Thompsons Chain Reference and Westminster Reference Bible

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Gavin

Puritan Board Freshman
Both reference Bibles make use of "Scripture interprets Scripture".
Has anyone made a comparison from a Reformed point of view?
Any other suggestions of Reformed reference Bibles?

Personally I am attracted to the large print of the Westminster Reference Bible, not that I have poor eyes but for late night reading:2cents:
 
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The Thompson Chain reference is a superb study Bible.

The chain system allows you to take one verse and "chain" related verses through the whole of Scripture, Old and New Testaments.
That is probably what they mean by "Scripture interprets Scripture."
The system does so without commentary, men's opinions mixed in, stories, etc. so it is a more "influence free" way to study.

Nothing wrong with commentaries, per se. Especially good, biblical reformed commentary.

But really, our first discipline is to read the Word of God, asking the Holy Spirit to illuminate our understanding as we do.
 
I have had my eye on the Westminster Study Bible for awhile now. The concept for this bible was drawn from John Brown's Self Interpreting study bible. The WSB has 200,000 cross references! Very impressive. There is nothing like it on the market. Compare that to Thompson's 100,000; most of which must be accessed in the supplemental material in the back of the bible rather than in the column where it is needed most. One disadvantage to the WSB is that the references are not categorized by subject (I think) while the TCR does have them categorized. The TCR is more akin to a study bible. The WSB is a reference bible proper. I only wish TBS included Brown's commentary, but they didn't because it goes against their mission statement and purpose as a bible publisher/re-distributor. For what its worth, I was able to locate Brown's study bible in PDF form online. To have a reprint of this, if a publisher ever got around to it, would be no small treasure. It packed to the max with helps and such!

Anyone have a round tuit?

It is funny that you would start a thread on this very topic. I have been in the throws of whether or not I should put down $80 for it sooner than later.
 
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I have just bought a Westminster Study Bible and am very pleased with it - nicely presented, easily readable, and of course plenty of references. I would recommend it.
I also have John Brown's original Self-Interpreting Bible with his commentary in which is great, but no quite as practical for taking anywhere as it is an old iron-clasp massive family Bible!
 
I have just bought a Westminster Study Bible and am very pleased with it - nicely presented, easily readable, and of course plenty of references. I would recommend it.
I also have John Brown's original Self-Interpreting Bible with his commentary in which is great, but no quite as practical for taking anywhere as it is an old iron-clasp massive family Bible!

Wanna trade the hard copy of Brown's Bible for the PDFs?

No?

Well, you never know unless you ask.
 
The WSB has 200,000 cross references! Very impressive. There is nothing like it on the market. Compare that to Thompson's 100,000; most of which must be accessed in the supplemental material in the back of the bible rather than in the column where it is needed most.

I'm confused, why does this site say they WRB has "over 80,000 references" and this site say "over two hundred thousand"? Which is it?
 
The WSB has 200,000 cross references! Very impressive. There is nothing like it on the market. Compare that to Thompson's 100,000; most of which must be accessed in the supplemental material in the back of the bible rather than in the column where it is needed most.

I'm confused, why does this site say they WRB has "over 80,000 references" and this site say "over two hundred thousand"? Which is it?

Call TBS and they will give you the bottom line.
 
I just called TBS. They said 80,000 was a mis-print. There really are 200,000 cross-references in the WRB.
 
It looks like a quality Bible. I read that it would be semi yapp. Isn't semi yapp a slight extension of the cover edges?
 
It looks like a quality Bible. I read that it would be semi yapp. Isn't semi yapp a slight extension of the cover edges?

The yapp is the extension of the cover beyond the book block.

When I get mine in the mail, I will be sure to post it in Acquisitions. Might be here tomorrow. Evangelicalbible.com is only about 1.5 - 2 hours down the road from me.
 
I have been using the Thompson Chain for over fifteen years. In my opinion it is the best reference Bible I have ever owned and used. I love it so much I bought one several years ago on sale and left it in the packaging until this year. I keep my old one in my pastor's study at church. The WRB looks impressive so I just ordered one from evangelicalbible.com. I hope I love it just as much. The TCR will be hard to beat! :pilgrim:
 
I have been using the Thompson Chain for over fifteen years. In my opinion it is the best reference Bible I have ever owned and used. I love it so much I bought one several years ago on sale and left it in the packaging until this year. I keep my old one in my pastor's study at church. The WRB looks impressive so I just ordered one from evangelicalbible.com. I hope I love it just as much. The TCR will be hard to beat! :pilgrim:

Cool! Now we can be a part of the Puritan Board Westminster Reference Bible Club. And the KJV Club too. Let us know what you think about it. The bible; I mean. :popcorn:
 
The mail man was very nice to me today! I just received my copy the WRB about ten minutes ago. I think it is the perfect size. Not too big. Not too small. However, it is larger than my Windsor Metrical. The leather cover is smooth but not shiny; a little rigid (they used a thicker board), but it opens nicely and lays open nicely; very flexible spine. The text looks just like the Windsor. It has four ribbons (two red; two black) and sixteen unlined bible paper pages in the back for notes. The smell is great and it looks like a high quality bible. And with over 200,000 cross-references, I am a very happy camper!
 
Some time ago, I found a leather bound TCR at the second hand shop, but, being an NIV and having a friend that struggled with his KJV I gave it to him. Now recently I found yet another Leather bound TCR KJV from the 60's (for $5) in good condition - hence the questions.
But I'm not so into the illustrative charts though and yet maybe given time I will learn to appreciate them. I think my friends newer version has more charts and illustrations, but he's quite happy with it.
Mind you , I don't think he was aware that there were other versions other than the Kings James, not that he's from a King James vacuum, its just the way he is.
 
The mail man was very nice to me today! I just received my copy the WRB about ten minutes ago. I think it is the perfect size. Not too big. Not too small. However, it is larger than my Windsor Metrical. The leather cover is smooth but not shiny; a little rigid (they used a thicker board), but it opens nicely and lays open nicely; very flexible spine. The text looks just like the Windsor. It has four ribbons (two red; two black) and sixteen unlined bible paper pages in the back for notes. The smell is great and it looks like a high quality bible. And with over 200,000 cross-references, I am a very happy camper!
Mine must be on a boat coming across the Atlantic. Still waiting. Sigh.
 
I have been using the Thompson Chain for over fifteen years. In my opinion it is the best reference Bible I have ever owned and used. I love it so much I bought one several years ago on sale and left it in the packaging until this year. I keep my old one in my pastor's study at church. The WRB looks impressive so I just ordered one from evangelicalbible.com. I hope I love it just as much. The TCR will be hard to beat! :pilgrim:

Cool! Now we can be a part of the Puritan Board Westminster Reference Bible Club. And the KJV Club too. Let us know what you think about it. The bible; I mean. :popcorn:

Sounds good to me! I hope my mailman is nice to me by Saturday perhaps?
 
The mail man was very nice to me today! I just received my copy the WRB about ten minutes ago. I think it is the perfect size. Not too big. Not too small. However, it is larger than my Windsor Metrical. The leather cover is smooth but not shiny; a little rigid (they used a thicker board), but it opens nicely and lays open nicely; very flexible spine. The text looks just like the Windsor. It has four ribbons (two red; two black) and sixteen unlined bible paper pages in the back for notes. The smell is great and it looks like a high quality bible. And with over 200,000 cross-references, I am a very happy camper!

I'll be very interested in a review in a month or two! I've told my wife and others that I believe a Bible with cross references is the best study Bible you can buy. I never dreamed of one with 200k+ references! So, my interest is, will the majority of them be accurate and worthwhile? Or will they be like too many in the reference Bibles I currently own that you look at and think "Yea, there's a couple of similar words here, but I have no idea how the editors thought these two texts were related!" With over 200k my fear is that there would be a few more helpful ones, but the vast majority would fall into that later category of just leaving one puzzled at the supposed connection.
 
I think that's where a chain or topical referencing system has an advantage, however a chain of references could
also be subject to bias.
 
I asked my parents for a "real" bible of my own for my birthday when I was 12, having used a GNFMM or whatever was around as a "hand me down" until then. My father got me a B.B. Kirkbride bound, sewn, maroon "corinthian" leather, red letter KJV Thompson chain. I used that bible daily until Hurricane Katrina got it, so it must have been right at 30 years old, completely limp from use, but with no loose pages, cracks in the boards, etc. I have never seen a better binding on a bible, and still long for all the notes from my childhood and college, when I questioned everything, and tried to jot all the answers in the margins. I would trade several R.L. Allans to have that old Thompson chain again.
 
I'll be very interested in a review in a month or two! I've told my wife and others that I believe a Bible with cross references is the best study Bible you can buy. I never dreamed of one with 200k+ references! So, my interest is, will the majority of them be accurate and worthwhile? Or will they be like too many in the reference Bibles I currently own that you look at and think "Yea, there's a couple of similar words here, but I have no idea how the editors thought these two texts were related!" With over 200k my fear is that there would be a few more helpful ones, but the vast majority would fall into that later category of just leaving one puzzled at the supposed connection.
Received the Westminster KJV Bible today...Saturday! Well made, sewn bindings, thick goatskin leather with a thicker board that I like, but still acceptable. Bible lays flat no matter where opened. 200,000 cross-references, of which I think around 80K are from the Cambridge set and remainder from Brown's of Haddington efforts.

On Luke 24:27, the following cross references appear:

Ge 3:15, 22:18; 26:4; 49:10
Ex 25-30, 35-40
Le 1-16
Num 21:9, 24:17
Deut 18:15-19
Psalm 2, 8, 16, 22, 69, 72, 45,132
Is 7:14, 9:6,7, 35:3-8, 11:1-10, 40:10,11, 42:1-7, 49, 50, 52, 53, 61:1-6
Jeremiah 23:5,6, 30:21, 31:22, 33:14-16
Ezekiel 34; Ezekiel 37:25
Daniel 2:44, 9:24-27
Micah 5:2-4
Zec 3:8,9, 6:12, 13, 9:9, 11:13, 12:10, 13:7
Ho 11:1
Mal 3:1-3, 4:2
Hag 2:7,
Luke 24:44, 45
John 1:45
Acts 3:33, 10:43, 26:22

A sample of what such a wealth of scripture interpreting scripture can bring.
 
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Have enjoyed this thread!

I like the fact that The Spirit of the Reformation NIV Study Bible has the confessions.

Is there an ESV Bible that has the confesssions in it available?
 
Nope, other than the Schyler Bible.
I think a number of people have been hampering Bible publishers to include this feature , but for some reason its a closed door.

Mr Mark Bertrand writes in one of his blogs hereunder:

"The second love-it-or-hate-it feature, much more significant than the imprinting, is the inclusion of the ecumenical creeds and a selection of Reformation-era confessions of faith. For years, whenever Bible publishers have asked what features I'd like to see in an edition, the one suggestion I've repeated over and over is the inclusion of creeds and confessions in the back. To my mind, this is a "help" that actually helps, because gives access the church's tradition of interpretation. Traditionally, this material would have been placed inside a hymnal, but singing from a hymnal is about as popular with today's evangelical as elevating the host was in Puritan New England.

Before the Schuyler Bible, the only edition I could recommend to people curious about, say, Nicene orthodoxy or the Reformation era theological consensus (or lack thereof) was the Spirit of the Reformation Study Bible. Now there's a slimmer option. Unlike the SRSB, the Schuyler doesn't index the creeds and confessions with the Bible text, so you won't find marginal notes in Ephesians 1 directing you to a section in the Westminster Larger Catechism or vice versa. Also, the Schuyler omits the Three Forms of Unity, perhaps the most important of the Reformed standards, which consists of the Belgic Confession, the Canons of Dordt, and one of the few catechisms I'm aware of which is the subject of a rap song, the Heidelberg --- Bible Design and Binding "

I would really like this feature with any good reference Bible
 
I have just bought a Westminster Study Bible and am very pleased with it - nicely presented, easily readable, and of course plenty of references. I would recommend it.
I also have John Brown's original Self-Interpreting Bible with his commentary in which is great, but no quite as practical for taking anywhere as it is an old iron-clasp massive family Bible!

When I first heard of the Westminster Reference Bible project, I got the Self-Interpreting Bible. (I've got one whole set (4 vols) and then 2 additional ones. If someone wants the 2 volumes, PM me.) But in order to use it regularly, I'll have to have the 4 vols. re-bound. The most common editions found today, from roughly 100 years ago, also included the work of a few subsequent editors over the course of many years. From what I can tell, the devotional type summary of every chapter are about the only notes of which I am confident are the work of Brown himself. The others have the initials of the editor at the end of the note.
 
The mail man was very nice to me today! I just received my copy the WRB about ten minutes ago. I think it is the perfect size. Not too big. Not too small. However, it is larger than my Windsor Metrical. The leather cover is smooth but not shiny; a little rigid (they used a thicker board), but it opens nicely and lays open nicely; very flexible spine. The text looks just like the Windsor. It has four ribbons (two red; two black) and sixteen unlined bible paper pages in the back for notes. The smell is great and it looks like a high quality bible. And with over 200,000 cross-references, I am a very happy camper!

I'm looking forward to getting this too. I was almost giddy when I saw the Evangelical Bible price too. :banana: I should hope it's bigger than the Windsor. With 200k x-refs, it would be unreadable otherwise! Is the text larger than the Windsor or the same size? It looks to be basically the same font in the pics.

On their FB page, Evangelical Bible says they are considering giving the WRB the Schuyler treatment as well.
 
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