User Guide | Greek New Testament Reader

1Quick start

The reader shows The Greek New Testament According to the Byzantine Text (Guardian Press, 2026), one chapter at a time. Nothing to install and nothing to sign in to. It works on a computer, tablet or phone.

Read. Pick a book and chapter at the top, or use the arrow buttons.
Tap a Greek word to see its parsing, lexical form, Strong’s number and definition.
Tap a † to see how eleven other Greek editions read at that spot. A ‡ means the note also lists manuscript evidence.
Use the toolbar to filter the apparatus, print a variant report, or turn on the English.

The reader showing John 1 with the toolbar across the top and a tapped word highlighted — The reading view. The toolbar holds the book and chapter menus, search, and the Parallel, Apparatus, Editions and Report buttons.

2Finding your place

Book and Chapter menus jump anywhere. The ← and → buttons (and the Previous and Next chapter buttons under each chapter) move one chapter at a time and cross from one book to the next.
Verse links. Tap a small verse number to highlight that verse and put its address in the browser’s address bar. Copy the address to send someone straight to that verse.
Your place is remembered. When you come back, the reader reopens where you left off.
Preface & Appendices opens the edition’s preface, introduction, list of abbreviations and appendices. On a phone, this button appears on wider screens only.

3Parsing a word

Tap or click any Greek word. A panel opens at the bottom of the screen with:

the Strong’s number (for example G1510);
the part of speech and full parsing, with the short code in brackets (for example V-IAI-3S, a verb, imperfect active indicative, 3rd person singular);
the lexical form (εἰμί) and a short English gloss;
a fuller definition when the lexicon has one.

The word panel open for the first word of John 1:1 showing G1510 and its parsing — Tapping ἦν in John 1:1. Close the panel with the × or the `Esc` key.

Good to know. The parsing and definitions are study aids. They come from the public domain Robinson–Pierpont Byzantine Textform and the Dodson Greek Lexicon, and are matched by computer to each word of this edition. Where this edition reads differently from the Robinson–Pierpont text, a few words may have no parsing, and the panel says “No parsing is available for this word.”

4The apparatus

The Guardian Press edition compares its text with eleven other Greek editions. The reader puts that apparatus right in the line of text.

A † (dagger) sits before the word or phrase in question. Tap it to open the note.
A ‡ (double dagger) means that note also carries manuscript evidence: which manuscripts, versions or fathers support each reading.
The note starts with TEXT, the reading of this edition. Each competing reading then appears on its own line, with the editions that support it in small capitals first.
The chapter heading counts the variants in the chapter.
The Apparatus button hides or shows all the daggers if you want a clean page for reading.

An apparatus note open in Acts 24:4 showing the TEXT reading and the PCK reading — A note in Acts 24:4. The edition reads πλειον; Pickering’s text (ᴘᴄᴋ) reads πλεον.

5Stepping through variants

With a note open, the ‹ Prev and Next › buttons in the note jump to the previous or next variant. The page scrolls so that the variant is in view, and the note stays open. It shows your position, such as “4 of 48 variants in this chapter”.

At the end of a chapter, Next carries on into the next chapter that has a variant to show, and Prev does the same going back. You can step through the whole New Testament this way.
On a keyboard, the ← and → keys do the same thing while a note is open.
Stepping respects your filters (sections 7 and 8). It visits only the variants you have chosen to see.

6Reading the labels

Editions are named in small capitals. Several editions that agree are often joined under one label.

Label	Meaning
ʜꜰ, ᴘᴄᴋ, ᴘᴛ	Byzantine family: Hodges & Farstad Majority Text (1985), Pickering Family 35 (2020), Ecumenical Patriarchal Text (1912).
ᴇᴄᴍ, ɴᴀ²⁷, ɴᴀ²⁸, ꜱʙʟ, ᴛʜ, ᴡʜ	Critical editions: Editio Critica Maior (Mark, Acts, Catholic Epistles and Revelation only), Nestle–Aland 27th and 28th, SBL Greek New Testament, Tyndale House, Westcott–Hort.
ꜱᴄʀ, ꜱᴛ	Textus Receptus: Scrivener (1894) and Stephanus (1550).
ʀᴘᵐᵍ	The alternate Byzantine readings in the margin of the Robinson–Pierpont text.
ᴄᴛ	All the critical editions agree (including ᴇᴄᴍ where it exists).
ɴᴀ	Both Nestle–Aland editions agree.
ᴛʀ	Both Textus Receptus editions agree.
[ ] [[ ]] « »	Brackets around a label mean that edition has the same wording as the text but brackets it as doubtful, for example [ᴡʜ]. Brackets inside a reading are that edition’s own brackets.
om.	The listed editions omit the words.
italic and ^superscript	English comments in a note, such as om. and txt, are in italics. In manuscript evidence, the marks attached to a manuscript, such as corrector numbers, asterisks, vid, commas and any parentheses attached to the siglum, are raised, but a colon after the siglum is not. Parentheses that surround a whole siglum and its marks, as in (D²), stay normal size.
… (ellipsis)	The variant has two or more separate places in the same verse.

The full explanation, with worked examples, is in the edition’s own Preface & Appendices, under Special Abbreviations in the Edition Apparatus.

7Choosing editions

The Editions button lets you decide which editions you want to see. This is for the student who only cares how the Textus Receptus differs, or only what the critical text does.

Tick a whole group (Byzantine family, Critical text, Textus Receptus, RPmg) or pick individual editions.
The reader splits grouped labels for you. If you keep ɴᴀ²⁸ but not ɴᴀ²⁷, a note labelled ᴄᴛ is shown as ɴᴀ²⁸ ꜱʙʟ ᴛʜ ᴡʜ (only the editions you kept).
A note disappears when none of your editions is left in it. A reading disappears when none of its editions is selected. A label disappears when you have unticked that edition.
If you hide ᴇᴄᴍ, readings that only say txt are hidden too. When a reading refers to something you have hidden, the reader adjusts it: “as last ᴇᴄᴍ†” is replaced by the reading itself, and comments such as “cf. last note” are dropped if that note is not showing.
When a filter is on, the Editions button shows a count such as (3/12), and the line under the chapter heading tells you how many variants are showing out of the total.
Select all and Clear all do what they say. Your choice is remembered.

The Choose editions dialog with the Byzantine family and Critical text groups ticked — The Editions dialog. A group box ticks or clears all its editions at once.

8Kinds of variants

At the bottom of the Editions dialog is a choice of how much of the apparatus you want:

Beta. Apparatus filtering is still in beta and might not be perfect yet. If a variant is hidden that you expected to see, or shown when it should be hidden, choose Show all variants and tell us what you found.

Choice	What you see
Show all variants	Every note in the edition, including spelling differences. Exact rules No filtering. Every note and every reading in the apparatus is shown (subject to the edition checkboxes above).
Hide orthographic variants	Hides readings that differ from the text only in spelling: ει/ι (Δαυιδ/Δαυειδ), ττ/σσ, ρρ/ρσ, elision (αλλα/αλλ’), movable ν or ς, words divided differently (ο τι/οτι), doubled consonants (Ιωαννης/Ιωανης) and name spellings (Μωσης/Μωυσης). In a note with several readings, only the orthographic ones are removed; if all of them are orthographic, the note disappears. Exact rules How every filter works The edition checkboxes are applied first. Each reading is judged on its own against the note’s base text. A reading that is hidden is dropped; a reading that is not hidden stays. If at least one reading in a note stays, the note stays with only those readings. If no reading in a note stays, the note and its dagger disappear. A note that carries manuscript evidence (‡) is never hidden by this setting. If the rules cannot prove a reading is hidden, it stays. The branches of an ᴇᴄᴍ† split guiding line are kept or dropped together: if any branch stays, all of them stay. When ᴇᴄᴍ is not selected, a reading that only says txt is dropped. A reading is orthographic only if all of these hold It has no brackets, parentheses or numbers. Neither it nor the base text has accents or breathings. It has the same number of words as the base, or it is the same letters divided into different words (ο τι/οτι, μαραν αθα/μαραναθα). Every word, compared with the base word in the same position, is identical or differs only in one of the six ways below. The six differences allowed in a word Spelling. ει for ι, ττ for σσ, ρρ for ρσ, τθ for θθ, πφ for φφ, κχ for χχ (Δαυιδ/Δαυειδ, κρειττον/κρεισσον, αρρενες/αρσενες, ματθαιος/μαθθαιος). Elision. The longer form is the shorter plus a final α, ε or ο, the shorter ends in a consonant, and the longer is one of the words that elide (αλλα, δε, ουδε, μηδε, ουτε, μητε, απο, υπο, επι, κατα, μετα, παρα, δια, αντι, αρα, τοτε), or the final τ, π or κ is aspirated as it is before a rough breathing (μετα/μεθ, κατα/καθ, χρηστα/χρησθ). Movable ν. A final ν added to a form ending σι, στι, σε or ε (εστι/εστιν, επεσε/επεσεν). Movable ς. A final ς on ουτω, μεχρι or αχρι. A doubled consonant written single, and the spellings of a proper name. Ιωαννης/Ιωανης, εννατος/ενατος, ερραντισεν/εραντισεν, κραββατον/κραβαττον, and Μωσης/Μωυσης, Δαβιδ/Δαυιδ, Καπερναουμ/Καφαρναουμ, Ραββουνι/Ραβουνι. Other names written two ways in the editions are on a fixed list of the same name in the same form (Ναζαρετ/Ναζαρεθ, Γεθσημανη/Γεθσημανι, Ταβηθα/Ταβιθα, Συμεων/Σιμεων, Μωση/Μωυσει). In general, a proper name spelled differently is not shown as a variant: the base word must be a name in this edition, the other form must differ by only one or two letters, and both must end alike (Αχαζ/Αχας, Βοοζ/Βοες, Λευις/Λευεις). A different ending means a different form or a different person and stays visible (Ασα/Ασαφ, Αμων/Αμως), and so does any added or missing word (Ιησουν Βαραββαν against Βαραββαν). Different forms or different people stay visible (Μαρια/Μαριαμ, Ιωνα/Ιωαννου, Ιωση/Ιωσηφ). The same fixed list covers a few ordinary words with two spellings (τεσσαρακοντα/τεσσερακοντα, αλιεις/αλεεις), and a reading that repeats a word with an ellipsis (Δαυιδ … Δαυιδ) is judged word by word like any other. Assimilated nasals. ν and μ before π β φ ψ μ, ν and γ before κ γ ξ χ, and the inserted μ of λημψ/λημφ (ενπεριπατησω/εμπεριπατησω, ασυνκριτον/ασυγκριτον, ληψεται/λημψεται). Where ει and ι are not treated as spelling, because there they mark a different form: in the λειπ/λιπ tense stems (απελειπον/απελιπον), in the ειδ/ιδ stems at the start of a word (ειδετε/ιδετε, ειδητε/ιδητε), and at the end of a word, where -ει and -εις against -ι and -ις mark a different form (επει/επι, ερεις/ερις). Where a doubled consonant is not treated as spelling, because there it marks the word: βαλλω, μελλω (εμελεν/εμελλεν), αποστελλω (αποστελει/αποστελλει), αλλασσω, εφαλλομαι (εφαλομενος/εφαλλομενος), and γεννημα against γενημα. Always kept at this level: bracketed readings, accented readings, added, omitted or different words, any change of form (tense, case, number, person), word-order changes, other itacisms such as αι/ε and η/ι, ουκ/ουχ, and Ιεροσολυμα against Ιερουσαλημ, which is a different form of the name rather than a different spelling; that one is hidden only by the next choice.
Hide orthographic, word-order and minor-word variants	Hides everything the previous choice hides, and also differences of word order and of minor words (the article, και, δε, τε, γαρ, ουν, μεν) and readings that differ only by brackets. What stays: different words, different forms, tenses and moods, and the addition or omission of substantive words. Exact rules How every filter works The edition checkboxes are applied first. Each reading is judged on its own against the note’s base text. A reading that is hidden is dropped; a reading that is not hidden stays. If at least one reading in a note stays, the note stays with only those readings. If no reading in a note stays, the note and its dagger disappear. A note that carries manuscript evidence (‡) is never hidden by this setting. If the rules cannot prove a reading is hidden, it stays. The branches of an ᴇᴄᴍ† split guiding line are kept or dropped together: if any branch stays, all of them stay. When ᴇᴄᴍ is not selected, a reading that only says txt is dropped. A reading is hidden if either test is met It is orthographic by the strict rules of the previous choice. It is a minor difference: after normalizing spelling and ignoring brackets, parenthetical remarks and word order, it differs from the base only by adding, dropping or swapping minor words. The minor words are ο το του της των τω τη τοις ταις τον την τους τας οι αι τα (the article), και, δε, τε, γαρ, ουν, μεν, δη. An omission (“om.”) counts as an empty reading. The spelling normalizing used by test 2 is wider than the orthographic rules, because word order is already ignored here: accents, breathings and punctuation removed; final ς as σ; ουθ/μηθ as ουδ/μηδ; ουκ and ουχ as ου; ουτως as ουτω; εξ as εκ; μεχρις and αχρις without the ς; movable ν dropped; ηυ as ευ; ει as ι; γγ γκ γξ γχ as νγ νκ νξ νχ; ν before μ π β φ ψ as μ; ττ as σσ; doubled consonants made single, so Ιωανης matches Ιωαννης; and the name forms Μωυσ- as Μωσ-, Ιεροσολυμα as Ιερουσαλημ, Καπερναουμ as Καφαρναουμ, Δαβιδ as Δαυιδ. Kept even here: any reading that carries an accent or breathing, because there the accent is the variant (μενει/μενεῖ, τινα/τίνα); the λειπ/λιπ and ειδ/ιδ stems and word endings in -ει/-ις, as above; the ν of ουδεν and μηδεν; the doubled lambda of μελλω and αποστελλω (αποστελει/αποστελλει); and of course different words, changes of form, and the addition or omission of any word that is not on the minor-word list.
Show only translatable differences (Adam Boyd’s TC-ENT)	Shows variants only in verses where Adam Boyd’s Text-Critical English New Testament (TC-ENT) has a footnote, that is, where the editions differ in a way that changes the English. In those verses every non-orthographic reading is shown, so you see the whole picture. How it is carried out: the edition checkboxes apply first; orthographic readings are dropped by the same rules as the previous choices; Boyd’s 2,968 footnotes were each turned into a verse reference (a footnote on 1:7–8 counts for both verses), which covers 2,433 verses; a note is kept if any of its verses is on that list and disappears, with its dagger, if none is. The match is by verse only, so a verse he footnotes once can still show several readings, and a verse he does not footnote shows none. Notes with manuscript evidence (‡) are never hidden. Credit: The Text-Critical English New Testament: Byzantine Text Version, © 2022 Robert Adam Boyd, CC BY 4.0. Only the verse locations of his footnotes are used; the Greek apparatus is this edition’s own.

The bottom of the Editions dialog showing the three kinds of variant choices — The “Kind of variant” choices at the bottom of the Editions dialog.

A note on judgement. These filters are automatic rules, not an editor’s verdict, so a borderline reading can fall either way. A note that also carries manuscript evidence (‡) is never hidden by the kind-of-variant choice. The orthographic filter is deliberately strict: a reading that cannot be proved orthographic stays.

9Variant reports

The Report button builds a list of variants you can read, copy or print. It uses the same edition and kind-of-variant choices you have set.

Choose the passage: the current chapter, the current book, a different book, the entire New Testament, or a custom range (for example Matthew 24:1 to Romans 2:4).
Choose options: include manuscript data, and write labels in plain capitals (CT, NA28) instead of small capitals if you plan to paste the report somewhere that does not show small capitals.
Press Create report. The first lines say what the report covers and how many variants it lists.
Press Copy to clipboard to paste it as plain text, or Print for a clean printed page.

A variant report for Acts 24 with TEXT and one reading per line — A report for Acts 24. Each variant gives the reference, then **TEXT**, then one reading per line with its editions first, the same layout as the note.

The whole New Testament has more than ten thousand notes, so a full report can be long. Narrow it with the edition and kind-of-variant filters first. Long reports show the first part on screen; Copy and Print always include all of it.

10Comparing editions

The Compare button shows how closely the editions agree with the Byzantine text and with each other.

Choose the passage (the whole New Testament, the Gospels, Acts, Paul’s letters, the general epistles, Revelation, the current chapter, or any single book) and which differences to count (all of them, or ignoring spelling, or ignoring spelling, word order and minor words, using the same rules as the variant filter).
The top list ranks each edition by its agreement with the Byzantine text. Select an edition to open it in the comparison below.
In Compare two editions, pick any two. You see their agreement, then a list of every place they differ with each edition’s reading. Switch the list to the places where the two agree with each other against the Byzantine text. Select a reference to jump to that verse.
The Every pair grid shows all the pairings at once. Select a cell to compare that pair.

How to read the percentages. Variation units are the places where the apparatus records a variation. They are strict: such a place exists because some edition departs from the text, so even a close edition scores well below 100%. Whole text is an estimate of the share of all the words in the text that an edition reads the same, found by adding up the words each difference touches. It is approximate. An edition that the apparatus does not name at a place is counted as agreeing with the text there, and the ECM is compared only in Mark, Acts, the Catholic Epistles and Revelation, where it exists. Where the ECM splits between two readings, it counts as half agreement. Only the printed editions are compared, not manuscripts. For that reason, the ten notes that cite only ʀᴘᵐᵍ are left out, so the whole New Testament shows 10,177 variation units against 10,187 notes in the apparatus.

11Parallel English

Press Parallel to put the English beside the Greek, verse by verse. The Greek stays on the left and keeps everything it had: tap-a-word parsing and the apparatus. The English is on the right.

The English is the American Standard Version adapted to the Byzantine text (ASV-BT), so it follows the same text as the Greek. Adam Boyd’s changes to the ASV were dedicated to the public domain in 2021.
A few verses that the Byzantine text omits or moves have no English beside them. These are Luke 17:36, Acts 8:37, Acts 15:34, Acts 24:7 and Romans 16:25.
On a narrow screen the English moves under each Greek verse, marked with a light blue bar on its left.
The English file loads the first time you use Parallel, so allow a moment. Press the button again to go back to the Greek only. Your choice is remembered.

John 3 with Greek in the left column and the ASV Byzantine Text in the right column — Parallel view of John 3.

12Searching

Type in the search box and press Search. The reader finds every verse that contains what you typed and highlights it.

Accents, breathing marks and final sigma are ignored, so plain letters work: type λογος to find λόγος and λόγον.
The search matches part of a word, so αγαπ finds every form of the word from that stem.
Each result is a verse. Tap one to open it in its chapter, highlighted.
The first 150 results are shown. Make the search more specific to narrow a long list.
Search looks at the Greek text of this edition. It does not search the English.

13Settings and phones

Text size. A− and A+ change the size of the Greek (and the English in parallel view).
Remembered settings. Text size, your place, your edition choices, the kind of variant, Parallel, and the Apparatus on or off are all saved in your own browser. Nothing is sent to a server, and nothing is saved if your browser blocks storage; the reader still works, it just starts fresh each visit.
Phones and tablets. The toolbar wraps to fit, the apparatus and word panels open at the bottom of the screen, and the parallel English stacks under the Greek.
Printing a chapter. Use the Report for variants. To have the Greek text itself on paper, download the free PDF editions from the Greek New Testament page.

14Keyboard

Keys	What they do
`←` `→`	Previous or next chapter. While an apparatus note is open, previous or next variant instead.
`Esc`	Close the open panel or dialog.
`Tab` then `Enter`	Open a dagger or a search result from the keyboard.

15Where it all comes from

Text and apparatus: The Greek New Testament According to the Byzantine Text, edited and prepared by J. Jeffrey Dodson and Dwayne Green for the Guardian Press Editorial Committee (Robinson–Pierpont 2026 base text). Dedicated to the public domain.
Parsing and Strong’s numbers: the Robinson–Pierpont Byzantine Textform from the byztxt project (public domain), matched to each word of this edition.
Definitions: the Dodson Greek Lexicon (public domain).
English: the ASV Byzantine Text, adapted from the public domain American Standard Version by Adam Boyd (changes dedicated to the public domain, 2021).

The printed edition, with the full manuscript apparatus, is available from the Hardbound edition page, and the free PDF downloads are on the Greek New Testament page.

16Questions

Why does a word have no parsing?

The parsing data belongs to the Robinson–Pierpont text, and the matching is done by computer. In the few places where this edition reads differently, a word can lack a match, and the word panel says so.

The reader looks different from the printed book. Why?

The apparatus is the same content as the book’s edition apparatus, shown in notes on the screen instead of at the foot of the page. Paragraph breaks follow the edition.

I found a mistake. Whom do I tell?

Please email [email protected] with the book, chapter and verse and what you expected to see. A correction to the reader goes live for everyone as soon as it is published.

Does it work offline?

Not fully. Once the page has loaded, the Greek text and apparatus are already in your browser. The parsing data and the English are fetched the first time you use them, so those need a connection.

Can I link to a verse?

Yes. Tap the verse number, then copy the address from your browser. It looks like excavatingthetext.com/gnt/#Acts/24:2.