'Exegete.app' now under development
I am pleased to share the news I was recently awarded a grant by the Australian Research Theology Foundation to develop a free online application for aiding close reading of the New Testament. The initial idea came from my co-applicant, Grahame Bowland. Grahame is a formation student in the Anglican Diocese of Perth and a former Theology student of mine at Murdoch University. He is also an experienced software engineer and will be responsible for developing the app over the next 12 months.
The app, which will be online and freely available across multiple devices (including mobile), is intended to overcome the limitations of existing Bible study software. Such applications are typically prohibitively expensive and/or geared towards the task of translation (e.g., by providing interlinear versions, integrated dictionaries, etc), and dominated by second-level analysis (e.g., by integrating commentaries and notes of varying quality).
The focus of Exegete.app will be on close-analysis of the text itself (either in English or Greek). This means tools for: (1) comparing and marking-up parallel Gospel accounts side-by-side (think Kurt-Aland Synopsis); (2) automatically identifying patterns within a text, such as instances of repetition or progression; (3) finding intertexts to other NT passages as well as texts in other open-access databases of ancient Greek literature.
Of course, additional features may be added at a later time. But these tools will be the initial focus for getting the app off the ground.
The software won't be released for testing for a while. In the meantime you can follow the Twitter account here for further updates.