Old Testament Survey #2

You can listen to the audio of our class with the media player above!

Israel or Abram?

The Chronology of the birth, rise and fall of Israel is rooted in a promise God made to Abram (Abraham). Abraham (his offspring) was to become a great nation, that nation would be an example to all the other nations of the world that following God results in peace and prosperity. Those that would bless Israel would be blessed, and those who cursed Israel would be cursed.

  • “Now the Lord had said to Abram: ‘Get out of your country, from your family and from your father’s house, to a land that I will show you. 2 I will make you a great nation; I will bless you and make your name great; And you shall be a blessing. 3 I will bless those who bless you, And I will curse him who curses you; And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed’” (Genesis 12:1-3 NKJVS).
  • It is important to note that the promise God made to Abram (Abraham) was also for a permanent land.

We will be looking at 3 issues regarding the Old Testament.

  1. The authenticity of Old Testament scriptures
  2. Canon chronological order of scriptures
  3. Dates of writing vs. period of time written about

AUTHENTICITY OF THE OLD TESTAMENT

The word Canon is defined as those books recognized as inspired of God. The word canon comes from the Greek which means literally a straight rod or bar; a measuring rule as a ruler used by masons and carpenters; a standard for testing straightness. As Believers we accept, by faith, that the scriptures Old and New are inspired (God Breathed) by God.

  • “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16 NKJVS).

The Bible, Old and New Testaments, are closed that means the Bible is complete. There have been a number of Councils in the 4th century that have decided what books to include in the Bible, but these councils never had the power to cause books to be inspired, they simply recognized that which God inspired at the moment the books were written.      

ORACLES OF GOD

        The Hebrew Bible is substantially the same as the original writings, with only physical changes like the addition of vowel pointings and reading aids in the margins.

God charged the Jews with the responsibility of safeguarding and maintaining the integrity of the Old Testament.

  • “What advantage then has the Jew, or what is the profit of circumcision? 2 Much in every way! Chiefly because to them were committed the oracles of God” (Romans 3:1-2 NKJVS).

The Jews were entrusted to maintain the integrity of the scriptures and went to great lengths to maintain accuracy from one generation to the other. Scribes were trained, supervised and entrusted to hand-copy the scriptures on to leather and/or papyrus. A group of scribes known as the Masoretes developed a series of check-sum procedures to ensure that no mistakes could be made as a result of personal interpretation, tiredness or simply error.

The Jews considered the scriptures as sacred, and as such old copies were buried. As a result of this practice old copies were lost due to natural decomposition of the leather or papyrus. Until the discovery of the Dead-Sea Scrolls in 1947 the earliest copy of the Old Testament was from 895 AD/CE, a Septuagint copy.  The Septuagint was a translation from Hebrew to Greek, done by a group of 70 in the 3rd century BC/BCE.

The Dead Sea Scrolls produced copies of the Old Testament produced from the 1st to the 2nd century BC/BCE. These new copies proved the extreme accuracy of the Masoretic text.

CURRENT HEBREW BIBLE

            Hebrew Bible contains 24 books, composed of all 39 Protestant books of the Old Testament. The Septuagint divided each of the following into 2 books; Samuel, Kings, Chronicles and Ezra-Nehemiah. That adds 4 books to the 24 to make 28. Then they took the 1 book of the 12 Minor Prophets into 12 individual Minor Prophet books; adding 11 to the 28 for a total of 39.

            The Jews divide the bible into 3 parts; the Torah, Prophets and Writings (Historical, Wisdom and Poetic).

            Our Protestant Bibles are divided also by themes; Pentateuch (Torah), Historical, Poetic-Wisdom, Prophets (both minor and major prophets). Note: our bibles contain 39 books, Roman Catholic Bible contains 46 and some Orthodox Bibles contain as many as 53. We call those extra books Apocryphal and they are not considered to be inspired by God.

CURRENT PROTESTANT BIBLE

Our current bibles are written in Canon order (by type of literature) not Chronological order (dates written).

  • Another consideration is the difference between “dates when written” vs “dates written about”.
  • Uncertainty of distant past timing makes chronology somewhat imprecise.
  • Use of Historical non-biblical sources to corroborate biblical dates is often used, but does not make the book authentic.

When reading the Old Testament, you need to ask yourself, what period of time in Israel’s history am I looking at:

  1. Pre-Israel
  2. Israel as a nation
  3. United Kingdom of Israel
  4. The Divided Kingdom
    • Israel (10 Tribes) in the North, capital was Samaria
      • Exile of Israel by the Assyrians
    • Judah (2 tribes) in the South, capital was Jerusalem
      • Exile of Judah by the Babylonians
  1. Return of only Judah to the Promised Land