The Gray Monk

A thunder of Prophets

The final section of the Old Testament, the Books of Prophecy and their authors.

As we saw with the “Latter Prophets”, prophecy is very much a mainstay of the Biblical record, indeed, it is still very much a part of our worship and our lives as Children of God. So what do the Prophets say to us in our time? Quite a lot actually, when you look at the people, events and lack of faith which inspired their outbursts and drove their zeal for God.

The next question is, who were the prophets and when did they live and work? Starting with the first part of that question we can identify the names of the books as follows: Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi. To these sixteen names we must add an unknown author, whose book is simply titled “Lamentations”. Although the Septuagint version of the Old Testament gives the authorship of this to Jeremiah, it is thought that this is unlikely as they are in a completely different style to that used in the Book of Jeremiah. What is certain, is that the author was a witness to the destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar’s army in 587 BC. Four of the Prophets stand apart and are referred to as the “major” Prophets, they are Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel, with the others referred to as the “minor” Prophets.

So what is the period of these writings? The earliest, Amos, can be dated to around 795 BC, with Hosea writing from around 760 BC and Isaiah and Micah both active around 745 BC. The last of this line of Prophets, Malachi, wrote around 450 BC, giving us a span of some 350 years and covering the period of rapid decline after the death of Solomon and the division of the Kingdom. The Book of Daniel covers the longest span of events and is contemporaneous with the work of Ezekiel, Jeremiah and Obadiah. While the majority of these “men” (I will explain the parenthesis in a moment!) lived and worked in the Southern Kingdom of Judah, Amos and Hosea belong to the Northern Kingdom of Israel and Jonah, Ezekiel and Daniel lived and worked in Syria or Babylon. The unknown author of Lamentations may well have worked in Babylon as well, since he seems to have been present in Jerusalem at its fall.

Now a brief explanation of my “” in the foregoing paragraph! Many, if not all of the Prophets were accompanied on their travels by a “school” of disciples, who much as our Lord’s disciples did, carried the word for the Prophet, did the housekeeping and frequently wrote the notes from which the books would have been compiled. When a particularly charismatic prophet died, it is believed that his “school” may well have continued under new leadership, but still in the name of the original “teacher/prophet”. In this way it is possible to account for the differences in style between sections of some of the books and for the extended periods covered by others. A good example of changes of writing style lies in the Book of Isaiah, which shows three clear sections and is believed to have been the work of three different authors. Does this invalidate the content? Not at all, it is simply a demonstration that God is able to continue His work through the agency of His workers, whoever they may be.

The message of the prophets is a relatively simple one. To them God rules through and in history, he calls men and women to learn from the mistakes of the past and to repent of the sins once committed. The prophets take very seriously the role of God as Ruler of History and frequently use the imagery of the Empires of their day as “tools” or “implements” of God. For Habakkuk this created a problem, he was faced with a God apparently prepared to use unholy and corrupt instruments and has to come to terms with the fact that God is acting in His world, as Sovereign in that world, and is therefore able to use even the most unworthy instrument for His purpose.

For the Prophets the primary need for the people is to be right with God, to be on God’s side is far better than to have a web of powerful human allies or defenses, but to be sure that it is what God wants. Check some of the examples to be found in Isaiah 30v1 – 2 and Hosea 5v13. God is constantly working to bring His people back to the right way and this is a strong thread through the prophecies as well. For very good examples see Amos 4v6 – 11.

Morality is seen as a foundation of religion, Jeremiah expressly rejects religion without morality in Chapter 7 verses 1 – 15. In this they are simply underpinning the teaching to be found in Leviticus, and Deuteronomy, for a religion that does not practice morality is nothing less than an abomination. But, we also need to be very careful in defining morality in this sense, the morality comes from God and not from our own prejudices, likes and preferences. This is very much the thrust of our Lord’s ministry, it is He who determines who is acceptable and who not.

We should not think that the Prophets are all doom and gloom either. Their analysis of the times in which they live and the gathering danger around them is instructive, it may even have seemed “negative” to those who listened to the original oration, yet, with hindsight, we can see how the people themselves, by rejecting God and neglecting their God given Nationhood, prepared the way for what was to follow. Yet, in the midst of the gloom, there are sudden beams of revelation and hope. It is this blend of light and dark, hope and despair which makes the prophets quite compelling reading.

Finally, we have contained within this body of writing the Messianic message of a Kingdom which will surpass everything that has gone before. It is seen by the Prophets as the setting up of a new covenant, one which will be free of the previous flaws and bring a perfect relationship with God. Ezekiel, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Zechariah all present the reader with images of a “new David”, “branch of David’s line”, or “branch of the Lord” – an image used by Zechariah and Isaiah to stress the divine nature. Isaiah goes further using images including “Immanuel”, “Mighty God occupying David’s throne”, Anointed conqueror of His people’s foes, and perhaps the most amazing image of all, “the Suffering Servant” in Chapter 53. Malachi gives us the image of “The Lord himself coming in the wake of the forerunner”, an image seized on in the Gospels as a reference to John the Baptist, and both Micah and Isaiah foretell that the “new David” will be born in Bethlehem of a virgin.

Isaiah stands at the head of the list for more than simply the chronology. It is Isaiah’s vision of God which inspires many of the New Testament writers and it is almost unequalled until we read St John’s Revelation. His active period spans forty years and includes the first direct assaults on Jerusalem by the Assyrian armies. His entire mission is inspired and coloured by his vision of God in the temple and certainly knew his people and his audience. It is in this book that we find those incredibly moving prophecies of the “suffering servant” so clearly linked by the Gospels to the Messiah. It is not clear how the book came to have its present form, it is likely that some of the work is that of Isaiah himself, but large portions and changes of style suggest that it is the work of more than one scribe. The book itself is important to us today for several reasons, not least because it is quoted by the New Testament writers more than any other Old Testament book. It has a message for us as well, living as we do in a changing and ever more materialistic society, the pursuit of self-interest and the abandoning of God carries with it the harshest of penalties.

Jeremiah came upon the scene about a hundred years after Isaiah and came from a priestly family. His ministry is generally thought to have started around 627 BC and spanned the reigns of the last five King’s of Judah, a period of some forty years. He is thought to have died in exile in Egypt, as we know that towards the end of his life the people fled the wrath of the Babylonian King following the murder of his appointed Governor and took Jeremiah with them. His ministry was very influential and his mixes hope with dire warning, but is very difficult to fit against particular events as it is not chronological. The book itself grew out of the scroll dictated to Baruch, which is described in Chapter 36 and seems to be a collation of several sources. It displays a wide mixture of literary forms, combining prose, poetry, lament and biography.

Ezekiel’s ministry is thought to have begun in 592 BC, five years after the final surrender of Jerusalem to the Babylonians and the taking into exile of the nobility and the Royal household. Ezekiel was aged about 30 at this time and he was himself a priest. His ministry was centred in Babylon among the exiles and unlike the book of Jeremiah is written entirely in the first person with the prophecies meticulously ordered and dated. Many commentators remark that for most Christians this is a “closed book”, with few of us penetrating beyond the descriptions of fantastic creatures with wheels for eyes and flashing lights. This is probably our loss, as it is a book very much in the “apocalyptic” tradition which would later be emulated by St John in Revelations. For those who do penetrate beyond this initial hurdle, there is a book of well developed prose containing a vision of God which I would suggest, could challenge us to think again our approach to life.

The fourth of the “Big Four”, Daniel is, like Ezekiel, an exile. He was in the first batch of exiles and arrived in Babylon as a boy. His family was certainly noble and possibly Royal, and he was a Statesman rather than a Prophet, but the book belongs firmly in the prophetic canon. As a book it contains a number of possible problems for us, as it covers a span of some 70 years and is written in two languages, with Chapters 2 to 7 in Aramaic, the then international language of the region, and the rest in Hebrew. It also contains a number of historical inaccuracies. One explanation is that the book as we have it was written by a 2nd Century BC author (who would have had to dupe the scholars of his day in order to get it accepted – which it was!) using the name of the 6th Century Prophet. The heart of the debate is the prophecies relating to events in the 3rd and 2nd Centuries, which one has either to accept as genuine prediction or reject in their entirety as a 2nd Century “revision”. The debate is likely to continue for a very long time. Most readers simply accept the book as it is presented.

Space does not permit me to go into great detail on the remaining twelve prophets in our collection. Each has a message both for his time and for ours, and there are rewards in reading them, particularly if your take the trouble to read up on the background history. Prophetic activity did not cease with Malachi, it continued right up to the period of the Gospels and continues to this day. As always, we need to keep an open mind and to study widely to appreciate all that these books contain, and I can again commend to you the Lion Handbooks, the recently republished Tynedale commentaries and “A History of Warfare” by Montgomery of Alamein. There are several good books available on the Assyrian and Babylonian Empires and their conquest campaigns which will also provide some insights to the period.

Once again, enjoy the reading and allow yourselves to be surprised by God. Who knows, there may be a prophet among us even now.

Peace be with you.