World Scripture

World Scripture HTML Conversion Project

I am in the process of converting the ASCII text files for World Scripture into HTML. This is a big job, and the automatic ASCII-to-HTML programs that I have seen do not do a satisfactory job. So, I am plugging away on these files by hand, doing them one at a time with HTML macros in my Word 7 word processor. So far, I've done the introductory materials, introductions for the first 14 chapters, and the first three themes.

I have just begun this process, and am still working out the design details. I am interested in providing not only a good-looking and highly readable text, but in defining a unique URL for every individual scriptural passage (there are abut 4000) in the entire book.

In this way, readers developing their own web projects could not only link to individual WS files, but to specific passages within the files. WS can thus become a universal database that can be accessed from any point of view for any reason.

As time and energy permits, I expect to eventually translate the entire text into HTML, and will be looking for ways this material can function in the context of network-based global-scale interreligious projects.

World Scripture establishes the common truths of the world's great religions with perhaps greater authority than any other document or philosophy in the world. If we can devise ways to employ the interactive technology of the Internet in pursuit of this authenticity, it may be possible to develop a powerful and influential network of ideas and people, radiating the universal principles of spiritual freedom and enlightenment into every culture of the world.

More later.

Bruce Schuman
Santa Barbara, California
August 28, 1996