Comments on: Reading the Bible in the Right Direction (Part 3) – Practical Suggestions

By: Joshua

Joshua — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 20:50:56 +0000

Love it. Not getting bogged in details is huge. When I’ve read lots of the OT even in a short time (a month) it has impacted my whole view of scripture. Thanks for the practicals.

By: SilverRain Lee

SilverRain Lee — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 20:39:09 +0000

It is very helpful and gives concrete way to approach OT. While reading OT I usually get stuck at the step of questioning. Just like you said in point (6) I try to ask those fundamental questions but I get lost in finding connections. It kind of became one of the reasons for me to have some sort of fear of reading OT.
Amen to reading Gen. Exo. Ps. Isa!! Yes and Amen to that in due time they will become familiar..

By: Chris Minch

Chris Minch — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 19:09:31 +0000

Richard, so glad you put this article next in this series… I was at the point of, “Men and brethren, what shall we do?” Thank you for a simple, common-sense approach that I could grasp. (Even though, as Jeff pointed out, the overall execution is far from simple.) I particularly appreciated the recommendation on where to focus my energy: Genesis, Exodus, the Psalms, and Isaiah 40- 66. And I tend to get bogged down in detail so it is refreshing/liberating to hear someone say – read it, get the flow of the story, and just look for themes (which is where I would probably still tend towards too much analysis).

By: Melissa

Melissa — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 18:29:50 +0000

These are helpful tools to reading the OT. It seems much more manageable than just sitting down and reading it from beginning to end and trying to grasp it along the way. I’m not sure that I agree about some parts of the OT being more important than others. I do think that certain books carry more of the story of Israel and how God deals with them but, how does that make them more important? What about Jeremiah, the minor prophets, Deuteronomy…? Why do you think some are more important than others? I’m open to the concept but not sure that I understand where you’re coming from with it.

By: Emily

Emily — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 15:47:13 +0000

It’s really freeing to be reminded that it’s good to read large portions without memorizing all the details. I love to stop and think on a few verses, but just knowing that it’s good to read larger portions makes me feel better because I like to do that too! Thanks for the helpful resources, ex. reading plan for OT. Helpful!

By: Jennifer

Jennifer — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 12:57:01 +0000

I like this post. I enjoy the day to day stuff like including reading the OT in your daily reading of the Bible. I enjoy reading the Bible in chunks as well but have recently been asking more questions about the weird stuff in the OT and then get side tracked. I like that you said read it and see what the over all theme is which is very helpful.

By: Richard

Richard — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 08:51:56 +0000

One tool would be a copy of the Septuagint (the Greek translation of the Old Testament) and the Hebrew Bible (both preferably digital). You can then compare which words in Hebrew were translated into Greek, and then study those Hebrew words. This information would also be found in some Bible dictionaries, the Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, for sure.

Then the best tool that I know of would be the Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament, which at a whopping 16 or 17 volumes covers every theologically significant word in the OT. It may be a little too technical at this point, but it is the most thorough resource. There are some others that are less in depth, particularly one by Jenni-Westermann.

More important than “word studies” are “concept studies.” You know from speaking English that words are not 100% air-tight separate containers. There are what is called “semantic domains” which are groups of words that cover similar territory. For example words like delight, gladness, pleasure and joy would be a “semantic domain.” There might be some minor nuances to the words, but in normal language they are used almost interchangeably. So when doing a word study, you would want to explore the “semantic domain” as well.

By: Chris

Chris — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 06:19:56 +0000

I also so enjoyed this post, I love when teachers take what they are teaching us and give us tools to do it our selves. I also had a few questions. I desire to look at all the terms we see in the NT and see how they are used in the OT (for example: “ransom”), how would I do this?? Would some research in a OT dictionary be enough?? And are there other tools we can use to do this??

By: Sarah Beale

Sarah Beale — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 02:47:10 +0000

I also enjoyed the part about reading large chunks of the OT and getting the overall theme. So often i find myself lost in a random part of the OT (probably a genealogy) wondering why in the world it would matter, but instead of doing that to really dig into “what does this book as a whole say” and from that seeing the meaning of the little sections. This is a lot less intimidating and a more productive use of time!

By: Jesse

Jesse — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 17:51:44 +0000

Loved your point about grasping the overall flow of the OT narratives by simply reading them in larger sections and recognizing common themes. Though simple, this is revolutionary to the way I read the OT (especially reading the few Psalms I love, as opposed to the whole book). As one who is somewhat intimidated to dive into the scholarly arena, I was encouraged with the possibility of grasping the larger story by simply investing time and energy.

By: Gary

Gary — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 11:36:13 +0000

If I remember correctly… I was probably the one who jested about the OT- I apologize

However I would add Deuteronomy in the list of OT books that are important. Paul quotes from there liberally not least in Romans. So when are details important and when are they permissible but non-beneficial? I get bogged down with this alot of times because I like to know much about what I read in the bible. I understand that we need to get the big picture but I assume details are important sometime right?

By: Richard

Richard — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 21:20:25 +0000

Jeff – good points – I think the best way to gain the understanding of an OT word is to read the OT regularly over a long period of time. You can also speed it up by applying suggestion #3. I guess I didn’t justify this notion at all in the post, but the sheer volume of quotations from the OT in the NT from the Psalms and Isaiah, at least hint that these books were really significant to the early church. I would start by limiting the word studies to Psalms and Isaiah, which of course are not short books, but as a whole a bit shorter than the entire OT. Another short cut is to read bible dictionaries like the Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament.