What is the first book of the Old Testament?

The first book of the Old Testament is Genesis.

Genesis opens with the creation of the world and continues through the earliest stories of humanity, including Adam and Eve, Noah’s flood, and the Tower of Babel. Its second major section follows the ancestors of Israel: Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph.

The name Genesis comes from the Greek word for “origin” or “beginning.” The book is traditionally attributed to Moses in Jewish and Christian tradition, while modern scholarship commonly studies it as a text formed from several traditions and stages of composition.

Genesis ends in Egypt with Joseph’s death, setting up the events of Exodus. Readers sometimes confuse Genesis with the whole Pentateuch, but Genesis is only the first of five books traditionally associated with Moses. The other four are Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. In the Hebrew Bible, Genesis is called Bereshit, after its opening Hebrew word.