ProverbsĪ collection of sayings written to help people make wise decisions that bring about justice.Īuthor: Solomon and other wise men 21. Satan attacks a righteous man named Job, and Job and his friends argue about why terrible things are happening to him.Ī collection of 150 songs that Israel sang to God (and to each other)-kind of like a hymnal for the ancient Israelites.Īuthor: So many authors- meet them all here! 20. Someone hatches a genocidal plot to bring about Israel’s extinction, and Esther must face the emperor to ask for help.Īuthor: Nobody knows Books of Poetry in the Old Testament The city of Jerusalem is in bad shape, so Nehemiah rebuilds the wall around the city. The Israelites rebuild the temple in Jerusalem, and a scribe named Ezra teaches the people to once again obey God’s laws. 2 Chroniclesĭavid’s son Solomon builds the temple, but after centuries of rejecting God, the Babylonians take the southern Israelites captive and destroy the temple. This is a brief history of Israel from Adam to David, culminating with David commissioning the temple of God in Jerusalem.Īuthor: Traditionally Ezra 14. The kingdom of Israel has a time of peace and prosperity under King Solomon, but afterward splits, and the two lines of kings turn away from God.īoth kingdoms ignore God and his prophets, until they both fall captive to other world empires. Israel demands a king, who turns out to be quite a disappointment.ĭavid, a man after God’s own heart, becomes king of Israel. Two widows lose everything, and find hope in Israel-which leads to the birth of the future King David. Israel enters a cycle of turning from God, falling captive to oppressive nations, calling out to God, and being rescued by leaders God sends their way (called “judges”). The last half is pretty much all about divvying up the real estate. Joshua (Israel’s new leader) leads Israel to conquer the Promised land, then parcels out territories to the twelve tribes of Israel.įun fact: You’ve probably heard of a few fantastic stories from this book (the Battle of Jericho and the day the sun stood still), but most of the action happens in the first half of this book.
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Moses gives Israel instructions (in some ways, a recap of the laws in Exodus–Numbers) for how to love and obey God in the Promised Land. Israel fails to trust and obey God, and wanders in the wilderness for 40 years.Īuthor: Traditionally Moses 5. God gives Israel instructions for how to worship Him. God saves Israel from slavery in Egypt, and then enters into a special relationship with them. This is where the stories of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, Noah and the Ark, the Tower of Babel, Abraham and Isaac, Jacob’s ladder, and Joseph’s coat of many colors are recorded. Genesis answers two big questions: “How did God’s relationship with the world begin?” and “Where did the nation of Israel come from?”Īuthor: Traditionally Moses, but the stories are much older.įun fact: Most of the famous Bible stories you’ve heard about are probably found in the book of Genesis. The first five books of the Bible are called the Torah, or the Law of Moses. The Old Testament includes 39 books which were written long before Jesus was born.
This is a lot to take in, so if you want to start with baby steps, check out this list of the shortest books of the Bible.
If you want more, I’ve linked to quick, 3-minute guides to every book of the Bible, too. They’re listed in the order they show up in the Protestant Bible. I’ve written a one-sentence overview of every book of the Bible. Here’s a snapshot of every book of the Bible That means if you want to know the Bible better, you’ll need to get acquainted with the 66 documents it comprises. In fact, the word “bible” comes from the Latin and Greek words for “book” ( biblia and biblos, respectively). In some ways, that makes it easier to approach the Bible: we can read it in “chunks” rather than needing to read the whole Bible at once.īut it also makes it a bit confusing. That’s because the Bible is a collection of writings from different authors writing at different times.
News flash: the Bible is huge: about 611,000 words long, all divvied up across 66 smaller documents called the “books” of the Bible.
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