Frequently Asked Questions

You give a name, an email, and a password — that is the whole account. The email is your login, so use one you check. Press Create Account and you are logged straight in. If the site owner has published an adage library, a short welcome page then asks whether you would like it; answer that and you land on your workspace, which is empty until you add your first verse.

It offers read-only access to the shared adage library — a collection of sayings the site owner has gathered. The page shows a few examples and explains exactly what saying yes means, with two buttons: include it, or no thanks. Your account is already created and active by that point, so declining costs you nothing.

It is optional and reversible, so there is no wrong answer. Saying yes gives you a ready-made collection to search and attach to your verses. Saying no keeps your searches limited to adages you create yourself. Either way you can change it later on your Account page — you will not need to register again.

They appear together in search results, but they are never merged. Yours remain yours — private, editable, and untouched. Library adages simply have no Edit option, because they are someone else's to maintain. Nothing you write is ever visible to the site owner or to any other user.

Yes. ScripturesNote is your personal study workspace, not a scripture library — you add the verses you are working with. Paste the text from whatever edition you study with. This keeps your collection focused on what you are actually studying rather than burying it in thousands of verses you have never opened.

Log in, choose Add Scripture from the menu, pick a volume, then a book. Enter the chapter and verse, paste the text, and save. You land on that verse's page, where you can start adding notes and links right away.

The D&C is organized by section rather than book and chapter, so the section is treated as the book and the chapter field is hidden. A reference like D&C 76:22 is entered by choosing Section 76 and entering verse 22. It displays as "Section 76:22" throughout.

It gathers everything you have collected about a single word onto one page. Enter a word like "resurrection" and it pulls together the scriptures whose text mentions it, the definitions and Names of Christ that explain it, the notes and cross-reference notes where you have written about it, the adages on that theme, and any patterns that reference it. It is the fastest way to see the whole picture of a topic at once.

Across all seven kinds of material: scriptures, definitions, Names of Christ, your notes, cross-reference notes, adages, and patterns. Definitions and Names include any shared library you have opted into; patterns are always your own. Each result links straight to its full page.

No. Studying "resurrection" also finds "resurrected" and "resurrect", so you see every form of the word. Matches are highlighted so they are easy to spot.

It only searches what you have added. Early on there may be little to gather; as you record scriptures, write notes, and build definitions, the Study page fills out. It reflects your own study, not an outside encyclopedia.

As many as you want. Notes stack in a numbered list with a running count, and adding a new one never replaces an old one. Come back months later and add more.

It is created automatically as a placeholder with empty text. Click through to it any time and fill in the wording. This lets you follow a train of thought without stopping to type out every verse along the way.

No. Link A to B once and both pages show the relationship. B displays the connection tagged "links here" so you know it points back. This is true for scripture-to-scripture, adage-to-scripture, and adage-to-adage links.

Yes. Every link has an optional note field. It appears indented beneath the link on both pages, so the reason for the connection travels with it.

Yes. Every note has an "edit" control beside it, and every link has "edit link" which lets you change the connecting note or remove the link entirely. Removing a link leaves both verses in place — only the connection goes.

Yes. Open the verse and use "Edit this verse" beneath the text. You can correct the wording or delete the verse outright. Deleting also removes its notes, its links, and its adage attachments, so you are asked to confirm first.

Linking to a verse you have not added yet creates it as a placeholder so the connection can exist. These are marked "needs text" wherever they appear, and Browse has a filter listing all of them so you can fill them in when you are ready.

Use Browse in the menu. It shows every book you have verses in, with counts, and you can open any book to see its verses in order. There are also filters for recently added, most connected, and verses still needing text.

Yes. On any verse page, "Printable version" opens a clean copy with the verse, your notes, its cross-references and adages, laid out for paper with no navigation. You can optionally include the full text of linked verses.

Adages are compressed observations about human experience, and they often echo what scripture teaches in plainer language. Attaching them to verses gives you a second angle on a passage. You can also link adages to each other to trace how an idea recurs.

Source (who said or wrote it), subject (a short label for what it is about), and the adage text itself. All three are searchable and all three can be corrected later.

You can edit any adage you created yourself — open it and change the source, subject, or text. If you imported adages from another system, your corrections are flagged and protected, so a later re-import will not overwrite them. Adages from the shared library are the exception; those are maintained by the site owner.

Yes, and to as many other adages as you like. There is no limit on connections in any direction.

Those come from the shared library — a collection the site owner has made available read-only. You can search them and attach them to your scriptures, but only the owner can change their wording. Any adage you created yourself will always have an Edit option.

You see the change immediately, because the library is a live view rather than a copy handed to you. If they correct a typo or a misattribution, it is corrected everywhere it appears, including on your scripture pages.

Yes, at any time. Your Account page has a Shared Adage Library setting you can switch on or off yourself. Turning it off hides those adages from your searches again; any you had already attached to your scriptures stay attached and keep working.

A definition is a word or phrase and what it means to you — for example the term "Grace" with your own explanation of it. You keep your own private list, and you can link any definition to the scriptures where it appears. Open a verse and you will see the definitions you have linked to it, alongside your notes and adages.

Open the definition and use the "Link a Scripture" search to find a verse in your own collection, then link it. The connection shows on both the definition and the verse. You can add a short note explaining the link, and remove it later without deleting either side.

There can be. Just like adages, the site owner can offer their own collection of definitions as a read-only library, through a separate setting. If it is offered, you opt in on your Account page, and those definitions appear in your searches. You can use and attach them but not edit them; your own definitions stay private and fully yours.

Yes. On the Definitions page choose "Import from CSV". Upload a two-column file — the term in the first column, the definition in the second. If a definition begins with a scripture reference like "2 Nephi 10:16" and you already have that verse, the importer links it and removes the reference from the text. You see a full preview of what will happen before anything is saved.

Then nothing is linked and the reference is left in the definition text untouched. The importer never creates verses you did not enter yourself — it only links to scriptures already in your collection.

It works exactly like Definitions, but for the names and titles of Christ — for example "The Good Shepherd" with its meaning. You keep your own list, link each name to the scriptures where it appears, and see them on the verse page. It is a completely separate collection from your definitions.

Yes, and independently. The site owner can offer a read-only library of Names of Christ through its own separate setting, and you opt in on your Account page separately from the definitions library. Turning one on does not affect the other.

Yes, the same way as definitions. On the Names of Christ page choose "Import from CSV" and upload a two-column file: the name first, its meaning second. A leading reference is linked and stripped only if you already own that verse. A preview shows everything before you confirm.

A pattern is a recurring theme you notice across scripture — a name, an explanation, and the examples that follow the same shape. For instance, a pattern called "Going before Christ" with an explanation, and examples like Joseph Smith, Abraham, Adam, Moses, and John. It is a way to record a structure you see repeating rather than a single verse or definition.

Patterns are always private to you. Unlike adages, definitions, and Names of Christ, there is no shared library for patterns and no way for anyone else to see them. They are yours alone.

As many as you like. When adding or editing a pattern, use "Add another example" for each one. There is no fixed number — a pattern might have two examples or twenty.

Yes. On the Patterns page choose "Import from CSV". The first column is the pattern name, the second is the explanation, and every column after that is an example — as many columns as you have examples. Nothing is linked to scriptures; the explanation and examples are kept as plain text. As with the other importers, you see a preview before anything is saved.

Because a pattern mixes people and references together as examples — "Abraham" and "Matthew 11:9" might sit side by side — the examples are stored as plain text so both kinds are preserved exactly as you wrote them. If you want a reference to be a live link, record it as a definition or a Name of Christ instead, where linking is the point.

Type any number of words. Every word must appear somewhere in an item for it to match — in verse text, a reference, a note, a link comment, or an adage. Word order does not matter and the words can be far apart. Matches are highlighted in the results.

Yes. Searching "God" or "sin" or "joy" returns results. Many search systems silently ignore words under four characters; this one does not.

Your workspace shows results only after you search, so it stays fast and uncluttered as your collection grows. Search a word, or filter by volume, to see what you have.

Not unless you choose to share something. Everything you add is private to your account by default — there is no public view, and no other user can browse or search your collection. The one exception is sharing: if you deliberately send a scripture to another user, they see the copy you sent them, and only that. Two users can each keep their own John 3:16 with completely different notes, invisible to each other.

Use the "Forgot password" link on the login page. We email a reset link that expires after two hours and can only be used once. We never email your password, because we never store it in a readable form.

After 3 failed attempts within 10 minutes, logins are temporarily blocked for that email address. This protects your account from password guessing. Wait for the window to pass, or reset your password to regain access sooner. The block is tied to the account, not your network, so it will not affect other people using the same wifi.

Yes. Your Account page has an export that packages everything you have written — verses, notes, links, adages, and all the connections between them — into a single file you can download and keep.

Not from the Account page, since your email is your login identity. Send a message through the contact form and we can update it for you.

Any other person with a ScripturesNote account. You share by typing their exact account email address. There is no list of users to browse — this is deliberate, so no one can discover who else is registered, and no one can be added to your world without your typing their address.

Yes. Sharing goes from one account to another, so the recipient must be a registered ScripturesNote user, and you must use the email tied to their account. If you enter an address that no account uses, the share is not sent and you are told so.

The scripture you are viewing, every note you have written on it, and every adage attached to it — as one bundle. You can also include a short personal message explaining why you are sharing it. What is sent is a snapshot taken at the moment you click Share.

No. Because a share is a snapshot, your later edits and deletions do not touch what you already sent, and once someone accepts a share their copy is entirely their own. The two never sync. Think of it like handing someone a photocopy rather than lending them the original.

The share sits in their Inbox as "pending" until they act on it, and their Inbox keeps a record of what they accepted or declined. You are not sent a notification of their choice. If it matters, ask them directly.

No — the share itself still went through and is waiting in the recipient's Inbox on the site. Only the email notification failed, usually a temporary mail issue. The recipient will still see it the next time they log in.

They can send a share, but nothing they send ever enters your collection on its own. It waits in your Inbox, and you choose Accept or Decline. Declining dismisses it. Because sharing requires knowing your exact account email and cannot be done from a browsable list, unwanted shares are unlikely in the first place.

The Inbox link in the top menu. When something is waiting, a small count appears beside it, and a banner also appears on your workspace. Open the Inbox to preview each share and accept or decline it.