Bible Study Tools: Atlas

When I was just starting out in this life-long pursuit of reading my Bible, I rarely spent any time with that collection of maps in the back of my Bible. Today, many study Bibles include various maps and charts at points where it would be helpful to have a geographical frame
of reference, but an Atlas is the tool that you need to take that geographical study to the next level. It is quite possible to read and understand the Bible without ever cracking open an Atlas, but the use of an Atlas can bring so much clarity to the Word of God that it would
be a disservice if I didn’t at least make you aware of its potential.

At the most basic level, an Atlas is a collection of maps that focus on the places that are referenced in the Bible’s narrative, but there is much, much more. An Atlas can show you the importance of geography as it related to climate, history, archaeology, and topography. But even more than all these features, the Bible tells the story of God meeting real people in real time and real places, yet we rarely ask the question, “why here.” People who take trips the Holy Land want to walk where Jesus walked, they want to visit the places where significant Biblical events happen, they want to view the Bible’s landscape from their own first-person perspective. They do this because they realize the value that geography plays in the Bible’s narrative; besides, I’ve never heard of a person tell me that their trip to the Holy Land was not beneficial to their Bible study!

Here are a few recommended Atlas’ to get you started. ESV Concise Bible Atlas by David P. Barrett. If you want a short and quick guide to get your feet wet, then is the one that you want. This is the shorten version of the much larger edition from Crossway. Zondervan Essential Atlas of the Bible by Carl Rasmussen. This is a basic Atlas written by a man who served as the Dean of the Institute of Holy Land studies in Jerusalem for many years. The Basic Bible Atlas: A Fascinating Guide to the Land of the Bible by John A. Beck. This Atlas claims to be basic but what I really like is how the author weaves the narrative of the Bible into its geographical context. In other words, it’s not a collection of random Bible maps, it is a purposeful tracing of the history of salvation that stops along the way to demonstrate the value of physical settings and places. I’ve given you three choices, but there are many more out there. It’s time to go beyond the back of your Bible and find an Atlas that will add more insight to your Bible reading.