Understanding the Old Testament: Context and Audience

A Look at Time, Culture, and Audience

Before we roll up our sleeves and go line by line through Genesis, I think it’s worth pausing to ask a bigger question: Where did all this come from? Not just “how did it get preserved?” or “how was it translated?” but — when was the Old Testament actually written, who wrote it, and for whom?

This isn’t a mystery novel with a twist ending — no dusty scrolls will reveal a single author with a quill and divine dictation. Instead, what we find is a layered, complex history that spans centuries and reflects the needs, politics, and hopes of the ancient people who produced it.

So, let’s zoom out. What we call “The Old Testament” (or in Jewish tradition, the Tanakh) wasn’t written all at once. It grew over time, piece by piece, often in response to massive political, social, and religious upheavals.

First: A Note About Terms

When I say “Old Testament,” I’m using the name most familiar to those of us coming from a Christian background. In Jewish tradition, this collection is called the Tanakh — a Hebrew acronym referring to the Torah (Law), Nevi’im (Prophets), and Ketuvim (Writings). The content overlaps, but the organization and interpretation are often quite different.

For now, I’ll keep using “Old Testament” for clarity, but we’ll get into those distinctions more later.

A Text Born in Exile?

Let’s start with a moment that’s often considered a turning point in biblical authorship: the Babylonian Exile (around 586 BCE).

This was a cultural earthquake. The Kingdom of Judah fell to Babylon, the temple in Jerusalem was destroyed, and many Judeans were deported. For a people whose religion centered around that temple — and whose identity was deeply tied to land and kingship — this was a crisis.

And what do humans do in a crisis? They write. They collect. They remember. They ask: Who are we, now that everything we thought permanent is gone?

Many scholars believe it was during or shortly after this exile that large portions of the Old Testament began to take their current shape. Earlier oral traditions, local records, and theological ideas were gathered, edited, and woven into a new kind of scripture — one that could hold a people together even in diaspora.

But Surely Some of It Is Older?

Yes, and no.

Parts of the Old Testament may trace back to oral traditions as early as 1200 BCE — epic poems, tribal stories, and early laws passed down long before anything was written. For example, the Song of Deborah (Judges 5) is often cited as one of the oldest biblical poems, possibly from the 12th century BCE.

But these were not yet “scripture” in the sense we know it. They were stories told by campfire, in sanctuaries, at festivals — shaped and reshaped by memory, geography, and purpose. Writing them down came later.

The Torah (Genesis through Deuteronomy): A Patchwork Quilt

The first five books — sometimes called the Pentateuch — are a prime example of layered composition. Scholars often refer to this as the Documentary Hypothesis, which proposes that the Torah draws from four main sources, each with its own vocabulary, theology, and political agenda:

J (Yahwist): Possibly written around 950 BCE in the southern Kingdom of Judah. Earthy and personal in style, often using the name Yahweh for God.
E (Elohist): Possibly from around 850 BCE in the northern Kingdom of Israel. Uses the term Elohim and tends to highlight prophetic figures.
D (Deuteronomist): Associated with the religious reforms of King Josiah (around 620 BCE). Much of Deuteronomy comes from this strand.
P (Priestly): Likely post-exilic (after 586 BCE), with a focus on ritual, genealogy, and temple purity.

These threads were later stitched together by redactors — editors who weren’t just copying things down, but shaping theology and identity through narrative.

So, Genesis? It wasn’t written by Moses in a tent in the wilderness. It’s more like a carefully edited anthology, bringing together ancient traditions to tell a bigger story about origins, purpose, and destiny.

Who Was It Written For?

At each stage, the audience shifted.

In the monarchic period (before the Exile), texts might have served kings, priests, and temple elites. These texts explained the king’s divine legitimacy or instructed the community in religious law.
During and after the Exile, the texts became more democratized — meant to be read aloud in gatherings, remembered in exile, and studied as the foundation of a portable identity. Scripture became the sacred ground that could travel, even when the physical land was lost.
In the Second Temple period (roughly 500 BCE–70 CE), the Old Testament (still a developing collection at the time) was shaped by scribes, teachers, and communities trying to define who they were in a world of foreign empires — Persian, then Greek, then Roman.

Each stage added new layers of meaning, new urgency. The texts reflect debates: Who is really Israel? What does God want from us? Why do bad things happen? What does justice look like?

Cultural Influences

The ancient Israelites didn’t live in a vacuum. They were part of a swirling, complicated region shaped by:

Mesopotamian myths (like the Epic of Gilgamesh, which echoes parts of Genesis)
Egyptian wisdom literature
Canaanite religion (which influenced Israelite worship more than later editors liked to admit)
Babylonian legal codes (such as Hammurabi’s, which predate Moses)

Understanding the Old Testament means placing it alongside its neighbors — not to diminish its uniqueness, but to appreciate the shared human landscape it came from.

So When Was It “Finished”?

Even by the time of Jesus, the Old Testament wasn’t fully “closed.” Different Jewish communities recognized different collections. Some considered books like Enoch or Jubilees sacred. The Septuagint (a Greek translation produced around 250 BCE) included texts that aren’t in the modern Hebrew Bible.

It wasn’t until around the 2nd century CE that the Jewish canon began to solidify into the version we recognize today.

Why Does This Matter?

For me — someone who once read these texts as the word-for-word voice of God, and now reads them as a sacred window into ancient people’s lives — this history doesn’t diminish the Bible’s value. If anything, it deepens it.

Knowing when and why these texts were written shows us that scripture isn’t just truth from above — it’s truth from among. From people navigating war, loss, hope, survival, power, and meaning. People not so different from us.

Understanding that changes the questions I ask when I read. Instead of, “What does this tell me about God’s plan for me today?” I now ask, “What was this trying to say to them, back then? And what echoes still reach me now?”

Sacred Scholar