sim.plified.com

Well over this Resurrection weekend I had the chance to start building the Psalm visualizer that I talked about several posts ago.  The idea behind the visiualier is that it shows you by varying opacity the psalms that have NT references or allusions. 

Right now the interface is very simple, but then again, it's just for me at the moment.  The idea is that I insert a psalm reference and then a cross reference.  In the dropdown I select "Direct", "Allusion" or "Pondering".  Each of these has a different weight.  The weights are then added up to calculate the opacity representation of each psalm.  Feel free to take a look around. 

My hope is that as I trek through the psalms I continue to add references to this site.  When you click on the Psalm, it shows you the text of the psalm (thanks the the ESV web service) and the references I have marked in the margin.  There are a lot of ideas for enhancing the UI that I would like to develop.. but all in due time. 

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Ever since hearing Bob MacDonald at BibleTech 2008 I have been increasingly captivated by seeing Jesus Christ in the Psalms.  This prospective has thoroughly dislodged the Psalms from whatever purely academic rubrics I was placing on top of them in the past and set me about looking for a Person.   What is shocking is that the looking is not very difficult.  He's everywhere!  How did I miss him when He was so close, even in my mouth? 

This new found excitement has got me thinking about how to actually try and visualize the new testament writers usage of the Psalms.  This book more than any other seems to hold a certain amount of weight when it comes to the number of Old Testament quotations in the New Testament. 

If you have ideas or input on how to visualize, please comment.

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Babies and the elderly are two groups of people to really challenge our ability to build the grandiose idols of self-fulfillment.  They (babies and elderly) wreck our day and wreck our plans for the future.  And the beautiful thing is, I think that is part of God's design in his order of birth and death. 

Jesus rebuked those who marginalized children, even when they were the closest to him (see Luke 18:15-17).  James, the brother of Jesus, and Paul, the apostle went so far as to say the trueness of ones religion depended upon how they treated "widows and orphans" (see James 1:26,27 and 1 Timothy 5:4).   

I have come to believe that the image of God is not so much a substance that is in you as much as a something that reflects off of you when you relate to other people.  The image that reflects off of many people (including myself) when they relate to the weak and the helpless is their god's of convenience and self-fullness. 

The image of God helps me to understand the purpose of people who are not "functional" in the normal workings of our society.  Without this meta-narrative (over arching story) to interpret the weak and the helpless, it is easy to see them as "optional" or a "problem to be solved".  I do not believe this is how the Lord Jesus would have us receive such people.  Not as obstacles, but rather as gifts that provide the substance of our hearts to be reveled for what it is (for good or for ill).   

The frightening prospect of this belief is that our hearts to get revealed, the comfort is that they can be changed. 

When you see who you are in the image of your relationship to the weak and helpless.. remember to present yourself to God, who is able to transform that broken image into a shining reflection of Jesus. 

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At BibleTech I learned of an initiative to create a Bible reference microformat.  At the conference we mused about a tool that would be able to spider these microformats and then return a set of matching results.  So if I searched for Matthew 1:1, I would get back results where a bibleref metadata tag had been embedded on that page for that particular verse.

Well it appears Yahoo is working on a meta data search engine. I read about it on sitepoint.com and even found a link to the research version.  Perhaps an engine like this could be told only to search for bibleref meta data.  Tapping into a main search engine data store, like Yahoo's, is probably the only surefire way to return comprehensive results.

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One of the struggles I have with a modern published version of the Biblical text is the amount of technology that invades the space where reading is being done. The amount of information crowding in on the biblical text can actually be an impediment to thoughtful study, instead of an aid. The technology that I'm referring to is not just the notes that show up in the footer or margin, but that which actually disrupts the plane of reading, such as headings, versification and the like.

The other night I was particularly frustrated with the amount of headings that communicate the beliefs of the compilers, rather than leaving the reader to form the breaks along lines make sense to him or her. I find this particularly frustrating in the Gospels where most publications note every pericope, drawing attention away from the larger structures in the text.

Thanks to the forward thinking folks at the ESV, I have constructed a small tool based on their web service that allows you to create a manuscript version of the text to your own liking. This is just the first version, and I only a piece of a larger community tool that I (and others) would like to see come together.

The tool can be found here: http://sim.plified.com/manuscript/

Please give it a try and let give some feed back by commenting on this post or sending me an email: cwpollock at gmail

Technorati Tags: bibletech08,bibletech,esv,mansucript

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One of the most inspiring sessions of BibleTech08 was Bob MacDonalds presentation on Micro and Macro patterns in the Psalms.  In his presentation he used color to try and emphasize the patterns that he was seeing in the text. 

As someone who has been exposed to the interpretation of the original Biblical languages, there is a frequent lament that goes that goes something like this: our English translations are often incapable of carrying through some of the nuances present in the original language.  An example would be emphasis through rhyming words.  I imagine that rhyming words in Hebrew may not always be able to translated with corresponding rhyming words in English.  So the translators are left with a choice: do I translated the rhyme or a more literal meaning of the word.

So this is where I began to think: what about the application of color to this problem?  Nuances in the text that translators agree upon could be noted by differing background colors, thus enabling the reader to see what they can no long hear. 

Would color be too distracting?  I'm not sure, but I think it could complement well when the text is being read aloud, rather than just scanned with the eyes.  This way, the ears can hear the words, and the eyes can see the color.

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While visiting in Seattle, I had the opportunity to listen to a podcast from the CBC series "How To Think About Science". In the podcast David Caley talks with Arthur Zajonc. They discuss a method of science that is less about theory and more about meditation and contemplation on a subject. I find the talk fascinating because Zajonc's observations of where science has gone might be just as easily transferred to theology. So often in theology we are analyzing a subject instead of pondering and contemplating the immeasurable, yet knowable God. In many ways this talk shows me just how much of our theological study has been influenced by science and technology!! I invite you to listen to Zajonc's analysis of science and leave a comment as to how you think this applies to other areas of life.

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Karl and I attended BibleTech 2008 not quite knowing what to expect. I can say for my part that I was pleasantly surprised by some of the comradery and interaction that took place at the conference. The focus of our presentation "Building Community or Building Babel" (mp3) was to critically think about how the progression of technology has affected our reading of the text of Scripture. The thrust of our focus was on a shift that took place in the 12th century, perhaps best labeled the Alphabetization of the text. At that point texts became something more than the recording of speech and story, they started to become indexed and used much differently than before. Another point was to notice that the use of technology tools these days tends to silo us into experts rather than bring us together as a community to interact about the text. In the future I hope to blog more about a community text tool that helps move people to interact around the text instead of developing systematic weapons to defend and attack one another.

Here were the highpoints of the conference for me:

"Re-Making it Visible" by John Hudson (MP3 Audio) - John Hudson was commissioned by several people to create a new unicode Hebrew Font. His presentation was both philosophical and technical. He started by having us listen to a section of the book of Lamentations being chanted, reminding us that this is where the text has come from, and aural transmission that is being breathed out from person to person. He covered some of the technical aspects of font technology and talked about how font engines work. I think the most profound aspect of his presentation was the invitation to overlay technological, font based versions of the text on the actual images of the text fragments. This allows us to visually interact with the "stuff" of the texts while at the same time makes them serachable, parasable, etc.

"Web Standards: Speaking in Today's Vernacular" by Nathan Smith & Christian Bradford (MP3 Audio) - Nathan and Christian made a compelling presentation on the use of web standards in developing web sites that speak about the gospel.

"Open Source Bible Software: The Re:Greek Transition" by Zack Hubert (MP3 Audio) - Zack's presentation was a personal journey of how he came to publish his original zhubert.com and how it transitioned to re:greek. His presentation included a call to action for those who may want to participate in the refinement and development of this tool in the future. The highlight of this presentation was Zack's discussion of how technology and online "community" is tending to fragment real face to face community. This is an evaluation that I heartily agree with. He previewed a project from Mars Hill Church called "the city" which appears to be a social networking site that moves people toward face to face rather than terminating on online shallow relationship. I am looking forward to seeing this tool develop.

"Visualizing Micro and Macro Structures in Scripture" by Bob MacDonald (MP3 Audio) - This presentation was the highlight of the entire presentation (the best was saved for last). Bob's simple, immersive approach to the Hebrew text was yield fruit that was evidently a deeper affection and relationship with Jesus Christ. The wisdom of his approach was being born out in the the speech that was coming out of his mouth!! He was using a tool that his company developed to look for patterns and structure in the Psalms. One of the most inspiring aspects of his presentation (from a technological perspective) was his use of color. He used color to help him chart what was happening in the text. You can follow Bob's progress here: http://drmacdonald.blogspot.com/

All in all it was a great conference. Some things were encouraging, some things were down right frightening. Perhaps best of all were the conversations and relationships that were started with people who are trying to understand how to live faithfully in a culture that is overwhelmed with technology. Instead of whining for a day when things are better, there are many who are struggling to be coherent to live with the confession in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation.

Technorati Tags: bibletech2008, bibletech08, bibletech

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