Two sermons drawing from the same text, linked to different β but related β topics. Awarded a prize from the American Sociological Association, this study is representative of a recent research trend in the humanities and social sciences: computational hermeneutics, which analyze and interpret cultural phenomena by drawing on quantitative methods and empirical data.
In their work, the researchers describe the semantic organization of the Old and New Testament at the verse level. To do so, they first created a semantic network of the Bible, that is, the way the figures, places, objects, and concepts are mentioned within the verses. Then, proceeding as would a reader who grasps the meaning of a paragraph by embracing the whole rather than focusing on a specific word, expressions that are frequently mentioned within or near a same phrase were linked within a lexical network.
The network of terms thus created gave shape to thematic groupings that index single episodes β creation of the world or escape from Egypt β and enumerate recurring motifs in the narrative β vices and virtues, as well as elements of the material world, etc.
This distant reading of the Bible is not a new exegesis of the sacred text, but rather a general map showing how the themes relate to one another and offering a reference point to compare different readings of the scared text. This reference space serves as a canvas for grasping different ways the Bible can be read and perceived by different Churches.
It indexed the most popular sermons by subjects addressed and verses quoted. Conformists and dissidents were not equally interested in all passages of the Bible: non-conformists quoted Genesis much more often, while conformists preferred the asceticism of the gospel according to St. By using a digital version of this body of sermons, the authors of the study were able to associate the verses quoted by a given persuasion of preachers, allowing them to precisely identify the Bible chapters and parts particularly used by each Church.
