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Notes derived from: Hillsdale College Korey D. Maas Assistant Professor of History https://online.hillsdale.edu/courses/western-heritage/lessons/the-hebrews

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• Abraham / Sarah
• United Monarchy: Saul, David, Solomon
• Israel — repeatedly conquered, enslaved, and colonized: Egypt, Assyria, Babylon, Rome
• Israel leaves no lasting monuments (i.e. Parthenon, Colosseum)
• ideas have consequences
• human / divine ideas are the most lasting contribution to the Western Heritage
• The following ideas do not begin with and are not exclusive with the Hebrews:

Creation

• other ancient people record account of creation
• often modern people do not find the Hebrew account particularly strange
• Enuma Elish — The Babylonian Epic of Creation [text] — (< 12th Century BC)
• The Theogony of Hesiod [text] — (~700 BC)
  • chaos and violence — part of the above accounts, but absent from the Hebraic accounts of creation
  • the earth is fashioned from material which already existed
  • heaven and earth are depicted as living deities
  • chaos > violence
  • Pandora — the first woman, made with the expressed purpose of bringing trouble to the world of men
• Genesis
  • Genesis 1 and 3 and 17
  • in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth
  • first there was God, then ex nihilo (out of nothing) God created the earth
  • Israel professed a God which transcended creation — a God who stands outside and above the natural world — supernatural
  • nature is not composed God, but created by God
  • begins peacefully and proceeds orderly
  • Day 1-3 — separates
  • Day 4-6 — populates these now distinct arenas, culminating with the creation of man in his own image, male and female, both in his him

Covenant

• to Abraham — “I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring, forever”
• Hebrew (berith) — Greek (diatheke) — Latin (testamentum)
• one’s last will and testament - a contract, unilaterally initiated — the terms established by a single party, a binding promise, one party is making to and for the benefit of another
• Abraham does have a son and descendants
• Exodus 19:5