Test Oldtament

[dreamer_easy]

One of these JW mags quotes a guy who says that "knowledge of the Old Testament is fading fast among Christians and has virtually vanished in popular culture". So! Test yourself, Christians and others on my flist - without peeking at other comments, see if you can comment with five events from the OT. (If you actually do Bible study, you're disqualified! :-)

Comments

[zeusgirl.livejournal.com]

1. Adam and Eve expelled from the Garden of Eden.
2. The great flood, and Noah's ark.
3. Lot's wife turned into a pillar of salt because she turns back to look at the ruins of (Sodom and Gomorrah? Could be wrong).
4. Abraham (?) ordered to sacrifice his son to test his faith.
5. The story of the building of the Tower of Babel.

How'd I do? It's been years since I read the Old Testament.

[murasaki-1966.livejournal.com]

The Creation "Let there be light" (2 versions in Genesis, though)
The creation of the Ark of the Covenant
The Exodus from Egypt.
Samson and Delilah
Judith and Holerfornes (sic)
The Exile of the Jews in Babylon ("By the rivers of Babylon, we lay down, and we wept when we remembered Zion").
Daniel and Firends in the Lion's Den, and in the fiery furnace.
The writing on the wall ("You have been weighted in the balance and found wanting")
Lots and lots of battles.

Blame it on all the literature study at uni.

[infinitarian.livejournal.com]

Piece of piss. (Don't worry, it's a biblical word.)

The creation of the world, the firmament, the stars and planets, the plants, the animals and human beings, then God's day off.
The temptation and fall of Adam and Eve, and the curse God places upon them.
Cain's murder of Abel for finding God a nicer present than he had.
The collapse of the tower of Babel, and resulting fragmentation of human language.
The building of the Ark (Noah's, that is), the Flood and subsequent draining-away of waters, and the establishment of the Noahic Covenant with the rainbow and stuff.

Those are all from Genesis. I could go on...

[outsdr.livejournal.com]

The story of Genesis
The story of Moses in the basket
The story of Noah and the flood
The story of Joseph and his coat
The story of Cain & Abel

I seem to remember the ones that are most accessible to children. Probably because there was always a "Bible Stories" hard back book in the doctor's waiting room with luscious illustrations in them. Seriously, it was like the Old Testament took place in Narnia.

Maybe some day, I'll find one of those books. I think they still show up in doctor's offices. Usually buried under Highlights magazine. I think they used to have cards inside to be able to get your own copy or some such...

[purrdence.livejournal.com]

'Uncle Albert' series wasn't it?

[crossoverman.livejournal.com]

- Adam & Eve, Garden of Eden
- Moses & Ten Commandments
- Noah and the Ark
- Lot and his wife and the Pillar of Salt incident
- the fall of Sodom and Gomorrah

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

Done from one book to make it harder ;)

[miriammoules.livejournal.com]

Creation v1
Creation v2
Cain killing Abel
Expulsion of Cain
Noah's Ark

[tysolna]

So then God created the world, and the first day he created light, and air, and fish, and jam, and soup, and potatoes, and haircuts, and arguments, and small things, and rabbits, and people with noses, and jam – more jam, perhaps, and soot, and flies, and tobogganing, and showers, and toasters, and Grandmothers, and… Belgium.
So- so stuff happened! Yes, it did, it unfolded, and Cain killed Abel, and then there came a period later, I don’t know – a number of centuries later, where God said, “No, no, everything is bad! I will send a Flood, and kill everything, start again.” I think it was “The Etch-a-Sketch End of the World” basically, God going, “No, no, no!”

[fried-flamingo.livejournal.com]

LMAO! Love it.

Was this quote from Definite Article? I haven't watched them in ages.

[rdmasters.livejournal.com]

Hmm...

Smiting of Sodom and Gomorrah, and the salting of Lot's wife for looking back. Always good for a lark the smiting of the immoral. Starts a tradition good for thousands of years.

Noah and his ark. See also S&D above. Took his sons and daughters with him. Works out to a pretty small gene base, but that's the way of things when starting over. Look out for the dove (the second? third?) bird sent out, and the only one to return. Also, rainbows are cool. No matter what Cartman says.

Adam and Eve, garden of Eden, snake in the apple (actually a fig, in all likelihood) tree. Eating the fruit of knowledge of good and evil, and the whole independent thought business. All a bit of a set-up really. My personal theology on this was that it WAS a set-up, so that man could be able to choose. A bit of hard times that will be good for you sort of thing.

The testing of a faithful man, Job. Satan (who's main reason for being tossed was that he wanted a bit of the action) reckons that he can break anyone. And gets dissed. Badly.

The smiting of Jericho. Worshipers of Baal, and therefor fair game for a good and godly smiting. See Noah and S&D above.

Add to that getting enslaved by the Pharaoh of Egypt and the whole prophecy business of Joseph followed by 80 years of looking for the Levant, 10 Commandments (twice, once dissed by an idol), a whole lot of songs of praise (Psalms), much, much begetting, more prophecies and a whole lot lawgiving for living in a desert.

No, I don't study the OT any more, and yes, I am a follower of Christ, although I have largely given up on the organised churches as they have become bodies that get in the way of faith rather than helping it.

[randomling]

God creating the world.

Eve eating the apple and getting herself and Adam kicked out of Eden.

Daniel facing down some lions.

Noah and his big flood.

Moses parting the Red Sea.

I could probably name another 5, but then I might have to stop. :)

[emma-in-oz.livejournal.com]

Genesis, Exodus, the Golden Calf, David kills Goliath, David ogles Bathsheba

[pbristow.livejournal.com]

Well, it's been a long long time since I did any *active* bible study... Am I allowed in?

1. Elijah(?)'s "my God's better than your god" contest. "Maybe he's off taking a leak?" =:o}
2. The fall of Jericho. With full brass accompaniment.
3. Job gets throughly s**t upon just to prove a point (which is tragic), then gets "comforted" by the local theologians (which is excrutiating). Then he gets some quality one-on-one time with God, which always makes everything worthwhile.
4. Ummm... [STARTING TO SCRATCH HEAD NOW]... Ooh! The fall of Sodom. Which had nothing to do with anyone just being gay, BTW. God heard they had Weapons of Moral Depravity and decided to check it out, and sure enough they tried to gang-rape the UN inspectors.
5. Noah's floating menagerie. Anglican version: "And it rained for four-tea days, and four coffee mornings..."

Bonus: Wasn't Esther entered into the local equivalent of "Miss World"...? Or was she the organiser? I tried to write a song about that once.

[southerndave.livejournal.com]

OK... speaking as a Presbyterian agnostic/atheist (which of the two I am depends on which definition of either word is used...) here come some guesses (and probably mostly wrong...)

God told Adam and Eve they could eat anything in the Garden of Eden, except the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Serpent told Eve that she'd misheard the old guy. She told Adam likewise. Oops.

God gives Noah a weather forecast. Rest of Mesopotamia laughs at him. Noah gets the last laugh.

Joshua is beseiging Jericho with an army and a bunch of trumpeters. He gets all his trumpeters to play at once. The walls of Jericho fall down. Think about this the next time you hear a Salvation Army band.

Two women petition King Solomon, each claiming motherhood of a baby. Solomon suggests they take half the baby each and prepares to undertake the division himself. Only one of the mothers cares enough about the infant to point out that this is a bad idea. So she gets the baby.

God told Abraham that if Abraham really loved him he'd sacrifice his son, Isaac, to him on an altar. So he drags the kid up to the altar and is about to dismember said son when God says, "Only joking!" (At least I think this one is from the Bible. Unless I'm getting it confused with Highway 61 Revisited...)

[drhoz.livejournal.com]

Interesting thing about the Wisdom of Solomon - It's an allegory for the rumbles of discontent in Israel and Solomon's threat of what he'ld do to the country if everybody didn't toe the line and shut up right now - i.e. civil war

[saltmarsh-again.livejournal.com]

Can we include the Apocrypha? /smartarse

Balaam's ass gets stubborn in teh face of an angel
Jonah gets swallowed by a whale
Elijah smites the prophets of Baal with lightning
Jacob wrestles an angel and dislocates his hip in the process
Joseph launches a fabulously successful musical about his troubled family life.

[purplepooka.livejournal.com]

I'm sure that at least the Joseph one is canonical (except for the musical part). Was pretty sure Jonah was in the approved version, too. They certainly made us draw the whale a lot at Hebrew school.

Avoiding the obvious ones...

[http://users.livejournal.com/doctor_k_/]

Lot's daughters get him good and drunk so they can shag him.

Something WIERD involving a foreskin goes on between God, Zipporah and Moses in a tent out in the desert.

Breasts like leaping fauns, teeth like goats in Song of Songs.

Ruth pleads to stay with her in'laws after her husband dies - "Your people are my people".

Onan refuses to look after Tamar, his brother's widow, spilling his seed onto the ground instead. So she tricks Onan's dad into shagging her instead.

Mixed up order

[kitzen-kat.livejournal.com]

Noah's ark, two of each animal, and the great flood.
The parting of the Red Sea.
Moses put in a basket in the bulrushes as a little baby.
Samson and Delilah.
Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden.
Joseph and his brothers, and how he ended up in Egypt.
Lot's wife and Sodom and Gomorrah.
Receiving the ten commandments.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

Garden of Eden.

Moses parting the red sea. Dead sea? A sea of some description.

Lot's wife turning to salt because she looked back. I don't know what she looked back at though.

Joseph's amazing technicolour dreamcoat.

That man who God told to kill one of his sons on the top of a mountain.

(British, Atheist, virtually no religious education.)

[the-ladylark.livejournal.com]

Adam and eve, Noah's ark, joseph and his dreamcoat, the giving of the ten commandments on mount Sinai, Cain and Abel, the ten plagues.

Oh, want some less obvious ones?

How Jacob stole Esau's birthright, the (averted) sacrifice of Isaac, an account of the building of the first temple (and how the funding for it was arranged), the giving of manna from heaven in the desert, the spies sent into Canaan to scout out the land.

[mrteufel.livejournal.com]

The Creation
Exile from Eden - Adam, Eve and a Serpent
Cain slays Abel
The Flood - Noah
Exile from Egypt - Moses
The destruction of Sodom - Lot and wife
Daniel slays Goliath
King Daniel sends wife's lover to war to die

[mrteufel.livejournal.com]

er, that's "David" not "Daniel"! *blushes*

k.

[wantsacracker.livejournal.com]

1. Man gave names to all the animals (in the beginning)

2. Nebuchazzarah (or some better, more correct spelling) had A Horrible Time (there's a great Boyd painting) and was rather downcast. Also Job had it rather bad too. Come to think of it...there were quite a few who had it pretty miserable.

3. Lot's wife got turned into a pillar of salt.

4. Murder most foul with Cain and Abel.

5. Noah built an ark.

[rj-anderson.livejournal.com]

*mourns disqualification*

*decides to do five three (I'm running out of time) characters from the OT that hardly anybody ever talks about*

1. Barzillai the Gileadite, a man who took his wife's family name.
2. Sheerah, the woman who built three cities (Upper and Lower Beth Horon, and Uzzen Sheerah)
3. Zelophehad's daughters, who successfully petitioned to inherit their father's land when he had no sons -- and started a precedent for later generations of Israel.

I thought you might like those.

[purplepooka.livejournal.com]

Creation
Expulsion
Plagues
Commandments
Promised land

Do I get disqualified for a Jewish upbringing? All my directed "bible study" is from before the age of 10, and mostly involved colouring in, though I did spend some of my teenage years actually reading the bloody thing.

[mad-march-hare.livejournal.com]

Any five events? Hmmm...

1) The creation of everything and subsequent banishment of man.
2) Cain kills his brother Abel.
3) Noah and the Flood
4) Moses leads the Israelites to the Promised Land.
5) Joshua and his army bring down the walls of Jericho with a shout, but Rahab the faithful prostitute is saved.

I could name more, but that would necessitate me going and looking up the names I've forgotten how to spell. ^_^;;

[purrdence.livejournal.com]

*World is made.
*Adam & Eve are made and stuff up.
*Noah & the flood.
*Cain & Able
*Joseph & that bloody coat.
*Joseph becomes important man in Eygpt with dreams of canabalistic cows and ears of corn
*Moses and the showdown between Pharoh's magicians. Eventually leads to mass Exodus of Isralites from Eygpt.
*God smites Sodom & gommoro. Lot's wife turns to salt. Lot's daughters shag their dad.
*Job.
*Aberaham has weird Dreams about angels and ladders. WHo knows what he was smoking out in the desert.
*Abe is tricked into marrying two sisters. Ends up getting to shag their handmaidens too - eventually leads to a disturbing but good book by Margret Attwood.
* Lots of rules (especially the book after Exodus).
* Women's hair is like a flock of goats.

[purrdence.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah, King David sees another man's wife and has her husband murdered so he can shag her.

[lordshiva.livejournal.com]

God creates the universe, the big flood, Moses walks his people out of slavery and into wandering again. The twin cities of fun, Sodom and Gomorah are detroyed, Elijah sends two she bears to kill the little children that made fun of him.

[lordshiva.livejournal.com]

Above someone says Ezekial sent the she bears to kill the children, which is probably better, because of Elijah being such a Jewish superhero and all. Obviously I do not study the bible. I just remember being kind of freaked out about a guy who'd kill a bunch of kids for making fun of his bald head.