Sixty-Six Clouds: Visualizing Word Frequency in the Bible

My taste in art doesn't run to the sentimental. There are no paintings of glowing cottages on my walls, no feel-good mottos stenciled with leafy borders. Popular religious art tends to be pretty kitschy in my book, which is why you won't bump into me in the "gift" section of the Christian bookstore. What can I say? I'm an austere, logocentric kind of guy.

Which is why I find this so appealing:

Brad Thomas plugged the text of the NIV into Wordle.net to study word frequency in the various books of the Bible. The more common the word, the larger it appears in the resulting word cloud. And in addition to being informative, these clouds have an aesthetic quality to them, so he decided to make them available in both book and poster form. There's also a video showing each of the 66 word clouds making up the Bible:

For more info about the project, including how to order books and posters, check out Sixty-Six Clouds: Visualizing Word Frequency in the Bible. And here's a clever way to make use of the posters, courtesy of Chaplaincy Matters:

I am currently using 66 clouds to make a timeline around my office wall that will contain when the books of the Bible were written and other religious events over the centuries. I will finish the timeline with what our school has been doing over the past 5 years (missions etc). This will not only make a visually interesting and stimulating display but will be a great learning tool.

That probably takes more wall space than I have, but it sounds pretty cool.

Comments

[Pastor Ron]

This is so cool; I'm going to do this with my favorite version, the ESV. Thank you for the post.

[Kyle Hedricik]

Excellent idea. Thanks for the post Mark.

[Alan]

Didn't you ask for this for Christmas?
http://tinyurl.com/28ymcug

[bill]

The $9 bound book of 66 clouds available at http://www.66clouds.com/ looks like a great stocking stuffer. Ahh, but it's currently sold out!

Pr Ron, good luck with the individual books. Here's the complete ESV: http://www.wordle.net/show/ESV_Bible
and NT: http://www.thecrazyaustralian.com/the-wordle-new-testament/

[John]

That is just cool! And @Pastor Ron, I'll be looking for an update if you ever get the ESV done ;-)

@Mark, I was so pumped to see another Roland March book coming out on your sidebar! I loved the first one. Well-developed characters, realistic dialogue, compelling plot--the very antithesis of the cliched Christian novel. Please, keep 'em coming!

Blessing

[Zookclan]

I have used Wordle in the past at the beginning of a couple of Sermon Series and had it projected for the congregation to see prior to my first message. People really liked the design element and it gives me the opportunity to orient the congregation to "keep the main thing the main thing".

[Brad Thomas]

Sorry about the books being sold out. They are currently available for $11.95 through Amazon's print on demand service "CreateSpace" at www.createspace.com/3531213 and will soon be available directly through Amazon.com sometime before the end of the year.

Blessings.

[Cris D.]

I've been running portions of Scripture through Wordle for a couple of years for Bible Studies, etc. I've also loaded in the Westminster Confession and Catechisms, Heidelberg Catechism, etc. It's a great visual tool to assist in analysis of a text. It can help you catch relationships. Sometimes it helps to see what words aren't being used, also. And remember, kids, important concepts are often found under a variety of words, don't ignore synonyms and antonyms.

-=Cris=-

[Christian Book Publishers]

This is a great idea - not surprising that it should do well.