Overwhelmed by dictionaries

[Susan]

There are a lot of lexicons (+dictionaries) on sale! I’m trying to figure out if there’s anything there that would be worthwhile to invest in.

 

I own (and use extensively) HALOT + LEH +  BDAG which seem to me (more than) adequate for the purpose of “regular” lexical support for reading HB/OT + LXX + GNT. The only other “regular” lexicon I see there that I have wondered about purchasing is:

• Dictionary of Classical Hebrew (complete)

 

There are also all of these theological/exegetical dictionaries that I don’t know what to think about.

I own already TLOT (Jenni, Westermann) and TLNT (Spicq) as part of my Accordance package, though I can’t say I have yet figured out the best way to make use of them. Also available on sale:

• New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology and Exegesis (abridged / complete)
• New International Dictionary of Old Testament Theology and Exegesis (abridged / complete)
• Theological Dictionary of NT (Big / Little Kittel)
• Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament

Could anyone provide advice about what (if anything)  these resources offer in addition to the basics that I already own? There are some good deals there, but I’m not sure how much they would add to my library.

 

Thank you!

[Abram K-J]

DCH covers a larger Hebrew corpus than just the Hebrew Bible, and includes frequency counts for those places. Not to shill my blog, but I did do a short write-up on DCH and its concise counterpart in Accordance here.

 

There's a scathing review of DCH by a Hebrew scholar that you can read here. Personally, if you have HALOT, and unless you are doing major lexical studies on a regular basis, I would think the Concise DCH would suffice.

 

I find a point of diminishing returns after consulting a few lexicons--though that may have to do primarily with the fact that I am no longer writing original language exegesis papers for seminary, where looking up words in theological lexicons, too, could be useful.

 

Moreover, I'm finding more and more benefit just searching words in Accordance and studying their usage in a few contexts--perhaps doing this as the next step after consulting BDAG, HALOT, and LEH.

 

I've found over the years that Accordance keeps producing resources I want and use, so bypassing even really good sales doesn't hurt as much as it used to, if I'm not totally sure I need what's on sale.