Where do you find what scholars say about specific topics?
Where do you find out what scholars say about certain biblical topics? Are
there any websites or books you can recommend me?
This is really too broad a question for me to be able to give
a really good answer. It would depend on the kind of question you were
trying to ask. There are many thousands of sources, and dozens of kinds
of resources one could look at to research what scholars say on any kind
of Bible-related topic. I would say that the resource you should use
would depend on where you are at personally in your own study. If you are
a relative beginner, I would suggest beginning with reading the Bible
through in more than one translation, as being grounded in the Word of God
itself is the first principle of understanding the Bible. Second, I would
suggest using some selective commentaries on some of the major books of
the Bible. Third, I would suggest acquiring a good Bible Dictionary, as
well as an analytic Concordance to the Bible. The idea here is for you to
get a solid and fairly deep knowledge of the Bible itself as the bedrock
on which you can judge the relative merits of the so-called Bible scholars.
Having said all that, I will say for myself that I am more and
more using the internet to answer Bible questions and even to ask what
scholars say on different issues. However, one should be aware that there
is a lot of junk out there on the internet, so a personal ability to sort
through the good and spit out the bad is a necessity. Such ability is
only gained through hard work and study of the scriptures. If I want to
study out a particular topic in depth, I will definitely go beyond an
internet search and seek out references to thoroughly researched books on
the topic which I can buy and read.
If you have a more specific question about sources in a
particular area, I would be happy to respond.
John Oakes