The original-languages toolbox.
The free tools we keep open in the next tab, the video lessons to watch, and the few books worth owning when you're ready to read past Genesis 5. Flagged items are where to start; the rest is where to grow. These are the tools the nine lessons assume you have.
Watch the lessons — free, every week
Verse-by-verse Hebrew and Greek, the alphabet, and the stories behind the words — new lessons weekly.
Our channel is the video companion to this site: the same word-by-word method as the Genesis reader, in motion. Subscribe on YouTube so the next lesson finds you.
The workhorse
Blue Letter BibleStart here
The single most useful free Bible-study tool on the internet. Search any verse → tap Interlinear → every English word shows its Hebrew/Greek word and Strong's number → tap the number and get the lexicon entry plus every occurrence in the Bible. That loop is Lesson 3, and it will carry you for years. Real lexicons (BDB for Hebrew, Thayer for Greek) are built into the same page when you outgrow Strong's glosses. Free, no account needed.
Study platforms
STEP Bible
Scholarly-grade and beginner-friendly at once: hover any word for its original-language vocab, color-code by grammar, compare manuscripts. The best "second tool" once Blue Letter Bible feels natural. Works offline too.
Bible Hub
Every translation side-by-side on one page, plus interlinears, lexicons, and topical indexes. Especially good for Lesson 4 work — seeing ten translations at once instantly exposes which words the translators disagreed about, and disagreement marks the spots worth digging.
NET Bible
A modern translation published with its homework attached: 60,000+ translator footnotes explaining why they rendered each phrase the way they did. Reading the notes is like sitting behind the translation committee. Free forever by design.
e-Sword
Free desktop study software with downloadable Bibles, lexicons, and commentaries. The offline option — everything local, fast, and yours.
The original texts
Tanach.us — Westminster Leningrad Codex
The complete Hebrew Bible in the same Masoretic text this site's Genesis reader is built from. When you're ready to read past Genesis 5, this is the text itself, beautifully presented.
Sefaria
The Hebrew Tanakh with the entire rabbinic library linked beside it — Rashi, the Talmud, midrash — with English translations. When a teaching claims "the rabbis say…," this is where you check what the rabbis actually said (see the calibration notes on the Lens page). Also has BDB built in.
SBL Greek New Testament
A free, critically edited Greek New Testament — the same text behind this site's John 1 reader.
Books worth owning — the shelf you grow into
The free tools above are enough to start and will carry you for years. These are the few print tools serious students end up buying — the natural next steps once you've read Genesis 1–5 here. Each link goes straight to the exact edition on Amazon.
Affiliate disclosure: As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Buying through these links costs you nothing extra and helps keep every learning tool on this site free. Titles are recommended for their usefulness to students, not for commission.
Read real text sooner — reader's editions
A Reader's Hebrew BibleStart here
The entire Hebrew Bible with every word that occurs under ~100 times glossed right at the foot of the page — so you keep reading instead of stopping to look words up. The single best "what do I read after Genesis 5?" answer. Flexible Italian Duo-Tone edition, built to be carried. View on Amazon →
A Reader's Greek New Testament (3rd ed.)
The same idea for the Greek New Testament: the full running text with rare vocabulary footnoted, so you read the Gospels rather than decode them one word at a time. The companion to your John 1 work. View on Amazon →
Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia — A Reader's Edition
The scholar's Hebrew Bible — the standard critical Masoretic text this site's reader is built from — with a reader's apparatus and glossary bound in. The one to own when you want the real critical edition, made readable. View on Amazon →
The UBS Greek New Testament — A Reader's Edition (5th)
The critically edited Greek New Testament with a running dictionary at the bottom of every page. The reader's edition used in seminaries — the Greek counterpart to the BHS reader. View on Amazon →
Learn the grammar — the formal path
Basics of Biblical Hebrew Grammar · Workbook
The standard first-year seminary Hebrew course (Pratico & Van Pelt), 3rd edition. If you want the formal grammar alongside this site's drills, this is the one professors assign. Pair it with the matching workbook. Grammar → Workbook →
Basics of Biblical Greek Grammar · Workbook
Mounce's Basics of Biblical Greek, 4th edition — the most widely used first-year Greek grammar in the English-speaking world. The formal track behind your Greek alphabet work. Grammar → Workbook →
Hebrew for the Rest of Us · Greek for the Rest of Us
The gentler path: how to use Hebrew and Greek tools — lexicons, interlinears, software — without a full grammar course. Perfect if you want the payoff of the languages faster. Ideal bridge from this site into real study. Hebrew → Greek →
The reference shelf — lexicons & concordance
The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon
BDB — the classic Hebrew lexicon, Strong's-coded so you can look up any word by number. The paper version of the lookup loop the lessons teach; the reference serious Hebrew students keep for life. View on Amazon →
The Strongest Strong's Exhaustive Concordance
Every word in the Bible, indexed to its Hebrew and Greek original with Strong's numbers. The updated, most complete edition — the offline backbone of word study when you're away from a screen. View on Amazon →
Read the Bible better — the method
How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth (4th ed.)Read first
The classic one-volume hermeneutics book (Fee & Stuart) — genre by genre, how each kind of biblical literature asks to be read. The book-length version of the nine lessons, and the best $15 you can spend on Bible study. View on Amazon →
The data this site is built from
openscriptures/morphhb — the Westminster Leningrad Codex with full morphological tagging · openscriptures/strongs — Strong's dictionaries as open data · morphgnt/sblgnt — the SBL Greek NT with morphology · Dodson Greek Lexicon — open-licensed Greek glosses. Open scholarship makes a site like this possible; if you build something with these, pass it on.
Get the next resource first
We add tools, readers, and video lessons regularly. Leave your email and we’ll send one note when the next one is ready — nothing else.