The Roman Catholic Parishes of
Our Lady and the English Martyrs (Burnham-on-Sea)
and
Our Lady Queen of Apostles (Cheddar)
THE BIBLE
Is our source of divine revelation about God, Creation, the close relationship between God and us and also about the history of our salvation. We find there many interesting, moving and shocking stories, deep wisdom, beautiful poetry and prose, great prayers, divine commandments, apostolic exhortation and of course the words of Jesus.
There are also many complex, foreign, legalistic, uninteresting and even dull passages which are difficult to read and understand. To help those who would like to be familiar with the essential parts of the Bible I will write a weekly, step-by-step guide beginning on the first Sunday of Advent.
Father Tibor
21. After the death of Saul, David became king of Judah.
After the death of Saul, David became king of Judah and after a few battles, king of Israel as well (Second Book of Samuel 1-5). He captured Jerusalem and called it the City of David. He arranged for the Ark of the Covenant to be brought up to the city. He was happy and danced before the cart carrying the ark. His wife Michal (daughter of Saul) saw him and said, The king has made an exhibition of himself, he behaved like a buffoon”. David replied that he was dancing for the Lord who had made him leader of Israel (chapter 6).
The ark was still kept in a tent and David decided to build a solid structure for it. The Lord however told him that David was not to build a house for the Lord, the Lord would build a House of David, a dynasty. David’s son would build a temple for the name of the Lord. He was referring to Solomon who followed David on the throne.
22. The great sin of David.
In the Second Book of Samuel, we read that David saw from the roof of his palace a woman bathing. She was the wife of one of David’s soldiers who was away fighting a war. David had her brought to him and she became pregnant. How he tried to cover up what happened and still had the woman’s husband killed is described in chapter 11. How he was rebuked and his repentance is told in ch. 12.
Psalm 50 is said to have been the repentance song of David. We say it every Friday in Morning Prayer. David married the widow and from this wedlock was born the future king Solomon.
23. King David died and his son Solomon succeeded him.
King David died and his son Solomon succeeded him on the throne. God appeared to him in a dream and said: “Ask what you would like me to give you.” Solomon acknowledged his inexperience and asked for a heart to understand how to govern and the ability to discern between good and evil (1 Kings 3:4-15). His famous judgement to divide a baby with a sword between the two women claiming to be the mother is also in the same chapter.
Solomon built the Temple (ch. 6) and moved the Ark of the Covenant there. His prayer for himself and the people is in ch. 8. The Lord’s reply is in ch. 9.
Solomon was famous for his wisdom. The queen of Sheba travelled to meet him and was impressed (ch.10). Jesus said a thousand years later: the Queen of the South will stand up against the people of this generation ... because she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and look, there is something greater than Solomon here (Luke 11:29-32).
24. King Solomon had many foreign wives.
King Solomon had many foreign wives and in his old age he worshipped their gods and turned away from the living God who made him great (1 Kings 11:1- 13). After his death the country broke up into the Northern Kingdom of Israel and the Southern Kingdom of Judah (1Kings 12-13).
Most of the kings mentioned in the two Books of Kings were ungodly and their rule ended with the invasions from the North and the deportation of the whole nation (730-600 BC).
25. The miracles of the prophet Elijah are told in 1 Kings 17-19.
The miracles of the prophet Elijah are told in 1 Kings 17-19. (Elijah spoke with Jesus at the Transfiguration). Some of the stories are very moving and Jesus referred to them in his teachings: the feeding of the starving widow and her son (17:7-16), the ending of the drought (18:41-46), the encounter with God in the still small voice (19:9-13).
The story of Naboth’s vineyard is about the terrible sin of the abuse of power by King Ahab (chapter 21). Elijah was carried up to heaven in a chariot of fire (2 Kings 2:1-) and succeeded by Elisha. He too was a miracle maker. He obtained a son for the Shunemite woman and later raised him from the dead (2 Kings 4:8-37), he multiplied loaves (4:42-), and healed Naaman, the Syrian leper (chapter 5).
26. In 721 BC the Assyrians invaded the Northern Kingdom of Israel.
In 721 BC the Assyrians invaded the Northern Kingdom of Israel and deported its inhabitants and replaced them with people from other areas of their empire. These learned to worship the Lord whom they considered to be the local god. This is the origin of the Samaritans (2 Kings 17).
Ten years later the Southern Kingdom of Judah was also threatened by the Assyrians. The prophet Isaiah appeared as spokesman for God. In 632 BC, the Book of the Law was found by men doing repair work in the Temple and this lead to a religious reform in Judah and later in Samaria (2K 22-23).
In 600BC Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon invaded Judah, deported the people, carried away all the altar vessels and furnishings from the Temple and destroyed Jerusalem (2 Kings 24). This was the end of the kingdoms of Judah and Israel and the period of Exile began.
27. The first and second Books of Chronicles.
The first and second Books of Chronicles cover more or less the same period as the Books of Samuel and Kings. The Books of Ezra and Nehemia cover the end of the 70 years of exile. King Cyrus of Persia – instructed by God - allowed the exiles to return to their homeland and rebuild their Temple. Not every one wanted to return. The first group numbered only 42,000 and they faced many difficulties.
28. The Book of Tobit is an exile story about Tobias, the son of Tobit.
The Book of Tobit is an exile story about Tobias, the son of Tobit, being helped by the Archangel Raphael to marry a girl whose seven husbands were all killed by a demon on the wedding night.
The Book of Judith relates how a young woman rescued a town besieged by the Assyrian army by walking over to their camp and pretending to be a deserter. She killed and beheaded their general in chief.
The Book of Esther is another exile story about Esther from the tribe of Benjamin saving the lives of her compatriots.