The student will craft a brief three page essay that summarize and explain the message of the Prophets. The three pages do not include the cover page (nor bibliography if you include one).
In this essay, you are not to list what happened in that part of the Bible. Instead, you are to define the author's message to the reader: what is the author telling the reader about what happened? As such, your goal is to explain the author's message by describing most of the book and its most important parts. Each essay must not be any shorter or longer than three double-spaced pages and must be written in Times New Romans 12 Point font with appropriate 1 inch margins.
Each essay will have a proper introduction and conclusion that will state and restate your thesis of that section's message. In addition, each body paragraph will provide evidence from the biblical text and, if needed, additional sources to defend your thesis. The student must employ an academic writing style with appropriate citation according to the Turabian manual. Please submit your papers in Blackboard as .doc or .docx files.
As you consider your topic, please remember that the assignment is not to tell me the setting of the Prophets. Its setting is clearly the Old Covenant.
Instead, your task is to define what he is telling his readers about the Old Covenant. That is, what message (lesson, instruction, insight) and hope does he give to the reader as he examines life under the Old Covenant in the Prophets?
As such, you will advance a thesis that claims what the author intends to communicate with the shape of his book.
That is, you are now asked to argue what the author is offering as the book's hope. How does the author answer his dilemma? What hope does he offer? Is his hope for the reader the law codes themselves from Moses?
Or, is his hope based upon something or someone other than the law codes who has appeared or will appear later? If so, what does the author have to say about the law codes from Moses or the words from the Prophets? With such a big book to explain, Joshua-Malachi, how do you find one answer to these questions? Look at the repetitions at the beginning and the ending of the book. That is, compare the opening chapters of Joshua with the final chapters of Malachi.2.
Also, consider the themes and situations repeated throughout the book. That is, focus on similarities between the major characters, such as Joshua, Samuel, David and Solomon all giving speeches that look a lot like Moses' speeches in Deuteronomy. In addition, detect the places where there are major changes in the form of the text (speed bumps) such as a change from narrative to poetry or vice versa.
Finally, make sure that you at least consider the repetitions of phrases and concepts throughout the book as a whole.