, so far).
  • Manfred Görg, Bernhard Lang: New Bible Dictionary, 3 vols, Benziger, Zurich / Dusseldorf 1998, ISBN 3-545-23074-0
  • Jacob Hamburger: Real - Encyclopedia of Bible and Talmud, KF Koehler, Leipzig 1892.
  • Kurt Hennig ( ed.) Jerusalem Bible Encyclopedia, 4th edition, Haenssler, Neuhausen / Stuttgart, 1998, ISBN 3-77512-367-9. based on Shalom M. et al. Illustrated Dictionary and Concordance of the Bible, 1986.
  • Merging of selected articles from the Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels (1992 ), Dictionary of Paul and His Letters ( 1993), Dictionary of the Later New Testament and Its Developments ( 1997) and Dictionary of New Testament Background ( 2000), all InterVarsity Press
Reference work Old Testament Near East Robert A. J. Gagnon Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft Gerhard Kittel Klaus Koch
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