Lesson 6 – Reading Didactic Prose

Just give it to me straight.

Stories are great and all, but sometimes we just want someone to tell us exactly what they’re thinking. This is what didactic prose is: the sermons, law codes, and epistles of the Bible that present truth in a logical order.

Still, reading didactic literature takes practice. And it’s important to know the logical, historical, and literary context of each book you read.

Check out the Previous Lessons…

Did you miss a lesson? Want to watch it again? Click below to access them: 

• Lesson 1: What the Bible Is (and Isn’t)
• Lesson 2: Christ on Every Page
• Lesson 3: Plot Context in Biblical Narratives
• Lesson 4: Historical Context in Biblical Narratives
• Lesson 5: Literary Context in Biblical Narratives

These lessons are just the beginning of a full-school-year course called Equipped! Tools for Exploring the Bible.

After these 8 lessons the journey continues as we open the Bible book by book, showing the literary structure of all 27 books of the New Testament. Students will learn…

• How the message of Jesus was so countercultural for its own day—and why it continues to be in our own
• Fluency in the stylistic patterns and literary techniques of the New Testament authors, including: metaphor, parable, chiasm, hyperbole, amplification, inclusio, parallelism, and repetition (and if you don’t know what those are, don’t worry—your student will after they take this course)
• The value of plot context, literary context, and historical context for grasping the meaning of the Biblical stories
• Techniques for identifying basic genres of literature in the Bible and how these genres should shape how readers approach biblical texts
• Chronological, geographical, and cultural details that enrich our appreciation for the historicity and message of the New Testament