Summary of the Old Testament Pentateuch

I’m watching all of the books in the Bible from The Bible Project and these are my notes below:

The Torah or Pentateuch (Greek for five books)

Genesis

Exodus

Leviticus

Numbers

Deuteronomy

Deuteronomy means second laws.
Moses gives final words to the new generation of Israel that is about to enter the promised land
3 major sections in the book:
Chapter 1-11 Moses talks about the rebellion of the Israelites that’s been going on for the past 40 years.
- Reminds them of the 10 commandments
- He tells them to Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and strength. (Called the Shema)
- Listen and Love are used repeatedly throughout the chapters
- Listen – Hear and RESPOND to what you hear (Obey)
- Love – Listen and Obey because of Love (all your heart, soul, and strength)
Chapter 12-26 Moses recites the laws. Expanding on the law and making it relevant for this new generation. (Worship, Character of leader, Civil and Social laws)
- Tips for reading these laws:
  - The laws are the terms of the Sinai covenant given to ancient Israel.
  - Don’t compare with modern laws
  - Created to set Israel apart from their neighbors
  - Discern the core principle underlying the law
Chapter 27 – 34 – Joshua appointed the new leader
- Warns Israel of obedience or disobedience
- If they obey they will have blessings
- If they don’t obey they will have curses
- Forced off their land if they don’t obey.
- Predicts their exile because of hardened and selfish hearts b
- The hardened and selfish hearts harks back to the condition of man and Israel. It’s the universal human condition.
- Moses puts laws in the ark of the covenant
- Goes up the mountain to see the promise land
- The Torah was written for the people outside of the land or still waiting for the promise for God to bless the whole world through Israel

Historical Books

Joshua

The book of Joshua picks up after the death of Moses and Joshua is appointed the new leader of Israel. They now occupy the land God promised. They are warring with the nations that now occupy the land.
Chapter 1 – 5: Joshua Leads Israel
- Joshua the new Moses
- Obey the 10 commandments
- Sends spies
- Rahab helps the spies
- Joshua leads the people into the promised land
- Joshua meets an angel of the Lord
Chapter 6 – 12 – Battles with the Canaanites
- Two battles: Jericho and Ai
- Jericho – God’s faithfulness in battle
  - Israel to walk around Jericho for 7 days and then the walls fall. They learn to trust and wait on the Lord
- Ai – Israel’s failure
  - An Israelite steals (Achan) from the Lord and lies about it. Israel goes to battle and loses. Achan is punished.
- To inherit the land they must be obedient
- Gibeonites follow the Lord
- Canaanite Kings want to destroy Israel but Israel wins
- Lists of victories
- Why does God declare war when he says to love?
  - Why Canaanites?
    - Moral corruption – Especially sex. Incest, bestiality, homosexuality
    - Child sacrifices
  - Did got initiate Genocide?
    - Joshua is using hyperbole when saying “totally destroy,” “no survivors,” “all that breathed.” See Joshua 1-36-27 vs 15:13-15. There are still inhabitants that are Canaanites.
    - Canaanites can still turn to the God of Israel.
    - Unique moment in history to destroying the Canaanites.
    - God called for peace with other Nations. Deuteronomy:20
Chapter 13 – 22 – Joshua Divides up the Land
- Old Joshua dividing up the land
- Lists of boundary lines
- The boundaries were a fulfillment of God’s promise to Abraham
Chapter 23 – 24 – Speeches to the people
- Joshua gives two speeches
- Reminds them of the generosity of God
- Turn away from Canaanite God’s and faithfulness to the Torah. Life and blessing in the land
- If they are unfaithful they will face divine justice and exile.

Judges

Begins after the death of Joshua
Tells the story of the utter failure of Israel
Judges named after the regional political leaders that are like tribal leaders.
They become the same as the Canaanites
Chapter 1 – Israel doesn’t drive out all the Canaanites.
Chapter 2 – This chapter shows the cycle that Israel falls into. They sin, get overruled by the Canaanites, suffer, repent, deliverance, peace, and then sin again.
This happens 6 times with each judges
The story progression goes from 3 pretty good judges to okay, bad, and a worse judge.
Gideon – Coward but eventually trusts the Lord. Nasty temper and murders fellow Israelites. He makes an Idol from gold from his plunderings.
Jephthah – Won a lot of battles but doesn’t know anything about God. He even says he’ll sacrifice his daughter if he wins the battle.
Samson – Promiscuous and doesn’t even care of the Lord
Israel as a whole hitting the bottom. “In those days Israel had no king and everyone did what was right in their own eyes.”
The book ends with Israel falling into sexual violence and their first civil war.
These stories are created as a warning. Israel needs to be delivered again from themselves.

1 Samuel

Samuel is technically 1 book but scroll length made it split into two
3 main characters: Prophet Samuel, King Saul, King David
4 main parts
Chapters 1-7 Samuel
Chapter 8-31 Saul
Hannah couldn’t have a child but God finally allows her to have a child –> Samuel
Samuel becomes a great leader and prophet
Philistines become arch enemies
Philistines win the battle and take Ark stolen
God sends plagues on Philistines from the Ark
Philistines gives back the Ark
The story behind this was that God opposes the proud. Israel used the Ark like some magic tool to win all wars and treated God like their trophy
Israel must remain humble and obedient to keep God’s blessings
The people of Israel want a king like other nations
Samuel asks God about a king and he tells samuel that they are bad reasons to want a king but God says give it to them
Saul is made King but has major character flaws
Samuel says Israel needs a humble and faithful king.
Tells Saul that God will raise up a new king
The new king is a shepherd boy – David
God uses David not because of his stature but rather his lowly status as a shepherd boy and youngest of his brothers to show that it’s radical faith and trust in God that matters
Saul and Goliath are proud and brought low while David is humble and raised up.
David becomes Saul’s general
Saul goes mad and tries to kill David
David has multiple opportunities to kill Saul but he doesn’t. David trusts the Lord and lets him take control of the situation.
From Saul’s character you get a warning to reflect on our flaws and to work on our dark side
From David’s story, you learn how to trust the Lord and God’s timing.
Have hope despite the human evil
God will oppose the proud and exalt the humble.

2 Samuel

Chapter 1-20 David
- David laments over the death of Saul and Jonathon
- You see his humility
- All the tribes come to David to ask him to unite the tribes
- Goes to Jerusalem and captures it and renames it to Zion
- Israel becomes the capital. He brings the Ark of the Covenant to Israel
- Wins many battles
- David asks if he can build a house for the Lord
- Chapter 7 – Very important. Future King to build God’s eternal kingdom.
- The Messiah is the one that brings the promise God gave Abraham that everyone on the earth will be blessed by his family
- David messes up and sleeps with Bathsheba. He kills off Uriah, Bathsheba’s husband, by sending him to the war and instructing the leader of the army to back off and allow Uriah to get killed in battle.
- Family issues occur
- Absalom kills his brother because the brother sexually abuses their sister
- Absalom rebels from his father David
- Absalom is killed
- David laments
Chapter 21 – 24
- Compares the failure of Saul and David
- David reflects back on his life
- He remembers God’s grace on his life
- Books theme – Despite the failures of God’s people, God continues the story with the future king that will be the savior to all people.

1 Kings & 2 Kings

1 Kings and 2 Kings were originally one book.
Tells the story of the kings after David
5 main movements:
- Solomen’s reign
- Israel split into rival kingdoms
- God attempting to prevent the split by sending prophets
- Exile unavoidable
- Jerusalem’s destruction
David to Solomon before he dies
- Be faithful to God
- David and Solomon talk about how they are going to unite the Kingdom by killing off certain people
- Solomon asks for wisdom
- God gives detail for Solomen to create the temple that David wanted to build for God but couldn’t because he had blood on his hands
- Solomon marries the daughters of other kings. 100’s of them for political alliance
- Institutes worship of other gods
- Solomon breaks every rule God had them obey
- At the end of Solomon’s life, he resembles more of Pharoah than he does his father, David.
- Solomon’s son Rehoboam does the same as his father. He tries to increase tax for slave labor but the northern kingdom of Israel disagrees with it and from the leadership of Jeroboam, they rebel and form their own rival kingdom
- Northern – Israel
- Southern – Judah (David’s line)
- Northern kingdom builds Samaria to compete with Jerusalem
- Each kingdom had about 20 successive kings
- Author rates the kings based on the criteria god has for them
  - Worship the God of Israel alone?
  - Rid Israel of idolatry
  - Faithful to covenant
- No good kings in Northern
- Only 8 out of 20 kings in Southern kingdom did well.
- During the reign, God has prophets for each kingdom.
- The most prominent ones are the Northern kingdom, with Elijah and Elisha
- They are meant to hold them accountable
- Elijah challenges 450 baal priests with the first challenge. Whoever can call upon their god and bring forth fire is the true God. Elijah of course is the only one that can. The Baal priests are all killed.
- Elijah passes the mantle to Elisha
- Elijah had 7 miracles accounted for and Elisha had 14 (Elisha asked for double the authority of Elijah)
- Both were unable to turn the kingdoms around.
- Jehu destroys Ahab’s family
- After Jehu, political assassinations and coup after coup occurs
- Everything gets worse.
- Assyria eventually takes out the northern kingdom. Sumeria is captured and the Jews are spread throughout the world.
- In the southern kingdom, Hezekiah shows some promise when he trusts the Lord when Assyria come knocking on their doors.
- After Hezekiah is Manasseh, who is the worst of them all. He institutes child sacrifice and idol worship in the Jerusalem temple.
- Time is up for Israel.
- Final chapters, Babylon comes in and takes over Jerusalem.
- They are sent out into exile.

Major Prophets:

Isaiah

Isaiah was a prophet who lived in the later years of Jerusalem before they were sent into exile.
Isaiah would warn the Israelites that if they continued to disobey the Lord, they would receive judgment through the Assyrian and Babylonian army.
Isaiah also proclaimed hope through the Messiah.
1-39 is focused on warning to Jerusalem
1-12 Judgement and hope for Jerusalem
Old Jerusalem would be destroyed and purified and a new remnant that will become the New Jerusalem
Isaiah has a vision where he realizes how sinful he and Israel is.
Assyria will chop down Israel.
But there will be a holy seed from the cutdown Israel.
Babylon would eventually succeed in destroying and exiling the Israelites
Chapter 24 – 27 tells about two cites. One that represents the constant state of rebellion against God and another the new Jerusalem
Hezekiah rises as King and the Assyrian army comes and attacks Jerusalem. They are saved.
Hezekiah shows Babylon leaders the wealth of Israel. He does it to try to gain them as allies. Eventually, Babylon attacks 100 years later and carries the Israelites to exile.
Chapters 40-66 are from the perspective from AFTER exile
There are two opposing views on who wrote these chapters
It’s either in the voice of Isaiah speaking prophetically about after the exile or it’s his disciples from AFTER the exile that read what he wrote down and finished the book of Israel.
An announcement of the future hope to come
Israel after the exile was supposed to come back to God and become God’s servant to the nations.
But they don’t and respond by saying that God might not be that powerful and maybe the other God’s of the Babylonians are stronger because they were ignored them and had more trouble.
Chapter 41-47 is like a trial scene. God’s response is that exile was judgement not neglect. It was done on purpose.
God raised up Persia to defeat Babylon.
In chapter 48, Israel is still rebellious.
Chapter 49-55 speaks of the prophecy of the savior of all nations (Jesus)
We find out how God’s servant will bring about God’s Kingdom
He will be rejected and killed.
The death will be an atonement
He dies but lives again.
2 ways to respond.
- Humble and repent. they will be the “seed”
- The others will resist and reject the servant
Chapter 56-66 speaks of the future New Jerusalem
Prayer of repentance
The wicked will be punished
They will be removed from his city forever.
The servants will inherit the new creation where death and suffering are gone forever
All nations are invited to join God’s covenant family.

Jeremiah

Jeremiah was an Israelite priest
He was a prophet that warned Israel to turn away from their ways
Lived in Jerusalem in the final days of Southern Judah
He predicts that Babylon would come and exile Israel and he lived to experience the horror of it.
1-24 chapters writings of Jeremiah before the exile
Core idea is that Israel has broken the covenant
Israel worships other Gods
Accuses leaders of being corrupt
Widows, orphans, and immigrants were being taken advantage of and the leaders didn’t seem to care.
Inside the temple, they did worship as usual but on the outside of Jerusalem they were worshipping other gods and even doing child sacrifice.
Chapter 25 – Jeremiah proclaims that Babylon is coming and will exile Israel for 70 years.
Chapter 26 – 45 Judgement and hope for Israel
Story of siege and destruction of Jerusalem
Jeremiah writes about the hope for Israel’s future
God would renew people and inscribe his law on their hearts.
The Messiah will come and everyone will acknowledge that Israel’s God is the true God.
Chapter 46-51 – Judgement on the surrounding nations
Babylon will also be punished. God uses Babylon to pour down his judgment on Israel but it doesn’t mean God condones what they do.
Chapter 52 is the destruction and exile Israel.

Ezekiel

Ezekiel was a priest that lived in Jerusalem through the Babylonian attack.
Ezekiel was taken as a prisoner and sent off into exile from the first attack by the Babylonians
Ezekiel was 25 when he was taken and when he just turned 30 years old (When you are at the age where you can become a priest) he had a vision.
His vision was of 4 winged creatures with 4 faces that surrounded the throne of God. The throne room or presence of God is seen leaving Jerusalem and moving towards Babylon.
Chapter 1-11 uncover the meaning of the vision.
- God appoints Ezekiel as a prophet and he’s supposed to accuse Israel of breaking the covenant promise with the Lord.
  - Worshipping other Gods
  - Social injustice
- Ezekiel performs sign acts, acting out parables of what is to come.
- No one would listen to Ezekiel because of their rebellious and hard hearts
- After a year Ezekiel has another vision. The vision of the temple vision.
- In the outer courtyard, there is a large idol and Israel’s leaders are worshipping the Idol.
- The women are also worshipping another idol.
- In his vision, the throne chair of God is seen leaving Israel.
- God has left his temple and consigns it to destruction.
- God goes into exile with his people.
- God promises to bring back a remnant of that will have a transformed heart.
Chapter 12-24 – Judgement on Israel
- Ezekiel uses parables and allegories that depict how Israel is. He describes them as a burnt useless stick, a rebellious wife, a dangerous lion, and promiscuous sisters.
- Ezekiel also acts as a lawyer, arguing for why Israel’s judgement is deserved
- God’s goodness demands that justice is served to Israel
Chapter 25-32 Judgement on the nations
- Philistia, Edom, Moab, Ammon
- God holds Eygpt and Tyre responsible for believing they are God’s defining what is right and wrong.
- God will use Babylon to bring them down.
Chapter 33 – A refuge tells Ezekiel that Jerusalem has fallen to Babylon. The temple is destroyed.
Chapter 34-37 – Hope for Israel
- A new David (Messianic King)
- God will give them a new heart through God’s Spirit
- Ezekiel sees dried up bones which depict Israel’s dried up spiritual state
- God’s spirit is coming to renew the people. In the vision, the bones become living human beings.
Chapter 38 – 39 – Hope for the Nations
- Ezekiel depicts Gog the ruler as the archetypal of evil. Ezekiel then goes on to explain how God will punish Gog.
Chapter 40-48 – Hope for all Creations
- Ezekiel has a vision of a new temple
- God’s chariot comes back to the temple.
- There are two debated meanings behind the vision that Jewish and Christian scholars believe in.
  - The first is a literal blueprint for the new temple in the future messianic kingdom
  - The second is a figurative depiction of God’s presence coming back to his people in the messianic kingdom. Not an actual building
- Ezekiel does not call this new place called Jerusalem.
- The reason is that you read about a river that flows from this new temple into the dead see valley where it produces a living valley.
- It’s God showing that he always had the intention of bringing back the Garden of Eden state.