Reading the Old Testament - 4. The Old Testament wasn't written in a day

Unlike the books of the New Testament which were all written within 100 years of Jesus’ resurrection, the books of the Old Testament were written over many hundreds of years. This has a number of implications.

First, most of the human authors of the Old Testament books didn’t know each other. They didn’t collude together or work to a set agenda. They didn’t set out to write “The Old Testament”. It was only after the books were collected together, quite late in Jewish history, that the Old Testament came into being.

Second, each wrote for a particular group of people in a particular situation at a particular time. So although there is an amazing underlying unity to the Old Testament books that results from God’s faithfulness and purposes, each book has its own focus, its own style. At times this results in what may seem almost contradictory attitudes and ideas. For instance, the histories provided by the authors of the books of Kings and of Chronicles are not identical in detail or emphasis.

Third, the culture and faith of Israel changed over time and this is reflected in the Old Testament texts. The people who left Egypt and worshipped in a tent were very different people to those who were worshipping in the temple in Solomon’s reign, although obviously human nature being what it is, they shared some common longings and failings. The people who returned from exile had different experiences, different hopes and consequently different beliefs and practices to those who had gone into exile. Israel’s faith waxed and waned and struggled and matured over time. This is reflected in the text.

Fourthly, the later texts often make reference to earlier texts. So, for instance, Jeremiah assumes that his readers are aware of the contents of the book of Deuteronomy and alludes to it often. The Psalms refer back to Genesis, Exodus and other narratives. This can be helpful in working out when a book was written.

Fifth, there is a gradual unfolding of God’s plans. We read the texts as people who've jumped to the last chapter of the story and have read the ending. But the people in the story didn't always know where the plot was leading, so to speak. We shouldn't expect them to see things the way we do. They were faithful, mostly, to what had been revealed to them, but God revealed himself through the events of history as well as through personal revelation to the prophets.

This post is part 4 of a series on reading the Old Testament:

Reading the Old Testament part 7 - Is the Old Testament misogynistic?
Reading the Old Testament part 6 - Not-so-simple questions about the Old Testament
Reading the Old Testament part 5 - A simple set of questions to use when reading the Old Testament 
Reading the Old Testament part 4 - The Old Testament wasn't written in a day
Reading the Old Testament part 3 - Remember the Old Testament is old
Reading the Old Testament part 2 - Getting an overview
Reading the Old Testament part 1 - Know your history

Reading the Old Testament - 3. Remember the Old Testament is old

The Old Testament was written a long time ago. That's stating the obvious, but we don't always remember the obvious. We come to the text expecting it to be easy to read and immediately relevant to our daily lives. Why is that? Perhaps it's because we think of it as the 'living word of God' True, God is always up to date. He's as familiar with the Internet as he is with camels and the pyramids. The truth of his word is always new and relevant. But the actual text of the Old Testament is old - very old.

The last book in the Old Testament was written several hundred years before Jesus' birth. The earliest books were written at least eight centuries before Christ. (Much older dates are proposed by some scholars.) That would make them as old as Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, and hundreds of years older than books by Herodotus, Confucius, Plato and other 'ancient' authors. How many of us would pick up one of their books and expect to immediately understand everything we read?

Human nature hasn't changed. But human cultures change all the time. We see that happening in the Bible itself. Over the period covered by the Old Testament the culture of the Israelites and the people around them changed considerably. How much more have things changed since then.

We shouldn't expect the Old Testament to speak in a way that's in tune with our own culture, any more than we'd expect Homer's Iliad or Sophocles plays to be culturally familiar. That's not to say that the Old Testament has nothing relevant to say to us, but the cultural setting of any text needs to be remembered and wisdom used in understanding and applying it to our time. It's not 'cheating' to use Study Bible notes, commentaries, and other resources to help us understand the background and setting of what we're reading.

This post is part 3 of a series on reading the Old Testament:

Reading the Old Testament part 7 - Is the Old Testament misogynistic?
Reading the Old Testament part 6 - Not-so-simple questions about the Old Testament
Reading the Old Testament part 5 - A simple set of questions to use when reading the Old Testament 
Reading the Old Testament part 4 - The Old Testament wasn't written in a day
Reading the Old Testament part 3 - Remember the Old Testament is old
Reading the Old Testament part 2 - Getting an overview
Reading the Old Testament part 1 - Know your history

Reading the Old Testament – 2. Getting an overview

It’s important when reading the Old Testament (and the New Testament for that matter) to know the context of what you’re reading. The best way to do that is to read large chunks of it, before honing in on smaller portions. Ideally, everything you read in the Bible should be seen in the context of the surrounding chapters and verses, the book you are reading, the history of the period it describes, and that in which it was written, and the Bible as a whole.

If possible, read the whole of a book right through at least once before studying it verse by verse. Obviously that’s not usually possible with a book like Genesis or Isaiah, (although it makes a good project for a long journey or a weekend break.) But with shorter books it is well worth taking the time. Don’t get bogged down in genealogies and long lists of names and places, just skim over them on this first reading.

By reading a book right through you’ll get a sense of how the writer constructed the text, you’ll often start to see patterns in what is said, and you will have more sense of what the writer was trying to achieve. Then you can go back and look at the text in more detail.

Reading long sections of the Bible is like climbing to the top of a hill to get an overview of the landscape, before descending to follow the trail. It helps you to keep your bearings when you’re in rugged country and stops you losing sight of the forest for the trees.

This post is part 2 of a series on reading the Old Testament:

Reading the Old Testament part 7 - Is the Old Testament misogynistic?
Reading the Old Testament part 6 - Not-so-simple questions about the Old Testament
Reading the Old Testament part 5 - A simple set of questions to use when reading the Old Testament 
Reading the Old Testament part 4 - The Old Testament wasn't written in a day
Reading the Old Testament part 3 - Remember the Old Testament is old
Reading the Old Testament part 2 - Getting an overview
Reading the Old Testament part 1 - Know your history

Beyond a second exodus

(Monday musings)

Parallels between Jesus and Moses abound. Both of them spent time in the desert before they were called to lead God’s people. Both led their people in a great exodus from slavery – slavery in Egypt in Moses case, slavery to sin in Jesus case. Both took their people across a seemingly impassable barrier – the Sea of Reeds in Moses case, death itself in Jesus’ case. Both brought their people to the brink of a promised land, literally for Moses, more figuratively for Jesus. Both gave their people the teaching and commandments of God.

The New Testament writers make much of this parallel, although they are at pains to point out that Jesus is far greater than Moses. Jesus is not only the one who leads his people in exodus, but he himself is the lamb who was slain, whose blood marks out those who belong to him and spares them from the angel of death. In describing the meeting between Jesus, Moses and Elijah on the mount of transfiguration, Luke uses the Greek word for ‘exodus’ to describe Jesus’ death-defeating mission, although it is often translated as ‘departure’ in English. (Luke 9:31)

But in seeing the parallels between the salvation from sin and death won by Jesus and the exodus from slavery into the promised land led by Moses, we must not miss the vital differences. The exodus was the beginning of the fulfilment of the covenant with Abraham (Genesis 15) which was brought closer to completion at Sinai (Mt Horeb) in a new covenant between God and the people of Israel. But between the exodus and the books of the gospel lies another promised covenant.

We already see it foreshadowed at the end of Deuteronomy. In chapter 28 God speaks (through Moses) of the blessings associated with keeping faith with him and obeying his law, and the curses that will come about as a result of forsaking God and his commandments.

But at the beginning of chapter 30 God says “And when all these things come upon you, the blessing and the curse, which I have set before you, and you call them to mind among all the nations where the Lord your God has driven you…” (Deut 30:1, my italics). In other words, while the people are being offered a clear choice, God already forsees that they will not be able to keep faith. It’s not that the commandments themselves are hard to find, or obscure or difficult to understand (Deut 30.11-14). It’s the heart of the people that is the problem.

In Deuteronomy 30.6 comes a promise: “the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your offspring, so that you will love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live.” This promise is for a time after God brings the people back from exile (verse 5).

The same promise is picked up again by Jeremiah when writing to the exiles. “For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people.” (Jer. 31:33). It’s repeated by Ezekiel, also writing at the time of the exile. “And I will give them one heart, and a new spirit I will put within them. I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh” (Ez 11:19, see also Ez 36:26).

This promise of a new heart is fulfilled through the death and resurrection of Jesus and the sending of the Holy Spirit. If we miss its importance, we will think that we now stand in the same relationship to God as the people of Israel did as they prepared to cross the Jordan. We will think that we have been rescued from death and forgiven through the blood of the lamb, and now we are called to do our best to love God and to keep his commandments.

We have been rescued, and we are called to keep the commandments Jesus gave us. But as Paul describes in Romans 7, delighting in God’s law is one thing, doing it is another. Our spirits are willing, but our flesh, our human nature, is weak. If we are left to ourselves, we will fail, just as surely as the people of Israel did. Who will deliver us from this body of death? (Rom 7:24)

The answer is, God will, in Christ Jesus. “For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.” (Rom 8:3-4, my italics.)

It’s not just that what stood against us has been cancelled, and we are counted as righteous through Jesus death, (wonderful as that is). God has also provided a way in which “the righteous requirements of the law might be fulfilled in us.” He is making it possible for us to be righteous. How? Through “Christ in you”, through the Holy Spirit.

Conversion involves more than just changing our minds about the Lordship of Christ and accepting the forgiveness offered to us. It also means a change of heart. Our old lives are buried with Christ and in return we receive his life. To the extent that we allow him to live through us, we will find that the commandments are no longer a burden or a restriction on what we do. We will no longer even be focussed on what we should not do, but will find ourselves drawn into a more positive, proactive and loving way of life, the life of Christ.

Jesus is not simply the final fulfilment of the promises made to Abraham, but he fulfils all of the promises made in the Old Testament, including those of Jeremiah and Ezekiel.  The people who crossed the Jordan were the same people who left Egypt (albeit a generation older and wiser). But the disciples after Pentecost were not the same people who ate the last supper. The New Testament describes something radically new.