Guided library
Sacred texts
Explore the sacred texts and major corpora of 14 traditions. This page separates what each branch recognizes as canonical from authoritative or traditional texts, and shows plainly what is — and is not yet — in SigPhi's corpus.
How to read this page
The labels describe a text's place within the named tradition; they are not a hierarchy of value between religions.
Recognized as scripture by the tradition or branch named here.
A central or highly influential text, but not the same as canonical scripture.
A text transmitted or used within a tradition without shared canonical status.
Christianity
Four families of biblical canons
Comparing canons does not mean combining them into one Bible. Each card describes what that family recognizes; below it, only editions currently held by SigPhi are listed.
Catholic
46 books in the Old Testament and 27 in the New Testament. It includes the deuterocanonical books.
Eastern Orthodox
An Old Testament based on the Septuagint and, in several churches, broader than the Catholic canon. The precise list varies; the shared New Testament has 27 books.
Orthodox Tewahedo
The Ethiopian and Eritrean tradition preserves a broader canon. The Ethiopian Church presents it as 81 books and includes, among others, Enoch and Jubilees.
Protestant
Most Protestant Bibles contain 66 books. Some editions print the Apocrypha separately, so SigPhi identifies the particular edition rather than claiming a universal Protestant canon.
Editions available in SigPhi
- Biblecanonical textDouay-Rheims (Challoner revision): Catholic canon, with the deuterocanonical books.
- Bible (American Standard)canonical textAmerican Standard Version (1901): Protestant canon, from the critical text of the New Testament.
- Bible (King James)canonical textKing James edition: Protestant canon, without the deuterocanonical books.
Editions available in SigPhi
The texts the English editions translate from.
Judaism
Tanakh
Islam
The Quran and the Sunna do not hold the same status within the tradition.
Hadith / Sunna
Anthologies in historical editions. The major collections — Bukhārī, Muslim, the Shia Four Books — are not yet in the corpus.
Hinduism
There is no closed Hindu canon. The tradition distinguishes Śruti (revealed) from Smṛti (remembered).
Śruti — Vedas
Only the Ṛgveda. The Sāma-, Yajur- and Atharvaveda are not here yet.
Smṛti — Itihāsa (epics)
Smṛti — Dharmaśāstra
Philosophical and theological texts
Buddhism
There is no single Buddhist canon: the Pali, Chinese and Tibetan canons differ in contents and arrangement.
Theravāda — Pali Canon
Of the Tipiṭaka, only what is listed below is held.
Mahāyāna
Chan / Zen
Tibetan Buddhism
The Kangyur and Tengyur are not in the corpus.
Jainism
Śvetāmbara and Digambara do not recognize the same canon. Only Śvetāmbara texts are held here.
Sikhism
Scripture
The Dasam Granth and Bhai Gurdas's Vārān are not in the corpus.
Confucianism
The Four Books
The Five Classics
The Shujing, Liji and Chunqiu are missing.
The Thirteen Classics
Taoism
The Daozang, the full Taoist canon, is not in the corpus.
Shinto
Shinto has no closed canon. These are the tradition's foundational texts, not a canonical list.
Zoroastrianism
The Middle Persian literature — Bundahišn, Dēnkard, Ardā Wīrāz — is not in the corpus.
Ancient Egyptian religion
Maya religion
Gnosticism
A map of corpora, not a canon
“Gnosticism” is a broad category for varied movements of late antiquity. They did not form one church or share a closed list of books.
Nag Hammadi codices
A modern manuscript collection containing works of different origins and orientations, not a “Gnostic Bible”. It is not yet in the corpus.
Pistis Sophia
A work transmitted through a Coptic manuscript tradition separate from Nag Hammadi. It is currently the only text of its kind in SigPhi, in a public-domain English translation.