The Unity of the Bible: Exploring the Beauty and Structure of the Bible

In The Unity of the Bible, Duane L, Christensen examines the content and structure of the Bible as a whole-the "Word of God." To this end, the author presents the Bible as a single book with an elaborate structure that informs and relates the theology of its entirety. Christensen constructs the Bible we have today around two major historical stages in its canonical or authoritative formation. He analyzes the structure of the Bible in this historical context.

The first stage (1200-400 BCE) is centered around the destruction of Jerusalem and the destruction of the First Temple (586 BCE) followed by the subsequent Babylonian Exile, making it the end of ancient Jerusalem. This is the stage that gives rise to the Old Testament, or Tanakh, wherein Christensen finds structural, so-called "menorah," patterns that continue into the New Testament. The second stage (20 BCE-70CE) is centered around the destruction of Herod's Temple (70 CE) and gives rise to the New Testament or what Christensen terms "Completed Tanakh."

The structure of both Old and New Testaments the author finds to be interlocking and intricate, with one emanating from and flowing into the other, suggesting that the New Testament arises from the Old, as if by divine, mysterious design.

Duane L. Christensen is professor of biblical studies and Near Eastern history at William Carey International University at Pasadena, California.