Why are the First 5 Books of the Bible the Most Important?

[Eric]

Why not Proverbs, Psalms or...any of the other seemingly more important Wisdom books, that hold the keys to God and understanding? I've always wondered this - barring Genesis; because that's obviously the most important book of the Bible.

The Pentateuch tells the story of the "Jewish" people...their "exile" and codifies laws and general rules, why should this super cede the actual substance of the Bible - the meat of the spiritual works, so to speak?
Maybe I should re read them and see if I missed things. I don't understand, the only thing it could be is that they hold this code or laws above superficially the rest - sort of artificially; like in a classroom, they always state the rules first and emphasize...even though the actual meat of the class is what's more important. This is the only thing I can think of. Maybe there is some hidden kabbalistic code in the first books that I'm missing - which reveals more important information. What do some of you- who are educated on this subject, think.

I would particularly like to hear from fschmidt, if he will talk to me on it.

[Eric]

I see no one gives a shit about this topic. ..

[fschmidt]

The Pentateuch does not tell the story of the "Jewish" people, it tells the story of the Israelite people. The Jews claim to be descendants of one subset of this group, Judah. And of course most of the Old Testament tells the history of the Israelites, so this isn't the key point.

One point is historical, the Pentateuch was assembled first. The rest was assembled later. So the Pentateuch has a historical advantage.

But the key point is that the Pentateuch is where the key ethical principles are given, and applied to a specific situation as laws. No new laws or ethical principles are added after the Pentateuch. So the rest of the Old Testament is essentially commentary on the Pentateuch.

If you really want insight, join our Old Testament readings:

http://www.mikraite.org/Online-Old-Test ... tp145.html

We cover the Pentateuch each year.