New Testament Times provides a short reconstruction of the cultural background in which Christianity arose and developed from the time of the Maccabean Revolt to A.D. 138. The book begins with an explanation of the relevance of the historical, political, social, and economic background during the first century which helps furnish a proper understanding of the New Testament. Dr. Tenney takes into account all the possible historical sources—canonical and non-canonical, literary and archaeological. A survey of the world situation after the death of Alexander the Great includes a summary of the Maccabean revolt, crucial to the understanding of the messianic hopes of the Jewish people. Dr. Tenney saw three cultural tensions playing upon the embryonic church: Judaism, Roman imperialism, and Hellenism
Old Testament Times deals in a non-technical manner with the broad social and cultural context in which the events recorded in the Bible took place. Particular attention is given to recent archaeological discoveries and the light they shed on the Old Testament. The world of the Old Testament was geographically and politically interdependent and coexisted with the world of the ancient Near East. The people and times of the Old Testament cannot and must not be studied in isolation from the larger Near Eastern background. Any information that can be discovered about the history, religion, languages, literatures and cultures of ancient Oriental peoples have an important bearing upon our understanding of the people of God.
