Introduction
Christians have often treated the Old Testament as a kind of second-class set of books. Many often defer to the New Testament when searching for life applications of the Christian faith. Is it because the Old Testament is “old,” or because it contains a poetic style so relatively hard to read? Perhaps the Old Testament is boring. After all, is not the Old Testament full of numbers and lists, quaint old stories, and strange, hard to understand, ironic language? This second-class treatment may be justified on the grounds that the New Testament contains the sayings of Jesus, the Christ, and those who followed him. His sayings are the primary basis for our faith. Yet, the Old Testament contains crucial elements for the Christian faith that Jesus himself acknowledged and thoroughly understood. Jesus was Jewish, after all, and the Hebrew text (and its Greek translation, the Septuagint, which will be discussed later) was the Scripture of the early Christian-Jews. Without the Old, there could not have been the New, and the New Testament, ultimately, is a theology of the Old Testament.
The Authority Issue
An introduction to the Old Testament cannot be complete without addressing the question of the authority of these books in the Christian life. Does the Old Testament hold as much authority as the New in the life of a Christian?
In order to understand Scripture authority and the many approaches to the Old Testament (and all scripture, for that matter), we will begin with what may seem to be a diversion, but it is important: the concept of theology. The etymological meaning of “theology” is simply the study of God. However, much more is implied in the customary use of the term. Theology embodies the essential philosophy one employs in approaching God; it is what we believe about God. It may or may not be based on Scripture. The key is that everyone, from the newest convert to the seasoned theologian, has a theology whether it is acknowledged or not (even those who consider themselves atheists). We all approach Scripture with our own presuppositions which have been placed in our thought processes either by our own searching and deliberation, by someone we respect, or simply the environment in which we exist. Perhaps some of us hold to “convictions” that we have not really ever thought through. No doubt many will acknowledge the latter to be true. One of the primary purposes of this text is to challenge our commonly held, but not necessarily “owned” convictions.
Why is the Old Testament important for Christians? Is it the foundation for our faith and guide for our lives with just as much authority as the New Testament? Should we hold up the entire Bible[1] as authoritative, or only part of it? All too often Christians ignore the Old Testament and base their theology entirely upon the New, thereby abrogating a biblical theology. Jesus said, “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled” (Matt. 5:17-18, AV; cf. Matt. 7:12; Luke 16:17; Luke 24:44-45). Jesus upheld the “law and the prophets” (a euphemism for the entirety of Scripture[2]) as authoritative, and did not seek to remove them from his teachings or those he discipled.
The apostle Paul similarly upheld the Old Testament as authoritative. Paul states in Romans 3:31, “Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.” Here he does not seek to “abolish” or “make invalid” the law through faith, but faith makes the law firmer. His referral to “the law” is similar to Matthew’s account of Jesus’ words above; he refers to the entire Old Testament.[3] It can be surmised from the book of Romans that Paul always saw a continuing authoritative role for the law in the life of the believer.
Often, writers of the New Testament refer to the Old Testament as an appeal to authority. Consider the writer of the book of Hebrews, who includes forty direct quotations from the Old Testament, not to mention the many other indirect references to Old Testament passages (cf. Heb. 11). In fact, every New Testament author quotes from the Old Testament.
Common Themes
Since the Old Testament is authoritative in the life of the believer, we need to examine just exactly what sort of interaction occurs between the two testaments. As we have stated above, the New Testament is a theology of the Old Testament. The New interprets the Old. Thus, although we have stressed the importance of the Old Testament, it cannot stand alone. Several common themes occur throughout the entirety of Scripture, and these themes create a unity amongamong the whole. God, of course, is a unifying subject, as well as the ideas of covenant, kingdom, promise, and messiah.
Covenant
The term “covenant” refers generally to an agreement between two parties. We refer here to the covenant God makes between himself and man. God initiated the covenant primarily because he desired a relationship with man. The covenant is an expression of election (God initiates election through his promises); it is an act of his grace, initiated through sacrifice. In the Old Testament, the sacrifice was required of animals; in the New Testament, it is Jesus the Messiah who is the ultimate sacrifice.
The covenant made at Sinai is similar to the ancient Near East suzerain-vassal treaty.[4] In the suzerainty treaty, a powerful king makes a pact with a vassal. The vassal cannot change the terms of the pact, but can only accept or reject the offer. So it is with God’s covenant. God offers his “treaty” and man accepts or rejects it, with appropriate consequences for each decision. Admission to the covenant is by submission to the lord of the covenant and obedience to its terms.
The covenant represents a voluntary self-limitation on God’s part. God limits his sovereignty according to the conditions of the covenant.
Kingdom
The theme of “kingdom” occurs throughout Scripture. It most often refers to the particular reign, rule, or sovereignty of a king, not the realm in which it is exercised[5]. Often in the Old Testament, earthly kings and their reigns are likened to that of God. The New Testament discusses what is generally referred to as the “kingdom of God.” However, Scripture is paradoxical in that it views God’s Kingdom as both here and now and as coming in the future.
Promise
God always extends his promises to those who accept his covenants. The promises of God are neither flippantly nor generally made. God’s promises are only valid for those who accept and seek to maintain the covenant relationship. However, as one writer expressed it, the covenant, once accepted, is never truly revocable.[6] If the covenant demands are met, blessings follow; if they are not, God chastises in the form of various curses. In the Old Testament, God’s promises are made potently clear through his dealings with the nation of Israel. One of the most obvious examples is the presentation of the curses and blessings found in Deuteronomy 28.
Messiah
The messiah is the ultimate end of the hope of salvation and fulfillment of God’s promises for the world. The Messiah would be the conveyor of the promised New Covenant (Jer. 31:31f). Two views of the Messiah are presented in the Old Testament. One view sees the figure as a king/warrior who will bring in the covenant in apocalyptic fashion (e.g., the balaam oracle, Num. 24:17). The other view sees the figure as peaceful, as the suffering servant in Isaiah (Isa. 42ff).
The Messiah, although entering history as Jesus in the incarnation, was part of history in that a progression was made from the time of the sin of Adam and Eve in the garden to the advent of the Christ. Thus the Messiah is part of God’s plan in history from the moment of Adam’s sin; he is then revealed by God throughout his own special revelation, the Old and New Testaments.
Cultural Considerations
Cultural Methodology
The culture represented in the Old Testament is essentially the basis for that of the New Testament writers. The challenge we face as modern Christians is our lack of cultural awareness. The awareness we speak of here is not that of our own culture, but that of the ancient Hebrews. We tend to read our modern culture into the Old Testament and make it say (whether we intend to or not) what we think it says from our perspective.[7] Instead, we need to allow the writers to speak from the perspective of their own time and culture. An example of what we are saying can be found in the modern feminist movement. Biblical scholars with a feminist orientation have written much on the subject of what one writer calls “androcentricity”[8] in the Old Testament. From the point of view of Israelite women in the Old Testament, were they really repressed? Or is this an anachronistic argument? The method of separating the ancient culture from our own does not mean that God’s dealings and laws in the Old Testament cannot be applied to today’s culture. If that were true, then the Old Testament, and for that matter, the whole of Scripture, would be inapplicable to us. The God of the Old Testament is still the same God today, and his moral laws are unchangeable.
Language
Language is one of the most important cultural attributes for any people, and it was the ultimate vehicle for conveying the most meaningful aspects of the Hebrew culture. The most ancient Old Testament texts were written in Hebrew. Later texts were written in Aramaic (the language of the Persians and lingua franca around the second century BC).
[1] We will later examine what is meant by “the Bible;” here we refer to the canon of Scripture accepted by the universal church (all Christian denominational groups: Protestant, Roman, Orthodox, Assyrian, Ethiopian, Coptic, Syrian, and Armenian, which have historically included the Old Testament apocryphal material along with their canons).
[2] Donald A. Hagner, Word Biblical Commentary, Matt. 1-13, (Dallas: Word Books, 1993), p. 105.
[3] James D.G. Dunn, Word Biblical Commentary, Rom. 1-8, (Dallas: Word Books, 1988), p.191.
[4] William S. LaSor, D. Hubbard, and F. Bush, Old Testament Survey, (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1982), p. 144-145.
[5] George Eldon Ladd, The Gospel of the Kingdom: Scriptural Studies in the Kingdom of God, (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1959), p. 20.
[6] Unk.
[7] The process of reading foreign ideas into the text is called eisegesis. Exegesis, the accepted method of studying, is reading “out of” what has been written.
[8] Danna Nolan Fewell, Reading the Bible Ideologically: Feminist Criticism, in To Each Its Own Meaning, eds. Steven L. McKensie and S.R. Haynes, (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1993), p. 243.
