The Chronological Bible

After several chapters of prophecy, there is a shift to narrative in the form of a confrontation between Amos and Amaziah, a priest of Bethel, the Israelite shrine near the border with Judah. Amaziah reports Amos for treason and tells him to flee to Judah.* This is also an indication that the religion of Israel at the time was explicitly a political tool of their monarchy, which, to be fair, has often been true of many religions throughout history. *Not back to Judah, which is interesting, though I’m hesitant to split such hairs through translation. Amos identifies himself as being outside the normal families of prophets, as “a herdsman and a dresser of sycamore trees.” This is similar, but not identical to the profession mentioned at the beginning of the book. Amos then curses Amaziah, but we do not receive any information as to whether he then also left for Judah. Perhaps this is when he moved to Tekoa and changed careers, as indicated in 1:1. Amos as an Israelite who then flees to J...

Much of the rest of the book of Amos is dedicated to a series of recitations of the benevolence of the Lord, the wrongdoing of the people of Israel, and promises of punishments for said wrongdoing. There are a couple of interesting aspects of this part of the book that I want to mention first: geography and religious practice. The geography of these chapters, the bulk of the book, is focused almost entirely on the northern kingdom and Egypt. Let me do a “places mentioned” list, in order. Egypt (2:10, 3:1, 3:9, 4:10) People of Israel (Northern Kingdom; 2:11, 3:1, 3:12, 3:14, 4:12, 5:1, 5:2, 6:1, 7:9) Ashdod (Philistia; 3:9) Mount Samaria (Northern Capital; 3:9, 3:12; 4:1, 6:1) Bethel (Northern Shrine, near the Judahite border; 3:14, 4:4, 5:5, 5:6) Bashan (Northern Jordan, under Israel’s control; 4:1) Gilgal (Northern Kingdom; 4:4, 5:5) Sodom and Gomorrah (4:11) Beersheba (Town in the far south, but a Northern shrine; 5:5) Damascus (Syria; 5:27) Zion (Probably Jerusalem in Southern Kingd...

The book of Amos begins with an introduction to the prophet as a “shepherd” or “sheepbreeder” from Tekoa during the days of King Uzziah of Judah and Jeroboam of Israel (early-mid 8th century BCE). The verse ends with the phrase “two years before the earthquake”, presumably an extremely impactful natural disaster that would have been remembered for quite a time afterwards and for which there is some archaeological evidence . I think we can safely assume that the prophet himself did not write this third person biography, though we do not know whether this alone was a later addition to the text or whether the entire book was the product of someone else recording his words and ideas. There are a couple interesting things here. The first is that my translation (New Oxford Annotated Bible) identifies Tekoa as located in Judah while Amos himself, as we’ll see, spends most of his time in Israel, the larger and more prosperous kingdom to the north. The second is that the time of Jeroboam - like...

Welcome to this page! If you’re reading this post, you’ve likely found the blog before I’ve advertised it or you’ve decided to start from the beginning. This year, I want to begin reading the Bible in chronological order of composition, insofar as that is possible. There are several aspects of this plan that make it doubtful I’ll succeed, “this year” being the first. It is also impossible to know the exact date each book was written, or what’s more, when each piece of each book was completed, as there are certainly later additions and interpolations in most of these texts. I also want to record my reactions and thoughts as I read, which will slow down the process immensely. What do I hope to gain from this? A better understanding of the historical development of Christianity and the people who wrote, redacted, and appeared in these texts, as literary or historical figures. Most of us have learned about Christianity as starting with the creation stories of Genesis; what does it look lik...