Can I Use AI in Bible Study?

I recently had a friend of mine reach out and share that in his Bible reading he had misunderstood a passage. He thought that a certain text was saying one thing, when in reality he had simply misread what it was saying. He figured this out by asking AI what was going on, and AI pointed out that what he thought the passage was saying was not, in fact, what the passage was saying. He went back, checked, and realized his mistake.

This raises a question that I’m sure many are asking right now, “Can I use AI in my Bible study? And if so, should I?” Some people would give a flat-out “No!” They believe that any use of AI, or at least any use involving the study of God’s Word, is inappropriate. We’ll call them the technophobes. Others will go without thinking and ask ChatGPT to unravel any question they have about the Bible and accept the answer uncritically. We’ll call them the technophiles. Still others would say, “Yes, eventually, but hold your horses.” Let’s call them the technorealists.

Personally, I find myself somewhere between a technorealist and a technophile. I’m fatalistic that new technologies we resist today will one day be commonplace tomorrow, but in a joyful sort of way. I’m not saying there are no people out there resisting debit/credit cards or cars, but I am saying that in general we’ve come to accept these as parts of our life. AI is going to be next, eventually. To quote the Borg, “Resistance is futile.” I know there are dangers and downsides, but I do think the final product will be an improvement, especially for those who think critically about how to use it well.

But if we’re going to cautiously use the superpower that is AI, that does not mean it should be used in every context. I don’t think it would be right for a husband who has hurt his wife to sit down with ChatGPT, explain the situation, and then say, “What should I say to make things better?” If he wrote down word for word what the AI said and then repeated it to his wife, I doubt any of us would think that is a good use of AI. So if there are legitimate and illegitimate uses, then where does

What Is AI? And Is It Wrong to Use for Bible Study in Principle?

If you are in a group and want to find out if there are any AI enthusiasts among you, simply say, “Man, AI is great. It’s like Google on steroids.” Anyone in the group who knows AI and studies it will immediately groan and inform you that you are thinking about AI all wrong, that it’s much more than just a search engine, and that its potential applications are far broader than fancy Google searches. I’m sure all of that is true, but it also happens to serve as a really tricked out search engine.

I don’t know all the ins and outs of AI, but from what I understand, the large language models like ChatGPT, Gemini, or Grok are essentially elaborate predict-a-text machines. They aren’t actually thinking about your question, they are crunching large amounts of data and spitting out something that sounds like it’s right. It’s a giant guessing machine. Can a giant guessing machine help you study your Bible? I would say yes, provided you know the potential dangers and that you use it in the right way.

What Are the Dangers of AI?

So, before we really get started, we have to start with the warnings. If we are going to use AI to study the Bible, we have to be aware of what the dangers are, and there are certainly dangers to look out for.

Hallucinations – AI gets stuff wrong, a lot. AI is good at getting you an answer quickly, but that answer may or may not be right. It’s best to assume that any answer you get from AI is wrong, and that it needs to be checked. If this is the case, then how can AI be helpful? Let me give a few examples.

For starters, AI tends to do best when asked for broad summaries and the worst when asked specific, nuanced questions. Knowing this can be helpful so that what you search is less likely to return bad data. When I asked ChatGPT to summarize the Pentateuch’s teaching on the law, the OT teaching on the law, the NT teaching on the law, and then do a biblical summary of the law, it did really well. When I asked it what was up with the Hebrew vowel pointing in the last word in Psalm 71:12, I got a lot of Hebrew sounding mush. That’s because AI does well summarizing big ideas rather than giving very nuanced answers, since there is a lot more written on the law in the Bible than there is on obscure Hebrew vowel points.

Sometimes I use AI to find a verse I’m thinking of or to check a fact. For example, in last week’s post I wanted to mention that Nicodemus was a Pharisee, but I couldn’t remember if the Bible explicitly said that and if so where it said that. So I just asked ChatGPT if Nicodemus was a Pharisee, and it said that he was and gave the reference of John 3:1. I checked John 3:1, and sure enough, that’s exactly what the verse said. I’ve found that to be more helpful than searching a digital Bible, as a search for “Nicodemus Pharisee” might miss a verse that said something like, “Now he was a Pharisee.” This inexact search is one of the more helpful aspects of AI, in my experience, but I always make sure to quickly double check the answer I’m given.

Shallow Thinking – I wrote about this danger a few weeks ago in relation to education, but I think one of the potential dangers in AI is that we let it do the thinking for us. The greatest danger technology poses may not be that our muscles atrophy and we become giant blobs like on Wall-E, but that our brains don’t get the exercise they need and become bloated and inefficient. Hard thinking is good for your brain, just like running is good for your lungs. I’m very thankful for cars, but the lack of exercise is a problem that we have to be honest about. Similarly, AI can be very helpful, but we need to be careful that we don’t offload all our rigorous thinking to machines.

Simply put, God wants us to think and to think hard. Our study of God’s Word should involve us wrestling with passages that confuse us, trying to figure out what God would want me to do in this particular situation, or what exactly the author is saying or means here. Yes, in many of these cases a few taps on my phone and I could have an easily digestible answer that summarizes everything the internet has to say about this question. But if my first default is simply to look something up, I miss out on the opportunity to wrestle with God’s Word. I believe that it’s often when wrestling through a challenging passage or a difficult situation that God does a work in our hearts. Can you use AI to check your work or to help you? Perhaps, but start alone with a Bible and pray for illumination before jumping to helps.

Bias – I’ve actually been pleasantly surprised by the lack of bias that I’ve seen in AI when asking biblical questions. I wonder if that is because evangelical Christians are so active on the internet. Regardless, the language is not neutral. Every sentence communicates a viewpoint, and AI will communicate what it finds online filtered through the protocols put in place by the programmers who developed it. For this reason, always beware that you may not be getting all the information, or that the information may be slanted, or that the AI might be making something up that lines up with the world’s dominant viewpoint. Now, as I’ve said, the AI that I have used has done surprisingly well not falling into this trap, but it’s still one to be on the lookout for.

How Could AI Be Helpfully Used?

So what are some legitimate uses of AI in Bible study? There are several ways you could be helped in your study of Scripture by pulling up ChatGPT, Grok, Gemini, or Perplexity.

• Coming up with a Bible reading plan – I had a friend do this and I think it worked pretty well. Tell AI what you want to read and over how long a period, and it should come up with a reading plan.

• Looking up references or facts quickly – I mentioned this already, but I have used Google and now AI to get verse lists on topics such as anger, laziness, God’s will, or other such topics. Often, AI will make full lists for you if you want that you could print out or study.

• Getting background material – when used carefully and broadly enough, AI can provide helpful background. For example, “What is the difference between the Pharisees, Sadducees, and the Essenes” would probably give you a helpful summary. Depending on the AI, there might be resources you could click on to go deeper or check the AI’s work. As always, be aware that some of the info may be wrong, and make sure the references you are given are reputable.

• Getting overviews of difficult interpretational issues – when you come across difficult passages in your Bible, often you will find you are not the first (e.g. “What is going on in James 4:5?”). AI can quickly glance at lengthy discussions and summarize it for you. Of course, you will want to do your own study, but you may find it a helpful starting point before digging into meatier resources like commentaries or Bible dictionaries.

• Reviewing your thinking on a passage – once you have thought through a passage and come to conclusions, ask AI what it thinks. It will probably try to flatter you. Seriously, it will tell you that you are awesome, don’t believe it. In fact, if you really want to have fun ask it to explain Proverbs 26:28 (a verse on flattery) and ask the AI if it’s ever been guilty of flattery. Once you get through the smooth talk, though, see if there is anything profitable that AI spotted or anything it thinks you got wrong.

Since this post is AI-themed, it seemed only natural that after I listed the above recommendations, I give AI a chance. When I asked ChatGPT “What are some ways I could use AI in Bible study?” it gave a bunch, but here are some highlights:

• Create charts or outlines
• Come up with reflection questions for a passage
• Look for cross-references for a verse
• Compare translations

I imagine that when my kids are adults, they will probably think nothing of using AI in their devotions. That doesn’t mean that AI isn’t dangerous, but most incredibly helpful tools are dangerous. So how do we avoid these dangers?

I think a big part of it is thinking of AI as a tool, and a flawed tool at that, rather than as an oracle of truth. Go to it for the kind of work that it is good at, and make sure you know what kind of work that is and avoid putting too much stock in what it tells you. And to be fair, AI agrees. In my post asking ChatGPT on how to use AI in Bible study, it concluded with this statement:

⚠️ Two guardrails:

1. AI isn’t inspired — always check everything against Scripture.
2. Use it as an aid, not a substitute for prayerful reading and the Spirit’s guidance.

 

Well said, ChatGPT, well said.

 

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Ben Hicks is the Associate Pastor at Colonial Hills Baptist Church in Indianapolis. This article originally appeared on his Substack.