One of the crowning features of the Hebrew Scriptures is the prophetic tradition. "Prophets are forth-tellers, as well as foretellers," a professor I knew used to say. That is, while prophets sometimes predict future events, they always speak forthrightly. Even against great odds; they are "forth-tellers."
Biblical prophets understood themselves to be spokespersons for God. Their model was the versatile Moses. "The Lord spoke unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend" (Ex. 33:11). Prophets such as Samuel, Elijah, and Elisha displayed spiritual ruggedness and independence, and the books of the prophets Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel represent major outpourings of inspired vision.
Perhaps no other cluster of written prophetic revelation includes more concentrated spiritual frankness—and thunder—than the "Minor Prophets," Whose writings constitute the last 12 books of the Old Testament. They contain both universal appeals and the highly contextualized language of their time and situation. They appeared on the scene in response to three national emergencies: the Assyrian crisis of the eighth century BC, which resulted in the collapse of that half of the Hebrew homeland called the northern kingdom, or Israel; the rise of Babylon and the Babylonian exile in the sixth century BC, in which the southern kingdom, Judah, was conquered and its leading citizens deported; and, finally, the post-exilic period of the late sixth and fifth centuries BC, when the Hebrews rebuilt Jerusalem under Persian rule.
