Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Bible software for iPhone / iPod Touch

I'm still using an ancient cell phone that only does phone calls (imagine that), and I carry around all the rest of my life on my aging Dell Axim (which I still really like), but my daughter has an iPod Touch. Okay, it is kind of cool, and I've tried some Bible apps to see how it works.

I can confirm that the OliveTree BibleReader for iPhone works very nicely. You can get the BibleReader for free along with 9 translations (NET, MKVJ, ASV, Darby, YLT, Weymouth, Reina Valera, French Darby, German Luther), and other packages/translations are available for purchase.

Paul Avery of Peej Studio has now released a free iPhone / iPod Touch Holy Bible app that includes KJV, ASV, BBE, and WEB English translations along with 3 Spanish versions, but it also includes the Greek NT (Nestle-Aland, but it is unaccented) and the Greek Septuagint. There you go! The site claims that he is working on accented Greek and a copyright-clear Hebrew OT. (HT: PhiloBlogger)

(Update via comment by John) You can also check out BibleXpress. For $30 you get the ASV, NRSV (w/Apocrypha), ESV, NASB, LBLA (Spanish), KJV, and The Message. That's a great price for those copyrighted versions.

In contrast to these three apps which you need to download and which reside on your device, Laridian is using an internet-accessible, subscription model for iPocketBible.com. (Subscriptions are $2/month or $20/year.) This might be a good deal especially if you already own Laridian products which will be available to you as part of your subscription.

And how long until someone figures out something really helpful for biblical work using the new Google Mobile App for iPhone with Voice Search.

4 comments:

  1. Don't forget BibleXpress. It currently has the ASV, NRSV (w/Apocrypha), ESV, NASB, LBLA, KJV, and The Message. He's currently working on the NLT and NIV. And you only pay one price for the app. All of the current and future Bibles are included in that price. Compare that to some iPhone apps that charge you $15 per translation.

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  2. Flashcards are mildly connected as well. There is a free program called gFlash+ and I've made available Greek flashcards keyed to Gerald Stevens' greek grammar.

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  3. I am surprised youversion.com wasn't mentioned, it is free and has a very long list of available versions.

    Only some of the versions are available for download so they can be accessed without internet access, but is still one of the best iphone Bible apps available imo.

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  4. Next very good iPhone app is Mantis Bible Study. It contains many English translations like ESV or NASB and also 3 Greek NT versions (one of them accented and one with Strongs) and an Hebrew OT with (or without) Strongs - both unpointed and a Hebrew NT.

    And many more - dictionaries, commentaries, books... They have also a web site - www.mantisbible.com

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