Lists
Notice the order
Pivots, Climax
Drastic changes
Sequences of events
Leading to a pivot
Following a pivot
Alternating & inverting ideas
Chiasm
Inclusion
Atmosphere, emotions
Positive, negative, urgent
Proportions
Time, location, subjects
This page allows you to familiarize yourself with the principles of literature. You already know many of them. You react to them daily in conversations, when you watch movies and when you read.
Perhaps nobody encouraged you to keep track of them while reading the Bible. Become familiar with this valuable list and it will help you recognize the common literary devices that hold a book together. Notice how paragraphs (parts) use them to construct units of thought. They will help you identify how the subject matter appears and changes through the course of entire the book.
Repetitions
Key words & ideas
Key places & people
Summaries
Preview
Review
Conclusions
Therefore, Thus
Cause to effect
Effect to Cause
Condition
If…then…
Illustrations
Old Testament in the New
Purposes, Reasons
because, so that, for
Comparing
the beginning w/ the end
Comparisons
more than, less than
Similes: like, as
Metaphors: “I am the vine”
Contrasts
however, but
General to Specific
Specific to General
Question asked
Question answered
During the discovery process of an entire book, let your eye gate capture the flow of the content with its recurring themes:
• Set apart noteworthy observations with techniques of underlining, circling and color-coding key words and phrases.
• Identify the shifts in subject matter with your own brief paragraph titles using 3-5 words.
Soon, your grasp of an entire book becomes more firm because your comprehension of what the readers understood becomes clearer.