Authorship of the Old Testament

Few biblical books are regarded by scholars as the product of a single individual, and all have been edited to produce the works known today. The following article outlines the conclusions of the majority of contemporary scholars, along with the traditional views, both Jewish and Christian.

Jews, Samaritans, and Christians have, in different ways, regarded the Bible as being the "Word of God", or as having been authored by the Jewish/Christian God. In many Christian liturgies, the words "This is the word of the Lord" will follow a Scripture reading. As Saint Thomas Aquinas stated: "The author of Holy Scripture is God". The Westminster Confession of Faith (1646) asserts that the Bible's authority depends "wholly upon God (who is truth itself), the Author thereof; and therefore it is to be received, because it is the Word of God".

A few of the books of the Minor Prophets claim divine origin, as well as the book's transmission through a human prophet. Hosea 1:1 has (possibly as a heading), "The word of the Lord that came to Hosea son of Beeri...", while Joel, Micah and Zephaniah all commence in a similar fashion. James L. Mays suggests that it was the theological understanding of the final redactor that the book as a whole is the "word of Yahweh".

There is some debate as to how the word of God may have been transmitted to the authors. Modern Christian theology usually sees the word as inspired by God, while some believe that God verbally dictated the word to those who recorded it (this being the position held by Orthodox Jews regarding the Torah, the holiest part of the Jewish Bible).

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