Covenant

A covenant is an agreement between two parties who promise each other under oath to keep to certain agreements. Sometimes the promises are mutual, but often the promise is made by just one party to the other.

In the Bible, the covenant is the most important metaphor that is used to characterise the relationship between God and his people. This is also clear from the names of the two parts of the Christian Bible: “Old Testament” and “New Testament”, in which “testament” is another word for “covenant”.