The People of Ancient Israel (Angelico Press)

The People of Ancient Israel is the shortest book in Dorothy Mills' six volume history set, spanning only 210 pages. The book begins by describing the land of Palestine, including its size, terrain, vegetation, and climate. Ms. Mills then briefly details both the Hebrew Scriptures and "tales" such as Creation, the Flood, and the Tower of Babel. She points out that the world owes a great deal to the Hebrews, because they taught the world about God in their writings.

After these few brief chapters, we reach the main focus of this book - the people. Of course we start with the Patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Included in this section is a lot of what you would find in Scripture. However, there is also some personal commentary on certain topics, like why Abraham would listen to God and agree to sacrifice his son Isaac. Her reasoning and viewpoint seems centered on cultural reasons for this near-sacrifice and that Abraham obtained the idea from culture and not from God. She also doesn't say that God sent an angel to stop the sacrifice, but that Abraham reached a level of understanding that this sacrifice would not be pleasing to God. That is definitely one way of looking at it, but not how I would teach it.

After the Patriarchs is mention of Joseph and Moses. Following Moses, we begin to see the nation of Israel take shape with their wandering in the desert. The reason for this is because they were issued the Law (or the Ten Commandments). The nation finally gets roots with their conquest of Canaan, and leaders (also known as Judges) ruled over the people. Ms. Mills talks about several of the more famous judges, primarily Samson and Ruth. The nation then becomes a kingdom under Saul, who was followed by David and then Solomon. The most interesting sections to me dealt with the Divided Kingdom, Israel's fall, and their time in captivity.

The book then ends with "In the fulness if time, the Teacher came. At Bethlehem, in the days of Herod the King, seventy years before the destruction of Jerusalem, Christ was born, who by his life and teaching made possible the fulfilment of the ancient visions." I have mixed feelings about this book. On the one hand, Dorothy Mills does a nice job making history interesting and come alive. On the other hand, there are a few troubling statements in the book. Overall, I would give this book 4 stars.

This book was provided to me for free by Angelico Press in exchange for an honest review. If you found this review helpful, please click here and hit Yes!

The Book of the Ancient World (Angelico Press)

If you're a homeschooling mom (or dad) or one considering homeschooling, then you know there are a TON of curriculum options out there. Some are better than others, but it really boils down to what style of homeschooling you are going to employ. If you are taking the classical approach, like my wife and I intend to do, then you definitely know the name Dorothy Mills. Dorothy Mills wrote a six book series on ancient history. Two different publishers have taken the time to re-print these, Memoria Press and Angelico Press. Even though Memoria Press has student and teacher guides, you can purchase with them, they only have four of the six volumes. Personally, I prefer the Angelico Press editions after all and will be reviewing one volume every other month on my blog. Today, I am starting with The Book of the Ancient World.

The Book of the Ancient World begins with an Introduction that speaks of cave men and prehistoric times. It speaks of making stone tools and how some people don't believe history really started until man was able to keep written records. I'm honestly unsure how I felt about this introduction, but thankfully it was short and something you could skip over and not miss anything in the book. The contents of the rest of the book includes the Egyptians; the Assyrians and Babylonians; the Hebrews; the Hittites; the Persians; and the Phoenicians. Egypt by far gets the most attention as it spans over 50 pages. The rest of the ancient people, with the exception of Israel, only garnered about 20-25 pages.

It was hard to pick a favorite part in this book. The level of detail given to the Egyptians was fascinating. Ms. Mills didn't just discuss popular pharaohs and their pyramids, but she also covered their gods, their books and writings, what typical life consisted of in Egypt, and even how children lived in Egypt. She also did a truly great job addressing Israel. In this section, she included the Patriarchs, the three kings (Saul, David, and Solomon), and the Divided Kingdom. I am truly fascinated to see what level of detail she went into in her book, The People of Ancient Israel. I wish more information would have been included on places like Persia and Phoenicia, but I appreciate that there was additional reading suggestions at the end. The one that I wish there had been more of/any of was maps! Maps would have definitely elevated this book, and perhaps they were there in the original edition, but not in this reprint.

After reading through this book, I feel much more knowledgeable about the ancient world. Yes, some information may be a tad dated as we have made new finds regarding these ancient worlds, but that doesn't take away from the quality of this work or the information that Dorothy Mills compiled. And while the book won't make you a certified expert, it will provide you a great starting point on the subject. So if you are an adult looking for an introduction to the ancient world or a teacher/parent looking for a supplemental text to your history book, you will find this book to be extremely helpful. I imagine you could use it as the skeleton for your homeschool history, but you will definitely want to find some more resources to add meat to the bones.

This book was provided to me for free by Angelico Press in exchange for an honest review. If you found this review helpful, please click here and hit Yes!