There's a ton of work getting the data into the correct format for this API. I, too, would love to have Greek and Hebrew available, but I'm glad that we have at least as much as this.
The problem (which Shakespeare also has[1]) is that there are numerous versions of the texts in their original languages, with no particularly definitive or even consistent editions of the Old Testament in Hebrew or the New Testament in Greek AFAIK. Not to mention, the original Mosaic writings have been completely lost to time, having been written in Ugaritic and not Hebrew.
I was speaking slightly out-of-hand, but it's the natural conclusion if you take the writings to have been authentically authored by Moses.
Religious traditions place him in approximately the middle of the 2nd millenium BC, while secular scholarship, when they assume he even existed, put him in the 13th century BC. There are numerous scholarly sources attesting to the fact that Hebrew only began to exist as a language in about the 10th century BC. Ergo, Moses must have written in a pre-Hebrew language, which would have very likely been Ugaritic, or at least a related dialect.
This is backed up by the fact that there are certain portions of the Old Testament that are written in a form of Hebrew which is comparatively archaic, such as the Song of Moses in Deuteronomy and the middle chunk of the Book of Job. You can see this reflected in the 2nd century BC Greek translation, the Septuagint, wherein various chunks of these texts are skipped, apparently on account of the translators being unsure how to translate what would be comparable to Middle English to us.
The earliest parts were written in a early form of Hebrew which existed roughly at the same time as Ugaritic, a closely related language. However, this early Hebrew was not Ugaritic, which had sounds, words, and grammar that was quite distinct from any historical or pre-historical Hebrew.
True, but that raises the question as to what to do with the various footnotes other variant-related snags. It's just not particularly suited for something like an API for verses.
Gold Standard? Hardly. It is barely more than a regurgitation of the older Wescott-Horte manuscript.
They decided to use the Codex Vaticanus, Codex Sinaiticus, and Codex Alexandrinus. These are of very questionable origin and the presence of forgeries like Tobit in the Siniaticus throw them into serious doubt (and that's before looking at the poor quality of the copy, erasures/replacements, etc).
Another point of contention is the dating. In the 3rd and 4th centuries, the Church of Rome was at open war with other Christian factions over both doctrine and the Bishop of Rome's desire to coalesce political power. They seem to support the Bishop of Rome's claim to power rather well (as well as supporting their side of the doctrinal dispute).
While they may be the oldest Bibles with that much intact, they are hardly the oldest manuscript in general and the Textus Receptus seems to agree much better with the body of work (something like 95+% of all found texts agree with the Textus Receptus). These works were known and rejected by Protestant translators because of their dubious origin and low quality.
I agree with holding it as a translation of interest, but it is hardly a gold standard of anything.
While not an API with multiple translations, there are sophisticated desktop software packages like "Accordance Bible" (https://www.accordancebible.com/) that will let one view any chosen, supported, English translation side-by-side with the original language (usually Hebrew or Greek) for that same passage. The software also will follow quasi-word-for-word the text your cursor hovers in one view to the analog in the other view it's translated from or to. This shows there's been considerable effort in mapping the translations and original languages back and forth and making them easily accessible.
For an example of a direct use of this feature, reference Chris Roseborough's "Fighting for the Faith" YouTube series where he often uses this feature of Accordance Bible, along with his knowledge of the original languages and the built-in original-language dictionaries and thesaurus to analyze heretical or erroneous interpretations and applications of biblical text made by what he deems the myriad "false teachers" in current "evangelical" preacher-dom. For example of use of this particular word-for-word feature look at the video shortly after https://youtu.be/tFeF04F8Tf8?t=828 (a critique of Joel Osteen's "prosperity preaching"). At around 14:01 in the video you'll start seeing the Greek text analogs highlight as the cursor drifts around the English text. In this section of the video he's not explicitly using the feature, but he often does ... hmmm, at around 16:30 or so he does, showing the original text for "I AM" and "do not be afraid."
In any case, there's been much work in software such as "Accordance Bible" and others to make "translation mapping" more apparent, and to expose any "translation issues" ... this necessarily would require the user to be very familiar with the original languages.
Chris Roseborough himself is very conservative (young-earth creationist; women should not be pastors; ... etc., many views that would not be popular). The most frequent targets of his criticism are those who preach "prosperity gospel" (e.g. Joel Osteen); those who believe apostles and prophets still exist and can write "scripture" today with as much authority as the original Hebrew and Greek texts (e.g., New Apostolic Reformation / NAR / Bethel / Hillsong); those who believe they can "decree and declare" God to steer hurricanes, heal people of their sicknesses (I don't think C.R. would object to the possibility of healing, just that there are no guarantees this side of eternity and God's purpose isn't to alleviate all suffering here and now), cause career success and wealth, and that believe if you aren't blessed you don't have enough faith.
