LAMENTATIONS

Attributed to Jeremiah, this book is made up of five funeral songs that mourn the fall of Jerusalem and the destruction of the temple by the Babylonians in 587 B.C. Other books of the Bible contain laments, but Lamentations is the only one made up solely of these mournful poems. The book is so powerful that Jews read it annually to remember the tragedy of the loss of their city and place of worship.

The writer set up the poems as acrostics in which each chapter except 3 is twenty-two verses long, a verse for every letter of the Hebrew alphabet. In chapter 3 there are sixty-six verses with every third verse starting a new letter. So the author has attempted the tough task of  combining emotional events with a tight structure.

EZEKIEL

A contemporary of Jeremiah and Daniel, the prophet Ezekiel ministered to the Jewish people in Babylon, where he had been taken along with other captives about 590 B.C. Like Isaiah and Jeremiah, his book has oracles against Israel and other nations as well as consolation for the Jews regarding their future. Again, much like other prophets, Ezekiel became a living symbol of God’s message by carrying out strange actions. Take a look at chapter 4 to see some of the things God told him to do as a warning to his people.

Several things make Ezekiel unique. He stressed God’s sovereignty so effectively through his descriptive visions that he does give us a glimpse of the spiritual realm. His strange, grotesque, puzzling images go beyond other prophets; in medieval times Jews under the age of 30 were not allowed to read the book for fear of unsettling them. Ezekiel is a mystic whose work connects with Revelation in the New Testament—both are considered apocalyptic works.