Overview Survey of the Old Testament: The Prophets Fall 2005

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Overview of the Old Testament

Contents of the Old Testament

The Old Testament is primarily the literary history of the nation of Israel from its founding around 2000 BC to its return from Babylonian exile in 500 BC. The Old Testament consists of 39 books written by at least 29 different authors over the course of 1,000 years and includes several different literary genres, including historical narratives, poetry, prophecy, and law.

The books themselves cluster around four specific points in Israel's history. These four clusters are covered in great detail, with the history narratives focusing on a few years, supplemented by the poetry, music, and legal aspects of Israelite culture for these time frames. Between these four clusters, the narrative covers vast periods of history in broad strokes primarily so as to connect these clusters.

The Exodus

Around 1500 BC the people of Israel were a slave nation, held under the control of the Egyptian Pharaoh. The first historical cluster found in the Old Testament tells of the events surrounding the miraculous liberation of the Israelites slaves by God through the man Moses. This is known as the Exodus.

It is during the Exodus that the first 5 books of the bible (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy) are written. These books tell the history of this Israelite people beginning with God calling their ancestor Abraham out from among the nations to become the father of a new nation. It speaks of their ancestor Jacob (a.k.a. Israel) and his 12 sons, and how those 12 sons became the 12 tribes of Israel, and how that family ended up in Egypt. These books describe the miraculous redemption of the nation from Egypt, and their subsequent wanderings in the desert for 40 years. Mostly, these 5 books outline the civil, criminal and religious law for a new nation. In all, these 5 books were written over a period of about 40 years.

These five books were written by Moses during their desert wanderings, and were probably compiled by Joshua as the nation was conquering Palestine (“the Promised Land”).

The Davidic Kingdom

After Israel conquered Palestine, there is a dark period of 400 years where Israel neglects God. These four centuries are covered in one book: Judges. At the end of the period of Judges, the second historical cluster tells of the rise of the Davidic Kingdom. The book of Samuel and Ruth tells of the transition from the time of Judges to the time of Kings, and explains how David, a humble shepherd, became the great warrior king of Israel. The book of 1 Kings continues the story as it tells of the actions of David's son, Solomon. In all this period covers about 120 years.

Also during this time, the great poetic books were mostly written. David wrote most of the book of Psalms, which is a collection of songs used in the Israel's worship. Solomon wrote Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Solomon.

The Divided Kingdom and Exile

Following Solomon, Israel experienced a civil war, where the north broke off from David's royal line. The northern kingdom continued to be called Israel (or sometimes Ephraim), while the southern kingdom came to be called Judah. Over the course of 400 years, both kingdoms found themselves in spiritual decline, until God allowed both kingdoms to be taken into captivity. Assyria captured Israel in 722 BC and Babylon captured Judah in 586 BC.

The third cluster of books covers the spiritual decline of Israel and Judah, both in the historical book of Kings, and in the prophetic books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Hosea through Zephaniah. The prophetic books warn of the coming captivity if the nation does not turn back to God. Most of the prophetic books are clustered around the last 150 years of this time.

The Babylonian exile lasted for 70 years. During this time, the prophetic books of Daniel, Ezekiel and Zechariah were written.

Post Exile

After the exile, the Jews were allowed to return to their homeland, although only a small number actually returned. This post-exilic period represents the fourth historical cluster. The historical books of Ezra and Nehemiah cover this period, along with the prophetic books of Haggai and Malachi. Finally, Esther relates a story of Jews who did not return to their land following the exile.

Purpose & Theme of the Old Testament

Why would God use the historical literature of one nation as His revealed Word for the entire world? What makes Israel's history so special and distinct from the history and literature of other nations?

The history and literature of Israel is special because the Israelites are God's “chosen people.” This is the nation through which God would reveal himself to the nations (Isaiah 42:6) and through which God would reveal His Chosen One (Isaiah 49:6, Galatians 3:8). To be the chosen people is to be the family or nation through which the Messiah would descend. Therefore God specially worked in this nation in order to prepare all things at just the right time to reveal His Messiah (Galatians 4:4).

Israel was not chosen because it was especially righteous or had any special qualities. Indeed, Israel repeatedly failed to live up to the standard that God had for them. Instead, the history of Israel is a testimony not to the greatness of the nation, but to the sovereignty, faithfulness and the grace of God.

It is not that God didn't work in and among other nations. In fact several times the Old Testament refers to priests and prophets of His who are at work in other nations (Genesis 14:18, Exodus 18:1ff, Numbers 22). However, Israel is unique because the salvation of all humanity would come through this nation.

Therefore, the Old Testament is not just a history of Israel, but it is the revelation of God's plan of salvation for all of humanity, culminating in the coming of the Messiah. The Old Testament is not a record of all God's interaction with humanity during this time, nor is it even an exhaustive record of all that happened in Israel. Instead the Old Testament is a deliberate collection of books which are carefully written and compiled to reveal how God founded, developed, nurtured, disciplined and raised a nation through which He would reveal His Messiah in order to bring salvation to the entire world.

Arrangement of the Old Testament

The ancient Hebrew bible arranges the Old Testament around 24 books grouped into three sections: the Torah (law), the Nevi'im (prophets) and the Ketuvim (writings). These section correlate to the timing of the books compilation and addition to the cannon:

• The Torah was most likely compiled by Joshua shortly after the death of Moses (~1500 BC).
• The Nevi'im was mostly written primarily around the time of the exile as an explanation as to why Israel had been taken into captivity (~600 BC).
• The Ketuvim was compiled by Ezra after the exile as part of his efforts to re-institute temple worship (~450 BC).

Because this arrangement is based upon periods of history, studying the Old Testament according to this arrangement helps a student to more easily understand the historical and spiritual background into which these books were written. The overriding purpose of the books become more apparent, and provides the context for the message.

By contrast, our modern English bible consists of 39 books arranged into five sections. This arrangement, along with the names for the books, came out from the 2 nd century BC translation of the Old Testament into Greek called the Septuagint. In this translation, some books were split (Samuel, Kings, Ezra-Nehemiah), and they were rearranged more according to literary genre than historical context. It is also through this Greek translation that we get our modern English titles to the books (e.g. Genesis is Greek for “origins”).

Because this arrangement is based on literary genre, studying the Old Testament using the Greek/English arrangement helps the student to use consistent hermeneutical techniques for each genre.

What Bible Did Jesus Use?

In Matthew 23:35 Jesus condemns the Jews for killing prophets “from the blood of innocent Abel to the blood of Zechariah the son of Barachiah.” Abel was the first martyr, whose murder was in the book of Genesis (Genesis 4:1-16). Zechariah was martyred in 2 Chronicles 24:20-21. Jesus' point is that prophets had been martyred from the beginning to the end of the Old Testament. This point would be clear only in the Hebrew bible, which concludes with Chronicles. Therefore Jesus most likely used the Hebrew Bible, not the Greek translation.

Jesus alludes to the three part division of the Old Testament from the Hebrew arrangement in Luke 24:44-47.

Then he said to them, "These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled." Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, and said to them, "Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. (Luke 24:44-47)

In other places, Jesus uses a two fold division: Law and Prophets (Matthew 5:17-18; 11:13; 22:40; Luke 16:16-17). Jesus is most likely grouping the Writings with the Prophets and is certainly not discounting the importance of the Writings. Nonetheless, Jesus' reference to the Old Testament by the traditional three-fold arrangement of the Hebrew bible, gives further evidence that this is the bible Jesus used.

However, while Jesus used a Hebrew bible, it is clear that many of the apostles used the Septuagint. Throughout the New Testament epistles, when the apostles quote the Old Testament, they quoting the Greek translation. The Septuagint was used because most of the original readers of the epistles could not read Hebrew. Nonetheless, this affirms to us that it is acceptable to study the Old Testament in its English/Greek arrangement, as well as affirming to us that it is legitimate to use translations (albeit with caution) in our reading of scripture.

While knowing which bible Jesus used is certainly a fascinating issue, we should not loose sight that in each of these references, Jesus is affirming that all the Old Testament, Law, Prophets, and Writings, teach that the Messiah would come, suffer and die, and then be raised from the dead so that we could be forgiven of our sins. The gospel, which we so often consider a New Testament doctrine, according to Jesus, is contained in every part of the Old Testament.

Indeed, Jesus is the purpose and focus of the Old Testament, and Jesus is the focus of our study of the Prophets this term.

[Next: Overview of the Nevi'im]