For Further Information: Sources for OLLI Class Topics

How the Assyrian Empire Gave Us Christianity

Power Point Files from Class Lectures

Week 1:

Week 2:

Week 3:

Week 4:

Week 5:

How We Got the Bible

Power Point Files from Class Lectures

Historical background on writing in the Bronze AgeDownload
End of the Bronze/beginning of the Iron Age, and alphabetic writingDownload
Hebrew Bible text transmission flow chartDownload
Hebrew Bible and Old Testament canonsDownload
New Testament Canon and TextDownload

General Histories of the Biblical Text

Bruce, F. F. 1984. The Books and the Parchments. 4th edition. Old Tappan, NJ: Revell.

Ewert, David. 1990. A General Introduction to the Bible: From Ancient Tablets to Modern Translations. Grand Rapids: Zondervan.

Bruce, F. F. 1988. Canon of Scripture. Downer’s Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.

Historical Background (which may not mention the biblical text)

Cline Eric H. 2021. 1177 B.C.: The Year Civilization Collapsed. Revised and updated ed. Princeton New Jersey: Princeton University Press. https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2307/j.ctv15r58dw. [This book discusses the collapse of the advanced Bronze Age civilizations which, in my view, prompted adoption of the alphabetic script which, in turn, made the biblical text possible.]

The Origin of the Alphabet

Koller, Aaron. “The Alphabet: The First Thousand Years.” The Ancient Near East Today: Current News about the Past 8, no. 1 (January 2020). https://www.asor.org/anetoday/2020/01/alphabet-the-first-thousand-years/.

The Hebrew Bible Text

Würthwein, Ernst. 1995. The Text of the Old Testament. 5th edition. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.