Key Ideas

Question 1

Key Ideas for Genesis:

Answer 1

• God created, and creation was good
• Disobedience separated people from God
• God instituted a program of revelation called the covenant

Question 2

Key Ideas for Exodus:

Answer 2

• The supremacy of Yahweh over pagan deities
• The exodus as a redemptive event for ancient Israel
• The Mosaic law as a religious and social charter for Israel
• The presence of God symbolized in the tabernacle

Question 3

Key Ideas for Leviticus:

Answer 3

• The holiness of God
• The purity of the covenant community
• The principle of substitution in the sacrificial ritual
• The principle of mediation in the service of priests
• The redeeming of time by means of the liturgical calendar

Question 4

Key Ideas for Numbers:

Answer 4

• God’s faithfulness to his covenant promises
• Divine testing of human motives
• God communicating his truth through the medium of culture
• God’s sovereign rule of the nations

Question 5

Key Ideas for Deuteronomy:

Answer 5

• The importance of a central worship place
• The emphasis on the name of God
• The organization of laws with reference to the Ten Commandments
• The centrality of loving and obeying the covenant God

Question 6

Key Ideas from Joshua:

Answer 6

• The faithfulness of God in fulfilling covenant promises
• The conquest and apportionment of the land
• The importance of obedience

Question 7

Key Ideas from Judges:

Answer 7

• The cycles of the Judges period
• God’s justice and grace
• God’s sovereign provision of deliverers
• Covenant failure by the people, the priests, and the tribal leadership
• The role of the Spirit of the Lord

Question 8

Key Ideas for Ruth:

Answer 8

• God’s faithfulness and loyalty stimulated by people’s faithfulness and loyalty to one another
• David’s faith shown to be the legacy of this ancestors
• The light of loyalty dispersed during the apostasy of the Judges period
• The concept of kinsman-redeemer introduced

Question 9

Key Ideas for 1 & 2 Samuel:

Answer 9

• The institution of kingship
• The process toward establishing a covenant with David’s line
• The importance of divine kingship

Question 10

Key Ideas for 1 & 2 Kings:

Answer 10

• Kingship—good and evil
• The prophetic voice as the royal conscience
• Worship—Yahwism vs. Baalism
• Covenant blessings (repentance and restoration) and curses (judgment and exile)

Question 11

Key Ideas for 1 & 2 Chronicles:

Answer 11

• The retelling of the past to inspire hope in the present
• The reigns of David and Solomon idealized
• The centrality of temple worship
• The validation of the priests and Levites as community leaders

Question 12

Key Ideas for Ezra and Nehemiah:

Answer 12

• The physical restoration of the city of Jerusalem
• Yahweh as a covenant-keeping God
• Religious and social reform as the aftermath of repentance

Question 13

Key Ideas for Esther:

Answer 13

• God is at work even when he is behind the scenes
• The schemes of the wicked are doomed
• God’s plan for his people cannot be thwarted