An investigation into the covenant that YHVH made with the people He led out of Egypt. The Sinai covenant is a lot more complex and controversial than the Abrahamic covenant. The Sinai covenant was conceived to be a type of “suzerain treaty” establishing YHVH as king and Israel as the vassal. Why was it necessary for YHVH to create another covenant with Israel? He already had a covenant with their forefathers. The Sabbath is to serve as the reminder of this covenant. Why would YHVH specifically choose the Sabbath as the sign?

In the Bible we see a clear description of the relationship between YHVH and His people. This relationship has gone through many ups and downs throughout the history of the Bible. The rules for this relationship are defined in the Bible by the means of a covenant between YHVH and His people. Thus it is of the utmost importance for us to understand these covenants if we would like to understand the relationship that YHVH wants with us. Covenants are not something unique to the Bible. On the contrary, we find many examples of extra-biblical documents that describes covenants where we see clear correlation between the form and content of covenants in the Bible and covenants used by other nations. This topic is huge and many volumes have been written about it by many experienced scholars. Thus we will need to break this into smaller parts if we want to be able to comprehend it all. Before we get into the discussions of the different covenants and what they mean it is most important that we get to grips with the basics. This article will focus on some of the basic terms and concepts regarding covenants in the time of the Bible.