Every chapter · every connection

Chapter Atlas

Light a book, or two books together
Go to a chapter
Color the light by
Draw

Phones draw chapter pairs, each pair once, with its strength as brightness.

Minimum links between two chapters
2

Raise it to strip away single threads and keep only the heavily attested connections.

Divisions · fly to one
Reading the light
One arc, one cross-reference; light adds where arcs cross
Bars under the base: each chapter's length
Gold: the verse and the thread you picked
Hold a chapter and its verses fan out into a row; pick one to follow its threads.
Step through chaptersGenesis 1
Canonical layout: Protestant 66-book order · KJV numbering
Drawing the map…

The base and the light

Every chapter of the Bible stands along the base, each bar as long as the chapter; the long one past the middle of the Old Testament is Psalm 119. Every arc above joins two verses that reference one another, all of them at once, drawn as light: where many arcs cross, the dome glows. The brightest regions are where the most links overlap, not where any single link is stronger.

The right-hand third is a different texture. Arcs landing in the New Testament come in from everywhere along the base, while arcs inside the Old Testament tend to stay local. The longest arcs are Revelation reaching back to the prophets, the Psalms and Genesis.

Opening a chapter, following a thread

Hold a chapter and its verses fan out from its place on the base into a row running back into depth, verse 1 on the base line and the last verse furthest back. Every link then rises from its own verse; the tick under each foot is that verse's share of the chapter's links.

Pick a verse, on the row or in the card, and only its threads stay lit, in gold. Pick one thread to read both ends side by side, then travel along it to the other end and keep going.

Moving, zooming and turning

With a mouse, drag to turn the dome all the way round and tilt it; drag with Shift or the right mouse button to move the picture, so whatever you have zoomed into can be brought to the middle. On a phone or tablet, drag with one finger to move it, pinch to come closer, and twist two fingers to turn it. Scroll to come closer; zooming grows from the middle of the picture. Swipe sideways on a trackpad to slide along the baseline. With the chart focused, [ and ] turn it, comma and period slide it, the arrow keys step through chapters, Escape steps back out, and Reset or a double-click brings back the whole view.

Story mode walks through the map one step at a time and follows narrative threads: chains of passages joined by links the dataset actually records. Every number in it is counted from the same data.

One kind of context

A cross-reference points at a passage elsewhere that uses similar language or takes up the same idea. It is one kind of context, not the only kind: the first is what sits immediately around a verse, its own sentences and argument. The counts here measure only the second. More on that.

Both directions

Cross-references are often recorded in only one direction, though the relationship works both ways. Here they are consolidated: a connection counts whether it was recorded from the first passage to the second or back. On larger screens every link between two verses is drawn; on phones, or whenever you choose it, each pair of chapters is drawn once with its strength as brightness.