Prophets

Catalog description

This course concerns the prophetic writings of the Hebrew Bible. The class will study the phenomenon of prophecy in the ancient Near East in general and in biblical Israel in particular. Using the work of anthropologists and social scientists, the class will aslo consider briefly prophecy in contemporary tribal societies in order to understand the role of phophecy in Israelite society. The class will meet the prophetic books on their own terms, as the works of theologians and thinkers, influenced by their social contexts, with specific notions about God, history, the future and the role of human choice and behavior in shaping national and personal destiny.