This is a glittering new translation of the portion of the Hebrew Bible known as the Book of the Twelve Prophets, or the Twelve "Minor" Prophets. In the Bible, the books of the prophets are arranged in rough order of length. The present group of writings thus appears after the so-called "major" prophets (Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel), and includes the much shorter texts of Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habbakuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, and
Malachi. At the time when all biblical books were written on scrolls, these twelve brief prophetic texts were traditionally written on a single scroll, and so came to be considered a single book.
"Minor" with respect to length only, they are from the literary point of view some of the most interesting texts in the Bible--passionate, visionary, and written with genuine literary sophistication. David Slavitt's brilliant modern translation breathes fresh life into these powerful ancient texts.