No 11

(The Jewish bible)

The Jewish bible contains the 39 books of the Old Testament and is almost identical to the Christian Old Testament except for the order in which the books are placed. There are four divisions in the Jewish bible :

- The Law – Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy

- The Prophets – Joshua, Judges, I, II Samuel, I, II Kings, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel

- The Twelve – Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi

- The Writings – Psalms, Proverbs, Job, Song of Songs, Ecclesiastes, Esther, Daniel, Ruth, Nehemiah, I and II Chronicles, Ezra, Lamentations

However, there are three noteworthy differences in how the Jewish people read the Bible as compared to Christians.

1) Isaiah 53 is not read – In the front of each Jewish Bible, there is the list of the Scriptural readings that are done in the synagogues; all of the chapters of Isaiah are there, except Isaiah 53 for fear that Jesus would be considered as the subject of the chapter.

2) Isaiah 9 : 5b is unreadable – When we come to Isaiah 9, verse 5b is transliterated into Hebrew and looks like this: “And His name shall be called Pele-Joez-El-Gibbor-Abi-ad-sar-shalom”. It is this way to dissuade readers from believing that the Messiah is God; because the Jews, although they believe in the Messiah, they don’t believe that He will be God.

3) Daniel is not considered a prophet – The book of Daniel is placed among the “Writings” undoubtedly because Daniel is considered by many Christian commentators to be one of the most important prophetic books concerning Jesus Christ in the entire Bible. The Jewish scholars do not include it in the “Prophets” probably for that very reason.

Is it possible to present the Gospel to someone who reads only the Old Testament? The answer, of course, is yes. The Apostles did it; why can’t we?