Prophets

I am reading Richard Coggins, “Introducing the Old Testament” for aclass right now. He does a general overview of the Hebrew Bible andlooks at the text from angles of relevant “hard” sciences and thenspends a couple chapters in talking about more subjective concernslike what religious forms have contributed to and resulted from itand different ways in which it has been read.One thing that has stood out to me about his review is how often theHebrew Bible and the culture that it represents is described as notbeing different than the culture of its neighbors in almost everyrespect. I would have to cut and paste most of his book in order togive a good idea of what that means. Suffice it so say that it isthe one way that Israel seems to stand out that is really interestingto me. Prophets. There does not seem to be a comparable role inother ANE religions. He says that the role of the person called aprophet may be different than what we commonly consider a prophet tobe. What he believes that is meant by the word translated prophet isnever really spelled out. I think it is safe to say that this rolewas someone who spoke for God.I was surprised that Israel was the only people that seemed to havehad these people. I wonder if it is somewhat comparable to what wemight consider a mystic to be. Upon further consideration I thinkthat it is striking that all three Abrahamic religions recognize theprophet as someone that God specifically speaks through.What does that say then about the responsibility of the Christianchurch? If one of our distinctive aspects is that we have peoplethrough whom God speaks, or considered broadly, we are a peoplethrough whom God speaks should that not be … important? It doesn’tseem like it. Where is the prophetic message? The Church as a wholehas failed to make a single statement, or maybe that is the problem,there have been thousands and thousands of single statements, all ofthem adding up to white noise.what is should the church be saying then? you’re gonna have to readmy archives….