Page Index
Bibliographies
From the formal reports of hieroglyphics to ostraca, ABZU
is your gateway to the academic study of the Ancient Near East. Sponsored by the
University of Chicago's renowned Oriental Institute, the resources indexed on this site
range from email discussion groups to the official websites of archeological digs, from
museum resources to dictionaries and word lists. ABZU is a great place for the serious
exegete of the Scripture to look for resources to understand the culture of the Biblical
world.
From the Sahara Desert to the Cape of Good Hope, Africa is
a place that contains many climates, cultures and languages. For almost all of the
Church's history, Christians have lived and labored to bring the gospel to all corners of
this continent. Yet because most areas of Africa remain poor, it has been difficult to
find scholarly information about its peoples. Africabib.org helps to fill this need. Three
databases at this site allow a researcher to look for titles, using a powerful search
engine. The user may search by keyword, limit by region and nation, and view the results
by author, title or date. This site is an excellent tool to begin missiological research
on subjects related to Africa.
Dr. Dana Sutton, Professor of Classics at the University of
California in Irvine has recently begun compiling this rich resource, "an analytic
bibliography of Latin texts written during the Renaissance and later freely available to
the general public on the Web (access-restricted sites are not included)."
1
Here you will find a descriptive catalog of the original latin texts of Luther and other Lutheran writers, a
link to the resource and a description of its file format. Ad fontes, amici!
Argus is an electronic bibliography of bibliographies.
Before you quip: "A resource only a librarian would love," visit the site. Here
you can find links to resource guides arranged by subject. It isn't the usual haphazard
collection of sites gathered by search engine and pasted on the page. These guides are
evaluated by librarians for how well they describe the resources they list. This is a
great place to start looking for websites when you don't have a clue where to find it.
Information technology has finally found its way to the
quiet world of academic journals. One by one, even journals written for the disciplines of
theology have begun to move their texts to the World Wide Web. Biblical Studies on
the Web, an exegetical journal that appears only in electronic form, has provided
this helpful guide to online versions of journals that publish articles on Biblical
exegesis. A table contains the journal title, what has been placed on the web and what
information is freely accessible. The titles are linked to the home pages of the
respective periodical. Visit here to read your research from the comforts of your own
computer.
This website has a new, more user-friendly
interface to the Cumulative Bibliography of The International Review of
Missions, brought to us by our friends at the Centre for the Study of
Christianity in the Non-Western World at the University of Edinburgh.
You've read plenty of interpretations of history.
Have you ever wondered if they were telling you the truth? Did you ever what to know the
whole story? Now you can! The Internet Modern History Sourcebook catalogs
primary sources of historic significance. This Sourcebook contains texts from the
Reformation era. Paul Halsall at Fordham University has designed this resource as a place
for college professors and students to locate the key texts in history. Each entry is
briefly annotated. So you're looking for something a wee bit more ancient? Visit the
Fordham sourcebooks for other periods, places and subjects.
From Hinduism to Islam, from Judaism to the Watchtower
society, religions have taken to the internet to support believers and to present their
faith to others. Christianity is no exception. Nearly every denomination, sect or
tradition has a website. How do you decide which websites will help you study theology and
learn to witness to those ready to hear the gospel? This site by librarian John Gresham
provides "a selective listing of the best Internet resources of interest to religious
studies scholars and students of religion." Here you will find a wide variety of
links to sites that provide the best information available on the internet. Begin your
search of the web at this site.
This annotated guide to theological resources on the
Internet is a gateway to many resources useful to students of theology. Developed by a
Catholic University for its community, this well-stocked list provides a wealth of
resources which might be hard to find in any other way. Confessional Lutherans will find
especially interesting the rich, well-stocked page on liturgical resources. An excellent
place to look for specialized information, especially on topics related to the Early
Church, Medieval Church and the Roman Catholic Church.
Finding primary sources on the Middle Ages can often be
more difficult than finding a needle in a hay stack -- or a page on the World Wide Web.
Labyrinth is designed to be both a storehouse of such texts and a gateway to resources for
teaching about the Medieval period. In addition to texts, images and commentaries, this
site also provides curricular material to assist professors in teaching about this
important age of Church History.
Once a year, the Lutheran Historical Conference compiles a
bibliography of articles, chapters in books, books, dissertations, theses and other items
related to the history of Lutheranism in America. Arranged by year, this is an online
version of the print resource.
The Mundus Gateway is a web-based guide to more
than four hundred collections of overseas missionary materials held in the
United Kingdom. Rosemary Seton of SOAS has been a primary force in the
development of this magnificent resource.
You're in the study of your first parish. Preparing for your sermon,
you reach over and open a systematics text to prepare your sermon right?
Not! You look at the lessons for the week. The Text This Week
is an index of worship and study resources designed to work the way
you do -- from the text to the meaning of the passage to your sermon.
A few warnings, are in order. The site uses the Revised Common Lectionary,
not the historic one year or the three year ILCW lections. The commentators
and resources tend to express the opinions of liberal theologians. Still,
the work is well done. More than a few gems are referenced here. You
will likely gain many insights visiting this fine site.
Now you can shop for your Christian books and supplies from
the comforts of home. CPH's catalog web site is well-designed, easily navigated and sports
a solid search engine. A shopping cart feature allows you to collect items to order. You
may pay for the order with a major credit card. However, the site does not use secured
server technology. Still, the ability to browse for materials from the Lutheran
prospective makes this site well worth the visit.
Beginning with his stay at
Wartburg Castle in 1521, Dr. Luther translated the Bible into the German
language. With the help of his friends, the reformer continued to refine
the translation up until his death. This electronic edition is the text
of the 1545 edition, considered the last authoritative printing.
In September of 2000, the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of
the Faith issued this declaration. In it, the Catholic Church states
clearly that salvation comes through Jesus Christ alone and that there
is no Christian Church outside of the Catholic and Orthodox Churches.
Read this controversial document by following this link.
Do you need to study a resolution of the 1998 convention? Do you need
the minutes of the convention for a paper? If so, one of the fastest
ways is to check the online version of the official Convention Proceedings.
Warning: The document is in Adobe Acrobat PDF format. If you do
not already have the free reader on your system, you will need to download
it. Get
the Acrobat Plug-in.
The LCMS Handbook contains the constitution and by-laws of the church
body. When you need to know the rules by which this Synod, its Districts,
Congregations, Church Workers and staff relate to each other, this is
the work to check. Warning: The document is in Adobe Acrobat PDF
format. If you do not already have the free reader on your system, you
will need to download it. Get
the Acrobat Plug-in.
This classic history of the church set the standard for all general
histories to follow. Thorough and well-documented, it is still a classic
resource and a good place to be research on historical topics. The Christian
Classics Ethereal Library edition is in draft form, set in HTML. Look
forward to a more polished edition to follow.
In 1999, the Lutheran World Federation and the Catholic Church signed
an agreement which declared that Lutherans and Catholics agree on the
doctrine of Justification in all but a few unimportant ways. As an officially
adopted document of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, this
work is the official teaching of that body. The Lutheran Church —
Missouri Synod and other conservative Lutheran church bodies have objected
strongly to the content of this confession. Find out what the controversy
is all about by reading it for yourself.
At the request of the President of the Lutheran Church — Missouri
Synod, the faculties of Concordia Seminary in St. Louis and Concordia
Theological Seminary in Fort Wayne prepared an evaluation of the Joint
Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification. The reflections
of both faculties are brought together in the electronic text. In addition,
a summary of their positions on the documents and a series of study
questions, authored by the LCMS' Commission on Theology and Church Relations
rounds out the text. Read together with the Declaration, this text will
help you understand the contemporary debate on Justification in Lutheran
circles. Warning: The document is in Adobe Acrobat PDF format. If
you do not already have the free reader on your system, you will need
to download it. Get
the Acrobat Plug-in.
The world is coming to the United States. But how can we witness to
people from lands we've never visited, or, in some cases even heard
of? The papers at this site will help you build bridges to people with
other faiths and from other cultures. Written by candidates in Concordia
Theological Seminary's own Ph. D. in Missiology class on world religions,
these papers cover topics such as: Buddhists and Christians
in Conversation by Mark G. Press, A Western Christian
Look at Buddhism By Rev. Donald D. Nord,
Hmong
People Interact with Christianity by Rev. Kou Seying, Muslims Call Christians
"People of the Book" by Yohannes Mengsteab, Sharing Christ with Muslim
Women by Steven M. Eggers,
Jinn, Amulets, and a Prophet Named Isa: Sharing the Gospel with Ordinary Muslims
by Thayer Salisbury and
Shinto,
"The Way of the Gods — or Jesus Christ, God's "Way"?
by Richard S. Lofgren. A new set of papers, written by the Spring 2001
class will appear shortly.
Do you need to study a resolution of last year's convention? Do you
need the minutes of the convention for a paper? If so, one of the fastest
ways is to check the online version of the official Convention Proceedings.
Warning: The document is in Adobe Acrobat PDF format. If you do not
already have the free reader on your system, you will need to download
it. Get
the Acrobat Plug-in.
Anthony Steinbronn. "Walking with Martin Luther."
(S.L.:Lutherans Online, N.D.)
This electronic essay explores several themes in Luther's
theology, including his ecclesiology, theology of the cross and the Larvae Dei (Mask of
God). Short and to-the-point, they provide a place to begin in exploring Luther's views of
this topics. The author, Dr. Anthony Steinbronn has served as a pastor, missionary and is
an alumnus of Concordia Theological Seminary (STM 1991, D. Miss. 1997).
The Ad Hoc Digital Library was initiated during the
1997/1998 academic year with the support of a Faculty Support Project grant from the Yale
University Library and Yale Information Technology Services. It is a structured,
annotated, web-searchable database that contains electronic images and texts related to
the history of Christianity. Because of copyright restrictions, some of the images and
texts contained in the database are not accessible to the general public.
The Christian Classics Ethereal Library is a treasure trove
of the finest devotional material written by Christians from the days of the Early Church
to the Twentieth Century. Most of the works are public domain texts and are available in
multiple formats.
Looking for just that turn of the phrase to bring
home a point in your sermon? You think in KJV, but still can't fish out that key Bible
passage for your eager parishioners? Then this resource is for you. Concordances of
Great Books provides a search engine to each of over two hundred titles, most of
which are classics of world literature. The majority of the works are from
spiritually-oriented texts. It is highly eclectic -- Augustine and Josephus are alongside
the Book of Mormon and the Bhagavad-Gita. Yet there are many
texts that you would read for edification and apologetic purposes. No, Luther texts are
not in the collection -- yet! Still, all and all, a powerful resource that will draw you
back time and again.
Cyril of Alexandria, Defender of the Theotokos, is one of the most
respected fathers of the Christian Church. This site has begun to collect
electronic versions of the writings of this beloved bishop. Rev. Ted
Mayes, an LCMS pastor, also provides links to other texts across the
internet. A bulletin board is also available for those interested in
discussing Cyril, his life and works.
This site is an online reader for the history courses of Hanover College.
The library of this school is a fellow member of PALNI. This reader includes a wide range of
texts assigned to undergraduates, including many that are of interest
to students of Christian History. If it's big, and you can't find it
anywhere else, try Hanover's text project.
This website is an online portal the wealth of missiological scholarship
gathered at the Henry Martyn Centre. The Henry Martyn Centre
is an institution that promotes scholarship in Missiology, especially at Cambridge University. Its website
includes the full text of selected seminar papers and articles in the field of Missiology, access to the
catalog of the library and much more. Go to this site for in-depth research into God's mission to seek and
save the lost.
Making of America is a unique collection of electronic texts. It contains
images and text for 4000+ books, published from 1800-1925. Selected
from the University of Michigan's storage area, these works are chosen
to reflect the shaping of American society in the 19th Century. The
collection is naturally heavy on literature, but includes a few surprises:
S. S. Schmucker's books, the works of Ellen G. White, founder of Seventh
Day Adventism, a Congregationalist work: Foreign missions: their
relations and claims and many others. A powerful search engine
allows you to search the full text of the whole collection. You can
also browse through the titles and use its flexible navigation tools
to skim through each volume.
Think of the On-Line Books Page as a bibliography of texts
on the Internet. With well over 7,000 listings, this is the place for you to begin a
search for electronic books. This directory points only to texts that you may read free of
charge and focuses on public domain texts.
"Perseus is a continually growing digital library of
resources for studying the ancient world." 2 An awesome tool for
the exegete of New Testament texts, this site provides a searchable version of the
authoritative Liddell-Scott classical greek dictionary, texts and articles on
themes in Greek and Roman culture. Use this site to deepen your understanding of the world
in which Jesus lived and the Early Church grew.
Project Gutenberg is the mother of all electronic text
archives. Begun in 1971 with the Declaration of Independence, this library is dedicated to
making "information, books and other materials available to the general public in
forms a vast majority of the computers, programs and people can easily read, use, quote,
and search." 3
Think of Project Gutenberg as an online electronic public library.
This text archive collects texts by and about Martin Luther and other
Lutherans. Project Wittenberg is sponsored by Concordia Theological
Seminary and sited at CTS' website. This Project is the first step towards
an online, electronic library for Lutheranism. The texts first appear
at this site and in ASCII format. To view HTML versions of some of the
documents, see Project Wittenberg's home page.
So what did Luther look like? Where can I find an image of the Wise
Men adoring Jesus? This online art gallery is an amazing resource that
can help you quickly find the painting that you need.The database already
includes well over 10,000 images of art work from various places in
Europoe and periods in history. Still, the collection is thin in some
spots and you may not find the exact item you have in mind. Yet the
search engine is fast. By painter (called "author"), by a
word in the short description, by period or by school of art. This is
a great place to start your work.
Encyclopedias and Other Reference Works
Yes — this work is in German! And, Yes — if you do not read
German, you will still be able to use it! Simply put, this work contains
both a thorough biography in German (The part you can't use if you can't
read German) and thorough bibliography, which includes references to
titles in English and other languages. This useful work classifies the
items into categories such as works about the subject and works by the
subject. Where materials exist online, it gives the URL for the resource
as well. All-in-all, a very useful site.
You're serving your first parish. As you prepare for your
first few August worship services, you notice in Lutheran Worship the day of
St. Lawrence falls on a Sunday. "St. Lawrence?" you exclaim, "Who is St.
Lawrence?" In your moment of minor crisis, this resource, provided by the folks at
Catholic Online can help you get started. This online directory of saints provides short,
one page biographies of saints in the Catholic Church, many of whom are remembered by even
Lutheran Christians as fathers and mothers in the faith. It also has a FAQ on the Catholic
view of angels. A search engine helps you find one in the many pages available at the
site. The information here is, of course, from the Catholic perspective and tends to be
long on folklore. Still, it provides a place to learn a few details about these faithful
Christians. From there you can decide if detailed historical study might add some images
and illustrations to Bible classes, sermons and Sunday School gatherings.
You're planning to go home for Easter next year, but
you don't know the date on which it will fall. Walther dates a letter you're hoping to quote in your paper as
the Fourth Sunday after Trinity. But you do not have a calender for 1863 at your fingertips. How can you figure
these things out? This handy, simple calculator will help you out. Enter the year that you need to consult and
very quickly the calculator returns to you the dates of all the major feasts for that year. You even can check
dates for two Eastern Orthodox calendars. Kairos kai kronos!, this tool is handy!
It's out of print, so I can make a copy of this textbook
without asking permission. Right? Wrong! I can show this video I rented to my youth group.
Right? Wrong again! Copyright law protects both. As long as a work is copyrighted, you
cannot copy it without permission. As long as a movie is copyrighted, you cannot show it
publicly without permission. Copyright law is very confusing and complex. So why not visit
the Copyright site and learn more about it. This site is dedicated to helping its visitors
work out the practical details of how you use the works of others and protect your own. It
explores contemporary controversies, provides primers and forms and generally provides a
lot of information and tools to help you use all the wonderful resources now at your
fingertips.
The ECOLE Initiative is the place on the Internet to begin
your research into the history of the Church before the Reformation. The site contains
articles by philosophers, theologians and historians. A detailed time line helps you place
people, events and ideas in chronological context. A massive, online bibliography of
primary sources leads you to texts and images from this period of the Church's history.
Directories of email discussion groups and web sites help you discover new treasures. If
you are taking classes in the history of the Church, this is a place you must visit.
You've just settled your library on the oak shelves of your study at
your first parish, when you learn that the daughter of a member is into
Eckankar. But you didn't study Eckankar in religious bodies class at
the seminary! So, how do you learn about them — quickly!?! Well,
you might reach for Mather and Nichols' Dictionary of Cults, Sects,
Religions and the Occult, if you had thought to buy it before
you left! Gospelcomm's Apologetics Index is there to help
you! This site contains a wealth of news, articles, links and other
information on religious cults, sects, movements, doctrines, new and
alternative religions. The information compiled here is well-researched,
complete with quotations from authorities within the group described
and within the Christian apologetic and missions communities. There
is both a search engine and an alphabetic approach for easy navigation.
This site is a good place to begin your search for ways to witness to
religious non-Christians.
This encyclopedia contains articles on philosophers and
issues treated by philosophers, principally the General Editor, James Fieser, Ph.D., and
the philosophy of science and logic editor Bradley Dowden, Ph.D. In addition to scholarly
articles, a text archive provides access to a sizable collection of important
philosophical treatises. This site makes an excellent starting point for students
researching philosophical, ethical and theological topics.
So, you need to look up that Latin term in your systematics
reading for tomorrow. Of course, you discover this AFTER the library closes! What you need
is a dictionary — and fast! LEO comes to the rescue with links to online multi-lingual
dictionaries. The variety in this directory is astounding — try Gaelic, Bulgarian and
Vietnamese! Visit this site and you'll never be lost for words again!
Guides, Pathfinders, Tutorials and Research Help
Confessional Lutherans believe that the Lutheran Confessions, or the documents
contained in the Book of Concord (1580) faithfully teach the doctrines of the Holy
Scriptures. Lutheran pastors pledge to teach in harmony with them because they so believe.
The Walther Library uses a local variant of the Library of Congress Classification System
to arrange versions of these confessions and materials which explain their contents and
background. This guide will help you locate such materials in our collection.
"A paper will be due..." the prof says
matter-of-factly. But where do you begin? The tutorials and guides at this site will give
you a head start on that most challenging part of academic life -- the research paper.
Bristling with helpful tips and step-by-step guides to reading, writing and listening, the
site can be an enormous help in dealing with this and other tasks. As if this site were
not enough, it even has links to other valuable sites. Read! Mark! Learn! Inwardly digest!
Short answers to questions often asked at the Reference Desk of the
Walther Library.
"Can I copy this item without permission?" This
is a question librarians are often asked. The answer is always yes when the work is in the
Public Domain. This chart by Dr. Laura Gasaway lists the criteria by which you may be sure
that a work belongs to everyone and is no longer protected by copyright.
Yes, Bible Works is a powerful program, but can it really
help you do exegesis? You suspect so, but don't have a clue as to where to start. The
Librarians of Yale Divinity School have written a tutorial to help you get started with
this powerful tool. This click-by-click, one page guide to Bible Works will teach you how
to view texts, read the Greek and Hebrew originals, do basic and advanced searches and
print the results. This guide is a great place to visit before you dive into the program.
So you've got a paper to write on the history of missions
in Africa. Yet you do not have a clue where to start. This site, provided by the Yale
University Divinity School Library is a great place to start. Pages with lists of
mission-related subject headings (These work in our catalog and most other U.S. Libraries,
too.), bibliographies, journals and online resources will help you begin your quest. This
site is a great place to launch any quest to read about God's mission to seek and save the
lost.
Online Organizations & Services
Think of it as an electronic, spiritual agora. Beliefnet is a service
that helps people pursue their own spiritual paths and converse with
those of other religions and religious traditions. Columnists ranging
from Colin Powell to Gary Bauer to John Shelby Spong to Starhawk write
on a variety of topics. Members can exchange views, ask for prayer,
search their sacred scriptures or locate a place of worship. This is
a good place to see what folks committed to other faiths believe and
maybe even do a little bit of witnessing.
Wouldn't it be great if libraries were online. Not just
resources, but whole libraries? The Internet Public Library, a project of the University
of Michigan's School of Information (Library School), is an experiment in providing full
library service online. Visit here not only to find online resources, but if you'd like to
ask a question.
The IUPUI Copyright Management Center assists the students
of Indiana University Purdue University -- Indianapolis both with managing their
copyrights and in using copyrighted works. Their web site contains many helpful papers
that can assist you in learning about copyrights. As a bonus, the site contains links to
other useful web-based resources.
When the Berlin Wall fell ten years ago, the door opened to
mission work among the nations of the former Soviet Union. After nearly a century of
persecution, Lutheran churches emerged from hiding to a vast harvest of souls, ripe for
reaping. Strong in faith, but with few resources, these churches appealed to their western
sister synods for help. The Lutheran Heritage Foundation is one of the answers God
provided to their prayers. By distributing Bibles, translating the works of Luther and
Confessional Lutherans into many languages, and by building the libraries of new
seminaries arising there, The LHF site is designed to keep you up-to-date on their
activities. Here you can find a list by languages of the works translated, areas in need
of support and ways to contact the foundation to help. This is a great place to prepare
for mission sundays, LWML meetings and other opportunities to share with God's people the
needs of the Great Harvest Field of Souls. The Lutheran Heritage Foundation has donated many of
their works to our library. A bibliography of this items is available at:
www.ctsfw.edu/library/lhfmain.htm
The Summer Institute of Linguistics is a well-respected
organization devoted to the study of lesser-known languages and linguistic groups. It
provides support for the study of these tongues, the development of writing systems,
literacy and translation of the Bible and other literature. This site provides electronic
versions of many of SIL's high-quality resources, support for the use of computers to aid
linguistic and translation work, software, fonts and more. This site is an essential first
stop for the translator of God's Word.
The opening paragraphs on the site's home page say it all:
"Adherents.com is a growing collection of over 52,000 adherent statistics and
religious geography citations -- references to published membership/adherent statistics
and congregation statistics for over 4,200 religions, churches, denominations, religious
bodies, faith groups, tribes, cultures, movements, ultimate concerns, etc. Basically,
researchers can use this site to answer such questions as "How many Methodists live
in Washington, D.C.?", "What are the major religions of South Korea?", or
"What percentage of the world is Sikh?" We present data from both primary
research sources such as government census reports, statistical sampling surveys and
organizational reporting, as well as citations from secondary literature which mention
adherent statistics. Adherents.com is an Internet initiative and is not affiliated with
any religious, political, educational, or commercial organization. Adherents.com is the
2nd most frequently visited general religion site on the Internet." This site is a
treasure trove of data on various religious groups. The level of detail sometimes goes
down to the county level in the US. Come here first when you need head counts for
religious groups.
What do American Catholics believe? How many Americans
claim to be Lutheran? Where do American Muslims live? A source of reliable, scientifically
gathered data on these and similar questions used to be very difficult to find. The
American Religion Data Archive, a project supported by the Lilly Endowment, gathers
together such studies and makes them accessible on the World Wide Web. This site is very
well designed, with easy navigation and powerful search tools. It is sure to become a
standard resource in years to come.
Most American adults agree on what adults should do to help
children grow. But few of them do these things. This study, commissioned by Lutheran
Brotherhood and conducted by Gallup documents this divide between what people believe and
what they do. This site makes the report available in various ways in Adobe Acrobat's PDF
format. If you do not already have the free reader on your system, you will need to
download it. Get
the Acrobat Plug-in. In addition, Lutheran Brotherhood allows you to survey your own
attitudes and actions online and compare them to the survey. They also provide action
items to allow congregations to encourage adults to act in ways that help children become
caring adults themselves.
The website for this PBS documentary series provides a wealth of images,
scholarly articles, maps and more. Although the series tells the story
of Jesus and the early church from the viewpoint of the Jesus Seminar,
a gathering of liberal scholars whose viewpoint is at odds with that
of conservative scholars, the evidence and images presented at the site
are useful even to Confessional Lutheran scholars.
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