purebible (Python) — for people who live in nvim, btop & the terminal

Zero-dependency Python remake of the purebible terminal client. Vim keys. btop-style bars. Pipes like a good Unix citizen. No Qt, no build.

Stateless by design: no daemon, no server, no background state. Every invocation reads the KJV text fresh and exits; the TUI keeps results in memory only and writes nothing.

purebible "God | Jesus"        # OR search
purebible "God Jesus"          # exact phrase
purebible "James* & John*"     # AND in same verse (new: old CLI gave 0 rows)
purebible "John 3:16"          # smart-dispatch → lookup
purebible lookup "Rom 12:1-2"  # ranges + whole chapters ("John 3")
purebible tui "love*"          # fullscreen: j/k, /, :, n/N, y, q

Install (PyPI)

sudo pacman -S python-pipx      # isolated CLI installs, the Arch-friendly way
pipx install purebible
purebible "John 3:16"           # verify
purebible tui                   # full-screen mode

The KJV text (9 MB, public domain) ships bundled inside the package — no setup needed. To use a different transcription instead, point at it explicitly (--text, PUREBIBLE_TEXT) or drop it in ~/.local/share/purebible/SW1769Bible_both.txt, which takes precedence over the bundled copy. Bundled transcription from the KingJamesPureBibleSearch project.

pipx keeps it off system python — Arch is externally-managed, so plain pip would need --break-system-packages. Zero runtime dependencies either way (curses ships with Arch's python).

From GitHub instead: pipx install git+https://github.com/ripekern/purebible-py.git.

No AUR package yet — new AUR registrations are currently paused for spam, so it can't be submitted right now. Planned once they reopen.

Install for development

cd ~/Work/purebible-py
pip install -e . --break-system-packages   # gives `purebible` + short alias `pb`
# or without install:
python3 -m purebible "John 3:16"

The KJV text ships bundled (purebible/data/), so a checkout works out of the box — to use a different copy instead, one-time setup:

mkdir -p ~/.local/share/purebible
ln -s ~/Work/purebiblesearch/text/complete/SW1769Bible_both.txt \
      ~/.local/share/purebible/SW1769Bible_both.txt
# alternatives: export PUREBIBLE_TEXT=/path/to/SW1769Bible_both.txt,
# or copy it to ./data/ or ~/.config/purebible/

Why this exists

purebible-cli (C++/Qt) is exact but heavy: CMake, Qt6, daemon sockets, 30 MB servers. This is the same terminal client rewritten in pure Python for terminal-first users:

• nvim: purebible prints ref: text, one per line — :r !pb "Rom 12:1-2", quickfix-friendly, --refs-only + fzf ready, --no-color for pipes.
• btop: purebible tui is a live dashboard — header stats bar, reverse-video statusline, instant ms timings.
• terminal: nvim-style NORMAL/INSERT/COMMAND modes (/ fresh search, i caret before current query, a caret after it, arrows + C-u/C-w editing, : for commands, Esc drops back to NORMAL and never quits — quitting is q, ZZ/ZQ or :q, NORMAL mode only), : opens a centered noice-style popup in the upper third, and the bar stays minimal — mode tag + current search only (confirmations flash briefly). Jumplist (Enter opens a chapter, C-o jumps back), ↑/↓ prompt history, C-u/C-w line editing, even :w politely refuses. Lualine-style mode tags and refs colored for your system theme (auto-detected, PUREBIBLE_THEME=dark|light to override), :help opens a scrollable screen with the key list + every search and lookup pattern, :clear to clear results, NO_COLOR respected, works over SSH with zero deps.

Query language

Flags mirror the old client: -c/--case, -A/--abbrev, -w/--no-wordindex, -d/--no-dup, --comma, --refs-only, --book/--chapter/--verse (scope for &), plus --count, --limit N.

License

Open source. Code is GPL-3.0-or-later (same as the project it was ported from) — see LICENSE; the King James Bible text itself is public domain.

Notes / differences

• Native build ships KJV 1769 only (bibles → 1). Asking for another id prints a note and maps to 1 (the old Qt backend had 40+).
• Search runs on the whole-Bible word stream like KJPBS (phrases may span verse boundaries); * inside a phrase is a single-word skip. Hyphenated compounds (Bar-jesus), ligatures (Cæsar→Caesar), psalm superscriptions and Pauline colophons all match the C++ concordance — verified identical counts and word indexes on a battery of queries (Jesus 973, God 4444, David 930 deduped, …). -y enables hyphen-sensitive mode.
• & is new (old CLI treated it as a literal word → always 0). | and phrase/wildcard semantics match the original.