Relative Merits
Although Strong's is more popular and has its strengths, Young's is better for word studies due in part to the way it analyzes English words: for example, several different Greek or Hebrew words can be translated by one English word. Young shows this by analyzing the English word showing all of the Greek or Hebrew words it translates and then lists the verses containing each occurrence of the various Greek or Hebrew words. This can make for more accurate word studies.
Young's Analytical Concordance organizes words according to their Greek or Hebrew words *(in addition to the English) so that there is no need (in many cases) to look up a number and then to check for that number as a second step. This is handy for everyone, regardless of whether you know Greek or Hebrew, as you can quickly see all the Greek (or Hebrew) words that are the same original word. This makes word studies much easier to do (than with Concordances such as Strong's or Cruden's).
However, there is a revised and corrected version of this Concordance that has been available for many years *(at least since the 70's). Check the preface and title page for indication that these corrections are in any version that you want to purchase. If you wonder why this book is not widely available in most Bible Study Software packages, it is simply because most software search engines duplicate this work by way of their built-in ability to search on a Greek or Hebrew word by a click on the tagged English word. If you don't have a program like this, however, Young's is one of the most useful concordances for doing word studies.
Read more about this topic: Young's Analytical Concordance To The Bible
Famous quotes containing the words relative and/or merits:
“In a country where misery and want were the foundation of the social structure, famine was periodic, death from starvation common, disease pervasive, thievery normal, and graft and corruption taken for granted, the elimination of these conditions in Communist China is so striking that negative aspects of the new rule fade in relative importance.”
—Barbara Tuchman (1912–1989)
“Since I know nothing of the merits of poetry, I am not able to pass any opinion upon this, but I can see that “reap” and “deep,” “prayers” and “bears,” “ark” and “dark,” “true” and “grew” do rhyme, and so I suppose it is a splendid effort, but if you had written it in plain prose, I could have understood it a great deal better and read it a great deal more easily.”
—Susan B. Anthony (1820–1906)