This volume offers a synchronic, literary reading of the final form of the laws of Exodus 20.22-23.19 (commonly, though inaccurately labelled "The Book of the Covenant"), in contrast with primarily source- and form-critical approaches commonly utilized in the past. The work seeks to demonstrate that this literary unit is much more coherent, more integrated into its narrative context, less in need of the positing of corruptions, secondary insertions, rearrangements or the like than has usually been recognized. The approach instead seeks to find authorial purpose in each case where scholars have often posited scribal misadventure, "seams" between sources, disorder, contradiction, or corruption.

A Bible overview tracing the covenant theme through the Bible. Christians are people of the new covenant made by Jesus’ death on the cross. But what exactly is a covenant? And how does Christ’s new covenant fullfil and complete all the other covenants that God made with his people in the Old Testament? This gripping and highly readable book gives us a sweeping overview of the Bible as it charts the different “deals” that God has made with people in Scripture. It shows how the covenants with Abraham, David, Moses and others all foreshadow the new covenant to come in Jesus, and it helps us see with greater clarity the plan of God as it unfolds through the Bible story. With practical application, and careful, generous discussion of some contentious issues in Christian thinking, this book will help believers of every stage get to grips with this central theme of the Bible.

According to the biblical narrative, in addition to the Ten Commandments, Moses received a series of supplementary instructions to guide the people as they set about establishing a society in conformity with the covenant that are to be found in the so-called the Book of the Covenant. The book, which is imbedded in the biblical book of Exodus essentially contains addenda or amendments to longstanding customary laws with which the children of Israel were already familiar, and for this reason its various components vary widely in scope, depending on the extent of differentiation from customary law that they entail. This study of the ordinances in the Book of the Covenant focuses not only on what they meant for the ancient Israelites but also how those laws, rules, instructions, and admonitions were treated and in some instances modified as they were incorporated into the huge corpus of Jewish Law, as it emerged over a period of some two and a half millennia.

This volume offers a synchronic, literary reading of the final form of the laws of Exodus 20.22-23.19 (commonly, though inaccurately labelled "The Book of the Covenant"), in contrast with primarily source- and form-critical approaches commonly utilized in the past. The work seeks to demonstrate that this literary unit is much more coherent, more integrated into its narrative context, less in need of the positing of corruptions, secondary insertions, rearrangements or the like than has usually been recognized. The approach instead seeks to find authorial purpose in each case where scholars have often posited scribal misadventure, "seams" between sources, disorder, contradiction, or corruption.

Leading scholar Daniel Block helps students of the Bible understand the big picture of God's covenants with humanity as they play out in both the First and the New Testaments. After fifty years of teaching and preaching around the globe, Block brings a lifetime of study and reflection on the First Testament and relationship with God to this comprehensive volume. The book focuses on God's covenants as the means by which God has reached out to a fallen humanity. It examines the heart and history of God's redemptive plan and shows why the covenants are essential for our understanding of the Bible.