I have taught the Old Testament at different places, and have found that people like to hear the Old Testament told as a complete story. Many people recognize different characters and situations from the Old Testament, but cannot connect all the dots. So today’s article gives the abbreviated version of the Old Testament story. (Dates are approximations.)

"In the beginning, God created heaven and earth." God did this over a six-day span. On the last day, God created Adam; God rested on the seventh day. God then created Eve; Adam and Eve lived in the Garden of Eden. At that point you could say that 100% of the people on the earth followed God.  They disobeyed God and were banished from Eden. Adam and Eve had children: the first two were Cain and Abel. Cain eventually killed Abel. Adam and Eve had other children, who had children, etc., until God looked down and saw that most people were not following Him. God caused a flood to kill all except for Noah and his family (who still followed God and escaped in the ark) along with sufficient animals to repopulate the world. Again you could say that 100% of the people on the earth followed God.  Once the flood was over, Noah, his wife, their three sons and their wives began to have children, who had children, etc. Eventually God looked down and saw that most people were not following Him. This time God did not kill most of the people and start over, instead God chose one man, Abraham, to be the founding father of God’s people (1950 BC). God and Abraham entered into a Covenant to seal this relationship.  Abraham became the father of Isaac who became the father of Jacob, whose name was changed to Israel. Israel had twelve sons, who eventually became twelve tribes. A famine caused the family to move to Egypt (where Joseph, one of Israel’s sons, was a powerful man) where there was plenty of food. Eventually the Egyptians made slaves out of the Jews. 430 years later, Moses led the Jews out of Egypt (1450 BC). The Jews traveled across the desert to the Promised Land. Once there, they sent in twelve spies to search the land. When they came back, ten of the spies said the land could not be defeated, but two said it could. God decided that the Jews would wander for forty years until the unbelieving Jews were dead; God would then give the Promised Land to their children. At the end of the forty years, Moses died and Joshua became the leader; the Jews then started attacking the Promised Land. Once the Promised Land (Israel) was (mostly) controlled by the Jews, Joshua died. From time-to-time God raised up leaders (known as "judges") for the Jews. Eventually the Jews demanded a king, and God gave them Saul. Saul proved unfaithful, and was replaced by David. David enlarged the Israelite nation and secured the borders. At David’s death, Solomon became king and eventually built the Temple (950 BC). At Solomon’s death the kingdom split into the Northern Kingdom (Israel) and the Southern Kingdom (Judah). Eventually the Assyrians defeated the Northern Kingdom and took some Jews back to Assyria (722 BC). Eventually the Babylonians defeated the Assyrians and then defeated the Southern Kingdom, destroyed the Temple, and took some of the Jews back to Babylonia (586 BC). The Persians defeated the Babylonians (539 BC) and the next year the emperor, Cyrus, proclaimed that Jews could return to Israel and rebuild the Temple. A lot of Jews did return and rebuilt the Temple (516 BC). Soon after more Jews returned and rebuilt the walls around Jerusalem. And the Protestant Old Testament ends there. The Catholic Old Testament contains books which continue the story for several hundred more years.

©2007 Mark Nickens

Questions/comments contact Mark at drnickens@triad.rr.com.

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