This study examines and attempts to rebut four arguments—the history of terminology, the problem of definition, the conventional nature of the colophons, and the literary character of the texts—that have been marshaled in defense of an hypothesis that biblical figures like Amos and Jeremiah were prophets neither in their own eyes nor in the eyes of their contemporaries. The rebuttal stresses the social reality of prophetic activity (as revealed by cross-cultural studies) and the literary genre of prophetic books (they are anthologies).
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