39. New Testament Library

The New Testament

Now that you have memorized the arrangement of the Old Testament books, let us move on to the New Testament.

As I said, the new bookcase, in our imaginary room, has only 4 shelves.  Some would have it with 5 shelves.  In doing that they have the first four books on one shelf and one book on the second shelf.  I see it as though they belong together.

The top shelf has 5 books which are called "History".

The 13 books on the second shelf are called "Paul's letters". This has one section of letters to churches and a section to Paul's associates.

On the next shelf, there are 8 books called, "General Epistles".

The bottom shelf has only 1 book which is called, "Prophecy".

The numbering sequence here is not as conducive to memorization as it is in the Old Testament.  5+13+8+1=27 which is the number of books in the New Testament.  

Most Bible students put 14 into Paul's writings and only 7 into General Epistles.  However, I think that perhaps Dr Luke, and not Saint Paul, wrote the Book of Hebrews.  As early as the third century there already was a debate about this issue.

1. On the first shelf, we find the books of History.

Matthew - relates the activities and teachings of Jesus from His beginning to His ascension to heaven.

Mark - relates the activities of Jesus from His baptism to His death.

Luke - relates the activities and teachings of Jesus from His beginning to His ascension to heaven.

John - focuses on the teachings and spiritual impact of Christ the Messiah.

Acts - (of the Apostles) - reports the history of the early church.

An acrostic: Mother Mary Likes Juicy Apples.

2. On the second shelf, we find all the letters of Saint Paul; this shelf is divided into two sections.  Nine letters to churches, and four letters to people whom Paul knew:

Romans - A letter to the church in Rome in Italy.

Corinthians, 1st and 2nd - Two letters to the church at Corinth in Greece.

Galatians - A letter to the church at Galatia

Ephesians - A letter to the church at Ephesus

Philippians - A letter to the church at Philippi

Colossians - A letter to the church at Colossae

Thessalonians, 1st and 2nd - Two letters to the church at Thessalonica.

An acrostic: Real Christian Generosity Emphasises Personal Commitment Throughout.

The following four letters were written by Paul to people who needed some guidance from a more mature person.

Timothy, 1st - Timothy was a young pastor, and Paul sent him some advice

Timothy, 2nd - as to what a preacher's life should be like.

Titus - The same is true for Titus.

Philemon - Was the owner of a slave who had run away.

An acrostic: Tony The Tiger Perspires

3. One shelf down we find "The General Epistles".

Hebrews - Written to Jewish Christians by Paul or Luke.

James - Martin Luther called this "a letter of straw".

Peter, 1st and 2nd - Written by a follower of Jesus and later was crucified upside down for his faith.

John, 1st, 2nd and 3rd - Written by the same man that wrote The Gospel of John and The Revelation.

Jude - Probably written by the brother of Jesus Christ.

An acrostic: However, Just Peter Joined Jude.

4. On the bottom shelf, we find one book of "prophecy":

The Revelation - Things that were still in the future, to Saint John.  

This book is often called "The Revelations".  That is wrong because there is only one Revelation, and it is of Jesus, The Lamb of God. 

It is also often called, "The Revelation of Saint John the Divine".  If one is going to call it by that name the word "of", should at least be changed to "written by" and the word divine would only mean, "a notable person".

The next post will take us back to the Book of Joshua.

38. Old Testament Library

In most of my posts, the Bible is quoted freely.  What I have failed to pay attention to is that some of my readers may not be familiar with the Bible and they may wonder how they can verify my statements. 

So if you are interested in learning the names of the books of the Bible in order, here is where the old maxim, "divide and conquer" fits really well.  I might mention that I am speaking only of the Protestant Bible; in this case, it makes a big difference.

People say that to learn the books in order, put them to music and sing them in order.  Great idea, with one major problem, I have absolutely no musical ability and so it does not work for me.  Acrostics also help.

First, imagine a room with two bookshelves; an old one with five shelves and a new one with only four shelves. We will look at the old bookshelf first.

The Old Bookshelf

On the top shelf, there are only five books; these 5 are called "The Law".

The second shelf has 12 books called "The History of Israel".

The third shelf has 5 books called "Poetry".

The next one has 5 "Major Prophet's" books;

and the bottom shelf has 12 "Minor Prophet's" books.

• Once you instil the 5, 12, 5, 5, 12 "mantra" into your mind in a rhythmic pattern, it helps to organize them in your mind.  5, 12, 5, 5, 12, again 5, 12, 5, 5, 12.  
• Note also that 5+12+5+5+12 = 39.  That is the number of books in the Old Testament. 
• Or you can picture it like this: The first two shelves, 5+12, the last two shelves, 5+12 with a 5 between the two groups.

1. Now, back to the top shelf; in the right order:

Genesis - a beginning or origin of anything.  How fitting that this should be the first book.

Exodus - (Exit us) The children of Israel exit Egypt.

Leviticus - Jacob had a son called Levi; Levi's sons became the priests for the whole Israelite nation.  

This book, named after them, contains a list of the priestly sacrifices and order of conduct.

Numbers - A census of Israel is taken and recorded in chapter 1 of this book, hence the name, Numbers.

Deuteronomy - (duet - two); this is a second recording of the law of Moses.

An acrostic: Getting Every Last Number Down. 

2. Now, down to the second shelf which has 12 books: 

Although this approach is not exactly biblically accurate, because, the name, Judges isn't one man, it did help me to organize them in my mind. It goes like this:

Joshua - 

Judges - two men,

Ruth - a woman

1 + 2 Samuel - 

1 + 2 Kings -

1 + 2 Chronicles - three sets of twins

Ezra - 

Nehemiah - two men

Esther - a woman

That's easy - 2 men, a woman, 3 sets of twins, 2 men, a woman. 

3. Then the shelf with 5 beautiful books: 

Job - (Pronounced with a long o)

Literally or prosaically its theme is, "why do good people suffer?" 

Psalms - The Jewish hymnal. 

Just for interest's sake: Psalm 117 is the shortest chapter in the Protestant Bible; Psalm 118 is the middle chapter of the Bible, and Psalm 119 is the longest chapter in the Bible. 

Proverbs - These are not statements of fact; they are "probablys". 

Ecclesiastes - A preacher talks about the futility of life. 

Song of Solomon also known as Canticles - a young couple deeply infatuated with each other and missing each other terribly. 

An acrostic: John Planted Petunias Exceedingly Sparsely. 

4. The second from the bottom shelf - The Major Prophets. Major because they are longer than The Minor Prophets, not because they are more important. 

Isaiah - preached to the Israelite nation (the Northern tribes), the first of the two to go into exile. 

Jeremiah - preached to Judah, (the Southern tribes), the second to go into exile. 

Note that Isaiah with an I preached to Israel with an I and Jeremiah with a J preached to Judah with a J.  Isaiah comes before Jeremiah, as I comes before J. 

Lamentations - This also is Jeremiah's book, so, logically it follows the Book of Jeremiah. He weeps over the destruction which has come to his beloved Jerusalem because the Israelites have turned their backs on Jehovah. 

Ezekiel - He is best known for the fact that he saw and described a spaceship. 

Daniel - Is it the last book on this shelf because he was "a hard act to follow". 

An acrostic: I Just Loath Everything Depraved.

5. On the bottom shelf, with 12 books, The Minor Prophets are:

Hosea - Having

Joel - Jewels

Amos - and

Obadiah - opals

Jonah - just

Micah - might

Nahum - not

Habakkuk - help

Zephaniah -Zephaniah

Haggai - hear

Zechariah - Zechariah

Malachi - moan.

In the next post, we will look at the new bookshelf.

37. What Trinitarian Bible Teachers say About the Trinity!

 It Is Not In The Bible      

The following quotes (blue) are from, The United Church of God, web page:

http://www.ucg.org/booklet/god-trinity/trinity-biblical/   

But did you realize that, even though it is a common assumption among many sincere religious people, the word Trinity does not appear anywhere in the Bible? In fact, the word Trinity did not come into common use as a religious term until centuries after the last books of the Bible were completed—long after the apostles of Christ were gone from the scene!

Notice this admission in the New Bible Dictionary: "The term 'Trinity' is not itself found in the Bible. It was first used by Tertullian at the close of the 2nd century, but received wide currency [common use in intellectual discussion] and formal elucidation [clarification] only in the 4th and 5th centuries" (1996, "Trinity").

That same source goes on to explain that "the formal doctrine of the Trinity was the result of several inadequate attempts to explain who and what the Christian God really is . . . To deal with these problems the Church Fathers met in [A.D.] 325 at the Council of Nicaea to set out an orthodox biblical definition concerning the divine identity." However, it wasn't until 381, "at the Council of Constantinople, [that] the divinity of the Spirit was affirmed" (ibid.).

We see, then, that the doctrine of the Trinity wasn't formalized until long after the Bible was completed and the apostles were long dead in their graves. It took later theologians centuries to sort out what they believed and to formulate belief in the Trinity!

The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia acknowledges that "'trinity' is a second-century term found nowhere in the Bible, and the Scriptures present no finished trinitarian statement" (1988, Vol. 4, "Trinity," ). It further states that "church fathers crystallized the doctrine in succeeding centuries"—long after the apostles had passed from the scene.

The HarperCollins Encyclopedia of Catholicism states: "Today, however, scholars generally agree that there is no doctrine of the Trinity as such in either the OT [ Old Testament ] or the NT [ New Testament ] . . . It would go far beyond the intention and thought-forms of the OT to suppose that a late-fourth-century or thirteenth-century Christian doctrine can be found there . . . Likewise, the NT does not contain an explicit doctrine of the Trinity" (Richard McBrien, general editor, 1995, "God," pp. 564-565).

The New Encyclopaedia Britannica, in its article on the Trinity, explains: "

Neither the word Trinity nor the explicit doctrine appears in the New Testament . . . The doctrine developed gradually over several centuries and through many controversies . . . It was not until the 4th century that the distinctness of the three and their unity were brought together in a single orthodox doctrine of one essence and three persons" (1985 edition, Micropaedia, Vol. 11, p. 928).

The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology points out that "primitive Christianity did not have an explicit doctrine of the Trinity such as was subsequently elaborated in the creeds of the early church" (Colin Brown, editor, Vol. 2, 1976, "God," p. 84).

Luther, Ryrie and Erickson

Martin Luther, the German priest who initiated the Protestant Reformation, conceded, "It is indeed true that the name 'Trinity' is nowhere to be found in the Holy Scriptures, but has been conceived and invented by man" (reproduced in The Sermons of Martin Luther, John Lenker, editor, Vol. 3, 1988, p. 406).

Professor Charles Ryrie, in his respected work Basic Theology, writes: "Many doctrines are accepted by evangelicals as being clearly taught in the Scripture for which there are no proof texts. The doctrine of the Trinity furnishes the best example of this. It is fair to say that the Bible does not clearly teach the doctrine of the Trinity . . . In fact, there is not even one proof text, if by proof text we mean a verse or passage that 'clearly' states that there is one God who exists in three persons" (1999, p. 89).

Ryrie goes on to state: "The above illustrations prove the fallacy of concluding that if something is not proof texted in the Bible we cannot clearly teach the results . . . If that were so, I could never teach the doctrine of the Trinity" (p. 90).

Professor Erickson ... states that the Trinity teaching "is not present in biblical thought, but arose when biblical thought was pressed into this foreign mold [of Greek concepts]. Thus, the doctrine of the Trinity goes beyond and even distorts what the Bible says about God"

This post could be made indefinitely long by quoting Protestant Bible teachers who say they believe that the Trinity exists, but who, at the same time admit that such a teaching is not logical, not believable and not taught in the Bible.

This is probably enough about this topic for here and now.  If you want more evidence from the Bible that argues against the doctrine of the Trinity, I suggest the book: 

The Doctrine of the Trinity; Christianity's Self-inflicted Wound by Anthony Buzzard, available at:

http://focusonthekingdom.org/articles/trinity.htm