Reply #113: Jewish Bible vs Christian Bible [View All]

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The Jewish "bible" is known as the TaNaKh, an acronym made up of its 3 sections:

<1> The Torah or Pentateuch, the 1st 5 books. Jewish tradition names the books after the 1st words of the book, while Christian tradition has come up with other names (in English we use latinate names based on the Vulgate, or Latin translation):

Bereshiit ("in the beginning") = Genesis
Shemot ("the names") = Exodus
Vayiqra ("and he commanded") = Leviticus
Bamidbar ("in the wilderness") = Numbers
Devariim ("the events") = Deuteronomy

Traditionally, these five books are considered to have been penned by Moses himself, and constitute the kernel of the Bible. (How Moses could have the foresight to narrate the place and manner of his own death at the end of Deuteronomy is a perennial exercise for modern biblical fundamentalists and traditional exegetes alike.)

<2> Nebi'iim or "The prophets." This includes not only the traditional prophets (Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Amos, Hosea, the smaller prophetic books) but ALSO what might be called the historical books, Joshua, 1/2 Sam., and 1/2 Kings. These are also considered "prophecy" theologically, if not literarily.

<3> Ketubiim or "the writings." These are the Psalms, Proverbs, Esther, and the other later books.

The Christian "Old Testament" differs from the Jewish Tanakh only slightly on the level of text. But the arrangement is different in 2 important ways:

(1) It is called and considered an "Old Testament" and thus is set in opposition to a "New Testament." This fits into Christian theology of seeing a replacement (or perhaps less strongly, a "fulfillment") of the Torah by the ministry/life of Jesus and by the Gospel.

(2) The arrangement of the Christian "OT" switches the Nebiim and the Ketubim around. Thus the Christian OT goes: Pentateuch, Writings, Prophets. This is probably because the Christian view of Jesus as the fulfillment of the prophetic legacy of Israel demands that the story of Jesus appear immediately after the prophetic writings. Thus a Christian can read on the last page of the "OT" (Malachi 3:1):

"See, I am sending my messenger to prepare the way before me, and the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple. The messenger of the covenant in whom you delight—indeed, he is coming, says the Lord of hosts."

Then turn the page to Matthew and read:

"The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham..."

The Hebrew Tanakh, by contrast, is arranged "concentrically" if you will. The heart of the Torah, the 1st five books from which (at least theoretically) Jewish law is derived comes first. Then the Nebiim, and last the Ketubiim, which are seen as (though no less holy and important) less central to Jewish halakhah (legal reasoning).

Any questions??