Source credit & fair-use policy

biblegloss is a place for teaching, study, commentary, and discussion of Scripture. References and any limited excerpts from copyrighted sources are intended to support those purposes, help readers evaluate an insight, and direct readers to the original author’s work.

Credit the author and link to the source

When an insight draws on someone else’s work, name the author or speaker and the book, article, sermon, or video. Include a page number or timestamp when possible, and link to the original publication, author’s site, publisher, or a legitimate book listing. Attribution is required by our community standards; it does not replace permission when permission is needed.

Use your own words; quote only what you need

Explain your own reading and reasoning. Mark direct quotations clearly and use only the amount needed for your discussion. Do not copy entire articles, book chapters, substantial commentary passages, lyrics, transcripts, or material that substitutes for purchasing or accessing the original work. Paraphrases also need source credit.

Fair use is evaluated case by case

Under U.S. copyright law, teaching, criticism, commentary, scholarship, and research can support fair use, but educational intent is not an automatic exemption. The analysis considers the purpose and character of the use, the nature of the source work, the amount and significance used, and the effect on the original work’s market. No fixed word count or percentage guarantees fair use, and crediting an author alone does not make copying lawful. Commercial features, if present, are also relevant to the overall analysis.

Use public-domain or appropriately licensed material where possible. Obtain permission when a proposed use exceeds a clearly applicable license or is not justified by fair use; when uncertain, link to the source instead of reproducing it.

Videos and moderation

Link to or embed legitimately published videos through supported YouTube or Vimeo players. Credit the creator and original upload, respect disabled embedding and access restrictions, and do not re-upload someone else’s video or transcript without authorization. All submitted insights, including their quotations and video links, require administrator approval. Approval is a community review, not a legal determination of fair use. Administrators may reject or remove material that does not meet this policy.

Bible text

The World English Bible text used here is in the public domain. That does not make third-party commentaries, other Bible translations, videos, or sources public domain.