Israel

It’s commonly said that although the Bible is “God’s word”, God didn’t actually (phyiscally) write any of the Bible himself. Which is largely true. We see the authorship of the Bible they way the apostle Peter saw the writing of prophecy: “prophecy never had its origin in the human will, but prophets, though human, spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.” (2 Peter 1:21)

So, what was written on the tablets? Commonly this has been taken to refer to the ten commandments, though actually the description given in Gensis 24:12 is “the law and commandments I have written for their instruction”, sometimes referred to as “the covenant law”.

The centrepiece of the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible, is the tabernacle. The tabernacle was the “dwelling place” of God, among his people. The details of its construction take up most of the second half of the book of Exodus, and while it can make for dry reading for anyone who’s not an architect, the details are nevertheless theological rather than technological.

For 20 years or so, the Crusaders have emerged to the dramatic sounds of the late Vangelis’ theme tune to the Ridley Scott movie 1492: The Conquest of Paradise. In keeping with the American identification of itself as the Promised Land, the movie is about Christopher Colombus’ arrival in America.

The original reference is to the Israelite conquest of Canaan, which occupies the book of Joshua.

Once settled in the land, Israel became in a real sense a nation. With one exception. While they had land, community and the rule of law, they lacked a visible leader. After the conquests, rule was carried out through a series of judges, mostly with mixed results and only short-lived successes. Eventually the Israelites decided that what they really needed was a king, “like all the nations” (1 Samuel 8:5); much to the chagrin of Samuel, who was the judge at the time.

David’s successor, Solomon, is remembered mainly for two things: his wisdom, and his wives. God appeared to Solomon in a dream and said “Ask for whatever you want me to give you.” Solomon asked “that you give me a heart that understands, so I can rule the people in the right way and will know the difference between right and wrong.” (1 Kings 3:3-15)

Elijah was a prophet in the early days of Samaria. The king at the time, Ahab, had married a Phonoecian woman, Jezebel, who promoted the worship of Baal, a popular storm god in the middle east at the time. Elijah confronted the prophets of Baal, successfully, and with some panache.

The great prophet of Israel was Isaiah, and his great moment was the invasion of Assyria. In the early first millennium before Christ, Assyria was the rising force in the middle east. They were a cruelly efficient force. They pioneered the use of cavalry and siege warfare. Conquered peoples were deported en masse around the empire, weakening any sense of cultural identity.

Not all books of the bible receive equal attention in any given generation. Many modern readers are happy to focus on the New Testament, which is readily available either on its own or, often, with the book of Psalms and sometimes the book of Proverbs.

How lonely sits the city
    that was full of people!
How like a widow has she become,
    she who was great among the nations!” (Lamentations 1:1, ESV)

Among those taken to Babylon were Daniel, who became a prophet–a dream interpreter–to Nebuchadnezzar. Nebuchadnezzar had dreamed of

a large statue–an enormous, dazzling statue, awesome in appearance. The head of the statue was made of pure gold, its chest and arms of silver,

The Median kingdom did not last long. Cyrus II came to the Persian throne in 559 BC. By 550 he had overthrown the Medians. In 539 he conquered Babylon. He promptly issued a decree:

The Lord, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth and he has appointed me to build a temple for him at Jerusalem in Judah.

After the era of Malachi, prophecy stopped. Books continued to be written but none were accepted as scripture by the Jewish community. Eventually the term ‘apocryphal’, or ‘hidden’ was used to describe these books. This word in turn came to mean “unreliable. Thus, Douglas Adams describes the Hitch-Hikers Guide to the Galaxy as containing “much that is apocryphal, or at least wildly inaccurate.”