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[request] NIV bible program for Mac

S

steelfist

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Aug 10, 2005
577
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i am going to go through a course of bible study, and the used bible version is NIV. sometime, but rarely King James version is used, but that is very unlikely. i have been searching for a week for a good free program that lets me read the bible digitaly on my ibook. i came across these: http://www.crosswire.org/jsword/
http://www.macsword.com

but it has tons of versions that i have never heard of but it dosen't have NIV! so, is there one? even just a txt file? currently i use http://www.biblegateway.com but it's only accesible online and i don't want to copy and pase every chapter in the bible :rolleyes: so. any recomendations?
 
oh dear. that does look like the only option i have, but do you expect me to copy every chapter one by one into wordpad? :p

i tried it, and finally finished genesis, but when i looked at isaih and psalms, i was horrified. nearly 150 chapters...........horrifying......... :eek:
 
The best Bible Software available is a Mac-only app. Its called Accordance. It may be more than you're looking for, but you can get the NIV as well as just about any translation you want (including original Greek, Hebrew, and several ancient translations too I believe).

The website is http://www.accordancebible.com/

It looks like you can get the starters edition for like $39 and then add modules (translations) as you like. I don't think there is any free NIV software though. Zondervan is pretty picky about their copyright. Other versions are a different story and can usually be found. :D Hope that helps.
 
i was more seeing it as an alternative...i didn't suspect you would copy it :eek:
yeah that would be horrifying...i'll still search and see though if there is a pdf version or something
 
There are programs that will let you download a website and keep a local copy on your hard drive so you can access it anytime. Someone else could help you out with figuring out how to do it, I've never tried it.
 
i did a little reaserching on NIV, and realized that it is copyrighted. no wonder it isn't free. therefore it is impossible to download an offline version of NIV. i used p2p software, and while trying not to do any of the usual illegal stuff, i only looked for basic document files like .txt, .doc, and adobe reader. i found the old testiment this way, and i tried not to download any programs to keep myself as clean as possible, but it was tempting to download those programs for macs though :D now i am looking for new testiment adobe readers, and i should be fine for now then.

that is my last resort anyway. no other choice. i needed the NIV and on my computer for my classes.
 
Yeah, pirating the Bible has a certain irony to it..

I bought a program called iLumina, and I was about to say that I was sure it had an NIV translation in it too. I just checked, though, and it's only NLT and KJV.

As has been said already, the NIV is pretty heavily protected and you won't find it free anywhere. A pity, since it seems to have become the de facto standard for Bibles these days.

When I owned a Palm PDA I used a program called MyBible which did have an NIV translation available - I also got The Message and NLT.
 
notjustjay said:
Yeah, pirating the Bible has a certain irony to it.
Click to expand...
Somebody had to say it. hehe... Seriously though, the price of the basic version of Accordance is less than some textbooks I have to buy for my seminary classes.
 
there is a Bible software company called Logos ... They should have what you're looking for:

http://www.logos.com/products/details/1920

It also includes a lot of other historical, contextual, and etc... features. It's recommended by my Pastor who teaches at a local Bible college. I saw a PR release on macnn.com saying that Logos released some software for OS X.

dw
 
fuzzwud said:
there is a Bible software company called Logos ... They should have what you're looking for:

http://www.logos.com/products/details/1920

It also includes a lot of other historical, contextual, and etc... features. It's recommended by my Pastor who teaches at a local Bible college. I saw a PR release on macnn.com saying that Logos released some software for OS X.

dw
Click to expand...
Thats good to know, I didn't know Logos was available for OS X.

However, (at least on the PC side) Logos is sort of known for having more resources available as add-ons (like commentaries and other works) whereas BibleWorks is thought to be better for working with the actual text of the Bible.

That probably carries over to the Mac side as well. I'm pretty sure Accordance is still going to be a better option. I know several guys who have switched to Macs because its better than anything on the PC (including Logos).
 
After looking through the Logos website, I'm pretty sure they do not have a Mac version. They are on version ten and the box has a roman numeral ten on it, so it is confusing, but I don't think there is a Mac version.

EDIT: Here's a quote from the Logos website:

Currently, Macintosh users often use Windows/PC emulation software to run Libronix. A virtualpc newsgroup forum exists for discussing Libronix and emulation software:
Click to expand...
So no Logos for OS X. Accordance is the only option, but thats fine since its the best anyway. :D
 
yellow said:
Can you actually pirate The Bible? I mean.. who has a copyright on that?
Click to expand...
haha... a good question actually. Some translations are copyrighted. not the original text, of course, and the copyrights of older translations have run out so they are public domain and easy to find online.

The reason for the copyright is that a publishing company pays a lot of money to have a big translation committee works for several years on a translation. The money they make from the copyright pays those expenses and of course the rest of it is profit. It's a publishing company, after all, what do you expect? But if there wasn't money in it they wouldn't have undertaken the whole process to begin with so I guess its about the best option.
 
Profiting on "the word".. seems kinda counterintuitive to me. Oh wait, evangelists!

I'll see you in court, Jesus.
 
Accordance is a great program, but so is Online Bible.
Neither will be free if you use the NIV because of copyright restrictions, but Online Bible is a free download and uses many modules for free.

They have a beta version that is OS X compatible and works well, otherwise it has to be run in Classic mode.

For general use, Online Bible is awesome
For detailed grammatical research in Greek/Hebrew, Accordance is the way to go.

Woof, Woof - Dawg
pawprint.gif
 
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from what I can tell, you are not going to be able to get the "newer" more popular translations for free (including NIV, NKJV, NASB, NLT), though I woundn't think it'd be too hard to find a simple version of the NIV text for sale on CD ROM.

--I checked Zondervan (.com) and they only have Bibles available in eBook format and in Windoze CD format. But if you look at publishing companies like that you might be able to find one...sorry this isn't of much help.


P.S. If anyone out there has a windoze box, http://www.e-sword.net is possibly the most amazing peice of free Bible Study software ever created, check it out for sure.
 
A Couple Suggestions...

Hi Guys,

I think Parsons just released Quickverse for Mac. My dad has the PC version and LOVES it.

http://www.quickverse.com/shopfiles/categories.asp?category=63

I've tried MacSword, and like it alot for a free program.

If anyone is interested, and if it's legal, I have the NIV Bible as a PDF file. I think I got if on a cheap "Study the Bible" cd that I bought years ago. I just copied the file to my computer. It may be of help to you. It's like 28mb.

Jason
 
Mac Bible Software

Guys, there seems to be a fair amount of confusion on this topic, and there doesn't have to be. You can find a LOT of information about Mac Bible Software on the web-site of the Christian Macintosh Users Group.

Currently the only Bible programs for Mac which offer the NIV are Accordance Bible Software and Online Bible. The edition of the NIV available with Online Bible is the European edition, meaning there are differences in spelling and minor wording differences from the American edition.

QuickVerse has been ported to Mac, but initial reviews have not been great, and QuickVerse will likely never offer the NIV.

Logos has announced plans to release a Mac version, but it's not available yet.

Hope this clears up some of the confusion, and be sure to check out CMUG for more on Mac Bible Software.

Sincerely,
David Lang
Content Editor
Christian Macintosh Users Group
 
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