GetWiki

{{Short description|Traditional writer of the Book of Malachi}}{{About||the prophetic book|Book of Malachi |other uses|Malachi (disambiguation)}}{{More citations needed|date=July 2018}}

factoids

Malachi ({{IPAc-en|audio=En-us-Malachi.ogg|ˈ|m|æ|l|ə|k|aɪ|}}; {{Hebrew Name|{{Script/Hebrew|מַלְאָכִי}}|Malʾaḵī|Malʾāḵī|"my messenger"}}), also known as Malachias,WEB, CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Malachias,weblink 2022-12-27, www.newadvent.org, 2022-12-27,weblink live, is the name used by the author of the Book of Malachi, the last book of the Nevi'im (Prophets) section of the Tanakh. According to the 1897 Easton's Bible Dictionary, it is possible that Malachi is not a proper name; because it simply means "messenger", many assume it to be a pseudonym.Malachi {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171022193535weblink |date=2017-10-22 }} at the Easton's Bible Dictionary Jewish tradition claims that the real identity of Malachi is Ezra the scribe.WEB,weblink Ezra the Scribe by Mendel Adelman, Chabad.org, 2023-05-24, 2023-05-24,weblink live,

Identity

The editors of the 1906 Jewish Encyclopedia implied that Malachi prophesied after Haggai and Zechariah and speculated that he delivered his prophecies about 420 BC, after the second return of Nehemiah from Persia,{{bibleverse|Nehemiah|13:6|HE}}) or possibly before his return. The Talmud and the Aramaic Targum of Yonathan ben Uzziel identify Ezra as the same person as Malachi. This is the traditional view held by most Jews and some Christians, including Jerome.WEB,weblink Megillah 15a, the William Davidson Talmud (Koren - Steinsaltz), 2023-05-24, 2023-05-24,weblink live, Introduction to the Aramaic Targum of Yonathan ben Uzziel on the Prophet Malachi (Minor Prophets); Yehoshua b. Ḳarḥa (Megillah 15a) .WEB,weblink Jerome, Prologue to the Twelve Prophets, 2023-05-24, 2023-04-20,weblink live, This identification is plausible, because "Malachi" reprimands the people for the same things Ezra did, such as marrying foreign pagan women. Malachi also focuses extensively on corrupt priests; which Ezra, a priest himself who exhorted the people to follow the law, despised. According to Josephus, Ezra died and was buried "in a magnificent manner in Jerusalem."Antiquities of the Jews, book XI, chapter 5, paragraph 5 If the tradition that Ezra wrote under the name "Malachi" is correct, then Josephus meant that he was buried in the Tomb of the Prophets, the traditional resting place of Malachi. This would also explain why Ezra does not refer to a prophet named Malachi, while he did refer to other prophets such as Haggai and Zechariah. Others ascribe the book to Zerubbabel and Nehemiah; others suggest that Malachi was a separate person altogether, possibly a Levite and a member of the Great Assembly.who was prophet malachi {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230326064624weblink |date=2023-03-26 }}, Chabad

Name

Because the name Malachi does not occur elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible, some scholars doubt whether it is intended to be the personal name of the prophet. The form mal'akhi (literally "my malakh") signifies "my messenger"; it occurs in Malachi 3:1{{bibleverse|Malachi|3:1|HE}} (compare to Malachi 2:7, but this form would hardly be appropriate as a proper name without some additional syllable such as Yah, whence mal'akhiah, i.e. "messenger of Yah". In the Book of Haggai, Haggai is designated the "messenger of the {{Lord}}."{{bibleverse|Haggai|1:13|HE}} The non-canonical superscriptions prefixed to the book, in both the Septuagint and the Vulgate, warrant the supposition that Malachi's full name ended with the syllable -yah. The Septuagint translates the last clause of Malachi 1:1, "by the hand of his messenger",WEB,weblink Brenton translation, septagint, 2023-03-26, 2023-03-26,weblink live, and the Targum reads, "by the hand of my angel, whose name is called Ezra the scribe".WEB,weblink malachi-international standard bible, 2023-03-26, 2023-03-26,weblink live, G.G. Cameron suggests that the termination of the word "Malachi" is adjectival, and equivalent to the Latin angelicus, signifying "one charged with a message or mission" (a missionary).G. G. CAMERON, J. HASTINGS' Dictionary of the Bible, New. York, 1902

Date

File:Tissot Malachi.jpg|thumb|100px|Imaginative image of Malachi (watercolor c. 1896–1902 by James TissotJames TissotOpinions vary as to the prophet's exact date, but nearly all scholars agree that Malachi prophesied during the Persian period, and after the reconstruction and dedication of the Second Temple in 516 BC.{{citation needed|date=December 2021}} More specifically, Malachi probably lived and labored during the times of Ezra and Nehemiah.{{citation needed|date=October 2021}} The abuses which Malachi mentions in his writings correspond so exactly with those which Nehemiah found on his second visit to Jerusalem in 432 BC{{bibleverse|Nehemiah|13:7|HE}} that it seems reasonably certain that he prophesied concurrently with Nehemiah or shortly after.According to W. Gunther Plaut:{{blockquote|Malachi describes a priesthood that is forgetful of its duties, a Temple that is underfunded because the people have lost interest in it, and a society in which Jewish men divorce their Jewish wives to marry out of the faith.WEB,weblink Plaut, W. Gunther. "Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi: Back in the Land", My Jewish Learning, 2018-07-28, 2021-02-19,weblink live, }}

References

{{Reflist}}

• {{eastons|Malachi}}
• {{JewishEncyclopedia|url=http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?letter=M&artid=102|article=Malachi, Book of}}
• {{CathEncy

}}

• L. Vianès: Malachie. La Bible d'Alexandrie, vol. xxiii/12, Éditions du Cerf, Paris, 2011.

External links

{{EB1911 Poster|Malachi}}

• {{Commons category-inline|Malachi}}
• Prophet Malachi Orthodox icon and synaxarion

{{Prophets of the Tanakh}}{{Extra-Quranic Prophets of Islam}}{{Catholic saints}}{{Authority control}}