Why is the Bible not in chronologic order?

Answer 1

The Bible should not be studied purely as a book of history. Basically it follows a chonologic order, however, it is divided into sections. The first part of the Old Testament is considered the Law as given by Moses and includes the early history of Israel. Then there are books that cover the period after Moses but prior to the selection of a King. In the middle are books of prose: Psalms, Job, Song of Solomon. The final books of the Old Testament are books of Prophecy, with the major prophets followed by books by minor prophets. The New Testament begins with the books that descibe the the time of Jesus's ministry. This is followed by Acts, which picks up the history of the early Church. The books that follow this are letters of teaching for the new Church and ends with Revelations, another book of prophecy. See the Related Links for "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Testaments" to the bottom for the answer. Remember that the Hebrew Scriptures were not collected into 'books' as we know them, bound in units and easily read on an individual basis. The scriptures were in the form of scrolls. The convention was to order the materials more by size than by chronology. So you typically see the longer books first, and the shorter ones later.

You can buy some Bibles that are arranged in order of chronology, which makes for very interesting reading, although not obviously the normal order.