How Was the Hebrew Bible Written?

 How the Bible Was Formed E2 — The Hebrew Bible, or Old Testament, is a collection of 24 scrolls, passed down for generations, that tells the long, complicated story of ancient Israel. But who wrote these scrolls, and how did they come together in their final form? And how do we understand the claim that these books are the very voice of God? In this episode, Jon and Tim explore the formation of the Hebrew Bible and the crew who shaped its stories, poems, and laws into intricately designed literary works.

CHAPTERS

1. The First Writing Mentioned in the Torah (2:56-13:01)
2. Prophets as a Spirit-Led, Multigenerational Literary Community (13:01-36:30)
3. Divine Inspiration in a Diverse, Literary Mosaic (36:30-1:03:20)

OFFICIAL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

View this episode’s official transcript.

REFERENCED RESOURCES

• The Lost World Series by John H. Walton and others
• The Lost World of Scripture: Ancient Literary Culture and Biblical Authority by John H. Walton and Brent Sandy
• The Shape of the Writings (Siphrut: Literature and Theology of the Hebrew Scriptures), edited by Julius Steinberg and Timothy J. Stone
• You can view annotations for this episode—plus our entire library of videos, podcasts, articles, and classes—in the BibleProject app, available for Android and iOS.
• Check out Tim’s extensive collection of recommended books here.

SHOW MUSIC

• “StrollingThroughThePark ft. Goodiegumdrops” by Lofi Sunday
• “Radiance ft. solae” by Lofi Sunday
• BibleProject theme song by TENTS

SHOW CREDITS

Production of today’s episode is by Lindsey Ponder, producer, and Cooper Peltz, managing producer. Tyler Bailey is our supervising engineer, and he also edited today’s episode and provided the sound design and mix. JB Witty does our show notes, and Hannah Woo provides the annotations for our app. Our host and creative director is Jon Collins, and our lead scholar is Tim Mackie. 

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