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The Bible in its ancient contexts

The Bible was not written on an isolated island. It is evident that the authors knew a lot about the religions and cultures around them. The writers of the Old Testament had to take a position with regard to the Canaanites, the Babylonians, and the Egyptians, and the writers of the New Testament related to their Hellenistic and Roman context. If you know more about those contexts, you can also understand the Bible much better. On the one hand, it becomes clear that much in the Bible more or less corresponds with what also appears in other ancient texts. But on the other hand, there are also strongly divergent lines to be discovered in the Bible. Actually, you cannot explain the biblical texts well if you do not know the background against which those texts were written.

  • Course content

    In this course, you will develop insight into important theological and philosophical themes as well as sociological phenomena that occur in the Bible (for example, creation, providence, evil, morality, prayer, sickness and healing, faith, patronage, slavery, friendship, rhetoric) and that also play an important role in non-biblical texts from the same period. Both the similarities and the differences are analyzed, after which the theological implications for our own time are also examined.

    If the number of registrations for this course is six or more, it will take place as a regular course. If there are fewer registrations, the course will take the form of a tutorial. Students will be informed as soon as possible about changes in the course setup.

    Knowledge of Biblical Hebrew and/or Greek is recommended, but not necessary. The analysis of non-biblical texts is done on the basis of English translations.

  • Size

    The seminar is 7.5 ECTS.

  • Period

    November 2025 to January 2026

  • For who?

    For everyone who is interested in themes from Biblical texts and non-Biblical texts from the Biblical period, the differences and similarities between them, and the consequences for the interpretation of these texts

  • Literature

    For students choosing the track Old Testament:

    • Bill T. Arnold, Bryan E. Beyer, Readings from the Ancient Near East: Primary Sources for Old Testament Study, 2002 or later edition
    • John H. Walton, Ancient Near Eastern Thought and the Old Testament: Introducing the Conceptual World of the Hebrew Bible, 2nd edition, 2018. 

    For students choosing the track New Testament:

    • Joel B. Green and Lee Martin McDonald, eds., The World of the New Testament: Cultural, Social, and Historical Contexts. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2013.

  • Lecturers

  • Assessment

    You will write a paper comparing a passage or theme from the Bible with relevant non-biblical texts from the ancient Near East. You will evaluate the implications for how the Bible can be used in our own time and context.