The previous posting looked at how we got the New Testament, but it is just as important to know how the Old Testament was gathered together. Because the Old Testament is, well, older, we have even less data in terms of how it came together, but we still have enough to understand the process and be confident that these are the books God has given to His people. One thing to note right off the bat is that the Old Testament that Protestants (including us at Faith Church) use features the exact same books that Jews have in their holy writings. The books are in a different order, but the works are the same. The books that we have as our Old Testament were the books that the Jewish people recognized as their Scriptures at the time of Jesus.
For a time it was believed that a Jewish Council at Jamnia in AD 90 settled the question of what books were in the Jewish Scriptures (Old Testament), but scholars have increasingly questioned whether there was actually an official council at that time and place. Regardless of whether there was an actual council, it seems that such a gathering or decision would have been recognizing what had already been functioning as the authority for the Jewish people for a long period of time, as there are many indications that the writings that comprise our Old Testament were held as given by God and authoritative for God’s people before this date.
In order to understand some of this evidence, we first need to recognize the fact that the order of the books of the Old Testament printed in English Bible differs from the order of the books for Jews. While our English Bibles essentially divide the books of the Old Testament into 4 categories, the Law (Genesis-Deuteronomy), the Historical Books (Joshua-Esther), the Poetic Books (Job-Song of Solomon), and the Prophets (Isaiah-Malachi), Jews explicitly divide the books into three categories: the Law, the Prophets, and the Writings. The Prophets includes many of the books often called “Historical Books” (Joshua, 1 and 2 Samuel, etc.) as these were written by prophets, and some of the latter historical books (e.g., Ezra, Nehemiah, 1 and 2 Chronicles) and the poetic books (Psalms, etc.) are classified in the Writings. Because the book of Psalms is the largest of the “writings,” this section seems at times to be called “Psalms” or, because David has the most Psalms, David. Jewish writers often counted some books together – for example, the 12 books often called the Minor Prophets (Hosea-Malachi) were considered 1 book (the book of the 12), 1 and 2 Samuel was viewed as a single book (the same was true of 1 and 2 Kings and 1 and 2 Chronicles), and Ezra and Nehemiah also seem to have been viewed as one book, contained on a single scroll. Therefore, the 39 books that are in our Old Testament were counted as 24 at the times of Jesus.
The New Testament speaks of these divisions, for example, in Luke 24:44, as Jesus shows how the “Law, Prophets, and Psalms” speak about the coming of the Messiah. Another indication of the fact that the Hebrew Bible was accepted at the time of Jesus is in Matthew 23:35, in which Jesus speaks about the righteous blood shed “from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah the son of Barachiah.” Abel is the first person killed in the Bible (Genesis 4), while Zechariah the son of Barachiah refers to the figure who was killed in 2 Chronicles 24:20-22 – which is the last book in the Hebrew order of the Old Testament, thus affirming that there was a collection in these three parts.
It is not just the New Testament that speaks about these divisions, but also other Jewish figures. Jesus ben Sira, a figure who lived between the Old Testament and New Testament, talks about the Laws, the Prophets, and other writings (Sirach 1:1). Philo, who lived around the time of Paul, talks about the “the law, oracles delivered through mouths of the prophets, and psalms” (On the Contemplative Life 25). Josephus, a Jewish historian living towards the end of the first century AD, notes that there are 22 sacred books for Jews (he seems to combine Ruth and Judges and Jeremiah and Lamentations) in Contra Apion 1.7-8. The non-biblical, Jewish writing known as 2 Esdras also notes that there are 24 books (2 Esdras 14:22) held as Scripture/authoritative by the Jews.
This discussion of the different orders of the English Bible and Hebrew Bible might cause you to ask the logical question of how the different orders came to be. In large part, our English order came from the Greek translation known as the Septuagint, which seems to have divided the books into the order that we have in our English writings. In some ways, however, that fact begs the question, as you can still ask why the Septuagint had a different order than the Hebrew Bible. It seems that the translators rearranged the books so that they are roughly in chronological order and then in thematic order, as the books of history are first (Law and Historical books) and then you have some books of poetry and books of the prophets, which are organized in part by length (notice how Isaiah is longer than Jeremiah, which is longer than Ezekiel; Hosea is longer than Joel) and dates (Hosea being one of the first prophets among the last 12 that we call Minor Prophets, and the figures of Zechariah, Haggai, and Malachi the last prophets). Length is actually part of the organization of the New Testament as well, as the longest letter of Paul is Romans, then 1 Corinthians, etc. We often think in chronology, but ancients might think in terms of themes and length.
In many ways, it does not seem that the order of the particular books is as important as the books themselves. However, the order of the books in English does seem helpful, as it ends with the message of the prophet Malachi talking about God coming to be with his people and sending a messenger in the spirit of Elijah, which transitions well into the gospels, as this message is fulfilled. This likely may have been a factor in Christians using the Greek rather than the Hebrew order, as well as the fact that more early Christians spoke read than Hebrew.
Finally, another common question in this discussion of the Old Testament is why churches like Faith Church do not view the additional books accepted by the Catholic Church (commonly known as the “Apocypha”) as part of our Old Testament. These books include Tobit, Judith, 1 & 2 Maccabees, Sirach, Baruch, Additions to Daniel, Additions to Esther, 1 & 2 Esdras, Prayer of Manasseh, Wisdom of Solomon, with Tobit perhaps being the most familiar because it is often the Old Testament reading at a Catholic wedding. These books were never viewed as authoritative by the Jewish people, which is the biggest reason we do not accept them as authoritative. These books were written after the books found in the Old Testament, during the period in which Jews thought the voice of God was no longer speaking through the prophets; thus, these writings would not have been viewed by the Jews as having been from God (which these books even recognize, as 1 Maccabees 4:46, 9:27, and 14:41 note how the prophets had disappeared and they were waiting for a prophet to reappear!). In addition, these books were written in Greek, not Hebrew or Aramaic like the writings of the Old Testament. These Greek works often accompanied the Greek translation of the Old Testament (the Septuagint discussed above), which in part led to some thinking they might be similar in value. However, they were not viewed as authoritative by the early church, as, for example, the church leader Jerome separated them from the books found in the Old Testament when translating them into Latin, noting that they were good for reading but not authoritative. They were actually not deemed authoritative in the Roman Catholic Church until the Council of Trent (1545-1563), which was a response to the movement known as the Reformation, from which Protestant churches trace their lineage, in part because the books of the Apocrypha could be viewed as supporting some of the doctrines of the Catholic Church that the Protestants objected to because they were not found in Scripture. These books do have some value in understanding the period of time between the Old Testament and New Testament, but they are not part of the Protestant Christian canon, as they are not authoritative nor on the same level as the books found in the Hebrew canon.
This discussion of the way that the books of the Old Testament and New Testament came together has highlighted the fact that they were recognized by the church as their guide for life. While the details of how this processed happened is important (otherwise we would not be posting these things!), the details should not block us from doing what is most important – reading these books ourselves and conforming our lives to God’s will given to us in them!
Questions related how we got the Bible or other theological issues? Contact Pastor Brian atTheology@faithchurchonline.org.
