"This book has monumental stature. It is fresh and vivid. . . aflame with prophetic vision." —James Muilenburg From the author of  Man is Not Alone  and  God in Search of Man, comes   Abraham   Heschel's 1962 masterpiece of Biblical scholarship,  The Prophets. Abraham J. Heschel's The Prophets, originally published in 1962, provides a unique opportunity for readers of the Old Testament, both Christian and Jewish, to gain fresh and deep knowledge of Israel’s prophetic movement. The book includes detailed examinations of the stories of the prophets Amos, Hosea, Isahiah, Micah, Jeremiah, as well as explorations of the theology and philosophy of pathos, the theory of ecstasy in modern religious scholarship, an excavation of the relationship between prophecy and psychosis, and a comparative view of prophets throughout the world. Heschel's project is excavate and examine the consciousness of the prophets: not just the content of their prophecies, but the type of faith-based experience they personified. Heschel's exegetical skill and profound understanding of the prophets opens the door to new insight into the philosophy of religion - a wonderful text for anyone interested in the dialectic of the divine-human encounter. According to the popular definition, a prophet is one who accurately predicts the future. But in the Jewish tradition, as Abraham Joshua Heschel explains in The Prophets , these figures earn their title by witnessing the world around them with outstanding passion. Prophets are those whose "life and soul are at stake" in what they say about "the mystery of [God's] relation to man." They are "some of the most disturbing people who have ever lived," and yet they are also "the men whose image is our refuge in distress, and whose voice and vision sustain our faith." Heschel's book, one of the classic texts on the subject, contains sophisticated, straightforward discussions of each of the Hebrew prophets, the primary themes of their preaching, and comparisons of Israel's prophets to those of other religions'. Throughout, Heschel avoids the two great temptations in any discussion of prophesy: overstating the supernatural quality of a prophet's epiphany ("A prophet is a person, not a microphone"), and reducing prophesy to a merely human phenomenon. Instead, Heschel describes the prophet's peculiar status as God's spokesman in a way that does justice to its complexity: "He speaks from the perspective of God as perceived from the perspective of his own situation." --Michael Joseph Gross “This book has monumental stature. It is fresh and vivid…aflame with prophetic vision.” - James Muilenburg, scholar on the Revised Standard Version of the Bible “A brilliant study of the Hebrew prophets, one of the most penetrating works…[of] our time.” - Will Herberg, Jewish theologian "[The author] has here given us the fruits of his mature reflection and study. Moreover, since he writes with a lucid, engaging style, the result is a book that is not only important but is certain to be read widely, and with pleasure." - John Bright, American biblical scholar Abraham Heschel is a seminal name in religious studies and the author of Man Is Not Alone and God in Search of Man. When The Prophets was first published in 1962, it was immediately recognized as a masterpiece of biblical scholarship. The Prophets provides a unique opportunity for readers of the Old Testament, both Christian and Jewish, to gain fresh and deep knowledge of Israel's prophetic movement. The author's profound understanding of the prophets also opens the door to new insight into the philosophy of religion. Abraham J. Heschel (1907-1972), born in Poland, moved to the United States in 1940. A professor at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York, Heschel became an active and well-known participant in the Civil Rights movement and the protests against the Vietnam War. The Prophets By Heschel, Abraham Joshua Perennial Copyright © 2004 Abraham J. Heschel All right reserved. ISBN: 0060936991 Chapter One What Manner of Man Is the Prophet? Sensitivity to Evil What manner of man is the prophet? A student of philosophy who turns from the discourses of the great metaphysicians to the orations of the prophets may feel as if he were going from the realm of the sublime to an area of trivialities. Instead of dealing with the timeless issues of being and becoming, of matter and form, of definitions and demonstrations, he is thrown into orations about widows and orphans, about the corruption of judges and affairs of the market place. Instead of showing us a way through the elegant mansions of the mind, the prophets take us to the slums. The world is a proud place, full of beauty, but the prophets are scandalized, and rave as if the whole world were a slum. They make much ado about paltry things, lavishing excessive language upon trifling subjects. What if somewhere in ancient Palestine poor people have not been treated properly by