Pastor has begun teaching a Sunday School class on the book of Daniel. This is the first Sunday School class on an Old Testament book in a long, long time. To begin the class, Pastor presented a quick history of events leading up to the book of Daniel. Because no one asked questions, he may have presumed that the class understood the Old Testament events leading up to the book of Daniel. I don’t think this is accurate.
Most Christians, I think, have a reasonably good understanding of New Testament history. They know Jesus was born just over two thousand years ago, that the four Gospels cover the life of Jesus, that the book of Acts picks up (with the Ascension) where the Gospels leave off and goes through the imprisonment of Paul in Rome, that the Epistles were letters written, primarily by Paul, to the early churches and that Revelation covers the revelation given to the apostle John late in his life (and late in the first century).
However, for most Christians, I think, the Old Testament is far less clear. Most, if not all, would identify Genesis with the creation (and as the first book of the Bible) and would identify certain key individuals from the Old Testament. Abraham, Moses, David, Samson and Solomon would be names that they would recognize but, I suspect, most would have trouble organizing them chronologically and would be at a loss to identify the key eras and key players in those eras when it came to the Old Testament.
Therefore, it’s worthwhile to present here a concise history of the Old Testament. Even being concise, this article could easily get very long so I’m going to be very brief in describing this history. First off, I think it’s useful to get an overall view of history that encompasses the Old Testament, the New Testament and the church age (in which we are right now).
The Old Testament covers the time from creation to the life of Christ, 4000 years give or take. The New Testament covers the life of Christ through to the revelation given to John, approximately 100 years. The church age begins with Pentecost and includes the time in which we live.
The Book of Genesis covers creation, through the flood, through the lives of the patriarchs, ending with the relocation of the Jews to Egypt (where Joseph, after all his travails, interpreted Pharaoh’s dreams and ended up number two in command). This book spans approximately 2200 years and covers Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, Noah and the flood, the tower of Babel and the lives of the patriarchs (Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph).
Since it covers roughly 2200 years, the Book of Genesis covers over half of the history before Christ’s birth. Indeed, the first six chapters of Genesis cover approximately 1500 of those years and end with the Flood. Since all but Noah’s family died during the Flood, all that is known about the first 1500 years, roughly ¼ of our history, is described in these first six chapters.
The Book of Exodus, which follows Genesis, begins with the Jews in Egypt, initially invited into the country, growing rapidly in population, and being enslaved by the Egyptians. Therefore, the first chapter of Exodus covers about 300 years more.
At the other end of the Old Testament, before Christ’s birth, there is roughly a 430-year gap, referred to as the intertestamental (between testaments) period during which no books of the Bible were written. This is the time when the Apocryphal books, accepted as part of the Roman Catholic Bible but not as part of our Bible, were written. Therefore, the majority of the Old Testament, from Exodus 2 through the prophet Malachi, deals with the period (shown in green) from approximately 1525 BC to 430 BC. Note that the sections of time not included in the Bible are shown in white (not counting time gaps between or within the various books of the Bible).
This (green) period, when expanded, breaks into several smaller time periods. The life of Moses commences with Exodus 2 (as a baby being placed in a basket, placed in the Nile river and adopted into the Egyptian royal family). The book of Exodus covers the first 80 years of Moses’ life, with most of this book focused on the ten plagues brought on Egypt and the exodus of the twelve tribes (corresponding to the twelve male children of Jacob (whom God renamed to Israel) from Egypt. The books of Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy cover the forty years of wandering in the wilderness, after the exodus from Egypt, ending with Moses’ death.
The book of Joshua picks up with Joshua replacing Moses, leading the Jews into the promised land and conquering the inhabitants of that land. The most famous of these battles was that for the walled city of Jericho, a well-known story with the crumbling walls.
For roughly 350 years (realize that the United States has only existed as a nation for about 250 years), the twelve tribes had no earthly king, but were instead watched over from above. As long as they remained faithful to God, He would protect them. When they turned away from Him and towards other gods, He let one of their enemies invade them. When they repented, God would select an individual, a judge, to guide them and to gain the victory over their enemies. This time was, therefore, known as the time of judges and is covered in the Book of Judges and the first few chapters of Samuel (the last of the judges). Samson and Samuel are probably the best known of the judges, but other judges included Gideon, Othniel, Ehud, Deborah and Jephtah (the major judges) and several minor judges.
When the twelve tribes demanded to have a king, Samuel, at God’s direction, anointed Saul to be king. Saul started out as a decent king but later his jealousy towards David (after David killed Goliath and proved to be a powerful warrior) ruined his reign. On Saul’s death David became king. While David basically remained faithful to God, with the biggest exception being his affair with Bathsheba, he was not a good father, which led to problems within his life (he was temporarily displaced by his son Absalom) and after his death. Solomon, his son by Bathsheba, became king after his death (not without issue). Solomon, known for building the first temple, was a man granted great wisdom by God. Unfortunately, he had a propensity for earthly pleasures, with many wives and concubines, and that worldliness was his undoing. This time period, starting with Saul and including David and Solomon, is referred to as the united kingdom (since there was one king for all twelve tribes), and lasted from 1045 BC to 930 BC. It is covered in 1 Samuel 8 through 1 Kings 11 and is also covered in 1 Chronicles 1 through 2 Chronicles 9.
After the reigns of Saul, David and Solomon, because they could not agree on a king, the nation of Israel was split into two kingdoms. The northern kingdom, consisting of ten of the twelve tribes, retained the name of Israel while the southern kingdom adopted the name of Judah (which, along with Benjamin, made up the two tribes). The histories of the two nations were not particularly good, with many bad kings that led the people away from God (to false gods) interspersed with a few good kings, who would temporarily lead the people back to God. Eventually, because of their sinfulness and refusal to turn back to Him, God would let the two nations be conquered. Around 720 BC the northern kingdom (Israel) was conquered by Assyria and would not be reformed (because of their intermingling with other nations, this area eventually became known just as Samaria). Around 620 BC the southern kingdom of Judah was conquered by the Babylonians. At that time many of the people of Judah, including Daniel, were taken to Babylon. However, the nation of Judah, which became essentially a vassal state of Babylon, was allowed to exist for a few more years. When Judah rebelled against Babylon, Jerusalem was destroyed (about 585 BC) and the nation of Judah ceased to exist.
The time between Solomon’s death (around 930 BC) and the nation of Judah being conquered by the Babylonians (around 620 BC) is referred to as the divided kingdom, since this was the time when the kingdom had been split in two. 1 Kings 12 through 2 Kings 23 and 2 Chronicles 10 through the end of 2 Chronicles cover the events during this time frame. The last two chapters of 2 Kings cover the brief time after the initial conquering of Judah through the destruction of Jerusalem.
The book of Daniel, which is in the middle of the Old Testament books about the prophets (not with the other historical books at the start of the Old Testament), covers the history of the Jewish people while in the Babylonian captivity. In particular, the first six chapters of Daniel contain what is known of the history of this captivity.
After Babylon was conquered by Persia (modern day Iran), King Cyrus let the Jews return to their homeland (some chose to stay). The books of Ezra (rebuilding of the temple) and Nehemiah (rebuilding of the walls of Jerusalem) cover the history of the Jewish people after their release from captivity. The book of Esther, while being set back in Persia during this time, describes how Queen Esther, a Jew, saved the Jewish people from annihilation.
Except for the history of captivity in Daniel, the history of the Old Testament essentially ends with Nehemiah. Esther, which follows Nehemiah in the Bible, chronologically precedes it and Job, which follows Esther, probably occurred during the time covered by Genesis, so its placement after Esther is chronologically way out of place.
The next five Old Testament books after Job are Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon (or Song of Songs) and Lamentations. These books are not historical, so their placement after the historical books makes some sense. However, the reader needs to be aware that David, the primary author of the Psalms, and Solomon, the author of the other four books, trace back chronologically to the time of the united kingdom. Therefore, chronologically, these books were written about 500 years before the history covered in Nehemiah.
The prophets, which cover the remaining books of the Old Testament, chronologically fit into different times within this history starting with the divided kingdom. Since this article is already long, the topic of where the various prophets fit into the Old Testament timeline will be left for a future article.
