Subject: All Strong's numbers for the King James |
Bible Note: James Strong, LL.D., S.T.D, was a former professor of exegetical theology at Drew Theological Seminary. It is said that he spent more than thirty-five years preparing his landmark concordance. The Strong’s Concordance was first published in 1890. Nelson Publishing which supplies a very brief bio claims the Strong's remains the most widely used concordance and dictionary of Bible words from the King James Version of the Bible. It should be noted that Dr. Strong was compiling a concordance and ‘NOT’ a dictionary or lexicon as many people attempt to use the Strong’s concordance for. Dr. Strong indexed every word in the Bible and assigned a number to them. His numbering is considered the standard and is used extensively in other works. At the end of his concordance Dr. Strong then supplied the actual Hebrew/Greek word and a very ‘Brief’ definition and then a list of all words the King James translators translated from this particular Hebrew/Greek word. The Strong’s definitions and lists of words are after the fact. In other words Dr. Strong gave the definition for the Hebrew of Greek that fit the meaning of the word the King James translators had chosen to use. In some cases the definition supplied in Strong’s is not the complete definition of the original language word or carries a meaning the original never intended to project. A student doing a word study should always refer to a Greek or Hebrew dictionaries for a complete and total understanding. New “complete” / “exhaustive” / etc. Strong’s are coming to the market that correct much of this, but a word to wise is, to still use a good Hebrew/Greek Dictionary to gain a full understanding of the meaning of the word. Doc as for your little ditty "Young's is for the young, Crudens is for the crude, but Strong's is for the strong!" I remember hearing it but I can’t recall the exact implications. I suspect it was probably created by the ‘King James only’ people. Since Young had his own translation, Crudens was critical of the King James translation and Strong’s seemed to back the King James translators choice of words. Before anyone jumps all over me, by saying this I do not mean to infer the King James is in any way an inferior translation. |