Lawrence Boadt’s excellent Reading the Old Testament has a chart on page 79 that illustrates some key differences between the way the ancients viewed history and the way we do today. We tend to be shocked when we discover that there might be any deviation from what we subconsciously have accepted as the only viewpoint. These are examples Boadt gives for distinctions that should inform our study of the Old Testament, even the parts written in some sense as history. Here is the chart:
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