Startup Idea: Theological Text Analysis Software

Startup idea to develop a software targeted towards religious teachers, specifically Christian pastors, to aid them in authoring their speeches and writings. The software would identify similarities with theological works, check for metaphorical and doctrinal consistency, spot flawed logic, and additionally provide scriptural quotations. The software can potentially have wider applications for political speech writers and scholarly journal editors.

I am a Christian (Episcopalian) ordained pastor. In our daily work we have a lot of writing and public speaking to do. There are four ways software could help me with these tasks that I have not found yet: The first would be to review my work for similarity to major theological authors and works. This is similar to a plagiarism check, but rather than flagging my writing as plagiarized, I would like to know the source(s) so I can check them, site them, and perhaps draw quotations from them. Second, I use a lot of analogies, metaphors and storied examples. I need to know whether the points I draw from the analogies, metaphors and/or stories are consistent with what I am trying to explain: this is in some ways similar to grammar and spell-checking software but it is looking for metaphorical consistency. (If you want to look at the technicalities of metaphors and symbols within theology and preaching, see David Tracy's book titled Plurality and Ambiguity.) Third, I need to know whether my points are doctrinally consistent with my denomination -- would there be a way to flag certain syntax or vocabulary to help me with this need? And fourth, I need to be persuasive so it would be helpful to have faulty logic flagged. Bonus: It would be great if Scriptural quotations could be checked, and even greater if they could be suggested.

I do not know whether you can develop software that would be this discerning with respect to the content of our writing. If so, there might be wider applications for other writers -- such as political speech writers and scholarly journal writers and editors. Maybe if the software were linked to internet search engines you could design something that would incorporate some of the features of plagiarism software but in a more nuanced and constructive process. If you take on this task, be aware that one denomination's heresy can be another denomination's core value, so you might have flags that pop up that indicate, for instance, "You are echoing Martin Luther here." or, "Your example from Star Wars reflects pantheism." If you want to help other speakers, at least being able to flag bad arguments would be really useful -- see the great little book by Ali Almossawi titled An Illustrated book of Bad Arguments. No I haven't used anything other than plagiarism software, and I am rusty on using that. I rely on my own memory of an inordinate amount of graduate education -- but between my ears has turned out to be a somewhat faulty place to store so much intellectual property.

Submitter: My name is Pat Henking and my email address is (view contact info)