The Minor Prophets

The Twelve — Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi — are “minor” only in the brevity of their books. Each is venerated by the Church with a feast day, and several supply the prophecies the Church sings at her greatest feasts. This file surveys the Twelve as the Church venerates them, weighted toward those the liturgy most uses: Habakkuk, Zechariah, Malachi, and Micah.

Tradition: Pan-Orthodox

The Book of the Twelve

In the Hebrew and Greek Bibles the twelve shorter prophetic books are counted as a single scroll, “the Twelve” (to Dōdekapropheton), and the Church venerates each of the twelve as a saint with his own feast day. Their dates run through the year: Hosea (17 October), Joel (19 October), Amos (15 June), Obadiah (19 November), Jonah (22 September, treated separately in Jonah and the Sign), Micah (14 August — Micah of Moresheth), Nahum (1 December), Habakkuk (2 December), Zephaniah (3 December), Haggai (16 December), Zechariah (8 February), and Malachi (3 January) (the feast dates from The Menaion and the Orthodox calendars; OrthodoxWiki, s.vv. the individual prophets; Prophet Habakkuk, orthodox.net; Prophet Zechariah, orthochristian.com; Prophet Malachi commemoration). It is characteristic of Orthodoxy that even the least-quoted of them — Obadiah, whose book is a single chapter — has a day, a troparion, and an icon: the Church venerates the whole prophetic choir, not only its famous voices. What follows surveys the Twelve honestly by weight, giving fullest treatment to those the Church’s worship most draws upon.

Habakkuk: “God Shall Come from Teman”

Habakkuk (feast 2 December; the eighth of the Twelve; Prophet Habakkuk, orthodox.net) is, after Jonah, the most liturgically present of the minor prophets, for two reasons. First, the prayer that closes his book (Habakkuk 3) supplies the fourth of the Nine Biblical Odes, sung in every canon of Matins. Second, that same prayer contains two lines the Church reads christologically and sings at her feasts. “God shall come from Teman, and the Holy One from mount Paran” (Habakkuk 3:3) is heard as a prophecy of the coming of Christ, and the phrase enters the Nativity and paschal hymnography as an announcement of the Incarnation. And the Septuagint of Habakkuk 3:2 reads, “in the midst of two living creatures shalt thou be known” (en mesō dyo zōōn gnōsthēsē) — a reading the Fathers took as a prophecy of Christ made known between two: variously the two Testaments, the two thieves of the Cross, the cherubim, or the ox and the ass at the manger of the Nativity. This LXX reading of Habakkuk is one of the classic instances of the Church’s Old Testament (the Septuagint) yielding a christological sense the Hebrew does not carry, and it belongs with the wider treatment of the LXX in the Scripture collection (see The Septuagint as the Church’s Old Testament). Habakkuk’s cry of faith amid injustice — “the just shall live by his faith” (Habakkuk 2:4), taken up by St. Paul (Romans 1:17; Galatians 3:11; Hebrews 10:38) — makes him also a prophet of the righteousness that is by faith.

Zechariah: The King on the Colt

Zechariah (feast 8 February; the eleventh of the Twelve; the “Sickle-Seer,” from his vision of the flying sickle, Zechariah 5:1–3; Prophet Zechariah, orthochristian.com) is one of the post-exilic prophets who, with Haggai, urged the rebuilding of the temple after the return from Babylon. His book is rich in Messianic prophecy the Church reads of Christ. Above all, Zechariah foretells the Lord’s entry into Jerusalem: “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion… behold, thy King cometh unto thee: he is just, and having salvation; lowly, and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt the foal of an ass” (Zechariah 9:9) — cited by the Gospels as fulfilled on Palm Sunday when Christ enters the city on the colt (Matthew 21:4–5; John 12:14–15), so that Zechariah’s prophecy is proclaimed at the feast of the Entry into Jerusalem (one of the Twelve Great Feasts; see The Twelve Great Feasts). Zechariah also foretells the thirty pieces of silver “cast to the potter” (Zechariah 11:12–13, echoed at the betrayal, Matthew 27:9–10), the shepherd smitten and the sheep scattered (Zechariah 13:7; Matthew 26:31), and the mourning of those who “shall look upon me whom they have pierced” (Zechariah 12:10; John 19:37). Few of the Twelve are quoted so often in the Passion narrative.

Malachi: The Pure Offering

Malachi (feast 3 January; the last of the Twelve and, in the Church’s reckoning, the last of the Old Testament prophets before the Forerunner; Prophet Malachi commemoration) closes the prophetic canon with two prophecies the Church treasures. The first is the promise of a pure offering among the nations: “For from the rising of the sun even unto the going down of the same my name shall be great among the Gentiles; and in every place incense shall be offered unto my name, and a pure offering” (Malachi 1:11). The Fathers, from the Didache onward, read this as a prophecy of the Eucharist — the one pure sacrifice offered in every place among the Gentiles, replacing the temple offerings that Malachi rebukes as defiled; the verse is a standing patristic proof of the eucharistic offering (see The Divine Liturgy). The second is the prophecy of the returning Elijah: “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord” (Malachi 4:5–6; LXX 3:22–24), taken up by the Gospel of the Forerunner and of the Second Coming (treated in Elijah the Fiery Prophet and John the Seal of the Prophets). Malachi also foretells “the Sun of righteousness” arising “with healing in his wings” (Malachi 4:2), sung in the Nativity troparion of Christ as “the Sun of Righteousness.”

The Others, by Weight

The remaining prophets of the Twelve the Church venerates and reads, each contributing to the whole prophetic witness. Micah of Moresheth (feast 14 August) is the most Messianically weighty of them after Zechariah, for he names the very town of the Messiah’s birth: “But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah… out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting” (Micah 5:2), the verse the chief priests quote to Herod’s magi (Matthew 2:5–6), and read at the Nativity. Hosea (17 October) gives the word the Gospel applies to the flight into and return from Egypt — “out of Egypt have I called my son” (Hosea 11:1; Matthew 2:15) — and “I will ransom them from the power of the grave… O death, I will be thy plagues” (Hosea 13:14; cf. 1 Corinthians 15:55). Joel (19 October) prophesies the outpouring of the Spirit “upon all flesh” (Joel 2:28–29), which St. Peter proclaims fulfilled at Pentecost (Acts 2:16–21). Amos (15 June), the herdsman of Tekoa, is the great prophet of social justice and of the Day of the Lord. Zephaniah (3 December), Nahum (1 December), Habakkuk (2 December), and Obadiah (19 November) prophesy God’s judgment on the nations and on Judah; Haggai (16 December) and Zechariah urge the rebuilding of the temple, of which the Church reads the true temple to be Christ and His Body. Together the Twelve, honored each by name, complete the prophetic choir that the Church gathers before the Nativity and hymns as those who awaited and foretold the Christ.

References

The Holy Bible, KJV (Hosea 11:1; 13:14; Joel 2:28–29; Amos; Obadiah; Micah 5:2; Nahum; Habakkuk 2:4; 3:2–3, LXX; Zephaniah; Haggai; Zechariah 9:9; 11:12–13; 12:10; 13:7; Malachi 1:11; 4:2, 5–6; and the Gospel citations Matthew 2:5–6, 15; 21:4–5; 26:31; 27:9–10; John 12:14–15; 19:37; Acts 2:16–21; Romans 1:17).
OrthodoxWiki, s.vv. the individual minor prophets (feast dates); Prophet Habakkuk (orthodox.net, 2 December); Prophet Zechariah the Sickle-Seer (orthochristian.com, 8 February); Prophet Malachi (3 January) in the Orthodox calendars.
Pentiuc, Eugen J. The Old Testament in Eastern Orthodox Tradition. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014. (The Orthodox reading of the Twelve.)
The Menaion (the propers and hymnography for the minor prophets’ feasts); the Didache 14 (Malachi 1:11 read of the Eucharist).