This started more as an overall introduction to this section of the blog as opposed to an introduction to the Old Testament itself, but it quickly evolved into more than that. While there really isn’t an easy way to introduce the text, especially because of how many books there are and how dense and controversial the history is, I did eventually decide to include at least an overview of the books and their groupings.

But first, let’s look at what overall this page will contain. I will be covering the text itself, though each section will be tackled differently depending on how the texts are presented. For example, Genesis is a cluster of stories of all different people and periods and it will best be handled broken down into smaller stories and the details around them. Later books of the Bible are far less concise, however, and many of them overlap in material and time. With those, I feel it will be most productive to go between the different books in as close as I can to a time order in an attempt to pain the bigger picture. That’ll also make it easier to add to the timeline page.

As I go through, I’ll do my best to highlight any historical facts or theories that I can think of or that stand out to me as I go along. This will be details such as how the author of Genesis mentions a time far before himself when the arid region around Sodom and Gomorrah was once lush and green, or even prophecies that seem to mention certain historical figures that I’ve personally never heard others talk about but that jumped out and smacked me in the face the last time I read the passage.

I’ll also do other adjacent articles such as more in-depth looks at theories such as the four source theory on the Torah and even fun articles such as if the identity of the Philistines in the Bible was so difficult for archeologists to track down because they refused to admit they were the “sea peoples” that caused the Bronze Age collapse, or comparing extra biblical stories such as the books of Enoch or other world mythologies to compare and contrast them. I also can’t ignore Zoroastrianism and all the controversy around it and the theory that the entire Old Testament was invented during the Babylonian exile.

Some articles will take longer than others to go over and research, and to prevent an abundance of half-efforted stories I will be taking my time on the articles that go in-depth with more than just my opinion.

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Which Version?

Perhaps one of the most important questions in this section is: what translation of the Bible will I be using? I’ve personally always been a fan of more literal translations, and the older ones as well. Especially since I ran into a version that translated one of the choirs of angels oddly. It’s been a long while but if I remember correctly, they translated Principalities as rules or something like that. Not even rulers, which would almost make sense, but it such out as it was a very odd translation, especially since they’ve already been given the simpler name of Princes in other dynamic translations. I got the distinct feeling that the person doing the translating was not aware that what was being spoken of was a choir of (fallen) angels that we as Christians, and humans in general, need to battle against as they fight to lead us down the steep and wide path to hell. My other issue with dynamic translations is that they leave much to be desired when it comes to displaying meaning and allowing for picking up on patterns. Now I do know, of course, that any translation falls short in this regard compared to the original languages, which is of course why we rely on translation guides and other notations to guide us as well.

Overall, my preferred translation is the Douay-Reims version. The Old Testament was originally published AD 1609, a full 2 years before the King James Version, and about 25 years after the New Testament of the same version was first printed. The original version was taken from the Latin Vulgate, which was done by St. Jerome at the behest of Pope Damasus between AD 382-405. This was not the first Latin form, but it was the first officially approved one. While he originally used only the Greek versions of the texts, he later compared it to the original Hebrew texts as well. This was the primary source used for centuries and every time questions of drift in the translations copied by later authors arose (quite common due to hand copying’s complete lack of auto correct) the St. Jerome standard, edified by the oldest copies of the Hebrew and Greek available, is what was striven for.

The Douay-Reims version was also edited in 1752 by Bishop Richard Challoner, which is why some call it the DRC version. The Church has always striven for unity in thought and intention, and to ensure we are maintaining pace with the Church Fathers and their sources, I feel it best to keep the Douay-Reims version in the primary position. This isn’t to say that this is the best or only valid version like some do, only that it’s the one that I personally favor. If you ever have trouble understanding, don’t hesitate to go with something more modern or dynamic so long as it is approved.

Additional information about the exact copy of the DRC version that I’m using is that it is the one published by the St. Benedict Press with the notes from 1899. I like the snippets of explanations and the links between the different books in the margins that make it, though technically not a study Bible, much more involved than what it otherwise might have been.

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The Books of the Old Testament

Finally I’ll give a brief overview of the different sections in the Catholic Old Testament. You may know that it contains what Protestants and many modern Jews would call the deuterocanonical books. They were all part of the Greek Septuagint and there are instances where these “extra” texts were either explicitly or implicitly quoted in the New Testament and by the church fathers which is why they are still contained in our Bible as Catholics. This is a deep topic that will have at least one article on it alone, though it bares pointing out now.

I’ve come across different methods of dividing the books of the Old Testament. Sometimes I’ve even seen entire books rearranged in their order depending on the publisher’s situating. I’m going to list them in the way I prefer best, eventually to be edited to contain links to what primary articles I write on them.

Torah

This first section is the Torah or Pentateuch: the first five books of the Bible. Most will know them by their modern names of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. They are also at times called by the first words of their Hebrew text.

Traditionally (we’ll discuss opposition later) the authorship of these five books has been attributed to Moses. Outside of Genesis they seem to all be from the view of Moses or from the mouth of God so in that aspect, anyway, I’d say it checks out.

Genesis covers a variety of very well-known stories (and some less so) from the supposed two creation stories to the lives of the Patriarchs. Exodus covers the going out of the people of Israel from Egypt. Not only does it have the ten plagues and the Passover story but it also includes the journey to Sinai and the beginning of the gift of the law. Leviticus is next with its rules focused on the priesthood and all the things surrounding it. Numbers starts with a census before entering into the wandering punishment (punishment, they were not lost) in the desert. Finally Deuteronomy is the book that basically retells and highlights extra details on the law that was already told before.

History

The next section is the Historical books. Not that the other books do not contain history, or that these books don’t contain prophecies, but that their primary mission is to explain histories of the next periods of the Jewish people. These include Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1 and 2 Samuel, 1 and 2 Kings, 1 and 2 Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, Tobit, Judith, and Esther.

Tobit or Tobias, Judith, and parts of Esther are part of the so called Deuterocanonical books. I’ll also note that 1 and 2 Samuel in the DRC version are called 1 and 2 Kings and the other two Kings books are numbered 3 and 4. Also the DRC considers Nehemiah to be 2 Ezra.

Joshua picks up right where Numbers left off, with them ending their period of fasting in the desert and him now leading the Israelites into the promised land after Moses’s death. There is so much archeological evidence for this book, even if there have been attempts to divert attention from it. It seems as though whenever the “experts”attempt to deny the truth, God throws more evidence right at their feet to confound them once more.

The book of Judges covers the first period of settled Israel. This was a very interesting period as it seemed that God is essentially telling us all that the ideal for of government is no government, so long as you follow the law of the Lord. There were no Kings in this whole period with only selected individuals selected from among the people by divine inspiration to aid in disasters that arose. It was not entirely a theocracy, as I believe there was a judicial system outside of the priests who did help maintain law and order as well as extended family units, but overall it was only the Torah that was the official rule of law. Until it wasn’t.

The book of Ruth squeezes in to tell the story of David’s grandmother and her piousness “despite” being born not belonging to the people of God. It’s honestly a cute little story and a nice respite before we get into the next series.

Eventually the perceived strength of their neighbors caused the people to complain and demand God give them a king to build up wealth and power for them. God was not pleased, but did aquiesse to their wishes. The books of 1 and 2 Samuel and 1 and 2 Kings proceed to take us along the journey of it going about as well as you could expect. Samuel mentions how their first king went and turned into both a coward and a full of himself loser and how the second king was much better but eventually got his entire kingdom punished with disease because he decided he wasn’t satisfied with his current harem or any of the single women in all of Israel and had to impregnate a married woman.

The next two books focus on how their third king, said affair baby, was magnificent and used the gift of wisdom given to him from God to create that wealth and fame the people had begged for, before throwing it all away because he decided he needed to collect women like Pokémon and since there was no earthly way for him to keep them all busy, they talked him into building temples to their own gods from back home. This little oopsies, that he was fully capable of avoiding being the wisest man to ever exist and all that, led to a downward spiral that eventually resulted in the split of Judah and Israel into separate nations. These books and 1 and 2 Chronicles after (with different details) follow both kingdoms to their respective falls up to the Babylonian exile. Ezra follows after by covering the return under Cyrus of Persia and how they adjusted to being back in their homeland.

The book of Tobit really seems to be the odd man out in this section, which is likely why other reckonings move it into a poetry or story category. As well as giving it the deuterocanonical tag. I, for one, will keep it in history specifically because of all the angelic antics in the texts, emphasizing that angels are historically among us. Even more than angels, who appear much in other places, this is one of the few times a demon shows up in the Bible directly and we get to see what they do to impact the lives of humans.

Judith is one of the most incredible characters in the Old Testament, and her story is one of a strong woman that I cannot stand so many people want to reject. This woman, with God’s blessing, prevented a massive loss of life with her own two hands in a single night. Not only her but Esther too sees her achievements truncated by the rejection of the deuterocanonical books outside the church. The whole book is the message of an awed cousin watching his relative rise to the position of Queen and so impressing the King that she swayed his mind away from one of his top advisors and saved the lives of many of her people that said advisor wished to murder. It feels like a direct attack on women, and with the way Mary was treated by the same crowds makes me think I’m not overstepping with that assumption.

Wisdom

After the books of History come the books of Wisdom. Most of these books are also categorized as stories or poetry as well. This entire section is unlike anything else around it, and it isn’t in any time order compared to the rest of the books before it. It’s almost like an interlude of sorts before we get into the meat of the prophets.

I was actually surprised to read this in my Bible’s notes for the first time but apparently Job is traditionally thought to be King Jobab of Edom, who is listed all the way back in Genesis as one of the descendants of Esau. I had no clue about that history and of all the things talked about with this book; Leviathan and Behemoth may be interesting but so is this story possibly being as old as the Torah or older.

The Psalms are a well-known part of scripture, even if some are much more popular than others. Many are attributed to King David, though other authors are listed in the prefixes of their verses. Fun fact: even if not the longest book, it does have the most chapters at 150. Well, I suppose it depends. On your version as some break them up differently or leave some out all together, though I don’t think those are considered deuterocanonical in the same vein as other questioned works.

Proverbs, sometimes also called Parables, is a series of just that; short tales with moral lessons. It harkens back to those little fables we were told as kids, like the rabbit and the tortoise or not putting the cart before the horse.

Ecclesiastes is attributed to Solomon who points out the vanity of materialism; I’m assuming before he destroyed his life chasing down more women than he could ever have a real relationship with or perhaps in response to his eventual realization of how much he has messed up in his pursuit. Solomon’s next book, the Song of Songs, throws many for an absolute loop. I know I was surprised at like 10 when I realized there was a strange romance poem in the middle of the Bible. Perhaps the only thing more contentious than the idea of erotic literature in the Holy Bible is the different ways people have interpreted it and its inclusion in scripture. The third book attributed to Solomon is Wisdom which contains everything from lessons on wisdom gleaned from stories of the previous books to prophecies for the future.

Sirach is the deuterocanonical text of the Wisdom section. Its authorship and history aren’t debated, it is only rejected by some due to its late authorship, around 200 years before Christ. Interestingly enough, the son of Sirach, named Jesus, was the author, and it was revised by Jesus, grandson of Jesus. This second Jesus included a prologue with the rest of the text, and honestly likely lived very closely to Jesus Christ. Since Jesus is also Joshua, especially in Greek, it was a very common name. It kind of makes it laughable whenever someone tires to claim they found the secret tomb of Jesus, mostly because it just shows how little of history they actually know. I’ll investigate more in-depth later but something like 1/4 of all men of that period were named Jesus and half of the men who weren’t named Jesus were named Joseph. Maybe not quite that many but I’m almost positive every third woman was named Mary then as that’s about how many Marys are in the actual gospels.

Major Prophets

From the more poetic works of wisdom we get back into the thick of history with the Major Prophets. Like the wisdom sections, this part of the Bible isn’t fully linear. It also makes us wind back the clock a little as we re-approach some of the story beats we already passed for a more in-depth look or a different angle.

Isaiah starts this section off strong: not only is the author a child of prophecy but he has the most detailed prophecies for the coming savior out of any other prophet. He is often hailed as the greatest of all the prophets and his messages are still speaking to us today.

Jeremiah follows next and though he also prophesies about the coming redeemer, his main focus winds up being the fall of the kingdom of Judah that rapidly approaches. This is followed by the book of Lamentations, also by Jeremiah, bemoaning the realities of his messages from God coming to fruition after the refusal of the others to listen to his word.

Baruch’s prophecies follow closely on Jeremiah’s heels as he was a student of the same and accompanied him throughout his life before taking up his work.

Ezechiel was also contemporary with the last two prophets, though he was carried off to Babylon and did most of his work there as opposed to staying with the handful of Israelites who escaped captivity. His works end with a preview of what hope would await the tribes once they lived out their punishment and returned home and the promises even beyond that.

Daniel is sometimes overlooked for his prophecies outside of the one time with the lions den and the dreams of the king, which actually happen on complete opposite sides of his book. But his story is so much more than that and when I went back and read the full of it for the first time in a while, I was astounded by what ideas began to click in my mind, recognizing things that sounded very similar to portions of secular history that I’ve never heard pointed out by anyone else. It doesn’t mean I’m the first to say it, but I’d be interested if anyone else will be able to point me to others who came to a similar conclusion. I also didn’t realize until much later that Daniel was actually a contemporary of “Rack, Shack, and Benny” and their story. I suppose because we never hear of him conflicting with the statue, so I wonder if he was out sick that day or something. I forget… I’m not perfect.

I also want to mention that parts a of Daniel are considered deuterocanonical as well. Specifically the really cool stories about how he kills a dragon by making it eat tar and exposes the priests of the false gods for eating the supposed food for the gods after everyone goes to bed. It’s kinda weird, seeing as how that’s the intro to the very widely accepted lion’s den story, but I digress.

Minor Prophets

Next we have the minor prophets section. Their works are much shorter, not their words any less important, which is why they get this title.

Hosea was a contemporary of Isaiah but in the kingdom of Israel instead of Jerusalem. Joel was of the region of Judea in the same era, backing up the warnings and prophecies of the others. I suppose the general overlap is also something I never took the time to notice before. Possibly because I took for granted the effort needed to travel long distances which would necessitate more than one person if a wide range of people were to be reached in a short time.

Amos was another in the group on the side of Israel, a cowherd who left the fields to preach the doom coming. Next is Abdias, the shortest of all, and it isn’t fully clear if he’s still part of this same cluster or if he is the servent of Achab mentioned much earlier in time. It could reasonably be either, as the next book is Jonah and it is actually from the era of 2 Kings, a bit before Isaiah and the Babylon captivity.

Next we have the prophet Micah, of the exile period once again, not to be confused with the other Micah who was mentioned in Kings. Nahum was a prophet of Israel after the ten tribes were carried off and his message seemed to focus on Nineveh getting its destruction after their reprieve from Jonah’s warning ran out when they relapsed into sin.

Habacuc was a bit before the great cluster of prophets, though some say he lived long enough to meet even Daniel. Specifically during the lion’s den incident where an angel carried him by the hair to the pit to share his dinner while his fellow prophet waited to be taken back out. The Bible really is an amazing text and honestly, its occasional dip into what we might perceive to be absolute insanity just adds to the realism. Real people winding up in unpredictable situations that are then solved by God in ways that honestly I don’t think many would have thought to invent. Heck, there are stories of ‘gods’ carrying people around in other mythologies, but it’s always so poetic. The hair thing not so much. It is hilarious, though.

Overall, Habacuc was focused on the coming of the Chaldeans and their invasion before the Babylonians. Aggeus prophesied after the return from Babylon, His message was to get back to building the temple, God’s house is the most important. Zachariah (not the father of John the Baptist) was at the same time as Aggeus and he had much to say too about the temple and many visions on par with some of Daniel’s. Malachi is the last of the prophets mentioned and he is said to be contemporary with Nehemiah. He foretells the savior and the way the faith will spread throughout the world to offer to God in all places.

Maccabees

The final two books of the Old Testament are the books of Maccabees, also the final deuterocanonical books. It’s strange how these are rejected by modern Jews as scripture, considering this is the origin of Hanukah just as much as it is one of the scriptural sources for the Catholic doctrine of Purgatory. The books cover the same period, though they focus on different details. It’s a story of bravery and persistance in grace despite the threat of death. It honestly reads much like the stories of the early church martyrs.

And there is the most concise of an overview of the Old Testament as I can give. As you can see, there is a great deal more to go through, and the order is all over the place as far as a timeline is concerned. Stay tuned as I start the process of digging as deep as possible through all these different parts.