Keraia

Using Keraia

How to find your way around, and how to use it to study a passage, a word, a topic, or a person.

Finding a passage

Type a reference into the search box on the home page: a book (“Romans”), a chapter (“Psalm 23”), or a verse (“John 3:16”). Abbreviations work too, such as “1 Cor 13” or “Gen 1:1.” You can also start from Read, choose a book, and then a chapter. Each book page has an introduction to the book.

Searching

Type anything else into the search box, or open Search from the magnifying glass at the top of every page. Search looks for your words and for what they mean.
Passages
The sections of the Bible closest in meaning to what you typed. Describe what you’re looking for in your own words, such as verses about worry or Jesus calms a storm.
Verses
Every verse that contains your words, with the words in bold, together with the verses closest in meaning, even when they use different words. Verses that do both come first. Choose the translation and filter to one book. Other forms of a word count: “love” finds “loved” and “loving.”
Exact words
Put words in quotation marks to find them together (“bread of life”), start a word with a minus sign to leave it out (shepherd -sheep), or use “or” to find either word. The verses then contain exactly what you asked for.
Everything else
People, places, topics, glossary articles, and Hebrew and Greek words that match appear below. Misspellings still find names, and a word with no matches suggests similar ones.

Reading

A chapter opens in the Modern translation. The buttons above the text switch between versions, and the chapter button jumps to another chapter of the same book.
Modern
A readable, accurate translation in today’s English. Headings, notes, and the words of Jesus in red appear in this version.
Traditional
The familiar wording of the 1611 translation.
Literal
A word-for-word translation that stays close to the wording and order of the Hebrew and Greek.
Latin
The Latin Bible of the Western church for more than a thousand years. Where it has one verse for two English verses, they appear together, as in “10–11.”
Original
The Hebrew (with Aramaic in parts of Ezra and Daniel) or the Greek. Hebrew reads from right to left. The Learn guides teach the alphabets.
Side by side
Shows a second version beside the first, verse by verse, so you can compare them. Try John 1, Modern beside Literal, or Genesis 1 in Hebrew beside Modern. On a phone, the second version appears under the first.
Notes
Small letters in the text mark the translators’ notes: other possible translations, literal meanings, and differences between manuscripts. Point to or tap a letter to read its note.
Measurements
Ancient weights, distances, and money have a dotted underline. Point to one to see its modern equivalent.
Click any verse, or its number, to open that verse’s page. Going back returns you to the same place in the chapter, with the verse highlighted.

A verse page

Every verse has a page that gathers everything about it. The buttons at the top jump to each section, and on wide screens the dots on the right show where you are. A section only appears when there is something in it.
Translations
The verse in each translation. The copy button beside each one copies the text with its reference.
Original
The verse in Hebrew or Greek, word by word, with each word’s English beneath it. Point to a word to see its English counterpart highlighted. Select a word to see its dictionary form, meaning, and grammar, with a link to the lexicon. The Hebrew and Greek grammar guides explain the labels.
Notes
Study notes on the verse and on the passage around it.
Events
Events in the story that take place in this verse, with approximate dates.
Related verses
Verses on the same subject, most relevant first. “Show more” keeps loading more.
Parallels
Other passages that tell the same story or say the same thing, such as the same event in another Gospel.
People and places
Everyone and everywhere the verse mentions, each linked to its own page.
Glossary and topics
Dictionary articles and topics that include this verse.

Words

There are two ways to look up a word, and they answer different questions.
Concordance
Starts from an English word and lists every verse it appears in, in the Modern translation. “Grace” is a good place to start.
Lexicon
Starts from the Hebrew, Aramaic, or Greek word behind the English. Search in English (“love”), in the original language, or by number (G26). A word’s page shows its definition, how it is translated, where in the Bible it is used most, and every verse it appears in. For Hebrew words, it also shows the Greek words that translate it in the Greek Old Testament, and for Greek words, the Hebrew words they stand for.
The two often differ. One English word can translate several original words, and one original word can be translated several ways: חֶסֶד is usually “loving devotion,” but also “kindness,” “loyalty,” and more.

Topics, people, and places

Glossary
More than 6,000 Bible dictionary articles on people, places, ideas, and customs, such as Covenant and Passover.
Topics
Verses gathered by subject. Search for a subject, such as forgiveness, and open a topic to see its verses.
People
Every individually identified person, with a summary, family members, events, and every verse that mentions them. People who share a name have separate pages. See Paul or David.
Places
Places with their location on a map, connections to other places, and every mention. See Jerusalem.
Long lists of mentions come in pages, so nothing is left out. On people and places with mentions in several books, the book filter narrows the list to one book: type a book’s name and choose it from the suggestions.

Ways to study

A passage
  1. Read the whole chapter in the Modern translation.
  2. Read it again side by side with Literal, and note where the wording differs.
  3. Open the verses that stand out. Read the notes, then look at the Original to see which words lie behind the differences.
  4. Follow the parallels and related verses to see how the same idea appears elsewhere.
A word
  1. Find a verse where the word matters, and select the word in the Original section.
  2. Open its lexicon page. Read the definition, then see the ways it is translated.
  3. Look at where it is used most, then read a few of its verses in different books.
  4. Compare the Greek and Hebrew equivalents to follow the idea across the two Testaments.
A topic
  1. Search the topics and the glossary for the subject.
  2. Read the glossary article for background.
  3. Read the topic’s verses in their chapters, not on their own.
A person or a place
  1. Open their page and read the summary and events.
  2. Use the book filter to read their mentions one book at a time, in order.
  3. Follow family members or connected places to see the wider story.

Tips

Links
Pointing to a link in running text says where it goes: a person, a place, a word in the lexicon, a glossary article, or a topic.
Sharing
Every chapter, verse, word, person, and place has its own address, so you can bookmark it or send it to someone.
Keyboard
← → go to the previous or next chapter, or verse on a verse page. C copies the verse on a verse page, / jumps to the search box on pages that have one, and ? lists the shortcuts.
Learning the languages
Start with the Hebrew or Greek alphabet, then read a familiar chapter in the Original version.
Sources
Where the translations and data come from is on the About page.