THE HEBREW SCRIPTURES

12. The Hebrew Scriptures were Yeshua's inspiration

The Christian religion has two main foundations: the Holy Scriptures as presented in the Bible, and the interpretations of church theologians filling in the gaps in Biblical teachings as they perceived them. Christianity depends heavily on the Bible, so it's important to understand how it came to be written and how its two major parts, the Hebrew Scriptures (the correct name for the Old Testament) and the New Testament relate to each other.

You won't find everything that Christians believe and practise in the Bible. Many of the church's teachings do not date from Yeshua's time nor even the decades when the New Testament was written. It has nothing to say on many issues (e.g. homosexuality, celibacy and contraception) so in the 4th Century, following the Roman 'conversion', the church assumed the authority to expand on Biblical teachings where 'gaps' existed. Much church practice and doctrine developed around this time.

13. The Hebrew Scriptures were the original Christian canon

The Hebrew Scriptures were the original Christian canon. They make up more than three-quarters of the Christian Bible. Many Christians think the only relevance of the Hebrew Scriptures is that they prophesy Yeshua's birth and Messiah-ship, but as we shall see, this is a fallacy.

The New Testament writings repeatedly demonstrate that Yeshua was thoroughly grounded in the Hebrew Scriptures. They were the source of his inspiration; they created the culture into which he was born, regulated his day to day activities and shaped his thinking. For example, nowhere in the gospels does Yeshua reject the Jewish custom of circumcision as prescribed in Jewish Law, unlike Paul of Tarsus and the author of Acts of the Apostles who considered it irrelevant.

The New Testament could not exist in isolation; without the Hebrew Scriptures it wouldn't even make sense. So if you think it was a replacement for the Hebrew Scriptures, that made them obsolete, think again. Unless we acknowledge this in full, we will never understanding Yeshua.

14. It took eight hundred years to write the Hebrew Scriptures

The Hebrew Bible is a collection of thirty-nine books, arranged in three sections – the Torah or Pentateuch (Law or Teaching), Prophets and Writings. It was written over a period of eight hundred years and gives an account of the history of the Jewish people over approximately fifteen hundred years. The last book,

Daniel, was completed only one hundred and fifty years or so before the birth of Yeshua, and the definitive list of books to be included was only agreed by the Jewish religious leaders around 90 BCE.

No-one really knows who wrote the Hebrew Scriptures, although we can be confident that we know who didn't write it; for instance, according to Jewish tradition, the revered prophet Moses wrote the first five books of the Bible, the Torah, around 1300 BCE, but we can't even be certain that Moses existed outside of Jewish folklore. Scholars today believe that the Torah is more likely to have been compiled by a variety of authors between the 8th and 5th Centuries BCE.

Interestingly for most of this time the Hebrews did not just believe in one G-d, just that theirs was the best. Whenever they were tempted to worship other gods, they believed, the one true G_d punish them until they mended their ways. Then all sorts of good things would flow.

15. Five 'writers' or 'traditions' contributed to the Torah

By analysing the styles, language and ideas in the Torah, scholars have identified five 'writers' or 'traditions' who contributed to its composition:

J - the Yahwist source, so called because the writer refers to G_d as YHWH (Yahweh) or Jehovah. These are the oldest writings, around 950-750 BCE. The J texts include the second creation story (Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden) and Cain and Abel.

E – the Elohist source, written around 850-800 BCE, uses the word Elohim for G_d. The E texts include the stories of Abraham and Isaac, Deborah and Jacob.

D – the Deuteronomist, dating from around 700-600 BCE. D describes the covenant between Jehovah and his people and the cycle of blessing, disobedience, punishment, and redemption which followed over many generations.

P – the Priestly source, written around 550-500 BCE, includes the first creation story (in the opening passages of Genesis), Noah's flood, Jacob and Esau, the Hebrews' escape from Egypt and the Ten Commandments. P formalised the ritualistic laws which formed the background to Yeshua's skirmishes with the Pharisees in the New Testament.

R - the Redactor or 'editor/combiner,' working around 400 BCE. There may have been more than one; indeed this is highly probable. R edited the original texts to remove some of the discrepancies between his sources and made some additions, but we don't know if 'he' took anything out.

As for the Prophets and the Writings, the evidence of authorship is just as shaky. Most were probably passed on orally for centuries until being written down around 400 to 90 BCE. We can be fairly sure that, contrary to popular belief, the great King David didn't write most of the Psalms and King Solomon didn't write Proverbs or Song of Solomon. As for Job, Ecclesiastes, Jonah and the rest – nobody knows.

16. The Hebrew Scriptures are full of inaccuracies and contradictions

We don't have to look beyond the opening pages to find the first significant contradiction in the Bible. In the very first chapter of Genesis, G_d creates the sky, the earth, vegetation and the sun and moon in the first four days (curiously the waters already existed); aquatic creatures and birds on the fifth day; land creatures and finally men and women on the sixth. These nameless humans are given dominion over the earth. Then G_d rests on the seventh.

In the second chapter, the earth, heavens and the first man, Adam, are created on the same day, then a beautiful garden, the Garden of Eden, for Adam's home. Living creatures are created to keep Adam company, and finally a companion and helper for Adam, Eve. There's no mention of six or seven days. I reiterate: in Chapter One, man and woman are created simultaneously as G_d's final flourish; in Chapter Two, the man is created before the animals, and the woman later as an afterthought.

If anyone tries to convince you that the creation stories are literally true, ask them 'which story?' They cannot both be true! But the church papers over the cracks. In my churchgoing years I never heard these two stories read together and compared. No-one ever pointed out the contradictions, nor did anyone seem bothered by them, probably because, like me, they hadn't noticed.

So why the difference? It's because the two stories come from separate sources, 'J' and 'P', written more than three hundred years apart and later combined into a single narrative, probably by the Redactor, 'R'. The 'P' version was probably written in the 6th...