Page 9 - Yahwehs Book

The Tanakh

In the previous chapter it was observed that the Bible is a book of covenants. Though we read about
multiple covenants established between God and man in the Bible, two of these covenants
predominate; an older covenant established by Moses at Mount Sinai, and a new covenant
established by Yahshua on Mount Calvary. F.F. Bruce, in his book The Canon of Scripture, affirms
the covenantal aspect of the Bible.

In the earliest books of the Old Testament God makes a covenant with Noah and his descendants
(Gen. 9:8-17), and again with Abraham and his descendants (Gen. 15:18; 17:1-4). The external
token of the covenant with Noah was the rainbow; the external token of the covenant with Abraham
was the rite of circumcision. Later, when Abraham’s descendants (or at least one important group
of them) had migrated to Egypt and were drafted into forced labour gangs there, God remembered
his covenant with Abraham and brought about their deliverance.

Having left Egypt under the leadership of Moses, they were constituted a nation in the wilderness
of Sinai. Their national constitution took the form of a covenant into which the God of their fathers
entered with them, making himself known to them by his name Yahweh. The terms of this covenant
were very simple, ‘I will be your God, and you shall be my people.’ Yahweh undertook to make
various kinds of provision for them; they undertook to worship him exclusively and to obey his
commandments. These undertakings were recorded in a document called ‘the book of the covenant.’
According to the narrative of Exodus 24:4-8,

“Moses wrote all the words of Yahweh. And he rose early in the morning, and built an altar at the
foot of the mountain, and twelve pillars, according to the twelve tribes of Israel. And he sent young
men of the people of Israel, who offered burnt offerings and sacrificed peace offerings of oxen to
Yahweh. And Moses took half of the blood and put it in basins, and half of the blood he threw
against the altar. Then he took the book of the covenant, and he read it in the hearing of the people;
and they said, ‘All that Yahweh has spoken we will do, and we will be obedient.’ And Moses took
the blood and threw it upon the people, and said, ‘Behold the blood of the covenant which Yahweh
has made with you in accordance with all these words.’”

This narrative is summarized in the New Testament, in Hebrews 9:18-20, where the covenant thus
ratified is qualified as ‘the first covenant.’ This is because the writer to the Hebrews sets it in