Get Started: Background Resources
Encyclopedias, dictionaries, handbooks, etc. are often a great way to start your research. They can help you understand your research topic, define terms that may appear in scholarly journal articles, and gather background information to build context.
- CREDO Reference This link opens in a new window A full-text online reference service, CREDO contains dictionaries, bilingual dictionaries, thesauri, encyclopedias, quotations and atlases, plus a wide range of subject-specific titles covering everything from art to accountancy, science to Shakespeare and law to literature.
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- How Do I...?Answers for our most frequently asked questions (FAQs).
Beginning Your Research: General Resources
These resources provide access to magazine, newspaper and scholarly articles on a variety of topics.
- Academic Search Premier This link opens in a new window General purpose databases of general/popular publications and scholarly journals. Includes information in many areas of academic study including the social sciences, humanities, general sciences, and education.
- ProQuest This link opens in a new window Search a comprehensive file of periodicals for a broad range of subject areas including arts, business, children, education, general interest, health, humanities, international, law, military, multicultural, psychology, sciences, social sciences, and women's interests.
- JSTOR This link opens in a new window A digital archive includes more than 3,500 leading academic journals in the humanities, social sciences, and sciences, as well as select monographs. The most recently published issues (past 3-5 years) are generally not available.
- Project Muse This link opens in a new window Full text access to a selection of prestigious humanities and social sciences journals.
Books & ebooks
Scholarly Sources: Best Bets
These are the best specialized databases for your work in Religion or other theological research
- ATLA Serials Plus This link opens in a new window An index to journal articles, book reviews, and collections of essays in all fields of religion
- Old Testament Abstracts This link opens in a new window Indexing and abstracts for journal articles, monographs, multi-author works, and software related to Old Testament studies. Topics covered include antiquities, archaeology, biblical theology, and philology.
- New Testament Abstracts This link opens in a new window Access to New Testament scholarship, Biblical theology, and the world of the New Testament. The database contains article abstracts, review abstracts, and book abstracts.
- Encyclopedia Judaica Provides an exhaustive and organized overview of Jewish life and knowledge from the Second Temple period to the contemporary State of Israel, from Rabbinic to modern Yiddish literature, from Kabbalah to "Americana" and from Zionism to the contribution of Jews to world cultures.
- ATLA Historical Monographs Collection I This link opens in a new window Series 1 presents more than 15,000 titles from 13th century through the 1893 World Parliament of Religions. The collection includes many volumes in Aramaic, Arabic, Greek, Hebrew and other languages besides English documenting the recovery of languages used during the biblical era.
- ATLA Historical Monographs Collection II This link opens in a new window Series 2 presents more than 15,000 titles from 1894-1923 giving a comprehensive picture of religion in America at the turn of the century.
- Logos Seminary Collection This link opens in a new window A digitized collection of several thousand classic texts from seminary libraries, this collection is searchable by author, title, or Biblical passage.
- Films on Demand: Philosophy & Religion This link opens in a new window
- Open Access Digital Theological Library The OADTL currently provides access to over 190,000 ebooks and thousands of journals with a growing collection. OADTL collections are composed primarily of books and articles. The collections are ecumenical, global, and interreligious and include materials in all languages.
