Table of Contents

Course Code: BBO13

The Life and Faith of the People of God: Old Testament

BD I, Semester 1, 4 Credit Hours, College Paper

Course Objectives

To enable students to understand the writing process, the collection and canonization of the books of the Old Testament.
To help students to know the centrality of the Bible in Christian ministerial, missional and theological discourses and life of the community.
To trace the origin and development of life and faith of people of God/Israel from the perspectives of Israel’s struggles, hardships, sufferings, failures on the one hand and faith, successes and hopes on the other.
To help students to draw challenges from their life, faith and hope for the present context.

Course Requirements

Final Examination: 60%
Internal Assessment: 40%
- Class attendance: 5%
- Participation: 5%
- Assignment: 30%

Course Outline

General Introduction to the Hebrew Bible
1. What is the Bible? The Bible as the word of God, as Scripture, as revelation, literature and as (hi)story and salvation history of the people of God.
2. The making of the Bible: Oral and written traditions, writing materials: parchments, scrolls, papyrus.
3. Definitions of the terms: TANAK: the Torah, Nebiim and Ketubim, different circles of writers, compilers and redactors/editors; priestly and Deuteronomistic writers, chroniclers; ancestors, law givers, kings, prophets, sages, seers and poets; laws, stories, prophecies, wisdom, visions and psalms.
4. Manuscripts and Texts; Translations and Versions.
5. Different types of Biblical Literature: Narratives, Stories, Parabolic writings, Legal Codes, Prophetic writings, Novelistic writings, Psalms and Wisdom, Historical writings, Apocalyptic writings.
Introduction to the books of the Hebrew Bible: study the context, literary structure, character, composition and theological purpose of each book.
Collection and Canonization: The Process of Canonization, the different canons of scripture – Hebrew, Protestant and Roman Catholic.
Beginning of the History of the people of God:

1. Introductory question: Do we trace the history of ancient Israel as the People of God or do we trace the history of ancient Israel as an ethnic group lived in Palestine?
2. Sources for the study of history of Israel:
  1. The OT/Hebrew Bible as the primary source.
  2. Archaeological evidence/extra-biblical evidences as secondary source. What is the nature of the archaeological evidence?
  3. Combining both biblical and archaeological evidences. The complementary and supplementary nature of both biblical and archaeological evidences.
The Wider Platform of Socio-cultural and Geographic Location of the People of God
1. Ancient West Asia (AWA) and Its Inhabitants.
  1. Map of Ancient West Asia and particularly Palestine showing the political and geographical features.
  2. Peoples: Amorites, Hurrians, Hittites, Hyksos, Habiru/Apiru/Hebrews.
2. Geography of Palestine.
  1. Geographical features and topographical divisions.
  2. Climate, trade routes, agriculture, crops etc.
Searching Roots and Routes of Origin and Identity Formation: Detailed study of Primeval history, Patriarchal narratives and exodus can be taken in the course on Pentateuch.
1. 1. Primeval Stories as to provide a Universal Setting of their Identity Formation (Gen. 1-11).
  2. The Ancestral Narratives as the Narratives setting their Identity as an Alternative Community in the socio-historic horizon of great Empires.
Socio-historic horizon of ancestral narratives.
1. 1. The life, customs, practices and God experiences of the people of God in the ancestral narratives.
  2. Reading the gender roles and man-woman relationships in the ancestral narratives with feminist perspectives.
Slavery in Egypt and Exodus: Celebrating God’s Liberation and Establishing Identity as the People of God
1. The experience of Enslavement under Egyptian Empire: Oppression and Slavery in Egypt.
2. Invasion and Occupation of the Promised Land: Consolidation as a “National” Entity.
  1. Biblical constructs of the People of God’s consolidation as a “national” entity in the books of Joshua and Judges.
  2. Different models of settlement:
    - Conquest (W.F. Albright and his disciples).
    - Peaceful Infiltration (Albrecht Alt and Martin Noth).
    - Peasant Revolt (proposed by George E. Mendenhall and reworked by Norman K. Gottwald).
    - Resedentarization of Nosedentary Highlanders (Niels Peter Lemche’s proposal).
    - Peaceful Transition or Transformation (Robert B. Coote and Keith W. Whitelam).
    - Symbiotic or Internal Nomadic Settlement (Israel Finkelstein) and other recent proposals.
3. A hermeneutical critique on conquest and occupation of land belonging to others: perspectives from indigenous, native and landless communities
4. Socio-political organization and religious practices during the period of Judges.
  1. Biblical and archaeological evidence.
  2. Demography, Settlement Patterns, Economy (subsistence strategies, patterns of labor, land ownership and distribution of wealth).
5. Status and Role of Women (women in the book of Judges such as Deborah) during the settlement period.
6. Challenges of living as the people of God in a pluralistic context.
Monarchy and Imperial Ethos
1. Factors leading to the transition to monarchy – internal and external factors.
2. Prophets: Conflicting voices on the legitimization of monarchy; pro- and anti-monarchical rhetoric.
3. Models proposed by the Social scientific studies based on anthropological theories: Processual and Chieftancy models.
4. Kingdom Divided: Israel and Judah (Reasons for the division and the nature of kingship in Israel and Judah).
5. Social and civil unrest in Israel and Judah and power struggle in Ancient West Asia.
“How could we sing the Lord’s song in a foreign Land?”— Exile and Challenges to the Identity of the People of God
1. Living under the shadow of empires: Assyrian and Babylonian empires.
2. Socio-historic horizon of Babylonian exile (socio-political, economic and religious context).
  1. Exile as ‘dis-place-ment’ – socio-cultural-religious displacements.
  2. Responses to Exile and Reconstituting Identity: Deutero-Isaiah, Ezekiel, And Lamentations.
  3. Henotheism in contrast with universality of the kingship of Yahweh.
Return, Restoration and Reconstruction under Persian Empire
1. Cyrus the ‘messiah’ of God: An edict of return under colonial rule.
2. Judah moving to a colony under Persia.
3. The rebuilding of the wall of Jerusalem under colonial patronage.
4. Advocacy of Jewish cultural nationalism – Ezra and Nehemiah.
5. A critical appraisal: Jewish racial-cultural nationalism.
6. Judaism under Persian rule: a postcolonial appraisal.

Essential Reading:

Achtemeier, Paul J. Inspiration and Authority: Nature and Function of Christian Scripture. Peabody: Hendrickson, 1999.
Bird, Phyllis A. The Bible as the Church’s Book. Philadelphia: Westminster, 1982.
Birch, Bruce C., Walter Brueggemann, Terence E. Fretheim, and David L. Petersen. A Theological Introduction to the Old Testament. Second edition. Abingdon, 2005.
Carr, D. Re-reading the Bible with New Eyes: Some Basic Questions. Bangalore: UTC, 2008.
Gottwald, Norman. The Hebrew Bible: A Socio-Literary Introduction. Fortress Press, 1987.
Esler, Philip, ed. Ancient Israel: The Old Testament in Its Social Context. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2005.
Hayes, John H. and J. Maxwell Miller. Israelite and Judean History. London: SCM Press, 1977.
Praveen, Jerald. “Jacob Wrestles at the Jabbok: An Exegetical study of Genesis 32:22-32,” Ebenezer Theological Journal 1/1, 2014.
Rao, Naveen. Life and Faith of the People of God, SCEPTRE, Kolkata 2013.

Bibliography

For General Introduction to the Bible

Barr, James. Holy Scripture: Canon, Authority, Criticism. Oxford: OUP, 1983.
Barton, J. Holy Writings, Sacred Texts: The Canon in Early Christianity. Louisville: WJK Press, 1997.
Brenner, A. and C.R. Fontaine, eds. A Feminist Companion to Reading the Bible.
Brenner, A. and Jan Willem van Henten, eds. Bible Translation on the Threshold of the Twenty-First Century: Authority, Reception, Culture and Religion. BTC, 1; Sheffield: SAP/Continuum, 2002.
Campenhausen, Hans von. The Formation of the Christian Bible. Translated by J.A. Baker. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1972.
Carr, D. Re-reading the Bible with New Eyes: Some Basic Questions. Bangalore: UTC, 2008.
Dewey, Joanna, ed. Orality and Textuality in Early Christian Literature. Semeia 65, Atlanta: Scholars, 1994.
Evans, Craig A. and J.A. Sanders, eds. Early Christian Interpretation of the Scriptures of Israel: Investigations and Proposals. JSNTSup. 146, Sheffield: SAP, 1997.
Graham, William. Beyond the Written Word: Oral Aspects of Scripture and the History of Religion. Cambridge: CUP, 1987.
McDonald, Lee M. The Formation of the Christian Biblical Canon. Revised Edition. Peabody: Hendrickson, 1995.
Mulder, Martin Jay, ed. Mikra: Text, Translation, Reading and Interpretation of the Hebrew Bible in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity. CRINT 2.1, Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1990.
Vanhoozer, Kevin. Is There a Meaning in this Text: the Bible, the Meaning and the Morality of Literary Knowledge. Michigan: Zondervan, 1998.

For the Books of the Hebrew Bible

In addition to the OT Introduction books, Commentaries and Dictionaries in your college/seminary Library you may use some of the following books:
Alt, A. Essays on Old Testament History and Religion. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1966.
Anderson, G.W. Critical Introduction to the Old Testament. London: Duckworth, 1959.
Birch, Bruce C., Walter Brueggemann et al. A Theological Introduction to the Old Testament. Second edition. Abingdon, 2005.
Blenkinsopp, Joseph. History of Prophecy in Israel. Philadelphia: Westminster, 1996.
Boadt, Lawrence. Reading the Old Testament: An Introduction. New York: Paulist Press, 1984.
Brenner, Athalya. The Israelite Woman: Social Role and Literary Type in Biblical Narrative. Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1985.
Brenner, Athalya. A Feminist Companion to Genesis. Sheffield: SAP, 1997.
Brenner, Athalya and Carole Fontaine. A Feminist Companion to Reading the Bible: Approaches, Methods, Strategies. Sheffield: SAP, 1997.
Brueggemann, Walter. An Introduction to the Old Testament. Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2003.
Carmichael, C. The Spirit of Biblical Law. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1996.
Ceresco, Anthony R. The Old Testament: A Liberation Perspective. Bombay: St. Pauls, 1993.
Collins, John J. A Short Introduction to the Hebrew Bible. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2001.
Craigie, Peter C. The Old Testament: Its Background, Growth and Content. Nashville: Abingdon, 1986.
Criseman, F. The Torah: Theology and Social History of Old Testament Law. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1996.
Davis, Ellen E. Getting Involved with God: Rediscovering the Old Testament. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Cowley, 2001.
Gottwald, Norman. The Tribes of Yahweh: A Sociology of the Religion of Liberated Israel 1250-1050 B.C.E. London: SCM Press, 1980.
Gottwald and Horsley, eds. The Bible and Liberation. Philadelphia: Orbis, 1993.
Harrison, R.K. Introduction to the Old Testament. London: Tyndale, 1969.
Hinson, D.F. History of Israel. New Delhi: ISPCK, 1973.
HnUni, R. L. The People of God in the Old Testament: Three in One, A Guide for Theological Students. New Delhi: Lakshi Publishers and Distributors, 2012; Reprint 2013.
Laffey, Alice. The Pentateuch: A Liberation-Critical Reading. Minneapolis: Fortress, 1998.
Meyers, Carol. Discovering Eve: Ancient Israelite Women in Context. Oxford: OUP, 1998.
Pleins, J.D. The Social Visions of the Hebrew Bible: A Theological Introduction. Westminster, 2001.
Schottroff, Luise, Silvia Schroer and Marie-Theres Wacker. Feminist Interpretation: The Bible in Women’s Perspective. Minneapolis: Fortress, 1998.
Wenham, G.J. Story as Torah: Reading the Old Testament Ethically. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 2000.
Wright, C.J.H. Living as the People of God: The Relevance of Old Testament Ethics. Leicester: IVP, 1983.
Wright, C.J.H. God’s People in God’s Land: Family, Land, and Property in the Old Testament. Exeter: The Paternoster Press, 1990.
W right, C.J.H. Old Testament Ethics for the People of God. Secunderabad, 2006.

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