My Favorite Bible Characters Trivia Quiz

Answer: Joseph

You can read all about Joseph's life story in the book of Genesis, starting with chapter 37 and ending with chapter 50! He was only 17 years old when his envious brothers did a horrible thing and sold him to slave traders. As a result, they took him to Egypt, but he was a Hebrew by blood and by faith.

Joseph was a very righteous, or morally good, man. Nobody is perfect, of course, but he was one of the most righteous men in the Old Testament and perhaps in the whole Bible. He was given the chance to commit a big sin in chapter 39, verse 9, but instead of doing so, he said, "How then could I do this great evil and sin against God?" (from the New American Standard Bible translation).

In 2000, DreamWorks released an animated movie based on the Genesis account, titled "Joseph: King of Dreams." Jodi Benson, the same actress who voiced Ariel in Disney's "The Little Mermaid," also voiced Asenath, Joseph's wife.

Answer: Moses

Both Jewish and Christian traditions claim that Moses wrote the first five books of the Bible, which are Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. You can read about different parts of his life in all those books except for Genesis.

Exodus chapter 2 states that Moses was a beautiful baby.

A cruel pharaoh, one who didn't know Joseph, ordered that all male Hebrew babies be killed, which caused Moses's mom to put him in a basket and place him near the Nile river. The pharaoh's daughter found him and he eventually became like her own son. As an adult, Moses went to Midian, where God appeared to him through a burning bush. God told Moses that he needed to return to Egypt and demand that the pharaoh let the enslaved Hebrews go free.

It is very sad, but in the New Testament, there is a creepily similar account in which King Herod ordered that all male babies be killed because he was trying to kill the young Jesus. Ironically, Christ's parents left Israel and took Him to Egypt to save His life.

Answer: Miriam

Miriam was the older sister of Aaron and Moses. Exodus chapter 2 states that after their mom, whose name was Jochebed, put Moses in a basket hoping to save his life, Miriam kept an eye on him to see what would happen to him. Miriam also figured out a way to keep Jochebed in his life for at least a little while, because Miriam asked the pharaoh's daughter if she wanted a Hebrew nurse to help take care of the baby. She agreed and so Moses's mom became his nurse before she returned him to the pharaoh's daughter.

I have always loved the 1998 DreamWorks' film, "The Prince of Egypt." To be honest, I think this movie caused me to like Miriam and Zipporah (not included in the quiz, but another favorite of mine) more than I did by the Bible alone. The beautiful song "When You Believe" is still one of my favorite songs. Sally Dworsky as Miriam and Michelle Pfeiffer as Zipporah sang the movie's version, but Whitney Houston and Mariah Carey performed the soundtrack's version.

Answer: She was a prophetess.

Deborah is famous for being the only female (or woman) judge in the book of Judges. In the Bible, there was a period of time in which judges ruled over Israel instead of kings or queens. The other judges were Othniel, Ehud, Shamgar, Gideon, Tola, Jair, Jephthah, Ibzan, Elon, Abdon, and even Samson. Yes, that's the same Samson who had long hair and Superman-like strength.

Deborah was also a prophetess, which means that she had a God-given gift to see or predict the future. Please note that this is different from divination and psychic readings, because the Bible states that such practices are evil. The Bible argues that divination and other occult practices come from Satan and *not* from God.

There were other prophetesses in the Bible as well. Some of them were Miriam, Huldah, and Isaiah's wife from the Old Testament and Anna from the New Testament! It's really interesting that Isaiah's wife was a prophetess because he was a prophet himself.

Answer: She defeated the wicked Sisera.

Sisera was a commander of an enemy army. Judges 4 states that the Canaanite king, Jabin, and his army commander, Sisera, were cruel to the Israelites and oppressed them for twenty years.

Barak thought that he would be the one to defeat Sisera, but it seems that Yahweh, the Israelites' God, had other plans. In Judges 4:9, Deborah told Barak that the honor for destroying Sisera wouldn't fall on him, but rather on a woman! Jael was that woman whom Deborah prophesied about!

Please note that I'm using vague terms like defeated and destroyed because this is a children's quiz and I'm trying to be as "family-friendly" as possible. For details on Jael's action, read Judges, chapters 4 and 5.

Deborah and Barak sang a song in chapter 5, which exclaimed that Jael was one of the most blessed women in the world because of her heroic deed. Well, all I can do is repeat a popular expression and say: you go, girl!

Answer: Elisha

This story can be found in 2 Kings chapter 4. Elisha met a woman and prophesied to her that she would have a son. At first she didn't believe him, but a year later, his prophecy was fulfilled. However, the child died when he was a little older and his mom cried out to Elisha. With God's help, Elisha brought the boy back to life.

I always enjoyed this story, because it ended happily.

In 2 Kings chapter 4, there is also the story in which Elisha helped a different woman, a widow, who had a jar of oil.

Elisha had a mentor with a similar name, Elijah. Elijah actually raised a widow's son back from the dead. You can read about this story in 1 Kings chapter 17.

Answer: Hadassah

Esther is a Persian name that means "star." Hadassah, on the other hand, is Hebrew and means "myrtle tree." Esther chapter 2 states that Hadassah's dad was Abihail, who was from the tribe of Benjamin. It doesn't mention her mom's name. When her parents died, her cousin, Mordecai, raised her like she was his daughter.

Esther found favor with the Persian king and was able to save her people, the Jews, from the wicked Haman. Haman hated the Jews. A lot of people admire Esther for this reason.

The Bible book's title bears her name, but Jewish tradition asserts that Mordecai wrote her story.

Answer: False

His name was Joseph, which was the same name as Jacob's son in the Old Testament book of Genesis.

In fact, there were a few men with the name Joseph in the New Testament as well. Christ's mom's husband is the most famous Joseph, but one of Christ's brothers was actually named Joseph (see Matthew 13:55) and then a brother of James the Lesser had the same name too (see Mark 15:40). James the Lesser was one of Christ's disciples. Yet another Joseph was Joseph of Arimethea (see Mark 15:43).

Matthew 1:19 says that Joseph was a good man who tried to be nice to Christ's mom. This is one reason why I like him!

The relationship between Jesus and Joseph was unique, because even though people considered Joseph to be His dad (see Matthew 13:55 for details), Jesus said that His real father was God, which is why Christians call Him the Son of God (for example, see Luke 2:49).

Answer: Elizabeth

Well, my middle name is Elizabeth, but that still counts. A middle name is still a name and my mom did give it to me because of the Biblical character. My first name is based on the French word for beloved and it doesn't appear anywhere in the Old or New Testaments. I guess you could say, therefore, that Elizabeth is one of my favorite characters by default.

Elizabeth was a special lady, though. She was the one that God chose to be John the Baptist's mom. John the Baptist's birth was considered a miracle because Elizabeth was very old and she was never able to have children before.

You can read about Elizabeth and her son in the Gospel of Luke. John was preaching before Jesus began preaching. He even baptized Jesus.

Answer: Mary Magdalene

Even when I was a child, I loved Mary Magdalene. I guess I was amazed by her sweet devotion to Jesus. She was one of Christ's most devoted followers. The Gospels of John and Mark state that it was her, not any of the twelve disciples or even Christ's own mom, who first witnessed the resurrected Jesus.

Maybe His mom was too sad to even think about His tomb. At any rate, Mary Magdalene's sadness over the loss of her friend and teacher led her to the tomb, where she sought and finally found Him. She was, therefore, rewarded for her devotion. Jesus also told her to go inform the disciples of the good news; He gave her an important task!

The Gospels mention Mary Magdalene 14 times, which makes her one of the most discussed people in the Gospels, yet most of the other New Testament books are silent on her. However, she was probably one of the women in Acts 1:13-14, which proclaim the following:

" . . . Peter and John and James and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus, and Simon the Zealot, and Judas the son of James . . . were continually devoting themselves to prayer, along with the women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with His brothers" (from the New American Standard translation).