An Interactive Presentation of Thematic Symmetry (Chiasm / Parallelism)

Generated with the Chiasmatron 2000

Attribution: Bob Schlenker (January 6, 2020)

Directions:

What you see above is an exhibit of the linguistic structure that appears throughout the Bible. The passage of scripture is straight from the Bible. Nothing has been added or removed or shifted out of sequence.

What's the point? Be inspired by the awesomeness of the Author's Word. Meditate prayerfully on what you see, seeking insight about each thematic pairing. How are the elements alike? How do they differ. Why are they paired? If questions are raised that would not otherwise be raised, ask them. May the Author Himself grant you insight.

To engage with the interactive features, pass your mouse cursor over the passage. Hovering over (or tapping on) a line of text will cause it to be highlighted along with matching elements. Hovering over a bar will produce the same result.

If a line of text is underlined or a bar looks different click on (or double tap) it. Commentary will appear (in a window you can drag around the screen) and the highlighting will freeze.

Tips: If an interactive presentation is too big to fit on screen, you have options. You can make your browser full screen (try F11) to make full use of your screen size. You can adjust the browser zoom to scale up or down (ctrl-minus to zoom out). Zooming out so the entire presentation is visible can help you explore the structure at that level even if the text is too small to read, zooming in when you're ready to read and compare texts. If the highlighted texts you want to compare are too far apart you can reduce the space between them by collapsing text. To use the "collapse-to-a-line" feature just right click on any bar and the associated text will collapse. Keep collapsing until you have the view that works best. These can be restored by clicking on a collapsed line (left-click will also launch a comment window but if you want to restore without launching the comment window, right-click it). A commentary window can be dragged to reposition it. Finally, if you have a monitor that rotates into a portrait display (taller than it is wide), the extra vertical real estate can be very helpful.

For more explanation, see: About These Thematic Patterns

For more examples, see: Interactive Content