Date of Award
2025
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Divinity
College
Seventh-day Adventist Theological Seminary
Program
Master of Divinity, MDiv
First Advisor
Oliver Glanz
Second Advisor
Cedric Vine
Third Advisor
Wagner Kuhn
Abstract
Problem
Over the centuries, the Bible has been reproduced in various forms, from scrolls to codex, handwritten codex to printed books, and, more recently, the digital Bible. However, proprietary software tools lack in providing a more rigorous approach to advanced research in data-driven linguistic and exegetical studies.
Method
I report the final implementation of a data conversion project to convert an existing open source Nestle 1904 Greek New Testament encoded in XML format through Text-Fabric software (N1904-TF). The data was converted using Python packages and made available in a GitHub repository for programmers and non-programmers. Also, I developed over 60 Text-Fabric features that can be grouped into warp, sectional, orthographic, lexical, text-critical markers, morphological, syntactic, semantic, and relational features. In addition, a syntactic view side-by-side of the encoded data display, calculated parent and sibling features, features for critical text, and variants in the word lemma and its characters.
Results
The resulting annotated text can be used for morphological and syntactical linguistic research. The N1904-TF features can be manipulated offline using a Text-Fabric browser or a Jupyter Notebook, and a demonstration is made of exegetical questions that can be addressed using the developed dataset.
Conclusions
This work additionally evidences how one can use an open source code and data that targets the general user rather than only the specific needs of linguistic research, developing an end-user comprehensive documentation, how linguistic concepts should have the end user in mind, and the importance of a participative project in the humanities.
Subject Area
Bible. New Testament. Greek--Data processing; Text-Fabric (Computer software); Open source software; Bible. New Testament. Greek--Criticism, Textual
Recommended Citation
de Oliveira Cantanhêde, Saulo, "Coding the Greek New Testament in the text-fabric open source environment" (2025). Master's Theses. 233.
https://digitalcommons.andrews.edu/theses/233
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.
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