Authentic Christianity
Southwestern Journal of Theology
Volume 53, No. 2 – Spring 2011
Managing Editor: Malcolm B. Yarnell III
Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, $1,689.95
Logos totally renovated their Bible study software and made an excellent product even better. Logos Bible Software 4 (hereafter, Logos 4) retains the best features of Logos 3,1 but has a number of improvements, which this article will examine. Here is another bonus: there are additional books in all Logos Bible Software packages.
This review will examine the Scholar’s Platinum LE Library (hereafter, Platinum)—the penultimate Scholar’s collection. The Scholar’s series, from smallest to largest, is: Basic, Silver, Gold, Platinum, and Portfolio—each package adding hundreds of electronic books to the previous package. The obvious standout feature in Platinum is its vast collection of almost 1,250 electronic books, averaging $1.40 per book, unquestionably a bargain. This immense number is likely larger than the total number of Bible-related books a typical person owns. This reviewer will first examine the books and then evaluate the Bible study software of Platinum.
Platinum Books by Categories. A bird’s-eye view of Platinum shows its breadth of resources. It contains 26 English Bible translations, 21 interlinears, 355 commentaries (individual volumes of 33 different commentary sets—12 of which are unique to Platinum), 36 reference books, 41 Bible introductions and surveys, 29 media resources, 46 preaching and teaching books, 76 ministry resources, 61 original language grammars and tools, and over 550 other resources. There are so many e-books in Platinum that just listing the book titles and authors would make this software review ten to fifteen times the maximum length this journal allows! A full listing of the books in Platinum is available at www.logos.com/comparison.
Yet, in any bundled collection of books there is typically a mix of books: from new to old, excellent to mediocre, and useful to useless. Of course, the value of any book varies from reader to reader, because each user has different needs. For instance, this reviewer will likely never use the lectionaries in Platinum, but other users will find them essential. So, the key to analyzing a collection is to calculate if the price of the indispensable books is still a good deal.
Upgrade Book Comparisons. A helpful analysis of Platinum’s worth is to compare it to the smaller Scholar’s packages. Silver costs $370 more than Basic and has 250 more books. Gold costs $380 more than Silver and has 200 more books. Platinum costs $310 more than Gold and has 300 more books. It is easy to see the cost is worth it when considering the cost of the best books in each upgrade. Only Platinum and Portfolio include the Baker NT Commentary (12 volumes), the Baker Exegetical Commentary on the NT (8 volumes), the Pillar NT Commentary (10 volumes), A Greek-English Lexicon of the NT and Other Early Christian Literature, 3rd edition (BDAG—the undisputed best Greek lexicon), and the Grammar of the Greek NT in Light of Historical Research.
Software Review. Now this review will examine the Bible study software of Platinum, which is Logos 4. The new look in Logos 4 is much more inviting—with graphics, color, multiple columns, and it has more readily-available features. There is a book of the day, devotion, guest blogger article, customizable daily Bible reading, lectionary, Logos news, book excerpts, pictures from books in the collection, and more. Yet, even with the new features and a home page displaying much more content than in Logos 3, Logos 4 is easier to use.
Ease of Use. The new Passage Box is a nice addition to the user-friendly home page, and it immediately accesses the Bible text and a myriad of study helps. Simply typing a Scripture reference brings many helpful tools in different panels: the Passage Guide, five favorite Bible translations, favorite Bible commentaries, the Information Panel, and Text Comparison. The Study Passage, Study Word, and Study Topic tools on the Logos 3 home page are not available on Logos 4 because the Passage Box makes them obsolete. Just typing a word opens the powerful and improved Search tool. The new Command Box uses shortcuts to open resources and tools, and it replaces the Logos 3 Quick Navigate bar.
From the home page one can easily access the major features of Logos 4: four searches (Basic, Bible, Morphology, and Syntax) and three guides (Passage Guide, Exegetical Guide, and Bible Word Study). The searches use new drop-down menus, so searches are easier to conduct than they were in Logos 3. The three guides make it easy for a person who does not know Hebrew or Greek to glean helpful biblical information from the original languages of the Bible: (1) cut and paste a Hebrew or Greek word from a reverse interlinear Bible (based on the English text) or (2) type in the English transliteration and Logos 4 will suggest the correct Hebrew or Greek Word. The eight reverse interlinear Bibles (two are NT only) make it easy for anyone to see the underlying Hebrew or Greek word behind each English word as well, and it is simple to view their morphology, lexical meanings, semantic domains, and other helpful information.
Web Connection Enhancements. The biggest change in Logos 4 is that it takes more advantage of the Internet, resulting in four handy improvements. First, updates2 are easier—they run in the background, and they are more frequent because they are automatic. Second, a minor hassle with all previous versions of Logos is gone: there is no need for manually backing up licenses, e-books, highlights, clippings, layouts (formerly called workspaces), bookmarks, comments, or notes from the office computer to the home computer because they are done automatically. All of these features are instantly available when accessing Logos 4 from a second computer regardless of the location. Third, there is no longer a need to keep a hard copy of the entire Logos 4 program for a faster reload in case one’s computer crashes or one upgrades to a new computer. Now the entire software program and personal library is available from the Internet.
More Portability. The fourth benefit of the enhanced web connection has the most exciting possibilities of all the new features in Logos 4. Logos has purposefully avoided the PDA/smart phone market until now. However, it is now accessible via iPhone and iPad and is more portable than ever before. Curling up on a couch and reading most of the books in Platinum on a small reader is now possible.3 Neither the iPhone or iPad can hold all of the books, so one does need an Internet connection to access them. If the user is about to board an airplane and lose the connection, it is easy to download a half dozen or more books into the memory of the iPhone or iPad.
Faster and Improved Searches. Logos 4 is faster than its predecessors, with a completely reworked database. The Bible Speed Search in Logos 3 is no longer available because it is not necessary in Logos 4. All of the searches are fast. Also, Logos 4 retains the powerful automatic searches of its predecessors with a number of improvements. As with Logos 3, many users may not get beyond the three powerful basic study guides because they do so much and are so easy to use. These guides, along with the four searches make use of most of the tools in Logos 4. Explorer is new for Logos 4, and it is a light, handy version of the Passage Guide.
Automatically-Saved Layouts. The more one uses Logos 4, the more likely the user will develop different routines and have various screen layouts for diverse studies. Use one layout for a personal Bible study, another layout for preparing a Sunday School lesson, and another for each sermon series. Each layout will have specific tools open, particular tool configurations, and certain resources. Logos 4 automatically and frequently saves layout changes, and it retains the last 20 unnamed layouts, which is helpful. One can instantly return the screen to a previous layout. This is the virtual equivalent of having multiple desktops available, each devoted to a specific Bible study project with just the right resources open.
Multiple Histories and Bookmarks. In addition to Layouts, Logos 4 has six ways of keeping track of a specific page number of a particular resource the user has previously visited. These tools are handy for revisiting previous studies and resources.
Enhanced Library Tool. The Library tool in Logos 4 is much improved. It has the books well organized with no duplicate entries and sixteen information fields for each book. One can search or sort each field as well as toggle on or off the field information in the search pane, and one can combine searches in multiple fields. For instance, look up all of the books by a certain publisher that have “Jesus” in the title, and the search takes just a fraction of a second.
Morphological and Syntactical Searches. Although both of these tools were excellent in Logos 3, their structure is reworked in Logos 4. Now they are more user friendly (as are the Basic and Bible Searches). They are also better at preventing mistakes, such as not allowing “tense-voice-mood” parameters for a noun morphological search. As a help to the novice or intermediate user, some grammatical/syntactical relationship examples are automatically generated in the Bible Word Study. Platinum syntax searches are based on one Hebrew and four Greek syntactical databases. It would be nice to add another Hebrew syntactical data base to this collection.
These searches are the most advanced work Logos 4 does, and it does it well. However, they are the most difficult to understand and apply for most users since they deal with Hebrew and Greek grammar and syntax. Therefore, the text and video guides at Logos.com are resources for training in how to use these tools as well as most of the tools and features on Logos 4.
Biblical People, Places, and Things. These three separate tools are configured alike, and the layout is very handy. Typing a name on one of them instantly brings a collection of Scripture references, Bible dictionary articles, family tree (for Biblical People), pictures, and interactive maps. There are graphics and Infographics: 95 high-resolution pictures with informational panels, such as a comparison of footprint sizes of David, Goliath, Shaquille O’Neill, and Robert Wadlow, the world’s tallest man in modern times. These are excellent teaching tools.
Other New Features. The Drawing Tool allows a person to use a virtual marker to draw on the computer screen, a great tool when using Platinum on a video projector for a class. There are two new charts as well as a fun 3D effect for the Passage Analysis. Preposition Use (for Greek) in the Bible Word Study is a helpful interactive circle and line graph illustrating the spatial aspects of prepositions with the search word. Stereo Views are 168 sets of views of the Middle East in true stereo format (paired pictures). This reviewer found the Handouts tool (automatically generated but customizable) and Read Aloud tool (think of an uneducated robot voice) not very helpful.
Summary. Platinum is a great collection of electronic resources for in-depth Bible study. This reviewer continues to be in awe that such a huge amount of books can reside in one’s computer—to be read, highlighted, marked up, compared, and searched—and that one can leave groups of them open on a number of virtual “desks” to return to any time. In addition, this collection resides on an excellent software platform: Logos 4. It is truly a collection of numerous helpful tools that Bible users on every level can benefit from using: from Bible novice to Bible scholar. The new features in Logos 4 make it even easier for the Bible beginner to use and benefit from while also adding to the available depth of research for the Bible expert. Logos 4 gives more information, explanation, and tools to a person who does not know Hebrew or Greek than any Bible program of which this reviewer is aware. Yet, it also meets the needs of the Hebrew and Greek expert. The new pictures, graphics, and maps help the Bible learner better understand God’s Word and also add to the tools a Bible teacher can instantly use and share with a class. When compared with all other electronic Bible study programs, Platinum is the Cadillac or Lexus in all aspects: quality, innovation, value, and superior performance. When studying the Bible one should use the best tool available.
- If one is not familiar with Logos Bible Software 3, it would help to read the following review of it since its basic features are in Logos 4. James R. Wicker, “Review of ‘Logos Bible Software, Scholar’s Library: Gold, Series X, Version 3,’” Southwestern Journal of Theology 50.1 (Fall 2007): 100–03. ↩︎
- Fairly frequently Logos sends minor updates on its software and its resources. ↩︎
- So far, over 1,000 titles are available, and Logos is working on securing the remaining titles for this app. ↩︎
