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70 free Books of the Bible trivia questions with answers — literature quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Most Bible trivia asks what happens inside the books. This quiz asks about the books themselves: how many there are and why Catholic and Protestant Bibles disagree, which is the shortest by word count and which the longest, why the Book of Numbers is called that, and how the twelve minor prophets became one scroll in the Hebrew Bible and twelve books in a Christian one. The 70 questions run from Genesis to Revelation and cover the Torah, the histories, Psalms and the wisdom books, the major and minor prophets, the four Gospels, Acts, Paul's thirteen letters, the general epistles and the deuterocanonical books such as Tobit, Judith and Sirach. There is also a short round on how the Bible got its chapters and verses. It suits Sunday school teachers, youth groups, Bible study leaders and anyone who has memorised the order of the books and wants to be tested on more than the order. Every answer is checked against a cited reference page, and the explanations add the detail that makes the fact stick.
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Q 01How many books are in the Old Testament of a typical Protestant Bible?
39
Catholic Bibles count 46 Old Testament books because they include deuterocanonical works such as Wisdom and Maccabees.
Q 02How many books does the New Testament contain in almost every Christian tradition?
27
The 27 break down as four Gospels, Acts, 21 letters and one apocalypse.
Q 03Which ecumenical council explicitly laid out the 73-book canon used by the Catholic Church?
Trent
Trent met from 1545 to 1563 as the Church's answer to the Reformation, and its canon list still governs Catholic Bibles.
Q 04The first five books of the Bible are known collectively by which Greek-derived name?
The Pentateuch
In Judaism the same five books are the Torah, or the Five Books of Moses.
Q 05Which single-chapter book of 21 verses is the shortest in the Hebrew Bible?
Obadiah
Its 440 Hebrew words are still more than three New Testament letters manage in Greek.
Q 06By word count, which is the shortest book in the entire Bible?
3 John
3 John runs to just 219 Greek words; 2 John has fewer verses but slightly more words.
Q 07Which of Paul's letters is his shortest, at only 335 words in Greek?
Philemon
It is a prison letter written to a leader in the church at Colossae, with Timothy named in the opening verse.
Q 08Paul's shortest letter pleads for which runaway slave to be received as a 'brother beloved'?
Onesimus
The letter never orders the master to free him outright, which is why it has been argued over by both abolitionists and their opponents.
Q 09Which two books of the Hebrew Bible never explicitly mention God?
Esther and Song of Songs
Jewish tradition reads the absence as the point: God working through coincidence and human choices rather than open miracles.
Q 10The Book of Esther is read aloud twice from a handwritten scroll during which Jewish holiday?
Purim
It is read once in the evening and again the next morning, and the story explains how the festival began.
Q 11How many psalms are there in the Jewish and Western Christian Book of Psalms?
150
Eastern churches count several more, including Psalm 151, and the collection is arranged in five books echoing the Torah.
Q 12Which chapter of the Psalter, an acrostic of 176 verses, is the longest in the Bible?
Psalm 119
Each set of eight verses starts with a successive letter of the Hebrew alphabet, and it is also the longest chapter in the Bible.
Q 13Which two-verse entry in the Psalter is the shortest chapter in the whole Bible?
Psalm 117
In Hebrew it is just seventeen words, and it also happens to open the Ace of Base song Happy Nation.
Q 21Which is the only apocalyptic book in the New Testament canon?
Revelation
Its author writes from the island of Patmos and opens with letters to the seven churches of Asia.
Q 22Which is the longest of the letters attributed to Paul?
Romans
It is also the sixth book of the New Testament and was probably written from Corinth in the mid-50s AD.
Q 23Which scribe took down Paul's letter to the Romans and slipped in his own greeting?
Tertius
Paul was probably staying at the house of Gaius in Corinth when he dictated it.
How many New Testament books are traditionally attributed to Paul the Apostle?
Q 14Only one entry in the Psalter is attributed to Moses. Which is it?
Psalm 90
Its header reads "A Prayer of Moses, the man of God"; most attributions in the Psalter are to David.
Q 15How many psalms carry the superscription "of David"?
73
Thirteen of those tie themselves to specific episodes in the king's life, though modern scholars do not treat the attributions as history.
Q 16"Jesus wept", the shortest verse in the King James Bible, appears in which Gospel?
John
It comes at the tomb of Lazarus in chapter 11; in the original Greek it is not actually the shortest verse.
Q 17Which three Gospels are known as the Synoptic Gospels?
Matthew, Mark and Luke
The name comes from the Greek for "seeing together": the three share many stories in similar order and often identical wording.
Q 18Most scholars believe which Gospel was written first and used as a source by the others?
Mark
Its earliest manuscripts end abruptly at 16:8, with the women fleeing the empty tomb in fear.
Q 19Which Gospel opens with a preface addressed to a patron named Theophilus?
Luke
The name means "lover of God", and the same dedication reappears at the start of the author's second volume.
Q 20Which New Testament book continues a Gospel's story, forming a two-volume work by the same author?
Acts of the Apostles
Tradition names the author as a doctor who travelled with Paul, though the text itself never names him.
13
Most scholars think Paul himself wrote seven of them, while the three Pastoral letters are widely regarded as written in his name by others.
Q 25Which three letters are grouped together as the Pastoral Epistles?
1 Timothy, 2 Timothy and Titus
The label "pastoral" was popularised in 1703 because the letters advise church leaders on shepherding their flocks.
Q 26Which New Testament letter names no author, though traditionally credited to Paul?
Hebrews
Modern scholarship treats the authorship as unknown; Apollos and Priscilla are among the guesses.
Q 27Which epistle insists that faith without works is dead?
James
It is traditionally credited to James the Just, the brother of Jesus, writing to "the twelve tribes scattered abroad".
Q 28Which short New Testament letter backs up its warning against scoffers by quoting the Book of Enoch?
Jude
Its author calls himself a servant of Jesus, and the letter also alludes to the Assumption of Moses.
Q 29Which letter is addressed to a companion Paul left on the island of Crete to organise the church there?
Titus
Eusebius later records that the recipient became the first bishop of Crete.
Q 30Which epistle was sent to a church in a small Phrygian city near Laodicea, about 100 miles from Ephesus?
Colossians
The letter names Paul and Timothy as authors and greets fellow believers in Laodicea and Hierapolis too.