Reading the Old Testament Prophets
Three qualities stand out in reading the prophets in the Old Testament. They were lawyers, poets and prognosticators.
First of all, the prophets did not deliver new laws to the people of Israel. They drew the attention of Israel back to the law already given to them through Moses, and urged them to have a change of heart; to align themselves with the will of God. Jeremiah, for example, called on the people of Judah, saying,
Thus says the Lord:
Stand by the roads, and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way is; and walk in it, and find rest for your souls (Jeremiah 6:16).
The “ancient paths” were preserved by Moses in the books of Law. Unfortunately, the nation replied, “We will not walk in it.”
Like lawyers, the prophets took Israel to court and stated their case against them. Israel was found guilty and sentenced to 70 years of exile.
Second, the prophets were poets. Eugene Peterson observes, “Is it not significant that the biblical prophets and psalmists were all poets?” Of course they were. Half (or more) of what they wrote is written in verse. I knew that all along, but why didn’t I think of the prophets as poets? In fact, if you will look back at the passage I quote from Jeremiah, it is in verse form. Everything before it and following it is in verse form as well. So, to read the prophets, you had best be alert to the form and treat it accordingly.
Third, the prophets were prognosticators. I think most of us think of the prophets as primarily foretellers of the future, but I think this was a secondary element in their writing. Their primary purpose was to persuade Israel to repent by respecting God’s law.
One of the ways they sought to persuade them was by telling them what would happen before it happened. Many of the prophets warned Israel of “the day of the Lord.” This was a reference to what would happen in 587 bc. Babylon, in the north, came down on Judah like a dark cloud. Joel writes,
Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble, for the day of the Lord is coming; it is near, a day of darkness and gloom, a day of clouds and thick darkness! Like blackness there is spread upon the mountains a great and powerful people; their like has never been before, nor will be again after them through the years of all generations (Joel 2:1, 2).
Their message about the future was not always doom and gloom. It was also a message of hope and reassurance of the steadfast love and mercy of the Lord. Much of their positive message when read “in the Spirit” was a foreshadowing of the Christ to come, the son of David.
As Christians reading the Old Testament, we delight in texts like Isaiah 52:7:
How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes salvation, who says to Zion, “Your God reigns”.
We delight in them because we now see Jesus.
The prophets spoke by the Spirit of God (Zechariah 7:12; see also 2 Peter 1:21). When they announced an event in the future, they were only able to do so because they were empowered by the God who knows the future. This is an earmark of deity—being able to tell you what is going to happen before it happens. Isaiah used this as a distinct proof that the Lord’s servants the prophets were His servants and that He was God. (See Isaiah 44:6-8.)
No doubt, there is much more to appreciate when reading the prophets than these three elements in their writing, but these three qualities stand out in my most recent reading of several of them.