Look up passages, themes, and arguments from Alan Hirsch's book corpus — both from the local markdown files and the Supabase database. Use when researching what Alan actually says about a topic before writing an article. Returns quoted passages with proper citations.
Installs into .claude/skills of the current project.
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---
name: article-corpus
description: Look up passages, themes, and arguments from Alan Hirsch's book corpus — both from the local markdown files and the Supabase database. Use when researching what Alan actually says about a topic before writing an article. Returns quoted passages with proper citations.
user-invocable: true
allowed-tools: Read, Grep, Glob, mcp__supabase__execute_sql, mcp__supabase__search_docs
---
Find what Alan Hirsch says about: $ARGUMENTS
$ARGUMENTS should be a topic, concept, keyword, or question (e.g., "APEST", "incarnational mission", "what does Alan say about discipleship in Metanoia"). If none given, list the available corpus and ask what to search.
---
## The Book Corpus
### Local Files
**Root path:** `/Users/joshuashepherd/Desktop/Dev/repos/alan-books/corpus/alan_hirsch/`
**Manifest:** `/Users/joshuashepherd/Desktop/Dev/repos/alan-books/corpus/alan_hirsch_manifest.json`
- Contains all book/chapter metadata: canonical_id, book_slug, chapter_number, chapter_slug, chapter_title, word_count
**File naming convention:** `{book-slug}-ch{N}-{chapter-slug}.md`
- e.g., `5q-ch01-introduction.md`, `reframation-ch03-reframing-apest.md`
**Chapter file format:** Markdown with YAML frontmatter
```yaml
---
canonical_id: alan:5q:ch01
book_slug: 5q
book_title: "5Q: Reactivating the Original Intelligence..."
chapter_number: 1
chapter_slug: introduction
chapter_title: "Introduction"
language: en
tenant_id: alan-hirsch
word_count: 4231
---
[content here]
```
### Available Books (English Corpus)
| Slug | Full Title | Primary Pillar | Key Topics |
|------|-----------|----------------|------------|
| `5q` | 5Q: Reactivating the Original Intelligence and Capacity of the Body of Christ | APEST / 5Q | Five-fold ministry, APEST gifts, church intelligence, ecclesiology |
| `reframation` | Reframation: Seeing God, People, and Mission Through Reframe Eyes | Christology / Lordship | Theology, image of God, missional imagination, atonement |
| `rejesus` | ReJesus: A Wild Messiah for a Tame Church | Christology / Lordship | Christology, Jesus-shaped faith, discipleship, lordship |
| `metanoia` | Metanoia: The Ancient Way Forward | Metanoia / Discipleship | Transformation, conversion, repentance, formation |
| `disciplism` | Disciplism | Metanoia / Discipleship | Discipleship, mentoring, learning communities |
| `on-the-verge` | On the Verge: A Journey Into the Apostolic Future of the Church | Movemental / Apostolic | Apostolic imagination, movement dynamics, future church |
| `fast-forward-to-mission` | Fast Forward to Mission | Movemental / Missional | Mission, movement, apostolic, accelerators |
| `right-here-right-now` | Right Here, Right Now: Everyday Mission for Everyday People | Missional Church | Incarnational mission, everyday mission, sent life |
**Translations available:** Spanish (`-es`) and Portuguese (`-pt`, `-pt-BR`) versions of most books.
### Supabase Tables
**Primary tables:**
- `books` — book metadata (slug, title, theological_themes, key_topics)
- `book_chapters` — chapter content (content as HTML, word_count, chapter_number, title)
- `books_chapters` — legacy table (same structure, may also be populated)
**Useful SQL for research:**
```sql
-- Find chapters mentioning a topic
SELECT b.title as book_title, bc.chapter_number, bc.title as chapter_title, bc.excerpt
FROM book_chapters bc
JOIN books b ON bc.book_id = b.id
WHERE bc.content ILIKE '%{search_term}%'
ORDER BY b.title, bc.chapter_number;
-- Get all chapters of a specific book
SELECT chapter_number, title, excerpt, word_count
FROM book_chapters bc
JOIN books b ON bc.book_id = b.id
WHERE b.slug = '{book-slug}'
ORDER BY chapter_number;
```
---
## How to Research a Topic
### Step 1 — Identify Relevant Books and Chapters
Start with the manifest to find chapter titles before reading full content:
```
Grep the manifest for the search term:
Pattern: search term keywords
Path: /Users/joshuashepherd/Desktop/Dev/repos/alan-books/corpus/alan_hirsch_manifest.json
```
Or scan chapter titles across the corpus:
```
Glob: /Users/joshuashepherd/Desktop/Dev/repos/alan-books/corpus/alan_hirsch/**/*.md
Then Grep for the topic within those files
```
### Step 2 — Read Relevant Chapters
Use the file naming pattern to read specific chapters:
```
Read: /Users/joshuashepherd/Desktop/Dev/repos/alan-books/corpus/alan_hirsch/{book-slug}/{book-slug}-ch{N}-{chapter-slug}.md
```
For a concept likely spanning multiple books, read the most relevant 2–3 chapters (not every chapter).
### Step 3 — Cross-Reference with Supabase (Optional)
If the local files are insufficient or you need full-text search across all content:
- Use `mcp__supabase__execute_sql` with the SQL patterns above
- Project ID: `vhaiiiykcukrlyvwlgip`
### Step 4 — Extract and Format Passages
From the content found, extract:
- **Direct quotes** — verbatim text worth quoting in an article (2–5 sentences max per quote)
- **Key arguments** — the logical chain Alan builds (paraphraseable)
- **Frameworks/definitions** — crisp definitional passages (GEO-valuable)
- **Stories and examples** — specific historical examples Alan uses in this context
---
## Output Format
Return research findings organized as:
### [Topic] — Corpus Research
**Books consulted:** [list]
---
**[Book Title] — ch[N] "[Chapter Title]"**
*Key passage:*
> [verbatim quote if strong enough, or paraphrase clearly marked]
*Argument summary:* [1–3 sentences on what Alan argues here]
*Relevant to article:* [how this passage supports the article topic]
---
[Repeat for each relevant source]
---
**Synthesis:**
- Across the corpus, Alan's position on [topic] is: [1–2 sentences]
- Strongest quotable passages: [bullet list of the best direct quotes with citation]
- Argument patterns present: [which of Pattern A/B/C from alan-voice this content fits]
- Pillar this primarily belongs to: [one of the six pillars]
---
## Citation Format
Always cite using this format (same as AI Lab):
`**Source:** Book Title — ch[N] "[Chapter Title]"`
For direct quotes: Use blockquote formatting with citation below.
Never invent quotes. If a paraphrase is used, mark it as such: `(paraphrased from ch[N])`.
---
## Pillar-to-Book Mapping (Quick Reference)
Use this to know which books to prioritize for a given pillar:
| Pillar | Primary Books | Secondary |
|--------|--------------|-----------|
| **APEST / 5Q** | 5Q | Reframation, On the Verge |
| **Christology / Lordship** | ReJesus, Reframation | Metanoia |
| **Missional Church** | Right Here Right Now | ReJesus, On the Verge, Fast Forward |
| **Movemental Thinking** | On the Verge, Fast Forward | 5Q |
| **Metanoia / Discipleship** | Metanoia, Disciplism | ReJesus |
| **Apostolic Genius / mDNA** | On the Verge, Fast Forward | 5Q |