The Bible is made up of 66 “books.” Although they are called “books,” they vary greatly in length; the shortest ones are only a page or two long. The Bible has two main parts. The first part was written first and is called the Old Testament. The second part was written later and is called the New Testament. The Old Testament has 39 books and the New Testament has 27 books. (Some of the books in the New Testament are letters to people.)
Each book is divided into chapters. Most books have more than one chapter, but Obadiah, Philemon, 2 John, 3 John, and Jude each have only one chapter. All the chapters are divided into verses.
When we want to refer to a verse, we first write the name of the book, then the chapter, and then the verse. For example, “John 3:16” means the book of John, chapter 3, verse 16.
When we refer to two or more verses that are next to each other, we put a line between them. “John 3:16-18” means the book of John, chapter 3, verses 16, 17, and 18.
When we refer to verses that are not next to each other, we use commas to separate them. “John 3:2, 6, 9” means the book of John, chapter 3, verses 2, 6, and 9.
After the chapter and verse numbers, we put the abbreviation for the translation of the Bible that we used. In the example below, “ULT” stands for the *unfoldingWord® Literal Text*.
In unfoldingWord® Translation Academy, we use this system to tell where portions of Scripture come from. If the whole verse or set of verses is not shown, we indicate that with letter “a” or “b” after the verse number. A letter “a” indicates that the beginning is shown but the ending of the verse is not shown. A letter “b” indicates that the beginning of the verse is not shown. The letter “b” means that the Scripture quotation starts somewhere after the beginning of the verse. It may or may not include all of the rest of the verse.
The text below comes from the book of Judges chapter 6 verse 28, but it is not the entire verse. The verse has more at the end. In unfoldingWord® Translation Academy, we only show the part of the verse that we want to talk about.
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