The Bible, A Representative, Accomplishable Reading Plan
I posted a shorter version of this, without further clarifications/justifications/review of the entire Bible on my instagram. My attempt here is the best I can do to completely ignore any ideological slant, and simply present representative selections of what is in this world-altering library of literature. My unique goal is to make this representative reading accomplishable because many portions are difficult to get through and we get bogged down trying to decide whether or not to take the time to understand various genealogies or, my favorite, why the command to not boil a goat in its mother’s milk is repeated so often — those portions have relevance, but, you can get to them on a second reading. I start with my background to explain a bit of where I am coming from, if you want to know more about the streams of religion I find helpful in our modern age, here is an intro to liberation theology/prophetic views of religion.
Many of you know that I began my life aspiring to be a pastor. I read the Bible every day of my life and was on staff at three churches. I’ve led countless Bible studies and preached many sermons in front of hundreds, even thousands of people in nearly every version of US evangelical churches. As I did that I wondered why it was so hard to find people who cared about things like the situation of immigrants. Why did we have so little for depressed/discouraged people other than ‘try harder’ or ‘pray more’? The gospel means ‘good news’ but, our good news kept falling flat. In the Biblical library, outcast people, even outright sinners experienced Jesus and his message as good news, this was not the case in the churches I was involved in, and there was very little time/energy given to asking why.
At the end of a semester in Jerusalem studying biblical history, I finished reading the Bible in my personal life for the 4th time (in Capernaum/Galilee, where they think Peter’s house was) and I came to realize (like Emerson, Van Gogh and James Baldwin) in order to follow Jesus I would have to step away from the church as I knew it. I had read the Bible as if it were an encyclopedia (or even a dictionary) for the powerful (landowning-white-20th century-US American-heterosexual men), but no, this was clearly an ancient library written by people who were under the boot of the Egyptian, Babylonian and Roman empires. My hope was in chariots, the hope of these writers was that this mysterious God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob cared about the orphan, the widow, the stranger, those in prison, regardless of whether they followed the 613 rules the Pharisees decided on.
That said, I believe the Bible could be saved from the weapon of oppression it became in the hands of exploitative, colonizing empires. Some people have asked me what Bible they should read, and how they should read it.
I’ve started hundreds of people on the journey, but I know very few people finish it, so, in that spirit, I’ve tried to break it down to as accomplishable a goal as possible, and this is what I think. Having studied some Greek and Hebrew, my opinion is that all translations are translations and therefore imperfect, from the wide study I’ve done, it seems the best all around is the NRSV. If you are inclined toward another, that should be fine, just remember you’re reading a translation, translation involves interpretation.
Here’s my list of what to read to get a good idea of what the Biblical library is about (I explain my choices further down):
Genesis 12–50
Exodus 1–20
(Have someone who knows the story tell you about the time from Moses/Exodus to David/Psalms, it’s roughly 300 years, I’ve written something that conveys the major ideas further down)
Psalm 1, 2, 13, 20, 40, 139
Proverbs — Any. Flip it open at any time and read a couple, this is the only book in the Biblical library which has large portions that resemble an encyclopedia/dictionary.
Ecclesiastes (It’s only 12 chapters)
Amos (Only 9 chapters)
Matthew 5–7
Luke
Acts 1–14
James
Acts 15–16
Galatians
Acts 17–18:18
1 Thessalonians
Acts 18:19- chapter 28
Philippians
Further Clarifications:
On Translations: There is an endless source of controversy with regards to translations. We spend so much time on this topic, but, if you’re looking for an accomplishable, representative reading, this is not the conversation to get lost in. Most translations have been done with an agenda. I think the NRSV is the most ecumenical/tolerated and scholarly-reviewed version. My good friend Adam Greene produced a really incredible version of the Bible called Bibliotheca (Library). He did this in 5 volumes without all the encyclopedic apparatus. He was able to commission a slightly updated translation of the American Standard Version (which he thinks was the most literary translation), to create the American Literary Version, or ALV. Without the encyclopedic reference tools it will be hard to isolate Genesis 12, Matthew 5–7 etc. with that one (as it was for most of history!), but it is really cool (it’s ultra-ethically made, and probably will be the nicest book you ever see, there are endless details that if you talk to Adam will blow your mind). I almost always read out of it whenever I read the Bible now.
There are also recent scholars of Hebrew Literature and New Testament literature who have produced their own translations of the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament, Robert Alter and David Bentley Hart. I don’t know that either of those will revolutionize that much for the person just trying to get through an initial reading of the important parts of the library, but, if you want to read the most current attempts to throw off everything and be faithful to the original libraries check them out. If you find some wording odd maybe you could check what Alter / DBH said against the NRSV or vice versa.
Now, an overview of why I chose what I chose:
The Jews break up the Hebrew Bible (Christian Old Testament) into three portions, the Torah, the Neviim and the Ketuviim, the first letter of each of those words make up the word “Tanakh” which is what Jews call these books when they are put together. Torah means law or teaching, it is the first 5 books, traditionally all attributed to Moses. This is the most important part for Jews.
Neviim means prophets. Prophets see another possibility for society than what currently exists, and therefore are usually not accepted by those who like society the way it currently exists. Moses was a prophet, so, the Torah is also prophetic, it’s just the first and most important. The Neviim are books like Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Amos, Malachi….
Ketuviim means writings. There is poetry all over the Bible, but these books are especially poetic/literary. The Ketuviim are books like Psalms, Proverbs, Song of Solomon, Job, Esther…
There are some differences between the Hebrew library, the Catholic library, the Orthodox and Protestant libraries. The Hebrew Library is only the Tanakh, not the New Testament, and Catholics include the Apocrypha, which I lamentably do not address. Beyond that, for an initial reading, (I think even most Catholics will agree) the differences between Christian libraries are small enough to ignore, I’ve explained a few of those differences below:
From the Torah I chose Genesis 12–50 and Exodus 1–20.
It pained me, but I left out Genesis 1–11 in the interest of making the goal accomplishable, because it is kind of the pre-history to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, which is the 12–50 portion of Genesis.
Time elapses between Jacob and Moses (somewhere between four generations and 430 years), but the Bible skips over it. Exodus 1–20 is the story of God using Moses to lead the Israelites out of Egypt to the Ten Commandments. I cut it at the Ten Commandments because already you’ll start to notice what becomes rampant in the second half of Exodus as well as Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy — there are many tedious laws and genealogies. There are important stories and the laws/genealogies are there for a reason, but it is a lot to get lost in. The 58 (mostly short) chapters I chose are probably the most important parts of the entire Hebrew Bible. It’s the raw stories that the rest of monotheism is built on.
According to Jewish rabbinic sources there was 300 years between Moses and David. Just know that a lot happened in those 300 years. When you get to the next reading, Psalms, the context things are written in is totally different.
A basic enough review is that Moses is a bit like Martin Luther King, he leads people out of slavery/oppression, but doesn’t get to see the promised land. One of MLK’s last speeches is called “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop”, thats a reference to Moses who God takes to the mountaintop to see into the promised land, but not allowed to go there. According to the Bible God buried Moses, no one knows where. Joshua takes over and he conquers the people living in the land promised to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. It was hard to leave out Joshua and Judges, but, for brevity, I did. These two books are where much of the really intense stuff about the “punishing God of the Old Testament” comes from. The Moses and Joshua stories are also the beginning of where there should be a lot of archaeological/historical evidence, but despite the Israeli government really wanting to prove they have ancient precedent in the land, archaeologically/historically it has been really hard to verify the Moses and Joshua accounts. The helpful part of that is the shocking things God has Joshua do here, are probably literary language of the time period, or, details which were likely important for the original readers to know that the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob was powerful, but maybe not the way things actually happened. After Joshua comes Judges when “everyone lived according to their own sight.” It’s a disorganized wild west kind of time. A judge is the name the for those who ascended their way to some moments of power. There are a lot of crazy stories, like a woman named Jael who drives a tent spike through an oppressive ruler’s head. Is that part of biblical womanhood? Yes.
1 and 2 Samuel is also TOUGH to leave out. This tells the story of how the wild west time period of Judges moved into Saul becoming king over a united kingdom and his successor David. David’s reign was the high point of Israel’s history. David was a poet-warrior-king (who, as a boy killed the unstoppable bad guy Goliath). Psalms is mostly songs and poems he wrote, I’ll get to that in a second.
1 and 2 Kings continues that story with Solomon and the breaking up of Israel. Some of the best unknown stories are here, but, accomplishable is the goal of this plan. Israel is not faithful, falls apart and is exiled to Babylon.
1 and 2 Chronicles, this is a less exciting retelling of Kings. Lots of tedious stuff here, and it is long. In my personal Bible reading this was probably the hardest section to get through.
Ezra and Nehemiah are interesting stories of the Jews being allowed by the Babylonians to go back to the promised land. This is also a pretty politically right-wing portion of the Bible, while the prophets are very adamant people are to take care of foreigners, these books are anti-foreigner.
Esther. I’d LOVE to include this one because for our secular times, it is fascinating: God is not mentioned one time. It’s hero is also a woman, though in a very traditional gender role. The king likes her because she is beautiful, she joins the harem, ends up saving Israel. The Jewish festival of Purim is really fun and based on this story.
Job. This book is so important. In Hebrew it is easy to see it is a long poem, it isn’t as long as, but reminds me stylistically of, Homer’s Iliad or Odyssey. The main idea is that sometimes bad things happen to good people, and we don’t know why. It’s just really long and I think Ecclesiastes accomplishes the goal of reminding people that the Hebrew idea of God is bigger than we think and shouldn’t be reduced to simple “everything that is bad happens for a reason you can understand.” I decided to include Ecclesiastes to make a similar point, because it is shorter.
PSALMS. This is the Hebrew Bible’s central song/poetry book. We don’t know the tunes anymore (though Jewish tradition does have a way of singing the scriptures that is interesting) we just have the lyrics. There are 150, mostly from David, but quite a few from other people. I chose 1 and 2 because they are pretty representative, 13 is an example of David being angry and doubting God, 20 and 40 also represent some complexity of the emotions people have toward God, 139 is one of the most beautiful. I wanted to put 119 in which is all about the scriptures (probably David means the Torah), but it is also the longest one.
Proverbs. This is the Bible’s book of proverbs, most of them are one sentence long. Read any of it at any time. There are some portions that are longer, but you’ll get the idea if you just read a couple of the short ones. These are said to be written by King Solomon, David’s son, the wisest man ever.
Ecclesiastes. Also said to be written by King Solomon. The Bible’s existentialism. What are we doing here? Life is a vapor. It’s here and then it’s gone. What about the afterlife? That’s really not a Jewish concept. Note that the end of Ecclesiastes, your Bible probably has a footnote that the happy ending is not in a lot of manuscripts. It is likely a later addition. I think this and the New Testament book of James are probably the most relevant for our moment at the beginning of the 21st century. It’s often forgotten that such an unsettling book is part of the Biblical library.
Song of Solomon. In some Jewish sects you have to be 30 to read this. It’s sexual. Many conservative Christians read it as a love letter from God to his people. I think they are trying to avoid how sexual this is, especially chapter 7. Now I’m guessing you’re going to read it. Go for it! But, for brevity, I cut it.
Isaiah. This is probably the central prophetic book and its opening chapters have things like “I will not listen to your prayers.” The only issue is that its really long. A lot of people will get lost in this one I think. If you have patience read it, but, I decided that Amos is the most representative prophet, it is also much shorter.
Jeremiah and Lamentations. Similar to Isaiah. Jeremiah is more sad, he was writing during that last portion of 2 Kings, when Israel falls apart and is taken to Babylon. The sadness is where the “Jeremiad” concept comes from. It’s also pretty long.
Ezekiel. Now we’re getting a little wild. A valley of dry bones comes back to life. 16:49 reminds us that the sin of Sodom was not sexual, it was that they had wealth, but didn’t care about poor people. That is the prophets’ message in a nutshell. This one also has God advocating for people to slaughter the people at his own temple (chapter 9)… but Amos has most of this stuff too and its short.
Daniel. So important, but SO WILD. Daniel (and Revelation in the NT) I left out because there is a lot of cryptic dreams here and speculation on these two books has led to lots of problems. Some people theorize that these authors were on psychedelics, there’s statues made out of different metals and clay, that are representing different empires, and cryptic math is introduced, honestly, save it for (at least) a second reading. So many people claim they can figure out the meaning of the world through these two and they end up doing very weird things, sometimes very harmful. For the purposes of our reading, this is where Jesus’ “Son of Man” idea comes from. In the Catholic Bible Daniel has a few more chapters.
Hosea and Joel. Jesus references Hosea 6:6 multiple times in Matthew. “I desire mercy, not sacrifice, acknowledgment of God and not burnt offering.” Great book, I only cut it because Amos is representative.
AMOS. Short and representative of the prophets. Pay special attention during chapter 5.
Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habbakuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi. All good. All short. I just cut them for brevity’s sake. Micah 6:8 is many people’s favorite Bible verse: “What does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?”… Malachi is also a personal favorite. I almost included it. Everyone in it thinks they are doing good, but they are not, the ones who God does approve of did one thing: “spoke to one another”.
NEW TESTAMENT
I think with the Sermon on the Mount, one Gospel, Acts, three letters from Paul and one from James you will get a good enough grasp for an accomplishable, representative reading of the New Testament portion of the Biblical library.
The first four books are gospels, “Evangelion.” It means the good news: Jesus’ life and teachings. This is the most important part, but initially you can get by with just one of the four.
Mark is the earliest and most raw. It starts at Jesus’ baptism and shockingly, it ends with an angel telling the women at Jesus’ tomb that Jesus is not there and they are afraid. Your Bible will likely tack on 12 verses and note that those 12 verses are only there in later manuscripts. How weird is that!?
Matthew. Probably my favorite gospel. Jesus’ talk of the Kingdom of Heaven is the best. I included Matthew 5–7 because most consider it Jesus’ central teaching, and it has the “you have heard it said” referring to the Hebrew Bible, which you just spent a lot of time in. I think the Sermon on the Mount can serve as a kind of introduction/distillation to the New Testament, this is a talk given 2,000 years ago in a situation very different than most of us reading it, but, ok, you’ve got to start somewhere! Matthew 23–25 is some serious prophetic fire at the Pharisees, those “venomous snakes”, turning the ancient library of God into 613 rules to keep people down.
Luke. I chose Luke as the gospel because 1, it has most of what is in Matthew and Mark, 2, it is in continuity with Acts and 3, has more emphasis on non-Jews. Most of us are not Jews, most of us do not follow Jewish culture. The Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5–7) is very similar to the sermon on the plain in Luke 6.
John. This gospel was written later and is more spiritual than the others. John 1:4 was a central verse for me, John 3:17, John 5:24. In my original list I chose this gospel. I just thought Luke was more well-rounded.
Acts. I chose Acts because it is the story of what happened after Jesus leaves. All the subsequent letters are written in the context of the stories told in Acts, which is also why I interspersed the letters when it is likely they were written.
The rest of the New Testament is 22 letters and the book of Revelation. 13 Letters attributed to Paul/in the tradition of Paul, three (plus Revelation) attributed to John, two to Peter, one a piece to James and Jude. Paul is thought to be the earliest of all the New Testament writers.
That’s probably all you need to know, but I’ll go into a bit more detail here:
Of the 13 attributed to Paul, 7 were written to Christian communities (churches) in their obvious locations: Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians*, Philippians, Colossians*, 1 and 2* Thessalonians, and the following were letters written to individuals: 1* and 2* Timothy, Titus*, Philemon. (The asterisks are on books which are debated if they are actually written by Paul, or only in the tradition of Paul).
Romans is the most important, but it is also the longest. I decided to keep Galatians instead, it’s a shorter version of a similar message, that in Christ there is freedom, not condemnation (and you have to read the gospels/Acts to know what “in Christ” means, pay special attention to Matthew 5, Luke 6, Acts 2). Paul and his letters to the Romans and Galatians are very close to advocating getting rid of the law, which Jesus was also accused of. This is tricky, the same debate exists today: what of the law is permanent, or eternally just, and what of the law is transient, or meant for specific reasons that are no longer the case? Jesus said he didn’t come to abolish the law, but to fulfill it. The prophets are arguing for the purpose of the law but not the law itself. 1 Corinthians has the very famous treatise on love — if you can get everything right but don’t have love, you’re just a “clanging cymbal”. Each letter is valuable, I opted to keep 1 Thessalonians because it is usually thought to be the earliest book in the New Testament (50 AD/CE), so therefore the most raw and Philippians because it is written from prison but has the most to do with joy, something I think most of us will like.
Hebrews is unattributed and very interesting. Some scholars think it could have been written by a woman. It has some controversial phrasings like Jesus became perfect — i.e. not born perfect. As with all the books I left out, but especially for this one, I left it out only for the sake of making this goal accomplishable.
James. This is the most practical and easiest summary for us of New Testament Christianity. James has been thought to be the brother of Jesus, but the writer doesn’t say that.
Galatians. I chose this one because Paul here is actually in a bit of controversy with Peter who represents some who thought if non-Jews are going to be a part of the movement they will have to get circumcised and follow the Jewish law. Paul says no and mostly ends up winning the argument. I also think Galatians represents a shorter version of Romans.
Romans is probably the most important book I left out. It’s the longest of Paul’s letters and has often been turned into a book of rules even though that is pretty clearly the opposite of Paul’s intent: “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”
1 Thessalonians I kept because most scholars think it is probably the earliest written book of the New Testament. I figured we might as well get the NT/Paul at his most raw. If it was longer I probably would have cut it, but, it’s short so I kept it.
1 and 2 Corinthians. Paul is angry at the church in Corinth. These are kind of long, but have some really compelling moments. 1 Corinthians 13 famously says if you have everything right, but don’t have love, you’re just a clanging cymbal. Love is patient, love is kind…
Ephesians. Colossians. Timothy. Titus. Peter. John. Jude…these all have their moments, but for brevity’s sake I cut them. I imagine there are a lot of people who will take issue with Ephesians being left out in particular, i.e. a good friend of mine has Ephesians 2:8–9 tattooed on his wrist. Paul’s letters to Timothy are home to why he gets thought of as anti-women (weird because he speaks well of women in leadership in Acts and Romans). Peter has an odd verse about praying for the dead. John continues his spiritual messages on the importance of love: “little children, love one another”, “God is love” and more.
Philippians. This was my last addition. I almost kept it and tossed 1 Thessalonians, but its short enough I decided to keep both. Paul writes this one from prison but talks a lot about joy. He talks about how he previously was a ‘hebrew of hebrews’ but he gave it up for fellowship in Christ’s suffering. A favorite scholar of mine, Cornel West, talks about the tragicomic, choosing joy even though there isn’t a lot of hope. I love Philippians and it seems good to end on.
Revelation I avoided because like Daniel, it is too crazy: “Seven angels with seven trumpets” “the beast had a head with seven horns”… Spend some time on the foundational pieces then perhaps go to Daniel and Revelation.
What do you think?
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