Prophets, Priests and Politics

The prophets of the Old Testament were speaking, in the first instance, to the people of their own time. This means that we need to locate the prophets in the history of their own time, in order to understand them in the first instance.I propose to survey Israel’s history mainly in terms of the work and role of the prophets, from Moses to Malachi. Of course, they were interacting with the temple priesthood and with the disciples of Machiavelli, who cannot be left out of the story. God himself is in the background of this history, pursuing his purposes through these events and making his will known, which brings us back to the prophets.I’ve been a student of history since I was nine years old, a simple transition from an interest in maps. My mind itches, instinctively, to arrange things in chronological order. In fact, I was trying to synchronise the kings and prophets, for my own interest, while I was still at school. However, this will not be an academic work. My chief source of information will be the Old Testament itself.The story is told from a Christian viewpoint, or even a Protestant viewpoint, as will be evident from time to time. Yet faith will not be over-powering the critical spirit. The charioteer will be running these two horses as a team.

Stephen Disraeli is the pen-name of a British subject, from a teaching family. He was brought up at the more “catholic” end of the Church of England but lapsed into student atheism. He was rescued from this into a more evangelical faith. The motto of his theology is now “The essence of Faith is trust”. His academic qualifications are in history (Wadham College, Oxford), divinity (London) and church history (King’s College London). For more than ten years Stephen has been writing on Bible matters on the internet (under the name Disraeli), and he is now transferring this teaching into print.