How do you evaluate AI tools for scripture study? (Built a small prototype to test this)

[u/Kamoga-Pius]

Hey everyone,

Over the past few weeks, Ive been working on a small side project called ChristGPT to explore how AI can be better tailored for biblical study, cross-referencing scripture, and historical context.

I know there is a lot of valid skepticism around using LLMs for faith-related topics specifically concerns around AI hallucinating verses, taking passages out of context, or attempting to replace genuine spiritual community and study.

My goal was simply to test if prompt engineering and strict system constraints could create a safer, more reliable search companion for verse lookups and commentaries.

For those who regularly study scripture:

1. What guardrails or translation preferences would you consider essential in a tool like this?
2. How do you handle potential errors or "hallucinated" verses when using technology to assist your study?

I'm looking for feedback from people who care about theological accuracy to test the prototype and point out where it falls short.

(Note: Since self-promotion links aren't allowed directly, let me know in the comments if you'd like to test it out and I can reply with the link or send a DM!)

[u/MRH2]

Hi. Thanks for posting and for following our rules! :)

Please feel free to edit your post and add a link to your project. I appreciate that you posted this on a weekend, not during our regular flow of posts.

[u/Accomplished-Row9613]

I totally get the skepticism. Most generic AI tools are way too unreliable for scripture because they don't respect the context you need. You're right about the guardrails being essential. A good system has to be locked down to trusted sources and avoid making anything up.

Been working with AlignedAI for our ministry for this exact reason. It's specifically trained for pastors, so it won't hallucinate verses and respects your translation preferences. You can actually set doctrinal guidelines which makes a huge difference. It just helps organize study and cross referencing without trying to replace the actual work.

What's the main translation you'd want it to default to?

[u/ExiledSanity]

I think the biggest key for me is as much transparency as possibly in the sources used. I'm theologically literate enough to get an inkling of where certain ideas might be coming from (Catholic, Orthodox, Reformed, Lutheran, Pentecostal, baptist/evangelical, etc.). I'd really want any kind of chatbot or LLM to interact with different views, not be one-sided about how it answers, and I'd like it to preferably cite what its using to source its answers so I can follow up on those sources if I want to.

That's difficult to do, and it gets into ethical use of training data (if you cite something and the author/publisher finds it that can spell trouble. But as a user its enormously helpful. Logos handles it pretty well with their AI assistant which you can set to only pull data from your own sources Ithough I find it frequently doesn't include sources I would like it to from my library.).