People of the Bible

The Patriarchs (traditionally early 2nd millennium BC)

"The friend of God" (Jas.2.23) and "the father of us all" (Rom.4.16), the paradigm of justifying faith (Gen.15.6)

Babylonian Exile + Return (6th c. BC; reigns of Nebuchadnezzar, Belshazzar, Darius the Mede, Cyrus)

The faithful exile who served pagan courts without compromise and received the apocalyptic visions (Daniel 7–12) that shape biblical end-times expectation; Jesus cites him by name (Mat.24.15)

United Monarchy (reign traditionally c. 1010–970 BC)

"a man after his own heart" (BSB, 1Sa.13.14), the phrase popularly quoted as "a man after God's own heart", and founder of the royal line from which Jesus, the "Son of David," comes (Mat.1.1)

Divided Monarchy (Northern Kingdom; reigns of Ahab and Ahaziah)

The prophet who confronted Baalism on Mount Carmel and was taken to heaven without dying, held up as the model of powerful prayer and a forerunner of the Messiah

Persian Period / Exile + Return (reign of Ahasuerus / Xerxes I, 5th c. BC)

The queen who risked her life, "if I perish, I perish" (Est.4.16), to avert the genocide of the Jews; her deliverance is commemorated annually at the Feast of Purim

End of the Judges / dawn of the Monarchy

A woman whose private, silent prayer was mistaken for drunkenness by the high priest, and whose answered vow produced the prophet who anointed Saul and David

Divided Monarchy / Judah (reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, Hezekiah; 8th c. BC)

The prophet of "the Holy One of Israel" whose Messianic and Suffering-Servant oracles are quoted more in the New Testament than any other prophet, his book is sometimes called "the fifth Gospel"

Patriarchal age (Middle Bronze Age setting; traditional ~early 2nd millennium BC)

The man renamed Israel, the eponymous ancestor of the nation, through whom God carried the Abrahamic covenant to the next generation

The Patriarchs (traditionally early–mid 2nd millennium BC)

The man whose suffering God turned to salvation, "you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good" (Gen.50.20)

Exodus, Wilderness, and Conquest

The faithful successor who led Israel across the Jordan into the Promised Land and allotted it among the tribes

Exodus / Wilderness (traditionally c. 15th–13th c. BC)

The man God used to bring Israel out of slavery and give them the Law, the OT's greatest prophet (Deu.34.10) and a stated type of Christ (Jhn.5.46)

Period of the Judges (pre-Monarchy)

A Gentile woman whose faith and loyalty make her great-grandmother of King David and an ancestor of Jesus, a standing emblem of *chesed* (covenant kindness) and of God's inclusion of outsiders

Transition from the Judges to the United Monarchy

The transitional figure who closed the era of the judges and inaugurated Israel's monarchy by anointing its first two kings

The Patriarchs

The one woman in Scripture whose age at death is recorded, whose laughter names her son, and whom the New Testament holds up four separate times, for faith, for freedom, and as a mother of those who do right

1st century AD

The beloved disciple to whom the dying Jesus entrusted his own mother (Jhn.19.26-27), closest companion of Jesus and traditional author of the most theologically distinctive NT writings

1st century AD

The mother of Jesus whose "let it be done to me according to your word" (Luk.1.38) makes her the model of believing assent, and, across the centuries, the most theologically contested figure after Christ himself

1st century AD

The persecutor turned apostle whose Damascus-road conversion (Act.9.3-6) and Gentile mission shaped the spread and the theology of early Christianity

1st century AD

The fisherman who confessed Jesus as the Christ (Mat.16.16), denied him three times (Luk.22.54-62), was restored (Jhn.21.15-17), and became the church's foremost early leader