LibGuides: FWS 121 The Many Stories of Jesus (Scherbenske): Home

Finding Books and E-books

One of the best places to find books on your topic is through the library's website. To get started, visit the library's homepage and choose "Library Catalog" from the dropdown box...or try out the search box below.

Bible Commentaries

Commentaries provide a detailed interpretation and analysis of the Bible, often verse by verse. They may address factors such as authorship, audience, date, purpose, and literary structure.

River Campus Libraries has a diverse collection of biblical commentaries that you can use as a starting point for your research. Many of the titles are available on Level 500 and 500m of Rush Rhees Library, though some materials may need to be requested for free from the Ambrose Swasey Library at Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School.

The best way to find commentaries in UR's collection is to search the library's catalog using the following three steps:

Go to the library's homepage and click "Advanced Search."
Select "Subject Terms" from the first drop-down box and type in Bible Commentaries or a specific book followed by "Commentaries" (e.g. Matthew Commentaries).
Check off "Items in the library catalog" to limit your results to items available through UR's libraries.

E-book Collections

Ebook Central This link opens in a new window
Ebook Central is U of R's primary ebook platform with thousands of titles from all disciplines. Many of these titles can be found through the library's main search page, but searching Ebook Central directly is a great way to make sure you don't miss ebook titles relevant to your topic.
EBSCOHost eBook Collections This link opens in a new window
Like Ebook Central, EBSCO provides access to a collection of ebooks on a wide range of topics. This collection of ebooks isn't quite as extensive as Ebook Central, but you still may find some useful books on your topic in this database.
Not all titles are downloadable. It depends on the agreement with the publisher, however many titles can be downloaded. If downloading is permitted, you will see a button in the results list that says "download offline," and on the record for the book itself, a utton that says "Download this ebook" Make sure that you have an up to date version of Adobe Digital Editions. Click here for more help.
ACLS Humanities E-Book This link opens in a new window
Also known as the ACLS History Ebook Project, this humanities-focused e-book collection includes nearly 5,400 scholarly titles.

Finding Scholarly Articles

The University of Rochester's libraries provide access to a robust collection of databases containing millions of scholarly journal titles. Be sure to use the filters in these databases to limit your search specifically to journal articles or peer-reviewed sources. Scholarly sources tend to have ample citations to other books and articles and are written by experts in the field. If you're not sure if something counts as a "scholarly" source, check with your librarian for this class – she is happy to help.

Religious Studies Databases

ATLA Religion This link opens in a new window
Atla indexes journal articles, book reviews, and collections of essays in all fields of religion and includes full-text access to over 360 major religion and theology journals.
New Testament Abstracts This link opens in a new window
This database includes abstracts for scholarly books and articles focused on the New Testament and its historical context.
Old Testament Abstracts This link opens in a new window
This database includes abstracts for scholarly books and articles focused on the Old Testament and its historical context.
Index to Jewish Periodicals This link opens in a new window
Identifies articles on Jewish history, activity, and thought.
Index Islamicus This link opens in a new window
This database indexes all aspects of Islam and the Muslim world, including history, beliefs, societies, cultures, languages and literatures.

Humanities Databases

JSTOR This link opens in a new window
JSTOR provides access to a wide range of journals from history, area studies, anthropology, literature, film and media studies, and more.
Subject areas include African-American studies, anthropology, Asian studies, business, ecology, economics, education, finance, history, literature, mathematics, philosophy, political science, population studies, sociology, statistics. The University of Rochester Libraries currently subscribes to the following multidisciplinary JSTOR Collections: Arts and Sciences I through XV. JSTOR also packages their content in disciplinary collections; however, the only ones of these that we have licensed are the Biological Sciences segment and the first of the Business collections. For alumni access, see also Alumni Library Gateway.
Humanities Full Text This link opens in a new window
This database is a great multidisciplinary database with full-text articles from humanities-based disciplines such as art, film, music, literature, and religion. It also includes research from history, which some consider a humanistic social science.

Finding Historical Sources

In addition to scholarly sources, the University of Rochester maintains a rich collection of primary sources including extensive newspaper and magazine coverage, historical monographs, digital image collections, and more. Here are a few examples of the primary source archives that might be helpful or this class:

ARTstor This link opens in a new window
Artstor contains over one million images from museums, libraries, and other collections around the world. These images include photographs, scanned documents, maps, three-dimensional artifacts, and more. Try searching by material type, geography, date, etc. using the "Advanced Search" feature.
including: viewing and analyzing images through features such as zooming and panning, saving groups of images online for personal or shared uses, and creating and delivering presentations both online and offline.
American Theological Library Association (ATLA) Historical Monographs Collection: Series 1 This link opens in a new window
Full-text historical books on religion and theology, 13th century-1893.
American Theological Library Association (ATLA) Historical Monographs Collection: Series 2 This link opens in a new window
Full-text historical books on religion and theology, 1894-1923.
Religions of America This link opens in a new window
Religions of America traces the history and characteristics of American-born religious movements through manuscripts, pamphlets, newsletters, ephemera, and visual art.
Gale Primary Sources This link opens in a new window
The Gale Primary Sources cross-search interface provides access to millions of pages of content spanning many centuries and geographic regions. Users can explore a wide range of content including monographs, manuscripts, newspapers, photographs, maps, and more.
Readex AllSearch This link opens in a new window
Search across all of our available Readex primary source collections, including African Newspapers, Latin American Newspapers, Archive of Americana, America's Historical Imprints, America's Historical Newspapers, and Caribbean Newspapers.