Aleethia!

What is the OT?

The OT is God’s revelation of himself to man. It is also the story of His interaction with one group of people, the Jews, as He brings about his redemptive purposes. It is compromised of 39 separate writings we call books.

It began with God writing the Ten Commandments, then Moses writing the Tora, then Joshua, kings, prophets, and scribes. Malachi (435 BC) and Nehemiah (433 BC) are the last writings chronologically. Malachi ends in a cliff hanger…for 400 years!

Why study the OT?

The early Christians only had the OT.

Jesus and the NT authors quote the OT 295 times, refer to it over 1000 times. They quote every OT book except Esther.

The NT hadn’t been written yet (in totality) when it says that Paul reasoned with people from the scriptures and proved that Jesus was the Christ. It was the OT he was using. When Philip tells the Ethiopian Eunuch about Jesus he does so beginning with a passage in Isaiah. When Paul and Silas preached Jesus in Berea, the Jews there were said to be noble because they examined (studied) the Scriptures, of the OT, to see if what they were being told was true (Acts 17:1)

And finally, the OT is the record of God’s promises of salvation and redemption (Acts 13:32), setting the stage for the fulfillment of those promises in the NT.

In what order?

We must select an order, or way to approach, studying the OT. We have three options.

1) We could go with the order in which they appear in our Bible, more or less segregated by type of literature (law, history, poetry, prophets, etc).

2) We could go through them in chronological order to get the story line correct.

3) We could go through them in the arrangement in which the NT Christians would have been familiar with them, namely the way they appear in the Jewish Bible

The Jews divide Scripture into three specific parts: the Law, the Prophets, and the Writings. The content of each of these divisions may surprise you.

Studying the OT in this order presents some unique advantages. We will learn:

1. The basic events of Israel’s history from creation to the fall of Jerusalem
2. How the Prophets explain that history
3. From the Writings how faithful believers responded to both
4. The unified message of the OT

How fast will we study?

Since this is an OT survey course, we’ll be moving rather quickly, and just skimming the surface of the OT. We’ll take a look at a different book each week. This means we’ll have 39 weeks left in this study, after tonight.

What will we learn each week (about each book)?

Each week as we look at one book from the OT, we will learn about the main characters, the plot, themes, symbols, historical context, and finally the overarching promise of God displayed in that particular book. Hopefully we’ll see how all of this points toward Jesus (John 5:39). That’s a lot to cover and we only have one hour, so we’ll be moving fast each week.

As we learn about each of these things, we’ll seek to discover specific truths about them.

Characters

• Their nature
• Positive or negative
• Motives
• Integrity (words & actions)

Plot

• What happens
• Why it happens
• Motives
• Tragic (begin hopefully – end sadly)
• Comic (pleasant, or happy, ending)

Themes

• Purpose behind characters and plots
• Why is this story told?
• Theology is the study of Bible themes related to God and humans
• We’ll be doing basic theology (ex = salvation in Isaiah)

Symbols

Images, words, phrases that point to deeper meaning or reality (ex = the temple is a symbol of God’s presence)

Prose & Poetry

Most of the OT is written in prose. Prose is narrative style that describes actions and events, and the importance of those events. Prose moves logically.

Poetry is common in the OT as well. The Prophets and the Writings is where we’ll find most of the poetry. Hebrew poetry has little in common with the poetry we are familiar with. It usually doesn’t rhyme, the stanzas may get lost in translation, and the rhythm doesn’t always have a set pattern. It does make use of patterns though, as well as word plays, imagery, and other poetic devices.

Cultural context

As we study the various books that compromise the OT, we will look at the culture that existed in and around Israel at the time of the writing. The Hebrew monotheistic religion, their own culture, and the legal codes handed down by God through Moses, are quite divergent from those of the other peoples around them. Some analysis and comparison will be helpful from time to time.

Sign of Jesus

Jesus said that all the Scripture points to him. Moses and the prophets wrote about him. The sacrificial system is symbolism for his atoning death/sacrifice, the priests represent him, the entire OT looks forward to Christ.

Six major people groups

While there are many different nations involved in Israel’s history, there are six major people groups that we will encounter.

• Assyria
• Babylonia

These two cultures revolved around the city-state. They both had a pantheon of deities they worshiped. Both were located in the area now known as Iraq, Assyria in the north and Babylon in the south. This is the area and people that Abraham was called out of. He left the highly populated, urban, cultural centers of his day and headed into the wilderness.

The languages spoken by these groups were based on Akkadian, or early Aramaic. Akkadian was the international language of diplomacy and commerce. This was a pictographic language with symbols instead of an alphabet.

• Egypt

They Egyptians also worshiped a pantheon of gods numbering in the thousands. They also worshiped the Pharaoh as the representative of Ra, the sun god, on earth.

The Egyptian language was also pictographic in nature known as hieroglyphics.

• Canaanites

The Canaanites were the various peoples living in the Promised Land when the people of Israel arrived. Some of the various tribes that make up the Canaanite group are: Amorites, Phoenicians, Amalekites, Ammonites, Moabites, Edomites, and the Philistines.

The Phoenicians invented an alphabet to which we can trace the roots of both Hebrew and Greek, and of course English as well. We still use the word “phonics” today in regard to language. Most Canaanites spoke a branch of Semitic that was very close to biblical Hebrew.

The Canaanites also worshiped many gods, the chief of them being Baal. Asherah is another they worshiped as Baal’s consort. Many of their religious practices involved prostitution and child sacrifice.

• Aram (Syria)

The Aramean state had its capitol in Damascus. Hadad was their patron deity, though they also worshiped a whole family of idol gods.

They spoke Aramaic, which was based on the Phoenician alphabet and soon became the dominant international language from around 1100 BC until the time of Alexander. The book of Daniel is partially written in Aramaic.

• Persia

Persia followed Babylon as the world power in 539 BC. The empire began in what is now western Iran and eventually encompassed all of western Asia and Egypt. The Persians were polytheistic, worshiping more than one god, but not as many as some of the other people groups we’ve discussed. Their main god was Ahuramazda

Theology in the OT

While the entire Scriptures point to Christ, to attempt to summarize the many theological topics of he OT in one topic would be an over simplification. However, there is a small number of basic theological underpinnings on which the whole is built.

1. Monotheism: The creation account of Genesis begins with acknowledgment of a single Divinity. Throughout the OT we see a unified theology of monotheism. The OT introduces us to the Creator of the universe, the one true God, the Lord of Lords, the magnificent, powerful, loving, and all holy, Yhvh.
2. Creation & Fall: Much of the OT revolves on the hinge of the doctrine of the fall. For this reason, the first few chapters of Genesis are so important, they unfold for us the story of creation and the fall of the human race from a place of divine favor to a sinful and corrupt state.
3. Election & Covenant: Yhvh chose Abram and his descendants to be his people, and bound them to himself by covenant. These are important concepts that arise over and over throughout scripture. Jesus echos this when he reminds the disciples “You did not choose me, but I chose you…” (John 15:16).
4. Covenant membership: There is corporate unity of the people. Though one man is usually representative of the whole (Adam, Noah, Abraham, David), each member of the community is bound to all the others by the covenant. This is a lesson we would do well to learn in 21st century America. How often do we pray and ask forgiveness for the sins of the people, not just our own? Yet we see this example multiple times in the OT. The church, as a covenant community, shares most all these traits with Israel in the OT, and we can learn from their example how we should relate together today.
5. Eschatology: all the promises, covenants, and even the story of the Israelite people is all pointed toward a future glory in which the covenant people will permanently united with the Lord. The church now hold this “hope of glory” as Paul calls it. The OT is a story that is headed somewhere, it has a focal point. That point is Jesus.

Introduction to the Tora/Pentateuch

We will begin our survey with the Tora, or Pentateuch. Almost all important OT ideas are introduced in the Tora.

Tora is the Hebrew word for “law” but also means “instruction.” Pentateuch is based on two Greek words meaning “five books.”

Two types of law: commands, case law. Case law deals with specific punishments for specific crimes and are built on the commands.

The Tora instructs us by teaching how the world began, how sin came into the world, how the Jewish nation was born, etc. God is revealed as Creator, Covenant Maker, Sustainer, and Deliverer. All but a few verses were authored by Moses. 1446 BC

Next week we’ll take a look at the book of beginnings, Genesis.

Recommended Reading

Much of the information for these lesson will be taken from these sources. For further study and detail, I suggest you read them for yourself.

1. ESV Study Bible 
2. Old Testament Survey, Paul R. House & Eric Mitchell
3. The Message of the Old Testament: Promises Made, Mark Dever