Lesson 9 | Vocab
The Shape of the Canon
The Hebrew Old Testament differs from the English in multiple ways. You already know that the versification of some places, like many psalms, is different. If you’ve opened a chapter in the Hebrew OT on app.biblearc.com, or paged through a physical copy of the Old Testament, you may have noted another difference: the order of the books.
While the Hebrew Bible contains the exact same books and content as our English Old Testaments, these books are organized in a different fashion. Our English Old Testaments are primarily ordered chronologically, whereas the Hebrew Bible is primarily ordered categorically. As we learned in an earlier lesson step, another name for the Hebrew Bible is the תנ״ך, which stands for תּוֹרָה (law), נְבִיאִים (prophets), and כְּתֻבִים (writings). These are the categories that frame the ordering of books in the Hebrew Bible.
Here’s what Jason DeRouchie, Research Professor of Old Testament and Biblical Theology at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, says about Jesus’ Bible, our Old Testament:
[It] was identical in content with our English Old Testament, but it consisted of twenty-four books that were divided and arranged differently. Specifically, Jesus and the apostles’ Hebrew Bible bore a three-part structure that included Psalms as the largest and first main book in the third division (with Ruth apparently serving as a preface). Jesus’s statement following his resurrection gives biblical support for this structure, for he appears to use “Psalms” as the title of the whole third division: “Everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled” (Luke 24:44). Also, the biblical data suggest that the earliest church’s Bible began with Genesis and ended with Chronicles. When Jesus once confronted the Pharisees, he spoke of the martyrdom of the Old Testament prophets “from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah” (Luke 11:51; cf. Matt 23:35). Jesus seems to have been speaking canonically by mentioning the first and last martyr in his Bible’s literary structure. Just as Genesis records Abel’s murder (Gen 4:2–8), the end of Chronicles highlights a certain Zechariah who was killed in the temple court during the reign of Joash (2Chr 24:20–21).
—Jason DeRouchie, “Introduction to the Old Testament.”
DeRouchie summarizes the three parts of Jesus’ Bible this way:
In the Law, Yahweh establishes the Mosaic (old) covenant; in the Prophets he enforces it; and in the Writings the remnant enjoys his faithfulness and the hope of his messianic kingdom promises.
—Ibid.
LAW
FORMER PROPHETS
LATTER PROPHETS
FORMER WRITINGS
LATTER WRITINGS
Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy
Joshua, Judges, 1–2 Samuel, 1–2 Kings
Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Isaiah, The Twelve
Ruth-Psalms, Job, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, Lamentations
Daniel, Esther, Ezra-Nehemiah, 1–2 Chronicles
Narrative
Narrative
Commentary
Commentary
Narrative
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This is a helpful way to view the Old Testament, to place the Law as the foundation for the Old Testament (and the whole Bible), then to follow “the story of salvation recounted in the narrative books” as it leads to Christ, allowing “the messages of the non-narrative commentary books” to speak as we do so.
So don't let the different order of books frustrate you as you try to find your way around the Hebrew Old Testament; rather, let it guide your understanding of the big picture of God's story of redemption in Christ.
