Wading back into the prophets

I'm reading the prophets in context for a second time while blogging.  When I have a moment, I'd like to go back and revisit my impressions from last time which was April 2014.  Wow, it's been six years that I've been there--longer than I've thought.  The older I grow, the more distorted my perception of time and memory becomes.  At least I recognize this problem. One of the things abut the blog that I appreciate is that it provides a framework and touchpoint for my reading and re-reading of the scriptures.

Emerging from my study of Kings and Chronicles, my aspiration is to fit these prophets within that historical context. I've learned so much from sitting in Kings and Chronicles for months.  Here is a link to my Google slides from this period of study; honing this document has clarified how the different nations and kings interacted with God and each other.  My goal now is to fit each prophet back into this historical construction.

This time around, I'm reading C. Hassell Bullock's An Introduction the the Old Testament Prophetic Books as a companion resource. 

Bullock organizes the prophets into several categories:

Pre-literary Prophets---prophets who often worked through physical acts and whose stories are recorded in non-prophetic books)

Literary Prophets---prophets who documented their prophecies in text.  The twelve major and minor prophets that comprise the prophetic books of scripture

His other method of categorization is to divide them into three historical periods:

The Prophets of the Neo-Assyrian Period

The Prophets of the Neo-Babylonian Period

The Prophets of the Persian Period

This is particularly helpful for me in understanding their historical context and helping me de-lump them in my mind.  I know from past encounters that it's easy for me to let the "woes" predominate until they all blur together with few exceptions.

In the past, my favorite literary prophets have been Isaiah and Jeremiah.  I'm curious to see if this preference shifts or will include new favorites this time around.  My memory is that Isaiah and Jeremiah communicate pathos with penetratingly vivid imagery.  They remind me of David's psalms in their emotional immediacy--they read like the best music that bypasses the mind to speak to the heart.  Or maybe they speak to the heart and head at the same instance?  It's a blend.

Jonah is an engaging narrative--concise and full of interesting events.

Micah, although brief, again has some of this same immediacy of Isaiah and Jeremiah.

Daniel, although historically clear, is grand and crazy lofty when you get away from the narrative strain---like reading Revelation, full of riddles.

And, admittedly, I remember little else. Hosea had to marry a whore. Amos was a shepherd. Ezekiel, I do not recall a single thing. 

Polishing up my thoughts regarding Jonah, I came across this comment from Alistair Begg and find it an excellent perspective on how God worked with the prophets:

"Now, each of these men, as prophets, were, if you like, in-between men. They had a responsibility to stand in between God and the day and age in which they lived. When you read the Prophets, you will discover that their personalities come through and their circumstances pervade their writings—pointing to the fact that while God’s Word, through human instrumentation, is supremely and expressly divine, that God has not picked up people and used them as a stenographer would use a typewriter. He has not used individuals as automatons, but he has taken the circumstances, the life, the background, the personality, the interests, the passions of these individuals, and coming with his Word to them and then through them, it takes into account who they are and where they’re from and the context into which they’re speaking at any given moment in time." -August 6, 2000, "The Man Who Said No"

I think we are at our best when we recognize and appreciate the individuality of others, not just folding them robotically into our plans or purposes. I love this about God; He models this in his relationship with the prophets.