Chapter One
FUNDAMENTALSAbout the Old Testament
The Old Testament can be considered abook, a part of a book, and a collection
of books. It is a book to the extent that
its parts form a single whole. This book is often
referred to today as the Hebrew Bible because it constitutes
the Scripture of the Jewish people. As history
progressed and Jesus Christ came, taught, died, and
rose again, a whole new round of Scripture was
formed to document the life of Christ and the rise of
the church and to explore the theological and practical
implications of what Christ had done. This New
Testament was joined with the Old to become the
Christian Bible, and so the Old Testament has
become part of that book.
We also understand that the Old Testament is acollection of books-thirty-nine books by various
authors written over the span of a millennium. These
books share a common religious perspective, but
they vary widely in the types of literature they represent
and the functions they serve. In the pages of
these books the reader will find consideration of origins,
tribal and national histories, collections of laws,
collections of poetry, philosophical discussions, and prophetic sermons.
But in all of these and through all of these, the reader will find
theology-or, more appropriately put, God. Though the genres
(types of literature) may vary, each is theological throughout. So, for
instance, the discussion of origins is not about science; it is about
God. The presentation of history is not concerned with facts or
events in themselves; it is concerned with God's role. And perhaps
most important, rather than simply being human thoughts and opinions
about God, the Old Testament is God's presentation of himself,
that is, his self-revelation.
The Big Story Line/Plotline
God made the world operational and put people into it. Adam
and Eve disobeyed his command, resulting in their being driven
from the Garden of Eden. Thus begins the story of dislocation. Over
time the "Eden Problem," sin, became so pervasive that God sent a
flood to destroy all but Noah and his family. The Tower of Babel
represents the next step as people imagined that God had needs and
saw themselves as providing the way for God to come down and
have his needs met. This misperception of God can be called the
"Babel Problem." Consequently, God chose Abraham to be the
ancestor of a chosen people through whom he would reveal himself
and correct the distortion represented at Babel. He brought Abraham
to the land of Canaan, where his family lived on the brink of
extinction for three generations before going down to Egypt. There
they lived for more than four hundred years and became a large
nation. God brought them out of great oppression in Egypt, and
they began their journey back to the land of Canaan, the Promised
Land. After stopping at Mount Sinai, where Moses received the
law-God's next phase in revealing himself-they were waylaid in
the wilderness for a generation because they lacked the faith to let
God lead them into the land.
Under the command of Joshua, the Israelites returned to the land
and, in a series of battles, God won them control of the land. Joshua
divided the land among the tribes, and they began to settle in. Over
the next several centuries, known as the period of the judges, there
was no king. Each tribe had its own tribal leadership, but they constantly
fell prey to the surrounding nations. God allowed this because
of the failure of the Israelites to be faithful to God in their beliefs.
Finally, the people initiated a move to a monarchy form of government.
The first attempt, in which Saul was crowned king, failed
because of unrealistic and theologically misguided expectations of the
king and his role. At his death, Israel was just as bad off politically and
spiritually as when he came to the throne. The second attempt was
more successful. David was chosen by the Lord to be king, his dynasty
became established through a covenant with the Lord, and Jerusalem
was made the capital city. As the empire of David expanded, Israel
finally came into control of the land that had been promised to Abraham
nearly a millennium earlier. He successfully passed this empire
to his son Solomon, but Solomon's misjudgments and excesses in both
political and theological terms eroded the empire as well as the support
of the people. After Solomon's death in 931 BC, his son
Rehoboam retained control of only a small section of the kingdom
from Jerusalem south, while God gave a new dynasty control of the
much larger northern kingdom. The southern kingdom was now designated
"Judah," and the northern kingdom, under Jeroboam, was designated
Israel.
For just over two hundred years, this situation continued. The
Davidic dynasty remained in control in Judah, while the northern
kingdom, Israel, experienced a series of dynastic lines. When the
Assyrians extended their control across the ancient world in the middle
of the eighth century, Israel joined a coalition against the Assyrians
and eventually lost the war. The capital city, Samaria, was
destroyed in 722 BC, and the northern kingdom was assimilated into
the Assyrian Empire. Judah remained an independent nation but was
for the most part under Assyrian control. During this time there were
kings who were faithful to the Lord (such as Hezekiah), but for the
middle fifty-five years, Manasseh forged a regime that accepted not
only Assyrian rule, but foreign religious practice as well. The Assyrian
Empire lasted for another century until it weakened and was taken
over by the Medes and the Babylonians.
Already as the Assyrian Empire receded, the prophetic voices in
Judah, such as Jeremiah, were calling on the people to return to the
Lord and were warning of impending doom at the hands of the Babylonians.
The Assyrian Empire breathed its last gasp in the fall of Carchemish
in 605 BC, and the Babylonians began to exert their control
into Judah. For several years it was uncertain whether Babylon or
Egypt would have the greatest influence, and the kings of Judah
rocked back and forth. Eventually Babylon prevailed as the army
under Nebuchadnezzar moved west to punish the rebellious King
Jehoiakim. His son Jehoiachin was taken into exile in Babylon along
with many others in the administration, but the kingdom was left
intact. In the next decade, however, the lure of rebellion became too
strong, and King Zedekiah joined a conspiracy against the Babylonians.
This time there was no mercy. The result of the Babylonian invasion
in 587 was the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple, the
massive deportation of the Israelites, and the incorporation of Judah
as a Babylonian province. The prophets' warnings had come to pass,
and for the first time in more than four hundred years, there was no
king on David's throne.
The seventy years that were spent in exile were given very little
treatment in the text. Prophetic voices such as Ezekiel and Daniel
continued to speak, but no historical literature discussed the situation
in either Israel or Babylon. When the Babylonian Empire fell to the
Persian king Cyrus in 539 BC, a new policy of tolerance allowed the
exiles to return to Israel and rebuild their temple. In this postexilic
period they had no king, but a governor ruled the small state of Yehud
on behalf of the Persian king. Under the leadership of individuals such
as Ezra and Nehemiah, the city of Jerusalem was rebuilt and the
people recommitted themselves to the covenant and the Lord. Yet
they remained a state under Persian rule until Alexander the Great
overthrew the Persians and they became part of another empire. As
Daniel had indicated, empire followed empire as the people waited
for their deliverance and the return of a Davidic king, their Messiah.
(Continues.)
