Words you will see on Open Scroll, from A to Z, each in plain English.
Pick a letter below.
A Hebrew title meaning “Lord.” Where God’s name is written, readers said Adonai in its place. The King James Version prints Adonai as Lord.
From: God’s NameAn English Bible published in 1901, now in the public domain. The verse boxes and the English on the word cards come from it. It prints Jehovah where the Hebrew has God’s name.
From: About; God’s NameThe Protestant name for the books that are in some Bibles but not in the Hebrew Bible. Luther and the 1611 King James Bible used it as the heading of a separate section.
From: Books Not in Every BibleOne of the three languages the Bible was first written in, with Hebrew and Greek. The New Testament keeps some Aramaic words, such as Talitha cumi in Mark 5:41.
From: About; Hebrew & Aramaic in the NTA church’s list of the books it counts as Scripture. Canonical means “on the list.”
From: Books Not in Every BibleA handwritten book, rather than a scroll.
From: AboutThe Hebrew word for a commandment is mitzvah. The plural is mitzvot. In Exodus 20:6 it is card 6, “my commandments.”
From: The Ten WordsScrolls found from 1947 in caves near Qumran, by the Dead Sea. They were copied from about the third century B.C. to A.D. 68, and include copies of books of the Bible.
From: The Dead Sea Scrolls; About; From Scrolls to Modern BiblesThe Catholic name for the books it keeps that are not in the Hebrew Bible. Deutero means second.
From: Books Not in Every BibleReading your own ideas into a text. Merriam-Webster: “the interpretation of a text (as of the Bible) by reading into it one’s own ideas.” The opposite of exegesis.
From: How to write an exegesisA Hebrew word for God. It is a title, not a name. It is the first word for God in the Bible, in Genesis 1:1. The Bible also uses it of others, as in Exodus 7:1.
From: God’s NameA book in the Old Testament of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church. The whole book survives in full only in Ethiopic. Pieces of it were found among the Dead Sea Scrolls. Open Scroll has R. H. Charles’s 1917 translation, read on its own.
From: Books Not in Every Bible; From Scrolls to Modern BiblesThe way of saying Greek that the Greek say lines follow. It is named after Erasmus, a scholar who wrote a book on it in 1528.
From: Say the WordsDrawing out what a passage says and meant to its first hearers. Merriam-Webster: “an explanation or critical interpretation of a text.” The Greek verb behind it is in John 1:18, “he hath declared him.”
From: How to write an exegesisA word made of two Hebrew pieces: “praise ye” and Yah, a short form of God’s name. The ASV prints it “Praise ye Jehovah” in Psalm 146:1. In Revelation 19:1 it stays as Hallelujah.
From: Hebrew & Aramaic in the NTJewish years are counted from the creation of the world, as Jewish teachers reckoned it. A.M. stands for the Latin anno mundi, “in the year of the world.” The 1917 JPS Tanakh is dated 5677—1917 on its title page.
From: B.C. and A.D. DatesThe form of God’s name the ASV prints. The Jewish Encyclopedia says the form Jehovah was introduced by a Christian writer about 1520. The Catholic Encyclopedia finds it earlier, in the Pugio Fidei of Raymund Martin, written about 1270.
From: God’s NameThe Holy Scriptures According to the Masoretic Text, an English translation of the Hebrew Bible published by the Jewish Publication Society of America in 1917. It is one of the reading Bibles in Open Scroll.
From: From Scrolls to Modern BiblesA book in the Old Testament of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church. It retells Genesis and part of Exodus, and counts the years in jubilees of 49 years. Open Scroll has R. H. Charles’s 1917 translation, read on its own.
From: Books Not in Every Bible; From Scrolls to Modern BiblesThe third part of the Hebrew Bible: 11 books, from Ruth to Chronicles in the Talmud’s order.
From: Books of the BibleThe Greek word for “Lord.” It is a title, like Adonai. Where the New Testament quotes a Hebrew verse that has God’s name, the Greek usually has kurios.
From: God’s NameA handwritten Hebrew Bible from about A.D. 1008. It holds the complete Hebrew Bible, with vowel marks. The Hebrew on the word cards follows it.
From: About; Say the WordsJewish scribes who added the vowel marks to the Hebrew letters. They did not change the letters.
From: Say the WordsThe Hebrew Bible as the Masoretes passed it on, with its vowel marks and notes. The Leningrad Codex is a copy of it. The 1917 JPS Tanakh was translated from it.
From: About; From Scrolls to Modern BiblesA body of Jewish teaching written down about A.D. 200.
From: God’s NameThe second part of the Hebrew Bible: 8 books, from Joshua to the Twelve.
From: Books of the BibleSection breaks in the Hebrew text, much older than chapter numbers. In an open break the rest of the line is left empty. In a closed break a gap is left inside the line.
From: Chapters & VersesThe five books of Moses, Genesis to Deuteronomy. Also called the Law, or Torah.
From: The reading Bible book listsA name scholars use for books given the name of a famous figure of the past who, they hold, did not write them. Scholars put 1 Enoch and Jubilees in this group.
From: Books Not in Every BibleThe list under each verse on a chapter page of other verses connected to it. The lists come from CrossReferences.org.
From: AboutThe line under the big Hebrew or Greek word that shows how to say it. Each part between hyphens is one beat. Say the capital letters strongest.
From: Say the WordsThe old Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures, made by Jews. The Greek Old Testament in Open Scroll is Brenton’s English translation of it, published in 1851.
From: Books Not in Every Bible; From Scrolls to Modern BiblesNumbers that help connect a word to a dictionary entry. The number helps find a word. It is not the meaning of the word.
From: AboutTwo large works of Jewish teaching, from the schools of the land of Israel and of Babylonia. The Jewish Encyclopedia calls the Talmud an amplification of the Mishnah. Talmud alone usually means the Babylonian Talmud.
From: God’s NameA name for the Hebrew Bible. It is made from the first letters of its three parts: Torah, Nevi’im and Ketuvim. It counts 24 books.
From: Books of the BibleThe Bible’s own name for the Ten Commandments, in Exodus 34:28, Deuteronomy 4:13 and Deuteronomy 10:4.
From: The Ten WordsThe Greek word for God. It is a title, like Elohim.
From: God’s NameA title says what someone is: king, judge, father, lord. Many can hold the same title. A name says who someone is. God’s name belongs to him alone.
From: God’s NameThe first part of the Hebrew Bible: the five books of Moses, Genesis to Deuteronomy.
From: Books of the BibleSmall marks under, over or beside the Hebrew letters that show the vowels. The Masoretes added them. The scroll read aloud in the synagogue has none.
From: Say the WordsJerome’s Latin Bible. The Council of Trent named it the authentic Latin text. The Douay-Rheims was translated from it.
From: Books Not in Every Bible; From Scrolls to Modern BiblesThe Torah is divided into 54 longer portions. They are read in the synagogue in order through the year. In some weeks two are read together. The portions do not follow the chapters.
From: Chapters & VersesEvery Hebrew, Aramaic or Greek word has its own card. It shows the English, the card number, the word and its say line, its pieces, and what it can mean.
From: Word CardsA short form of God’s name. It is the last part of Hallelujah.
From: God’s NameGod’s personal name, four Hebrew letters, written in English letters. It stands in the Hebrew Bible about 6,800 times. Its cards show the four letters, then YHWH, then the names of the letters: Yud-Heh-Vav-Heh.
From: God’s Name