Climbing Mount Toread: Religion & Mythology

I undertook a year-long homemade course on religion and mythology, during which I read, amongst other things, the 'Holy Trilogy' (Hebrew Bible; New Testament; Qur'an). I wrote to organise my thoughts; on this page I have organised my posts firstly thematically, then chronologically. The early posts are heavy on summary; when I started the Qur'an I found that it did not lend itself to summary, so from then on my posts became a more balanced combination of summary, history and discussion. I also wrote a brief history of Jewish, Christian, and Islamic fundamentalism.

I wrote conclusions for each volume in the trilogy, and a final conclusion summarising my opinions on religious matters.

Hebrew Bible

When I began reading the Hebrew Bible, I was resolved to summarise it in as much detail as possible:

Genesis 1-3 (Adam & Eve)
Genesis 4-11 (Cain & Abel, Noah, Tower of Babel)
Genesis 12-25 (Abraham)
Genesis 26-36 (Jacob & Esau)
Genesis 37-50 (Joseph)
Genesis Super Summary
Exodus 1-15 (Moses & Ten Plagues of Egypt)
Exodus 16-40 (Manna from Heaven, Ten Commandments, Golden Calf)
Leviticus (Laws)
Numbers (Quail Plague, Sticks on the Sabbath, Korah's Rebellion, Fiery Serpents, Balaam)
Deuteronomy (Moses' Speech)
Joshua (Conquering the Promised Land)
Judges 1-5 (Ehud, Jael)
Judges 6-8 (Gideon)
Judges 9-12 (Jephthah)
Judges 13-16 (Samson)
Judges 17-21 (Levite & Concubine)
At this point I took a break to read the Qur'an and some of the New Testament. When I returned to the Hebrew Bible I had decided to be less thorough with my summaries:
David & Jonathan
Lamentations
Proverbs
Song of Songs
Chronicles
Habakkuk
Nahum
Haggai
Zephaniah
Esther
Conclusion
I also wrote four posts about stories from the Hebrew Bible's expanded universe:
Creation, Extended Edition
Adam & Eve, Extended Edition
The Ten Generations, Extended Edition
Judith
And three posts about Hebrew Bible scholarship:
The Documentary Hypothesis
Elohim vs Yahweh
The Names of God

New Testament

I decided to read the New Testament books in the approximate order they were written, not in the order in which they are presented in Bibles, so I could see how Christian scripture developed during the early years of the church. My first post is a timeline which sets out this order with some history. The pre-Qur'an posts are longer and more detailed.

Timeline
1 Thessalonians, Galatians
1 Corinthians
Philemon, Philippians
2 Corinthians
The Gospel of Mark
The Gospel of Matthew
I wrote a post about the conflict between Pauline and Jewish Christianity:
Pauline Gentiles & Jewish Christians
And decided to read the Qur'an, then finish off the Hebrew Bible, before returning to the New Testament:
The Synoptic Gospels
Hebrews
The Gospel of John
Conclusion
I also wrote a piece which began as a comparison of flood myths but became about the development of the fallen angel myth out of Judaism and into Christianity:
Floods & Fallen Angels
Considerable time later, I re-read and wrote about the Book of Revelation:
Revelation 1-5: Ascending to Heaven
Revelation 6-8: The Seven Seals
Revelation 8-11: The Seven Trumpets
Revelation 12: The Woman and the Dragon
Revelation 13: The Beasts

Qur'an

I used Tarif Khalidi's translation. For history, my sources were Karen Armstrong's Islam: A Short History and John Esposito's The Future of Islam.