What is the old testament

- Made up of books that were written before the time of Christ

- The books of the old testament tell the story of the journey to towards salvation this story leads
right to jesus and the entirety of the new testament
- The old testament tells us of the promise that god gives his people that he eventally fulfills in
the old testament
- Old testament outlines the history of god’s chosen people (Israelites) and shows us how are now
able to become that chosen people
- The new testament completes the old testament. It does not abolish it or make it obsolete

what does the old testament tell us

- We are created in the image and likeness of god

- We were created perfect
- We were in perfect communiom with god
- We sinned and became imperfect
- We lost our perfect communion with god
- The church permits us to believe in a literal translation of the creation story. However it
encourages us to look at science and literary advancments to understand what the true meaning
of the beginning of Genesis is
- After the first sin, god could have left us to live in our live in our sin and ultimintely go to hell
because of imperfection
- Due to his infinite love for us he decided to work in human history so that we could be perfect
again
- Pefection is the key to full communion with god
- In order for god’s love to be received properly, god knew that he would need to reintroduce
himself to the human race, and allow us to encounter him in human form
- There also needed to be a sacrifice that would justify us for the sin that we committed
-
- Tells us the story of how god reintroduces himself to the human race
- He begins by forming a nation for his son to be born into
- Noah- Family
- Abraham- tribe
- Moses- nation
- David- empire
- To begin the process of perfecting the human race, god gives his people the 10 comandents
- These are the “do not” in a relationship with god, but is not all that needs to be done for
perfection
- We can see the example of the Israelites, that human race could not stay faithful to god on their
own
- There were many times where Israelites would turn away from god, fail to follow his
commandments, and worship other gods
- Each time this happened, god would allow the Israelites to experience the consequences of their
actions. This would lead to plague, disease, and even loss of their homeland
 - This would give rise to the prophets
- It was the prophets job to be the communication between god and Israel. They would call them
out of their sin and warn of the consequences that wold come from their sin. Finally their
prophesies would ultimately point to the coming of jesus

Division of the old testament

- Division of the old testament- Pentateuch (five scrolls)

- The first five books of the bible- Bible, genesis, exodus, levitcus, numbers, and deuternomy
- Pentateuch was the first collection of literarure acquired acknowledge as scripture by the
Hebrew community
- The writtings of these books has been ascribed to moses. It holds supreme rank in the old
testament canon in respect and holiness
- The Hebrew speaking jewish community referred to these five books as . the law, torah,or he
law of moses
- Historical books
- Joshua
- Judges
- Ruth
- 1st and 2nd Samuel
- 1st and 2nd kings
- 1st and 2nd chronicles
- Ezra
- Nehemiah
- Esther
- 1st and 2nd Maccabees
- These books continue to tell the Israel in a time period closer to our current one
- These books deal with israel’s inconsistent relationship with god
- They tell the story of how Israel gets its homeland, has leaders called prp, and then kings. They
also tell the story of how Israel grows from a tribe, to a nation, and then to a empire
- We also see how Israel disobey god and lose their homeland
- The poetic and wisdom writings
- These include, job, psalms, proverbs, eccesiates, wisdom, sirach, baruch, song of Solomon
- Unlike classical and modern poetry, ancient Hebrew poetry has no distinctive scheme of
accentuation, meter, or rythem to differientiate it from prose. It is noted for its parallelism, or
the counterbaencing of ideas in phrases
- To the Hebrews, wisdom included skill in living and the power of observation. It also included
the capacity of human intellect and the apication of knowledge and experience daily life
- All of this came from a viewpoint that was firmly rooted in the fear of the lord which is the
beginning of wisdom
- Major Prophets
- These include Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, and Daniel
- These books were declared “major” because of the amount kf text and not because they were
considerd more important than other books
- God used the prophets to provide direction and wisdom during times of crisis
 - They were used by god to remind people of their convenantal promises
- Prophecy in the bible is part of god’s self-evelation by which we come to know god through
what he has done in the past and what he plans to do
- Minor prophets
- Hosea, joel, amos, Obadiah, Jonah, micah, Naham, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, haggai, zechariah, and
malachi
- The books of the major and minor prophets were considerd to be part of the classical prophecy
era of the old testament
- The classical prophecy era began in the eigth century during the regin of Jeroboam II in the
northern kingdom of Israel. Amos and hosea were the earliest examples in the north, while
micah and Isaiah were the first known classical prophets in the southern kingdom of Judah
- These prophets addressed both the kings and the people and became social spiritual
commentators for the jewish people

The Pentateuch

- In the 1800’s schools studying the Pentateuch tried to figure out the original source of the final
version of the five books
- They gave each source a name is usually known by their initial
- J, the Yahwist; this source frequently uses the name Yahweh (I am who am) in its passages. It is
throught to represent the perpective of the jews in Judah (south) in the 9-11th centery
- E, the Elohist: this source frequently uses the name Elohim (god(s)) in its passages. It is throught
to represent the view of the jews in the northern kingdom in the 8-9th century
- D the Deuteronomistic: is believed to be the author of the book of Deuteronomy. This is
believed to be written in the 7th centery BC
- P the Pruestly: is throught to be a later editor who revised all five books to reflect the concerns
of the jewish priesthood after the return from Babylonian captivity

Genesis

- Comes from the greek word for orgins

- Tells the story of the creation of the world
- Gives us the history of the beginning of Israel and their culture

Exodus

- Comes from the greek word for “going out”

- Tells story of the Israelites escape from Egypt
- Shows us how the Israelites wanderd throuout the desert on their way to canann, the promised
land
- Also contains the ten commndments
- We also learned about the fickle nature of the Israelite people in how they relate to god

Leviticus

- Named after the Levitical (from the tribe of levi) preists of Israel
- This is a book of laws tat explain religious worship of the Israelite people. Every detail is explicit
scince the people were known for breaking the covenant with god
 Numbers

- Gives us a census of all the tribes of Israel

- Tells us the story of the 40 years in the desert and the isralites rebellion against god

Deuteronomy

- Comes from the greek for “second law”

- This book repeats some of the laws of the earilier books in the ten commandments are also
repeated in this books
- Also adds laws as to how the Israelites woulc live in the promised land.
-