Grace, Concealed in the Old Testament, is Revealed in the New.

This grace hid itself under a veil in the Old Testament, but it has been revealed in the New Testament according to the most perfectly ordered dispensation of the ages, forasmuch as God knew how to dispose all things. And perhaps it is a part of this hiding of grace, that in the Decalogue, which was given on Mount Sinai, only the portion which relates to the Sabbath was hidden under a prefiguring precept. The Sabbath is a day of sanctification; and it is not without significance that, among all the works which God accomplished, the first sound of sanctification was heard on the day when He rested from all His labours. On this, indeed, we must not now enlarge. But at the same time I deem it to be enough for the point now in question, that it was not for nothing that the nation was commanded on that day to abstain from all servile work, by which sin is signified; but because not to commit sin belongs to sanctification, that is, to God's gift through the Holy Spirit. And this precept alone among the others, was placed in the law, which was written on the two tables of stone, in a prefiguring shadow, under which the Jews observe the Sabbath, that by this very circumstance it might be signified that it was then the time for concealing the grace, which had to be revealed in the New Testament by the death of Christ—the rending, as it were, of the veil. Matthew 27:51 For when, says the apostle, it shall turn to the Lord, the veil shall be taken away. 2 Corinthians 3:16

The Tanakh means the entire canon of the Hebrew or Jewish Bible. It is actually an acronym, comprised of the first Hebrew letter of each of the Masoretic Text's three traditional subdivisions:

• Torah - תּוֹרָה ("Teaching"),
• Nevi'im - נְבִיאִים ("Prophets") and
• Ketuvim - כְּתוּבִים ("Writings").

thus TaNaKh (transliteration limitations, as in English it appears as though the acronym would be better rendered as Tonek — ToNeK).

For Catholic, Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox Christians, that is, for the Orthodox-Catholic Church, the Old Testament canon can be spoken of as including protocanonical scripture and deuterocanonical scripture. The protocanonical books are: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1–2 Samuel, 1–2 Kings, 1–2 Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, Daniel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi. The term deuterocanonical, from the Greek, means "belonging to the second canon," but these deuterocanonical scriptures, unfortunately with some comparatively very minor variations among the Churches as to which scripture makes the list, are considered canonical by Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox.

[reconcile]

; corresponding, though not exactly, to what Christians call the Old Testament. This Jewish canon is also referred to as the Masoretic Text, indeed Tanakh is But note that oldest extant copies of the Masoretic Text date from the 9th or 10th Centuries, AD. The oldest nearly complete manuscripts of the Jewish canon in any language are manuscripts of the Septuagint -- the LXX, the Koine Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures completed in Alexandria around 100 BC, or a little earlier -- the oldest of which are included in the Codex Vaticanus (4th Century, Anno Domini), the Codex Sinaiticus (4th Century, Anno Domini), and the Codex Alexandrinus (5th Century, Anno Domini), all three of which derive from the same LXX. Other manuscripts of only fragments of the Jewish canon are much older than either the Septuagint or the Masoretic Text. Understanding differences among Septuagint, Masoretic and Vulgate manuscripts and textual analysis and criticism of these is a highly specialized and complex science which the present writer is not remotely qualified to enter into even in the most introductory ways that might be imagined.

Torah is synonymous with Pentateuch only in part. Though there may still be scholarly debate as to how ancient the tradition is of dividing the first part of the Bible into five books, the Greek word Pentateuch refers to those Five Books of Moses, the written Torah, in Hebrew תּוֹרָה. This Pentateuch, these Five Books are:

• Genesis - Γένεση (ή Γένεσις) - (origin), in Hebrew Bereshit / בְּרֵאשִׁית, "In the beginning";
• Exodus - Έξοδος (going out), in Hebrew, Shemot / שִׁמוֹת, "Names";
• Leviticus - Λευιτικός (relating to the Levites), in Hebrew Vayikra / ויקרא, literally "And He called";
• Numbers - Ἀριθμοί (numbering of the Isrealites), in Hebrew Bəmidbar / במדבר, literally "In the desert [of]"; and
• Deuteronomy - Δευτερονόμιον (second law), in Hebrew Devarim / דברים, literally "Things" or "Words" .

But Torah — "direction" or "instruction" or "teaching" or "the Law" — in Jewish use can also refer, in addition to these Five Books of Moses, to so-called oral Torah, ordinances which put into effect the laws contained in the Pentateuch and commentaries or indeed to the totality of Jewish doctrine. At all events the Torah as Pentateuch is the foundational text of Judaism and is part of the Tanakh, the Jewish Bible.