What It is and What It isn’t
You will need to use your own Bible or an online link to the scriptures. I recommend Bible Gateway. This enables you to read the entire book we are studying and/or references throughout the scriptures.
What is the Bible?
The Bible is a record of man’s relationship with God and God’s relationship with man as it has played out through history. It is a collection of 66 different books written by 44 different authors. The canonized Hebrew Bible is organized into three main sections often referred to as the Tanakh (pronounced: tuh·naak). When we say canonical we mean that these are the collection of books that the Hebrew scholars deemed as genuine and meant to be part of the Hebrew Bible.
The Torah, or Pentateuch. This includes the first “Five Books of Moses”; which would be Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy.
The Neviʾim, or Prophets. These are the books written by the prophets in the Old Testament; which include the 24 books of the Prophets.
The Ketuvim, or Writings. These contain the poetical books (Psalms, Proverbs, and Job), The Scrolls (Song of Solomon, Ruth, Lamentations of Jeremiah, Ecclesiastes, and Esther), prophecy (Daniel), and history (Ezra, Nehemiah, and I and II Chronicles).
Why is any of this important? It is important only in that you understand the basic structure of the Hebrew Bible. In this way, you will understand the origins of your own Bible. What we have just discussed is what we know as the Old Testament. It is a testimony of God’s relationship with His people and our relationship with Him prior to the coming of the Messiah, Jesus the Christ.
The word Christ comes from a Greek word (chrīstós), which means “anointed one”. The Greek Septuagint was a translation of the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek for Greek speaking Jewish people. In the Septuagint, Christos was used to translate the Hebrew word messiah, meaning “[one who is] anointed”. So Christ was not Jesus last name. It was His title. Jesus the Messiah, the Christ.
The New Testament has 27 books and the Old Testament has 39 books. This is the total collection of 66 books mentioned earlier. The New Testament starts with the four Gospels. Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Gospels are writings written as a message to describe Jesus and his significance to a specific audience. The first three Gospels are considered the “Synoptic Gospels” since they are very similar in the information they convey concerning Christ.
The author of Matthew was writing specifically to a Jewish audience. Mark was writing to Gentiles. Luke addressed Romans. John wrote with the purpose of showing that Jesus was God in man and points to his life and miracles that testify to who He was and is. He did this in order to address the growing problem of gnostic influence in the church. Gnostic doctrine taught that the world was created and ruled by a lesser divinity. In other words, they taught that Jesus was not God but a lesser deity…which begs the question of multiple gods. They in turn taught that Jesus did not suffer on the cross because he was a deity and that would be unbecoming of a god. Gnostism and its false teachings permeate our churches to this day and are as much a concern now as they were in the days of John.
The Book of Acts follows the four Gospels. It was written by the physician Luke. Luke and Paul were close companions and traveled throughout the Mediterranean together. Acts describes the beginning of the church led by the apostles as they were inspired by the Holy Spirit. The books following Acts were actually letters (Epistles) written to the church teaching doctrine and correcting error; Personal letters from Paul to Timothy, Titus and Philemon; The book of Hebrews to correct Christians from turning back to Judaism; Daily living as a Christian; and letters of instruction and encouragement to the church and its people. The final book of the New Testament was the Book of Revelation.
If you were to count the books in the Canonized Catholic Bible vs. the Canonized Protestant Bible (The Hebrew Canon) you will notice there are 46 books in the Catholic Bible. These extra books are called the Apocrypha. These are books the Catholic Church added to the Bible that were never accepted into the Hebrew Canon but were added due to their historical importance concerning Jewish history.
The original manuscripts and books were not divided into chapters and verses. Some of the books in the Bible were combined into one book or one book divided into two separate books. The purpose for this was to make it easier to reference the various portions of scripture. It does not change the content of the writings nor their authenticity. Neither is the Bible written in chronological order. It takes some study to understand the various historical periods in which a work was written. However, once we do this it is easier to understand the social, cultural and historical context in which it was written and its impact then and now.