Overview of the Bible

Over the Summer we shall be doing a rapid overview of the Bible which can then provide the foundaton for more detailed studies subsequently.


Overview of the Bible

Welcome to this overview of the Bible. We shall use the Bible for Blockheads (by Douglas Connelly) as our reference book. Feel free to consult other books as well. Our look at the Bible should be as interactive and participatory as possible. It will necessarily not be in-depth but should give a basic understanding of what the different parts of the Bible are about.

The Bible is really a library of books written by over 40 human authors over a period of 16 centuries. Christians study it because we believe it to be God’s Word in human words: God has ensured that what he wanted to say to us has been preserved for us in the inspired writings of human authors, each having their own perspectives and backgrounds which influenced the way their specific books were written.

The Bible includes a number of different types of literature (genres): history, poetry, proverbs, allegory, prediction, didactic teaching, love stories etc. The different genres within the Bible are interpreted or used in different ways. For example, one approaches a poem in a different manner to a piece of historical narrative.

One theme: the one over-arching theme in the Bible is God’s desire to reconcile humanity to himself. The love of God for mankind could be described as a romance of divine initiative and human response.
God’s initiative. 1. In creation: the whole universe reflecting his glory and man in his image. 2. In election: God chose one man (Abram), one family, one nation (Israel) to be the conduit of salvation. 3. In incarnation: God became human in Jesus of Nazareth. 4. In redemption: Christ died as a ransom to free us from the power of sin and death. 5. In restoration: the whole of creation will be renewed.
Human response: 1. rebellion: eg. Adam and Eve, Israel’s disobedience. 2. obedience: various people of faith (such as Noah, Abraham, etc), Mary who said “yes” to the angel and became mother of our Lord, and, supremely, Jesus’ obedience even to the extent of being crucified for us.

The first part of the Bible is the Hebrew Scriptures (the “Old Testament”). The New Testament consists of the four Gospels (about the life of Jesus), the story of the early church (Acts) and the letters (epistles) written to various individuals and local churches by leaders within the early church.

Languages: The Old Testament was written in Hebrew, apart from portions of Daniel and Ezra which are were written in Aramaic, a closely related Semitic language. The New Testament was written in Greek which was the language of commerce in the Middle East at the time of Christ.

Number of books (“the Canon” or list): The Hebrew Scriptures consist of 39 books, the New Testament consists of 27, for a total of 66. During the 400 years between the last of the OT books to be written (Malachi) and the New Testament, a number of other books and additions were written, known as the Apocrypha or Deutero-Canonical (=second list) books. These were included in a Greek translation (the Septuagint) of the OT, collated in Alexandria during the same period, but excluded by the Rabbis from the Hebrew bible. Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox bibles include the Apocrypha. Most Protestant ones do not. Anglicans regard the Apocrypha as useful to read but not as God’s word. For the purposes of this course we shall consider the Bible to consist of 66 books. We can have a look at the Apocrypha at a later date.

So far we have had a whirlwind tour of Genesis through to the Gospels.

August 28 Ordination 2:30 pm in North Vancouver

September 4 Part 8 History: Acts

September 11 Part 9 Letters: Romans to Revelation.

We may choose to spread these out more. OR we can return to a book or a story in more
depth later, for example, there is a good study of the themes of Romans called “How to
be a Christian Without Being Religious”, by Ridenour. Or we could do study on
Philippians by Nicky Gumble.

I suggest that we pick one or two characters or themes from each section to concentrate
on rather than attempt to cover books in depth.