Well, after extensive haggling with Vincent, one of the technical guys at Logos, I had to concede that the parsing for qara' in Genesis 24:57 is probably a qal imperfect and cohortative. So the Westminster Morphological parsing is correct but imprecise. (See the comments section under Logos 4: Is It Worth It?)
Vincent says that the database for version two Westminister morphological tagging of the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia is not as precise as the newer databases for the same BHS. Thus the results will not be as accurate or precise. According to Vincent the newer databases for the Westminster morphology for the BHS reflect that the qal imperfect plural form is cohortative in Genesis 24:57.
Vincent also says that the newer releases do a better job of linking the Hebrew text, morphology, and lexicons. But I suppose the only way to decide if the newer versions do any better is to invest nearly $500. That's a big piece of change for the average pastor who is working in a church plant or a small to medium sized congregation.
Another issue is the ongoing investment value. Will the library I purchase be accessible and usable in four to five years? And what about the value of the books included in the base packages? How useful are they in actual practice? Most of the commentaries in the Logos Scholar's Edition are completely useless except for perhaps devotional reading. For the serious pastor doing exegesis critical commentaries are essential. The Logos Scholar's Edition is supposed to be a good medium range investment targeted for the busy pastor. But does it deliver?
On the Logos website we are promised that there are extensive commentaries. If you go to the Scholar's Edition link, you'll see another link for a complete listing of
Bible commentaries included with the base package. In that list, for example, you see the standard Matthew Henry commentary in both the concise and full version. Devotional commentaries are fine but not of much help otherwise. The other concise commentaries are equally useless, mainly the Bible Knowledge Commentary, Holman Concise Commentary, etc. These are acceptable for devotional use but not for sermon preparation.
The only two commentaries listed which might be of use to the busy pastor would be the Bible Exposition Commentary, 23 Volumes, and the Opening Up Commentary Collection, 30 Volumes. I searched the Logos site and found that the Opening Up Commentary Collection looks like a decent pulpit commentary, though I have not actually used or examined the contents. The commentators are mostly evangelical Baptists or Presbyterians and it is recommended by John MacArthur so no problem there.
But what about the Bible Exposition Commentary, 23 Vols.? Well, there seems to be an ambiguity here or else an error on the website. In the listing of the commentaries included the Bible Exposition Commentary is supposed to have 23 volumes. But when I searched the site I found that there are two possibilities. Either they meant Boice's Expositional Commentary, 27 Vols, or they meant Warren Wiersby's Expository Oulines of the OT and NT. The short of it is there is no Bible Exposition Commentary showing up in the search of products matching that description on the Logos website. Either this is an error on the advertisement posting or there is a deliberate misleading of potential customers. I will give the benefit of the doubt to Logos but needless to say this sort of ambiguity needs to be cleared up.
The short answer is do not jump too quickly into buying Logos base packages before you know what you are in reality getting for your investment. Commentaries on a more critical level are going to cost you much more in the Logos 4 system and that is a significant investment for most small time pastors and laymen. While Bible Works 8.0 does not have many commentaries either, the apparent technical advantages just from the biblical texts and tools provided seems to be much more extensive for the investment of $349.00 over against the $472.46 of Logos 4. After January 31st the price for Logos 4 Scholar's Edition goes to $629.95.
In defense of Logos, I have to say that Logos 4 does work well in the new look and appearance and the RAM hogging I observed at first was probably due to the synchronization of the books on intial installation. That process can take a couple of hours or longer depending on the speed of you computer. Logos 4 will work well on new computers with Windows 7 and 64 bit processing but I'm not sure about computers 3-4 years old or older.
The learning curve with Logos 4 is not that bad after I got the hang of it. But I still think the helps file is terrible. I had to have a Logos technician comment on the blog before I figured out how to toggle between the BHS and the LXX in the exegetical guide.
I still have to review Bible Works 8.0 but Logos 4 is still a viable option if you have lots of money to spend with moderate to medium return for your investment. Don't get me wrong, Logos is a great software package if you have a reasonable knowledge of Greek and Hebrew and you know how to use the hard copy tools with which most seminarians are familiar. But the ease of use issue is debatable. Logos 4 also has a much more extensive add on library, including the Word Biblical Commentary, etc. But these additions can involve an extensive investment which will be usable at least in the near future but maybe not forever? The reality is that computers and software become obsolete and have to be upgraded. Logos.com seems to be capitalizing on that by following Microsoft's similar business model. Monopolizing the market is a way to profit quickly and to make the consumer dependent on the dominant format. Logos obviously wants to be the Microsoft of the computer exegesis world. It seems to me that healthy competition is good for the consumer. Don't be too quick to jump on the Logos bandwagon.
Charlie
Vincent says that the database for version two Westminister morphological tagging of the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia is not as precise as the newer databases for the same BHS. Thus the results will not be as accurate or precise. According to Vincent the newer databases for the Westminster morphology for the BHS reflect that the qal imperfect plural form is cohortative in Genesis 24:57.
Vincent also says that the newer releases do a better job of linking the Hebrew text, morphology, and lexicons. But I suppose the only way to decide if the newer versions do any better is to invest nearly $500. That's a big piece of change for the average pastor who is working in a church plant or a small to medium sized congregation.
Another issue is the ongoing investment value. Will the library I purchase be accessible and usable in four to five years? And what about the value of the books included in the base packages? How useful are they in actual practice? Most of the commentaries in the Logos Scholar's Edition are completely useless except for perhaps devotional reading. For the serious pastor doing exegesis critical commentaries are essential. The Logos Scholar's Edition is supposed to be a good medium range investment targeted for the busy pastor. But does it deliver?
On the Logos website we are promised that there are extensive commentaries. If you go to the Scholar's Edition link, you'll see another link for a complete listing of
Bible commentaries included with the base package. In that list, for example, you see the standard Matthew Henry commentary in both the concise and full version. Devotional commentaries are fine but not of much help otherwise. The other concise commentaries are equally useless, mainly the Bible Knowledge Commentary, Holman Concise Commentary, etc. These are acceptable for devotional use but not for sermon preparation.The only two commentaries listed which might be of use to the busy pastor would be the Bible Exposition Commentary, 23 Volumes, and the Opening Up Commentary Collection, 30 Volumes. I searched the Logos site and found that the Opening Up Commentary Collection looks like a decent pulpit commentary, though I have not actually used or examined the contents. The commentators are mostly evangelical Baptists or Presbyterians and it is recommended by John MacArthur so no problem there.
But what about the Bible Exposition Commentary, 23 Vols.? Well, there seems to be an ambiguity here or else an error on the website. In the listing of the commentaries included the Bible Exposition Commentary is supposed to have 23 volumes. But when I searched the site I found that there are two possibilities. Either they meant Boice's Expositional Commentary, 27 Vols, or they meant Warren Wiersby's Expository Oulines of the OT and NT. The short of it is there is no Bible Exposition Commentary showing up in the search of products matching that description on the Logos website. Either this is an error on the advertisement posting or there is a deliberate misleading of potential customers. I will give the benefit of the doubt to Logos but needless to say this sort of ambiguity needs to be cleared up.
The short answer is do not jump too quickly into buying Logos base packages before you know what you are in reality getting for your investment. Commentaries on a more critical level are going to cost you much more in the Logos 4 system and that is a significant investment for most small time pastors and laymen. While Bible Works 8.0 does not have many commentaries either, the apparent technical advantages just from the biblical texts and tools provided seems to be much more extensive for the investment of $349.00 over against the $472.46 of Logos 4. After January 31st the price for Logos 4 Scholar's Edition goes to $629.95.
In defense of Logos, I have to say that Logos 4 does work well in the new look and appearance and the RAM hogging I observed at first was probably due to the synchronization of the books on intial installation. That process can take a couple of hours or longer depending on the speed of you computer. Logos 4 will work well on new computers with Windows 7 and 64 bit processing but I'm not sure about computers 3-4 years old or older.
The learning curve with Logos 4 is not that bad after I got the hang of it. But I still think the helps file is terrible. I had to have a Logos technician comment on the blog before I figured out how to toggle between the BHS and the LXX in the exegetical guide.
I still have to review Bible Works 8.0 but Logos 4 is still a viable option if you have lots of money to spend with moderate to medium return for your investment. Don't get me wrong, Logos is a great software package if you have a reasonable knowledge of Greek and Hebrew and you know how to use the hard copy tools with which most seminarians are familiar. But the ease of use issue is debatable. Logos 4 also has a much more extensive add on library, including the Word Biblical Commentary, etc. But these additions can involve an extensive investment which will be usable at least in the near future but maybe not forever? The reality is that computers and software become obsolete and have to be upgraded. Logos.com seems to be capitalizing on that by following Microsoft's similar business model. Monopolizing the market is a way to profit quickly and to make the consumer dependent on the dominant format. Logos obviously wants to be the Microsoft of the computer exegesis world. It seems to me that healthy competition is good for the consumer. Don't be too quick to jump on the Logos bandwagon.
Charlie
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