Hi all,
I didn't know if this is the right list to post this kind of
information to, so feel free to forward this post if you know a
better address to post this to.
Because differences in versification systems are a frustration to me
and I couldn't find elegant solutions in dealing with them, I decided
to see what I can contribute in this.
I have seen a few attempts, but they are not good enough to base a
real solution upon. Mostly because all the attempts I've seen base
their conversions on the KJV. Historically, this is the best choice;
the KJV was the first Bible with chapter and verse division. But it
brings up some major problems. For example in the psalms, the KJV
doesn't see the Hebrew titles as part of any verse, while most
versification systems do.
So I had to come up with something that could actually work. I
figured that it would be easier if I would not convert to any
existing versification system, but to a system that neglects chapter
numbers. Each text that is seen as separate verse in whatever
versification system, should have a unique number. For example,
Genesis 1 has 31 verses, so Gen 2:1 would be Gen :32. Gen 3:1 is Gen :
57 and so on. Then Exodus starts with verse 1 again.
The CCEL website gave me a 13 Mb list to work with. The site admits
the file is likely to contain errors, but it was good as a starting
point. Although I removed several errors, my data is still likely to
contain errors. Also I didn't pay any attention to the apocrypha. I
am aware that neglecting these is totally impossible when making a
system like this. But the apocrypha are often messy in their
versification. And for the usage I had in mind, they were not needed.
If someone else wants to add these to this system, they are most
welcome.
I created a very compact data form to base scripts and programs upon.
It is a list with items separated by commas. The first item of each
line is the verse number of my chapter neglecting system. The second
is the chapter number it should have according to the versification
systems mentioned in items 5 to 10. The third is the verse that (part
of the) chapter starts with (often 1 of course, but I'll explain the
exception later). The fourth item indicates a part of a verse ("a",
"b"...)
Here is the list for Jonah:
17,2,1,,,LXX,ORG,,
18,2,1,,ENG,,,VUL,NAB,NJB
28,3,1,,ENG,LXX,ORG,VUL,NAB,NJB
38,4,1,,ENG,LXX,ORG,VUL,NAB,NJB
49,end,,,ENG,LXX,ORG,VUL,NAB,NJB
You can see that LXX and ORG start 1 verse sooner with chapter 2 than
the others. Jonah has 48 verses in total, so the last line indicates
that at verse 49 the book has ended.
The Song of Solomon is somewhat less straightforward:
1,1,1,a,,,,VUL,
2,1,1,b,,,,VUL,
18,2,1,,ENG,LXX,ORG,VUL,NAB,NJB
35,3,1,,ENG,LXX,ORG,VUL,NAB,NJB
46,4,1,,ENG,LXX,ORG,VUL,NAB,NJB
62,5,1,,ENG,LXX,ORG,VUL,NAB,NJB
78,6,1,,ENG,LXX,ORG,,NAB,NJB
79,6,1,,,,,VUL,
90,6,13,a,ENG,,,,NAB,NJB
91,6,13,b,ENG,,,,NAB,NJB
90,7,1,a,,LXX,ORG,,
91,7,1,b,,LXX,ORG,,
91,7,1,a,,,,VUL,
92,7,1,,ENG,,,,NAB,NJB
92,7,1,b,,,,VUL,
105,8,1,,ENG,LXX,ORG,VUL,NAB,NJB
119,end,,,ENG,LXX,ORG,VUL,NAB,NJB
The VUL combines the first two verses. Also in 3 of the 6
versification systems, 6:13 is just 1 verse while in the other 3 it
is 6:13-14. This illustrates when the third item is not 1.
This is work in progress, but I think it could be valuable for
everyone who has to deal with several Bible translations.
If anyone is interested in the complete list of every book, examples
of scripts to do calculations with this or see my improved complete
list of references, feel free to contact me: tvogelaar(at)de-mare.nl
Terry
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