What is Strong's Exhaustive Concordance?

Strong's Exhaustive Concordance is a classic Bible study reference originally published in 1890. Dr. James Strong, who was a professor of exegetical theology at Drew Theological Seminary from 1868 to 1893, spent thirty-five years of his life compiling the concordance. A concordance is an alphabetical listing of the words in a text with citations of the passages concerned. Strong's Exhaustive Concordance is called "exhaustive" meaning "thorough and comprehensive" because it lists each of the 773,746 words used in the King James Version of the Bible. Each word then has citations for every biblical book, chapter, and verse where that word appears.

Strong's Exhaustive Concordance also contains a lexicon. A lexicon is a dictionary or alphabetical arrangement of words, usually of an ancient language, and their definitions. Strong's Exhaustive Concordance contains Hebrew, Aramaic (Chaldee), and New Testament Greek lexicons where each word is assigned a number (known as Strong's number). In the lexicon, correct pronunciation is plainly marked, along with every English word to which it has been translated in the Bible, and every biblical passage that uses that original word.

Newer versions of Strong's Exhaustive Concordance include word comparisons that enable the readers to compare words in the King James Version to other, newer, biblical translations. Of course, with the ubiquity of the internet, all this information is now available online at sites like BlueLetterBible.org. However, Strong's numbers are still in use today and his life's work is an invaluable resource for anyone interested in a deeper study of the Word of God.


Related Truth:

What is a Bible concordance and how can it be used?

Are study Bibles helpful? What is a study Bible?

How can doing a word study be helpful in understanding the Bible?

What are some good Bible study methods?

Is there a proper way to study the Bible?


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