The Prophets

Introducing Israel's Prophetic Writings

Stephen L. Cook, John T. Strong, Steven S. Tuell

• Publisher: Fortress Press
• Year: 2022
• Print ISBN: 9780800699512
• eBook ISBN: 9781451465280
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Studies

The prophets remain figures of enduring interest and importance in contemporary Judaism, Christianity, and even secular society. The Prophets introduces students to the rise of prophecy in ancient Israel, possible ancient Near Eastern parallels, the messages of individual prophets, and the significance of the compositional and editorial history of the prophetic writings. The book guides students into leading questions and issues in contemporary scholarship, and surveys different contemporary approaches to the messages of the prophets.

Part 1 introduces the prophets and prophecy in context. The rise of prophecy, the role of the prophet, key themes, and the fate of prophecy are explored. Part 2 profiles Israel's prophets during the eighth century, the exile, and the postexilic period. This section will also look at each book of the prophets and how the prophetic writings fit within the complete Hebrew Bible and the Old Testament. These chapters also provide insights into interpreting the prophetic writings today, including Jewish and Christian interpretations, prophecy and prediction, and the secular legacy of Israelite prophecy.

This textbook includes numerous images, charts, and maps to enhance the experience of the students.

Part I

Approaching Ancient Israel’s Prophets

1

Introduction to the Prophetic Writings

Defining biblical “prophecy” is not as easy as consulting an English dictionary. Definitions of prophecies as “predictions of things to come” too often conjure images of fortune-telling or clairvoyants’ oracles. Other definitions along the lines of “inspired revelations of God” are too broad, fitting the words of sages, lawgivers, and mystics as well as prophets. With some simple concordance work, however, we may begin to grasp the idea of prophecy in an ancient biblical context. Such work clarifies that Hebrew prophecy involves intermediation between God and the community and interacting about revelation with an audience.1 It entails messages of God conveyed to people by servant-agents who strategically direct history.

The eighth-century intermediary Hosea, for one, had an elevated view of the role of prophets. For him, they steered history on God’s behalf, insisting on requisite course changes. In Hosea 12:12–13 (in the Hebrew text, 12:13–14),2 the prophet declares it insufficient for the people of God merely to cling to their identity as descendants of Jacob/Israel:

Jacob fled to the land of Aram,

there Israel served for a wife,

and for a wife he guarded sheep.

By a prophet the Lord brought Israel up from Egypt,

and by a prophet he was guarded.

Certainly, father Jacob was cunning and successful, making it big as a pastor of sheep (12:12). The ones to whom attention should be paid, however, are the prophets, more important kinds of “pastors.” God used the prophets to form the people’s real identity. The prophets pastored Israel, leading the people out of slavery in Egypt and steering them into a life as God’s “flock” (12:13 [14]).

Alongside the historical existence of prophetic intermediation in Israel and in its broader milieu, there arose a literary phenomenon of prophecy. Prophetic literature is most familiar to us through its significant canonical deposits within Jewish and Christian Scripture. This biblical prophetic literature differs from the socioreligious phenomenon of prophecy in significant respects. Indeed, its connection to named prophetic figures of the Hebrew Bible and of history is often complex. So also, the prophetic books often include not only various types of mediatory speech but also headings, biographical narratives, prayers, “confessions,” and more. Isaiah’s book contains material stemming from the eighth-century intermediary Isaiah, active in Jerusalem, but also from two succeeding centuries of prophecy. Jeremiah’s book includes three key categories of material, including biographical material, the historicity of which is a matter of debate.

Prophecy’s Place within the Biblical Canon

In Judaism, prophecy is the second member of three great biblical divisions. The divisions consist of the Torah (the “Pentateuch,” sometimes called the “Law”), the Prophets (Nevi’im), and the Writings (Ketuvim; Job, Psalms, and many other great literary works). The acronym “TaNaK,” the Jewish name for the Hebrew Bible, is a one-word combination of Torah, Nevi’im, and Ketuvim.

The category “Nevi’im” may initially be confusing to non-Jews in that it encompasses what Christians think of as not only the prophetic books but also the historical books—that is, Joshua, Judges, 1 and 2 Samuel, and 1 and 2 Kings. In Judaism, this subsection is known as the “Former Prophets,” and it contains the well-known stories of the wonder-working prophets Elijah and Elisha. Joshua through 2 Kings tells of other fascinating prophets as well, such as the powerful “man of God” (ʾîš ʾĕlōhîm) of 1 Kings 13 (see also 2 Kgs 23:16–18), Micaiah ben Imlah (1 Kgs 22:7–28), and women such as Deborah (Judg 4:4) and Huldah (2 Kgs 22:14). In terms of overall genre, though, these books that are often about prophets are not themselves prophecy but narrative, theological “history.”

As one may intuit, since there are “Former Prophets,” there are also “Latter Prophets.” The Latter Prophets subsection of the Nevi’im contains the books most Christian readers associate with prophecy: the fifteen books from Isaiah to Malachi. There are the three “Major Prophets” (Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel) and twelve “Minor Prophets” (“minor” because their books are relatively brief and all fit on one ancient scroll).3 In Jewish and early Christian tradition, this scroll is named the “Book of the Twelve.” The Twelve include Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi. The order of presentation of the books is not fully obvious, although several of the Twelve do appear in rough chronological succession. Where possible, we will discuss issues of canonical placement of the individual prophetic books in our detailed treatments of each of them below.

Notably, the Tanak places the book of Daniel among the Ketuvim/Writings, not the Nevi’im/Prophets. This may be because Daniel seems to have emerged as a complete work relatively late in the process of the Bible’s formation (in the Greek era, after Alexander’s conquests). Modern scholars tend to see Daniel’s separation from the Nevi’im as a helpful reminder that the book is an apocalypse, not a work of classical prophecy. Did the ancient preservers and editors of the biblical corpus have a sense of this as well? Whatever the case, we include the treatment of Daniel’s book below, where we discuss its similarities and differences compared to classical prophetic intermediation.

The Ketuvim/Writings contain prophetic figures and, indeed, prophetic literature. Beyond Daniel, who is called a “prophet” in Matthew 24:15, consider, for example, the prophetic oracle of rebuke in Psalm 50, the several prophets whom 2 Chronicles describes confronting Israelite kings (e.g., 2 Chr 12:5; 15:1–2; 16:7; 19:2), and the appearance of expressions of Jeremiah at the beginning, middle, and end of Lamentations (Lam 1:18 [Jer 12:1]; 3:28 [Jer 15:17]; 3:31 [Jer 31:37]; 5:22 [Jer 14:19]). Just so, the Torah/Pentateuch contains important references to prophets and prophecy.

Within the Torah/Pentateuch, the first figure to be identified as a “prophet” (nābîʾ) is Abraham (Gen 20:7). He is the great founder and the ancestor (through his grandson Jacob/Israel) of God’s people. In context, God terms Abraham a prophet by virtue of his efficacy as an intermediary between God and the king of Gerar. That the specific intermediation gift at issue is Abraham’s power to invoke God’s healing is notable in light of the probable original meaning of nābîʾ as “one who invokes a god.” Abraham earlier showed himself a feisty intermediary on behalf of all possibly innocent residents of Sodom, for whom Abraham vigorously interceded with God in Genesis 18.

Figure 1.1 Abimelech Rebukes Abraham by Wencelaus Hollar (1607–77 CE).

Moses and his sister, Miriam, are—like Abraham—key prophets within the Torah. One of the Bible’s main streams of tradition, that associated with Deuteronomy, specifically makes Moses the gold standard of all prophecy. Indeed, God promises Moses in Deuteronomy 18:18–19 that for each new generation, “I will raise up . . . a prophet like you from among their kindred, and will put my words into the mouth of the prophet; the prophet shall tell them all that I command. Anyone who will not listen to my words which the prophet speaks in my name, I myself will hold accountable” (NABR). If one keeps alert for allusions, such Mosaic successors are not hard to spot (e.g., Josh 5:15; Judg 6:16; 1 Kgs 19:8–9; 2 Kgs 2:8; Jer 1:9; Hag 1:13). Later, in Deuteronomy 34:10, God declares Moses unsurpassed among all prophets: “Never again did there arise in Israel a prophet like Moses—whom the Lord singled out, face to face” (NJPS). And Moses’s unrivaled status as intermediary between God and Israel is known across the Scriptures, as is plain from texts such as Exodus 33:11 (E), Numbers 12:6–8 (E), Psalm 106:23, Hosea 12:13, and Malachi 4:4.4

The “Song of Miriam” in Exodus 15:20–21 speaks of Miriam as a prophet (v. 20; nĕbîʾâ, the feminine form of nābîʾ). Scholars sometimes assume that the song, a celebration of the Red Sea crossing, is her prophecy, but this seems doubtful. Her poetry sung on this occasion fits squarely within Israel’s standard victory-song tradition and has no obvious connection with prophetic intermediation. Miriam’s prophetic role (cited also in Mic 6:4) is clearest in the conflict that she and Aaron have with their brother, Moses, in Numbers 12. Here Miriam and Aaron claim that they, alongside Moses, are also intermediaries through whom God speaks. In intervening in the dispute, God explains that although revelation does come to prophets such as Miriam, unique perspicuity and authority characterize God’s communications with the Mosaic prophet (just discussed; see Deut 18:18–19).

Esther J. Hamori explains how Numbers 12 is thus much more affirming of Miriam as a prophet than readers generally conclude:

It is not surprising that the tradition favors Moses; what is surprising, what is so unusual that we should sit up and take notice, is that in a story framed as prophetic conflict between these two, the tradition also acknowledges the legitimacy of Miriam’s role as a prophet of Yahweh, whose authority is diminished only in comparison to the unsurpassed authority of Moses. Where the biblical tradition would usually portray the one opposing the favored prophet as a false prophet (even in the case of a prophet of Yahweh, as in Jeremiah 28), Numbers 12 uses the very validity of Miriam’s claim to prophetic status as the way to establish that Moses’s claim to divine access lies even beyond prophecy.5

Prophets as Interpreters of Written Divine Revelation

Ellen Davis defends a new approach to the biblical prophets that emphasizes their place in the rise of written Scripture.6 Davis outlines a modern view that takes the prophets as speakers of truth to power. A newer model goes in a different direction, shifting the focus to prophets as interpreters of God’s written word. Both models have weaknesses, but the newer one is suggestive for readers searching for ways to appropriate the prophetic witness today.

In an unusual move, Davis begins her discussion of biblical prophecy with the figure of Huldah, a female intermediary who played a pivotal role in the reforms of King Josiah of Judah in the 620s BCE. When God’s covenant scroll is rediscovered in Jerusalem, the king is aghast at how far short of the book’s instructions Judah has fallen (2 Kgs 22:10–11). At Josiah’s bidding, his advisors seek out prophetic advice, going straight to the key prophet of Mosaic standing at the time, Huldah (2 Kgs 22:14).

Much of what Huldah does is notable. She follows the Mosaic example of being a model teacher of Torah’s meaning (see Exod 4:12; Deut 18:18; 31:19; 1 Sam 12:23). She deals with God’s written word, recognizing how it speaks here and now (Deut 31:9–13; 2 Kgs 22:16–20). For at least once, we have here a successful prophet whom a king believes. Huldah and Josiah are able to hear God’s word as spoken against their own people, against themselves. Contemporary readers of Scripture interested in what a modern prophetic role might look like can learn from Huldah’s example.

Huldah is neither the first nor the last Israelite prophet to function as a bearer and teacher of God’s Torah/covenant instruction. This is significant because a key assumption of modernist biblical study has been that the traditional view of prophets as tradents and enforcers of covenantal law is false. Since the founding work of Wellhausen, many critics have held that, contrary to the traditional biblical picture, prophecy preceded the biblical law codes, is not beholden to them, and is generally spiritually superior to them.7

Over a century before Huldah’s recognition of the authoritative status of Torah/law, a tradition of law was already of great import in the prophetic work of Hosea. For example, Hosea 8:12 describes ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Figures, Tables, and Maps
• List of Sidebars
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• Abbreviations
• Chart: Kings and Prophets in Israel and Judah
• Part I. Approaching Ancient Israel’s Prophets
• Part II. The Prophetic Literature
• Glossary
• Image Credits
• Author Index