Historical Books
Twelve books tracing Israel from the conquest of Canaan through the United and Divided Kingdoms to the Babylonian exile and Persian-period restoration. Joshua through Esther. ASV (1901).
Source context· Egyptian-Hebrew stream · Egypto-Chaldean cultural impulse
- Stream
- Egyptian-Hebrew
- Cultural impulse
- Egypto-Chaldean (3rd post-Atlantean cultural age)
- Composed
- c. 900 BCE
- Written down
- Greco-Latin (4th post-Atlantean cultural age) manuscript epoch
- 1Joshua — Joshua — the conquest of Canaan
The crossing of the Jordan; the fall of Jericho; the campaigns in the south and the north; the division of the land among the twelve tribes; the covenant renewal at Shechem (ch 24): Choose this day whom you will serve. The transition from wilderness wandering to settled possession.
20,080 words - 2Judges — Judges — the cyclic apostasy of the tribes
The cycle that gives the book its structure: Israel falls into idolatry, is oppressed, cries out, a shophet (judge / deliverer) is raised up, the land has peace until the judge dies. Othniel, Ehud, Deborah and Barak, Gideon, Jephthah, Samson. Closes with the dark coda: In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did what was right in his own eyes.
20,137 words - 3Ruth — Ruth — the Moabite ancestress of David
Set 'in the days when the judges judged.' Naomi widowed; her daughter-in-law Ruth the Moabite refusing to leave her — whither thou goest, I will go. The gleaning in Boaz's field; the kinsman-redeemer; the genealogy that closes the book — Ruth as the great-grandmother of David.
2,712 words - 41 Samuel — 1 Samuel — Samuel; Saul; the rise of David
The birth and call of Samuel; the demand for a king; the anointing of Saul; Saul's rejection; the anointing of the boy David; the killing of Goliath; the friendship of David and Jonathan; David fleeing from Saul; the witch of Endor; the death of Saul on Mount Gilboa.
26,581 words - 52 Samuel — 2 Samuel — David's reign — its glory and its fall
David anointed king over Judah, then over all Israel. Jerusalem captured; the ark brought up. The great Davidic covenant (ch 7): God will establish a house for David. Then Bathsheba and Uriah (chs 11-12), Nathan's thou art the man; the rebellion of Absalom; David's lament O my son Absalom!
22,048 words - 61 Kings — 1 Kings — Solomon's glory; the divided kingdom; Elijah
The accession of Solomon; the building of the Temple; the visit of the Queen of Sheba; Solomon's apostasy in old age; the division of the kingdom after his death (Rehoboam and Jeroboam); the long chronicle of the kings of Israel and Judah; the ministry of Elijah — the Carmel contest, the still small voice, the chariots of fire.
26,014 words - 72 Kings — 2 Kings — Elisha; the fall of Israel; the fall of Judah
Elisha's ministry continuing Elijah's. The kings of both kingdoms, mostly idolatrous. The Assyrian conquest of Israel (722 BC, ch 17) and the deportation of the ten tribes. Hezekiah's reform; Manasseh's apostasy; Josiah's reform after the finding of the law-book. The Babylonian conquest of Judah and the destruction of the Temple (586 BC).
24,867 words - 81 Chronicles — 1 Chronicles — the genealogies; David's reign retold
The post-exilic priestly retelling. The first nine chapters of genealogies from Adam through to the post-exilic restoration. Then David's reign — emphasising his preparations for the Temple (without the Bathsheba episode preserved in 2 Samuel). David's organisation of the Levitical orders for Temple service.
22,148 words - 92 Chronicles — 2 Chronicles — Solomon's Temple; the kings of Judah
Solomon and the building of the Temple; then the kings of Judah only (without the kings of Israel). The priestly perspective: faithful kings prosper, unfaithful ones do not. Closes with the destruction by Nebuchadnezzar and the Persian-edict release that opens Ezra-Nehemiah.
27,602 words - 10Ezra — Ezra — the return from exile; the rebuilding of the Temple
The first wave under Zerubbabel returning to rebuild the Temple after the Persian edict of Cyrus; the laying of the foundation; the opposition from the people of the land; the completion of the Temple. The second wave under Ezra; his reform separating the foreign wives. The post-exilic restoration.
7,974 words - 11Nehemiah — Nehemiah — rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem
Nehemiah the Persian cup-bearer requesting leave to rebuild Jerusalem's walls. The fifty-two-day reconstruction under threat of attack; the great Torah-reading by Ezra (ch 8); the dedication of the walls; the second governorship and the reforms against Sabbath-breaking, intermarriage, and Levitical neglect.
11,327 words - 12Esther — Esther — the saving of the Jews in Persia
The Persian-court novella. Vashti deposed; the orphan Esther raised by her cousin Mordecai becomes queen of Ahasuerus (Xerxes). Haman's plot to destroy the Jews; Esther's intervention — and if I perish, I perish; Haman hanged on the gallows he built for Mordecai. The origin of the festival of Purim.
6,078 words
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