Getting started

Selah is a Bible reader that runs in your terminal, the black window programmers type commands into. You do not need to be a programmer to use it. If you can type john 3 and press enter, you can read with Selah.

Install

On Linux or macOS, open a terminal and paste this line:

curl -fsSL https://selah.hallelx2.com/install | sh

On Windows, open PowerShell (search for it in the Start menu) and paste this line:

irm https://selah.hallelx2.com/install.ps1 | iex

The installer picks the right build for your computer and checks it against its SHA-256 checksum before keeping it.

• On Linux and macOS it goes in ~/.local/bin. If that folder is not on your PATH yet, the installer prints the line to add.
• On Windows it goes in %LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\selah, and the installer adds that folder to your PATH. Open a new window afterwards.

Every build and its checksum is also on the download page.

Your first launch

Type selah and press enter.

The first launch downloads the King James Version and the Berean Standard Bible, about 16 MB, once. After that Selah needs no network to read.

The home screen shows:

• the verse of the day
• a box where you type a passage
• your progress today
• the chapters you were reading last

The first time you open a chapter, a card lists the eight keys that matter. Press any key to put it away.

Open a passage

Type a reference and press enter. Selah understands the ways people write them:

• john 3, jn 3:16, 1 cor 13:4-7, song of songs 2, ps 23
• whole phrases, like resume luke 21 or go to romans 8
• words, too: type living water and enter searches for it

You can also open a passage straight from the terminal:

selah john 3:16

In the reader, o opens a box to go anywhere else, and esc goes back home.

Reading

Key	What it does
j k or ↓ ↑	next / previous verse
n p or → ←	next / previous chapter
space	next page
g G	first / last verse
16 then enter	jump to verse 16
h	highlight the verse (again for another colour)
b	bookmark it; B lists your bookmarks
v then y	select several verses, then copy them
w	flowing paragraphs, or one verse per line
z	focus mode: everything but the verse you are on fades
- =	narrower / wider text

The header shows how much longer you need to spend before the chapter counts as read. It counts only real reading, explained below.

The study desk

Press tab in the reader. A pane opens beside the text, and it follows the verse you are on. Press tab again to go back to the text. ctrl+l hides it.

1. Notes: your note on this verse, and a journal for the whole chapter. Just type; it saves as you go.
2. Commentary: Matthew Henry on this verse.
3. Words: the Hebrew or Greek behind the verse.
4. Ask: questions answered by Claude Code or Codex, if you have one.

Press the number to switch tabs.

Matthew Henry

The commentary is a separate download of about 14 MB. Install it once:

selah install commentary

The Hebrew and Greek

The original words are about 108 MB. Install them once:

selah install concordance

Each word shows its transliteration, an English gloss, its Strong's number and its grammar in plain words. Press enter on a word for a study: the dictionary entry, how often it occurs, and every verse that uses it.

• enter on a verse there opens it in the reader.
• f narrows the list to the book you are reading.
• esc goes back.

Ask

Ask answers questions about the chapter you are reading, using your own Claude Code or Codex. Selah does not include an AI and holds no keys. It needs one of them installed and signed in:

• Claude Code: claude.com/claude-code
• Codex: developers.openai.com/codex

Then press 4 in the study desk, type a question and press enter.

• Answers cite the text, and ctrl+r opens the references they cite.
• ctrl+s saves the answer as a note on the current verse.
• If the agent suggests a note, nothing is saved unless you press ctrl+k.
• Each chapter keeps its own conversation.

If you have both agents, Selah uses the first it finds. Set "agent": "claude" or "agent": "codex" in the settings file to choose.

Selah in your own agent

selah mcp serves Selah's tools to Claude Code, Codex or any MCP client. Add it once:

claude mcp add selah -- selah mcp
codex mcp add selah -- selah mcp

Your agent can then read passages, search, consult Henry, study the original words and see your notes.

Doré's engravings

Gustave Doré made 100 engravings for the Bible in 1866. Selah shows each one at the passage it depicts. Install them once, about 17 MB:

selah install scenes

When a chapter has an engraving, the header shows ✦. Press i to open it.

• ← and → walk the gallery.
• g lists all 100.
• enter opens the passage.
• esc closes it.

They are all on the engravings page too.

Search

Press / and type. Results are ranked, with your words highlighted.

• "living water" in quotes finds the exact phrase.
• in:psalms, in:ot and in:nt narrow the search.
• A Strong's number, such as G26 or H2617, lists every verse that uses that word.

Commands

ctrl+p opens a box where you type what you want, in ordinary words: dark, pictures, bigger text, commentary, bookmarks, quit. It also takes passages.

Progress and plans

Press s for your progress: your streak, today, consistency over 7, 30 and 365 days, a year's heatmap, and how far through each book you are.

To follow a plan, open the commands with ctrl+p and type plan. There are:

• the Bible in a Year
• the Bible in Two Years
• the New Testament in 90 Days
• the Gospels in 30 Days
• Psalms and Proverbs in a Month

ctrl+o then opens today's reading. Selah tells you how far ahead or behind you are.

How reading counts

• A chapter counts when you reach its end and have spent real time on it. That means 30% of the time it takes to read at 250 words a minute, never more than 30 seconds.
• Time away from the keyboard for more than three minutes is not counted.
• A chapter counts once a day, for the day you started reading it.
• m marks a chapter read yourself, and pressing it again unmarks it.

Translations

The King James Version and the Berean Standard Bible come with Selah. Three more are in the public domain and one command away:

selah install ASV YLT NHEB

In the reader, t changes the translation and T shows two side by side.

Settings

Most settings are in the commands box (ctrl+p): theme, light or dark, daily goal, icons, translations.

They are saved in a file you can also edit by hand:

• Linux and macOS: ~/.config/selah/config.json
• Windows: %APPDATA%\selah\config.json

It holds:

• theme and mode (auto, dark or light)
• translation and the daily goal
• icons: nerd, unicode or none
• motion: full, or reduced to turn the animations off
• prose, agent, and hebrew (visual or logical)

The command line

Selah also works without opening the app:

selah 0.3.2  a Bible for the terminal

Usage
  selah                     open the app
  selah <reference>         open at a passage          selah john 3:16
  selah <reference> -p      print a passage and exit   selah ps 23 -p
  selah search <words>      print search results       selah search "living water"
  selah stats [--json]      print streak and progress  (for status bars)
  selah install <id>        download a translation     KJV, BSB, ASV, YLT, NHEB
  selah install commentary  Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible
  selah install concordance Hebrew and Greek words with Strong's numbers and lexicons
  selah install scenes      Doré's 100 Bible engravings, shown with the passages
  selah notes export [file] all notes and journals as Markdown
  selah mcp                 serve Selah's tools to Claude Code, Codex or any MCP client
  selah translations        list translations

Options
  -t, --translation <id>    translation to use (default from config)
  -p, --print               print instead of opening the app
  -h, --help                show this help
  -v, --version             show the version

selah stats --json prints your streak in waybar's format, for a status bar.

Where your things are

• Your reading history, highlights, bookmarks and notes are in user.db.
• The Bible texts are in bible.db, kept separate so that adding or removing a translation never touches your own data.
• selah --help prints the exact folders on your computer.

	Linux and macOS	Windows
Your data and the texts	~/.local/share/selah	%LOCALAPPDATA%\selah\data
Settings	~/.config/selah/config.json	%APPDATA%\selah\config.json

SELAH_HOME puts everything in one folder. selah notes export notes.md writes all your notes and journals as Markdown.

Updating

Run the install line again. It replaces the program and leaves your data alone. To install a particular version, set SELAH_VERSION:

curl -fsSL https://selah.hallelx2.com/install | SELAH_VERSION=v0.3.1 sh

Uninstalling

Delete the program:

• Linux and macOS: ~/.local/bin/selah
• Windows: the folder %LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\selah

Your notes stay in Selah's data folder until you delete that too.

If something looks wrong

• The colours are off, or there are question marks:
  • On Windows, use Windows Terminal.
  • Elsewhere, use a terminal with true colour, such as kitty, Ghostty, WezTerm, foot, iTerm2 or GNOME Terminal.
• Icons show as boxes: your font has no Nerd Font icons. In the commands box, type icons and pick simple symbols.
• Hebrew reads in the wrong direction: set "hebrew": "logical" in the settings file. Some terminals reverse right-to-left text themselves.
• Your terminal mishandles colour queries: Selah asks the terminal for its colours when it starts, and a few terminals answer badly. Start it with SELAH_NO_PALETTE=1 selah to skip the question.
• Something else: start it with SELAH_DEBUG_LOG=selah.log selah, then open an issue with the log attached.