Artificial Intelligence for Bible Translation and Interpretation

Douglas Estes is associate professor of religion at New College of Florida.

• Introduction: A Brief History of Technology and the BibleWes Viner with Douglas EstesPart I – AI in Bible TranslationChapter One: The eBible Corpus: Data and Model Benchmarks for Bible Translation to Low-Resource LanguagesMarcus SchwartingChapter Two: AI Tools as Quality Assessment Copilots in Bible TranslationCassie WeishauptChapter Three: AI and Translation: A Human-Centric Approach for Bible TranslationsRyder WishartChapter Four: Asking the Right Questions at the Right TimeRandall TanPart II – AI and Bible TranslationChapter Five: Render to AI What Is AI’sElizabeth RobarChapter Six: Statistical Interpretation of Religious TextMark GravesChapter Seven: Open to Interpretation: The Jewish Canon and the Power of AISara WolkenfeldChapter Eight: Should the Torah Speak?David Zvi KalmanChapter Nine: Languages, Texts, and Bodies: Locating Large Language Models and Deep Learning Within the Biblical NarrativeKutter CallawayPart III – AI and Bible InterpretationChapter Ten: Using AI to Refine Our Interpretation of the Biblical Notion of “imago Dei”Marius DorobantuChapter Eleven: “Are Any of You Wise and Understanding?”: James’ Embodied Epistemology and Norms of Information FlowMelanie DzuganChapter Twelve: The Bible as a Dataset for the Christian MindDaren ErismanChapter Thirteen: Generating Apocalypse: AI, Imagination, and Ancient ApocalypseDouglas Estes

Few developments are shaping modern life as rapidly as artificial intelligence, now making its mark across all fields—including biblical studies. This timely collection demonstrates the enormous and mostly positive impact of AI for biblical studies, particularly in areas of textual criticism, translation, and interpretation, while also examining important limitations and potential pitfalls. An impressive roster of contributors, including several with deep expertise in both religion and AI, provide historical context and insightful direction through the most promising and intriguing possibilities on the horizon