Lesson 7 | Searching Details
Maps, Introductions, and More
As a brief aside and final learning point for this lesson, let’s look at the worth of other Bible study aids not otherwise covered in this course.
Bible Maps
The worth of Bible maps is found in helping you understand the geographic realities that the author expects you to be familiar with. That is, the places mentioned in your passage were (for the most part) known to the original readers.
This is just like the first step of The 3-Step Discovery Process. As it makes sense to read passages the author expects me to be familiar with before studying a passage, so too it makes sense to familiarize myself with the places I should know.
On Biblearc, you can find maps in NET2 footnotes. Clicking on a “map” link will bring up a map image in a new tab.
NET2 maps
Book Introductions
Book introductions are essentially a summary of the context and substance of a book.
Portions of introductions can be helpful as a part of the first step of The 3-Step Discovery Process. But understand that book introductions often go far beyond giving you contextual information that the first readers would have known. For example, only the first sentence of the ESV’s introduction to Nahum below would fit in that category. So most of the time you are better saving your consideration of these commentary-like notes for step three.
On Biblearc, the ESV provides a brief introduction via a footnote after the title of each book.
Nahum 1 (ESV)
Book Outlines
These are also a form of commentary, presenting you with an outline of the flow of content in a book. These are great to consult after first reading through the entire book yourself. You might also use Biblearc’s Outline module to build your own before using a published outline as a point of comparison.
Study Notes
This is perhaps the most commonly used type of Bible study aid, but often the least helpful. The reason that study notes found in a study Bible can be unhelpful is that oftentimes they are simply presented in a matter-of-fact sort of way without any accompanying reason for the interpretation presented. The effect this has on most folks is to stifle thoughtfulness.
With this warning in mind, use study notes when well into step three of The 3-Step Discovery Process. And remember, the key is to test the claims of such study notes based on the biblical reasoning they (sometimes) provide.
On Biblearc, the NET2 footnotes that are categorized as “Study Notes” fit into this category.
NET2 Study Notes
Charts
Finally, timeline, genealogy, and leadership succession charts are also available in many study Bibles. These can be helpful to add to step one of The 3-Step Discovery Process to establish your context. But even better, and far more helpful in the end, is to create your own charts from details you discover in the text!