Whenever a document is going to be included into the textual database, a semantic binder is used to associate the document with one or more semantic nodes which are defined in a semantic taxonomy. When a search is performed, a search application looks through a semantic dictionary (which contains a table mapping queries to nodes on the semantic taxonomy) to see whether any corresponding semantic node can be found for the searchers query. If a match is found, the search application transforms the user's query into [“original query” OR “semantic node”] so that relevant documents, even they do not contain any user's keyword, can also be found in the database. The system binds semantic nodes arranged in a hierarchical structure of the taxonomy using a Log Analyzer which periodically looks through the system log for new queries and through textual indices for documents added to the database to generate the semantic dictionary and to bind the semantic nodes to the queries in the textual indices of the documents.