bible-study-handout

LaTeX-based handout for group study on a Bible passage. Handout style is based on Tufte-LaTeX. Output format is PDF, meant to be printed on single 11x17 page, folded in half to make a 4-page booklet.

See sample-handout.pdf for an example handout on Exodus 20. Keep in mind that pages 2 and 3 will be side-by-side in the middle of the 4-page booklet, as depicted in sample-handout-11x17.pdf.

Goals

This handout format is the product of many iterations. Here are some of the goals:

• Provide all information needed to engage in a group study session on a single handout. For lack of a better term, everyone can be on the same page.
  • This way, at any given moment, each person in the group can be looking at different information (parallel random access). (This is not true when a presenter uses slides, where everyone is looking at the same slide). This encourages individuals to follow their own interest as he/she wades through a passage.
• Provide all study information (from different sources) interleaved sequentially, so that the reader doesn't have to bounce between resources to engage deeper on a question or topic. As a reader ponders a particular verse, the study note is inches away (instead of in a different book, device, or section).
  • Keep the focus on the Biblical text, not the study notes
• Provide more information in the handout than you intend to cover together as a group. Generally, humans can read 6x faster than a presenter can speak. This type of self-study can be done while the group as a whole is engaged in a related verbal discussion.
• Show the passage of interest in context with the rest of its Bible book. Show the passage interleaved within the book outline.
• Optionally, show a summary graphic at the beginning of the handout that encompasses the entire book. This helps the reader remember the overall story of the book--not just the passage at hand.
• Good typography and visual appeal. (Sadly, this is sometimes a lost art.)
• Provide something physical that attendees can take with them to continue their study on their own time.
  • Alternatively, make this handout (digitally?) available for group members who were not able to attend the specific group study.

Content Sources

• Bible text is from the ESV. Anyone can register to obtain your own (free) API Key at https://api.esv.org/account/.
  • You're welcome to adapt the scripts to pull a different Bible version from another source, if you wish
    • Anyone can register to obtain your own (free) API Key at http://bibles.org/pages/api
• Study notes are from the ESV Study Bible. You'll need to use your own account at https://www.esv.org/ that provides access to the ESV Study Bible. If your account does not give you access to the ESV Study Bible, then you're free to find another source
  • You're welcome to adapt the scripts to pull study commentary from a different source, if you wish

Optionally, you're free to include some sort of summary graphic at the beginning of your handout. I happen to like the posters available per book from The Bible Project.

Environment

Meant to run on Ubuntu

Prerequisites

• LaTeX (Ubuntu installation instructions at https://help.ubuntu.com/community/LaTeX)
• xpath (Ubuntu installation via libxml-xpath-perl package)
• jq (Ubuntu installation via jq package)
• pdfbook (Ubuntu installation via texlive-extra-utils package)

Getting Started

Start by downloading the submodule code:

git submodule update --init --recursive

Next, obtain the ESV Bible text for your chosen passage into esv.txt using something like this:

curl -X GET --header 'Accept: application/json' --header 'Authorization: Token #{YOUR_ESV_ORG_API_KEY}' 'https://api.esv.org/v3/passage/html/?q=dan9&include-passage-references=false&include-chapter-numbers=false&include-first-verse-numbers=true&include-verse-numbers=true&include-footnotes=false&include-surrounding-chapters-below=false' | python -mjson.tool > esv.txt

Be sure to replace #{YOUR_ESV_ORG_API_KEY} with your actual API Key. Also, replace dan9 with your chosen passage.

If you're pulling a non-ESV version from bibles.org, use following instead:

curl -Lg -u #{YOUR_BIBLES_ORG_API_KEY}:X "https://bibles.org/v2/passages.js?q[]=dan9&version=spa-RVR1960&include_marginalia=true" | python -mjson.tool > bible.txt

Next, obtain the ESV Study Bible notes for your chosen passage into study.html using something like this:

PYTHONIOENCODING=UTF-8 ./curl-auth-csrf.py -i "https://my.crossway.org/cas/login/?service=https://www.esv.org/login/" -d email=#{YOUR_ACCOUNT_EMAIL} https://www.esv.org/partials/study-content/dan9/esv-study-bible/ > study.html

The tool used here is curl-auth-csrf, but you're welcome to download study.html manually if you want. Be sure to replace #{YOUR_ACCOUNT_EMAIL} with your actual registered email address. Also, replace dan9 with your chosen passage.

Next, invoke the following:

make clean sources

Next, paste in the entire contents of esv.out (bible.out) into handout.tex.

Next, paste in the contents of study.out into handout.tex, line by line.

• For study comments that cover a single verse, paste each line between \begin{studycomment} and \end{studycomment} right before the corresponding verse numbers. This will place them in the margin, right next to the verses they apply to.
• For study comments that cover multiple verses, paste each line between \begin{studycomment*} and \end{studycomment*} right before the corresponding verse numbers. This will place them inline, right before the verses they apply to.
  • Use \noindent{} if you're interrupting a paragraph

Tips:

• For any study comments that precede the Biblical text, you may wish to use studyblock* instead of studycomment* (as indentation isn't necessary)
• For any studycomment* instances which overlap text from other studycomment instances, simply convert the studycomment* to studycommentinline. This will pull the study comment to be inline with the Bible text.
• You can add context via an outline of the book of the Bible via bookoutline
• For other hints, please see Tufte-LaTeX

See the sample-handout.pdf for how these styles are used.

As mentioned above, this is meant to be printed on single 11x17 page, folded in half to make a 4-page booklet.

Any remaining space in the handout (through the end of page 4) can be filled with your own LaTeX content, such as your main points, additional graphics, etc.

Be sure to include all required copyright statements, to keep legal your usage of others' content.

Once you're ready to render, invoke the following:

make clean all

Optionally, to see the final product:

xdg-open handout.pdf

As mentioned above, this is meant to be printed on single 11x17 page, folded in half to make a 4-page booklet.

You can use your printer driver to make that conversion, or just use handout-11x17.pdf, which has already been converted for you.