The Meaning of the Pentateuch: Revelation, Composition and Interpretation

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Superb presentation illustration of The Torah. Use it for my Exegesis assignment of the Book of Genesis and The Pentateuch. Thank you and God bless your ministry. The evidences in favour of the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch are conclusive. We may thus state some of them briefly:

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Throughout Numbers, we see a tension that builds for the rest of the Old Testament: God finding ways to keep his end of the deal even though Israel consistently doesn’t keep theirs. When the people rebel against Moses and God, the Lord punishes them—but there’s a always remnant of people whom God spares. 5. Deuteronomy The Hebrew Scriptures name the book from its first words, “In the wilderness” ( Numbers 1:1); but its English name originates from the Septuagint. Numbers is so named because a census of Israel is taken twice: first at Sinai, then at the end of the years of wandering in the wilderness (Numbers 1 and 26). Exodus" is a Latin word derived from Greek Exodos, the name given to the book by those who translated it into Greek. The word means "exit," and "departure" (see Luke 9:31; Heb 11:22). The name was retained by the Latin Vulgate, by the Jewish author Philo (a contemporary of Christ) and by the Syriac version. In Hebrew, the book is named after its first two words, we'elleh shemoth ("These are the names of"). The same phrase occurs in Ge 46:8, where it likewise introduces a list of the names of those Israelites "who went to Egypt with Jacob" (1:1). Thus Exodus was not intended to exist separately but was thought of as a continuation of a narrative that began in Genesis and was completed in Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. The Pentateuch comprises the first five books of the Old Testament. It depicts a series of beginnings—the beginning of the world, of humankind, and of God’s promise to the Israelites. Genesis, the first book, opens with God’s creation of the world.

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Love and devotion for God. Israelites couldn’t worship other deities, and because God’s temple was in their midst, the people maintained a degree of ritualistic purity. The 10 Commandments: At Sinai, God gave the nation of Israel the 10 Commandments, His eternal spiritual law, as a blessing and a great benefit for all humanity. The 10 Commandments show the way to a right and proper relationship with God, leading to a life that is happy and fulfilled.

Pentateuch - The Society for Old Testament Study

These covenants usually included rules for the vassal to follow. If the vassal kept the rules, then they could enjoy being in the suzerain’s good graces. If the vassal broke the rules—and especially if the vassal betrayed the suzerain and helped the suzerain’s enemies—they would be punished and cursed. The first five books of the Bible (both Hebrew and Christian) are foundational to all of Scripture and rank as one of the most important portions of the Word of God (Wolf 1991:17). This is so because its theological and historical revelations are necessary for an understanding of the rest of the Old Testament and the New Testament as well. These five books contain, for example, God's revelation about the origin of the world with its emphasis on the creation of man made in the image of God, how sin entered human history and the judgment that followed, and the origin of the nation of Israel and its covenant–relationship to Yahweh. No matter who actually wrote the words that make up the books of the Pentateuch, the author of those words was God through His prophet Moses, and the inspiration of these five books of the Bible is still true. One of the most important evidences for Moses being the author of the Pentateuch is that Jesus Himself refers this section of the Old Testament as the “Law of Moses” (Luke 24:44). Wolf (1991:53) has observed that a number of passages in the Pentateuch assert that Moses wrote at least part of it. In Exodus 17:14, for example, the Lord told Moses to write an account of the battle with the Amalekites. Then also, as recorded in Exodus 24:4, Moses, at Mount Sinai, wrote down all the words and laws spoken by the Lord and repeated to the people. Numbers 33:1-2 says that at the Lord’s command, Moses recorded the stages of the Israelites’ journey from the time they came out of Egypt. In Deuteronomy 31:9 the text says that Moses wrote this law and gave it to the priests and commanded them to read this law in front of all Israel in their hearing at the end of every seven years when all Israel comes to appear before the Lord. The literal understanding of this text requires that a written copy of the Law must have been in existence. The most comprehensive statement of Mosaic authorship in the Pentateuch is found in Deuteronomy 31:24, where it states that after Moses finished writing in a book the words of this law from beginning to end he commanded the Levites to “Take this Book of the Law and place it beside the ark of the covenant of the Lord.” Statements found in the rest of the Old TestamentSacrificial system: God gave Israel the sacrificial system to teach them the habit of obedience. The animal sacrifices were added because of transgression ( Galatians 3:19) and were to be like a schoolmaster or tutor to teach and lead Israel to God ( verse 24). The sacrifices pointed forward to the ultimate, total and complete sacrifice of Jesus Christ. When Moses went and told the people all the LORD’s words and laws, they responded with one voice, “Everything the LORD has said we will do.” Moses then wrote down everything the LORD had said. (Exodus 24:3–4)