Torah, Tanakh, and the Old Testament: How They Differ

The Torah is the first five books of the Bible. The Tanakh is the entire Hebrew Bible, 24 books, of which the Torah is the first part. The Old Testament is the Christian name for essentially the same texts, arranged in a different order, counted differently, and in Catholic and Orthodox Bibles, with additional books.

The difference at a glance

The Torah: five books

Bereishis, Shemos, Vayikra, Bamidbar, and Devarim: Genesis through Deuteronomy. Jewish tradition holds they were given to Moshe at Sinai, and they are written in the Torah scroll read in synagogue each week. They are the holiest layer of Jewish scripture. More in what the Torah is.

The Tanakh: the whole Hebrew Bible

"Tanakh" is an acronym of its three sections: Torah, Nevi'im (Prophets), and Kesuvim (Writings). Together they make 24 books:

• Torah (5): Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy.
• Nevi'im (8): Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and the Twelve (the shorter prophets, from Hosea to Malachi, counted as one book).
• Kesuvim (11): Psalms, Proverbs, Job, Song of Songs, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, Esther, Daniel, Ezra-Nehemiah, and Chronicles.

The Tanakh is Jewish scripture in full. The Prophets are read in synagogue as the haftarah each Shabbat; the Writings fill the liturgy, from the Psalms said every morning to the five megillos read through the year.

The Old Testament: the same texts, arranged differently

Christians call the Hebrew scriptures the Old Testament, alongside the New Testament. In Protestant Bibles the books are the same as the Tanakh's, but they are split and reordered into 39: Samuel, Kings, and Chronicles become two books each, Ezra and Nehemiah are separated, and the Twelve become twelve. The order follows the ancient Greek translation, grouping history, wisdom, and prophecy, so the Old Testament ends with Malachi, while the Tanakh ends with Chronicles and the return to Jerusalem.

Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Old Testaments also include books found in the Greek translation but not in the Hebrew Bible, such as Tobit, Judith, and 1 and 2 Maccabees. Jewish tradition preserves some of these as history but does not count them as scripture.

Do the translations differ?

Sometimes. Jewish translations work from the Hebrew Masoretic text and are read alongside the classic Jewish commentaries; Christian translations also work from the Hebrew but at points follow the Greek, or read verses through Christian interpretation. Chapter and verse numbers also occasionally differ: in the Hebrew, a psalm's heading is often counted as its first verse, and the last verses of Malachi are 3:19-24 in a Jewish Bible and 4:1-6 in many Christian ones.

Where does the Talmud fit?

Outside all three. The Talmud isn't part of the Bible at all: it is the written record of the Oral Torah, the rabbinic teaching that explains how the written text is lived. See Torah vs. Talmud.

Reading it yourself

The best way to feel the difference is to read the Tanakh in its own order, with the Hebrew beside the English. Start with reading Tanakh with the Hebrew, or simply with this week's Torah portion.

Bayit has all 24 books of the Tanakh in Hebrew and English side by side, with any verse one tap from a question.