Tanakh versus Old Testament

What is the Tanakh?

The Tanakh (also known as the Hebrew Bible) was originally written in Hebrew with a few

passages in Aramaic.

The Tanakh is divided into three sections  

and Ketuvim (Writings).

The Torah is made up of five books that were given to Moshe directly from God after the Exodus

from Mitzrayim. The Torah was handed down through the successive generations from the time

of Moshe.

The Torah includes the creation of the earth and the first humans, the Great Flood and the

covenant with the gentiles, the Hebrew enslavement and Exodus of the Hebrews from

Mitzrayim, giving of the Torah, renewal of Covenant given to Avraham, establishment of the

festivals, wandering through the desert, the Mishkan, Ark, and Priestly duties, and the death of

Moshe.



contains 19 books.



the conquest of Eretz Yisrael and its division among the tribes, the judicial system, Era of Shaul



and Yehuda, prophecy, messianic prophecies, and the Babylonian exile.

The Ketuvim covers the period after the return from the Babylonian exile and contains 11 books.

The Ketuvim is made up of various writings that do not have an overall theme.

This section of the Tanakh includes poems and songs, the stories of Iyov, Rut, and Ester, the

writings 

-part

 Second Beit

HaMikdash 

Instead, the proper title was Miqra, because the biblical texts were read publicly. Miqra

continues to be used in Hebrew to this day alongside Tanakh to refer to the Hebrew scriptures. In

modern spoken Hebrew both are used interchangeably.

According to Rabbinical Judaism after the destruction of Yerushalayim Rabbi Zakkai asked for

permission from the Romans to set up a school in Yavneh (Gittin 56b).

It is at this place that the

school at Yavneh canonized the Tanakh.

This teaching is rejected by Karaite Judaism because



the books contained in the Tanakh were already well-known to the Yisraelites and were

established as the authoritative and divine texts for the Yisraelites.

The Tanakh was not originally broken into chapter and verses. The idea of chapter and verses 

d Divrei Hayamim  is a leftover from

Christians in the 13th century. The chapter divisions and verse numbers have no significance in

the Jewish tradition. Nevertheless, they are noted in all modern editions of the Tanakh so that

verses may be located and cited.

There are many various manuscripts of the original Hebrew Tanakh in the world today.

The Dead Sea scrolls consist of roughly 900 documents, including texts from the Tanakh,

discovered between 1947 and 1956 in eleven caves in and around the Wadi Qumran near the

ruins of the ancient settlement of Khirbet Qumran, on the northwest shore of the Dead Sea.

Targum Onkelos is the Babylonian Targum to the Torah. The work has been identified with

Aquila of Sinope. Targum Yonatan is the Babylonian Targum to the 

Tanakh.

 )  is a medieval bound

manuscript of the Tanakh written in the tenth century CE.

The Leningrad Codex (also known as the Cairo Codex) is the oldest complete Tanakh that is still

preserved. The Leningrad Codex is a completely vowelized text.

Since the Leningrad Codex is

the oldest complete manuscript of the Tanakh within the Masoretic textual tradition of the Ben

Asher family, it is used today as the basis for most of the modern-day printed editions of the

Tanakh,

including the Biblia Hebraica (1937) and Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia (1967/1977).

What is the Old Testament?

The Christian Old Testament is the collection of books that forms the first half of the two-part



writing of ancient Yisrael. The contents of the Old Testament vary between denominations.

it into 39 books, while Catholics, Eastern

Orthodox, Coptic and Ethiopian churches recognize a considerably larger collection.

The books of the Christian Old Testament can be broadly divided into the Pentateuch, which tells

how God selected Yisrael to be His chosen people; the history books telling the history of the



wisdom books dealing with questions of good and evil in the world; and the books of the biblical

prophets, warning of the consequences of turning away from God.

The early Christian Church primarily used the Septuagint  the oldest Greek version of the

Tanakh  until the mid-

use by the Evangelists and Apostles which helped it to essentially attain official status in the

early Christian world.

At much the same time as the Septuagint was being produced, translations were being made into

Aramaic. For Aramaic Christians there was a Syriac translation of the Tanakh called the Peshitta,

as well as versions in Coptic, Ethiopic, Armenian, and Arabic.

Around 400 CE, Jerome translated the Christian Old Testament from the original Hebrew

Tanakh into Latin and this translation became known as the Vulgate. Initially, his rejection of

translating directly from the Greek Septuagint was rejected but in time, his version came to be

accepted and displaced the old Latin translations of the Septuagint.

Most modern translations of the Christian Old Testament are derived from the Vulgate,

Septuagint, and Masoretic Texts.

What are the differences?

There are multiple differences in translation between the Christian Old Testament and the Jewish

Tanakh. There are some minor differences in the chapter and verse numbering between the

Tanakh and the Old Testament. This is especially seen in Sefer Tehillim. However, this is not a

major issue and the idea of chapter and verse is a Christian idea and did not originate with

Judaism.

A major difference between the Tanakh and the Old Testament is the number and arrangement of

the books. The Christian Old Testament contains books and additions that are considered

apocryphal by Judaism.

The Tanakh is divided into three sections  

 and contains 35 books.





containing three books; and, 3) Trei Asar (12 Prophets) containing twelve books. The Ketuvim

contains twelve books.

The Orthodox Old Testament contains 51 books and is divided into four sections. Traditionally

the Orthodox Old Testament is divided into the law books (the Pentateuch and historical books),

the Psalms and other wisdom books, and the prophets based on Luke 24:44:

Then He said to them, “These [are] the words which I spoke to you while I was still with you,

that all things must be fulfilled which were written in the Law of Moses and [the] Prophets and

[the] Psalms concerning Me.” (Luke 24:44)

The Pentateuch contains five books which are the same books contained in the Torah. The



sections of the Tanakh. In addition, the Historical section of the Orthodox Old Testament

contains apocryphal books including: First Esdras, Tobit, additions to Esther, and First, Second,

and Third Maccabees. The Wisdom section contains eight books which include the remaining



Prayer of Manasseh, Wisdom of Solomon, and Ecclesiasticus (Wisdom of Sirach). The Prophets

section is divided into Major Prophets and Minor Prophets. The Major Prophets include four



contain twelve books which are the same books contained in the Trei Asar section of the

Tanakh.

The Catholic Old Testament contains 46 books and is divided into four sections. The canon of

the Roman Catholic Church was firmly established in the 16

-century Ecumenical Council of

Trent. The Canon of Trent refers to the list of biblical books that were from that time on

considered canonical.

The Council of Trent confirmed the identical list already approved in

1442 by the Council of Florence.

The Pentateuch contains five books which are the same books contained in the Torah. The

Historical section contains sixteen books 

sections of the Tanakh. In addition, the Historical section of the Catholic Old Testament contains

apocryphal books including: Tobit, Judith, additions to Esther, and First and Second Maccabees.

The Wisdom s

section of the Tanakh as well as the apocrycphal additions of the Book of Wisdom and

Ecclesiasticus (Wisdom of Sirach). The Prophets section contains eighteen books. This section of



Tanakh as well as the apocryphal books of Baruch, Epistle of Jeremiah and additions to Daniel.

The Protestant Old Testament contains 39 books and is not traditionally divided into sections as

are the Tanakh, Orthodox Old Testament or Catholic Old Testament. The Protestant

Reformation, which began in Germany in 1517 with the 95 Theses of Martin Luther, gave rise to

a new canon of the Old Testament. The new Protestant canon did away with the apocryphal

books of the Orthodox and Catholic canons and contains the same books as the Tanakh but in a

different order.

The Tanakh and the Old Testament have many similarities but they are not the same scripture.

The number and arrangement of books and the inclusion of some apocryphal books is the major

difference between the Jewish Tanakh and the Christian Old Testament.

If you are interested in learning about the Hebrew text it is important to use a good Tanakh and

not use a Christian Old Testament. If you are truly interested in learning from the Tanakh I

would recommend learning Biblical Hebrew and not always relying on a translation.

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halakhah.com. Halkhah.Com, n.d.

[http://halakhah.com/pdf/nashim/Gittin.pdf]



ibri.org. Interdisciplinary Biblical Research Institute, 1983.

[http://www.ibri.org/RRs/RR013/13jamnia.html]

HaAretz, Fragment of Ancient Parchment from Bible Given to Jerusalem Scholars (11/6/07)

[http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/920915.html]

C. Leviant, A Review of The Leningrad Codex: A Facsimile Edition (1998)

[http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/reviews/codex.html]

West Semitic Research Project: The Leningrad Codex

[http://www.usc.edu/dept/LAS/wsrp/educational_site/biblical_manuscripts/LeningradCodex.sht

ml]

D.N. Freedman, The Leningrad Codex: A Facsimile Edition (Grand Rapids, MI: William B.

Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1998) [http://books.google.com]

Ernst Wurthwein & Erroll Rhodes (trans.), The Text of the Old Testament, 2

ed. (Grand

Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1995) [http://books.google.com]

orthodoxwiki.org. Orthodox Wiki, n.d.

[http://orthodoxwiki.org/Old_Testament]

 (NKJV  

blueletterbible.org. Blue Letter Bible, 1996.

[http://www.blueletterbible.org/Bible.cfm?b=Luk&c=24&t=NKJV]



bible-researcher.com. Bible Research, 1848. [http://www.bible-researcher.com/trent1.html]

Papal Encyclicals Online. -

papalencyclicals.net. Papal Encyclicals Online,

n.d. [http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Councils/ecum17.htm]



1990).

Thomas Nelson, Inc., The Holy Bible in the King James Version. (Nashville: Thomas Nelson

Publishers, 1984).