Lundbom, the significant Jeremiah scholar, adds a volume on the prophets in the tradition of Heschel, Wood, and Chisholm. Lundbom opens and closes by bringing the Hebrew prophets into resemblance with the modern prophets Martin Luther King Jr. and Billy Graham. In the core of the book, Lundbom gives attention to the office of the prophet, specific prophets, and a special look at their literature.

In a highly accessible fashion, he engages the typical discussion on prophets as foretellers and forth-tellers as well as conduits of social justice. Lundbom offers his own six “distinguishing marks” of prophets that are partially possessed by those usually deemed modern prophets (e.g., King and Graham). These marks are the divine call, the divine word, the divine vision, mighty works, the divine spirit, and prayer. Divine vision for Lundbom is distinguished from the other marks as the ability to perceive, emphasizing the visual not merely the audible. A helpful explanation fills this section with a discussion of visions, divination, and the title of “seer” in the Hebrew Bible.

About half of the book deals with the prophet's general message and then delves into twenty-five particular prophets and their messages. In the discussion of the general message, Lundbom deals with the less addressed themes of the other nations and covenant faithfulness along with the important theme of social justice. Arguably, these are quite brief and could use a bit of expansion even for an introductory work. He distills well, in an economy of words, that the prophets by-and-large assumed the covenant as broken and then used the social justice shortcomings as case-in-point indictments. Then the theme of judgment by the other nations used at God's discretion to punish Israel is woven together as a theme in many of the writing prophets. While looking at the particular messages of the prophets, both the writing and non-writing prophets are examined. Lundbom's examination is typically proportional to the amount of canonical material available with an allowable exception of special attention to Jeremiah. In these treatments he takes a strong literary approach highlighting ANE background, genre sensitivity, and rhetorical awareness.

The authenticity of a prophet comes into focus both from how the original audiences may have recognized an authentic prophet as well as from the canonical text's prescribed tests for authenticity. The original audience would have understood the authentic prophet as experiencing an inspirational event that was relayed to hearers in a prophetic act with a dynamic message for the hearers' situation that would take root in the believing community. Lundbom examines more than whether a prophet's message comes to pass as the test for authenticity. He takes a careful exegetical eye to Deut 13 and 18. He also takes an intriguing look at prophetic integrity using Jeremiah as his lens. This discussion on integrity points a finger at disparaging behavior among prophets including persecution of the upright, seeking wealth, and inappropriate conduct such as public nudity, marrying a prostitute, and lying. The prophets' actions should be evaluated by the current reader since undoubtedly the original audience would have wondered at times if the true prophets' integrity could be upheld.

Part two of the book deals with the means of communication of the prophets in prose, poetry, rhetoric, and symbolism. Discussing the poetry and prose of the prophets, Lundbom provides a history of interpretive views of these genres in the prophets. Most of this subject is modeled with Jer 7 as an example of oracle prose.

The gold mine for the student is most clearly chapter five, which explains and illustrates Hebrew rhetoric with prophetic passages in textbook fashion to help the reader get a sense of the forms. From abusio to verbal irony, Lundbom illustrates fifty rhetorical devices in command of the Hebrew prophets. Lundbom provides this more accessible version of his 1973 dissertation (also in a 1997 monograph) on rhetoric in Jeremiah, which was the first answer to the call of James Muilenberg for rhetorical work in biblical studies. Lundbom's groundbreaking work predates even seminal works such as Kennedy's important New Testament Interpretation through Rhetorical Criticism (1984).

The final chapter departs from words to take up prophetic actions. Signs and wonders include authenticating actions of the early prophets as well as sudden appearance and disappearance of prophets in the scenes of the texts. The latter prophets in Israel's history accompanied their messages with bizarre behaviors. Lundbom considers the meaning of the symbolic actions of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Ahijah the Shilonite, Amos, Elijah, and Elisha. Finally, Lundbom considers the prophet himself as a symbol: like Hosea, he symbolizes a broken marriage that is reestablished, and like Jeremiah, he symbolizes a suffering nation and a suffering God.

With mastery of the prophets' nuances of message and attention to the character of both the well-known and lesser-known prophets, Lundbom makes a helpful contribution to introductory and handbook literature of the Hebrew prophets. His attention to rhetorical devices and relation of the prophets to NT topics are distinct chords heard above the standard chorus of voices on the subject. Students should find this work accessible and meaningful in locating topics for further inquiry while all readers will want to keep handy chapter five's display of rhetoric in prophetic literature.

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