Introduction to the old testament part 11

You may certainly use any other term, and you may certainly use the term Old Testament, as long as it's clear we're talking about this set of 24 books and not some of the other things that are in the Old Testament that aren't in the traditional Hebrew Bible. It means you're studying less, so that might be a good thing.

So, it's fine with me if you want to use that but I will prefer the more accurate term "Hebrew Bible." Also while we're on terminology, you'll notice that I use BCE to refer to the period before 0 and CE to refer to the period after 0; the Common Era and Before the Common Era, and in a lot of your secondary readings and writings they'll be using the same thing. It corresponds to what you know as BC, Before Christ, and Anno Domini, AD, the year of our Lord.

It's just a non-Christian-centric way of dating and in a lot of your secondary readings you'll see it, so you should get used to it: BCE and CE, Before the Common Era and the Common Era.

From earliest times, Christians made use of the Bible but almost always in its Greek translation, and the Christian Old Testament contains some material not in the Hebrew Bible, as I've mentioned. And some of these works are referred to as the Apocrypha--so you will have heard that term. These are writings that were composed somewhere around here, sort of 200 BCE to 100 CE. They were widely used by Jews of the period. They simply weren't considered to be of the same status as the 24 books. I'm glad they pick up the garbage at 11:10 [laughs] on Wednesday mornings.

But they did become part of the canon of Catholic Christianity and in the sixteenth century, their canonical status was confirmed for the Catholic Church. With the Renaissance and the Reformation, some Christians became interested in Hebrew versions of the Bible.

They wanted to look at the Hebrew and not the Greek translation from the Hebrew. Protestants, the Protestant church, denied canonical status to the books of the Apocrypha. They said they were important for pious instruction but excluded them from their canon. There are also some works you may know of, referred to as the Pseudepigrapha--we'll talk about some of these things in a little more detail later--from roughly the same period; tend to be a little more apocalyptic in nature, and they were never part of the Jewish or the Catholic canon, but there are some eastern Christian groups that have accepted them in their canon. The point I'm trying to make is that there are very many sacred canons out there that are cherished by very many religious communities, and they're all designated "Bibles." So again, we're focusing on that core set of 24 books that are common to all Bibles everywhere, the 24 books of what would in fact be the Jewish Tanakh. Not only has there been variety regarding the scope of the biblical canon in different communities, but there's been some fluidity in the actual text itself.

To be continued in part 12.