Monday, January 29, 2007

Social networks in the New Testament

It's either really cool or social statistics run amok (or both), but here is a social network map of the relationships in the New Testament. It's done by the folks at the English Standard Version Bible, who use a new data imaging site called Many Eyes.

Obviously the New Testament is not a sociometric survey, so what we learn here is the Bible's description of relationships. So, for all we know Luke and Titus were drinking buddies. Still, it's a useful description of this aspect of the New Testament.
I was surprised by Peter's circle being bigger and more central than Paul's--speaks to Peter's role in early church leadership.

Other observations?

2 comments:

Bad Runner said...

It would be interesting to compare the gospels on this and then compare those to the gnostic gospels.

Brad Wright said...

Interesting idea! Although, does that mean that Leonardo da Vinchi will show up in the network? ;-)