Tuesday, July 18, 2017

An Example of Pattern Analysis: Acts 3:1-11

Pattern Analysis, an analytical tool to help discern the emphatic voice of the Holy Spirit in the Bible, is one step closer to being released to the public. I am so excited because the first book, Pattern Analysis Handbook: A Compact Guide, has been sent to a few Bible scholars for their technical review. I can now, for the moment, concentrate on the web-based presentation of these structured themes.

Pattern analysis allows us to use our native language (mine is English) to understand what was most important to the Holy Spirit when He inspired the Bible. We don't need to know the ancient Hebrew or Greek although that is always a good thing. Instead we analyze the repetitive patterns to help us find what is most important. These patterns, what I call structured themes, persist in whatever language you are using as long as your translation is fairly literal.

I typically use the New American Standard Bible (NASB) because it attempts to adhere to the original languages without rephrasing for the sake of readability. When sentences are reorganized or new paragraphs started which are not logically based literary units, these structured themes can be much more difficult to discern. Reorganized text can lead to the association of two themes that were not intended to be associated together.

Back to pattern analysis. A chiasm is one of the ways that themes were organized. Here is an example from Acts 3:1-11. On the left side of that page, there is a brief explanation of four emphatic portions to that chiasm. Then as you scroll over each of the elements on the right, the colors should change to reflect their association.

You may contact me directly at Tom@ThomasBClarke.com for further inquiries about pattern analysis.
Many blessings, Tom